GOP Mouthpiece Insults and Trashes Latino/Hispanic Community

It pains me to give this woman any recognition, but her latest mean-spirited attacks on the Latino/Hispanic community is another example of why the Republican Party will remain irrelevant and be perceived as the party of anti-Latino, anti-African-American, anti-gay, anti-women know-nothings. 



"Coulter singles out immigrants from Latin America as particularly “nitwitty,” saying they have too many babies out of wedlock, without citing a published source for the assertion. Nearly half of undocumented-immigrant households -- 45 percent -- consisted of a spouse or cohabiting couple with one or more children, compared to 34 percent of legal immigrants and 21 percent of the U.S. born, according to a 2010 Pew Hispanic Study.

 Apparently unaware that Latinos do not depend disproportionately on government benefits, Coulter writes:

 "That's a lot of government dependents coming down the pike. No amount of "reaching out" to the Hispanic community, effective "messaging" or Reagan's "optimism" is going to turn Mexico's underclass into Republicans … Rather than being more hardworking than American, Hispanics actually work about the same as others, or, in the case of Hispanic women, less."

In fact, Latinos -- especially immigrants -- are more entrepreneurial than the general population. As Cristina Costantini points out in a piece for ABC/Univision,Hispanics created twice as many businesses as the general public since 2000, according to census data.

[skip]

Non-Hispanic whites accounted for 64 percent of the population in 2010 and received 69 percent of the entitlement benefits. In contrast, Hispanics made up 16 percent of the population but received 12 percent of the benefits, less than their proportionate share."



Just to remind us all of who this unfortunate woman is, here're some of her other thoughts and ideas that contribute to why Americans find much of what the GOP stands for repulsive:


"I’ll take 69 cents on the dollar [referring to the wage gap between men and women] or whatever current feminist myth is about how much we make, just to have to never have to pay for dinner. That seems like a fair deal to me.”


“If we took away women's right to vote, we'd never have to worry about another Democrat president. It's kind of a pipe dream, it's a personal fantasy of mine, but I don't think it's going to happen. And it is a good way of making the point that women are voting so stupidly, at least single women.It also makes the point, it is kind of embarrassing, the Democratic Party ought to be hanging its head in shame, that it has so much difficulty getting men to vote for it. I mean, you do see it's the party of women." 


"Gays are the molecular opposites of blacks," Ann Coulter tells a room full of gay men (some of them black), because "everybody likes the gays moving in next door." And yet, the self-proclaimed right-wing Judy Garland explains, gay marriage "is not a civil right — you're not black." 

There are pages and pages of other outrageous quotes by Coulter, and many conservatives will defend her by saying she is just pulling liberals' chains by being controversial.  She seems to have no confidence in actually using what's left of her intelligence to make cogent or convincing arguments, so she uses hyperbole and insulting rhetoric to get attention--that's her first motivation--and then get her point across.  She's become a sad, stale clown.  Her wit has been for years completely devoid of any wisdom and, instead, full of envy and contempt.  

The longer she plays her tiresome political talking game, the more pathetic and irrelevant she becomes, because those groups she has insulted and slandered in her very long and withering career will be the groups that will be running the country.  

Her comments are on the internet for eternity to remind us of what a yuk-yuk,  inconsequential waste of human breath she is.

Rick Santorum THRILLED Vote in Support of Disabled in UN Defeated

The [bad] jokes keep writing themselves, my friends. 

 As the GOP continues to look inward to try to discover why they were rejected in what they believed was a "gimme" election, along comes Little Ricky Santorum to give us a whoppingly crude illustration on why the Republican brand is in trouble: 

 "[Santorum] has been on a crusade against a dangerous attempt by the United Nations to help disabled people around the world. This week, he won! The Senate refused to ratify a U.N. treaty on the subject. The vote, which fell five short of the necessary two-thirds majority, came right after 89-year-old Bob Dole, the former Republican leader and disabled war veteran, was wheeled into the chamber to urge passage. 

 “We did it,” Santorum tweeted in triumph." --NYTimes

 Yes. He really tweeted that. 

 But wait, it gets worse, [if anyone can imagine anything worse than what Santorum did--but this is, afterall, the Teapublican Party--the Party of NO!:

 "WASHINGTON — Former Senator Bob Dole of Kansas sat slightly slumped in his wheelchair on the Senate floor on Tuesday, staring intently as Senator John Kerry gave his most impassioned speech all year, in defense of a United Nations treaty that would ban discrimination against people with disabilities. 

 Senators from both parties went to greet Mr. Dole, leaning in to hear his wispy reply, as he sat in support of the treaty, which would require that people with disabilities have the same general rights as those without disabilities. Several members took the unusual step of voting aye while seated at their desks, out of respect for Mr. Dole, 89, a Republican who was the majority leader. Then, after Mr. Dole’s wife, Elizabeth, rolled him off the floor, Republicans quietly voted down the treaty that the ailing Mr. Dole, recently released from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, so longed to see passed." 

 [skip] 

 "Mr. Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, his voice rising as senator after senator moved slowly into the chamber, rejected the concerns of Republicans and made a moral argument for approval of the treaty. 

 Mr. Dole, he said, had not come to the Senate floor 'to advocate for the United Nations.' 'He is here because he wants to know that other countries will come to treat the disabled as we do,' he added. 

Approval of the treaty, Mr. Kerry said, would demonstrate that “what we do here in the United States Senate matters.” He added, 'Don’t let Senator Bob Dole down.'”  --NYTimes

UPDATE: To emphasize the fact that the treaty was NON-BINDING:

 "Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) said the U.N. committee recommendations would be nonbinding, prompting Lee to ask, “If this does nothing, then why would we ratify it?” Kerry countered that the treaty would allow the United States to serve on the committee to advocate for the rights of U.S. veterans and citizens living or traveling abroad. 

 “I have not said it does nothing,” Kerry said. “I said it does not change U.S. law; that is different from saying it doesn’t do anything. 

If it didn’t do anything I wouldn’t be here, nor would President Bush have signed it.”  




The Teapublicans, in their irrational paranoia, voted down a measure which we initiated here in our own country, made colossal fools of themselves, and shamed America. 

 The final vote was 61-38 vote. 

All the nay votes were Republican. 

 REPUBLICANS 61 -- DISABLED AROUND THE WORLD -- 0 

 I imagine they're all proud of themselves.

David Warren "Dave" Brubeck (December 6, 1920 – December 5, 2012)

David Warren "Dave" Brubeck (December 6, 1920 – December 5, 2012)

My favorite.

HOW DARE PRESIDENT OBAMA DO WHAT HE PROMISED TO DO DURING THE CAMPAIGN!

President Obama has taken his balanced budget approach to the American people, and the GOP still believes it won the election: 

The GOP Plan?

From the NYTimes: "In a letter signed by Speaker John Boehner and six other House leaders, Republicans didn’t even bother to assemble their own package of spending cuts and revenue increases; they did a simple copy and paste of a few proposals made extemporaneously at a hearing last year by Erskine Bowles, the Democratic co-chairman of a deficit reduction committee. 

 The proposal, which Mr. Bowles quickly disavowed on Monday, purports to raise $800 billion in revenue over a decade by ending deductions and loopholes, while allowing the Bush-era tax cuts for the rich to continue. It would cut $1.2 trillion in spending, half of which would come from Medicare, Medicaid, and other health programs, including an increase in the Medicare eligibility age to 67. Another $600 billion would be cut from other unspecified spending. "


And this:

 "House Republicans would allow a vote on extending the Bush middle class tax cuts (the bill passed in August by the Senate) and offer the President nothing more: no extension of the debt ceiling, nothing on unemployment, nothing on closing loopholes.

 Congress would recess for the holidays and the president would face a big battle early in the year over the debt ceiling. A top GOP House leadership aide confirms the plan is under consideration, but says Speaker Boehner has made no decision on whether to pursue it.

 Under one variation of this Doomsday Plan, House Republicans would allow a vote on extending only the middle class tax cuts and Republicans, to express disapproval at the failure to extend all tax cuts, would vote “present” on the bill, allowing it to pass entirely on Democratic votes." --h/t dailykos



 Be careful, Republicans, what you plan for in this game.  The American people support President Obama.  Elections have consequences:

"How dare he? President Obama, I mean: How dare he do what he promised during the campaign? How dare he insist on a “balanced approach” to fiscal policy that includes a teensy-weensy tax increase for the rich? Oh, the humanity."  --Eugene Robinson


More HERE.

Something for Sunday

Jon Stewart Pwns Sens. McCain and Graham on Ambassador Susan Rice

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

The Man The GOP Should Have Nominated...

but who wasn't radical enough for the extremists in his party:  Jon Huntsman. 

 WASHINGTON -- "Jon Huntsman's run for president was widely anticipated but ultimately brief. The former Utah governor and U.S. ambassador to China urged the Republican Party to be more open-minded on social issues, less ambitious in military policy and marginally willing to negotiate. The crowds weren't too receptive. Viewed as the toughest general-election threat by the president's political advisers, Huntsman nevertheless finished third in the New Hampshire primary. He bowed out of the race shortly thereafter. 

But with the GOP now licking its wounds from the 2012 election loss, he has maintained a steady presence in the political conversation. In an interview with The Huffington Post, Huntsman laid out his vision for the Republican Party going forward. He called for neo-conservatism to be sidelined, for states' rights on issues like gay marriage to be respected, for comprehensive immigration reform to be pursued. He also said the party had to be open to compromise, including on the idea of raising marginal tax rates (as a last resort)." 

 Speaking further on why the GOP nominees were so out of touch with the electorate: 

 "Some do it professionally. Some were entertainers," he said of the Republican presidential field. "I looked down the debate stage, and half of them were probably on Fox contracts at one point in their career. You do that. You write some books. You go out and you sell some more. You get a radio gig or a TV gig out of it or something. And it's like, you say to yourself, the barriers of entry to this game are pretty damn low." 

He chuckled a bit when reminded that a pizza conglomerate, in the person of Herman Cain, had led the Iowa caucus polls at one point. "It wasn't a period where rational thinking or any kind of commitment to reality or truth or optimism necessarily prevailed," Huntsman said. "It was how can you eviscerate the opposition." 

 On marriage equality: 

"States ought to be entitled to do whatever they want," he said. 

On the tax cuts and spend presidency of George W. Bush, conservative president: 

"We weren't coming from a position of strength [in 2012]," he said. "We sounded like hypocrites talking about spending when that was all we did under George W. Bush." 

 Huntsman gets it: 

Huntsman insisted his party has to evolve. The cultivation of knee-jerk conflict, he argued, has produced remarkably little fruit. For four years, the goal was to "thwart the opposition, stymie the opposition, obfuscate, be a flamethrower, go out there and destroy the system, and here we are," he said. "We have seen the results of that mentality." 


 Fortunately for the Democrats and President Obama, the GOP embraced teh crazy and Mitt Romney, a man who had no core values. The party has only itself to blame for the utter foolishness of putting forward the group of extremist candidates, and for ultimately nominating a well-oiled weather vane.



Bruce Bartlett on Reality vs. The Conservative Movement November 26, 2012 — 
Ron Chusid 

"The conservative movement suffers from being dominated by extremists who drive out anyone who does not agree with all the counter-to-fact and irrational views which they now hold (which are very similar to the extremist views which William F. Buckley, Jr. purged from the conservative movement in the 1960′s.) 

Bruce Bartlett, who worked in the Reagan Administration, has found that it is not possible to simultaneously look at reality and be welcomed by other conservatives: I’m not going to beat around the bush and pretend I don’t have a vested interest here. Frankly, I think I’m at ground zero in the saga of Republicans closing their eyes to any facts or evidence that conflict with their dogma. Rather than listen to me, they threw me under a bus. To this day, I don’t think they understand that my motives were to help them avoid the permanent decline that now seems inevitable."

What Do You See?

"The Truth" by Michael D’Antuono 
(Photo courtesy of Michael D’Antuono)
By Katherine Landergan,
Boston Globe Correspondent

 "A painting that was removed from an art installation in New York City because of public backlash is now on display at the Bunker Hill Community College Art Gallery, sparking outrage as well as an outpouring of support for the artist.

The portrait depicts President Obama as Jesus, wearing a Crown of Thorns with his arms outstretched. Michael D’Antuono’s painting, which is called 'The Truth,' is part of a larger exhibit 'Artists on the Stump: The Road to the White House 2012.'

According to the gallery’s website, the exhibition is an opportunity for artists to 'weigh in on the issues, candidates and country.' ”

[skip]


"D’Antuono, who has been an illustrator for nearly 25 years, began crafting political works of art in 2009. 'The Truth' was his first piece, which he had planned to display as an art installation in New York’s Union Square Park on Obama’s 100th day in office. He said the painting was to be in a mock voting booth; the idea was members of the public would view the painting privately, and they would then be interviewed about what they thought of the piece. 

But D’Antuono decided to pull the installation after receiving approximately 4,000 angry emails about the painting. His family also voiced concerns for their safety, because of the amount of publicity the painting was generating. 'I was threatened for eternal damnation,' D’Antuono said. 'One lady said, ‘I hope you get arthritis in both your hands and can never paint again.’” In a phone interview Tuesday, D’Antuono said he feels that many of the people who were sickened by the painting may have missed its real meaning. 'They weren’t interesting in the point of the painting,' he said. 'They didn’t get that far.'






I see the painting as a symbol of what Mr. Obama has had to endure since his election in 2008. IMO, there can be no "blasphemy" in using crucifixion as a symbol of extreme hatred and a wish to do extreme violence to someone whose words and actions are not acceptable to certain segments of a population, since Jesus Christ wasn't the only historical figure who was crucified.  To me, this painting symbolizes the extreme hatred and wish to do harm to our 44th president by certain extremists in this country.

All my life I've heard the expression "I was crucified" in reference to receiving extreme criticism and or rebuke from someone.  How many times have we heard the threat "I'll crucify you!" as a warning to someone whose ideas or actions we disagree with?

This painting is an allegorical reference to how one half of this country has treated President Obama.  

Apparently, the truth stings.

And so people who disagree with Mr. D'Antuono's work wish to see him crucified for his interpretation.


More HERE.

Florida GOPer Admits to Voter Suppression

Florida GOPer Admits to Voter Suppression
From the Palm Beach Post:



Former Florida GOP leaders say voter suppression was reason they pushed new election law


Former GOP chair, governor - both on outs with party - say voter fraud wasn’t a concern, but reducing Democratic votes was.

By Dara Kam, John Lantigua
Palm Beach Post Capital Bureau

A new Florida law that contributed to long voter lines and caused some to abandon voting altogether was intentionally designed by Florida GOP staff and consultants to inhibit Democratic voters, former GOP officials and current GOP consultants have told The Palm Beach Post.

Republican leaders said in proposing the law that it was meant to save money and fight voter fraud. But a former GOP chairman and former Gov. Charlie Crist, both of whom have been ousted from the party, now say that fraud concerns were advanced only as subterfuge for the law’s main purpose: GOP victory.

Former Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer says he attended various meetings, beginning in 2009, at which party staffers and consultants pushed for reductions in early voting days and hours.

“The Republican Party, the strategists, the consultants, they firmly believe that early voting is bad for Republican Party candidates,” Greer told The Post. “It’s done for one reason and one reason only. … ‘We’ve got to cut down on early voting because early voting is not good for us,’ ” Greer said he was told by those staffers and consultants.

“They never came in to see me and tell me we had a (voter) fraud issue,” Greer said. “It’s all a marketing ploy.”

***********************

For days after the election, I read on several rightwing blogs how the only way that President Obama could have won was through voter fraud.  This type of thinking, of course, disabuses the thinkers of the idea that perhaps women, young people, African-Americans, Latinos, and Asian Americans all voted for President Obama because he more fully represented their values and hopes than did Mitt Romney, who overwhelmingly appealed to older, whiter, male American voters.
Instead, these rightwingers continue to delude themselves with the idea that only people who wanted "free stuff" voted for Mr. Obama, and that even then, there was rampant and widespread voting fraud, and that was the explanation for Mr. Obama's victory over the GOP candidate, a victory that gave Mr. Obama over 64 million popular votes to Mr. Romney's 60 million.


That sort of thinking is what caused their confusion and disbelief on election night, when President Obama walked away with another victory under his belt--only the fourth president, since FDR, to win a majority of  the popular vote, the others:  Eisenhower, and Ronald Reagan.


But back to the cries of voter fraud as the only explanation for Mr. Obama's win.  I haven't seen any blog posts on what the former Florida GOP chair and governor has attested to:  that Florida GOPers deliberately and with malice designed laws to slow down and discourage voting by certain segments of the voting public--segments that traditionally vote Democratic.

***************

[cont.]

"Greer is now under indictment, accused of stealing $200,000 from the party through a phony campaign fundraising operation. He, in turn, has sued the party, saying GOP leaders knew what he was doing and voiced no objection.

“Jim Greer has been accused of criminal acts against this organization and anything he says has to be considered in that light,” says Brian Burgess, Florida GOP spokesman since September.
But Greer’s statements about the motivations for the party’s legislative efforts, implemented by a GOP-majority House and Senate in Tallahassee in 2011, are backed by Crist — also now on the outs with the party — and two veteran GOP campaign consultants.

Wayne Bertsch, who handles local and legislative races for Republicans, said he knew targeting Democrats was the goal.

'In the races I was involved in in 2008, when we started seeing the increase of turnout and the turnout operations that the Democrats were doing in early voting, it certainly sent a chill down our spines. And in 2008, it didn’t have the impact that we were afraid of. It got close, but it wasn’t the impact that they had this election cycle,' Bertsch said, referring to the fact that Democrats picked up seven legislative seats in Florida in 2012 despite the early voting limitations.
Another GOP consultant, who did not want to be named, also confirmed that influential consultants to the Republican Party of Florida were intent on beating back Democratic turnout in early voting after 2008."


But, say the rightwingers, Mr. Obama won because FRAUD!


Crist said he was asked to curb early voting

"Crist said party leaders approached him during his 2007-2011 gubernatorial term about changing early voting, in an effort to suppress Democrat turnout. Crist is now at odds with the GOP, since abandoning the party to run for U.S. Senate as an independent in 2010. He is rumored to be planning another run for governor, as a Democrat.

Crist said in a telephone interview this month that he did not recall conversations about early voting specifically targeting black voters 'but it looked to me like that was what was being suggested. And I didn’t want them to go there at all.'

About inhibiting minority voters, Greer said:

'The sad thing about that is yes, there is prejudice and racism in the party but the real prevailing thought is that they don’t think minorities will ever vote Republican,' he said. 'It’s not really a broad-based racist issue. It’s simply that the Republican Party gave up a long time ago ever believing that anything they did would get minorities to vote for them.'

But a GOP consultant who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution said black voters were a concern.

'I know that the cutting out of the Sunday before Election Day was one of their targets only because that’s a big day when the black churches organize themselves,' he said."

**************

When a Democrat wins an election, the GOPers scream FRAUD! while they manipulate and scheme to make voting for Democratic candidates more and more difficult for minorities.  This is never seen as a fraudulent way of winning elections, since most of the GOP pols who engage in this criminal activity believe only the Republican Party has the right to govern this country.  Any other party--see Democratic--they see as interlopers who win only through millions and millions of people cheating at the polls.


However, we actually know where the real fraud is occuring and which party schemes to subvert democracy and suppress the vote.


More here:

Oops!  Republicans Arrested for Voter Fraud!

Breaking: GOP Caught Red Handed, Election Fraud in Indiana

Franklin Graham's Ignorance

I don't know how many people listen to or follow his preaching, but the fact that Franklin Graham has a platform to declaim this nonsense is shocking:


 "In the last four years, we have begun to turn our backs on God," he said. "We have taken God out of our education system. We have taken him out of government. You have lawyers that sue you every time you mention the name of Jesus Christ in any kind of a public forum."




"In the last four years..."   Is it just a coincidence that in the last four years we've had a bi-racial president in the White House and that Graham identifies just those four years as the only years when "we have begun to turn our backs on God?"

"We have taken God out of our education system."  No.   Graham is wrong here.  God and gods were never intended to be in our public education system.  Private Christian and any other religious educational systems are replete with gods, Christian and otherwise.  What Graham seems to be whining about here is that our PUBLICLY TAX FUNDED educational systems do not favor ANY god, as our Founding Fathers intended, but about which Graham is still shamefully ignorant.  Also, Graham does not understand that any school child is completely free to pray to his or her god privately to him or herself at any time he or she wishes to.  What Graham is complaining about here is that his Christian god is not worshipped publicly and led by public school administrators supported by tax payers of all denominations and even by nonreligious tax payers.  Again, Graham is complaining about a very unAmerican version of religious freedom.  It appears he's unhappy about the fact that our Constitution does not allow him and his kind to impose his idea of religion on his fellow Americans. 




Graham continues:


"Maybe God will have to bring our nation down to our knees—to where you just have a complete economic collapse. And maybe at that point, maybe people will again begin to call upon the name of almighty God."


I don't know where Graham received his religious instruction, but it appears to me that it was at the same school where all religious fanatics study.  Because his brand of religion is not universally practiced in the US, he believes his god will punish America by plunging it into an economic disaster, thereby causing all manner of suffering and deprivation to come to every woman, man, and child.  This is the sort of god Graham would have every woman, man, and child worship through fear of retribution and unending suffering.  I've read about these sorts of vengeful religious ideas in certain parts of the Middle East and anywhere that religious leaders hope to control their followers through portentous prophecies.

Why this very unholy man, Franklin Graham, has any following is a mystery to me, since he demonstrates his ignorance of our American heritage and is no more tolerant of religious freedom enshrined in our Constitution than is the worst of Middle Eastern mullahs, or other religious fanatics. 








,

Eric Whitacre's Virtual Performance of "Sleep"

Eric Whitacre's "Sleep."

Enjoy.






Here's the story of this composer's project.

Happy Thanksgiving

Butternut Squash Soup

A break from politics.

With Thanksgiving arriving on Thursday, I thought I'd share some of our family's favorite recipes.

This is my butternut squash soup that is always a big hit as a first course.

It's easy, it's healthy and it's quick!

Butternut Squash Soup, 4 servings

4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
1 medium onion, chopped
1/2 large or one medium butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cubed
2 medium carrots, scraped and chopped
2 small to medium tart apples, peeled, seeded and cubed
16 oz. good quality vegetable or chicken stock
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
salt and pepper to taste

slivered scallion for garni

In a 2 quart sauce pan, saute the onions in the butter until soft and golden. Add the squash, carrots and apples. Let them cook in the onion butter mixture for 2 to 3 minutes over medium low heat. Add the stock and gently simmer until all the veggies and the apples are soft.

I have a wonderful appliance--I use a Braun hand-held emulsifier. to puree the veggies and fruit right in the sauce pan. If you don't own one of these devices, transfer the contents of the pan to a food processor or blender and puree until all lumps are gone.

Return the puree to the sauce pan, add the cream and the spices. Heat through. Serve with scallion garni.

This makes a great first course or a nutritious lunch, served with a hunk of crusty  ciabatta bread.

Enjoy!

Sunday Night Poetry

TATTOO


This is the tomorrow, dreamed
as you drove through
each town to buy bottles of wine,
loaves of bread.

A trash schedule, laundry stub,
forgotten details, fill the private
wrack you occupy in your home
among the pines.

Through the windows,
evening’s breath swirls
your hair in circles,
dark leaves beneath 
the forehead of night.

The stars’ disorderly designs
attract you.  You slide
out of your skin, trace muscle

and bone, make your own
design—tattoo of your most
famous heart, with the little
arrow pointing down.

                         --SK

Shame on McCain and the GOP

I'm posting this in answer to the ongoing discussion in the blogpost below.  A few commenters brought up the Benghazi tragedy, and I thought this piece by Steve Benen makes it perfectly clear that UN Ambassador Susan Rice was NOT lying, was NOT covering anything up, and she was certainly NOT, as Senator McCain tried to smear her, incompetent.

Ambassador Rice did her job and she did it well.

Five days after the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Susan Rice appeared on "Face the Nation" to give the public an update on the available information. She explained that it was too early to draw "definitive conclusions," but the "best information we have to date" suggested the violence "began spontaneously ... as a reaction to what had transpired some hours earlier in Cairo" in response to the anti-Islam internet video.

The ambassador then added, "But soon after that spontaneous protest began outside of our consulate in Benghazi, we believe that it looks like extremist elements, individuals, joined in that effort with heavy weapons." Asked about a possible al Qaeda role, Rice said this was unclear, explaining, "I think this is one of the things we'll have to determine."

For John McCain and other increasingly-hysterical Obama administration critics, Rice was lying and her use of the word "spontaneous" is itself an outrageous scandal. It's not altogether clear why this is causing far-right apoplexy, but this is where we find ourselves at this point.

In an interesting twist, CBS News obtained the CIA talking points given to Rice in preparation of her interview.

CBS News correspondent Margaret Brennan says the talking points, which were also given to members of the House intelligence committee, make no reference to terrorism being a likely factor in the assault, which left U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans dead. [...]

The CIA's talking points read as follows: "The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the US Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the US diplomatic post in Benghazi and subsequently its annex. There are indications that extremists participated in the violent demonstrations."

In other words, what Rice said is, almost to the syllable, exactly what the combined judgment of the intelligence community believed as of the time of her interview. She wasn't lying; she wasn't incompetent; and she wasn't covering anything up.

Yes, the CIA assessment later changed as more information became available, but that only bolsters what Rice said at the time -- that the search for answers was ongoing.

McCain's smear campaign simply isn't based on facts. The senator owes Rice an apology.


Kevin Drum:

Yep. They're just convinced that Obama runs a gang of Chicago thugs who are lying and cheating behind the scenes at every opportunity. It's a foundational story on the tea-party right. Unfortunately, the reality is that whatever else you think of Obama, he's one of the straightest arrows we've had in the White House since ... forever. He runs a tight ship organizationally, and on a personal level he's so intolerant of personal peccadilloes that he sometimes seems almost inhuman. It would be astonishing if he could actually avoid a serious scandal for an entire eight-year term, but if anyone can do it, it's probably Obama.

And yes, it's driving Republicans crazy.



MORE:

"Rep. Peter King (R-NY) has admitted that the CIA and intelligence community approved U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice’s talking points before she made her much-derided Sept. 16 appearance on several Sunday news shows to discuss the attacks in Benghazi. King, one of the most outspoken critics of the Obama administration’s response to the attack, came to his conclusion following testimony from former CIA Director David Petraeus.

After leaving the closed-door hearing, King spoke with reporters for several minutes about Petraeus’ statements. Rice’s television appearances were among the topics discussed, leading King to indicate that while Petraeus did not personally write Rice’s talking points, the CIA did approve them."



All of the posturing by the GOP on this tragedy is nothing more than political gamesmanship.  And John McCain proved it by grandstanding in front of the cameras, losing his temper, when asked why he chose to come out with attitude to smear Ambassador Rice's reputation instead of actually attending a meeting that dealt with the Benghazi attack.  Asked why he didn't attend the meeting on the Benghazi attack, McCain bellowed at the reporter who dared to ask him, and then  had a meltdown because he was caught with his ugly-colored partisanship pants down around his ankles.

More here:

Benghazi is not a scandal

Loser GOP Presidential Candidate Blames "Moochers" For His Defeat

It was all those "free gifts" that Santa Claus President Obama stuffed in all the Democrats' greedy stockings over the last four years that won him  re-election, and not the fact that Romney ran a losing campaign or chose a Randian extremist as his running mate.  Nor was it the fact that every single state where Mittens has a palace home soundly defeated him.  And his wonderboy muscley muscled zombie-eyed, granny-starving running mate?  His home state AND home town rejected him as well.

Oh where is the love?

But it's all President Obama's fault, says Mittens, for giving women free birth control and government funded abortions on demand 24/7 in special secret rooms in the White House;  for giving away free health care to illegal immigrants and space aliens; for giving students free money for college--but only if they attend Liberal, Commie, Marxist,  Godless schools where everyone is forced to wear Che Guevara t-shirts while smoking free weed [courtesy of Santa Obama] and, lastly, because President Claus gave away free cell phones for every you-know-what on welfare. 






ANALYSIS By MICHAEL FALCONE (@michaelpfalcone) and AMY WALTER (@amyewalter)

Nov. 15, 2012

It's been just over a week since his defeat at the hands of President Obama and already a chasm between Mitt Romney and some prominent members of the Republican Party seems to have opened up.

The failed GOP presidential hopeful's candid assessment of why he lost the race, which he offered on conference calls with donors yesterday, instantly drew a sharp rebuke from Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal who called Romney's take "absolutely wrong."


Romney told top donors he came up short on Nov. 6 because "what the president's campaign did was focus on certain members of his base coalition, give them extraordinary financial gifts from the government, and then work very aggressively to turn them out to vote, and that strategy worked."

According to Romney some of the best "gifts," went to Hispanic voters, a group that voted overwhelmingly for President Obama.





More reading:

Romney Blames Loss On Obama’s ‘Big Gifts’ To Minorities, Women
 

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Republican Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal slammed former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney last night in a strong rebuke of Romney's comments claiming that President Barack Obama won the election because he provided “gifts” to minorities and young voters.

Jindal told reporters at a Republican Governors Association meeting in Las Vegas that Romney's comments, which came in a conference call to donors earlier on Wednesday, were "absolutely wrong."

Here's what Jindal had to say, via The Washington Examiner:

 

“That is absolutely wrong. Two points on that. One, we have got to stop dividing American voters. We need to go after 100 percent of the votes, not 53 percent — we need to go after every single vote. And second, we need to continue to show that our policies help every voter out there achieve the American dream, which is to be in the middle class, which is to be able to give their children the opportunity to get a great education, which is for their children to have even better-paying jobs than their parents.”

 

“If we’re going to continue to be a competitive party and win elections on the national stage and continue to fight for our conservative principles, we need two messages to get out loudly and clearly: One, we are fighting for 100 percent of the votes, and secondly, our policies benefit every American who wants to pursue the American dream, period. No exceptions.”

 

Republican strategist Ana Navarro hit Romney on Twitter, saying that "Romney was the biggest gift Obama got."
 

The Generals and the Other Women

Normally it's a waste of time wading into the swamp of sexual scandals.  I don't think it's anyone's business on what goes on in people's private lives.  But the military has other rules and regs on this, specifically  the Military Code of Conduct.  From what has been reported in the media, General Petraeus had retired from active duty when he began his affair with Mrs. Broadwell.  Who knows.

What has been astonishing about the daily revelations about this scandal is that two highly decorated and powerful military men involved themselves with what looks to be, by all accounts, unstable, obsessive women who were drawn to power and glory like squirrels to a pile of nuts.

What on god's blue-green earth were Generals Petraeus and Allen thinking when they wrote those letters to Jill Kelley's sister's lawyer in support of her request for child custody?  If one believes what has been written about Natalie Khawam, Kelley's sister, she's a dishonorable and out-of-control typhoon of a wreck of a disaster.  Why would such eminent men as the generals want to be involved in a domestic entanglement that has nothing to do with them?  Perhaps the thousands and thousands of "flirtatious" emails General Allen shared with Jill Kelley will tell us?

And the FBI guy who facilitated all of this--you know, the knucklehead who sent Jill Kelley a photo of himself shirtless--he seems to have had a political axe to grind and hoped to ensnare President Obama in the scandal.  Instead he irreparably damaged two generals whom the American people thought of as heroic and unimpeachable


It's all so tragic and comedic at the same time.

Who really gets the "free stuff?"

Countless rightwing bloggers have been hawking the excuse that President Obama won re-election because he promised moochers "free stuff."  This salves the trauma most true believers experienced on November 6 and allows them to ignore the real reasons President Obama and the Democrats won.  Facing that reality is too harsh, so the fallback is to blame the forty-seven percenters for wanting the government to give them goodies.

But reality is quite the opposite.  This map published online in the NYTimes shows us exactly what part of the US receives the most government "goodies," and it's not, for the most part, the liberal northeast or other so-called liberal enclaves of moochers and ne'er-do-wells that extremist GOPers love to blame for their defeat.

Here's the map.

I don't expect the truth illustrated by this map to sink into the cemented ideology that they have used as the basis of their complaints--people who wanted "free stuff" elected President Obama.  The "moochers," for the most part, are living in the states that bought into that false idea and rejected Mr. Obama.

Who really gets a lot of "free stuff," i.e., government welfare? Take a look.

And here.

And the 47 percenters Romeny wrote off?  Where do they live?

Sunday Night Poetry

This Veterans' Day I remember and thank all who serve and served our country.

I especially remember my cousin, a US Marine, who served in Viet Nam, and died from the affects of Agent Orange.




The Howl of Orphans

                       --for G.M.

We listened for the car engine
to turn off

in someone’s driveway
there is always an absent car.

Your letters spoke of nausea
burning, bloody

you swore you weren’t
one of us there.

We looked for you
at the kitchen table--

Salami, cheese--your favorites
with a side of politics:

“And I won’t even mention the howl of orphans
that reaches up to the throne of God.” [1.]


All night we sat by your bed,
heard the story of Monkey Mountain,

saw your red-peppered arms,
imagined

heart, lungs, liver--
a cauliflower of organs.

You violently bloomed then
left us with your great

body, under the flag.


[1.] From "The Diameter of the Bomb," Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai

"REPUBLICANS HAVE BEEN FLEECED AND EXPLOITED:" --Conservative David Frum

It's not news to those of us who've been telling conservatives this for years.

It's not news to those of us who've warned conservatives that people who watch no  teevee news are better informed than people who watch FAUX NOOZ.

Conservative hate-radio jocks like Limbaugh, Beck, and Savage have poisoned the airwaves with their bigotry and lies, and conservatives never call them on it.

Conservative writers like Mark Levin resort to apocalyptic prose and fearmongering in order to keep their readers cowering and at the same time craving more lies and misinformation to justify their anxieties.

We knew this.  And conservative writer and pundit, David Frum, confirms it:




“Republicans have been fleeced and exploited, and lied to by a conservative entertainment complex,” Daily Beast and Newsweek contributing editor David Frum told Friday’s Morning Joe panel in a discussion on the outcome of the 2012 election
.
Frum, who is a Republican and once served as a speechwriter for President George W. Bush, has criticized conservative media outlets in the past for “immers[ing] their audience in a total environment of pseudo-facts and pretend information.” Frum joined Morning Joe on Friday, in part, to discuss his new e-book “Why Romney Lost: And What the GOP Can Do About It.”
Asked to name those media outlets he meant, Frum deferred, saying, “I name names in the book.”
Later, though Frum tweeted that he would happily repeat his message direct to Fox News.

davidfrum@davidfrum

By the way, if anybody at Fox would like me to repeat to their faces what I said on Morning Joe this AM, I accept. Unlikely, I know, but …

9 Nov 12

 

Frum argued that Republican leaders, who he says are “cowards” rather than “fundamentally mistaken,” have a difficult relationship with the GOP activist base and donor base.

“The problem with GOP leaders is they’re cowards, not that they’re fundamentally mistaken,” Frum said. “The real locus of the problem is the GOP activist base and the GOP donor base. They went apocalyptic over the past four years and that was exploited by a lot of people in the conservative world.”

While Frum said he believedMitt Romney would have been “a really good president,” he also noted that Romney was “twisted into pretzels [and] the people who put cement shoes on his feet are now blaming him for sinking.”

Host Joe Scarborough added to Frum’s statement, saying “conservatives have been lied to.”

“They’ve been lied to by people who engage in niche marketing and make tens of millions of dollars engaging in niche marketing,” Scarborough said. “I’m a capitalist, God bless ‘em…but that’s not an electoral strategy, that’s a business strategy for them.”

The reason so many conservative blogger are disheartened by the results of Tuesday's election is that they've been  consistently lied to by their heroes, while their heroes are laughing all the way to the bank.


"of David Frum's E-Book ("Why Romney Lost").

Chapter 1:

Liberals were right all along.

Chapter 2:

About everything.

The End."   h/t d r i f t g l a s s



Matt Taibi of Rolling Stone:

"...the fact that so many Republicans this week think that all Hispanics care about is amnesty, all women want is abortions (and lots of them) and all teenagers want is to sit on their couches and smoke tons of weed legally, that tells you everything you need to know about the hopeless, anachronistic cluelessness of the modern Republican Party. A lot of these people, believe it or not, would respond positively, or at least with genuine curiosity, to the traditional conservative message of self-reliance and fiscal responsibility.

But modern Republicans will never be able to spread that message effectively, because they have so much of their own collective identity wrapped up in the belief that they're surrounded by free-loading, job-averse parasites who not only want to smoke weed and have recreational abortions all day long, but want hardworking white Christians like them to pay the tab. Their whole belief system, which is really an endless effort at congratulating themselves for how hard they work compared to everyone else (by the way, the average "illegal," as Rush calls them, does more real work in 24 hours than people like Rush and me do in a year), is inherently insulting to everyone outside the tent – and you can't win votes when you're calling people lazy, stoned moochers.

It's hard to say whether it's good or bad that the Rushes of the world are too clueless to realize that it's their attitude, not their policies, that is screwing them most with minority voters. If they were self-aware at all, Mitt Romney would probably be president right now. So I guess we should be grateful that the light doesn't look like it will ever go on. But wow, is their angst tough to listen to."

But there is some hope:

It's Official: Allen West Loses