Murder made legal will not stand

Toon from Slate.

The Rude Pundit on "The Niggering of Trayvon Martin":

We see this again and again. A black male who captures the imagination of the nation must be degraded by the right. He must be turned into something else, some Other. President Obama can't simply be an educated black man from a lower middle-class background with whom they disagree ideologically. No, he's got to be an enemy, a foreigner, a nigger. It's hard to denigrate someone who might be like you, conservatives. But it's easy to attack a nigger because he's just a nigger. Or a coon.

You're allowed to defend yourself against a REAL threat everywhere, "duty to retreat" laws notwithstanding, but apparently, the "stand your ground" laws in 24 states allow you to START a confrontation and then get scared halfway through the proceedings when it's apparent you're going to lose and shoot the guy you started the confrontation with. If he's black.

Zimmerman knows by now that he fucked up BAD. That's why he's hiding under a rock somewhere and not becoming a big celebrity like Kim Kardashian's ass by bragging on FOXNoise about how he saved the Republic by blowing a kid armed with pogey bait to kingdom come. I've got news for him that he already knows: he's going to go to prison. As he should.

The Sanford cops fucked this deal up enough, probably knowing full well what they were doing, that the racist cretin punk Zimmerman will never be charged with 1st degree murder, but I hope the punk gets 20 to life for 2nd degree murder. We'll see how well he "stands his ground" in a Florida prison full of black men when the NRA and racist cops and pols and gasbags drop that wannabe real man like a hot rock and aren't there to back him up. Street justice - the same "justice" given young Mr. Martin under that stupid right-wing law - is liable to get him first. Fine with me.

Update:

Can We Trust the Cops’ New Account of Trayvon Martin’s Killing?

No. I've read the police reports on my own arrests enough times to know that cops are skilled liars with a criminal justice system that's on their side.

The Sanford cops handled this about like innumerable "white man kills black man" cases in the South and elsewhere, figuring no one would ever notice. Once the rocks were turned over and the sunlight shone on this incident and the story made the big time, they realized how badly they had screwed up and are trying, in vain it will turn out, to save their own asses. Even as professional liars, they're not that skilled. They had best STFU and leave the subsequent skilled professional lying on their behalf to their lawyers, who will get paid even if the Sanford PD is no more after this.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

CHENEY UNDERGOES HEART TRANSPLANT
Gets heart of young Chinese dissident.

U.S. Can Still Win in Afghanistan, Says Top Commander
Iraq and Vietnam, too.

Employers Expect to Hire 9.5% More Graduates This Year Than Last
Do you want fries with that?

??? - News Quiz - ???

Oil prices are rising and are expected to continue rising through the spring, summer and fall because:

A ) supply is tight.

B ) the invisible hand of the free market system is moving in mysterious ways.

C ) UFOs are using alien technology to siphon off our reserves for Mars.

D ) there's a Presidential election coming up, and Wall Street, Big Oil, and the banksters would really love to have a Republican in the White House.

Hint: supply isn’t tight, the hand ain’t invisible, and Mars doesn’t run on oil.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Sorry about my lack of blogging yesterday. The motel wifi was down. This thing turned into a fancy Freecell machine. Heh.

Thanks to kejiaquin.

Headin' out...

We're going out to the coast today so blogging will be etch-a-sketchy for a few days. Sorry, couldn't resist. See yas.

Scarce ...

I'l be scarce around here for the foreseeable future. They took dad-in-law to the hospital this early morning. According to them he suffered a massive stroke during the night. He's been unresponsive since. The doctors say it could be "minutes, hours, or days". The merciful conclusion for a 90-odd year old man with Alzheimer's would be sooner rather than later. See yas when I see yas ...

Update:

Dad-in-law passed at 1840 this evening. He's in a far better place.

The 4 Horsemen of Republican Failure

Gleefully gleeped in toto from our pal montag!

Radio Free America

My two favorite radio stations are independent community stations that come up with their own programs, KVMR and KTKE. Give 'em a listen.

Raw Story

FCC decision strikes critical blow to right-wing radio dominance

“Now these right-wing radio networks won’t keep getting their translator applications approved,” Renderos added. “That will severely limit their ability to expand.”

The FCC’s decision also set clear criteria for community radio stations in heavily populated urban areas, which are otherwise bombarded by the endless droning of commercial media full of snide opinion masquerading as news.

The FCC’s move Monday was the first step on a path laid out by the Local Community Radio Act, signed by President Barack Obama at the start of 2011, which represented the first real victory in activists’ long fight against the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) the radio industry’s biggest lobbying group. The bill freed up portions of the radio spectrum that had otherwise been kept empty by the larger broadcasters, who had long insisted upon four clicks of blank space on the FM dial to prevent interference. It also stipulated that new space on the dial must be reserved for community stations in urban areas where there might otherwise be none.

“There’s hardly news at all on commercial radio at this point, much less a diversity of viewpoints and a diversity of news.” Doyle concluded. “A lot of times corporate media doesn’t even cover things that are majority views, and there’s a disconnect between what we hear in the media and what we know most of our neighbors are thinking and feeling. This is a real opportunity for people to connect with each other and start building real alternatives.”

It's a real alternative to the crap Big Radio serves up.

Update:

Me'n Mrs. G are going out to the coast tomorrow. We like KPYG (or KPIG, it's complicated)(wiki) down there. With a logo like this, is there any question why? Listen online.

Quote of the Day

MFBTIR on Clusterfuckistan:

When you’re buried alive in the Graveyard of Empires, all you can do is claw your way out.

Racist? Us?

Seems the guys at Little Green Snotballs are put out by the racism of those on their side. Of course, they were part of the problem for a long time but no matter, it's good of them to see the light. Fortunately I don't have to link to them and I can send you to Addicting Info instead:

The right has truly perfected the Orwellian art of doublespeak. While screaming out of one mouth that liberals are the real racists (seriously, they do. Google it), conservatives, who will swear on a stack of Republican Bibles, engage in some of the most vile racism outside of a Ron Paul newsletter.

littlegreenfootballs.com has posted a partial list of the comments regarding the murder of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. You’ll recall that Trayvon, armed with Skittles and a bottle of iced tea, was stalked by George Zimmerman and shot for the crime of walking while black. Three weeks on and Zimmerman has yet to be arrested. The Department of Justice and the FBI have announced that they will be investigating this…oversight as a hate crime. Apparently this has outraged the Fox News commentator community.

...

Calling all kinkster hippie sluts

Welcome to all you folks who googled "kinkster hippie sluts"! If it's Wednesday it's a Morford must read.

I know how it is. Have you been feeling it, too? The heat of recent media attention? The sour breath of bland, conservative evil on your nicely tattooed neck? Perhaps you've noticed. Sluts and sex, gays and deviants, perverts and hippies, yoga teachers and tattooed miscreants have been in the news a lot recently. More than usual, even. And that's saying something.

It's not difficult to see why. There's a very weird, grisly Republican presidential race underway right now, featuring some of the least appealing, most disagreeable conservative candidates to limp across the national stage in decades. And that's really saying something.

It's all a result of the sad fact that the once-noble GOP has devolved in the past few decades from a semi-reasonable party of stiff values and staid institutions, into a kowtowing, far-right, fundamentalist drainage ditch full of Christian fear, Bible literalism and anti-everythingism. Voilá: one hell of a kinkystrange little witch hunt, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Then he starts in on Frothy Mixture:

He's like an incontinent raccoon accidentally coming within hissing distance of getting into the Westminster Dog Show.

Much more. ends on a happy note:

You think for yourself, act for others, love without regard for church or country or sad conformist dogma. And let me just tell you, they hate that most of all. You slut.

Quote of the Day

Drifty:

...

The racket you hear beneath your feet is the sound of Abraham Lincoln spinning in his grave fast enough to give local spacetime a double swirly.

...

Fox 'News' Lies Kills!

...

Hallie Jean Mayes Knauss Culpepper passed away on February 16, 2012. Ten days earlier, she had fallen, but as Knauss says, refused to see a doctor. Her obituary notes that she was a "lifelong, dyed-in-the-wool Republican" who at one time had also been a business owner (TECO Products, now Griffin Products).

...

And it wasn't because she didn't like doctors. Shit like this really pisses me off.

Scary black man ...

Not so much. The last conversation Trayvon had before that cracker asshole killed him for Walking While Black:

...

Recounting her conversation with Martin, the teen girl said, "He said this man was watching him, so he put his hoodie on. He said he lost the man."

"I asked Trayvon to run, and he said he was going to walk fast. I told him to run but he said he was not going to run," she said.

After a few minutes, the girl said, Martin thought he was safe. But eventually the man appeared again.

"Trayvon said, 'What are you following me for?'" the girl said. "And the man said, 'What are you doing here?' Next thing I hear is somebody pushing, and somebody pushed Trayvon because the [phone’s\] headset just fell."

...

Way cool ...

I've seen this before and I think it's the coolest thing. Chalk art.

Small government ...

Yeah, right:

More toons here.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

ROMNEY OUTLINES HIS FOREIGN POLICY
Would look for a failing country, take it over, oust its leader, deport most of its citizens and then sell it for a huge profit.

Go with whatcha know...

Republicans Split on War In Middle East
Half want to attack Iran, half want to attack Syria.

The third half wants to attack both at once.

This next one is no shit, with or without the squiggly:

Norwegian Study: LSD Helps Treat Alcoholism
Primarily through one-time, life-changing revelation: you’re a drunk.

Theory: Internet Flame Wars Actually Good for Society
When you consider most of these people would otherwise be marching down Main Street in Nazi uniforms.

Heh. Good point.

Really, Joe?

HuffPo

Joe Arpaio, Maricopa County Sheriff, Says Media Conspiracy Against Birthers Is 'Bigger Than Watergate'
...

Arpaio also maintained that his own political leanings were irrelevant to the investigation.

“I don’t care about the politics,” he said. “That has nothing to do with it.”

Really, Joe?

Comment from Facebook:

Walter K Maier Isn't it about time he got the jacket where the arms tie around the back?

Yep. It's too dangerous to let him reach his handgun.

New Bill Requires Man To View Sonogram Photos Before Having Sex With Someone Half His Age

Goblinbooks

A controversial new bill is making its way through both houses of Congress that would require older men to view sonogram photos, grade school class pictures, and birthday video footage of women half their age with whom they wish to engage in sexual intercourse. The Family Values Law, as it's called, is supported by a variety of activist groups, but it is bitterly opposed by a coalition of state senators, church leaders, and corporate CEOs.
...

Political insiders speculate wildly on whether the bill will ever make it out of Congress. On one hand, many of the most powerful legislators in both the House and Senate will be directly affected. But the bill is gaining widespread grassroots support that makes it difficult to oppose. Religious figures -- many of whom are elderly men themselves -- are staging a massive write-in campaign against it, arguing that Scripture and church traditions don't prohibit an old man betraying his marriage vows and moving in with his massage therapist.

"This law would discriminate against people like us," says the pastor of a Norfolk-area megachurch who spoke on condition of anonymity, because of pending legal issues. "God wants everybody -- all straight, elderly, rich men -- to be happy. That message is throughout the Bible."

"He's right," admits Schell. "Then again, there's some really sick crap in that book."

Most wingnut christowhackos' Bibles fall open right at those passages as well.

Note: CLEARLY LABELLED SATIRE. I hope.

What is this 'vote' you speak of?

Because if it was up to the Republicans, half of us wouldn't get the opportunity (who needs those stinking 'rights' anyway):

...

“This wave of restrictive voting laws is inexcusable, and the numbers clearly show the impact it could have on this year’s elections,” said Wendy Weiser, director of the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program. “These laws represent the most significant cutback in voting rights in decades. Rather than erecting senseless barriers to voting, we should make our voting system work for all Americans by upgrading our ramshackle voter registration system.”

...

The conservatives can "vote early and often". The rest of us, not so much.

How you know ...

Our national media is broken.

What could happen?

Arizona is going the way of Afghanistan:

...

But not the Special Missions Unit. Oh, no. A state senator named Sylvia Allen wants to spend $1.4 million to arm and "train" a militia of armed volunteers who run around Arizona busting anyone suspected of "cross-border criminal activity," including both Mexican drug cartels and the units of the Hezbollah who, Ms. Allen believes, are inches from pouring over the border in force from their training camps in Mexico. Of course, exactly who will train these citizen soldiers, and how they'll be trained, has been left somewhat vague, because what can possibly go wrong with arming government-sponsored vigilantes and loosing them upon the populace in a place where racial distrust and division has been at high tide for two years.

...

Um, like I said before, Arizona already has a militia. It's called the National Guard.

For those who are interested ...

My homemade dog waste recycler is working as advertised.

Quote of the Day

Robert Fisk via our pal Montag:

...

Now this was an extraordinary plea to come from the US commander in Afghanistan. The top general had to tell his supposedly well-disciplined, elite, professional army not to "take vengeance" on the Afghans they are supposed to be helping/protecting/nurturing/training, etc. He had to tell his soldiers not to commit murder. I know that generals would say this kind of thing in Vietnam. But Afghanistan? Has it come to this? I rather fear it has. Because – however much I dislike generals – I've met quite a number of them and, by and large, they have a pretty good idea of what's going on in the ranks. And I suspect that Allen had already been warned by his junior officers that his soldiers had been enraged by the killings that followed the Koran burnings – and might decide to go on a revenge spree. Hence he tried desperately – in a statement that was as shocking as it was revealing – to pre-empt exactly the massacre which took place last Sunday.

...

"I know that generals would say this kind of thing in Vietnam. But Afghanistan?"

I know a couple old NCOs (*cough* Gord and F-man *cough*) who've been saying it was gonna come to this for years.

And let me just add: I don't care how professional, elite, or well-disciplined your army is, if you put them in theater for 10 years without a defined mission and endgame, among a population of which you cannot tell the good guys from the bad guys, there will be a breakdown in discipline. When you keep rotating troops in an out, for four, five, or six tours, when you have to medicate troops to keep them from completely losing their grip, there will be more and more of these incidents and tragedies. Afghanistan is just another Vietnam and until the generals and chickenshit civilians realize that, incidents like this will become more and more frequent.

Heh ...

Stolen from the Americans Against the Tea Party FB page.

Happy St. Paddy's Day!

Welfare states ...

Dear Mississippi.

Shut the fuck up:

Yes, it's true, as BuzzFlash at Truthout documented a short time ago, the State of Mississippi (MS) "sucks up $2.73 in federal support for every dollar its residents pay in national taxes." In the dog-whistle language of the right wing, that makes the state where 66 percent of GOP voters believe in creationism, an official "welfare state."

In short, the MS state government run out of Jackson is a leech upon the US government, but try telling that to Mitt Romney.

...

Like my dad used to tell me when I was a kid, as long as I'm supporting you, you'll shut up and do what I tell you.

The Jukebox in my mind ...

Some good blues from Cyndi Lauper.

Cyndi Lauper - Don't Cry No More

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Thanks to MisAcerdayt179.

Fuck it...

I'm declaring "Weekend!". It's been raining here for four days. It's only just turned to snow. If we're gonna get our predicted 5-7 feet by Monday it better heavy up pretty quick.

I really like this song and nobody's made a video of it yet so I did. My folks said I'd probably go to my, er, reward on a motorcycle and that's fine with me, thus the subject matter. This song has the best verse I've heard in years:

"If you visit my grave you won't be alone,
I'll be dancin' on my own gravestone,
Bring your pretty woman, bring your fruit of the vine,
A whole lotta laughin' and a little bit o' cryin'! "

Can't ask for much more than that.

The first time I heard this song I was kinda put off by it. After a coupla times I understood - death is the end result of life and the song celebrates it as such. This is actually a pretty happy song. Fullscreen for best effect.

BTW, I put this vid on the band's Facebook page and they liked it and thought it was "trippy".

I See Hawks In L.A. ~ The Spirit Of Death

Thanks to me.

Repugs should stop and smell the flowers

I'm thinking of sending them some nice bouquets of these:

You might think that titan arum is just another monstrous, maladorous growth best left in its native jungles of Sumatra, where its vile-smelling flowers sustain the rare species by drawing pollinators with a hankering for rotting flesh. Hence the nickname -- corpse plant.

And I wish them all the tidings the name of the plant implies.

Shit seeks its own level Headline of the Day

Westboro releases ‘You Might Be a Slut’ ad for Limbaugh’s show

Quote of the Day

Bill Maher via PoliticalTicker:

"It's no coincidence that the type of tree which God forbade Adam and Eve eating from was the tree of knowledge. Rick Santorum home-schools his children because he does not want them eating that (audio bleep) apple," Maher said. "He wants them locked up in the Christian madrassa that is the family living room, not out in public where they could be infected by the virus of reason."

Home schooling is a great way to keep kids from learning inconvenient things they don't want them to - facts, truth, history, science, etc. An ignorant population is easily frightened and manipulated and will believe the lies the Repugs want them to.

The War on Women ...

The new MoveOn.org commercial if you haven't seen it:

Might as well ...

Wear sheets. Or, as Fez put it "Old, extra White and Stupid is no way to go through political life." Why? This is why:

...

"The Republicans really are the party of white people, and especially older white people," Kohut told reporters as the poll was released. "They’ve done nothing in this campaign to make themselves be more favorably viewed" among other parts of the electorate.

...

Latinos, for example, view the Republican Party unfavorably by a 2-1 margin (30% favorable, 60% unfavorable). By contrast, Latinos view the Democrats favorably, 56%-31%.

...

Christ ...

This is why I generally avoid Americans when I'm traveling abroad. I've heard this shit many places ("What do you mean they don't speak English," in some little town in Bumfuck, Portugal) but a presidential candidate with 3 graduate degrees should know better, even if it is the Frothy One.

...

Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum told Puerto Ricans on Wednesday they would have to make English their primary language if they want to pursue U.S. statehood, a statement at odds with the U.S. Constitution.

...

The best one I ever heard was in the Port of Marseilles, France. I was standing on one of the weather decks aboard MS Prinsendam with the cruise director, his wife, and my wife (all Francophiles btw) when another passenger asks the cruise director why the flags on the pier, arranged in a circle, didn't have an American flag included in the display. The cruise director explained France was part of the EU and the 20-odd flags were from EU nations. The other passenger asks then "So why don't they have an American flag?"

When someone in Europe says "you're so American," it's not intended as a compliment.

That Sinking Feeling

Newsweek

For passionate Pacific Islanders, the people of Kiribati are displaying impressive sang-froid. Destined to disappear undersea as a result of climate change, the atoll nation is making arrangements for the day when it will exist only in out-of-date atlases. Kiribati’s government intends to purchase 6,000 acres in Fiji—a land blessed with less precarious sea levels, and, clearly, a very accommodating people—on which to relocate Kiribati’s entire population of 103,000. The projected date for the change of address: 2062.

In case you've never heard of Kiribati, you have. Here's a little movie about it:

Thanks to openflix.

Statistics ...

...

In 2009, Benjamin G. Edelman of the Harvard Business School published the results of a state-by-state study on the number of people who were subscribing to adult membership Web sites; Edelman found that eight of the 10 states that had the highest per capita consumption of online porn were states that Republican John McCain won in 2008’s presidential election. Utah topped the list, and other red states in Edelman’s top 10 included Oklahoma, Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana, Alaska, North Dakota and West Virginia. The only states in Edelman’s top 10 that Obama won in 2008 were Florida and Hawaii.

More recently, in December 2011, Rutgers University researcher/blogger Omar Haq published the results of his study on Google searches for gay porn. Haq found that between 2004-2011, the top 10 states that had the most Google searches for gay porn included five states that McCain won in 2008 (Texas, Mississippi, Kentucky, Louisiana, West Virginia) and five states that Obama won (New York, Ohio, New Mexico, Nevada and Florida). “People subscribe to a lot of porn in the southern Bible Belt states,” Haq noted. “I really believe it is suppression. Freud himself said that the more you suppress people, the more they are going to want to do something. It might be due to conservatism; I think that definitely plays a role."

...

Can we now please shut up about porn vs. morality?

There's a first ...

I actually agree with Ann Coulter:

...

"And just a more corporate problem is I think our party and particularly our movement, the conservative movement, does have more of a problem with con men and charlatans than the Democratic Party," she said. "I mean, the incentives seem to be set up to allow people — as long as you have a band of a few million fanatical followers, you can make money. The Democrats have managed to figure out how not to do that."

...

It's because the Dem base probably has an average of 75-100 IQ points over the GOP base.

Quote of the Day

Blue Girl and Yellow Dog:

Shut up about firing Rush Limbaugh! For the love of all that is holy, shut up about firing him. He needs to stay on the air and keep talking, doubling down every few days, all the way to November, criminy, even republicans are bailing on him, now is no time for him to clam up.

And ...

Speaking of right wing nutjob theocrats, Charlie Pierce* looks at the Frothy One's latest success and the people who gave it to him:

...

For all the post-game analysis of whether or not Santorum is now clearly "the real conservative" alternative to Romney, and whether or not it's time for N. Leroy Gingrich, Definer Of Civilization's Rules And Leader (Perhaps) Of The Civilizing Forces, to get out of his way, the basic point is being missed. The basic argument is not about being "the real conservative" per se; it's about being "the real conservative" as "conservative" is defined by a shoeless, Bible-banging, anti-intellectual, woman-hating, sex-maddened Republican base. And, for the moment, that is Santorum in full. He has recovered from whatever damage he did to himself in Michigan, and I'm thinking he didn't really do that much. His retrograde position on contraception is now fully part of the mainstream debate. He has been rewarded by the people who feel the same way he does, and they happen to be the people who are driving the train at the moment. And he's doubled down on all the other faith-based nonsense that passes for critical thought in the Republican party. Daring to be stupid is the highest form of courage to the people to whom Santorum is pitching his campaign. And there are a lot of them, and very few of them are sold on Willard Romney.

"The dangers of carbon dioxide? Tell that to a plant, how dangerous carbon dioxide is," he said.
(I asked a tree in my front yard, Rick. It said it thought you were a colossal dick.)

...

That's why guys like Frothy don't want people to go to college, ignorant people are easier to manipulate. I don't know why the GOP doesn't adopt the slogan "The dumber you are, the more we like you".

*Not a right wing nutjob theocrat.

Since ...

Politicians love watching polls, they should watch this one (.pdf!) closely:

...

1. Support for Continued Diplomacy Rather Than an Israeli Military Strike
Only one in four Americans favor Israel conducting a military strike against Iran’s nuclear program. Seven in ten favor instead the US and other major powers continuing to pursue negotiations with Iran. Three in four say that the US should primarily act through the UN Security Council rather than acting by itself.

...

3. If Israel Goes Ahead With a Strike
If Israel goes ahead with a military strike against Iran’s nuclear program and Iran retaliates (but not against American targets), only one in four favors the US providing military support for Israel and only 4 in 10 favor the US providing even diplomatic support. Few would support open opposition. The most popular position is for the US to take a neutral stance. If Israel strikes Iran even without American approval one in three Americans think the US would provide military support and a slight majority thinks that it would at least provide diplomatic support.

...

The American people are sick of war and a very small few actually want us to get sucked into another one by some right-wing nutjob theocrats in another country.

Great thanks to Dr. Fez for the link.

Woman On The Wheel

I doubt if Ms. Peters anticipated the knives currently being thrown at women from the right , but this song turns out to be rather timely. Posted on YouTube yesterday.

"One false move and it's a real bad day at the amusement park"

Thanks to gretchenpeters.

If only...

Thanks to Slate.

Lee needs an Intervention!

In a Rude Pundit post about Sandra Fluke comes this:

(Note: The Rude Pundit is having a serious case of the writer's block when it comes to bloggery. Hopefully, he'll drink his way through it. If not, he may need to call in the pill guy. If that doesn't work, he'll call the powder guy. If that doesn't work, he'll call the virgin sacrifice guy. One way or another, he'll deal with it.)

Fixer, if you can lift it, take yer stash bag and get over there! I know it doesn't have any virgins...

"They don't like me. They really, really don't like me".

The National Memo.

Mitt Romney's losses in Alabama and Mississippi underscore a stark reality: The core of his party does not want him.

To paraphrase The Rolling Stones:

You don't always get what you want/but if you try sometime/I think you'll find/you get exactly what you got comin'.

If there was any clearcut karma in the world they'd get a Santorum/Gingrich ticket. I'd love it, but they'll get Romney and then they'll lose, just not as badly.

Collapse of the shiny pretty things

If it's Wednesday, it must be Morford on how we're runnin' outta planet ta fuck up.

And then the international think tank said, you know what? It's still not working.

All the green initiatives in the world combined with all your good intentions intermixed with a million heartfelt promises to do better, all the environmental summit agreements and all the solar panels and recycled toothbrushes and spending all those hours sorting plastic from glass and carefully rinsing your mustard bottles?

What's that you say? You've heard it all before? The end is nigh and civilization as we know it is on track for serious collapse, meltdown, infrastructure implosion unless -- and this might be the biggest unless in modern world history -- unless there's a major and they do mean major overhaul of how culture, greed and entitlement operate? Sure you have. So did the Romans

Hence, zombies. Hence, Rick Santorum's sad little existence, his and his followers' blind faith in an angry, self-hating God to save us all from His own creation.

Hence, gruesome end times scenarios, apocalypse porn and a new reality show called "Doomsday Preppers" -- or was that "Doomsday Bunkers"? -- all about numbly misanthropic, unbathed white nutballs in mostly Podunk towns readying themselves for the end of the world by stockpiling canned meat, coddling large firearms and training themselves in hand-to-zombie combat as they feed their twitchy kids stuff they killed with a crossbow in the driveway. Neat.

Here is the question of our day: Does it take a cataclysm? It takes a wake up call so massive and deadly there is nothing else to be done but make ferocious and painful change? Or can it be induced by something more calm and deeply felt, a flip and turn in the soul, an intimate spiritual awakening writ large? What's it going to take? I don't know, either, but whatever it is, it really might require some intense sacrifice on the part of -- whoa, wait a second. Is that the new iPad? Wow. Pretty.

Shorter: smoke it while ya got it before the Earth is all stems and seeds. Enjoy.

Exactly!

Stolen from the Americans Against The Tea Party FB page.

I admit it ...

I talk a lotta shit. If you ever catch up to me at a cocktail party or at a bar on a cruise ship, I will regale you with strange, made up stories, tell you shit just to get a rise out of you, and tell a lot of off-color jokes. I'm also the master of the grand entrance. It's the way I am and I always draw a crowd. I've had total strangers come up to me, shake my hand, and tell me what a funny guy I am. Thing is, I'll tell you I'm bullshitting and I don't ever expect to get paid for the crap I say.

That said, some people whose words could have life and death implications, talk a lotta shit, take it and themselves seriously, and actualy draw a 6-figure salary:

...

Seriously, O'Hanlon has never been right about anything, not even whether Sarah Palin had a clue what she was talking about in foreign policy. (She didn't.) It's just amazing that he's still out there getting paid to pontificate.

Quote of the Day

Our pal Comrade Misfit:

Rich and clueless. Didn't we have enough of that between 2001 and 2009?

Yes indeed, my friend.

Heh ...

Dr. Fez:

...

Of course, this being the South, those are probably the only actually innocent people in the building.

Look who's counting votes in Gooberville down south.

The Clown Car ...

The Frothy Mixture won big last night and that means we have to buy more popcorn.

Rick Santorum won primary victories in Alabama and Mississippi on Tuesday, according to network projections, bolstering his credibility as Mitt Romney’s top challenger and denying the former Massachusetts governor an opportunity to solidify his status as inevitable nominee. With most of the vote counted, Romney appeared likely to finish third in both races, with Newt Gingrich poised to take second.

...

So they're gonna continue to out-wingnut each other for the foreseeable future. The more crazy they bring, the better it will be for Barry in November.

How d'ya git a chicken stump broke?

Georgia Republican Compares Women to Cows, Pigs, And Chickens
...

"They's all jist fine fer fuckin'!"

I mighta made part of that up...

Headline of the Day

Cheney says Canada ‘too dangerous’ for visit

Yeah, a real Somalia is Canuckistan. Besides, The Dick might get arrested for war crimes. Or get sick and have to be treated under - gasp! - socialized medicine.

Better just stay holed up in Der Dickenbunker and wait for your battery to run down, Dick.

Off ...

Gonna be in Manhattan in a little while with the Mrs. to see our lovely and talented niece Lauren perform in a showcase for Broadway agents, directors, and producers. Break a leg, sweetie!

Because we have to get out ...

Sooner rather than later. I'm putting our pal Montag's post up in toto. Please sign the petition.

Calling all bloggers

I have had enough of that bullshit Kabuki we call the War on Afghanistan. I have started a petition on the White House website calling for us to declare Victory in Afghanistan and get out. I need your help to get 25,000 signatures by April 10. If we get to that number the White House says they will respond. I don't want to hear that it will not do any good. All I want are as many signatures as possible. Please sign and pass it around to as many people as you can.

There is a registration necessary to sign but they are already watching you so it is harmless.


Declare Victory in Afghanistan and bring all troops home now.

Can't fix stupid ...

Personally, I don't know why anybody gives a shit what people in Mississippi and Alabama think anymore.

...

In Alabama, 45 percent say he's a Muslim, 41 percent aren't sure and 14 percent think Obama's a Christian. In Mississippi, 52 percent of likely GOP voters say Obama's a Muslim, 36 percent aren’t sure and only 12 percent take his word that he's a Christian.

...

I mean, come on, who really looks at that part of the country as a hotbed of intellectualism? You know Dems can't win there, no matter what they say. There is no way these people will support a black man in the White House and they're gonna believe what Rush, Hannity, and Fox 'News' tells them.

Update:

And it might just be time for this little reminder.

Support The Troops. Until it costs money....

We've posted before about government nickel-nosing that threatens the mental health of Bush's Unnecessary Veterans until the last one of them dies from old age in about a hundred years. Dr. Winston Chung in the EssEffChron revisits this despicable aspect of "support the troops":

Amidst speculation and outcry surrounding the alleged killer of 16 civilians in Afghanistan, the AP reports that the solider comes from a base, Lewis-McChord, that has a history of soldiers being convicted for killing Afghan civilians, one who shot a Salt Lake City police officer, and another who killed a Mt. Ranier National Park ranger.

Joint Base Lewis-McChord saw more suicides in 2011 than ever before and doctors at its hospital, Madigan Army Medical Center, are being reviewed for whether they have been influenced by how much a PTSD diagnosis can cost.
...

Captain Susan Carlson is a social worker whose story was chronicled in the New York Times last month, serving as an example of one of thousands who have been discharged from the military by virtue of being diagnosed with a personality disorder. She provided portions of her medical record to the New York Times, including a document signed by a psychiatrist saying, “Her command specifically asks for a diagnosis of a personality disorder,” (my em) suggesting the possibility that military commanders pressure clinicians to issue diagnoses for reasons other than soldiers’ best interests.

Based on these trends, I guess it’s not surprising that the military has also become wary of the costs for treating veterans’ mental health. But, the war in Afghanistan continues and what few vets I’ve seen that are returning from this war have some of the most serious mental health needs.

As resources continue to be cut and minimized, what happens to the mental health of the thousands of soldiers who continue to fight in Afghanistan?

We'll find out and it won't be pretty.

Just a word about the recent killings in Clusterfuckistan - I'm a little grateful that the doggie Sergeant nutted up over there rather than waiting 'til he got back to Washington.

He may have done us all a favor if the timetable for getting the fuck out of that shithole moves up because of his alleged act.

Quote of the Day

Bill Maher

Tough weekend for Mitt Romney - lost Kansas by a zillion pts. Guess an endorsement by Ted Nugent aint what it used to be.

Heh. His cat scratch fever musta done cooled off.

"But it's Spring, sir!"

The weather has been gorgeous on the Isle of Long, low 60s to 70, for the last few days and me and the girls have been out in the yard getting rid of the remnants of winter (mild as it was). On our way out now to prep the flower beds.

Works for me ...

Hey, if our women have to get 'probed' to get adequate reproductive care, the men should have to do their part as well:

Before getting a prescription for Viagra or other erectile dysfunction drugs, men would have to see a sex therapist, receive a cardiac stress test and get a notarized affidavit signed by a sexual partner affirming impotency, if state Sen. Nina Turner has her way.

...

I'd add they should have a colonoscopy too, just to check for prostate problems, a major cause of impotence.

"Lube? What is this 'lube' you speak of?" Heh ...

Time to go ...

This just makes it that much harder for our boys and girls over there:

US troops in Afghanistan have been placed on alert following the killings of 16 Afghan civilians by a US soldier.

US officials warned of reprisals after the soldier went on a rampage in villages near a base in Kandahar. Nine children were among those killed.

...

It's long past time to get out of that shithole. At this point we've shitted up our own bed so badly that even if we doubled our resources over there it still wouldn't do any good. Just as other nations have learned since time immemorial, Afghanistan is a lost cause.

Update:

Our pal Comrade Misfit says it quite well.

...

I have no idea how this all can be turned around. I believe that if there was a time when we could have prevailed in Afghanistan, it was gone by 2005. We squandered the chance we had to make a difference and, since then, it has been more a matter of denying the flow of the tide of the war. The cheerily optimistic pronouncements from first the Bush Administration and now the Obama Administration have been the equivalent of putting pretty siding over a rotting structure.

...

Yeah, if we would have done it correctly from the get go, we might have had some success there, but the Chimp and his henchmen were never serious about Afghanistan. All they wanted was to use it as a stepping stone to Iraq and anywhere else in that part of the world who had oil.

The reason why ...

I say John McCain should be relegated to a rocking chair on his front porch, yelling at the kids to get off his lawn:

Former Republican presidential nominee John McCain is still adamant that no one was more qualified than Sarah Palin to be vice president in 2008.

...

Time to get you back to the home, gramps.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

State Legislature in Wisconsin Passes Bill to Amend State Constitution to Restrict Recall Elections
If it goes well, all elections will be outlawed.

U.S. to Cut Size of Iraq Embassy Staff in Half
World’s largest embassy building will now employ just enough people to sweep the floors.

And mercs.

Pat Robertson Calls for Legal Sales of Pot
Just not to homosexuals.

Study: LSD Can Help Treat Alcoholism
And a few stiff drinks can stop the hallucinations.

And around and around we go...

Heh ...

Mitt Romney's "Southern Strategy". Heh ...

I liked Dennis Kucinich ...

I liked what he stood for and I liked his stand on principles, however:

Glenn Greenwald says everything that needs to be said about the near universal reaction to the defeat of Dennis Kucinich. It's dispiriting, to say the least, that such a stalwart liberal losing his office is celebrated with even more gusto than the defeat of your average Blue Dog, but there it is.

I realize that Kucinich was an odd duck and that he probably "asked for it" by supporting the gerrymander along with a hundred other bad political decisions. Nobody ever said he was a master strategist. What he was, was the guy who occupied the most leftward space in our political system along with just a small handful of others like Barbara Lee and Bernie Sanders --- and that's important. It's not like they grow on trees.

...

I support anyone who has the backbone to stand up for the right things but it does no good if that person is not taken seriously. Kucinich's "odd duck" persona prevented a lot of people on his own side from taking him seriously, even though they shared principles. Comparing him to Bernie Sanders and Barbara Lee isn't fair to Sanders or Lee who are taken seriously by their side. I don't give a shit what conservatives say about them because they'd never vote for Sanders or Lee but when they speak, progressives listen. When Kucinich spoke, the most common reaction was "what did he pull out of his ass now?"

I hope he does well in the private sector and hopefully will be able to push the progressive message a little better, but I'm not sad he's out of the Congress. An elected representative who says crazy shit more times than not is not what's needed at this time. I'm sure the people of his former district would like a representative whose voice is considered in the debate as opposed to being mostly dismissed and ignored. He might be a hero to us raging Lefties, but his constituents decided that they'd rather someone more effective than wacky.

Conservative propaganda ...

Our pal Montag shows that once again, conservative policy, once put into practice, is an abject failure:

The Republican/Teabagger attack on Obamacare needed a front man to begin the trek to the Supreme Court. They found a front woman in the person of Mary Brown, owner of a small Florida body shop. She was adamantly opposed to being required to buy health insurance. Now for the fun part.

...

It had to happen...

From the "Technology" section of the LATimes:

Man charged with bigamy after two wives find each other on Facebook
...

The first wife was apparently totally in the dark about Faulk/O'Neill's second marriage until Facebook listed wife No. 2 under the "People You May Know" feature.

Wife No. 1 clicked through to wife No. 2's Facebook page, and that's where she saw the telltale cake picture.

Make up yer own tagline. Heh.

Why Ron Paul Took Up Politics

"Is this all there is?"

"Brain Dead Morons"

Quit holding back and say what you mean, dammit! Heh.

Thanks to oldfartrants.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

A pretty gospel tune.

Emmylou Harris - Who Will Sing For Me

Thanks to Mr2cuteHappy.

It's the Amurrikan Way

Why Can’t You Smoke Pot? Because Lobbyists Are Getting Rich Off of the War on Drugs

Yep. You are a criminal if you cut out Big Pharma's bottom line. Or the po-leece unions or the Prison Industrial Complex. Or the liquor lobby. I'm pretty sure the fix is in.

Thanks to YubaNet.

Selma Revisited

200 Marchers Carry on Selma-Montgomery Journey

You can no doubt watch it on MSNBC since Reverend Al is involved.

I passed through Selma AL just a few days after the original marches, maybe even in betweenst 'em since I'm not sure of the actual date, on my way to Camp Lejeune. The only reason I went through there was that it was on the road I was taking.

I must have gone through the outskirts of town because as I remember it there wasn't much to the place. I knew about the march and decided to send my folks a postcard so I stopped at a store.

The next person to enter the store was the biggest fucking cop I've ever seen in my life. His shoulder patch read "Alabama Alcohol & Beverage Control". They must have a lotta trouble controlling beverages down there because this guy had about the same weapons loadout as the average Marine fire team. And a lot more leather. Oooh...

Did I mention that I was driving a '48 Plymouth with California plates and a college decal in the back window? The cop musta thought I wuz another one'a them commies come ta free the Nee-groes and wanted ta nip it, nip it in the bud!

He must have seen the MCRDSD base sticker during his no doubt detailed inspection of my Kalifornia Krime Wagon because he took one look at my haircut and tan line that ended just above my ears and figured I wasn't the enemy and noticeably relaxed.

I don't remember if we exchanged any pleasantries. I sent my folks the postcard and was possibly the most well-protected motorist in the state of Alabama on my way east. The cop stayed in my rear view mirror for miles. Heh.

This Is What Prompted Laurens County’s “Purity Pledge”

Fitsnews - "Unfair. Imbalanced."

An embarrassing (and judging from Google, ongoing) national news story about a Republican “purity pledge” in Laurens County, S.C. had its roots in a small-town affair.
...

So … South Carolina is now the butt of national jokes (again) because a bunch of rural Republicans wanted to prevent the reelection of a philandering cop?

Um … yeah. That pretty much sums it up.

Heh. The population density of Laurens County is 97 people per square mile. Kinda lonely. Anything for a laugh, I guess, even if it's on them.

The Revolutionary War's Battle Of Mud Lick Creek might have been the most interesting thing to have happened there, and they have to share it with neighboring Newberry County.

Headline of the Day

Arizona Senate approves lying to women to prevent abortions

Why not? The Repugs approve of lying about anything and everything to get their way.

"A Second Civil War is a real possibility"

From The Passing of Andrew Breitbart: Know Thine Enemies:

We are in a civil war folks. The corporatist state side (AKA the corporate power) knows it. Many on our side don't. They still think that it's politics as usual. They think that at some time the Republican Party will come to its senses and return to being the traditional center-right party it was until the Gingrich wing took it over. It's time that we all begin to wake up. The GOP is now a far-right party, in the context of what such parties look like in the other advanced capitalist nations. US capitalism has become increasingly less dependent on manufacturing and increasingly more dependent on the extraction and sale, at home and abroad, of fossil fuels, and on profits to be derived from purely financial transactions. Since the GOP cannot run on such a platform, it must run on such issues as racism, homophobia, misogyny, religious bigotry (abortion illegalization being based much more on the latter than the former), Islamophobia, and the drive towards Permanent War (although other words are used to describe it).

We've known this for years, but it seems to be dawning on folks thanks to the tremendous tin-eared ineptitude of this primary season and Obama Obssessive Disorder in the candidates, Repug gasbags, and the retard Dead End Quarter whom they think is a lot bigger than it is.

Republican presidential hopefuls have met the enemy...

This is good! NY Daily News snark-o-rama on the Repug primary flusterpluck. 1st and last ¶:

They stand up there, week after week, moving from state to state but somehow preaching to the same choir of angry whites, and it is as if Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich and even Ron Paul — the one who actually seems to say what he means — are running for the President of Podunk, not the United States.
...

They haven’t just run off women and kids and people of color with this slog of a campaign for President of Podunk. They have run off smart people. Dumbest campaign ever, getting dumber by the minute. I keep hearing they’re worried about going to Tampa without a candidate. Why? It might be their best option.

I hope so! Romney's going to get the nod, but the double-dealing back-room bullshit they have to use to get that might be the most fun of all.

Quote of the Day

Drifty:

...

The modern history of American Conservatism [is] the story of the Right hitting the same slot machine over and over again, hoping that it will come up "Ein Volk. Ein Reich. Ein Führer."

...

Ha-ha!

Wonder when they're gonna shut the lights off:

Rush Limbaugh is in trouble. Two days ago he didn't have a single unpaid public service announcement on his flagship show on WABC in NYC. Yesterday, 56% of his ads in NYC were unpaid PSAs. Today, 90% were unpaid PSAs, and the show included three occurrences of 'dead air'.

...

Good on ya, girls.

Jaw, Meet Floor...

Pat Robertson Says Marijuana Use Should be Legal

He's old enough he's entitled to get one right before he croaks. Now he can croak.

Quote of the Day

Fez:

...

Which one of The Four Horseman* of the Asspocalypse are going walk in the limo tracks of Ronald Reagan and be driven to Philadelphia, Mississippi so as to metaphorically if not literally piss on the graves of Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner by praising state's rights ("stahts rats") while decrying affirmative action, or possibly even race mixing?

...

Shopping Day

Big day! Spa Day for the pups and breakfast at Q's! I'll leave yas with Morford since it's Wednesday.

How about issues and ideas, politics and public debate? Is it your most favorite thing ever to take the most combustible, extremist stance imaginable on nearly every topic, no matter how grotesque or absurd, and then slam your way through the nuances and counterarguments with a sledgehammer made of phlegm and odium just to get attention, gathering enemies and antagonism like a spent nuclear rod gathers imminent doom and wrapping the whole thing in a glorious sheen of brazen douchebaggery?

Is this you? Very good. Let us call you Option One.

Enjoy! See yas later.

Hardons and Jerkoffs ...

Jill looks at the reasons behind the Republicans' limpness and the kind of porn they need to get it up again:

...

The national security and economic agendas we've seen from Republicans during this election season are nothing new. But it does clarify just why the low-information voter -- you know, the kind who would applaud a candidate who thinks that a President who wants everyone to have access to education and job training is a "snob" -- responds to Republicans. Because there's something reassuring about seeing, year after year, election after election, a bunch of white guys out there talking about the same things over and over again: The answer to all our economic problems is to give more money to the rich, and the answer to our fading American empire is to find someone to bomb. Republicans may have felt emasculated when a black man defeated Sen. Bomb-Bomb-Iran in 2008. They may be feeling emasculated when the economy starts to show signs of life for someone other than those in Mitt Romney's income level. I KNOW they're feeling emasculated when women rise up in the face of blatant misogyny and say "Enough!" But creating a nice big conflagration in the Middle East? THAT gets the blood flowing to the Republican member again.

Shhh ...

Sandra Fluke is a secret agent lady ... or something. Thankfully, Thers spent more time on it than I did:

...

Wow, that is some devestating evidence that Sandra Fluke is "being sold by the left as something she’s not." She was Cunningly Disguised by publishing an article under her name, and perfidiously hid her True Purpose by making the article available to anyone running a search using... her name.

OMIGOD, she published an article about a separate subject taking a position that a lot of people on the right might dislike, therefore, she is wrong about contraception, and a fraud! Also she believes things that people on the right don't like! How... something proof of something!

...

I'm waiting for the conservatives to blame the slut prosititute woman for killing Breitbart.

Dear God, Please Blow Me

Pat Robertson: Prayer Could Have Stopped the Tornadoes

The equally ridiculous flip side is that some of what the phony Christians like Robertson pray for mighta caused them.

Springsteen takes aim at robber barons and bankers

Kos on Springsteen's new album, links at site.

But "Death to My Hometown" has company on Wrecking Ball as a political song. As on so many earlier Springsteen albums, Wrecking Ball is populated by characters speaking to us, telling their stories. Those stories were never as bright and hopeful as their often-anthemic settings made casual or careless listeners think, but they've gotten darker and again, point a finger at the causes of the darkness. In "Jack of All Trades," a man lists all the jobs he does in the effort to survive, assuring that "I'm a jack of all trades, honey, we'll be all right." But despite that reassurance, despite the comforting (or defeated? we can't quite tell) tone and the litany of work he can and will do, this struggle for survival has context—"The banker man grows fatter, the working man grows thin"—and, if at the time those lines are delivered they sound resigned, two verses later, the speaker voices his anger—"If I had me a gun, I'd find the bastards and shoot 'em on sight."

I will be getting this album.

Lakotas arrested halting Keystone XL pipeline trucks

the narcosphere

An action alert was sent out shortly before the arrests: "Calling all Lakota men on the Pine Ridge Reservation to come to Wanblee, South Dakota." The alert said "Pipeline trucks are being held there at the border by our Lakota Oyate, Oglala Sioux Tribal Police and State Troopers in an effort to keep them from entering our territory. Even the state troopers told the trucks they have to turn around and cannot bring their pipeline or other materials on to our reservation."

"Pipeline trucks are refusing to turn around claiming they have corporate rights that supersede any other law." Reports from the scene say that the trucks are being allowed to pass, as Lakotas are being arrested attempting to halt the trucks from entering their sovereign territory."

One sentence bears repeating:

"Pipeline trucks are refusing to turn around claiming they have corporate rights that supersede any other law."

There ya go. One of the biggest problems we've got in a nutshell.

"Must Read" of the Day

An open letter to the people who hate Obama more than they love America

Sample:

You like war. You like torture. You like Jesus. I don't know how in the hell any of that is compatible, but no one ever accused you haters of being over-committed to ideological consistency. You like people who look like you or at least hate most of the things that you hate. You hate everything else.

Yes ...

This is what young Americans are fighting and dying for:

Women are subordinate to men, should not mix in work or education and must always have a male guardian when they travel, according to new guidelines from Afghanistan's top clerics which critics say are dangerously reminiscent of the Taliban era.

The edicts appeared in a statement that also encouraged insurgents to join peace talks, fuelling fears that efforts to negotiate an end to a decade of war, now gathering pace after years of false starts and dead ends, will come at a high cost to women.

"There is a link with what is happening all over the country with peace talks and the restrictions they want to put on women's rights," said Afghan MP Fawzia Koofi, who warned that the new rules were a "green light for Talibanisation".

...

It's time to leave these goat fuckers in the 12th Century and get the fuck out. To quote the Chimp before we went into that god forsaken shithole "We are not in the business of building nations". Sorry, but these people had over a decade to get it together and they haven't made the effort. Loyalty can still be bought as easily as it was when the Soviets were there and these people don't want a central government; never have, never will. They don't want democracy, they don't want technology, and they don't want to know about anything but their parochial needs and their subservience to Allah (seems they have a different Allah than the Muslims I know but that's another post).

Fuck this shit. It's time to get out and let them go back to beating their women, raping their children, and killing each other over insults. It's 10 years on and if it was gonna happen, it would have happened already. It's never gonna happen.

Really?

How stupid do you have to be to come up with something like this? Did some idiot actually think it was a good idea to alienate everybody who might vote for them before November?

Before you can join the Laurens County Republican Party in South Carolina and get on the primary ballot, they ask that you pledge that you’ve never ever had pre-marital sex — and that you will never ever look at porn again.

Last Tuesday, the LCGOP unanimously adopted a resolution that would ask all candidates who want to get on the primary ballot to sign a pledge with 28 principles, because the party “does not want to associate with candidates who do not act and speak in a manner that is consistent with the SC Republican Party Platform.”

...

Half these Republican guys can't get it up without looking at porn.

How to Make Siri Curse Like a Sailor

Heh. Gizmodo again, this time on the creepiest disembodied voice since HAL. With a decidedly NSFW video!

Getting bored with Siri? Us too. Finding out what the weather is, setting reminders and asking question gets old. You know what never gets old? Hearing a robot voice curse. I mean, we're all teenage boys at heart, right? Here's how to make Siri curse like a motherfucking sailor.
...

Siri won't respond with an f-bomb if you curse at her but she will call you whatever you tell her to call you. So if you replace your name with Mr. Dickfuck Shitlicker Damnbitch Asshole, she'll call you just that.

More.

Here's a good one:

Have you all seen that annoying "Rock God" Apple iPhone commercial? I fixed it.

Thanks to 106.3 The Buzz.

From The Buzz:

When I first saw that commercial, I looked over at my wife and said, “So that’s now ‘Nickelback’ got started!”

Heh.

My sides, they hurt...

Gizmodo

The Montgomery County (Texas) Sheriff's Office had a big day planned. After becoming the first department in the country with its own aerial drone ($300,000!), they were ready for a nice photo op. And then the drone crashed into a SWAT team.
...

"[The] prototype drone was flying about 18-feet off the ground when it lost contact with the controller's console on the ground. It's designed to go into an auto shutdown mode...but when it was coming down the drone crashed into the SWAT team's armored vehicle."
...

It's no wonder we're not able to find a video of this spectacular publicity failure.

No shit!

Good thing it didn't crash into the local Dunkin Donut shop. Woulda got a buncha cops with one one round. Heh.

Headline of the Day

Gingrich Bets Big Oil Will ‘Crater The Economy’ To Defeat Obama

They're trying. They will fail. Nice of Neutie to say it out loud though.

Bootstraps ...

And all that:

Despite the Republicans' continual insistance that climate change isn't a real phenomenon, the tornado season started a full month earlier than most years in the Midwest. To date, there have been 46 confirmed deaths.

Wide swaths of the Midwest have been destroyed, leaving American people to pick up the battered pieces of their lives and rebuild.

But Governor John Kasich has just made it that much harder for Ohioans to do just that:

...

We don't need federal disaster aid. Look at all that busted up lumber laying around. All you need to do is buy some nails and a hammer and you can build some sort of shelter. Grab them bootstraps and start pulling, Ohio.

The stupid ...

It burns.

Since when ...

Did Israel become the 51st State?

...

Is Netanyahu taking heat from U.S. legislators for publicly disrespecting Obama? Are you kidding? Congress is too busy bowing to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the pro-Israel lobbying group, which just happens to be meeting in Washington this weekend.

...

I tell ya, were I the President (or Emperor), I would do a "Kennedy-to-the-Moon" and demand a full conversion to renewable energy by the end of the decade. Then, I would kiss the Middle East off, Arab and Israeli alike, and tell them to settle it among themselves. If they all end up killing each other? Oh well ...

Update:

Yeah, let's start another war anyway. What the fuck is wrong with these people?

Repug talking points

Stolen from my own FB page after stealing it from several others.



Yeah, that oughta work...

The nation's business ...

My ass:

Stolen from the Being Liberal FB page.

Word ...

Drifty:

...

If this is your first exposure to American Conservatism, what you must understand is that ever since they got bent over the barrel at Appomattox Courthouse and forced to surrender on terms set by the Union devils, Southern White bigots have made it a point of honor never to apologize for any of the loathsome, depraved, anti-American things they say and do, but to instead stand proudly up for their heritage as inbred, rage-drunk, racist shitbags.

...

The Jukebox in my mind ...

What went through my head when I heard about Rush Lintball's 'apology':

Pat Benatar - Little Too Late

Quote of the Day

Michael Moore:

Thanks to the Americans Against The Tea Party FB page.