Fucking Clown-Shoes.

Alabama.
Alaska.
Arizona.
Arkansas.
California.
Colorado.
Connecticut.
Delaware.
Florida.
Georgia.
Hawaii - Three pages worth of Google results for "hawaii school obama speech concern" didn't turn up any local articles regarding that state's schools censoring the President's speech; only the standard AP article about it.
Idaho.
Illinois.
Indiana.
Iowa.
Kansas.
Kentucky.
Louisiana.
Maine.
Maryland.
Massachusetts. (A letter to the Editor.)
Michigan.
Minnesota.

You know, I'm tired for now. But any of you who are shocked or baffled that this is going on in your area.... it's everywhere.

OMG SOSHALIZT!

Here's an excellent little 4-minute video explaining why scary government-run care is a GOOD thing.



So those of you who have private insurance and think a public option is a BAD thing can rest assured that your insurance companies are spending your money just the way you want them to: lobbying Congress to oppose universal health coverage.

You selfish fucks.

Virginian Goober-natorial

So the Washington Post has an article about Republican gubernatorial candidate Robert F. McDonnell today. It would seem that Mr. McDonnell believed all kinds of wacky, wacky things back in 1989 when he wrote his Master's thesis.

As if I would vote for him anyhow, since I disagree with him on all kinds of stuff, but this cements it, you know?

Kennedy

Can we please stop it with the trope, "The Media gave Ted Kennedy a pass when it came to Chappaquiddick." They did? Really? Gave him a pass? Can anyone over the age of 30 think "Ted Kennedy" without also getting a glimmer of "Mary Jo Kopechne?" No. No, you can't. So while the JUSTICE system may have failed Mary Jo, and the Kennedys sure as shit failed Mary Jo, I really don't think anyone can accuse the media of failing her, nor of giving Kennedy a pass regarding her.

Descent is the highest form of patriotic.

(See explanation of title here.)

Here's the big difference, you deliberately clueless motherfuckers, between Bush fils's Town Hall Meetings and Obama's Town Hall Meetings:

Bush banned people and cancelled meetings which were not to his hand-picked specifications and engaged in all kinds of other media fuckery.

Obama and other pols out there on the Town Hall circuit are actually getting the opportunity to hear - and thus publicly air - other sides of the issues. Even when they're batshit fucking insane.

SOCIALISM!!

Perfect comment posted by user Ozone on Fark in this thread:

This morning I was awoken by my alarm clock powered by electricity generated by the public power monopoly regulated by the U.S. Department of Energy.

I then took a shower in the clean water provided by a municipal water utility.

After that, I turned on the TV to one of the FCC-regulated channels to see what the National Weather Service of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration determined the weather was going to be like, using satellites designed, built, and launched by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

I watched this while eating my breakfast of U.S. Department of Agriculture-inspected food and taking the drugs which have been determined as safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

At the appropriate time, as regulated by the U.S. Congress and kept accurate by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the U.S. Naval Observatory, I get into my National Highway Traffic Safety Administration-approved automobile and set out to work on the roads build by the local, state, and federal Departments of Transportation, possibly stopping to purchase additional fuel of a quality level determined by the Environmental Protection Agency, using legal tender issued by the Federal Reserve Bank.

On the way out the door I deposit any mail I have to be sent out via the U.S. Postal Service and drop the kids off at the public school.

After spending another day not being maimed or killed at work thanks to the workplace regulations imposed by the Department of Labor and the Occupational Safety and Health administration, enjoying another two meals which again do not kill me because of the USDA, I drive my NHTSA car back home on the DOT roads, to my house which has not burned down in my absence because of the state and local building codes and Fire Marshal's inspection, and which has not been plundered of all its valuables thanks to the local police department.

And then I log on to the internet -- which was developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Administration -- and post on Freerepublic.com and Fox News forums about how SOCIALISM in medicine is BAD because the government can't do anything right.

No comment from me except, "Awesome!"

Lock-step? Um, no.

You know, I keep seeing folks on the Right talking about folks on the Left being in lock-step with Obama just like they always were for Bush and Cheney and whomever else was in favor at any given time. "You people all think he's the Messiah!" they say. "You all parrot whatever message the Left-Wing Mainstream (wait, what?) Media tells you to say!"

One of the best Venn Diagrams I've seen was one which looked like this only, you know, circles:

((People who call Obama "The Messiah")) ((People who voted for Obama))

You'll note that the circles do NOT intersect.

Anyhow, from Crooks and Liars:

Are the Obama people really that dumb? They were "surprised," "caught off guard" by the massive dirtstorm unleashed on healthcare reform?

These are the geniuses of 11-dimensional chess? Puhleeze. I think they've started to believe their own press. Obama the Healer, Obama the Post-Racial Lincoln. What a bunch of damned dopes.

Yeah, we Lefties are sure a bunch of lock-step "Yes" men, aren't we?

Watch this space.

In a couple of weeks - or within a couple of weeks, depending - I'm going to try to post at least once a day for a solid month. I'm going to shit my lackadaisical, poorly-researched opinions at all of you fans (how many people read this - 2? 3?) once a day for a solid month. Even if all I can come up with is, "[Politician's Name] is a weenie!" I'll friggin' well post.

Just need a starting date and I'm on it like vomit.

Oh, just stop it.

Dear Republicans:

Please stop pretending you're still in power.

Dear Democrats:

Please stop pretending they're still in power.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH, ALL OF YOU.

Fairness Doctrine

I am against bringing back the Fairness Doctrine. The people arguing for it say that there need to be voices countering the Massive Right-Wing Talk Radio blah blah blah. Here's the thing: WHICH opposing viewpoint do the folks in favor of the Fairness Doctrine want represented? The "Liberals?" Which ones? Greens? ACLU? NAACP? American Communist Party?

There aren't two viewpoints which need to be represented; there are HUNDREDS. The "Fairness" doctrine is damned near as exclusionary as having nothing in place at all. Will "Fairness" apply to neo-Nazis? Pedophiles? PETA? The NRA?

I'm not saying any of them are more "right" than any other... but in trying to represent all viewpoints there are going to be big, big problems. Politics is perception, and there are too many damned angles of perception to legislate "fairness" for them.

War! HURGH! What is it good for?

Why, War is Peace, of course.

"...the only way this war can be "won" is if most of the Palestinians in Gaza--and the so-called "West Bank," too, where HAMAS has a lot of support--are decimated..."

Heard the same shit on Limbaugh a few days ago. I sometimes nap, and when I nap I turn on talk radio, and because of where I live "Talk Radio" = "Foxy Fox and the Foxes, Fox, Inc." Anyhow, he was talking about how there's never going to be peace between Israel and Hamas, because no one is ever going to be "allowed" to win, and the only way for there to be peace in a conflict is if one side crushes the other.

Another nutbag recently reposted a link to an old post of his which says that "... makes this a very modern war, which won’t end until one side or the other is burned, occupied, and crying uncle. Fact is, the Palestinians can’t do that to the Israelis. Another fact is, the Israelis won’t (but could) do it to the Palestinians."

Is it really part of Conservative ideology that one side is RIGHT and the other is WRONG, and that peace cannot reign until they have crushed their enemies, seen them driven before them, and heard the lamentation of the women? Because that seems awfully a) cavalier, b) inhumane and c) cynical to me.

Yes, Barack Obama is inexperienced.

Here's the thing.

I am forced to agree completely with anyone who says that John McCain has more experience in government than Barack Obama. Eh, "forced" is the wrong word; there's no shame in being younger than one's opponent, you know?

I think Barack Obama knows far more about actually LIVING in the country he wants to govern than John McCain does. McCain has had power and prestige going for him pretty much since birth (except for the 5 1/2 years he yeah yeah I know, who doesn't?), and it feels to me as though Obama has grown up in the same country I have. I'll cop to a wholly emotional argument. As far as politics go, I think emotion holds at least as much force as logic.

I agree that Barack Obama is inexperienced with foreign policy. The thing is, I think Biden brings enormous foreign policy experience to the ticket. I also think that Obama is bright enough to bring in people who will give him good intelligence. I think that Palin brings absolutely NOTHING to McCain's ticket. The people who have said that she has executive experience, etc... well, for one thing, I've read about how she USED her position.* For another, while she has held positions of power, her apparent complete lack of intellectual curiosity is unacceptable. It's not that she isn't very knowledgeable; it's that she doesn't CARE that she's not knowledgeable. She only seems interested in the things people tell her she's supposed to be interested in. This is no big deal if you're a Project Manager in Generic Corporation, but I think it's downright dangerous in the Vice President of the COUNTRY.

Mother Fuck. I started this four hours ago and then had to do a bunch of TOTALLY UNIMPORTANT (read: real world) things and now I've lost both my train of thought AND my eloquence. So assuming anyone still reads this thing, maybe I'll grace you with more later.


*And no, I don't believe everything I read on liberal blogs, because the Right has no monopoly on stupidity.

Gov't vs Sports

You know, it really is infuriating how our federal legislature is spending more time getting to the bottom of doping in sports than it is getting to the bottom of corruption in the Executive branch.

Also, I've noticed that a lot of the blogs/sites/diaries/whatevers I read don't so much provide a lot of content as they do commentary ON content. I was thinking about what a pain it seems to be to make posts which are long enough to bother with when I realized that 3/4 of what's on OTHER people's pages is a bunch of C&P with commentary inserted. So now when something in an article racks me off, maybe I'll just C&P it into Wordpad, insert my pithy witticisms, and pretend I'm a professional blargher too.

The GOP is GOB.

That's "Going Out of Business."

The most entertaining part of the political process for me right now is watching conservative commentators shit themselves with hatred of John McCain. Guys, Huckabee's out and Romney scares too many people. Pretty sure you're stuck with McCain. I know that a shit-flavored popsicle is horrible, but isn't it better than no popsicle at all?

Wheeeeee

Unattributed quote:

"For God so loved the world that He gave Man Free Will and then got pissed when we didn't meet his arbitrary standards. Oh, and he had his Son offed when he realized how impossible those standards were."

Fark quote

From Confabulat on Fark.com:

Good Republican Christians know there's "good science" and "bad science."

"Good science" is the stuff that makes life easier, like electricity, high-speed internet, leaf blowers, SUVs, satellite TV, and hairspray (judging from these pictures, anyway).

"Bad science" is the stuff that makes life worrisome, like evolution, climatology, geology, and ecology.

The value of the scientific method, to these individuals, only depends on whether it is capable of making them lazier and duller. If a scientific theory fails on those two levels, it is hated and rejected, in favor of fairy tales that allow dullness.

Much easier to deal with.

Jesus was a pussy.

Ok. So. Jesus was tortured, then crucified, and hung there in extreme pain and misery for three days because his Father loved us so much He was willing to give up His son (in extreme pain and misery) to save us from our sins, right?

And the point is both that God gave up His son, suffering mightily, and Jesus was crucified, suffering mightily, and that through these acts they have purged the world and offered everlasting life, right?

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight.

1. God gives up His son. Well, God is omniscient and omnipotent. He is the Alpha and the Omega, after all. And he already knows that Jesus is a Good Guy, so he'll end up in Heaven with ease. How, exactly, is God "giving up" his son when as soon as J-Man dies, he'll be there with him? Isn't it more like having Jesus catch an earlier bus home?

2. Jesus suffers. His suffering is, from what I gather, integral in this whole "washing mankind clean of its sins" thing. So I've been wondering: there are people dying slowly in agony all over the planet by the thousands due to torture, disease, abuse ... for whose sins are THEY dying? If you think about it, there have been women in Sierra Leone and Darfur who were basically raped to death over a period of weeks. I kind of think that's worse than a quick 3-day crucifixion. Why doesn't their suffering count toward the sins of all mankind?

3. Hey, how about those aforementioned death-by-repeated-violation women - a whole lot of them had children. How is the death of a single man with no dependents for political reasons over three days somehow more laudable and noteworthy than the death of a woman with children for TANGENTIAL political reasons over a period of months?

4. Those are only examples. How about political dissidents in countries like China and Iran who are tortured for months and then executed? And more. And more.

Three lousy days, guaranteed to see your Dad when you're done? FUCK you. That's not suffering. That's a fucking picnic. With fire ants, but a picnic.

Hot hot planet

Ok. It's global CLIMATE CHANGE. And the fact that there haven't been many hurricanes blasting up the East Coast for the last couple of years should actually WORRY you, as it's a symptom of WEATHER SYSTEMS SHIFTING, which is a FUCKING GLOBAL THING.

Global Climate Change

Some of you may have heard from one news source or another that in Britain, a high court ruled that "An Inconvenient Truth," when screened as part of a lesson plan in secondary schools, must include certain caveats.

Some of YOU may have subsequently learned that the caveats are reasonable, and that the high court ALSO ruled that the film was, on the whole, scientifically sound.

Far less of you, though, have heard that the gentleman who brought the suit was financed by British companies who fund studies specifically to refute global warming. Like the American studies funded by people at Exxon/Mobil.

I think a lot of people hear "British high court" and think, "Ah ha! This is not an American or Middle-Eastern body, so it must not have anything to do with energy politics!" BZZT. You lose. Energy politics are more global than you think.

John Edwards

I heard John Edwards on the Jim Lehrer News Hour a couple of nights ago and I really liked pretty much everything he had to say. Weird. Then again, I only heard the last 15 minutes or so.