The 1 Percent’s Solution

Paul Krugman on austerity.

Thus, the average American is somewhat worried about budget deficits, which is no surprise given the constant barrage of deficit scare stories in the news media, but the wealthy, by a large majority, regard deficits as the most important problem we face. And how should the budget deficit be brought down? The wealthy favor cutting federal spending on health care and Social Security — that is, “entitlements” — while the public at large actually wants to see spending on those programs rise.

You get the idea: The austerity agenda looks a lot like a simple expression of upper-class preferences, wrapped in a facade of academic rigor. What the top 1 percent wants becomes what economic science says we must do.

Does a continuing depression actually serve the interests of the wealthy? That’s doubtful, since a booming economy is generally good for almost everyone. What is true, however, is that the years since we turned to austerity have been dismal for workers but not at all bad for the wealthy, who have benefited from surging profits and stock prices even as long-term unemployment festers. The 1 percent may not actually want a weak economy, but they’re doing well enough to indulge their prejudices.

And this makes one wonder how much difference the intellectual collapse of the austerian position will actually make. To the extent that we have policy of the 1 percent, by the 1 percent, for the 1 percent, won’t we just see new justifications for the same old policies?

Yep. What the 1% wants, the 1% gets. So far. This may change after we eat them and turn them into liberal shit. Heh.

Update:

Business Insider

The Economic Argument Is Over — Paul Krugman Has Won

You can go read the details, but was there ever any doubt? :-)

I'm down wid da ol' dude!

Thanks to oldfartrants.

Disasterpiece Theater

Watch this! More at The Daily Show.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Indecision Political Humor,The Daily Show on Facebook

A More Realistic Bush Museum

An absolute "must read" from The Rude Pundit!

There's so many rooms that it would be hard to see them all in one visit. The "Gitmo Yourself" experience lets you put on an orange jumpsuit and get waterboarded, feared up, and forced into stress positions, all while assuring you that you're not being tortured because America doesn't torture. There's Halliburton Hall, devoted to all the money given to contractors and subcontractors for nearly every support aspect of the wars. There's the Wall Street Rules room, which is empty, but there's a check at the end. There's the artifacts room: the flight suit from the Mission Accomplished aircraft carrier landing; the plastic turkey Bush served to troops in Iraq; the dog pillow Tony Blair slept on at the foot of Bush's bed; and the funding promised but never delivered on No Child Left Behind. This is not to mention the interactive exhibits, like Can You Tell When Ari Fleischer Is Lying? (hint: the answer is "Always"), Is That a War Crime? (hint: the answer is always "No"), How Would You Punish Joseph Wilson?, and Would You Call the Air Around Ground Zero Safe? (Christine Todd Whitman gives a thumbs up). Of course, there's a bunch of t-ball pictures. And a piece of the fallen Twin Towers because Never Forget.

- The final room is a simple space. Rows of chairs are aligned in front of a screen. In the center of the seat is a dildo molded, in detail, on Karl Rove's penis. You are asked to position yourself so that the dildo enters your anus, the better to feel like an American during the early years of the new millennium. On the screen, a series of people tell you how misunderstood George W. Bush is: Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, Jack Abramoff, Scooter Libby, Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, and more.

Next to your chair is a small whip. That is for people who voted for Bush at least once. They are encouraged to beat themselves, leaving scars and welts on their back, so that they walk out bleeding, asses reamed, in order to remember all the harm they did to the rest of us.

Almost as an aside, in yesterday's Grand Opening of the Bush Whitewashatorium Iraq was never mentioned once. Nor was the "Mission Accomplished" banner on exhibit. The Chimp'll never admit it, of course, but he knows.

API to saddle up!

The American Patriot Institute is pissed off at this and I don't blame us:

Military.com

VA Silent on Exec Bonuses for Manipulated Data

A year after testifying that some executives received bonuses by manipulating appointment data for veterans needing mental health care, a former Department of Veterans Affairs hospital administrator said officials have avoided the issue “like the plague.”

“They avoid it with a 10-foot pole,” Nicholas Tolentino told Military.com in a telephone interview Monday.

They'll be damn lucky if the pole we shove up their ass is only 10 feet!

Go read the rest of the article and you will know why us creaky old Vets are pissed off enough to groan our way to our feet and head for the sound of the guns. Our newer Vets, from Iraq in particular, were suckered into giving it up for a neocon lie and we owe them big time. All Vets are affected by this as well.

Stay tuned.

More Bush Lie-Bury

These would be funnier if he hadn't sent 4400 of our men and women to die in vain for a neocon lie.

Click to embiggen

Thanks to YubaNet.

Headline of the Day

An op-ed by our Lt. Governor:

Time for California to Decriminalize, Tax & Regulate Marijuana

And moybe our next Guv if he keeps talking like that!

Battleaxe Bush Speaks

Barbara Bush Thinks There’ve Been Enough Bushes In The White House, No Room For Jeb

One too many, actually.

Update:

From Mrs. Betty Bowers, America's Best Christian in a response to this article in Time:

Barbara Bush, a perennial role model for the husky drag queen set, just stuck a pin in poor Jeb's genetically bequeathed ambitions. Gore Vidal once recounted Richard Nixon begrudgingly admiring her “because she really knows how to hate.” Praise indeed from Mr. Nixon. But it's nice to hear Bar finally say something most Americans can agree upon, even if she is two Bushes too late.

Being of a generous frame of mind, I'd say ONE Bush too late. GHW wasn't the worst President in American history, but Dim Son WAS. A Bush too far.

Bush Lie Bury Opens

The Rude Pundit

Yessirree, the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Whitewashatorium of Wonders is opening in all its Panglossian glory, forcing us to look backward and think, "Aw, schucks, that dumb shitkicker wannabe was just doing the best his little ol' brain could do. He didn't mean to set the nation on the path to its imminent doom." Truly, it's like creating a library to a gorilla that wasn't quite as gentle or articulate as Koko. Well, look, here's a pile of kitten corpses it petted to death, but, goddamn, wasn't it adorable to watch them together briefly. And at least it could use sign language to say, "Me throw poop now." You might have to duck, but don't say you weren't warned.
...

The whole thing seems designed not just to cover-up for every horrible thing done to the United States under Bush. Actually, it reflects the essential emptiness of the man who led the country as an incurious figurehead, a meat puppet with Dick Cheney's and Karl Rove's hands up his ass at different times. In recent interviews, you can hear the reporters trying to get Bush to have a scintilla of self-awareness, a moment when he says he regrets something or made a wrong decision. He doesn't, though, because he can't. He can't because he was never secure in anything but his rightness, no matter how much of a failure he was.

Now, though, George W. Bush wants to be forgotten. He has disappeared because he is incapable of doing anything. He bumblefucked his way into history. His library merely represents his non-entity status. And it costs 16 bucks to see it.

No thanks. I can get something useful for 16 bucks that WON'T make me sick. Like a Mexican dinner

Quote of the Day

From The Mudflats:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is a phenomenally stupid man. Someone like this shouldn't be entrusted with monitoring a summer camp foosball table, let alone with governing a state of 26 million people.

Can't argue with that.

World’s. Dumbest. Enemies.

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford on the Boston Bombchuckers and our idiot wingnuts' reaction to them.

Chechnya! Of course! Chechnya wants America dead because they hate our freedoms, our shopping malls and our shiny perfect Jesus. Right? Because we have invaded their homeland and destroyed their culture with Burger King and Walmart and…um, wait, what? We haven’t? They don’t? The Boston bombers, while originally ethnic Chechens, are largely “self-radicalized?” And the younger one, Dzhokhar, is an American citizen? And they acted alone? And they’re basically dumb as logs? Oh.

It’s all so… confusing. So frustrating. How are we supposed to handle this? Who are we supposed to hate upon? The idiot Tsarnaev brothers don’t fit our beloved terrorist stereotypes, do not play the role we wanted them to play. Damn them!
...

This shall not do. No wonder he haters and the finger-pointers feel so gypped. No wonder hothead GOP numbskulls like Lindsay Graham and John McCain wanted Dzhokhar tried as an “enemy combatant,” mostly because they like saying the words “enemy combatant” on Fox News with a sneer and a total disregard for American law. If there’s one thing the GOP loves, it’s finding someone to despise and combat. Besides Obama, of course.

What a strange moment in American history. No clearly defined enemy, Islamophobia at a (relatively) low ebb, gay marriage foregone and obvious, the Red Scare of yore now a pale footnote, even our normal modalities of racism and sexism lacking the same bitter tang now that Obama won a second term and all the nasty old white guys who used to control everything have become less relevant and/or are dying off en masse.

Truly, to much of America – but especially the pundits of the right – the Tsarnaev brothers and their insipid act of violence have been a major disappointment. Can’t blame Obama, can’t blame Islam, can’t blame the lefties or vegans or immigrants, can’t hate upon Mexico or Europe or Iran – all our normal machinery of bias and intolerance left with nothing to gnaw upon. What’s a enemy-loving populace to do?
...

This much we do know: the enemy is definitely not well-funded, expertly trained clans of wild-eyed terrorists from foreign lands. The truth is, most terrorist attacks since 9/11 have been of the lone wolf variety, which, given the general idiocy, ignorance and ineptitude of most who attempt these plots, is a direct insult to wolves.

True dat. The Boston bombers bear more relation to the Columbine shooters than they do to al Qaeda. Read the rest.

Serves ya right, sucker

Click to embiggen

Thanks to YubaNet.

Quote of the Day

From an article about the British defeat and retreat from Afghanistan:

“These are the last days of the Americans,” said the other elder. “Next it will be China."

Heh. Always thinking ahead, them Afghans. To the 19th century.

Original Intent

Thanks to PreventGunViolence.

The Conservative Paranoid Mind

Michael Tomasky

There’s a common thread linking conservatives’ positions on gun control, immigration, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev: the constant need to stoke fear.

Yep. There's an article, but that's the gist of it. Fearmongerers suck.

Headline of the Day

What to Do with G.W. Bush?

The short answer is leave me alone with him for two minutes. Problem solved.

"Our repellent ride of self-inflicted wounds will just continue"

El Rude-o, back from Germany, on the Boston bombing and its aftermath.

You're gonna hear conspiracy heaped upon conspiracy, from the evil Moooslim connection to the wacky Chechen/Russian/Kyrgyz cover-ups of something or other to, inevitably, the Lizard People, but here's what we all know happened: A couple of brothers, one with a wife and kid, who were ball cap-wearing bros watched too much jihadi shit on the internet, perhaps met a person or two in a visit to the homeland, and decided to act stupidly, which is what stupid young men do. And, oh, hey, an older brother got his younger brother to go along with a plan because it's cool to blow shit up. We won't find out anything useful from Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. It was an isolated incident, no different than Newtown, Columbine, or any other crime where assholes got a shit-ton of guns and bullets, something that makes them awfully American at this point. Hell, if their last name had been Smith, we wouldn't even be talking about it as anything more than one more tragedy in our carousel of carnage, another time we won't learn or do a goddamn thing.
...

It's goddamn embarrassing to see the Senate's prettiest debutante, Lindsey Graham, more or less standing at Tsarnaev's bedside, cock out, ready to fuck the bullet hole in the guy's neck while Kelly Ayotte and John McCain fondle each other and watch as Peter King jacks off in the corner, all sweaty in anticipation of a declaration that Tsarnaev's an "enemy combatant" so he can be Gitmo'd or some such shit.

It's depressing beyond words to hear people say, as Graham did, that "The homeland is the battlefield" and call for surveillance, more surveillance, on the ground, in the sky, surveillance of every space, every orifice, give up more freedom, always be a suspect, always make sure the authorities are watching. Who gives a fat monkey fuck about your Fifth Amendment rights when there might be a single terrorist out there?
...

Now, we're gonna have another freak-out over Who Knew What When, with the FBI's questioning of Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011 becoming the new Benghazi.

Our repellent ride of self-inflicted wounds will just continue.

Of course it will. Sigh.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Senate Blocks Background Checks for Gun Buyers
Keeps them for voters.

I wonder if we'll have to show a gun to vote?

Foreign Students Balk at Coming To U.S., Fearing Country Full of Lunatics Armed With Automatic Weapons
Fortunately, country also full of lunatics armed with automatic weapons to protect us.

The danger is not so much getting caught in the crossfire because by and large they're the same lunatics, but rather getting caught at the intersection of two hot air fronts.

Average Age of Fox News Viewers: 65
Average IQ of Fox News viewers: 65.

On the bright side, that's an energy-saving room temperature.

Study Finds Most-Frequent Texters Shallow, Money-Obsessed, Bigoted
Least-frequent texters, deep, spiritual, tolerant.

Never texted nor will I. Patting self on back for being deep, spiritual, tolerant. 2 out of 3 ain't bad!

By 2020, Tourists From China Will Outnumber All Others
Wealthy Chinese will come here to buy luxury goods made by poor Chinese.

Exhaustive Nonpartisan Report: U.S. Use of Torture After 9/11 Ordered by Those at Top
So long ago no one remembers who was in charge at the time.

I sure as hell do.

How to blow up a town and get away with it in the most dangerous state to work in

Reuters

The fertilizer plant that exploded on Wednesday, obliterating part of a small Texas town and killing at least 14 people, had last year been storing 1,350 times the amount of ammonium nitrate that would normally trigger safety oversight by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
...

Fertilizer plants and depots must report to the DHS when they hold 400 lb (180 kg) or more of the substance. Filings this year with the Texas Department of State Health Services, which weren't shared with DHS, show the plant had 270 tons of it on hand last year.
...

Failure to report significant volumes of hazardous chemicals at a site can lead the DHS to fine or shut down fertilizer operations, a person familiar with the agency's monitoring regime said.

I do believe "fertilizer operations" have been effectively self "shut down".

"That's just a god awful amount of ammonium nitrate," said Bryan Haywood, the owner of a hazardous chemical consulting firm in Milford, Ohio.

Under the heading of grim irony, Governor Goodhair (R-TX) had not long ago returned from visits to other states to steal businesses from them, promising lower taxes and less regulation.

Kos

In a press conference today about his trip to lure California businesses to Texas, Gov. Rick Perry boasted of statistics demonstrating Texas’ superior job climate, but bristled when a California reporter brought up a less flattering ranking: Texas’ top position among all states for worker deaths and injuries.

After Perry touted Texas’ low tax and low regulatory burden on businesses, an Orange County Register reporter mentioned Texas’ poor record of worker safety, asking, “Can you speak to safety in your lower-regulation state?”

“I don’t think it has anything to do with the regulation side,” Perry said. “You all in California are not very knowledgeable about the energy industry” which, he said, “is a fairly dangerous workplace’ compared to other industries. He argued that worker injuries and deaths would not be reduced by better safety regulations: “It’s not because of lack of regulations.”

Yes it is because of lack of regulations Governor!

And for Governor Perry's information California has a large and long standing oil industry.

Yes we do. I think Goodhair doesn't know jack shit about much of anything.

He is also trying to get gun manufacturers to leave Connecticut in the wake of their new firearms regulations.

He does know to ask for federal disaster assistance even though he tried to get it denied to the victims of Hurricane Sandy. A hypocritical asshole who done got karma-bit on the ass.

Note to Perry: Just secede already. Take the rest of the Confederate "takers" with you so can have an East Coast, and YOU prop 'em up. We're tired of it.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Mark Twain is still hot stuff Out West Here and I live right between his old stomping grounds of Gold Country and The Comstock. I saw a 2-CD album of his life and times in word and song at WalMart for ten bucks and grabbed it. This is Emmylou's only song on the album and I never heard it before. "When Halley Came To Jackson" is on YouTube by Mary Chapin Carpenter, who wrote it, but not by Emmylou so I whupped it onto some footage and here it is.

Scene is CA SR 152 from Casa de Fruta eastbound toward Pacheco Pass. Shot with Active-i glasses/vidcam

95 more videos at my YouTube channel! {/shameless whoring}

The Vermin Surface

Just one more reason I hate right-wingers. It's a long list...

LATimes

Nearly as soon as I heard about the bombings on Monday, I was certain that somewhere in the nutty right-wing blogosphere someone was already concocting a storyline that would blame the crime on President Obama and the federal government. Alex Jones came through with impressive rapidity.
...

Jones is asking Americans to believe that their own government is responsible for all of the worst terrorist attacks in the country’s history and that the motivation for the latest one is a desire to grope sports fans. All of this is, of course, total ping-pong-balls-for-brains nonsense. It would be laughable if it were not for the fact that this conspiracy kook claims 2 million radio listeners and more online followers than Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh combined.

Jones is a purveyor of the neo-Confederate brand of “patriotism” that has gained currency on the far starboard side of American politics. I do not think he should shut up or be shut down; he has the same 1st Amendment rights as I do. But he deserves to be exposed for what he is: a delusional, self-promoting bully who is slandering the very people who are right now doing the truly patriotic work of bringing the Boston bombers to justice.

Some people will say anything for money and fame, never mind the damage they do. I hope he chokes on it.

Hypocritical Asshole Headline of the Day

Cruz called Sandy aid ‘pork’ but wants ‘all available resources’ after Texas blast

Figures.

A Senate in the Gun Lobby’s Grip

Gabby Giffords in the NYTimes. Not bad for a gal who almost had her head blown off.

I watch TV and read the papers like everyone else. We know what we’re going to hear: vague platitudes like “tough vote” and “complicated issue.” I was elected six times to represent southern Arizona, in the State Legislature and then in Congress. I know what a complicated issue is; I know what it feels like to take a tough vote. This was neither. These senators made their decision based on political fear and on cold calculations about the money of special interests like the National Rifle Association, which in the last election cycle spent around $25 million on contributions, lobbying and outside spending.
...

They looked at these most benign and practical of solutions, offered by moderates from each party, and then they looked over their shoulder at the powerful, shadowy gun lobby — and brought shame on themselves and our government itself by choosing to do nothing.

They will try to hide their decision behind grand talk, behind willfully false accounts of what the bill might have done — trust me, I know how politicians talk when they want to distract you — but their decision was based on a misplaced sense of self-interest. I say misplaced, because to preserve their dignity and their legacy, they should have heeded the voices of their constituents. They should have honored the legacy of the thousands of victims of gun violence and their families, who have begged for action, not because it would bring their loved ones back, but so that others might be spared their agony.
...

Mark my words: if we cannot make our communities safer with the Congress we have now, we will use every means available to make sure we have a different Congress, one that puts communities’ interests ahead of the gun lobby’s. To do nothing while others are in danger is not the American way.

Fuckin' A, lady.

‘Oopsie Daisy Homophobe’

Funny. Via Raw Story.

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Indecision Political Humor,Video Archive

11,000,000 New Dems!

Gee, the right-wingers are saying this like it's a BAD thing! :-)

I knew that...

Study: Belief in an angry God associated with variety of mental illnesses

People who believe in an angry, punishing God are much more likely to suffer from a variety of mental illnesses, a scientific study published in the April edition of Journal of Religion & Health finds.
...

In keeping with prior studies on this very subject, she queried the data on three types of believers: those who see God as angry, those who see God as neutral and those who see God as loving. Controlling specifically to weed out the non-believers, Silton found that a belief in a forgiving, loving God is associated with positive psychological traits, “almost protecting against psychopathology,” she told Raw Story.

No specific data on those whackos who believe in God in the first place. Probably have to define "God" to do that. Lotsa luck. Heh.

My personal definition of God is simply the wonder of the universe. My church is everywhere.

Calling Out The Scumbags

He's right again.

Thanks to oldfartrants.

Exploding your emotional bandwidth

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford on the Boston bombing.

Besides, despite the horrific images, there was plenty to be heartened by. Did you notice? While the bombings were likely accomplished by a single person or small number of people, the wild outpouring of love and support, the hundreds if not thousands of first responders, police, fireman, medical personnel, various citizens who rushed to help, who donated blood, not to mention the millions who poured out love and support via messages and blogs, kind words and non-partisan stories? That was sort of staggering. That was sort of a wonder. As debilitating and depressing as the bombings were, the reaction was just the opposite, and far larger.

This is the most essential reminder of all, is it not? A handful of violent sociopaths will never match, much less defeat, the support and care of tens of millions. Those who wish harm and damage upon humanity will never outnumber those who enable, empower and heal. The odds are in our favor. They always are. This is why we are still alive. Maybe the only reason.

It’s easy to pluck out the imbeciles and opportunists, the conspiracy nuts, ones who light up the chat rooms with anti-Islamic hate, who instantly politicize the bombings, who cannot wait to find an enemy or leverage the tragedy to hammer some petty political point. Is the Boston bomber some local, small-time sociopath who used the Internet to make explosives? Was it a terrorist splinter group? Was it a Saudi? Some Tea Party anti-abortionist? A pro-NRA redneck? Militant vegan? Who can we blame?

What an odd, charged, fascinating moment, this space of not knowing.
...

Make no mistake, we will almost certainly find out who did it. Then the frantic political blogs and talking heads will finally get to embark upon some heated, semi-intellectual conversation about insanity, or domestic terrorism, or racism, or some new form of the same old demons we haven’t considered yet.

Will it help? Will we learn anything new? Maybe. Doubtful. Maybe we’ll just re-learn the old chestnut that America must have its demons. We must have our enemies. If we can’t find any, we invent them. It’s what we do.

More.

The Teabaggers Can Go Fuck Themselves

Tea Party Officially Blames Obama For Boston Marathon Bombing

In the hours after yesterday’s Boston Marathon attack, the right wing was quick to blame Muslim extremists despite the lack of a single indication of the identity of those involved. Similarly there were those on the left, like me, who were just as quick to point out that a bombing on Tax Day/Patriot’s Day at a marathon dedicated to the families of the Newtown Massacre smacked of a right wing Timothy McVeigh style “protest” (aka right wing terrorism). Time will tell which of us is correct but rather than wait for the facts to surface, the Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips has decided that President Obama is clearly to blame in an email sent out on Tuesday.

The second purpose of all this anti-Muslim screeching is even more disgusting: That this attack occurred on Tax Day as well as Patriot’s Day (the third Monday in April) at an event in which several of the Newtown families were running is a giant red arrow pointing, not at Muslims, but at right wing extremists steeped in Tea Party rhetoric of revolution, Second Amendment solutions and “watering the tree of liberty with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” They know this. They also know that if this turns out to be the case, the nation’s eyes will look to them just like they did after the Oklahoma City Bombing. Back then, the silent guilt they carried was enough for them to tone down the proto-Tea Party insanity that is fully realized today. As a preemptive move, they are loudly blaming Obama and Muslims because if (when) the other shoe drops and the country finds out that, yes, Fox News and Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh and the entire conservative entertainment complex that oozes violence and eliminationist rhetoric had a hand in egging on the bomber(s), they will already have millions of conservatives ready to defend them and even refute that it wasn’t a Muslim. Keep in mind, this is the political movement that still has a large percentage of people that believe Obama is a secret Muslim, Iraq was behind 9/11 and that we found the WMDs. A year from now, they will still be absolutely convinced that Muslims attacked Boston and Obama “let it happen.”

The right wing media knows its audience and they know how tight a grip they have on how that audience (mis) perceives reality. Expect to see a lot more of the kind of self-serving trash that the Tea Party Nation is selling to its easily manipulated audience in the next couple of days and weeks. They have to get in there and shape public opinion before reality rears its ugly head.

The story lies in between those quotes. Go read it even though you know just about what it says. The Teabagger pukes make me sick.

Heh

I think the graphic is one of the times Fry didn't stay away from the brown acid. Or maybe it was bathtub soju. Heh. Good point, though.

A tip o' the Brain to God of the week.

City Lights

From a photo gallery at the LATimes. 10 more. Way cool. I live in the dark spot west by southwest of the dot signifying Reno NV. I can also see why there's so much trouble back east. Heh.

Click to embigdazzle!

Prejudices

When I heard about the Boston Marathon bombing, my first thought after it was determined not to be a natural gas explosion, was that it was home-grown right-wing terrorists. Local Patriot's Day, Income Tax day, etc. To me, it fits.

Other people have their prejudices too. One of the first reactions I heard was "Burn all the mosques! It's Obama's fault!"

I'm ashamed to have to call those assholes Americans.

Who do you think is closer?

Another Empire To The Graveyard

Remnants of an Army by Lady Elizabeth Butler.

Depicts Dr. William Brydon, an assistant surgeon in the Bengal Army arriving at the gates of Jellabad on his exhausted and dying horse. He was thought to be the sole survivor of some 16,000 strong army and followers from Kabul, which was forced to retreat the 90 miles over snow covered passes to Jellabad during the first Aghan war. A few others eventually struggled through to the fort.

Click to embiggen

Michael Korda on our ill-fated Clusterfuckistan adventure and defeat.

Nations, like people, seldom learn from their own experience, still less from the experience of others. It is a huge tribute to the tact of the distinguished British historian William Dalrymple that it is not until page 435 of his dramatic, richly peopled, and spell-binding history of Shah Shuja and the first British battle for Afghanistan, when he at last draws the inevitable parallel between the British attempt to subdue and control Afghanistan in the mid-19th-century and America’s own disastrous war there over the past decade. [...]
...

Perhaps the most famous military painting in the history of British art is Lady Elizabeth Butler’s The Last Remnant (Wrong title - G), an immense Victorian tear-jerker of a picture that depicts the approach of the alleged last survivor of the British army sent to Kabul, Dr. Brydon, to the gates of Jalalabad, slumped on an exhausted pony and bearing the news of the British Army’s total destruction (nearly 20,000 killed). In a nation that has often sought pride as much in heroic defeats as in victories, the haunting scene of the Last Stand of the 44th Foot at Gandamak—the soldiers forming a square and defending themselves with their bayonets until every one of them was slaughtered by howling, ferocious Afghans—remains as well remembered in Britain as Custer’s Last Stand is in the United States.

One might have hoped that the virtual annihilation of a whole British army in 1842, as Britain’s imperial power waxed, would have discouraged the United States from trying to impose its will on Afghanistan, or at least persuaded the United States government and military establishment to study the past before committing us to the longest military adventure in American history, but no such luck.

More like "fat fuckin' chance".

Kipling nailed it:

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An' go to your Gawd like a soldier.
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
Go, go, go like a soldier,
So-oldier of the Queen!

The Queen(s) in this case being Cheney and Bush, neither one of whom has any idea what it's like to be a soldier. Damn their eyes.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Leaked Intel Report: North Korea Capable of Launching Nuclear Missile
Based on intercepted email Dennis Rodman sent Scottie Pippen.

Markets Higher on Increased Chinese Consumer Demand for Imported Goods
They're beginning to buy some of the stuff made in our sweatshops.

Poll: 92% Favor Universal Background Checks
NRA: that's hardly unanimous.

It's close enough for government work.

Airlines Ponder Installing Scales, Charging Passengers According to Weight
Move hailed by jockeys, deplored by sumo wrestlers.

Secessionists

In toto from Democrats Organizing For America.

"This is not my nation any more.

This is not my America!" they say.

Don't laugh- they're probably right.

Because if you believe that America in the 21st century should function under the same assumptions and with the same values as America in the 18th century...

then no, this actually isn't your America any more.

If you believe that "Freedom of religion" means that you have the right to make decisions about health care, family planning, equal rights, evolution and education for people who do not share your religion...

you're in the wrong place.

If you believe that black people vote for a black man only because of race but white people never vote for a white guy because of his race...

if you believe that a 90 year old veteran who has been voting for 50 years should be denied a ballot because he no longer has a driver's license...

then it's not your America any more.

If you believe that bullying and abuse is ok as long as you do it for Jesus, and that kids are better off in orphanages than with gay parents and that rape shouldn't be an 'excuse' for an abortion because some girls rape easy...

this is not your America.

If you believe that the working poor, pensioners and veterans in America just want 'free stuff' but the wealthy demand their personal income tax cuts for the good of the nation...

no, this is not your America.

If you think you have the right to say who other people can love...

this isn't that place.

And if you believe that it's not possible for your candidate to lose an election unless the "urban" people cheated...by voting... that an acceptable way to win is to try to stop as many people as possible from voting, that "bipartisan' means that all the wrong people are supposed to do things your way and that the "United" part of "United States of America" only applies when your party is running the show...

then you don't understand what America is.

It's not a country where you can just 'opt out' when things don't go your way, and where a bunch of people whining that they want to leave will make us turn our backs on our principles.

It's not a place where beginning a sentence with "I'm not a racist' makes it ok to call the President a ni**er.

It's not a country where a rich, privileged old man can attack a young woman's character in vicious and almost pornographic simply because he disagrees with her politics and not suffer consequences.

It's not a place where we believe that a helping hand in the middle of a natural disaster should come with a pricetag..

It's not a nation where we think it's ok for poor people to die from treatable diseases because millionaire CEO's don't want to cut into their profits.

And thankfully, it's not a nation where bitter, obscenely wealthy men can buy themselves an election.

You folks are the same people who yell "America- love it or leave it" at us every time we try to fix what's broken around here.

Now, it seems like you don't love it enough to stick around and work together.

Well, we're not trying to run you out, but you are certainly free to go.

Of course you don't get to take your state with you- sorry, but that 'Constitution' thing you're always going on about says the states stay together.

And you don't get the flag you're always waving; that belongs to America.

But you can leave, if that's really what you want.

The border is that-a-way.

Tracy

Thank you, Tracy.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Pretty song, positively cosmic slide show, message from God.

Thanks to 1BlueStarRising

Headline of the Day

Doctors Reveal Dick Cheney Burning Through At Least 3 Hearts Each Week

And we get to pay for it. Lucky us. Grrrr...

Rand Paul and the Sweet Smell of Your Own Crap

(Thanks to Crooks and Liars for the link)

From a post at TPM about great white hope and missionary Rand Paul venturing among the natives. Last coupla ¶:

The gist of what happened yesterday was that Paul took this clown show to an audience at an historically black college where, yeah, they actually do know that Lincoln freed the slaves and that Frederick Douglass was a Republican. And they’ve even heard about the Dixiecrats. After I reading Benjy Sarlin’s account I was surprised Paul didn’t introduce himself by thanking the crowd for welcoming him to the ‘Democrat Party Plantation.’

Rand’s surprise was akin to one of those old Bugs Bunny cartoons when Bugs’ nemesis walks over a loose floorboard and the board flies up and whaps the guy right in the face. You can become so lost in your own story that you confuse your conciliation with your aggression. The GOP is so deep into its own self-justifying racial alternative reality that there’s some genuine surprise when the claptrap doesn’t survive first contact with actual black people.

Note to Randian Paul: Pull the spears out and go back to the drawing board. Heh.

Shopping Day

Over the mountains and through the woods etc. etc. See yas. I'll leave you with this lovely thought:

Quote of the Day

El Rude-o from his post about some dumbass song:

This notion that Christians or whites or straights are persecuted or under attack is utter bullshit. Is anyone taking away any rights from you? No? So you're equating "persecution" with someone saying "you're wrong." The thing is that white, straight, Christian (mostly) men are shit-scared of their power dwindling so they have to make themselves into victims. They have to shut down progress because they see it as just an attack on them.

The "culture war" in a nutshell.

Headline of the Day

Former Tenn. Lawmaker Allegedly Drove 90 MPH While Masturbating Out Window

I've been scratching my head trying to figure out how he could do that and there's only one answer - cruise control. And alcohol. Heh.

Top 40 Ding Dong!

Following up on my post on the death of Iron Drawers:

‘Ding Dong! The witch is dead’ heads to top of UK charts after death of Margaret Thatcher

“Ding Dong! The witch is dead”, as sung by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz, on Tuesday raced to the top of the Amazon download chart in Britain, a day after the death of former prime minister Margaret Thatcher.

Another version sung by jazz legend Ella Fitzgerald placed at number 4 and also topped the iTunes UK vocal chart as record-buyers passed their judgement on the legacy of Thatcher, who died of a stroke on Monday aged 87.
...

The Official Charts Company, which collates sales from all outlets, predicts that the “macabre sense of humour of British music fans” will give the 1939 record a top 40 placing in their weekly chart.

The Brain is once again proud to lead cultural trends! Heh.

Gee, ya think?

Right-wing religious nuts limit Republican Party's future

Who knew the christowhackos could do the country such a service?

Click to embiggen

From the LATimes

Headline of the Day

New brain study should probe shallow recesses of tea party minds

That'll be kinda "Brain Study 101". Not hard, won't take long, good practice for studying actual brains later on.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Guided Missile Destroyer John S. McCain Sent to Korean Peninsula to Deter Threats
If that doesn’t work, we’ll send John McCain himself.

How d'ya say, "hey you kids, get off the lawn!" in Korean?

Obama Apologizes for “Best-Looking” Remark About California AG Kamala Harris
Says he should have left it at “Va-va-va-voom!”

He's right, though. Kamala's a babe!

Researchers Find Computers Can Read, Record Our Dreams
New app records, edits dreams, uploads them directly to YouTube.

Stock up on bleach. There's gonna be a shortage...

Los Angeles First City to Synchronize All Its Traffic Signals
Now when you're stuck at a gridlocked intersection for thirty minutes, so is everyone else.

Various places in L.A. have had synchronized traffic lights for years. Steve McQueen said he could make all the lights on Ventura Boulevard at 3 AM if he was going 130mph. I have reason to believe he knew whereof he spoke.

A Majority of 52% Now Supports Marijuana Legalization
And nearly 40% say don't Bogart that joint.

My friend, pass it over to me...

Thanks to Andrey Milevskiy.

Heh.

Headline of the Day

Conservatives Are Morphing into the Party of Doomsday Preppers

“It’s not that conservative people are more fearful, it’s that fearful people are more conservative,”

Old Cold War bomb shelter joke, right after the nuclear holocaust:

Knock, knock...

"...Who's there?"

Scaredy cats suck and they're trying to take us down with them as a matter of policy.

Ding Dong!

The witch is dead!

Whatever else may be true of her, Thatcher engaged in incredibly consequential acts that affected millions of people around the world. She played a key role not only in bringing about the first Gulf War but also using her influence to publicly advocate for the 2003 attack on Iraq. She denounced Nelson Mandela and his ANC as "terrorists", something even David Cameron ultimately admitted was wrong. She was a steadfast friend to brutal tyrants such as Augusto Pinochet, Saddam Hussein and Indonesian dictator General Suharto ("One of our very best and most valuable friends"). And as my Guardian colleague Seumas Milne detailed last year, "across Britain Thatcher is still hated for the damage she inflicted – and for her political legacy of rampant inequality and greed, privatisation and social breakdown."

To demand that all of that be ignored in the face of one-sided requiems to her nobility and greatness is a bit bullying and tyrannical, not to mention warped. As David Wearing put it this morning in satirizing these speak-no-ill-of-the-deceased moralists: "People praising Thatcher's legacy should show some respect for her victims. Tasteless." [...]

How George Bush Gave Krazy Kim The Bomb

From October 10, 2006 by Greg Palast.

How did a berserker like North Korea’s Kim Jong Il get the bomb in the first place? Answer: He bought it from the Dr. Strangelove of Pakistan in 2001 — while all our President’s men ordered our intelligence agents to keep their eyes shut tight.

Why would Team Bush pull back our agents from nabbing North Korea’s bomb connection? The answer in two words: Saudi Arabia.

The agent on the line said, “There were always constraints on investigating the Saudis.” Khan is Pakistani, not Saudi, but, nevertheless, the investigation led back to Saudi Arabia. There was no way that the Dr. Strangelove of Pakistan could have found the billions to cook up his nukes within the budget of his poor nation.

We eventually discovered that agents knew the Saudis, who had secretly funded Saddam’s nuclear weapons ambitions in the eighties, apparently moved their bomb-for-Islam money from Iraq to Dr. Khan’s lab in Pakistan after Saddam invaded Kuwait in 1990.
...

The U.S. government missed discovering Dr. Khan’s radioactive fire sale because our agents were hard at work ignoring the Saudi money trail. If the agencies had not been told to “back off” the Saudis and Dr. Khan, would the U.S. have uncovered the nuclear shipments in time to stop them? We can’t possibly know, but, to paraphrase Yogi Berra, it’s amazing what you don’t see when you’re told not to look.

Thanks again, Georgie. Worst. "President". Ever.

Well, that didn't take long...

Click to embiggen

Via Truthout.

Knuckledraggers of North Retardistan

Boy, just like Christians cherry pick the Bible, conservatives read the Constitution selectively, don't they?
...

I don't know why we're spending so much money and so many lives fighting the Taliban overseas when we have our own homegrown version right here at home. We have to get rid of these superstitious, anti-science, anti-women, anti-gay, anti-progress, anti-humanity, knuckle dragging Neanderthals or our country is doomed. Remember this story in the 2014 mid term elections.

Thanks to oldfartrants.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Published on Apr 5, 2013
Live at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre, Atlanta, GA, 4/4/2013

Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell ~ Invitation To The Blues

Thanks to ra33ra33.

Break the kids in early...

...in the school-to-prison pipeline. The Prison-industrial Complex needs a compliant taxpayer-funded labor force to keep the overhead down and enhance the bottom line.

Click to embighouse

Thanks to YubaNet.

Nuke Nuke Mickey Lover

Well, this oughta piss the kid off! Heh.

Anonymous hackers take control of North Korean propaganda accounts

Click to empiggen

"Zone Of Impunity"

HuffPo:

Secret Files Expose Offshore's Global Impact

Dozens of journalists sifted through millions of leaked records and thousands of names to produce ICIJ’s investigation into offshore secrecy
...

A cache of 2.5 million files has cracked open the secrets of more than 120,000 offshore companies and trusts, exposing hidden dealings of politicians, con men and the mega-rich the world over.
...

Mobsters and Oligarchs
...

Politically connected wealth

Promises like those have been met with skepticism, given the role played by key G8 members — the U.S., the U.K. and Russia — as sources and destinations of dirty money. Despite the new efforts, offshore remains a “zone of impunity” for anyone determined to commit financial crimes, said Jack Blum, a former U.S. Senate investigator who is now a lawyer specializing in money laundering and tax fraud cases.

“Periodically, the stench gets so bad somebody has to get out there and clap the lid on the garbage can and sit on it for a while,” Blum said. “There’s been some progress, but there’s a bloody long way to go.”

NAMES, dude, we want NAMES.

Update:

Leak of Identities & Emails of Rich Hiding *$32 Trillion* Offshore

Some names, but not nearly enough.

Be careful what you wish for

Colorado gun group leader: ‘There’s a time to hunt deer’ and a ‘time to hunt Democrats’

You better stick to deer, asshole. You're going to get more than you bargained for. Not all us Dems are peacelovedope hippies who won't shoot first. I've been shot at. Have you?

"Vote Sanford, South Carolina," By The People Of Other Awful States

Mr. Bilbeau of Goblinbooks is a wicked, wicked man. Heh.

Hey. It's Florida, Jersey, and a couple of the other guys. We're calling in a favor. We need you to elect Mark Sanford and give him a wide margin. We want a breather. No more bad press for awhile. We're tired of being known as the bad parts of the country. It's your turn, okay?

Florida is sick of everyone talking about how people are eating each other's faces off and voting Rubio. Texas wants to tone down the coverage about how you can bring a gun into a delivery room. And New Jersey just wants no one to mention it in any way. You guys are as terrible as we are. It's time people appreciated that. Vote Sanford. It's the right thing to do.

If you elect Mark Sanford, it will confirm every stereotype of asinine, hypocritical social conservatives who don't even know the Bible they like to beat other people up with.
...

We all have our rednecks lopping their limbs off in powerboat accidents and going to CPAC. But you guys started the Civil War, for chrissakes. Seriously. Why the hell does no one ever call you on that? You owe us.
...

Pick up that slack, South Carolina. The ignorant, heavily-armed people of this great land are counting on you. Be the jackasses we know you can be.

Heh.

Headline and Quote of the Day

Reaping What You Sow: Are White Supremacists Preparing to Fight a new Civil War?

The US Republican Party ignores any white hate group threat since these groups are largely anti-Obama and vote Republican.

White supremacists, neo-Nazis, and racists are the scum of the earth and should be shot on sight. Possibly a less-than-liberal viewpoint, but it's mine.

Related:

All charges dropped against 2 members of white supremacy group

Some others were convicted.

The convictions so far are: Christopher Brooks, 28, sentenced to three years in prison for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon; Luke Leger, 32, and Kent McLellan, 22,both sentenced to four years of probation for pleading no contest to participating in paramilitary training.

All had been accused of training with AK-47s and other weapons to kill Jews, immigrants and minorities during a two-year undercover investigation of paramilitary activities in Holopaw, a remote area in eastern Osceola County.
...

In a similar case in 2007, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office intelligence unit duped a leader of the Aryan Nations hate group into allowing undercover deputies to form a motorcycle club known as the 1st SS Kavallerie Brigade Motorcycle Division.

I bet their annual picnic was a hoot. Heh. Oy.

I have a sneakin' hunch we're going to see a lot more of this update:

Report connects Tea Party leaders with white supremacist groups

For some reason, this does not surprise me.

Why you probably suck at sex

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford going on about ... teehee!


Go read. This one only needs one quote:

After all, when all you’re fed is junk food and Red Bull, who will teach you about duck confit and single malt? When all you have is a blunt sexual hammer, everyone just gets nailed.

Old Stoners Rule!

I love it when then the mysteries and wonders of the universe are reduced to one old stoner doing arts and crafts! And He created me in his own image!

Click to embiggen.

Thanks to the LATimes

Not much going on today so I'll just leave this so the spammers can earn their money.

The Coming GOP-Evangelical Divorce

Michael Tomasky

What are evangelical conservatives going to do? I ask the question not with any sympathy, but with a mountain of schadenfreudian glee—I am profoundly reassured about my country’s direction every time I hear Tony Perkins bemoan it. But however it’s asked, it’s a question that’s growing more and more urgent. Mike Huckabee says that if the GOP embraces same-sex marriage, “evangelicals will take a walk.” Others pooh-pooh this on the usual grounds that they’ve got nowhere else to go. But they do: back to private life. And it’s my bet that in, say, eight or 12 years’ time, that’s where a lot of evangelicals will be. Having gotten into politics to rescue America from the sinners and fornicators, I reckon a critical mass will decide by 2024 that it was fun while it lasted, but that the fight is hopeless.
...

Then what for the Christian right? They got into politics in the 1970s. Remember, Jerry Falwell himself, in a 1965 sermon called “Ministers and Marches,” denounced mixing religion and politics. But then came late-’60s tumult, Roe v. Wade, and kindred signs of the devil’s grip (preceded by the Supreme Court’s decision to take God out of the classroom). Religious conservatives got into politics to undo those things. And here we are, 50 years later, and it’s only gotten worse as far as they’re concerned. By 2024, if my forecasts are correct, things will get only worse still.

Well, how much patience can a movement have? By 2024, evangelicals will have been up to their armpits in politics for half a century. With what to show for it? A country where (I’m betting) abortion is still legal, and now Adam and Steve are saying vows. And their vehicle for their agenda, the Republican Party, will be walking away from them to a place where they smell more votes (and money).

The money boys, aka the "Repug establishment", have been working the Bible thumpers like a red-headed stepchild for their votes for forty years and not given them a damn thing they wanted. I'll be glad to see a really bitter divorce of a marriage made in hell.

Make up your own "Defense Of Marriage" jokes. Heh.

Guns for Gays

The Rude Pundit

Here's what has to happen: we gotta get gays and lesbians by the thousands...no, no, by the tens of thousands to buy guns. No, wait, even better. Someone call George Soros for some major scratch. We gotta start a program to arm Ls and Gs and Bs and Ts and even Qs with the baddest ass guns currently legal, motherfuckin' AR-15s and fuckin' .50 caliber rifles, toss in some pistols like Glocks and Magnum revolvers. And get 'em all concealed carry and whatever other licenses they need. Then, once all the gays got themselves armed, they need to start showing up with their guns, all tricked out in the most over-the-top outfits that play right into what ostensible straights fear most about the LGBT community, crazy stereotypes, like cross-dressed feather queens and tight-pants and cropped shirts on skinny boys and the bull-dykiest-lookin' lesbians that you can imagine. Send 'em out with their guns to shooting ranges, to gun shows, to pro-gun marches, every fuckin' place that NRA gun nuts and militias and white supremacists and worse show up.

A queer army, man, of locked and loaded leather studs and lipsticked femmes. And it's not just a show, motherfuckers, although what a goddamn show it'll be.

I like it! And the guns will be fabulous!

This ain't some April Fool's Day joke. It's time to go all Black Panther on their asses. We can have a fabulous group of armed drag queens show up with their AKs strapped to the back of their sequined dresses and promenade around downtown because it's their constitutional fuckin' right. We can have a troop of muscle bears and suit-wearing butches show up at Tea Party events locked and loaded, wonderin' why "freedom" doesn't have anything to do with who you love. And, just to be helpful, we'll need to have a security team of trans gun owners to guard schools, all wearing school uniforms, of course, of course.

Yeah, some of the gun-noids will be fine with it, happy that more people are armed for the coming black helicopter zombie nightmare. But you can bet there's gonna be a whole lot of 'em that start reconsidering this whole "no compromise" position on gun "rights."

Yep. It'll scare the shit outta the lily white gun nuts when The Other, Any Other, show they have rights too.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Growing Fleet of New Warships Under Command of Various Chinese Gov’t Agencies Harrassing Neighbors in Disputed Waters
After Chinese Navy, second-most powerful regional force is now Beijing's sanitation department.

GOP Balks at Official Path to Citizenship
Prefers free market solutions such as forgery, bribery, identity theft.

French Province Using Drones to Deliver Newspapers
Featuring computer-generated content and printed by automated presses, it's delivered right to the door of its humanoid readers.

The kid who used to deliver it on his bicycle is now operating the paper drone from his mom's basement and becoming obese. The progress of man.

FAA Predicts 10,000 Drones In Skies by 2020
Majority will be operated by 14-year-old boys.

Watch out for falling newspapers.

Bad News: Deaths Tied to Painkillers Rising in U.S.
Good news: you won’t feel a thing.

It's a blessing...

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Published on Nov 26, 2012
Kentucky Educational Television's "The Lonesome Pine Specials"; recorded at the Kentucky Center for the Arts; producer Richard Van Kleeck; director Clark Santee; copyright 1992, KET

Sam Bush - mandolin, fiddle
John Randal Stewart - guitar
Al Perkins - dobro, banjo, guitar
Mark Winchester - bass
Larry Atamanuik - drums

Emmylou Harris & Nash Ramblers ~ Walls of Time

Thanks to foxfireman188.

The kid needs a 'time out'

North Korea puts rockets on standby to 'mercilessly strike' the U.S.

The proper response:

Thanks to YubaNet.

Truncated transcript from today’s SCOTUS argument

This is funny. Just go read it. COURTNEY MILAN'S TUMBLR.

COOPER: Thank you, Mr. Chief Justice, and may it please the Court. Today, we—

ROBERTS: In keeping with the practices of this Court, we don’t allow anyone to complete a full sentence before interrupting them. Tell us why the people who hired you should even be allowed to bring a case.

COOPER: Because California said so.
...

BREYER: I’m going to ask you an extremely long question riddled with nonspecific nouns, and you’re going to have to guess what I mean by it.

COOPER: I’m pretty sure the answer is no? But let’s stop talking about whether I should be allowed to talk, and get on to what I’m going to be talking about. Which is: nostalgia. Nostalgia for the good old days of traditional, bedrock values. Man, back in 1971, this Court said there was no federal question as to same-sex marriage. Those were the fucking days.
...

Ted Olson’s turn.

OLSON: We all know that if you don’t decide on behalf of respondents, you’ll be heralded as bigots for generations to come, so—

ROBERTS: Before we get to the question of our bigotry, can we talk about standing?

OLSON: Yeah, they have none.
...

SCALIA: I’m going to ask you a ridiculous question: When did it become unconstitutional to discriminate against gays and lesbians?

OLSON: It would be bad form at this juncture to say, “Fuck you, Scalia, you just want to grandstand,” so I’m just going to say it’s a nonsensical question.
...

VERRILLI: Look, we’re trying to find narrow grounds for you to affirm under, if that’s what you’re looking for. Narrow grounds. Affirm. Maybe even 6-3?

JUSTICES, COLLECTIVELY: Yeah, none of us are buying it. It’s probably the only thing that the nine of us agree on.
...

SOTOMAYOR: Okay, but lemme explain how the Supreme Court works. We’re actually terrified of screwing up. That’s why we mainly take cases where there’s a circuit split—because then there’s a lot of arguments on both sides. We’re all kind of freaked out here, because no matter what we decide, someone will be out for our blood. We avoided doing the right thing on racial segregation as a court for 50 years. Why not do this here?

Go.

The Red Tape Diaries

This is as good an explanation of the VA backlog as I've seen.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Indecision Political Humor,The Daily Show on Facebook

Your evolution is totally gay

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford on the evolution of support for equal rights of marriage, whether real or politically motivated.

Out of the cheap woodwork they come, these swiftly “evolving” politicians, racing as fast as they can to get with the foregone program and support gay marriage ASAP because they see the writing on the Supreme Court wall, which is the same as the writing on the bathroom wall, which is the same as what appears in every poll and survey and sample across the civilized, intelligent, non-Republican world.

And that writing says one thing: Idiots and fools, cretins and political roadkill are ye who do not get over your uptight sexual fears and ignorance of God, pronto.

The hottest story of all right now? Aside from the “leery,” “reluctant,” dully conservative Supreme Court whimpering toward a half-baked, non-sweeping decision on Prop 8 and DOMA that no one will really like? Speed.

Which is to say, everyone’s amazed at the breathtaking, almost impossible-to-believe quickness at which the gay marriage issue has “evolved,” not just for politicos desperate for the love of younger voters who don’t give a damn for the ludicrous “culture wars” of their elders, but for the entire culture, how quickly gay marriage has skyrocketed to a majority of public support in a short handful of years, so fast that no one can really answer why.

Not looking a gift horse in the mouth aside, perhaps it's because folks simply aren't as mean as they were, or better informed that civil rights for one are civil rights for all or they mean nothing.

From the Atlantic link above:

The consensus from Court watchers Tuesday seems to be that the Court is itching for a way to avoid a sweeping ruling on same-sex marriage. I can buy that. Such a ruling would be terribly disappointing to same-sex marriage advocates (and probably not beloved by same-sex marriage foes, either). But in this seminal case, to paraphrase a former government official, you go to court with the justices you have. And the justices America has right now seem ready to wait a while longer to recognize marriage equality. Charles Cooper, the lawyer without any facts to back up his argument, may end up winning in the end.

Young Mark winds it up:

Of course, this is not news. The fact that so many politicians are jumping on a fast-moving, sexually charged bandwagon when it’s the easy and opportunistic thing to do is only evidence that they’re politicians, doing what politicians do. Which is, making everyone gag at their hollow and pseudo-spiritual “awakenings,” right on cue.
...

Speed bumps will persist, the Supreme Court may or may not have the balls to declare as valid what everyone already knows is imminent, hateful states and staunch conservatives will go to their graves waving their sad flags of religious ignorance and fear, same as it ever was.

But gay marriage is essentially done. Liberals won. Your kids have already moved on, long ago. And of course, they also de facto/by and large support gun bans, women’s rights, environmental action, et al. And would you look at that? They didn’t even have to “evolve” to do it. Go figure.

I did a lot of their "evolving" for them on a number of subjects over the years. Damn kids come to the right answer without even having to work for it. Heh.

The stupid, it burns...

Raw Story

Republican lawmakers in Tennessee sprung to action and demanded answers after confusing a mop sink recently installed in the state Capitol for a Muslim foot-washing sink.

Members of the state House and Senate contacted state Senate Clerk Russell Humphrey to ask if the floor-level sink had been installed outside the House chamber men’s restroom to accommodate Muslims’ ritual of washing their feet before prayer, according to The Associated Press (Nice photo of the sink - G).
...

Legislative Administration Director Connie Ridley assured the lawmakers in an email that “the facility administrator for the State Capitol Complex that the floor-level sink installed in the men’s restroom outside the House Chamber is for housekeeping use.”

“It is, in layman’s terms, a mop sink,” Ridley said.
...

“Tennessee, like the federal government, has a compelling state interest to protect our citizens from jihad terrorism,” Matheny said at the time.

That measure would have criminalized Muslim foot-washing rituals and dietary restrictions.

I will assume the legislation would have criminalized Jesus washing his disciples' feet as well. They could clean swabs in it while they're waiting for his return. Idiots.

Then again, maybe there aren't any real followers of Christ's teachings around there.

Republicans Struggle to Recover From TeaPartyitis

Will Durst on the GOP "autopsy".

The study was commissioned by members of the party's hierarchy and given the official title- Growth and Opportunity Project. A GOP for the GOP. Although Grossly Obvious Poppycock fits as well. Claiming party purity trumps electoral victory, there is already heavy pushback from the right. "What good is it to win earthly spoils when you lose your immortal soul and your breath still smells like embalming fluid?"

What this really calls for is an independent perspective. You want an autopsy, we'll give you an autopsy.

"Summary Report of Autopsy concerning the corpse of the 2012 Republican campaign. External Examination. Close inspection of the body, an old white billionaire, reveals a serrated knife approximately 9 inches long with the initials, Grover Norquist, engraved on the handle, protruding from under the right side between the 4th & 5th ribs.

Gunshot residue found covering the right hand in excess of ½ inch depth, which considering the holes in the right temple exhibiting upward trajectories, is consistent with what can only be described as a series of self- inflicted gunshot wounds. DNA tests reveal skin samples found under the broken nails of both hands are indicative of numerous encounters between the victim and an unknown woman or perhaps group of women.

The nose is missing which corresponds to the victim's recent recurring publicized bout of TeaPartyitis, a disease which causes the sufferer to cut off his nose to spite his face. In the rectum, what appears to be a wooden stick 6 inches long and ¾ inch in diameter, has been lodged for quite some time causing a critical backup of feces.

Pending toxicology results from the lab, internal examination reveals organs in a state consistent with the victim's age, with two conspicuous anomalies. A steady diet of bunk and bamboozle has dulled the senses creating a milky film that covers the retinas. Most exceptional was the astonishing discovery of the total absence of a heart.

It is the opinion of this office the cause of death was this myocardial void along with the aforementioned complications from various acute traumas. In other words, the victim was probably dead for a long time, just didn't know it."

If they'da had a nose they coulda smelled it.

Everyone Knows A Gay Person. Everyone Knows A Conservative

Goblinbooks. Caution: scary picture!

We're in the middle of a stunning upsurge of support for gay people and an equally stunning collapse of support for conservatives. And I believe the reasons are the same: More and more people actually know them.
...

[...] And we, the public, also know, through personal experience, that Roberts himself was recommended to the bench by a halfwit who thought Jesus Christ actually told him to launch a preemptive war on Iraq.

Yes, yes we know that.

With increased openness, you can encounter gay people or conservatives anywhere. You might meet a coworker's partner at a company lunch, say, or have a longtime friend post a picture of an aborted fetus on your Facebook page. Maybe an older relative finally has the courage to express himself - and he either tells you he's going to start dating, or he sends you a racist email about the president.

However these things happen, millions of people across the country are getting more accurate images of both groups. They understand a gay person is a well-adjusted man or woman who happens to be attracted to people of the same gender. And they understand a conservative is someone who doesn't believe in climate change, and maybe not even evolution, and enjoys hoarding weapons and highlighting the scariest parts of Atlas Shrugged.

The way forward, in both cases, is clear. Gay people should be proud of who they are. They should feel free to talk honestly, even bluntly. Conservatives should really, really do the opposite. They need to pull the plug on CPAC and encourage Michele Bachmann to build that compound she's probably sketched out. They need to fight those feelings they have about contraceptives and the gold standard. They're not right. They're not natural.

They need to find a deep, dark closet and just cram themselves in there. For good.

I long for the day when a "brave conservative" is one who dares to come out as such instead of one who wants to send other people's kids to die in unnecessary criminal wars.

Light Blogging Today, i.e. I'm Pooped

I'm taking it easy today. We did a lot of driving this past weekend. Rode a trial on Saturday and collected a new pooch on Sunday. I'll let others have at the wingers today.

Here's the pooch. She's a 3-year-old tricolor Springer Spaniel named Roxie. Beautiful and friendly and settling in. She's the one on the left.


Here's a short vid of a bit of the trials action. Mrs. G walked almost a mile to get this. Prairie City SVRA is HUGE and the other sections were too far to walk to.


I win the 1st Place trophy every time because I'm the only one who ever signs up in my class - Old Farts Who Oughta Know Better.

Click to embiggen

Interestingly, the artist who did that lovely rendition of the dusty, tired boots that came off a dusty, tired rider, a white-bearded old trials rider himself name of Gene, was right there at the post-trial trophy presentation. I shook his hand and told him how terrific I thought it was.

It was a helluva good weekend and I'll just bask in the afterglow while I wait for my first-time-out-this-season thigh muscles to quit screaming "abuse!" at me. Heh. See yas later.