Just wait ...

The Republicans will put the kibosh on this*:

The number of businesses approved to accept food stamps grew by a third from 2005 to 2010, U.S. Department of Agriculture records show, as vendors from convenience and dollar discount stores to gas stations and pharmacies increasingly joined the growing entitlement program.

Now, restaurants, which typically have not participated in the program, are lobbying for a piece of the action.

...

What? People using government money to actually eat in a restaurant? That will never do. If they can afford to eat in a restaurant, they don't need food stamps. Bad enough they have TVs and cell phones.

It's the same thing with drug testing public assistance recipients and putting a time limit on benefits. Anything that makes poor folks' lives a little more bearable is completely out of bounds for the Republicans.

*Thanks to our pal Lambert for the link.

What's the point?

If you listen to the NRA, you'd think the answer to crime prevention would be for everyone to be armed. Fine. Then how come people, when in a position to maybe stop a crime, don't? If you have the time to watch him reload, you have the time to take a shot - only takes one. Ain't no point in having it if you don't use it when you need to, pussy.

So ...

The status quo will be maintained.

...

"I think putting money back in the pockets of working families is the best way to get demand rising, because that then means business is hiring, and that means the economy is growing. So I'm going to propose ways to get America back to work that both parties can agree to," [President Barack Obama] said. [my em]

...

If "both parties can agree to" it, it probably ain't worth a shit to regular folks, let alone the paper it's printed on.

Link stolen from David Atkins.

Howzat workin' out for ya, Ricky Boy?

Following up a little on Fixer's post.

Texas cut fire department funding by 75 percent this year

The majority of Texas is protected by volunteer fire departments. There are 879 volunteer fire departments in Texas and only 114 paid fire departments. Another 187 departments are a combination of volunteer and paid.

For that reason, aid from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) could be more important than ever to the state where wildfires have recently been raging.

Smooth move, Ex-Lax. YOU slash state funding for the Texas cellar-savers and WE get to pay for it with that federal gummint money you claim not to like.

A word about wildfires in the west. One time, I was driving south through Nevada from Oregon on US 95 through a series of thunderstorms. There were 33 - I counted - lightning-caused fires on either side of the road for about fifty miles. A coupla acres each and the entire firefighting effort that I saw was half a dozen blanketasses with shovels in the back of a Ford pickup.

It was sufficient. None of the fires came within ten miles of a structure. I think the Indians were just there to respond in case any of them did.

A minimal effort like that is fine out in the middle of nowhere. Not so fine where people live.

I live in the middle of a pine forest that stretches for hundreds of miles. Just here around my town, there are more fire departments than you can shake a stick at. My town has gone from a volunteer fire department (motto: "We haven't lost a foundation yet!") with a coupla paid firefighters who drove the trucks to where the volunteers would hopefully show up, to a professional paid fire department with four fire stations and all kinds of modern equipment. They put out fires and save lives and God bless 'em.

All the little towns and even some of the ski areas around here have their own fire departments. They all have mutual assistance pacts. A forest fire is no respecter of city limit signs. We have CalFire, BLM, and the Forest Service. We have access to air tankers, water-dropping helicopters, hotshot (wiki) and jail inmate hand crews from anywhere in the state or other states if we need them. Shit, I think we've called on Mexican bomberos to come help on occasion.

In short, when there's a fire, the idea is to PILE ON.

Cuts are happening and they're killing people and destroying property. The point is that every last dime for all this is from our tax money and I don't begrudge one damn penny of it. It's something we do for ourselves and one another as a society where we give a damn about others.

Oh, that's right, current Repug policy is "I got mine and fuck you", never mind if some people get terribly hurt. After all, low taxes and services are what people want, right? Right? I hope the current awful conditions in Texass bite Ricky Boy right on the ass.

I hope they're a lesson to other governors etc. as well. There's such a thing as false economy where saving money now will cost a hundred times as much later.

Headline of the Day

Rabid Dog Briefly Mistaken for Tea Party Candidate

Receives Standing Ovation at Missouri Rally

Hey ...

Much as I bust on Texas, deservedly so, I wouldn't wish this on anybody.

Wow ...

Some of god's mouthpieces are actually getting it ... you know, that Jesus never said "I got mine so fuck you":

...

Four members affiliated with the religious group Faith In Public Life held a brief press conference during FFC’s afternoon intermission to denounce the GOP’s adherence to the philosophies of anti-government, anti-religion author Ayn Rand. The leaders — Rev. Jennifer Butler, Jim Wallis, Rev. Derrick Harkins, and Father Clete Kiley — asserted that the GOP efforts to cut funding from many anti-poverty programs while balancing the budget on the backs of the poorest Americans were not in line with Christian values: [my em]

...

Color me surprised.

Great thanks to our old pal (in blog years) Skippy for the link.

Hopefully ...

The President is taking lessons:

...

[Teamsters union president James] Hoffa riled up Fox News and the right wing Monday with a Labor Day speech in Detroit in which he called Republican members of Congress "sons of bitches" and said union workers are ready to "go to war" with the tea party next year and "take out" Republicans at the ballot box.

Hoffa said he'd say the exact same words all over again.

"I would because I believe it," he said. "They've declared war on us. We didn't declare war on them, they declared war on us. We're fighting back. The question is, who started the war?"

...

If Mr. Obama would talk like this, he'd win in a landslide next year. This is what Liberals/Progressives want to hear. Obama should have been saying this the minute they tried to break the unions in Wisconsin.

The Republicans have declared war on unions and the middle class (the majority of Americans, by the way) and the President should be standing up for them, not working to pad the pockets of the rich by caving in to the Republicans at every turn.

E.J. Dionne:

Let’s get it over with and rename the holiday “Capital Day.” We may still celebrate Labor Day, but our culture has given up on honoring workers as the real creators of wealth and their honest toil — the phrase itself seems antique — as worthy of genuine respect.

...

That the language of Lincoln and John Paul is so distant from our experience today is a sign of an enormous cultural shift. In scores of different ways, we paint investors as the heroes and workers as the sideshow. We tax the fruits of labor more vigorously than we tax the gains from capital — resistance to continuing the payroll tax cut is a case in point — and we hide workers away while lavishing attention on those who make their livings by moving money around.

...

Yeah, the "job creators". Just like WMDs in Iraq. Just another excuse to loot the Treasury on behalf of the rich and the corporations while the rest of us are left sucking wind.

If Obama keeps on his current course, even if he is reelected, he won't have much of a country left to govern by the end of his second term. Being "above the fray" (if not actually beholden to big business) ain't gonna cut it anymore. The road down which we're headed affects us all, regardless of party affiliation and regardless of wealth or the lack thereof, in a very bad way. Regardless of ideology, it's time for Mr. Obama do what people like Krugman and Stiglitz and the "professional Left" (and history) have been telling him to. He's done the opposite so far and it's obvious where that's gotten him. It's time for him to do the right thing, not what his people are telling him is politically expedient (that doesn't seem to be working either).

As some of my southern friends like to say, it's a "come to Jesus" moment for the President. It's time for him to figure out who America really is, the top 2% or the rest of us who bust our ass to buy the crap that keeps them in the style in which they're accustomed. It's time for him to stop trying to curry the favor of rich white guys because they're never gonna let him in the club. [Dr. King rolls over.]

Heh ...

Pic stolen from the General.

Headline of the Day

America's Intellectual Deficit Is More Dangerous Than Its Financial One

To blithely rearrange an old saying about mary-ju-wanna, it's better to have brains in times of no money than to have money in times of no brains.

Rude Pundit Twofer

Absence of Labor Day

Today, on CNN's American Morning (where apparently only Ali Velshi got the day off), the question of the day was "Do unions help or hurt America?" The responses were surprisingly not insane, and a good many were pro-union. Of course, it was a stupid fucking question, being asked in a studio that probably contained union members, but, as with so many things these days, CNN was merely giving credence to the anti-worker rhetoric spouted by the right. Are unions good or bad for America? Well, shit, considering that corporations come up with ways to hire near-slaves whenever they can, it shouldn't even be a question.

Of course, if actual actions by unions got even a tiny fragment of the coverage that the Tea Party gets if it farts in a windstorm, you might realize that they really do represent the majority of Americans: the ones who want decent jobs and decent treatment and decent standards of living and who understand that the wealthy in the country (what we used to call "capital") are the very people who are trying to destroy unity in the working class through bullshit like the Tea Party.

[...] Maybe you did hear that organizers of the Pittsburgh Labor Day parade, with tens of thousands of participants, told anti-union politicians to go fuck themselves, that workers are not their props, and that they can't march.

But, if you did hear that last one, that's only because thuggish union members were being mean to the poor, poor politicians who want to strip away their right to exist. And we can't make the lapdogs of our corporate masters feel bad, can we? [...]

Today's Republicans vs. the United States (Part 1)

On last night's under-the-radar podcast/online radio venture, Cheater and the Rude, the Rude Pundit posited another way to think about the Republicans and their relationship with America. It's a variation on the abused partner metaphor, one that's a bit more extreme: At this point, Republicans have gotten so batshit and destructively irrational about their hatred of Obama and the Democrats that they've become like the psychotic boyfriend who grabs his girlfriend who's threatening to break up with him and puts a razor to her face, saying, "I'm gonna make you so ugly, no one will ever fuck you again. And then you'll only have me" before horribly scarring her.

What more can we make of a party that seems determined to wreck whatever it can in order to the nation to shit, calculating that frightened Americans will turn back to Republicans.

To take it further, this year has become about whether or not you give a shit about America. The battle that is occurring in our politics is so ludicrous that it begs belief. We are, in essence, arguing over whether or not there should be a United States of America. This ain't liberal hysteria. This comes from listening, reading, and watching the right, including nearly every candidate for president.

The USA they want damn sure won't be the "shining city on the hill" although there will no doubt be a few "shining gated and heavily guarded communities on the hill". Too bad the sheep who help the plutocrats pull this off won't be allowed to live in them. When (if?) they come to their senses it will be too late.

Just sayin' ...

Pic from here. Click to make bigger.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

McCourt Offered $1.2 Billion for Dodgers by Chinese Government
Would be more caring, responsible owners.

Now that's funny!

REMINDER
Totally batshit crazy is the new normal.

Airline Billing Dispute Reveals Existence of CIA Rendition Flights
Detainees still owe money for in-flight drinks, meals.

Report: Weapons Manufacturers Lost More Than 16,000 Guns in Two Years
Hopefully they fell into the right hands.

Getting a gun that that "fell off the assembly line" eliminates a lot of the middle men involved in getting one that "fell off a truck". Much more efficient.

Cheney Boasts He Urged Bush to Bomb Syria
Also Berkeley, San Francisco.

Report: Climate Change Prompting Rise in Mental Illness
Particularly among presidential hopefuls.

Combination USB Drive/Vibrator Debuts
Not recommended for business meetings.

I'm going to go look for video of that...

Just a thought ...

I hear the talking heads on the TV saying President Obama has to "go big" in his jobs speech on Thursday. When asked what he should do, they all say "he has to have a plan that Republicans will sign on to."

I'll posit there is nothing the President can propose the Republicans will sign on to. The President has to "go big" and then shove it up the Republicans' collective ass. We all know that ain't gonna happen. Hopefully, there'll be a football (soccer) match on somewhere I can watch instead.

This ...

Will be so good. Anything that can "make wingnut heads explode" is fine with me.

Quote of the Day

The title of a post at Jill's:

It's not called "Labor Day" to commemorate the work of hedge fund managers and cost-cutting CEOs

It's only a matter of time ...

[A big welcome to Crooks and Liars and Skippy's readers! Thanks, Mike and Skippy! - F.]

Before we storm the gates. Gordon posted a piece from Greenwald yesterday and his message at the end is portentous:

...

Shorter: the government hates and fears us for our freedom*.

In this age of the interwebs, fortunately, word gets out a lot faster to more people and it's only a matter of time before people wake up and start demanding their share. When people are starving and unemployed (especially the youth), and they see the rich living it up, they're gonna want their piece of the pie:

...

So as average wages fall, and nearly 14 million people remain unemployed, America’s economic recovery has almost entirely benefited corporations. This development adds another chapter to the decline of the middle class, whose incomes are shrinking and wages are stagnating. Last year, top executives’ salaries increased 27 percent, while workers’ salaries increased only 2 percent. At the moment, income inequality in America is the worst it’s been since the 1920s, as the richest 1 percent make nearly 25 percent of the country’s income.

When they see the political class, of either party, is no longer on their side, when they hear how much the rich and corporations rake in while they can't feed their kids, when they are told what meager help they might expect from the federal government will be cut, when they don't have any hope of getting out from under, when they're told the rich shouldn't have to pay taxes and all the burden is upon the poor and middle class, when unemployment of the nation's youth reaches 30 - 40%; that will be the day when the corporatocracy will get its comeuppance.

While those in Washington look at the numbers and percentages, I'll ask you to picture 14 million desperate people in a large group, more by the time it gets really bad. Do these arrogant assholes think their private security (and their cronies in local police departments) can protect them from the will of the masses? There will be a "let them eat cake" moment (we've traveled too far down the Road of Impunity for it not to happen). Now it's just a matter of when it happens and what the American people will do at the time.

Obama had the power to stave off that moment, had he used his momentum and voter popularity just after his election to do the right thing (he could have enacted a "shit sandwich Friday" and everybody would have gladly eaten it once a week). Instead he made it worse, either by being bought, cowed, or just inept. That door has since closed.

Unless something radically changes in the next 4 years of Obama's term (if he actually gets himself reelected), we will be irrevocably set on the path to a probably violent class war. It will be then that Americans will see change. The only questions will be the form it will take and how many will survive it. Look to the East; Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Syria, just a portent of what will happen here. People are people, all over the world, and when people get desperate, they will do whatever it takes. I hope our elected officials keep that in mind over the next few years.

Update:

D-cap sees things that way too:

...

This President is a nothing more than Richard Lugar or Chuck Hagel or John Warner - a somewhat moderate 80's Republican. He is no progressive and I don't think he is much of Democrat. In fact I don't think of much of Obama at all anymore.

... I guess we really do need a Republican to lead us completely off the cliff to finally wake the fuck up. Apparently reason, logic and presenting the facts don't work in a world competing with Justin Bieber's car accident or J-Lo's divorce.

...

*The government fears us. Period.

I can't understand ...

Why none of them are in jail, but then, we live in a rich man's world and that's as far removed from reality as anything can be:

...

You know how this works, don't you? The banksters involved pay the ratings agencies to rate the bonds. The rating agencies get paid according to the rating that they give to the bonds. So they get higher fees for rating mortgage-backed tripe AAA than they would if they rated them AA (or C).

But nations pay no ratings fees to S&P, so they don't have any qualms about how they rate nations.

...

You know what the problem is? We have too many people not producing anything; too many "middlemen". Too many people are making money in this country by doing nothing else than moving a piece of paper from one place to another.

The decade's biggest scam

Glenn Greenwald nails it:

First, this wastefulness is seen as inefficient only if one falsely assumes that its real objective is to combat Terrorist threats. That is not the purpose of what the U.S. Government does. As Daniel Weeks explains today, the Congress -- contrary to popular opinion -- is not "broken"; it is working perfectly for its actual owners. Or, as he puts it, "Washington isn't broken -- it’s fixed":

Our problem today is not a broken government but a beholden one: government is more beholden to special-interest shareholders who fund campaigns than it is to ordinary voters. Like any sound investor, the funders seek nothing more and nothing less than a handsome return -- deficits be darned -- in the form of tax breaks, subsidies and government contracts.

The LA Times, and most people who denounce these spending "inefficiencies," have the causation backwards: fighting Terrorism isn't the goal that security spending is supposed to fulfill; the security spending (and power vested by surveillance) is the goal itself, and Terrorism is the pretext for it. For that reason, whether the spending efficiently addresses a Terrorism threat is totally irrelevant.

Second, while the Security State has little to do with addressing ostensible Terrorist threats, it has much to do with targeting perceived domestic and political threats, especially threats brought about by social unrest from austerity and the growing wealth gap. This Alternet article by Sarah Jafee, entitled "How the Surveillance State Protects the Interests Of the Ultra-Rich," compiles much evidence -- including what I offered two weeks ago -- demonstrating that the prime aim of the growing Surveillance State is to impose domestic order, preserve prevailing economic prerogatives and stifle dissent and anticipated unrest.

Read the rest. Shorter: the government hates and fears us for our freedom.

Quote of the Day

John Cole via Jill:

...

We seriously have the dumbest politics in the world, the stupidity of which is surpassed only by the mediocrity of our journalism.