On Friday night’s edition of “Real Time with Bill Maher,” host Bill Maher and guests filmmaker Michael Moore, commentator S. E. Cupp and New York Times columnist Andrew Ross Sorkin discussed the obstructionist Republican Congress and its mission to take down the president by taking down the country. Moore opined that the Republican Party is a “squealing dinosaur” whose time has come.
Okay, Tea Baggers, really. It’s time for you guys to fuck off out of American politics. You have gone over the backside of sanity, landed in a pile of stupidity and then topped it all off by playing in traffic. I could handle Benghazi. I could handle Fast and Furious. I could handle the IRS scandal. I could handle the AP tapping scandal. That being said…They proved that long ago but this one is absolutely the most ridiculous reaction yet.
When you start freaking the fuck out because the President had a Marine hold his umbrella at a press conference, you have proven yourself unfit for adult conversation.
You are dumbing our country down. No one in their right mind has any business being upset about this, seriously. This is the kind of shit you should be embarrassed to grouse about, because it is so very, very inconsequential. In fact, it’s the kind of thing you only notice when your hatred for someone has made you blind with rage. It’s when you idiots harp about subjects like this that it becomes almost impossible not to assume some kind of racial element is at play. Otherwise, why would you care? Why would you waste your energy? Life here on this planet is short — and it could be even shorter now that we know carbon levels in our atmosphere are at extremely precarious levels to say the least — so why waste any of that time being angry about something that Marine probably felt honored to be asked to do?That Marine was probably so glad he wasn't anywhere he could get blown to bits by disgruntled goat fuckers he would have gladly tickled Obama's ass with a feather.
I think I understand though why you decided to give a fuck about Umbrellagate. It’s because you know deep down that Benghazi was squashed and now may wind-up blowing up in the GOP’s face since they decided to doctor the White House emails. The IRS scandal will likely end up pushing the pendulum back towards sanity in campaign finance, and may even be used to justify a renewed push to overturn Citizens United. Already two of your pet scandals have been effectively put to rest — not that Grand Inquisitor Darrell Issa will get the memo, but somewhere inside your blackened hearts you know this to be the case. So it’s time for Rush, Hannity and Beck to tell you the next manufactured outrage you need to partake in.
Published on May 16, 2013
Emmylou Harris, Merle Haggard & Willie Nelson Performing at the Grand Opening, from Dust to Dreams... Smith Center for the Performing Arts in Las Vegas.
Eric Holder Pushes Louie Gohmert Into a Crazy Idiot Rage:
...it was gratifying to see him bitch slap arrogant numbnuts Rep. Darrell Issa at yesterday's House Judiciary Committee hearing. But one other confrontation from the bizarro hearing, which covered everything from pot legalization to Kermit Gosnell's crimes, will give you a little warmth on this cold fish of a week.I think technically Miss Becky vomits into the infinite void inside Gomer's Brain Housing Group but I'm not picky about details. Heh.
So it was that Republican Rep. Louie Gohmert, a shitkicker from one of the shitkickingest districts in Texas, started to question Holder. In case you are unaware of what a hilarious public figure he is, Gohmert looks like Jim Nabors' inbred cousin and sounds like Foghorn Leghorn trying to cough up a stray pubic hair. He also is one of the craziest sumbitches in the crazy-ass House Republican caucus, ready to believe anything Glenn Beck vomits into his brain.
Holder started to speak to say that Gohmert was wrong when, his blood all het up by gettin' backsassed by a Negro, Gohmert jumped in, "You point out one thing that I pointed -- that I said that was not true." Gohmert had to have his cross-burning ass smacked down by committee chair Bob Goodlatte (which is just the most awesome name for a Republican), who told Gohmert to shut the fuck up and let Holder answer.Geebus, the guy's so fucking dumb he doesn't know when he's had his ass handed to him and he's proud of it! He knows who votes for him, though. So do we. Yeesh.
And then Holder pantsed Gohmert in front of everyone and pointed out what a tiny little dick and balls the Texan has: [...]
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What followed can best be described as Gohmert going into an insulted idiot rage, screaming and slapping himself, crying that the Negro had gotten so uppity as to tell him he's wrong, while the other Republicans, including Issa, realized they had let him out of the cellar for too long and tried desperately to shut him up and get him back into the basement to sit in his rocker next to the radio that plays Rush Limbaugh's show. Holder's look of barely contained amusement is pretty fuckin' sweet. It climaxed with Gohmert saying, and this is as clear as can be in the video, "The attorney general will not cast aspersions on my asparagus." No, really. And so, his asparagus defended, he was done.
Then Holder kicked Gohmert in the stalk, stating for the record that Louie Gohmert is not nearly as important as Louie Gohmert thinks he is: [...]
The punchline? Gohmert has posted the exchange on the front of his House website. He's proud of what he did. And you can bet his constituents are, too.
Does anyone else see this strategy coming from President Obama and this administration? Surely by now they’ve figured out from their own experiences (and from the Clinton era) that the only thing House Republicans want to do with a Democrat in office is to launch investigation after investigation, hoping to find something impeachable. Whitewater, Monica Lewinsky, Obama’s birth certificate, Benghazi and now the IRS, these are all things they’ve tried desperately to remove a president for, and miserably failed.Yeah, keeping Orange Boner from Happy Hour is cruel and unusual punishment. Suffer, bitch.
If President Obama is half as smart as I think he is, then I’m pretty sure he’s come to realize that through gerrymandering and right wing ideologues controlling primaries, he’s dealing with possibly the greatest collection of nincompoops in the history of American politics. They’re ruthless, but they’re also so eager to destroy him, they’ve become the Wile E. Coyote of Congressional investigations. He also knows that other than pushing for another tax cut for the rich or attempting to repeal the Affordable Care Act yet again, they’re not going to do anything else before Boehner and the rest head off for happy hour or another vacation.
So when you’re faced with a Congress that has nothing but utter hatred and contempt for you and a Senate that is hamstrung by procedural filibusters, what would you do if you were President? I don’t know about you, but what Obama seems to have been doing with every overblown controversy the GOP has dug up — that’s what I would do. Whether it was his birth certificate or Benghazi, or anything else, he’s let them go on and on, patiently letting the facts come out and watching Republicans lose all credibility. It’s like the poker equivalent of flopping a royal flush and playing your hand to perfection to take the maximum number of chips possible.To my description of Obama as my Stealth Ninja Jedi Prez, add Ju-jitsu Master. :-)
For example, knowing that Darrell Issa and the rest of the House GOP were working with flawed documents and then allowing them to go this far without correcting it in the beginning, that’s an epic troll on Obama’s part. He’s learned that everything he proposes, they will oppose, and vice versa. So long as the GOP is in charge, he’s going to get very little done other than watch them make fools of themselves in front of the American public. It’s really a no-lose situation. They aren’t going to work with him under any normal circumstances and the more he leads them on, the more they prove to voters how absolutely petty and partisan they are.
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[...] Kudos to President Obama for seeing the forest for the trees and letting the GOP’s ridiculous conspiracies be their downfall.
You do realize that Washington DC is not the real world, don’t you? It’s a state of mind. An altered state of mind. Where you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. Slammed when you stand and rammed when you run. Berated if you lie and lambasted for the truth. Where even the slightest of breeze can carry the pollen of disaster. And the pack on top knows the best way to avoid getting a face full of disaster pollen is to spread the dried residue of other exquisite catastrophes first. Ream or be reamed.Heh.
And as far as DC stories go, a lack of misfortunes is no good reason not to speak of them. So now the Washington punditry has banded together to float the notion that President Obama’s second term agenda has stalled. That he’s such a lame duck the presidential limousine should be sporting a blue placard hanging from the rear view mirror. Best thing to do is to burrow deep and lie low. Give up and crawl into the overhead compartment of Air Force One and eat marzipan in the dark.
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It takes a special kind of degenerative myopia to craft these precocious accusations. First off, you need to be blind as an Oedipal bat to ignore the exhaustingly recalcitrant House Majority, including leader John Boehner, who would rather be seen washing skid mark undies in a Congressional hallway water fountain, than work with the President.
To fail to witness the GOP defy the will of 90% of America while appeasing their NRA overlords, your sunglasses must be cut from slabs of granite. Wearing your hoodie on backwards to not be aware that both sides of the aisle are concerned with one thing and one thing only: re- election. Suffer from tertiary retinal jam not to notice you’re jumping on a bandwagon so flimsy a lighting moth would crash through the floorboards.
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And since we’ve agreed his Presidency is over, why stop there? Since the number one GOP strategy since January of 93 has been to deny any Democratic President even the tiniest of victories, this might be an unimpeachable time to preemptively besmirch Hillary Clinton’s upcoming first term as an unmitigated calamity and complete and utter failure. Unless you’re into self- fulfilling prophecies.
Such a dicey and delusional species are we. Such masters of self-deception, of bizarre equivocation, cherry picking our tragedies and our collective neurosis as we are told by the warped media, nasty politicos, hate-radio pundits and marketers of all kinds just which thugs and demons we should fear most, and which merely exist somewhere in blighted, faraway neighborhood you need not care about.Yeah, thanks a great steaming pile.
What’s your tremor du jour, citizen? Hooligans with guns? A twitchy NRA with even more guns? Chechen morons with unregistered cookware? The IRS?
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Do you know who’s laughing hardest about the current IRS microscandal? Exxon. Apple. Microsoft. Monsanto. Genentech. All those giants of industry that escape billions in taxes by way of various loopholes, exemptions, armies of expensive tax attorneys. Carry on, rich people – go get richer. It’s OK, no one’s looking.
The worst part of this little IRS scandal? Nope, not that Obama is having another Worst Week Ever. It’s that the Tea Party is suddenly back in the national spotlight, all righteous and spittle-flecked, full of its usual inbred nonsense, when it was all but dead a week ago. Worse still: If the GOP has its way, we’ll be hearing the Tea Party’s nasally shriek through the 2016 elections. Thanks, IRS.
...we can always find the gems among the grime, the rainbow amidst the ugly political thunderstorm.That's my default position when it comes to wingnuts. It's spring-loaded to the pissed-off position.
Look, there’s another one right now, beaming bright over Minnesota, which just became the 12th state in the union to approve gay marriage. Can you believe it? Is it not a thing?
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Minnesota is, of course, also home to the Tea Party’s twitchiest nutball, its most flagrantly insane hood ornament, one Rep. Michele Bachmann, a goofy homophobe of epic proportions who once dragged a squadron of conservative “prayer warriors” into senate chambers to ask God to help smite the evil gays.
And lo, it would appear God has finally responded to Michele Bachmann, and the nation’s right-wing homophobes in general. Can you see it? Why, it looks like a very large, very bright, very unmistakable… middle finger.
RNC Hispanic Outreach Director Becomes A DemocratHeh. The vato gets it. Also debunks the right-wing racist "Spics are stoopid" claim.
It’s High Time the IRS Investigates the Funding of the Tea PartyAmen to that!
For years now, journalists have been doing the heavy lifting in investigations of Charles and David Koch using their billionaire status to fund faux grassroots groups to push their far right agenda on the country — an agenda that effectively boils down to deregulation of corporations to the detriment of the working class, the environment and wealth equality in America. It’s about time the IRS investigated.
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In April 2010, Koch Industries issued a statement denying involvement in the creation of the Tea Party movement: “…no funding has been provided by Koch companies, the Koch foundations, Charles Koch or David Koch specifically to support the Tea Parties.” Technically, they might be correct; the Kochs funded Americans for Prosperity (AFP) which then created the Tea Party groups.
The debate right now should not be the ethics of the IRS investigating Tea Party groups – the debate should be why the U.S. Department of Justice has not brought any criminal prosecutions.No shit. Go read this.
The most extraordinary things about this truly incredible tale of World War II are that it hasn’t been told before in English, and that it hasn’t already been made into a blockbuster Hollywood movie. Here are the basic facts: on 5 May 1945—five days after Hitler’s suicide—three Sherman tanks from the 23rd Tank Battalion of the U.S. 12th Armored Division under the command of Capt. John C. ‘Jack’ Lee Jr., liberated an Austrian castle called Schloss Itter in the Tyrol, a special prison that housed various French VIPs, including the ex-prime ministers Paul Reynaud and Eduard Daladier and former commanders-in-chief Generals Maxime Weygand and Paul Gamelin, amongst several others. Yet when the units of the veteran 17th Waffen-SS Panzer Grenadier Division arrived to recapture the castle and execute the prisoners, Lee’s beleaguered and outnumbered men were joined by anti-Nazi German soldiers of the Wehrmacht, as well as some of the extremely feisty wives and girlfriends of the (needless-to-say hitherto bickering) French VIPs, and together they fought off some of the best crack troops of the Third Reich. Steven Spielberg, how did you miss this story?Much, much more! Go read!
Afghan marathon: US troops 'passing the baton to mercenaries' ahead of 2014 withdrawal
In any case, experts agree, the US paid contractors will stay in Afghanistan for many years to come.Well of course they will. Yeesh.
OBAMA PLAYS GOLF WITH THREE GOP SENATORSHeh.
Grover Norquist issues fatwas.
Disney Ends Bid to Trademark “Dia de los Muertos”Why not the 4th of July and Marine Corps Birthday too? Corporate greed unchained. Yeesh.
Still trying for Bastille Day, Oktoberfest.
Ground-Controlled Plane Flies Pilotless Nearly 500 MilesNow that's funny! Over time, the passengers will get used to it. I just hope the guy with the Xbox controller isn't controlling flights from a saloon!
Landmark flight cut short when passengers find out.
Study: College Degree Doesn't Always Pay OffWant Belgian fries with that?
But Ph.D.s in Art History have found good jobs on front lines of fast food industry.
"Now that the sonovabitch is dead, why is the US still angry with us?"The last ¶ is the money shot:
"Us", in this conversation, are the Taliban. The SOB in question is Osama bin Laden.
The Taliban’s frustration was relayed to me by Yahya Maroofi, Counsellor to Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai – Karzai's Kissinger, if Kissinger had a soul.
The Silk Road nation of Kazakhstan is an excellent place to encounter the dervishes of the Great Game for control of the camel-and-pipeline routes of the Central Asian steppes. Here we can witness the diplomatic-military idiocies of new empires pathetically attempting to ignore the dried skeletons of the imperial forces that went before them.
Maroofi was spending the day in Kazakhstan’s capital on his way to little-noticed peace negotiations – little noticed because neither Uncle Sam nor Great-Uncle Britain were invited. Attendance is limited to those frontline states that will be left holding the grenade when the US and UK pull out the pin with the removal of their troops in 2014. The lineup includes Kazakhstan, Russia, Kyrgyzstan (birthplace of the Boston Bombers) and the big new swinging dick on the block, Turkey, as well as Iran, the nation most feared and despised by the Taliban. The unannounced guests, of course, are the Taliban themselves....
However, it is the hope of most Afghans, and the goal of the Karzai government, not to kill Taliban, but to bring them into the government.
Or, as Maroofi explains, to recognise publicly that “the Taliban are already in the government, in the Parliament, in control of governorships” – but not openly. The talks among the frontline nations are to bring the Taliban back to its roots as a political organisation, not an armed insurgency.
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Chinese state companies are today lining up in Kabul with shovels and signing bonuses. Maroofi likes Chinese companies – they're more likely to provide jobs than baksheesh. Unlike Western companies.
Baksheesh. Bribes. Corruption. It was this topic that set Maroofi on a long rip. Yes, Afghans have been showered with billions in bribes, backhanders and corrupt deals, but who's paying those bribes? Who's doing the corrupting?
“Karzai told Lockheed [Lockheed Martin, the defence technology company], ‘You give hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts to my family and to my minister’s families because you expect to buy influence. You’re not getting influence, and you’re not getting your money back, either.'”
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Right now, the Taliban are ready – if reluctantly – for the peace deal, in order to get a piece of the resource action. And they're astonished that, with that sonovabitch Osama dead, the US still holds a grudge.
Why? Face it: if Karzai can end the war, then the winner of the Great Game is… China. After all, the US has almost all the ore it needs under the States or within easy grabbing distance from Canada and Latin America. And unlike China, desperate for those gas pipelines from Kyrgyzstan and oil lines from the Caspian, the US has fracked natural gas and oil coming out its arse. Indeed, unleashing Afghanistan’s resource riches will only crash the price of commodity reserves held by US companies.
Afghanistan’s peace is China’s economic life-line and America’s commodity price recession.
General Joe is not worried. “You can accuse me of being an optimist and I’ll plead guilty,” that Afghanistan is set for war without end. For US corporations, that means a profit centre without end, because even after US troops go, the military-industrial gravy train – boarded by contractors, special ops mercenaries, “development” agencies and their fixers – will continue to roll.General Joe might not know a Tajik from a camel fart, but he knows who he works for. Much, much more. Worth a read.
Donald Blankenship was the most powerful coal mogul in America, but he could soon be indicted, thanks to 14 years of work by two Pittsburgh lawyers. By Laurence Leamer, the author of the new book The Price of Justice.
Although the investigation began by exploring what role Massey supervisors and executives had in the 2010 explosion at their Upper Big Branch mine, the feds have gone on to look into a wide range of devastating accusations against Blankenship. This is a daring inquiry into the dark heart of power at Massey and in West Virginia. If only a portion of what they are exploring is true and Goodwin has the guts to stick to it, in the next couple of months Blankenship may be indicted with a series of charges that will shake up the Mountain State as few things have in years. If Goodwin decides not to indict and cuts a deal to help his anticipated run for governor next year with the backing of Big Coal, as the most fervid cynics suggest, he will have to defend his conduct from Bluefield to Wheeling. But everything so far suggests that the investigation has led inevitably and inexorably to Blankenship, and that Goodwin and his associates will not be walking away without an indictment.There's no such thing as "clean coal". On any level. This might help on one.
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Blankenship may very well be indicted in the next few weeks and if the evidence is strong and well presented, he will be convicted and sent to prison. That will send a signal to the entire Appalachian region that no longer can corporate and political mandarins run roughshod over the rights of the people.
Heartbreak, as only she can do, the Matraca Berg classic...from the album out now, Old Yellow Moon with Rodney Crowell,
Observing him, it quickly became clear that, like all bullies, Issa is not prepared to fight. He counts on his opponents to back down. His M.O. is to make outrageous, unsubstantiated claims, follow them with a lot of bluster, and then quietly fold at the first sign of being challenged. And here’s his “tell”: The more bombastic he is, the more he hungrily seeks out the cameras, the more he promises “explosive revelations,” the less he actually has. Bullies don’t win fights; they win defaults. Push back just the tiniest bit, and it’s all over.
Republican spotlight shifts from Obama to ClintonBut, gee, why would they be doing that?
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Soon after the hearing by the GOP-led House Oversight Committee looking into the events surrounding the death of the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans, a recently formed pro-Republican opposition research group blasted out an e-mail with the headline "Benghazi Hearing Raises Serious Questions About Clinton."
America Rising PAC then followed up Thursday with a Web video which it says outlines "the serious questions raised about Hillary Clinton's leadership yesterday in a House Oversight Committee hearing."
The Republican National Committee and American Crossroads, the Karl Rove-backed pro-GOP super PAC, also issued e-mails critical of Clinton, America's top diplomat at the time of the attack last September 11. The group put out a web video Friday morning that asks if Clinton "was part of a coverup." And Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a possible 2016 GOP White House contender, criticized Clinton in an interview on Thursday on Fox News Channel.
Obama can't run for a third term and Clinton, who's weighing a White House run, would be the instant front-runner for the Democratic nomination if she launches a bid for president.Ohhhhhh, I get it...
A move suggested to them by Dick Cheney. It's always been a politically motivated "investigation," but this is their way of saying, "we don't care about the truth, only about winning."
The reason the Rude Pundit can't count the number of fucks he doesn't give about Benghazi is because there is not a goddamned thing that anyone has said that could have prevented the attack from happening (other than the hindsight observation that security in Benghazi should have been beefed up. Yep, and having flying monkeys drop grenades would have been cool, too). And the only possible scandal is that, after the fact, some people said some shit that might not be true. That's it. That's all there is. So, please understand, House GOP members and noted panty-wearer Lindsey Graham, we don't care about Benghazi, no matter how much you want us to. You can bring out every self-aggrandizing State Department employee you want, but, sorry, you have not been able to fluff the flaccid prick of this into a proud, erect Libyagate.
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So that's the deal: Obama's Benghazi "lies" for Bush's Iraq lies. And then let the chips fall where they may with guilt and prosecution. Then we can swap again. Say Fast and Furious for approval of torture. You might think it's mutually assured destruction, but, dear, dumb GOP, like when you overplayed the Bill Clinton blow job perjury charge, you seem to think that possible lies to cover-up fuck-ups are the same as lies that lead directly to thousands of people dying. You seem to think that low-level incompetence is the same as giving the orders to commit war crimes.
But, no, really, continue with the Hillary Clinton bashing, which is all this actually is. It's just so retro-charming at this point. Make sure that no Republicans even thinks about voting for her in 2016. That's a valuable way to spend your time. And if this one doesn't stick, well, the Rude Pundit's pretty sure you'll just move on to a new fake scandal rather than actually governing.
Which is the only reason we haven’t covered this much. Because what is worth covering has largely been covered; because some in government have already lost their jobs for the incompetence; because we have had nine separate Congressional investigations, while attacks on embassies and consulates in the past have been far less likely to be controversial. In other words: this is now a function entirely of factionalism. It’s a test of how far one cable news channel can go in creating something big out of something tragic, regrettable, well worth looking into, but in the end scarcely scandalous.
This Benghazi thing is making the right insane. Literally. You know the saying about doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result? That’s where the GOP is right now. They are so invested in this fantasy that they have lost any ability to see reality. And Fox News feeds the fire, complaining that no other news outlets are covering this. Could it be because it’s utter and complete bullshit? Of course not, not to these modern-day inquisitors. They hate our president that much. It’s sickening.
The NRA is the new Christian right
Remember that shrill, fundamentalist, God-fearing, adorably insane Christian coalition that somehow elected Bush to two miserable terms, then self-imolated in a cavalcade of confusion and homophobia? Behold, it hath re-emerged! It is now tinier, angrier, far more paranoid, licks AR-15 semi-automatics like popsicles and gathers itself into sweltering Texas convention centers packed like canned lard with panicky, overweight white guys who cheer Glenn Beck’s sweaty tears and give standing ovations to Sarah Palin. Welcome back, right-wing fearclumps! My how you’ve shrunk. And God, you look awful.
The NRA is also a twitchy clown car of paranoia and failure
This much we know: Any event where Sarah Palin still gets a standing ovation, where not a single respected celebrity, politician, spiritual leader or intellectual pundit would ever dare show his face, where they want to arm children and compare Michael Bloomberg to a Nazi, these are surefire signs you’re among the most lost and desperate in America.
Yes, the NRA still has a ridiculously powerful lobby in Washington D.C. So does the high fructose corn syrup lobby. Did you see the photos from the big convention in Houston? Glenn Beck holding up a rifle? Wayne LaPierre’s mouth contorting in manic anguish? This is the army of the insane and the paranoid, the least compassionate the country has to offer. Sorry, Newtown kids; they hate you most of all.
George W. Bush is a sad, awkward loser
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George W. Bush is, in short, a shameful footnote, sad and strange and sort of awful. The Republican party – for whom, if they’re honest, George W. Bush remains their truest and most accurate representative – should be proud.
A new report says that Fox News President Roger Ailes ordered the Fox News control room to cut host Geraldo Rivera’s mic just two days before November’s election because he was defending President Barack Obama against the network’s “misinformation” about terrorist attacks in Benghazi.Well, whaddya expect? There's a party line that must not be crossed, even by the famously liberal godless commie fuck Rivera (choke). They oughta change their name to FOXRepugProp. Yeesh.
Look at how bwave and stwong the wittle state of Kansas has been. Standing there on its two feet like big gwown-up boy. It's adorable. You're adorable, Kansas. C'mere so we can pinch your pudgy cheeks, woogums. Your tough ol' governor, Sam Brownback, signed a bill into law that says, "[A]ny act, law, treaty, order, rule or regulation of the government of the United States which violates the second amendment to the constitution of the United States is null, void and unenforceable in the state of Kansas." You made it a felony for federal government official to enforce a federal firearms law. Aww. That's just...so cute that the rest of us just can't stand it, like a baby sloth on Buzzfeed. Just look at you, acting like you're not part of the United States and pretending that if the United States abandoned you, you wouldn't fall quickly into a pretty dark nightmare of debt, wrecked schools, worse roads, and no jobs. And we just don't want that to happen to you, cutie-wootie.Amen. And if they don't STFU and sit down, slap 'em 'til they do.
Yeah, see, Kansas is one of the many, many red states that gets more federal tax money than the state sends to Washington. At $1.10 received for every $1 paid, it's nowhere near the worst freeloader, but it'd be a pretty big hit if Uncle Sam said, "Ooh, don't like our laws? Then kiss our cash's ass as it walks out of your state."
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Your despicable asses survive on the backs of the very states you despise for being liberal: New York gets only 72 cents in federal spending for every federal tax buck. New Jersey? 49 cents. Taxachusetts? 83 cents. You're living on our dime, Kansas, South Carolina, Alabama, Missouri, Alaska, North Carolina, Montana, and Alaska, all states attempting to nullify federal laws. Fuck, if we just got a buck for a buck up here, our infrastructure could be strengthened and more people would have jobs. California gets 87 cents for each dollar. That state would love to get South Carolina's level of federal spending. You got that, motherfuckers? You are fucked without us, without block grants and military bases and highway construction contracts and so very much more that our tax dollars at least partially pay for in your state. We could nullify you. So howzabout abiding by the laws of the nation we're all a part of?
Yeah, sometimes the adults need to stop coddling the kids and tell them to shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down.
Poll: Nearly One Third of Americans Think Armed Revolution Against Government NecessaryHeh.
Other two thirds love watching reality shows about them.
Researchers Find Evidence of Cannibalism by Jamestown Colony Settlers
Their findings will be basis of upcoming special on Food Channel.
Report: $2 Trillion Underground Economy Keeping Country Afloat
Experts suggest Bernanke be replaced by Snoop Dog.
Thousands Busted in Kansas, Nebraska, OklahomaYes, giggling and feeling good in those states is definite evidence of being on drugs,
After inhaling smoke drifting eastward from Denver pot holiday celebration.
Published on May 1, 2013
Finally, FINALLY here...From the album Cimarron...Emmylou.....Emmylou..Laying siege to the Anne Murray classic...I do not own anything as always. Help get Emmylou's mentor, Gram Parsons into the Country Music Hall of Fame by visiting and signing the petition at WWW.GRAMPARSONSPETITION.COM God bless all...
Congressional GOP beginning to notice their own incompetence
"Stalemate" is the nice way of saying that House Republicans couldn't pass a bill to dial 911 if John Boehner were on fire.
It is difficult to imagine many Americans agreeing to abandon democracy for another form of government, but there are a frightening number of citizens who hate America’s representative democracy with such passion that they are leaning heavily toward overthrowing the government and installing a fascist dictatorship.Buncha sore losers flappin' their gums. If they try a violent overthrow, it would be the best case yet for drone strikes on Americans in the United States. Turning 'em into red paste would calm 'em right down. It won't come to that. Chickenhawl pussies, the lot of 'em.
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What the Republican threats of armed revolution really expose is that anything outside the conservative agenda, whether it is gay rights, contraception, clean air regulations, free and fair elections, immigration, or freedom from religious imposition is an assault on their liberty and more than enough reason for “armed revolution” against the government.
Dubya's Europe Trip Canceled After His Arrest Is Called ForShit, nobody told that dumbass anything while he was in office, why start now? Drat.
Republican Party political consultant, strategist and pollster Frank Luntz is whining. Being Frank Luntz, you can be sure that it's calculated whining, but it's whining nevertheless.Ya see what happens when even a Repug powerhouse tells the truth just ONCE?!
The man who has devoted the better part of his professional life to turning words into weapons of mass misdirection in support of his clients -- often resulting in their becoming weapons of mass indigestion for his clients' opponents -- is claiming that his privacy rights have been violated by a University of Pennsylvania student who secretly taped "off-the-record" comments made by Luntz about how certain well-known figures within the conservative movement are hurting the movement.
There are two storylines in play here: 1) The Original -- What Luntz actually said about divisive conservatives hurting the Republican Party; and, 2) The Conjured-- Luntz the aggrieved.
Clearly, Luntz's whining is aimed at changing the narrative from storyline one to storyline two.
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The latest Luntz story has the no-longer boy wonder trying to finagle his way out of what can only be characterized as "another fine mess."
In late April, Luntz , a 1984 U of Penn graduate, was invited by the school's College Republicans to speak at a public event on campus. According to thedp.com's (The Daily Pennsylvanian) Sarah Smith and Will Marble, "During the speech, members of the audience asked Luntz about his views on political polarization in the United States. Luntz - who also taught at Penn in the 1980s - answered that he was hesitant to speak on the record." He then asked "if anyone was recording the speech." A Daily Pennsylvanian reporter covering the event "shut his recorder off. When Luntz asked College junior Aakash Abbi if he was recording, he told Luntz he was only taking a picture, but continued filming the speech ..."
Luntz then proceeded to go off on some of his longtime Republican Party-related brethren, particularly conservative pundits and talk-show hosts. "They get great ratings, and they drive the message, and it's really problematic. And this is not on the Democratic side. It's only on the Republican side," Luntz said in the tape. "Democrats have every other source of news on their side. And so that is a lot of what's driving it. If you take -- Marco Rubio's getting his ass kicked. Who's my Rubio fan here? We talked about it. He's getting destroyed! By Mark Levin, by Rush Limbaugh, and a few others. He's trying to find a legitimate, long-term effective solution to immigration that isn't the traditional Republican approach, and talk radio is killing him. That's what's causing this thing underneath. And too many politicians in Washington are playing coy."
The student who recorded Luntz's remarks sent them off to Mother Jones' David Corn, who, as Wonkette's Gary Legum pointed out, "is becoming a clearinghouse for this sort of thing," referencing Corn's work publicizing Mitt Romney 47% video.
"I made the choice to share my recording with Mother Jones because Luntz's comments are important. They illustrate one of the largest schisms within the GOP and expose the hypocrisy of Luntz's willingness to place blame for his party's division upon a media establishment he has helped build. Further, his request to be taken off the record was never one to which I acquiesced" Aakash Abbi wrote in a thedp.com column.
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And in a final burst of Luntzian magnanimity, he announced that he would not renew a scholarship in his father's name for students to travel to Washington, D.C.
A recent poll of 863 registered voters, conducted by Fairleigh Dickinson (which also happens to be one of the Rude Pundit's nicknames for his penis) University's Public Mind showed that 44% of Republicans believe "that an armed revolution in order to protect liberties might be necessary in the next few years." The overall number, 29% of respondents with 18% of Democrats and 27% of independent voters believing the same, is alarming enough. But that nearly half of Republicans think that they might have to take up their AR-15s of freedom in order to go to war with their government? Man, a bunch of people are living in the kind of fantasy land where their giant beer bellies are seen as sexy and that the greatest threat in the world comes from a black Kenyan in the White House. Partly, the Rude Pundit thinks, "Oh, c'mon, motherfuckers. Wheeze yourselves out of your scooters and just try it. You'll be drone missiled into a red paste in no time." But mostly, he just feels sad.I have nothing to add.
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Seriously, it's like the GOP is a bunch of whoremongers driven mad by syphilis, refusing any medical treatment because penicillin is from the Devil and they'd rather scrawl filthy manifestos against Obamacare in their shit and howl at the moon and call it "genius."
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We are so very fucked because Americans are so fucking dumb, especially the Americans belonging to one particular political party. When a large number of a nation's citizens are more willing to entertain armed insurrection than providing health care for the poor, well, it's pretty goddamn hard to make the case that we're the Greatest Country in the History of Everything.
Last week, Politico published a piece by Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei simultaneously criticizing and celebrating Times reporter Mark Leibovich for writing a book on D.C. culture while also being part of it. This past Saturday night was the annual journalist-celebrity-politician schmooze-fest that is the White House Correspondents' Dinner. How uneasy are you with this brand of Beltway navel-gazing?Heh.
Mark Leibovich is one of the wittiest writers about politics around. If he is already provoking Politico to take a preemptive strike at a book that no one has read and isn’t out until July, he must be doing something right. Indeed, we’ll know Leibovich’s book, titled This Town, is a success if he can never eat lunch in that town again. As for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, it is what it is — a campy hoot as long as you don’t have to attend. Just seeing (on C-Span) how the Washingtonians are dressed as they saunter down the red carpet is hilarious; the town’s fashion sense hasn’t changed all that much since I attended the senior prom of my D.C. high school, Woodrow Wilson, quite some time ago. This year, as in other recent years, the only real winner at the dinner itself was President Obama. He was funny, and watching journalists and politicians squirm as the president mocks them is always a fabulous spectator sport. The black-tie audience in the ballroom looked as if it was having about as much fun as the Broadway opening-night crowd at Springtime for Hitler.
Poll: Plurality Wants One Party To Control White House, CongressNote to Repugs: It ain't YOU they want. Wise yer asses up.
While I don’t watch pro sports or have the slightest interest in the lives of its players or teams, I do delight when the open palm of raw history slaps an excessively masculine, long-repressed institution across the face (Catholic church, US military, Republican party), and I certainly recognize the awesome refrain currently being blared out far and wide right now in regard to gay athletes in pro sports in general: “It’s about goddamn time.”My sentiments exactly.
But I don’t want to appear blindly partisan—a sundering of the union would make the other half of America equally fulfilled. The red-state republic could finally establish a theocracy in which the fundamentalist Christian church would legislate all the important aspects of civic life. It could either send its illegal and/or legal immigrants northward or reinstitute a reformed system of indenture whereby immigrants are purchased by bona fide citizens who have a fully modernized respect for private property. It could, taking the lead from the pioneering Kansas legislature, abolish the income tax, raising revenue from, for example, a “pay to work” program. It could ban abortion in all instances, including rape and incest, and use the growing population of orphans to establish an impressive standing army.I'd like to let them secede for a "trial period". See how long it takes them to go totally third world and want to come crawling back to a rich nation that will support them like they're used to.
Fuck Kansas, and fuck the horse it rode (into the Union) on.
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The. Country. Is. Split. Right. Down. The. Middle. May I, with the subtlety of cannonballs falling upon Fort Sumter, suggest that we stop using the anodyne categories of red and blue, and start calling the two sides “Confederate” and “Union,” which is what they really are?
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Little Czechoslovakia split itself in two; why can’t we?
Justice O’Connor: Maybe Bush V. Gore Was A MistakeGee, ya think? Thanks a great steaming pile, lady.
In the YouTube video posted on Friday, a man can be heard tearing into Infowars.com reporter Dan Bidondi over “right wing conspiracy theories.”
The day of the bombing, Jones had tweeted that “this thing stinks to high heaven #falseflag,” adding that “the FBI has been behind virtually every domestic terror plot in the US.”
“Your boy said this was a false flag, the bomb that blew up people was a false flag,” the angry man in the video notes. “The FBI is behind the bombing, that’s what you’re here to cover. And that’s why I’m the asshole? Because the FBI blew up those people at the Boston Marathon? That’s right. That’s because you’re a dope. And what you say is dangerous and people like you shouldn’t be able to drive a car, much less espouse your opinions in public.”
“But we have a First Amendment, got to protect it. But you’re an asshole. And so is Alex Jones… And that’s the nicest thing I can say about you, you son of a bitch.”
“Anything else you got to say?” Bidondi asked.
“Yeah, I just said it, motherfucker,” the man shot back. “I am the smart guy because I’m not standing here saying the FBI blew up the people at the Boston Marathon, you fucking shitheel.”
“We got the photos to prove it,” Bidondi insisted.
“You got shit, you got jack shit, you got your dick in your hand,” the Boston resident replied. “You fucking asshat.”
New Fears of Civil War in Iraq
According to Déjà Vu News Service.
Congress Quickly Allocates Funds to End Airport DelaysLet's hope their vacations are taken up with their constituents' complaints about cutting Meals On Wheels and Medicare cancer treatment.
Just before booking flights home for one week vacation.
Twinkies Return to Shelves Later This Year
Same ones that were removed from shelves early last year
FDA Finds Fraudulent Botox Being Sold in U.S.Grooooan...
And yet victims haven't raised an eyebrow.
I’ve been focused on economic policy lately, so I sort of missed the big push to rehabilitate Bush’s image; also, as a premature anti-Bushist who pointed out how terrible a president he was back when everyone else was praising him as a Great Leader, I’m kind of worn out on the subject.I have nothing to add.
But it does need to be said: he was a terrible president, arguably the worst ever, and not just for the reasons many others are pointing out.
From what I’ve read, most of the pushback against revisionism focuses on just how bad Bush’s policies were, from the disaster in Iraq to the way he destroyed FEMA, from the way he squandered a budget surplus to the way he drove up Medicare’s costs. And all of that is fair.
But I think there was something even bigger, in some ways, than his policy failures: Bush brought an unprecedented level of systematic dishonesty to American political life, and we may never recover.
Think about his two main “achievements”, if you want to call them that: the tax cuts and the Iraq war, both of which continue to cast long shadows over our nation’s destiny. The key thing to remember is that both were sold with lies.
I suppose one could make an argument for the kind of tax cuts Bush rammed through — tax cuts that strongly favored the wealthy and significantly increased inequality. But we shouldn’t forget that Bush never admitted that his tax cuts did, in fact, favor the wealthy. Instead, his administration canceled the practice of making assessments of the distributional effects of tax changes, and in their selling of the cuts offered what amounted to an expert class in how to lie with statistics. Basically, every time the Bushies came out with a report, you knew that it was going to involve some kind of fraud, and the only question was which kind and where.
And no, this wasn’t standard practice before. Politics ain’t beanbag and all that, but the president as con man was a new character in American life.
Even more important, Bush lied us into war. Let’s repeat that: he lied us into war. I know, the apologists will say that “everyone” believed Saddam had WMD, but the truth is that even the category “WMD” was a con game, lumping together chemical weapons with nukes in an illegitimate way. And any appearance of an intelligence consensus before the invasion was manufactured: dissenting voices were suppressed, as anyone who was reading Knight-Ridder (now McClatchy) knew at the time.
Why did the Bush administration want war? There probably wasn’t a single reason, but can we really doubt at this point that it was in part about wagging the dog? And right there you have something that should block Bush from redemption of any kind, ever: he misled us into a war that probably killed hundreds of thousands of people, and he did it in part for political reasons.
There was a time when Americans expected their leaders to be more or less truthful. Nobody expected them to be saints, but we thought we could trust them not to lie about fundamental matters. That time is now behind us — and it was Bush who did it.
Published on Apr 26, 2013
The wonderful Emmylou live on the OGWT in 1977. Luxury Liner features some Hot Guitar Pickin' from Maestro Albert Lee...........
The Hot Band: Glen D.Hardin, piano; Rodney Crowell, rhythm guitar & vocals; Emory Gordy, bass & vocals; John Ware, drums; Hank De Vito, pedal steel guitar; Albert Lee, lead guitar & vocals
The coverage of the opening of this vast temple to prevarication and ruin is not about bricks and mortar. It's about an attempt by the courtier press to absolve itself of a dereliction of duty that rivaled even that of the president in question while New Orleans drowned, and while the economy was bubbling toward disaster.Yep.
It's a deep dive. Hold your breath...The elite press is dedicating an entire day of coverage to the perpetuation of a monstrous public lie. Electing George W. Bush twice was a monumental act of democratic self-destruction from which the country has yet to recover. Celebrating him celebrating himself is simply to pour battery acid into the still-open wounds.In order to take in the ginormous magnitude of Dubya's project to destroy the American Dream, ponder this simple question -- what if he'd done nothing? Follow me below the fold for this speculation...
What always struck me about Bush and his incompetent cronies is the activist nature of their "wreck everything quickly" administration. All Bush had to do was NOTHING to have a successful presidency. Everything he touched turned (immediately) to shit...and yet he couldn't wait to destroy more. Thank goodness the American people turned on him during the post 2004 "Wind At My Back" "Hand Social Security Over To Wall Street" debacle.Word.
I'm convinced that someday, 50 years from now when historians are analyzing the moment that "broke the back" of the American dream, they'll focus on the Bush Administration -- specifically the catastrophic response to 9/11. Karl Rove's goal was always to repeal the New Deal, monkey-wrench the government to make it untenable, and hand the burning wreckage over to his billionaire pals who are greatly inconvenienced by all those middle class "entitlements", environmental protections and Union rights.
All he had to do was nothing. Instead, he almost wrecked everything.
Thus, the average American is somewhat worried about budget deficits, which is no surprise given the constant barrage of deficit scare stories in the news media, but the wealthy, by a large majority, regard deficits as the most important problem we face. And how should the budget deficit be brought down? The wealthy favor cutting federal spending on health care and Social Security — that is, “entitlements” — while the public at large actually wants to see spending on those programs rise.Yep. What the 1% wants, the 1% gets. So far. This may change after we eat them and turn them into liberal shit. Heh.
You get the idea: The austerity agenda looks a lot like a simple expression of upper-class preferences, wrapped in a facade of academic rigor. What the top 1 percent wants becomes what economic science says we must do.
Does a continuing depression actually serve the interests of the wealthy? That’s doubtful, since a booming economy is generally good for almost everyone. What is true, however, is that the years since we turned to austerity have been dismal for workers but not at all bad for the wealthy, who have benefited from surging profits and stock prices even as long-term unemployment festers. The 1 percent may not actually want a weak economy, but they’re doing well enough to indulge their prejudices.
And this makes one wonder how much difference the intellectual collapse of the austerian position will actually make. To the extent that we have policy of the 1 percent, by the 1 percent, for the 1 percent, won’t we just see new justifications for the same old policies?
The Economic Argument Is Over — Paul Krugman Has Won
There's so many rooms that it would be hard to see them all in one visit. The "Gitmo Yourself" experience lets you put on an orange jumpsuit and get waterboarded, feared up, and forced into stress positions, all while assuring you that you're not being tortured because America doesn't torture. There's Halliburton Hall, devoted to all the money given to contractors and subcontractors for nearly every support aspect of the wars. There's the Wall Street Rules room, which is empty, but there's a check at the end. There's the artifacts room: the flight suit from the Mission Accomplished aircraft carrier landing; the plastic turkey Bush served to troops in Iraq; the dog pillow Tony Blair slept on at the foot of Bush's bed; and the funding promised but never delivered on No Child Left Behind. This is not to mention the interactive exhibits, like Can You Tell When Ari Fleischer Is Lying? (hint: the answer is "Always"), Is That a War Crime? (hint: the answer is always "No"), How Would You Punish Joseph Wilson?, and Would You Call the Air Around Ground Zero Safe? (Christine Todd Whitman gives a thumbs up). Of course, there's a bunch of t-ball pictures. And a piece of the fallen Twin Towers because Never Forget.Almost as an aside, in yesterday's Grand Opening of the Bush Whitewashatorium Iraq was never mentioned once. Nor was the "Mission Accomplished" banner on exhibit. The Chimp'll never admit it, of course, but he knows.
- The final room is a simple space. Rows of chairs are aligned in front of a screen. In the center of the seat is a dildo molded, in detail, on Karl Rove's penis. You are asked to position yourself so that the dildo enters your anus, the better to feel like an American during the early years of the new millennium. On the screen, a series of people tell you how misunderstood George W. Bush is: Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, Jack Abramoff, Scooter Libby, Tom DeLay, Bill Frist, and more.
Next to your chair is a small whip. That is for people who voted for Bush at least once. They are encouraged to beat themselves, leaving scars and welts on their back, so that they walk out bleeding, asses reamed, in order to remember all the harm they did to the rest of us.
VA Silent on Exec Bonuses for Manipulated DataThey'll be damn lucky if the pole we shove up their ass is only 10 feet!
A year after testifying that some executives received bonuses by manipulating appointment data for veterans needing mental health care, a former Department of Veterans Affairs hospital administrator said officials have avoided the issue “like the plague.”
“They avoid it with a 10-foot pole,” Nicholas Tolentino told Military.com in a telephone interview Monday.
Time for California to Decriminalize, Tax & Regulate MarijuanaAnd moybe our next Guv if he keeps talking like that!
Barbara Bush Thinks There’ve Been Enough Bushes In The White House, No Room For JebOne too many, actually.
Barbara Bush, a perennial role model for the husky drag queen set, just stuck a pin in poor Jeb's genetically bequeathed ambitions. Gore Vidal once recounted Richard Nixon begrudgingly admiring her “because she really knows how to hate.” Praise indeed from Mr. Nixon. But it's nice to hear Bar finally say something most Americans can agree upon, even if she is two Bushes too late.
Yessirree, the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Whitewashatorium of Wonders is opening in all its Panglossian glory, forcing us to look backward and think, "Aw, schucks, that dumb shitkicker wannabe was just doing the best his little ol' brain could do. He didn't mean to set the nation on the path to its imminent doom." Truly, it's like creating a library to a gorilla that wasn't quite as gentle or articulate as Koko. Well, look, here's a pile of kitten corpses it petted to death, but, goddamn, wasn't it adorable to watch them together briefly. And at least it could use sign language to say, "Me throw poop now." You might have to duck, but don't say you weren't warned.No thanks. I can get something useful for 16 bucks that WON'T make me sick. Like a Mexican dinner
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The whole thing seems designed not just to cover-up for every horrible thing done to the United States under Bush. Actually, it reflects the essential emptiness of the man who led the country as an incurious figurehead, a meat puppet with Dick Cheney's and Karl Rove's hands up his ass at different times. In recent interviews, you can hear the reporters trying to get Bush to have a scintilla of self-awareness, a moment when he says he regrets something or made a wrong decision. He doesn't, though, because he can't. He can't because he was never secure in anything but his rightness, no matter how much of a failure he was.
Now, though, George W. Bush wants to be forgotten. He has disappeared because he is incapable of doing anything. He bumblefucked his way into history. His library merely represents his non-entity status. And it costs 16 bucks to see it.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry is a phenomenally stupid man. Someone like this shouldn't be entrusted with monitoring a summer camp foosball table, let alone with governing a state of 26 million people.Can't argue with that.
Chechnya! Of course! Chechnya wants America dead because they hate our freedoms, our shopping malls and our shiny perfect Jesus. Right? Because we have invaded their homeland and destroyed their culture with Burger King and Walmart and…um, wait, what? We haven’t? They don’t? The Boston bombers, while originally ethnic Chechens, are largely “self-radicalized?” And the younger one, Dzhokhar, is an American citizen? And they acted alone? And they’re basically dumb as logs? Oh.True dat. The Boston bombers bear more relation to the Columbine shooters than they do to al Qaeda. Read the rest.
It’s all so… confusing. So frustrating. How are we supposed to handle this? Who are we supposed to hate upon? The idiot Tsarnaev brothers don’t fit our beloved terrorist stereotypes, do not play the role we wanted them to play. Damn them!
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This shall not do. No wonder he haters and the finger-pointers feel so gypped. No wonder hothead GOP numbskulls like Lindsay Graham and John McCain wanted Dzhokhar tried as an “enemy combatant,” mostly because they like saying the words “enemy combatant” on Fox News with a sneer and a total disregard for American law. If there’s one thing the GOP loves, it’s finding someone to despise and combat. Besides Obama, of course.
What a strange moment in American history. No clearly defined enemy, Islamophobia at a (relatively) low ebb, gay marriage foregone and obvious, the Red Scare of yore now a pale footnote, even our normal modalities of racism and sexism lacking the same bitter tang now that Obama won a second term and all the nasty old white guys who used to control everything have become less relevant and/or are dying off en masse.
Truly, to much of America – but especially the pundits of the right – the Tsarnaev brothers and their insipid act of violence have been a major disappointment. Can’t blame Obama, can’t blame Islam, can’t blame the lefties or vegans or immigrants, can’t hate upon Mexico or Europe or Iran – all our normal machinery of bias and intolerance left with nothing to gnaw upon. What’s a enemy-loving populace to do?
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This much we do know: the enemy is definitely not well-funded, expertly trained clans of wild-eyed terrorists from foreign lands. The truth is, most terrorist attacks since 9/11 have been of the lone wolf variety, which, given the general idiocy, ignorance and ineptitude of most who attempt these plots, is a direct insult to wolves.
“These are the last days of the Americans,” said the other elder. “Next it will be China."Heh. Always thinking ahead, them Afghans. To the 19th century.
There’s a common thread linking conservatives’ positions on gun control, immigration, and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev: the constant need to stoke fear.Yep. There's an article, but that's the gist of it. Fearmongerers suck.
What to Do with G.W. Bush?The short answer is leave me alone with him for two minutes. Problem solved.
You're gonna hear conspiracy heaped upon conspiracy, from the evil Moooslim connection to the wacky Chechen/Russian/Kyrgyz cover-ups of something or other to, inevitably, the Lizard People, but here's what we all know happened: A couple of brothers, one with a wife and kid, who were ball cap-wearing bros watched too much jihadi shit on the internet, perhaps met a person or two in a visit to the homeland, and decided to act stupidly, which is what stupid young men do. And, oh, hey, an older brother got his younger brother to go along with a plan because it's cool to blow shit up. We won't find out anything useful from Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. It was an isolated incident, no different than Newtown, Columbine, or any other crime where assholes got a shit-ton of guns and bullets, something that makes them awfully American at this point. Hell, if their last name had been Smith, we wouldn't even be talking about it as anything more than one more tragedy in our carousel of carnage, another time we won't learn or do a goddamn thing.Of course it will. Sigh.
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It's goddamn embarrassing to see the Senate's prettiest debutante, Lindsey Graham, more or less standing at Tsarnaev's bedside, cock out, ready to fuck the bullet hole in the guy's neck while Kelly Ayotte and John McCain fondle each other and watch as Peter King jacks off in the corner, all sweaty in anticipation of a declaration that Tsarnaev's an "enemy combatant" so he can be Gitmo'd or some such shit.
It's depressing beyond words to hear people say, as Graham did, that "The homeland is the battlefield" and call for surveillance, more surveillance, on the ground, in the sky, surveillance of every space, every orifice, give up more freedom, always be a suspect, always make sure the authorities are watching. Who gives a fat monkey fuck about your Fifth Amendment rights when there might be a single terrorist out there?
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Now, we're gonna have another freak-out over Who Knew What When, with the FBI's questioning of Tamerlan Tsarnaev in 2011 becoming the new Benghazi.
Our repellent ride of self-inflicted wounds will just continue.
Senate Blocks Background Checks for Gun BuyersI wonder if we'll have to show a gun to vote?
Keeps them for voters.
Foreign Students Balk at Coming To U.S., Fearing Country Full of Lunatics Armed With Automatic WeaponsThe danger is not so much getting caught in the crossfire because by and large they're the same lunatics, but rather getting caught at the intersection of two hot air fronts.
Fortunately, country also full of lunatics armed with automatic weapons to protect us.
Average Age of Fox News Viewers: 65On the bright side, that's an energy-saving room temperature.
Average IQ of Fox News viewers: 65.
Study Finds Most-Frequent Texters Shallow, Money-Obsessed, BigotedNever texted nor will I. Patting self on back for being deep, spiritual, tolerant. 2 out of 3 ain't bad!
Least-frequent texters, deep, spiritual, tolerant.
By 2020, Tourists From China Will Outnumber All Others
Wealthy Chinese will come here to buy luxury goods made by poor Chinese.
Exhaustive Nonpartisan Report: U.S. Use of Torture After 9/11 Ordered by Those at TopI sure as hell do.
So long ago no one remembers who was in charge at the time.
The fertilizer plant that exploded on Wednesday, obliterating part of a small Texas town and killing at least 14 people, had last year been storing 1,350 times the amount of ammonium nitrate that would normally trigger safety oversight by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.I do believe "fertilizer operations" have been effectively self "shut down".
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Fertilizer plants and depots must report to the DHS when they hold 400 lb (180 kg) or more of the substance. Filings this year with the Texas Department of State Health Services, which weren't shared with DHS, show the plant had 270 tons of it on hand last year.
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Failure to report significant volumes of hazardous chemicals at a site can lead the DHS to fine or shut down fertilizer operations, a person familiar with the agency's monitoring regime said.
"That's just a god awful amount of ammonium nitrate," said Bryan Haywood, the owner of a hazardous chemical consulting firm in Milford, Ohio.
Yes we do. I think Goodhair doesn't know jack shit about much of anything.In a press conference today about his trip to lure California businesses to Texas, Gov. Rick Perry boasted of statistics demonstrating Texas’ superior job climate, but bristled when a California reporter brought up a less flattering ranking: Texas’ top position among all states for worker deaths and injuries.
After Perry touted Texas’ low tax and low regulatory burden on businesses, an Orange County Register reporter mentioned Texas’ poor record of worker safety, asking, “Can you speak to safety in your lower-regulation state?”
“I don’t think it has anything to do with the regulation side,” Perry said. “You all in California are not very knowledgeable about the energy industry” which, he said, “is a fairly dangerous workplace’ compared to other industries. He argued that worker injuries and deaths would not be reduced by better safety regulations: “It’s not because of lack of regulations.”
Yes it is because of lack of regulations Governor!
And for Governor Perry's information California has a large and long standing oil industry.
