Jerry Reed ~ Lord, Mr. Ford
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Saturday Emmylou Blogging
As a country music fan for fifty years, since back when it was called 'country and western' and people wouldn't ride in my car because I played it on the radio, I am sensing a subtle shift in the genre in the 21st century. So far, if this vid is any indication, it's for the better.
This goes out to all of us who 'held on' through the Bush years.
This goes out to all of us who 'held on' through the Bush years.
Solomon and Emmylou on the old George Jones / Tammy Wynette hit
Solomon Burke and Emmylou Harris ~ We're Gonna Hold On
Thanks to 1000Magicians.
Are You Tired Of Me Darling
Nanci, Emmylou and Iris on a song they recorded together for Nanci's Other Voices / Other Rooms Cd
If you want to get a Nanci Griffith album, make it Other Voices, Other Rooms or Other Voices, Too. Trust me on this one. You can get the rest of them later.
Nanci Griffith, Emmylou Harris, & a way knocked up Iris DeMent ~ Are You Tired Of Me Darling
Thanks to 1000Magicians (UK) who only joined YouTube about a week ago and is already one of my favorites to gleep stuff from.
Update:
There's a war on between some of the music companies and the folks who post the videos on YouTube without paying them. This video was yanked about 10 minutes after I posted it. Buy the album.
Update II:
Now it's back. Yeesh. Buy the album.
Friday, March 13, 2009
"Stewart creamed him."
Following up on Fixer's post, here's the ChiTrib on the Stewart/Cramer Vanilla Cage Death Match. With video.
It wasn't uncomfortable at all, Mr. Stewart. It was a pleasure to watch you hand Cramer his ass. You plenny smart fella for a comedian, and you got the balls the political gasbags oughta have. Good job.
Update:
Think Progress has more, with links.
Cramer probably couldn't hear the alarm clock from hidin' under the bed. Or else he was, understandably, too drunk to go on TV. Heh.
The crowd at Comedy Central's studio cheered because it was good populism, well aimed and well delivered. And Cramer, the usually peripatetic host of CNBC's "Mad Money," sat and took it, mostly, like a schoolboy willing to let the teacher go on in hopes of still being allowed to graduate.
Stewart creamed him, if anything almost to a fault. [...]
He called it "this weird Wall Street side bet" happening on top of, and dwarfing, the public game of whether stock A or B is headed up or down. He kept the focus, almost unrelentingly, on the Wall Street gamesmen and women who turned bad mortgages into epic disaster and, to his credit, tried to indict Cramer and his colleagues en masse, and for failing a broader civic duty.
"I hope that was as uncomfortable to watch as it was to do," Stewart said when it was over.
It wasn't uncomfortable at all, Mr. Stewart. It was a pleasure to watch you hand Cramer his ass. You plenny smart fella for a comedian, and you got the balls the political gasbags oughta have. Good job.
Update:
Think Progress has more, with links.
Last night, CNBC’s Jim Cramer had a brutal face-off with The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart. “I understand that you want to make finance entertaining, but it’s not a f*cking game,” Stewart told Cramer. Cramer also agreed to do one show with more serious, level-headed commentary.
There has been almost universal acknowledgment that Stewart humiliated Cramer. Jim Fallows called it a “slaughter,” and the Huffington Post has a gigantic headline reading, “Jon Stewart eviscerates Jim Cramer and CNBC.” [...]
As Michael Calderone notes, yesterday on Twitter, MSNBC host Joe Scarborough wrote that he would have the “exclusive Jim Cramer interview tomorrow morning to discuss tonight’s war with Jon Stewart.” But after the rough night, Scarborough wrote this morning that Cramer was a no-show:
Cramer probably couldn't hear the alarm clock from hidin' under the bed. Or else he was, understandably, too drunk to go on TV. Heh.
A conservative's snivel
Here's David Frum, whom I detest but love to see in trouble, in Newsweek esplainin' why lesser wingnuts than Rushole should be in charge of the Repugs. This is how he starts off his big whine:
Oh, we got the idea, all right. You've just explained that you've gotten everything wrong you've ever done in your life, and you want us to believe the crap in the next three pages and give you another run at wreckin' the joint? Fat fuckin' chance.
Then there's like three or four pages of failed conservative ideas kinda warmed over, and a fantasy about making them appeal to the other-than-white voters. Don't waste your time. I read it so you don't have to. Here's the last coupla paragraphs:
That's truly excellent! The money and power end of the party calling the base that they've pandered to for votes for years a CULT because they've got all the attention right now! The gypsies have taken over the palace and the royalty is astonished at the damage they're doing!
Hey, Repug royalty: Well, whadja expect? You let 'em in and they're all yours and you deserve 'em. Fuckin' live with it. The rest of us are enjoyin' the shit out of it!
That's an easy one! Profit, of course. That's been Repug policy for many years and what's gotten this country in the shape it's in now.
Here's my advice to the so-called 'moderate' Repugs, though the term is an oxymoron: Abandon the Repuglican party to the wingnut moron dittoheads and start an entirely new one with a different name. That oughta take twenty or thirty years to get where you can get a dogcatcher elected somewhere, and the rest of us will be safe as long as the money people and the wingtards are separated.
The noise will still be irritating, but we can live with it.
[...] I'm a conservative Republican, have been all my adult life. I volunteered for the Reagan campaign in 1980. I've attended every Republican convention since 1988. I was president of the Federalist Society chapter at my law school, worked on the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal and wrote speeches for President Bush—not the "Read My Lips" Bush, the "Axis of Evil" Bush. I served on the Giuliani campaign in 2008 and voted for John McCain in November. I supported the Iraq War and (although I feel kind of silly about it in retrospect) the impeachment of Bill Clinton. I could go on, but you get the idea.
Oh, we got the idea, all right. You've just explained that you've gotten everything wrong you've ever done in your life, and you want us to believe the crap in the next three pages and give you another run at wreckin' the joint? Fat fuckin' chance.
Then there's like three or four pages of failed conservative ideas kinda warmed over, and a fantasy about making them appeal to the other-than-white voters. Don't waste your time. I read it so you don't have to. Here's the last coupla paragraphs:
In the days since I stumbled into this controversy, I've received a great deal of e-mail. (Most of it on days when Levin or Hannity or Hugh Hewitt or Limbaugh himself has had something especially disobliging to say about me.) Most of these e-mails say some version of the same thing: if you don't agree with Rush, quit calling yourself a conservative and get out of the Republican Party. There's the perfect culmination of the outlook Rush Limbaugh has taught his fans and followers: we want to transform the party of Lincoln, Eisenhower and Reagan into a party of unanimous dittoheads—and we don't care how much the party has to shrink to do it. That's not the language of politics. It's the language of a cult.
That's truly excellent! The money and power end of the party calling the base that they've pandered to for votes for years a CULT because they've got all the attention right now! The gypsies have taken over the palace and the royalty is astonished at the damage they're doing!
Hey, Repug royalty: Well, whadja expect? You let 'em in and they're all yours and you deserve 'em. Fuckin' live with it. The rest of us are enjoyin' the shit out of it!
I'm a pretty conservative guy. On most issues, I doubt Limbaugh and I even disagree very much. But the issues on which we do disagree are maybe the most important to the future of the conservative movement and the Republican Party: Should conservatives be trying to provoke or persuade? To narrow our coalition or enlarge it? To enflame or govern? And finally (and above all): to profit—or to serve?
That's an easy one! Profit, of course. That's been Repug policy for many years and what's gotten this country in the shape it's in now.
Here's my advice to the so-called 'moderate' Repugs, though the term is an oxymoron: Abandon the Repuglican party to the wingnut moron dittoheads and start an entirely new one with a different name. That oughta take twenty or thirty years to get where you can get a dogcatcher elected somewhere, and the rest of us will be safe as long as the money people and the wingtards are separated.
The noise will still be irritating, but we can live with it.
They put a man on the Moon ...
You would think they'd have figured out a way to clean up the fucking mess they made around our world. If there are aliens who have come to our little backwater of the Milky Way, it's no wonder they haven't stopped to say "hi". They look at all the crap floating around and don't wanna be bothered with a world full of slobs.
Not only have we shitted up our world but we've turned the space around it into a landfill. Makes me proud to be a human ...
And just an addendum, NASA and the other space agencies track 18,000 pieces of man-made crap orbiting the planet.
As a dangerous chunk of debris bore down on the International Space Station on Thursday, the crew took refuge in the Russian Soyuz lifeboat in case they had to flee to Earth.
NASA said a 5-inch piece of a spent rocket motor came within striking distance of the $100-billion station. If it had hit the station, damage could have been catastrophic.
...
Not only have we shitted up our world but we've turned the space around it into a landfill. Makes me proud to be a human ...
And just an addendum, NASA and the other space agencies track 18,000 pieces of man-made crap orbiting the planet.
What Jon Stewart should have said ...
The 'money heads' are just as bad as the 'political heads' on TV. Athenae calls them out:
Lots more at the link. Go get 'em, darlin'.
You monumental dick. You still think this is about you, about who loves who more, about who has the most successful show. You still think that this is all just a big ironic joke, that this isn't actually real. You still think the money you talk about is what, like Monopoly money, just paper, just numbers, just stuff you can spout and not have to deal with any actual consequences. That's not Grandma's retirement or your dad's pension, it's just Jim Cramer having a wacky good time! Money's just like basketball or Britney, it doesn't really exist except in the magic box called the TV.
...
And while we're at it, why the fuck is it I spend all day listening to print journos beefing about the lack of standards for opinionating on the Internet and garnering an audience while clowns like this choad and Glenn Beck pollute the airwaves with barely justifiable bullshit every day for the last decade? Have we just basically given up on TV "news?" Are we still pretending it doesn't exist? Is it beneath us to notice that while bloggers lack standards and a stylebook of their own, you can say completely fucking anything on TV and nobody will ever call you on it, ever?
...
Lots more at the link. Go get 'em, darlin'.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
Epiphany at Lowe's. Why not? They got everything else...
Yesterday, we went to PetSmart, IHOP, Target, BedBath&Beyond, Costco, CVS, Office Depot, SaveMart, and 7-11. We don't go the 42 miles to The Big City very often, and when we do we make the most of it. We actually bought a few things we wanted as opposed to needed. In the process, we scrubbed off $220 worth of rebates and discount coupons along with some cashola. Note to the Big Boxes and other national chains of that ilk: keep 'em comin'! Didn't charge a goddam thing except gas (Costco doesn't accept cash for gas). Charge cards are for things like tires, emergencies, travel, and online purchases.
Mark Morford
Morford's in Frisco. I'm surprised he can tell surreal from the ho-hum daily drudge in Baghdad-by-the-Bay. Maybe he just doesn't go to the hardware store often enough. Us homeowners sure do!
Then he talks about the lack of crowds and the crumbling of empire that must surely follow, and ends with:
Note to Mr. Morford: Go check with yer colleague Violet Blue for the porn. She has an interesting take on Red State Porn. Heh.
Question for Ms.(? Ya never know in Frisco without a crotch check.) Blue: If porn and masturbation are so good for you, how come them Red States are so fucked up?
Gotta go now and put in a new 5-way shower head, with hose attachment, that does everything but tickle yer ass with a feather. $23.99 discounted 'while supplies last' which might be forever since they had a wall full of 'em.
I already activated Mrs. G's new arthritis-friendly almost-no-effort stapler. I still use an old clunky one, and the new one has sort of a machine gun effect when I use it.
And, oh yeah, the pups look great and the nationally advertised TV special breakfast at IHOP was cheap and pretty good.
About once a month we go do our bit to keep the Kingdom afloat.
Update:
I think I figured out why the shower head was on sale: The package was a washer short. Some poor fresh-from-the-rice-paddy Chinese factory worker has no doubt, er, volunteered several of his choicest organs to make up for the boatload of mistakes he caused. Note to the foreman in the washer packaging dept.: Make sure yer new hires have all their fingers before you tell them to pack that many washers!
As for me, it's nothing a trip to our local hardware store won't fix. Homeowners are used to that, and no project, however small, is ever completed without more trips to that emporium than were planned on. It is written...
Update II:
Hardware store. A wall of small plumbing and faucet parts, sliding metal cabinets, 3 deep. No washer. However, on the nosebleed heights of the top shelf, reachable onlywith the help of three Sherpas and an oxygen tank by a folding step-stool thoughtfully provided by the store, were 3 little boxes. Couldn't see the washers but I could reach up and in and access them. Found some, same OD, very slightly smaller ID, half the thickness. Oughta work if I stack two. If the smaller ID makes the shower head do anything weird, I got gasket punches. Turns out, the ID was exactly the same as the actual orifice in the hose. Go figure. Anyway, up an' runnin'. 22¢, had ta break a dollar, damn! Problem solved.
Mark Morford
If you are seeking a tiny bit of good news, if you wish to uplift your sagging spirits or inject a hint of vibrational goodness into your tormented bloodstream and perhaps reassure yourself that things will work out just fine because the world economy is merely going through the fiscal equivalent of an epic liposuction combined with a global colon cleanse, then here is what you must not do.
Do not go shopping. Do not, in particular, visit any of those massive, gleaming 10-acre megastores, the kind with the football-field parking lots and the 40-foot ceilings and wall-to-roof mountains of goods that threaten to topple on your head when you crane your neck to examine just how the hell they managed to stack those lawnmowers that high.
Too depressing, is why. Also, too surreal.
Morford's in Frisco. I'm surprised he can tell surreal from the ho-hum daily drudge in Baghdad-by-the-Bay. Maybe he just doesn't go to the hardware store often enough. Us homeowners sure do!
Then he talks about the lack of crowds and the crumbling of empire that must surely follow, and ends with:
But that leads to the larger theory at play here, a deeper -- and perhaps slightly more frightening and intriguing -- possibility. It is this: the old kingdom must fully crumble and die before the new can arise. The American empire, like every gleaming, overreaching empire of note before it, is near its end.
This is the long view, now coming into abrupt focus: Only from the death of all those once-definitive American mainstays: cars, newspapers, Wall Street, banking, home ownership, God -- can something truly innovative and revolutionary be born. You think? I can't be quite sure. Someone get me some porn and drugs.
Note to Mr. Morford: Go check with yer colleague Violet Blue for the porn. She has an interesting take on Red State Porn. Heh.
Question for Ms.(? Ya never know in Frisco without a crotch check.) Blue: If porn and masturbation are so good for you, how come them Red States are so fucked up?
Gotta go now and put in a new 5-way shower head, with hose attachment, that does everything but tickle yer ass with a feather. $23.99 discounted 'while supplies last' which might be forever since they had a wall full of 'em.
I already activated Mrs. G's new arthritis-friendly almost-no-effort stapler. I still use an old clunky one, and the new one has sort of a machine gun effect when I use it.
And, oh yeah, the pups look great and the nationally advertised TV special breakfast at IHOP was cheap and pretty good.
About once a month we go do our bit to keep the Kingdom afloat.
Update:
I think I figured out why the shower head was on sale: The package was a washer short. Some poor fresh-from-the-rice-paddy Chinese factory worker has no doubt, er, volunteered several of his choicest organs to make up for the boatload of mistakes he caused. Note to the foreman in the washer packaging dept.: Make sure yer new hires have all their fingers before you tell them to pack that many washers!
As for me, it's nothing a trip to our local hardware store won't fix. Homeowners are used to that, and no project, however small, is ever completed without more trips to that emporium than were planned on. It is written...
Update II:
Hardware store. A wall of small plumbing and faucet parts, sliding metal cabinets, 3 deep. No washer. However, on the nosebleed heights of the top shelf, reachable only
Shadow war ...
Sy Hersh drops a bomb:
Not surprising, though Executive Order #12333 (signed by Jimmy Carter) forbids political assassinations for any reason. Another in the long list of crimes on the Bush/Cheney rap sheet.
At this point, there's a couple 8 x 8s in The Hague with their names on 'em.
Investigative reporter Seymour Hersh dropped a bombshell on Tuesday when he told an audience at the University of Minnesota that the military was running an "executive assassination ring" throughout the Bush years which reported directly to former Vice President Dick Cheney.
...
Hersh replied, "After 9/11, I haven’t written about this yet, but the Central Intelligence Agency was very deeply involved in domestic activities against people they thought to be enemies of the state. Without any legal authority for it. They haven’t been called on it yet."
Hersh then went on to describe a second area of extra-legal operations: the Joint Special Operations Command. "It is a special wing of our special operations community that is set up independently," he explained. "They do not report to anybody, except in the Bush-Cheney days, they reported directly to the Cheney office. ... Congress has no oversight of it."
...
Not surprising, though Executive Order #12333 (signed by Jimmy Carter) forbids political assassinations for any reason. Another in the long list of crimes on the Bush/Cheney rap sheet.
At this point, there's a couple 8 x 8s in The Hague with their names on 'em.
Great thanks to Larisa for the Raw Story link.
All you need to know ...
About the Beltway 'journalists' (Keith and Rachel excepted). Greenwald:
If it weren't for the 'news' media, Bush would have been impeached before the end of his first term.
...
That's the most important truth of American political life: journalists like Fineman (and Ignatius, Marcus, etc. etc.) endlessly pretend to be watchdogs over the political establishment when, in fact, they are nothing more than subservient appendages to it, loyal spokespeople for it, completely merged into it. It's not that we have a press that fails to perform its function. They perform it perfectly. The point is that their function is to amplify and glorify establishment power -- the exact opposite of what Thomas Jefferson thought they would be doing when he advocated for a free press as the supreme safeguard against abuses of power.
If it weren't for the 'news' media, Bush would have been impeached before the end of his first term.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Quote of the Day - Zwei
The lovely Avedon:
Me too, darlin'.
I just want to say that I'm really sick of getting constant announcements that I can now buy an Obama trinket of some kind, a T-shirt or a coffee mug or god-all-knows-what ...
Me too, darlin'.
Kismet ...
Who could have known?
It's why I tell all the young people I know to wait until their 30s to have children. Have some fun first, get to know your mate before you bring kids into the world. And they ask me "well, you're like 150, why don't you have children?" And I tell 'em it's because the Mrs. and I are still having too much fun. At 18, you have no idea who you are, let alone how to be responsible for another life. I feel bad for the baby.
Sarah Palin's 18-year-old daughter Bristol has reportedly broken off her engagement with Levi Johnston, the father of her 2-month-old son Tripp ...
It's why I tell all the young people I know to wait until their 30s to have children. Have some fun first, get to know your mate before you bring kids into the world. And they ask me "well, you're like 150, why don't you have children?" And I tell 'em it's because the Mrs. and I are still having too much fun. At 18, you have no idea who you are, let alone how to be responsible for another life. I feel bad for the baby.
Thanks to Ol' Fez-head for the link.
Quote of the Day
Jack via Maru:
It's all about 'Party' for them. The people don't matter.
...
The country had had a bellyful of George Bush, Dick Cheney, and the rest of the messengers of darkness in Washington who had sold out the principles of the Republican Party in favor of huge deficits, a doubling of the national debt, and a growing intrusion of the federal government into people's private lives.
But instead of getting on board the change train and recognizing the incredible amount of damage their people had done to the country, Republicans go blithely along as though nothing has happened. They're busy obstructing Obama's programs and criticizing the Democrats' spending plans that are aimed at trying to bring the country out of a horrible recession.
...
It's all about 'Party' for them. The people don't matter.
The Holy Land ...
In a nutshell. Turkana hits it on the head:
Indeed, it all comes down to getting both sides to talk honestly. Israel has to admit that a Palestinian homeland is not in their future plans - that the West Bank is an obstruction to their controlling all of the water resources of the Jordan River - and Hamas and Hezbollah have to admit their motivation is the destruction of Israel, whether by violence or by gaining a 'right of return' to ancestral land within Israel's borders and taking over the political process there.
It seems an intractable problem, but if George Mitchell got 2 flavors of Irish and the English (people just as stubborn as the Jews and Arabs) to put down their guns, he has the best chance of getting these two to quit shooting and start talking.
Hopefully they do it soon because there's a lotta stuff I want to see over there (on both sides) but I ain't taking the Mrs. into a war zone.
... The old adage comes into play: one doesn't make peace with one's friends, one makes peace with one's enemies. It is not necessary that Hamas recognize Israel before negotiations. Neither is it necessary that Israel recognize the necessity of the establishment of a Palestinian state, before negotiations. It is only necessary that Hamas recognize Israel and that Israel recognize a Palestinian state when negotiations have ended. Because there will be no peace without such mutual recognition.
Indeed, it all comes down to getting both sides to talk honestly. Israel has to admit that a Palestinian homeland is not in their future plans - that the West Bank is an obstruction to their controlling all of the water resources of the Jordan River - and Hamas and Hezbollah have to admit their motivation is the destruction of Israel, whether by violence or by gaining a 'right of return' to ancestral land within Israel's borders and taking over the political process there.
It seems an intractable problem, but if George Mitchell got 2 flavors of Irish and the English (people just as stubborn as the Jews and Arabs) to put down their guns, he has the best chance of getting these two to quit shooting and start talking.
Hopefully they do it soon because there's a lotta stuff I want to see over there (on both sides) but I ain't taking the Mrs. into a war zone.
Light blogging today
Light to none, actually. We're taking the pups for a very early Spa Day and having breakfast out, some fine dining at an exotic international joint that does pancakes, and getting some shopping done. See yas.
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
German cocks and Dickey-Wickers
El Rude-o on Obama's reversal of the Dark Ages of stem cell research.
I get a visual of a stolen road sign on the wall over the bed: "Watch out for falling Dickey-Wickers!"
Yes, it's hilarious!
The fuckers are scared shitless that something'll get discovered that puts the lie to their phony christian and social misconceptions about everything they think came directly from their Sky Monster, disregarding and constantly trying to roll back everything that has been discovered since the last Dark Ages.
For those among you who may not know, Krauthammer is confined to a wheelchair. I don't know exactly what's wrong with him - physically, that is - but stem cell research might help him. The only other thing that might ease his suffering is a quick trip down the Capitol steps. I have volunteered many times to assist him on this short journey.
The conflict between ethics and science lies in how the science is used. Knowledge benefits us all. Except the wingtards, that is. They believe in suffering and want us to believe as they do. By law if necessary, for their perception of our own godless commie fuck good. Fat chance. If God wishes to dupe me into ignorance, She can come down here and do it her own goddam self.
First off, it's just gotta be pointed out, for no other reason than it's just damned funny, that the name of the rider to various bills that's been used to limit or ban federal funding of embryo creation for stem cell research is the Dickey-Wicker Amendment. And, if you're as goddamn tired and filled with scrips as the Rude Pundit's been the last few days, just saying "Dickey-Wicker" out loud will make you giggle like a Japanese schoolgirl. Dickey-Wicker (c'mon, that's hilarious) has been renewed every year since 1995, although interpreted differently by Presidents Clinton and Bush, but with President Obama's announcement that federal funding can be used on existing embryos, Dickey-Wicker might fall.
I get a visual of a stolen road sign on the wall over the bed: "Watch out for falling Dickey-Wickers!"
Yes, it's hilarious!
Predictably, Obama's executive order created a hategasm on the right. [...]
The fuckers are scared shitless that something'll get discovered that puts the lie to their phony christian and social misconceptions about everything they think came directly from their Sky Monster, disregarding and constantly trying to roll back everything that has been discovered since the last Dark Ages.
Finally, past the evangelical flat-earthers and the paranoiacs, you get to the fuckwads, like Charles Krauthammer, a man who could stand to benefit from a few stem cells. He was invited to the signing ceremony, but declined for a few reasons, one of which bespeaks a man whose mouth is so firmly planted on the former president's ass cheeks that even remoras tell him to give it a rest. Also on Fox "news," Krauthammer (translation: "German cock") said that Obama "had a memorandum which he signed in which he talks about restoring the scientific integrity in government decisions, which was is an outrageous attack on Bush. I disagreed with where Bush ended up drawing the line on permissible research, but he gave in August of 2001 the single most morally serious presidential speech on medical ethics ever given." Yes, nuance and seriousness were the hallmarks of the Bush administration. Even though he agrees with Obama for the most part, Krauthammer continued, "So I think it was disrespectful. And in pretending, as Obama did, that there's never a conflict between ethics and science, he was wrong."
For those among you who may not know, Krauthammer is confined to a wheelchair. I don't know exactly what's wrong with him - physically, that is - but stem cell research might help him. The only other thing that might ease his suffering is a quick trip down the Capitol steps. I have volunteered many times to assist him on this short journey.
Strangely, the Rude Pundit agrees with Charlie Kraut on this last point. It's just that the conflict's been between science and backwards ass ethics and morality. It's been an irrational conflict, not a science-based one. That difference now is a huge leap forward, an evolution, if you will, in America's attitude towards what is possible to explore.
The conflict between ethics and science lies in how the science is used. Knowledge benefits us all. Except the wingtards, that is. They believe in suffering and want us to believe as they do. By law if necessary, for their perception of our own godless commie fuck good. Fat chance. If God wishes to dupe me into ignorance, She can come down here and do it her own goddam self.
Large popcorn, extra butter, please
The Raw Story
Oh boy!
Works for me.
And yer point is...? The truth has a decidedly negative slant when applied to Repugs.
Here's the joy in all this - the wingnuts are fighting over who gets to be the bull goose loony most 'offensive, radical, insulting, and confusing' amongst them! Outstanding!
It's like a Steel Cage Death Match - "Many wingnuts enter, worst wingnut leave as face of Repuglitard party!"
I'm diggin' the shit out of it!
As far as 'promoting' The Coultergeist or other reactionary radicals as the face of their party, I say promote 'em all! Make 'em all Admirals in The Grand Wingnuttia Space Fleet and let 'em duke it out. Let's get this over with!
Make that a tub o' popcorn!
Note to Ms. McCain: I don't really think there are any Repug 'moderates', but, and I'm in a particularly generous frame of mind today, there may be a few sane ones. If you think there are enough of you to ever have any political viability ever again, best to come up with a new name for your end of the Repug party ('end of the Repug party' has a nice ring to it!). Oh, and 'Democrats' is taken.
Now that the dust has just begun to settle after last week's battle royale between Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele and radio host Rush Limbaugh, the last thing the party would want is another internecine feud.
But here it comes anyway.
Oh boy!
On a column written just before conservative pundit Ann Coulter sets out on a highly publicized debate tour with comic Bill Maher, the daughter of the Republican party's last presidential candidate says that promoting her "as the face of the Republican Party is a recipe for disaster."
Works for me.
According to the twenty-four-year-old Meghan McCain, who only recently registered with the GOP, "certain individuals continue to perpetuate negative stereotypes about Republicans."
And yer point is...? The truth has a decidedly negative slant when applied to Repugs.
"Especially Republican women. Who do I feel is the biggest culprit? Ann Coulter," McCain writes in a Daily Beast blog.
McCain continues, "I straight up don’t understand this woman or her popularity. I find her offensive, radical, insulting, and confusing all at the same time. But no matter how much you or I disagree with her, the cult that follows Coulter cannot be denied. She is a New York Times best-selling author and one of the most notable female members of the Republican Party. She was one of the headliners at the recent CPAC conference (but when your competition is a teenager who has a dream about the Republican Party and Stephen Baldwin, it’s not really saying that much).
Here's the joy in all this - the wingnuts are fighting over who gets to be the bull goose loony most 'offensive, radical, insulting, and confusing' amongst them! Outstanding!
It's like a Steel Cage Death Match - "Many wingnuts enter, worst wingnut leave as face of Repuglitard party!"
I'm diggin' the shit out of it!
As far as 'promoting' The Coultergeist or other reactionary radicals as the face of their party, I say promote 'em all! Make 'em all Admirals in The Grand Wingnuttia Space Fleet and let 'em duke it out. Let's get this over with!
Make that a tub o' popcorn!
Note to Ms. McCain: I don't really think there are any Repug 'moderates', but, and I'm in a particularly generous frame of mind today, there may be a few sane ones. If you think there are enough of you to ever have any political viability ever again, best to come up with a new name for your end of the Repug party ('end of the Repug party' has a nice ring to it!). Oh, and 'Democrats' is taken.
The A-word
David Sirota on what to call the State Of The Nation.
Mighta been the 'shrooms, dude...
Around here, it takes about ten years, and, yes, though the last decade went by in the seeming blink of an eye, the last eight seemed like they took forever. Hear that dripping sound? That's my ass bleeding for anybody that can't make it on a half a mil a year. I got a coupla alliterative 'A-words' for them, too. One of them is 'arrogant' and the other is a compound word with 'holes' as the last syllable.
As I sit here comfortably with all my stuff paid for, on a pretty much fixed income, with my consuming and borrowing days behind me and a total of outstanding debt that I could pay off with the money in my nightstand, I think about the folks in financial trouble, the real folks, not the richies facing living like only slightly rich people for the first time - oh, the horror! I feel like the paratroopers about to jump into Normandy on D-Day. Told that they were projected to take 90% casualties, each and every one of 'em thought to himself, "Man, I feel sorry for all those other guys".
Recently, I've been groping for the precise word to characterize the zeitgeist of this (unfortunately) historic moment. I know it's not merely "demoralized." It's something far more dread-laden -- a word I finally found during a visit last week to central Mexico.
Sitting atop the famed Pyramid of the Sun, I took in Teotihuacan -- the ancient metropolis outside Mexico City. Its weathered bricks and mortar look like many great archaeological wonders, except its annals include a harrowing asterisk: When the Aztecs discovered the site, it was abandoned, and nobody knows what happened to its inhabitants. The ruins thus feel like monuments to an apocalypse.
Mighta been the 'shrooms, dude...
That's the term that popped into my mind as I baked in the Mexican sun -- "apocalypse": a phenomenon whose signs are everywhere these days.
As wages stagnate in a nation whose median household income is $50,000 a year, one financial executive tells reporters that bankers "can't live on $150,000 to $180,000." Another bemoans efforts to restrict CEO pay by saying that "$500,000 is not a lot of money" -- and the New York Times chimes in by insisting that it’s true: "Half a million a year can go very fast."
Around here, it takes about ten years, and, yes, though the last decade went by in the seeming blink of an eye, the last eight seemed like they took forever. Hear that dripping sound? That's my ass bleeding for anybody that can't make it on a half a mil a year. I got a coupla alliterative 'A-words' for them, too. One of them is 'arrogant' and the other is a compound word with 'holes' as the last syllable.
As I sit here comfortably with all my stuff paid for, on a pretty much fixed income, with my consuming and borrowing days behind me and a total of outstanding debt that I could pay off with the money in my nightstand, I think about the folks in financial trouble, the real folks, not the richies facing living like only slightly rich people for the first time - oh, the horror! I feel like the paratroopers about to jump into Normandy on D-Day. Told that they were projected to take 90% casualties, each and every one of 'em thought to himself, "Man, I feel sorry for all those other guys".
Red Light Express Revisited. By Sean Hannity.
The fictional high-speed rail line from Disneyland to the Moonlite Bunny Ranch that I posted about last week might do Hannity some good. I wuz gonna use the title "Hannity looooves him some Air Force Amy" but somebody already did.
Windy City Watch has more.
While Kelly was doing what FNC is known to do, MAKE SHIT UP, the photos of Hannity were sitting right there, not on some paparazzi page but on the official MBR website.
We will not accuse Hannity of any illegal behavior, MBR is a licensed brothel in Nevada, but we will accuse him of being a grade A HYPOCRITE. We don’t claim to know the circumstances surrounding these photos, however we do know that in 2005 Hannity went after Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg claiming she supported legalized prostitution.
I support it as well, for a variety of reasons I won't go into here, and so do the cow counties out there in Nevada for whom the brothels are the main tax base.
I also had a stake in the well-being of brothel employees at one time. Dave, the owner of the Old Bridge Ranch*, east of Reno, bought all his girls Harley-Davidsons. A group ride was spectacular to watch! To say the least! As a mechanic at the bike shop they used, I paid particular attention to safety items. Nothing's as bad for business as a workin' girl fulla road rash...
*Go see what 'Customer Appreciation Day' is like. Heh.
I'm sure Hannity was just doing a little, er, research, or perhaps lecturing these soiled doves on the evil of their ways, so he could more inaccurately mis-inform his right-wing 'moral values' crowd. Sure looks like he isn't having any fun, huh? He better not cop to havin' any fun, anyway.
Former KBR Electrician Speaks Out
This will piss you off. Shorter: KBR does substandard, criminally negligent work that kills our soldiers, and takes no responsibility for the shoddy work or correcting it. They take the $Billion$ just fine.
Update:
Go see Ms. Sparky's site. She has lots more about KBR.
I left her this comment:
Update II:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Update:
Go see Ms. Sparky's site. She has lots more about KBR.
I left her this comment:
I have worked as an electrician's assistant, and my main function, according to the electrician, was to body block him out of danger if he came across line voltage. Never had to do it while he was washing his hands though.
Update II:
Ms Sparky’s Response:
Good Point!!!
Condolences ...
The Old White Lady had to say goodbye to her cat Cotton yesterday. I haven't had a cat in many years, and I miss having one in the house (Mrs. F is allergic), so I've lived vicariously through OWL's brood since we started blogging here. Please stop by and give her your best ...
Multitasking ...
The latest in a line of anemic outrage from the Republicans; President Obama is doing too much, too soon.
Listen to me. Just because your boy couldn't chew gum and walk at the same time doesn't mean others are incapable of handling the job. While it worked for Charles Emerson Winchester III ("I do one thing, I do it very well, and then I move on."), George W. Bush was not a rising star in the thoracic surgery field, nor did he play one on TV. Mr. Obama is a professor of constitutional law and an intelligent man, and that's how shit is done.
This man is the leader of the free world, what in Hell do you expect from him? While I know we're all used to the "high functioning moron", I expect Barry to handle everything put in front of him while standing on his head, making sparks shoot out of his ass.
How is it where you work? Do you tell your boss you can only do one thing at a time? I know that most days, I'm working on 3 cars at once and I've seen what Mrs. F has to deal with. Do you think she can tell the top folks at Honda, Sharp, Canon, Konica - Minolta they have to wait because she's dealing with a problem with one of her other clients and she'll get to them when she has time? She'd be replaced so quick you'd hear a sonic boom. When you reach the top of your field, you're expected to do the impossible and make it work. I expect the same from the President of the United States.
As I said before, we're all used to mediocrity thanks to Bush and the Republicans but that is what got us into this mess to begin with. It is why we have the debacle in Iraq we do and why we can't help our people in the event of a natural disaster (see: Hurricane Katrina). The Republicans have failed in so many aspects that this President has no other choice but to handle many of the problems left by Bush et. al. at the same time.
As people are drowning in their medical bills, as Wall St. collapses, as our military is stretched to the breaking point, as our reputation in the world is at an all-time low, as science has been subverted by the interests of organized religion, taking each of these problems in turn will allow all the others to exacerbate. Broad, wide-ranging action is needed now and it's refreshing to see someone in office who can handle the chore.
This bad wind from the Right (more like a stale fart) is nothing more than an attempt to get some traction for their failed, inept agenda after having everything they stood for refuted on 4 Nov. 2008. As I've said previously, they have nothing; nothing that could do the people of America well. There are no new ideas, no new plans, no attempt to work with this President to try and straighten out the mess we're in, only obstruction. They are slaves to their ideology, staying aboard a sinking ship, in the vain hope it will right itself, even after the captain has given the order to abandon the vessel. They grovel before a man who has never been elected dogcatcher, yet can force them to toe the 'party line', itself a tattered relic of the days when "greed was good", even if it calls for the failure of the nation we love and have sworn to defend. When you have nothing, the only thing you can do is complain about someone doing what you're incapable of.
If the Republicans were smart, they'd shut up, sit back, and let time be the judge of Obama's policies. While they might not be supportive, at the least they could claim some partial credit for a recovery if things work out well and say "I told you so" if they don't (the American attention span is excruciatingly short). This petty whining and finger pointing only makes them look like spoiled, emotionally-deficient little children. At least, most Americans are seeing them for what they really are.
Listen to me. Just because your boy couldn't chew gum and walk at the same time doesn't mean others are incapable of handling the job. While it worked for Charles Emerson Winchester III ("I do one thing, I do it very well, and then I move on."), George W. Bush was not a rising star in the thoracic surgery field, nor did he play one on TV. Mr. Obama is a professor of constitutional law and an intelligent man, and that's how shit is done.
This man is the leader of the free world, what in Hell do you expect from him? While I know we're all used to the "high functioning moron", I expect Barry to handle everything put in front of him while standing on his head, making sparks shoot out of his ass.
How is it where you work? Do you tell your boss you can only do one thing at a time? I know that most days, I'm working on 3 cars at once and I've seen what Mrs. F has to deal with. Do you think she can tell the top folks at Honda, Sharp, Canon, Konica - Minolta they have to wait because she's dealing with a problem with one of her other clients and she'll get to them when she has time? She'd be replaced so quick you'd hear a sonic boom. When you reach the top of your field, you're expected to do the impossible and make it work. I expect the same from the President of the United States.
As I said before, we're all used to mediocrity thanks to Bush and the Republicans but that is what got us into this mess to begin with. It is why we have the debacle in Iraq we do and why we can't help our people in the event of a natural disaster (see: Hurricane Katrina). The Republicans have failed in so many aspects that this President has no other choice but to handle many of the problems left by Bush et. al. at the same time.
As people are drowning in their medical bills, as Wall St. collapses, as our military is stretched to the breaking point, as our reputation in the world is at an all-time low, as science has been subverted by the interests of organized religion, taking each of these problems in turn will allow all the others to exacerbate. Broad, wide-ranging action is needed now and it's refreshing to see someone in office who can handle the chore.
This bad wind from the Right (more like a stale fart) is nothing more than an attempt to get some traction for their failed, inept agenda after having everything they stood for refuted on 4 Nov. 2008. As I've said previously, they have nothing; nothing that could do the people of America well. There are no new ideas, no new plans, no attempt to work with this President to try and straighten out the mess we're in, only obstruction. They are slaves to their ideology, staying aboard a sinking ship, in the vain hope it will right itself, even after the captain has given the order to abandon the vessel. They grovel before a man who has never been elected dogcatcher, yet can force them to toe the 'party line', itself a tattered relic of the days when "greed was good", even if it calls for the failure of the nation we love and have sworn to defend. When you have nothing, the only thing you can do is complain about someone doing what you're incapable of.
If the Republicans were smart, they'd shut up, sit back, and let time be the judge of Obama's policies. While they might not be supportive, at the least they could claim some partial credit for a recovery if things work out well and say "I told you so" if they don't (the American attention span is excruciatingly short). This petty whining and finger pointing only makes them look like spoiled, emotionally-deficient little children. At least, most Americans are seeing them for what they really are.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Earmarks ...
(Stays on top today - G)
Or 'pork', if you will. Being this is what I heard the Rethugs going on about this weekend, I figured I'd say a few words.
Aside from the hypocrisy, which quite a few talking heads had no other choice but to take note of (40% of the earmarks in the spending bill are Republican), earmarks can be stimulating for the economy. "Bridges to Nowhere" notwithstanding, earmarks can be used quite effectively to bring stimulus to targeted areas of the country.
The problem is they're not subject to review. The challenge, it would seem to me, would be to determine which 'pork' would be beneficial to the most people. For example, an infrastructure project such as a light rail line from the suburbs to a city, or a high speed rail line connecting major cities (such as the Paris - Brussels Directe in Europe).
The idea, though how feasible it would be is another story, is to have an 'acceptance criteria' they would have to live up to before being included in a bill. A set of guidelines stating a minimum population size the earmark would benefit (ex: an earmark would have to be beneficial to 100K people or more) and a cost cap. Things like 'pig odor studies' and 'Hawai'i travel and tourism' should be undertaken by the various industries who'd benefit. I've driven past hog farms in the summer and yes, there's an odor problem, big time (wouldn't wanna live near one). Thing is, the industry should be forking over the money to reduce the problem under threat of fine from the EPA, not expecting the taxpayer to clean up their mess that they've been making a profit from all these years. Same with the Polynesian tourist industry.
Unfortunately, with the state of the Republican Party today, any type of oversight or regulation is a bad thing. Yes, they'll yell and scream, but far be it for them to set an example by not inserting earmarks into the bill. Maybe, if they started practicing what they preach, the general public might take them seriously again. Adding $3bln to the spending bill and then blaming President Obama for not vetoing the thing is laughable; just another example of Republican hypocrisy in lieu of offering any decent suggestions about how we might overcome the problem of wasteful spending.
Pointing fingers doesn't solve problems, definitive action does. Pointing fingers without advancing a reasonable compromise (as opposed to pushing the failed policies that got us into this mess) is not the way things get done. Since President Obama took office, they've done nothing but bitch and moan but have come up with nothing new. If it didn't slow down the process so much, I wouldn't care because they're relegating themselves to superficiality (the national polls are proving that), but people are hurting and need help now. Obstruction is only putting more people over the edge.
The Party of Limbaugh is well on its way to becoming irrelevant and if they keep it up they'll be condemning themselves to obscurity. I won't stop them but it would be nice if they didn't drag the rest of us down with them.
Or 'pork', if you will. Being this is what I heard the Rethugs going on about this weekend, I figured I'd say a few words.
Aside from the hypocrisy, which quite a few talking heads had no other choice but to take note of (40% of the earmarks in the spending bill are Republican), earmarks can be stimulating for the economy. "Bridges to Nowhere" notwithstanding, earmarks can be used quite effectively to bring stimulus to targeted areas of the country.
The problem is they're not subject to review. The challenge, it would seem to me, would be to determine which 'pork' would be beneficial to the most people. For example, an infrastructure project such as a light rail line from the suburbs to a city, or a high speed rail line connecting major cities (such as the Paris - Brussels Directe in Europe).
The idea, though how feasible it would be is another story, is to have an 'acceptance criteria' they would have to live up to before being included in a bill. A set of guidelines stating a minimum population size the earmark would benefit (ex: an earmark would have to be beneficial to 100K people or more) and a cost cap. Things like 'pig odor studies' and 'Hawai'i travel and tourism' should be undertaken by the various industries who'd benefit. I've driven past hog farms in the summer and yes, there's an odor problem, big time (wouldn't wanna live near one). Thing is, the industry should be forking over the money to reduce the problem under threat of fine from the EPA, not expecting the taxpayer to clean up their mess that they've been making a profit from all these years. Same with the Polynesian tourist industry.
Unfortunately, with the state of the Republican Party today, any type of oversight or regulation is a bad thing. Yes, they'll yell and scream, but far be it for them to set an example by not inserting earmarks into the bill. Maybe, if they started practicing what they preach, the general public might take them seriously again. Adding $3bln to the spending bill and then blaming President Obama for not vetoing the thing is laughable; just another example of Republican hypocrisy in lieu of offering any decent suggestions about how we might overcome the problem of wasteful spending.
Pointing fingers doesn't solve problems, definitive action does. Pointing fingers without advancing a reasonable compromise (as opposed to pushing the failed policies that got us into this mess) is not the way things get done. Since President Obama took office, they've done nothing but bitch and moan but have come up with nothing new. If it didn't slow down the process so much, I wouldn't care because they're relegating themselves to superficiality (the national polls are proving that), but people are hurting and need help now. Obstruction is only putting more people over the edge.
The Party of Limbaugh is well on its way to becoming irrelevant and if they keep it up they'll be condemning themselves to obscurity. I won't stop them but it would be nice if they didn't drag the rest of us down with them.
RS3M* at Full Throttle
*Repug, or in this case, Rove, Spin, Slime, & Smear Machine.
Think Progress, with comments.
Puke first.
Remember, everything before November 4, 2008 was Clinton's fault, and everything after is Obama's.
A coupla comments:
That's about the size of it.
Think Progress, with comments.
On Fox News this afternoon, Karl Rove insisted that “this crew” in the White House has caused the collapse of the market, faulting the Obama administration for the economic crisis. He blamed Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner in particular, saying Geithner could not point fingers at the previous administration because he was one of the three people who made the decision to bail out the banks in the first place, with last fall’s TARP.
In fact, Rove declared that only three people made the decision about the bank bailout — and none of them were then-President Bush:
Look, Geithner was sitting in the room, last year. Three people made the decision about the bank rescue package: Geithner, Ben Bernanke, and Hank Paulson, the Treasury Secretary.
Rove added that those three “unanimously made those decisions about the bank rescue.” Apparently they simply informed then-President Bush of their decision to give $700 billion to banks after the fact. Watch it:
Puke first.
Ironically, during the same interview, Rove declared that the Obama administration has “got to start accepting responsibility for the outcome of their decisions” — seconds before suggesting that Bush didn’t even play a role in one of the most consequential decisions of his presidency.
Apparently Bush wasn’t really “the decider” after all.
Remember, everything before November 4, 2008 was Clinton's fault, and everything after is Obama's.
A coupla comments:
Lemme get this straight. Obama is responsible for everything that happens BEFORE he takes office, including the carnage left from disasters he inherited, but Bush is blameless for everything that happened on his watch, including disasters caused directly by his faulty policies?
Oh yeah — IOKIYAR.
Standard Operating Procedure for that White House. Others, especially DICK Cheney, told the “high functioning moron” what to do and he unquestioningly did it.
That's about the size of it.
Quote of the Day
Charles M. Blow, NYT op-ed on the Repugs:
Perfect!
And who has surfaced as their saviors? Bobby Jindal, Michael Steele and Rush Limbaugh — the axis of drivel. (my em)
Perfect!
Oh, the irony...
Ironic Times
Good thing it missed. The Repugs would have blamed Obama.
Obama Mulls Reaching Out to Taliban
Based on warm reception he received from Republicans.
Bush DOJ Secret Memos Cancelled Constitutional Rights
But only because our freedoms were threatened.
Still More Secret Bush Memos Released
In one, grants himself pardon in case anyone finds out about memos.
Supreme Court Sides With Consumers Against Drug Manufacturers
6 justices apparently off their meds.
Asteroid Just Misses Earth, Averting Catastrophe
Although financial mess would have cleared up pretty fast.
Good thing it missed. The Repugs would have blamed Obama.
One in Every 31 Adults in Prison
Rest still at large.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Sunday Crazy Redneck Music Blogging
U.S. 40, aka the 'Lincoln Highway', the first automobile road across America, is the main street of the town I live in. Parts of it are in original condition, but this song ain't about busted shock absorbers. Heh.
Buck Norris (of the BCB Band) ~ Highway 40 Blues
Thanks, Buck.
NuRPS
Termite58 gives a nice history of this group. Click on the video after it starts and it will take you to YouTube, then click 'more info'. Lead-in:
Formed in 1969, the New Riders of the Purple Sage was initially envisaged as a part-time spin-off from the Grateful Dead. Jerry Garcia (pedal steel guitar), Phill Lesh (bass) and Mickey Hart (drums...
New Riders of the Purple Sage ~ Lonesome L.A. Cowboy
The First American Dictator
I got no idea who Bruce Mulkey is, but he tamps Bush's crap into a nice, neat brick:
I have nothing to add to that.
What are the dictatorial powers bestowed on George W. Bush by the previously-undisclosed DOJ memos? He had the power to:
1. Deploy the U.S. military inside the U.S.
2. Order foreigners and citizens alike arrested and held indefinitely without charges
3. Command the military to search citizens’ homes
4. Instruct the NSA to spy on citizens, listen in on their phone calls and read their emails
5. Suspend freedom of speech and freedom of the press
Apparently he only got around to implementing #2 and #4, but god only knows what he’d done if there had been another terrorist attack on American soil.
Since the election of President Obama, I had decided to relegate Bush and his associates to history, preferring to participate in bringing about change in my community and in our nation. But these memos reveal duplicitous and treasonous behavior, and DOJ officials have indicated that there is more damning evidence yet to be released.
The men and women responsible for these illegal and immoral acts must be held accountable. They, and others who might emulate them, need to know that we, the citizens of this nation, will not stand for further desecration of our civil liberties. They need to be held up as examples so that others will be loath to go down this path again. Bush and his pals need to do be investigated, indicted, convicted and imprisoned, for these men and women were the true terrorists, and they came closer to eradicating American democracy than Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda ever will.
I have nothing to add to that.
Reminder!
I'm still working on the blogroll so if your blog ain't listed in the right hand sidebar already, drop me an email so I can include it (and thank you to those who've already done so). I should have everything up and running by tomorrow.
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