CONSERVATIVE NINCOMPOOPERY

This is just a small sample of what passes as "political discussion" on conservative blogs:



Radical Redneck August 10, 2013 at 8:24:00 AM EDT 
News Flash! Michelle Obama snubbed from Vanity Fair's best dressed list. Moochie Obama dresses like a pig. She probably has body odor too. I wouldn't let her in my house, so why should Vanity Fair?

 

Reply Anonymous August 10, 2013 at 8:36:00 AM EDT It's not Moochies looks I care about, it's her attitude that turns my stomach. But what did you expect when Omar the tent maker is her designer!



Yeah.  Some tent!  But we know the people who write that trash are disassociated from reality and are too soaked in bigotry to even know they're bigots.

Meanwhile, Mrs. Obama is intelligent and beautiful.  And they're not. 

 

Reply Ron Russell August 10, 2013 at 8:58:00 AM EDT People like Zippy and the Moocher are never happy, no matter how much power, money and celebrity vacations, golf rounds , White House parties...etc they have. They always want more. It's pathetic!


Glenn E. Chatfield said...  August 9, 2013 at 1:37 PM   "What I stated was not 'whining,' rather it was fact. And I posted no link because anyone of average intelligence and who reads or listens to news at least once a month knows what I stated was true. 

 Do I need statistics to say this country is deeper into sexual morality than every before? Same-sex fake marriage is now the top perversion movement. Abortion is rampant, hookups rather than marriage is the norm, pornography is available like no time in history, sex indoctrination is taught in kindergarten - 'just use a condom' -- etc. 

And you need stats to show this?!?!? Violent crime is lower because more people are carrying firearms. DUH. The connection has been proven empirically too often. The deficits are shrinking?!?!? 

What sort of bizarre math comes up with this. No time in history has this country been the trillions of dollars in debt as it is now. Your 'evidence' is nothing but gov't propaganda. How about coming into the real world."

Kid said... TS/WS, That IS fascism 101. using the IRS to negatively impact political opponents is: 1) a million more times serious than the idiotic 'watergate' non-event. 2) just s jump to the right of full blown NAZI storm trooper tactics. But the libtards love it don't they? August 8, 2013 at 7:56 PM

Average American said... "America has forgotten how to fight a damned war! 

All this politically correct bullshit, nation building, rules of engagement, putting in an 'elected government' as soon as possible--all these things are STUPID!! 

The right answer is to go in, KICK ASS, WE run the place until the heathens are really ready to do it themselves, and then WE install their first government. 

When we KNOW that we have the right leaders in place, THEN let them dip their frigging little pinkies in blue ink, NOT UNTIL! And don't be afraid of these third world pukes. Last and MOST important, let the military do what we pay them for. 

Keep the frigging politicians OUT of it! AND KEEP THE NEWS MEDIA W A Y AWAY!!!!!!!"  August 7, 2013 at 9:12 PM


Just Saying It Like It Is.July 23, 2013 at 2:11 PM "The President of the United States is doing more harm than good, I don’t care what that Progressive screw-ball says on her blog.. . 

What bothers me the most is the ignorance of those who follow her like lost sheep in the night not seeing the implications of Obama’s statements. Nobody wants to discuss facts nor reality just false propaganda. 

What these leftist progressive idiots either fail to see or ignore the facts behind Obama's insidious statement, is the fact hath this will being out more and more racial tension and even lead to serious implications 

These scummy Progressives make me sick with their hypocrisy and lies, especially that Progressive, hatful, lying blogging whore Even that douchbag illiterate Rachel Jeantel is not that naive or ignorant! 

First time on your site thanks for your brutal honesty.. Can't understand what those leftie bottom feeders dislike you so much.....LOL..."




Now go wash your eyes with bleach and be thankful you're not one of them.

Crazy Louie Gohmert

Your Modern Republican Party:

















 Paul Krugman: "...the madness of the GOP is the central issue of our time."

Joe Scarborough Calls Out "Stupid" Republicans

UPDATE BELOW

In an angry outburst, former GOP Representative, Joe Scarborough, let loose a barrage of scathing attacks on the stupidity of GOP senators who plan to hold America hostage and shut down the government unless Congress defunds the ACA.

The extremist TeaPublicans planning this sabotage are Senators Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and Marco Rubio.  Like petulant little narcissists, they intend to disrupt the entire country if they don't get their way.  Even if their goal is totally unattainable.  And stupid.

Read what Scarborough had to say about these dunderheads:



"Scarborough described right-wing efforts as a 'spectacle' and a 'side show,' saying, 'it is never going to have the desired effect.' 

 Repeating the word 'stupid' multiple times, Scarborough said a threatened shutdown could have disastrous effects for the GOP. "When do you realize that your stupidity is getting in the way of conservatives winning national elections? Do you want to keep losing? You have lost the popular vote five out of six times in presidential races. 

 'Do you really want Hillary Clinton to be the next president for the next eight years? Are you really that stupid? Are you really that dumb? Are you really in that much need of being angry and resentful that you just stop caring about winning elections? 

 'If so, you are not a Republican," Scarborough said. "You are not a conservative. You're a nihilist and you have no place in our party. Take your stupid act somewhere else, because I, for one, am tired of losing and having stupid people like you defining my party.' 

 Calling the Republican infighting 'the best thing that can happen for the Democrats,' Scarborough praised moderate Republicans such as Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn and North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr, who are resisting efforts to defund the healthcare-reform law. 

 'This shutdown show budding on the Senate side is causing real problems with the most conservative members of our representatives, who know Harry Reid is not going to let it defund.' "


Didn't Governor Jindal of Louisiana tell the GOP to stop being the Stupid Party?

It appears some members of the GOP are too stupid to see what's in front of their noses.

UPDATE:

More stupidity from GOPers:


"Former Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC), whom you might remember dropping out of politics in April to go into…a more lucrative, seven figure form of politics with the Heritage Foundation, told Newsmax TV yesterday that the GOP should be willing to destroy America if that is what it takes to get rid of medical care for the American people. 

 Interestingly, DeMint says Obamacare is more damaging to America “than anything I’ve seen pass in my lifetime.” 

 Obamacare apparently being more damaging than a Republican destruction of America itself. 

So what he is saying is that the GOP must be willing to do more damage to America than the most damaging thing they’ve seen so far, in order to stop the second-most damaging thing done to America."

Nah! The Republican Party Isn't Racist! Just Ask Them; They'll Tell You!

UPDATE BELOW


Keep it classy, Phoenix. 

Read about how the rabid racists blame Mr. Obama for dividing the country as they shout slurs at and and show their spittle-flecked hatred of our American president.  

But it's Obama's fault that they're such disgustingly, sleazy bigots!

This is the loathsome base of the Republican Party, and it is stomach-turning ugly.  


Happily, it will be very, very bad for the party.  

Their indignant  protestations about the "libtards" seeing racism everywhere where it concerns President Obama is now firmly and forever documented in cyberspace for the world to see and for all to understand that everything we've suspected about their bigotry is ABSOLUTELY AND IRREFUTABLY TRUE.  

  
From TPM:



"As President Barack Obama spoke in Phoenix Tuesday about responsible home ownership, hundreds of people stood outside protesting his policies, many shouting and carrying racially charged chants and signs. 

 'Bye Bye Black Sheep,' the protestors shouted at one point, a reference to the president's skin color, according to the Arizona Republic. 

 Another protestor carried a sign that said "Impeach the Half-White Muslim!" 

 'He’s 47 percent Negro,' one protestor shouted. 

 'We have gone back so many years,' Judy Burris told the Republic. 

'He’s divided all the races. I hate him for that.'

Obama supporters were also rallying outside the high school where the president spoke. 

 'There’s so much extremism in Arizona,' said Jonathan Rines, a retired member of the U.S. Navy, said of the 'Black Sheep' chant." 



(The comments at the linked post on TPM are spot on.)


UPDATE:


Southern senator:  "My people dislike Obama because he is too ‘exotic.’  "

"A southern senator said that his constituents disliked Barack Obama because the President seemed 'exotic,' Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) told the editorial board of the Des Moines Register on Wednesday. 

The comment from the unnamed senator came during a closed-door meeting about filibuster rules last month. “And, not naming any names, but one senator got up from a Southern state and said, ‘You’ve got to understand that to my people down here, Obama seems like’ -– he thought for a second and he said -– ‘like he’s exotic,’” Harkin told the Des Moines Register. 

 'We kind of laughed at that –- what’s that mean? Exotic? That he’s just exotic, that he doesn’t share our values and that kind of thing. It was kind of a strange comment.' 

 Many conservatives falsely believe Obama was not born in the United States and not a Christian. A Public Policy Polling survey from 2011 found slightly over half of Republican primary voters believed Obama was born outside the United States. 

The Pew Research Center found last year that 34 percent of conservative Republicans believed was a Muslim."


But...but...it's not FAIR to call them racist!!!!!

A Conservative Dream Playing Out In Small Town Pennsylvania?

Or not:



Gilberton, Pa., Police Chief Kessler Blocks Town Meeting With Armed Militia


That an unbalanced gun-nut could rise to the position of police chief in small town America is not surprising, that he could command a paramilitary unit to bar citizens from attending a town meeting is something no one except some creative Hollywood script writer would imagine for a movie, and then decide it was too crazy an idea--no one would believe that an American town would tolerate a maniac like that for its chief law enforcement officer.



And yet, it happened:




"Police Chief Mark Kessler has been heading up the Gilberton Police Department for several years. To an outsider, his life as the face of law in a small town was about as uneventful as you would expect. That is, until last month. On July 15, Kessler received international attention by posting a YouTube video in which he slammed 'libtards,' called John Kerry a traitor, bashed the U.N., and fired off dozens of rounds from an automatic rifle. 

A few days later, Kessler followed up on his first video by firing off more rounds of ammo in response to anyone who was offended by his first video. But in Gilberton, Kessler is known for a lot more than YouTube videos. In addition to being the town’s police chief, Kessler is the head of the Constitution Security Force (CSF), a 100-man militia that vows to protect gun rights in the small town. 

For years, residents of Gilberton have been uncomfortable with Kessler’s antics. Some even feared that he could begin using his militia to police the town. After Kessler’s videos were posted, residents of the town finally had something they could use against him in an attempt to remove him from his post as police chief. 

A town meeting was called, during which Kessler was suspended for using borough property for personal use. The town council ruled that Kessler used police department guns without permission. But the meeting was all but uneventful. 

At the meeting, more than 100 of Kessler’s militia members showed up. The men, all carrying firearms, blocked the entrance to the Gilberton Town Hall and prevented residents from going inside. Few managed to get past Kessler’s security, but those who did spoke to town councilmen about their disdain for Kessler and the position he holds in the town."

"Stale, Moss-Covered, Wacko Birds"

Anyone know what that colorful description is about?


Never mind, I'll tell you:


That's what one bunch of GOPers is saying about another bunch of GOPers.

When a political party's only goal is to cripple a presidency, and therefore the country, it usually ends up eating its own, and here are some examples of how the modern Republican Party, in thrall to the crazies in the Tea Party. is doing that very thing:


From TPM:


“ 'I didn’t start this one and I don’t plan on starting things by criticizing other Republicans,' Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky said recently as he and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie likened one another to various cuts of a butchered pig. 

 'But if they want to make me the target, they will get it back in spades.' 

 No matter who started it, in the past few months, one Republican called others 'wacko birds,' another said some of the party’s lawmakers were 'stale and moss-covered' and a third suggested one member of the GOP was a tool of the White House. 

 A recent flare-up over defunding the health law prompted Texas Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas to question the political manhood of fellow Republicans unwilling to risk closing down the government over the future of 'Obamacare,' as GOP critics call the law they want to repeal. 'They’re scared of being beaten up politically,' he said."

Here's a GOP shill, Charles Krauthammer on the same subject:



"(b) Obamacare 

 The other battle is about defunding Obamacare. Led by Sens. Mike Lee and Ted Cruz, the GOP insurgents are threatening to shut down the government Oct. 1 if the stopgap funding bill contains money for Obamacare. 

 This is nuts. The president will never sign a bill defunding the singular achievement of his presidency. Especially when he has control of the Senate. Especially when, though a narrow majority (51 percent) of Americans disapprove of Obamacare, only 36 percent favor repeal. President Obama so knows he'll win any shutdown showdown that he's practically goading the Republicans into trying. 

 Never make a threat on which you are not prepared to deliver. Every fiscal showdown has redounded against the Republicans. The first, in 1995, effectively marked the end of the Gingrich revolution. The latest, last December, led to a last-minute Republican cave that humiliated the GOP and did nothing to stop the tax increase it so strongly opposed. 

 Those who fancy themselves tea party patriots fighting a sold-out cocktail-swilling establishment are demanding yet another cliff dive as a show of principle and manliness. 

 But there's no principle at stake here. This is about tactics. If I thought this would work, I would support it. But I don't fancy suicide. It has a tendency to be fatal."




The GOP has given up on governing and adopted a siege mentality, inspired by the radicals in their party.  When the Republicans took charge of the House in 2010, their mantra was "Jobs!  Jobs!  Jobs!" on which they've delivered NOTHING.  They've continued in their efforts to be the GOOs (Great Obstructionist Opposition) that has delivered nothing but pain and suffering in the states where they're in the majority and in the House.  

Paul Krugman explains this strange phenomenon that has taken over a once great political party: 


"Last week House Republicans voted for the 40th time to repeal Obamacare. Like the previous 39 votes, this action will have no effect whatsoever. But it was a stand-in for what Republicans really want to do: repeal reality, and the laws of arithmetic in particular. The sad truth is that the modern G.O.P. is lost in fantasy, unable to participate in actual governing."

[skip]


"Republicans, confronted with the responsibilities of governing, essentially threw a tantrum, then ran off to sulk. 

 How did the G.O.P. get to this point? On budget issues, the proximate source of the party’s troubles lies in the decision to turn the formulation of fiscal policy over to a con man. Representative Paul Ryan, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, has always been a magic-asterisk kind of guy — someone who makes big claims about having a plan to slash deficits but refuses to spell out any of the all-important details. 

Back in 2011 the Congressional Budget Office, in evaluating one of Mr. Ryan’s plans, came close to open sarcasm; it described the extreme spending cuts Mr. Ryan was assuming, then remarked, tersely, 'No proposals were specified that would generate that path.'

 What’s happening now is that the G.O.P. is trying to convert Mr. Ryan’s big talk into actual legislation — and is finding, unsurprisingly, that it can’t be done. 

Yet Republicans aren’t willing to face up to that reality. Instead, they’re just running away."



Thus, conscience does make cowards of them all!

Sunday Poetry

“Pregnant Man Gives Birth to Twins”

                                  Headline in a tabloid newspaper


With love and tender joy he felt each toss
and tug within his fecund cavity
And so, with happy heart he told his boss,
“I’ll need paternal leave for my maternity.”

Beneath his three-piece suit he grew and grew
as month by month his secret blossomed forth.
Each morning he arose and threw and threw
his breakfast, sickened by a twinning girth.

The Mrs. gave him sympathy and care
and coached him on his breathing and his pant.
She told him, “Fear not, Love, I will be there,
unless I have to work late, then I can’t.”

Love’s labor’s never lost when life begins,
and brave men, such as these, give birth to twins.

                                                                                                                --S.K.

A Humanist Chaplain?

Definition of chaplain from Wikipedia:


Traditionally, a chaplain is a minister, such as a priest, pastor, rabbi, imam or lay representative of a religious tradition, attached to a secular institution such as a hospital, prison, military unit, police department, university, or private chapel. Though originally the word "chaplain" referred to representatives of the Christian faith, it is now also applied to people of other religions or philosophical traditions–such as in the case of the humanist chaplains serving with military forces in the Netherlands, Belgium and Canada. In recent times, many lay people have received professional training in chaplaincy and are now appointed as chaplains in schools, hospitals, universities, prisons and elsewhere to work alongside, or instead of, official members of the clergy. The concept of 'generic' and/or 'multifaith' chaplaincy is also gaining increasing support, particularly within healthcare and educational settings.


Should U.S. military employ a humanist chaplain for members who adhere to no religion?  It seems a no-brainer to say "yes."  What would be the compelling reasons NOT to?  

More and more Americans are identifying as "noners."

A recent Pew Research reports that "noners" represent an increasing percentage of the U.S. population.

Key Findings and Statistics on Religion in America

"More than one-quarter of American adults (28%) have left the faith in which they were raised in favor of another religion - or no religion at all. If change in affiliation from one type of Protestantism to another is included, 44% of adults have either switched religious affiliation, moved from being unaffiliated with any religion to being affiliated with a particular faith, or dropped any connection to a specific religious tradition altogether."






Other countries and institutions have employed humanist chaplains to cater to the needs of the nonreligious with no dire consequences. These humanist chaplains would serve more as psychological advisors rather than "spiritual" advisors for those who do not believe in spiritualism and incorporeal beings.  I see no harm whatsoever in serving the needs of all members of the military, not just those who are religious.

However.

In keeping with their narrow-minded views, the House of Representatives has now proposed a bill that would prevent a humanist from serving as a military chaplain. Thus, in essence, favoring religion versus those who hold no such beliefs.  That thinking is more in keeping with a theocracy and, IMO, contrary our secular laws.

NPR reports:

Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives approved an amendment to a Pentagon spending bill instructing the armed forces to only allow religious organizations that believe in a higher power to endorse chaplains. And so far, the Navy has not indicated whether it will accept the Humanist Society as the endorser of Jason Heap.


Jason Torpy, president of the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers, believes the House amendment is a wash, and he expects that the military will continue to modernize. "We have women in the military, we have blacks in the military, we have Hispanics," he says. "We have lesbian, gay and bisexual service members, and we have atheists and humanists. And just as they've had to accept those other kinds of diversity, they'd have to accept our kind of diversity as well: diversity of belief."

According to current Pentagon records, about 1 percent of active duty military in all four services checked boxes for "agnostic" and "atheist" as their religious status. That's more than 13,000 soldiers, airmen, Marines and sailors. This is, incidentally, more than all the Hindus, Buddhists and Muslims combined — and they each have their own chaplains.

 But some traditional chaplains, such as Ron Crews, will have none of it. Crews, a retired Army chaplain with 28 years in uniform, is director of the advocacy group Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty.


" 'For God and country.' That is the motto of the chaplain corps," he says, "and someone who comes from a humanist freethinker position could not ascribe to that motto. So it's by definition of who a chaplain is." In recent years, other atheists have aspired to become military chaplains, but Heap's application has reportedly gotten farther than any others. 

 The office of the U.S. Navy Chief of Chaplains has not indicated when it will make its decision."




So the motto of the chaplain is "For God and country?" So change it to "For Freedom and Country," and there'll be no controversy.  After all, it is the military that protects our precious freedoms, not gods.  But in a country that is soaked in religion and bigotry against those who hold no beliefs, I doubt that will ever happen, even if "For Freedom and Country" is more in keeping with what the Founding Fathers envisioned for this secular nation.

When it comes to questions around religion, those who are believers are the ones who are the most frightened of any change to accommodate nonbelievers.

Why are they so frightened and defensive?

My thinking is that any intrusion into their comfort zone of belief that presents a threat is perilous for them, and the result is anger and determined opposition. Apparently their beliefs are so weak, so tentative, that there is no chance for any new movement that challenges them.  They fear what they know, because what they know can be tested and challenged.

Well, it's time to start new traditions.  Let us live up to our secular nation's promise that all citizens be treated equally, and that includes the religious and the nonreligious. 

What The GOP Thinks About The Latino, Hispanic Community

And why they'll never win their votes:

Never Lose The Child That Was Once You

Inadvertent post deletion yesterday.  So sorry to those who took the time to read and leave a comment.


Here's the poem:





Crossroads 
     -- by Joyce Sutphen 

 The second half of my life will be black 
to the white rind of the old and fading moon. 
The second half of my life will be water 
over the cracked floor of these desert years. 
I will land on my feet this time, 
knowing at least two languages and who 
my friends are. I will dress for the occasion, 
and my hair shall be whatever color I please. 
Everyone will go on celebrating the old birthday, 
counting the years as usual, but I will count myself 
new from this inception, this imprint of my own desire. 

 The second half of my life will be swift, 
 past leaning fence posts, a gravel shoulder, 
 asphalt tickets, the beckon of open road. 
 The second half of my life will be wide-eyed, 
 fingers shifting through fine sands, 
 arms loose at my sides, wandering feet. 
 There will be new dreams every night, 
 and the drapes will never be closed. 
 I will toss my string of keys into a deep 
 well and old letters into the grate. 

The second half of my life will be ice 
 breaking up on the river, rain 
 soaking the fields, a hand held out, a fire, 
 and smoke going upward, 
 always up.

The National Shame That Is The GOP

UPDATE BELOW:

Norm Ornstein, a congressional expert and scholar at the conserative American Enterprise Institute, criticized GOP leaders' efforts to 'sabotage' Obamacare as 'sharply beneath any reasonable standards of elected officials.'

In a National Journal colum titled, 'The Unprecedented—and Contemptible—Attempts to Sabotage Obamacare,' Ornstein said the GOP anti-Obamacare effort is 'spinning out of control' and 'simply unprecedented.' 

 He noted that after President Bush enacted the Medicare prescription drug benefit in 2003, Democrats worked with Republicans to improve it and help seniors rather than attempting to tarnish it for political gain. 

 Even when Democrats opposed the Iraq war, he said, 'they did not try to sabotage the surge' because "[t]o do so would have been close to treasonous.'

 Ornstein concludes: But to do everything possible to undercut and destroy its implementation—which in this case means finding ways to deny coverage to many who lack any health insurance; to keep millions who might be able to get better and cheaper coverage in the dark about their new options; to create disruption for the health providers who are trying to implement the law, including insurers, hospitals, and physicians; to threaten the even greater disruption via a government shutdown or breach of the debt limit in order to blackmail the president into abandoning the law; and to hope to benefit politically from all the resulting turmoil—is simply unacceptable, even contemptible. 

One might expect this kind of behavior from a few grenade-throwing firebrands. That the effort is spearheaded by the Republican leaders of the House and Senate—even if Speaker John Boehner is motivated by fear of his caucus, and McConnell and Cornyn by fear of Kentucky and Texas Republican activists—takes one's breath away."

Ornstein is correct.  The Republicans have stopped being part of the governing body that proposes, enacts, and implements the laws of this country.  They have become a party of saboteurs, willing to create chaos, confusion, and misery to get their way, which way has nothing to do with compromise and governing.   

The GOP is no longer a political party.  It is a collection of malevolent ideologues, very much, IMO, like the anti-abolitionists of the 1850s who stopped at nothing, even murder, in order to preserve their slavery way of life.  A little more than 160 years ago, Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner was beaten nearly to death for delivering a radical speech against slavery and no one stopped the beastly South Carolina Senator from delivering the blows.

Although the present-day political parties have not sunk to that--yet, the unyielding obstructionism and sabotage by the GOP is having the same deleterious affects on the country. 

As the GOP continues in its intransigence that is the greater cause of the slow recovery from the economic disasters that started under the last GOP president, remember which party is the one acting as spiteful, vengeful saboteurs.


UPDATE from Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate, Economics:


"Leading Republicans appear to be nerving themselves up for another round of attempted fiscal blackmail. With the end of the fiscal year looming, they aren’t offering the kinds of compromises that might produce a deal and avoid a government shutdown; instead, they’re drafting extremist legislation — bills that would, for example, cut clean-water grants by 83 percent — that has no chance of becoming law. Furthermore, they’re threatening, once again, to block any rise in the debt ceiling, a move that would damage the U.S. economy and possibly provoke a world financial crisis.

Yet even as Republican politicians seem ready to go on the offensive, there’s a palpable sense of anxiety, even despair, among conservative pundits and analysts. Better-informed people on the right seem, finally, to be facing up to a horrible truth: Health care reform, President Obama’s signature policy achievement, is probably going to work. 

 And the good news about Obamacare is, I’d argue, what’s driving the Republican Party’s intensified extremism. Successful health reform wouldn’t just be a victory for a president conservatives loathe, it would be an object demonstration of the falseness of right-wing ideology. So Republicans are being driven into a last, desperate effort to head this thing off at the pass."

The GOP's Best and Brightest on Immigration Reform and Other Things

Rep. Steve King, an Iowa Republican, has always been a bit of a melon head, but he outdid himself in an interview that came to light this week in which he described “DREAMers” — people brought to this country illegally as children — as misshapen drug mules. 

“For every one who’s a valedictorian, there’s another 100 out there that — they weigh 130 pounds and they’ve got calves the size of cantaloupes because they’re hauling 75 pounds of marijuana across the desert,” the honorable gentleman said. 


It's easy to understand why our Latino community, as a majority, would not want to be associated with a political party that has Rep. King as a prominent mouthpiece.

Here's a poll that enforces that:


Latino voters disapprove of potential House GOP plans to address immigration issues without creating a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, according to a Latino Decisions poll released Wednesday.


On another note, here's an apology video from the rural Pennsylvania POLICE CHIEF, Mark Kessler.  

I didn't know what he was apologizing for, apparently calling liberals "libtards," and such--something anyone can read on any conservative blog any day of the week.

But anyway, here's his response (NSFW).  And remember, this koo-koo bananas guy is the police chief of his town AND votes Republican.







A "libtard" friend just sent me the video that this gun-loving neaderthal GOPer apologized for (NSFW):


 

California and New York See Huge Obamacare Savings

UPDATE BELOW

We all know how the opponents of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) predicted the destruction of the universe, and the restaurant at the end of it, if it passed. And we all know how many times the Republicans in the House have voted to repeal it.

But has the Republican Noise Machine bothered to tell their Chicken Littles anything about the good news that's been reported concerning the ACA?

Other than the sound of their heads exploding over President Obama's remarks after the Zimmerman trial, I've heard nothing.


Report: Obamacare's '80/20' rule has led to nearly $4 billion in savingsAs "Obamacare" continues to be one of the most controversial pieces of legislation ever implemented, a new report shows that Americans saved nearly $4 billion in 2012 due to a key provision in the Affordable Care Act. 

 The American people have often been divided by the new health care reform, and with all Americans required to be covered with insurance by January 2014, uncertainties are up in the air. While "Obamacare" is controversial, a new report shows that it has saved consumers billions of dollars. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the new "80/20" rule, which requires insurers to spend 80 percent of every dollar earned on medical services, helped saved American consumers $3.9 billion in 2012. 

 The savings were divided into two areas. About $3.4 billion was saved by insurers keeping their premiums lower in order to comply with the new law and $500 million came in the form of rebates being sent back to consumers who overpaid for their premiums. The total cost wasn't solely the result of the "80/20" rule, but it was the leading cause of premiums being kept at a lower level. 

 While some states have seen a rise in premiums, the result has not been pinpointed. Premiums often increase with each passing year, but "Obamacare" being the sole reason for the increase is not factual. A new report released last month noted that premiums in California will see a large decrease due to subsidies from the federal government. 

 "Rates will vary by region, age and level of coverage, and many lower-income Californias will qualify for federal subsidies that will greatly lower the premiums. The plans will come in four tiers, ranging from bronze to platinum. The former will charge lower premiums, but carry higher out-of-pocket benefits, and the latter will have the highest premiums but have the lowest out-of-pocket costs."


Here is Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate in Economics:

"Still, here’s what it seems is about to happen: millions of Americans will suddenly gain health coverage, and millions more will feel much more secure knowing that such coverage is available if they lose their jobs or suffer other misfortunes....
 So yes, it does look as if there’s an Obamacare shock coming: the shock of learning that a public program designed to help a lot of people can, strange to say, end up helping a lot of people — especially when government officials actually try to make it work"

And here's an opposing view by Peter Ferrara of Forbes:

"He overlooks the equal millions of Americans that will suddenly not get health coverage under “universal” Obamacare, the millions more who will choose not to get health insurance “secure knowing that such coverage is available” if they get sick later, the tens of millions who will lose their employer provided health insurance, regardless of whether they like that coverage or not, the millions more who will lose their full time jobs for part time jobs with lower incomes and no benefits, becoming truly middle class in the Obama/Krugman era, where middle class is just another word for declining real incomes." 

 Though opinions might vary on the new health care reform, millions of Americans will now have access to affordable health care. Whether you think the government should have a role is an open question and one that may or may not fit into your political ideology."

Here's another thought:  The Republicans in Congress  made a pact on the night of Mr. Obama's inauguration in January of 2009 to obstruct any and all proposed legislation, appointments, and programs so that his presidency will be a failure.

If they had worked with President Obama to help fine tune and implement what they themselves had proposed as an answer to our national health care crisis, perhaps a plan with fewer problems could have been hammered out through compromise.  But the GOP, in thrall to extreme ideologues, did all they could to scare the American people into believing that the passage of the ACA would be tantamount to treason and the descent into totalitarianism led by the America-hater, Kenyan Usurper, Barack Hussein Obama.

A list of those hideous totalitarian governments that provide universal coverage for  their citizens is HERE.

And here is a list of the countries from the World Health Organization that are better than the USA [ranked at 38] at providing health care to their citizens:

France
Italy
San Marino
Andorra
Malta
Singapore
Spain
Oman
Austria
Japan
Norway
Portugal
Monaco
Greece
Iceland
Luxemborg
Netherlands
United Kingdom
Ireland
Switzerland
Belgium
Columbia
Sweden
Cyprus
Germany
Saudi Arabia
UAE
Israel
Morocco
Canada
Finland
Australia
Chile
Argentina
Denmark
Dominica
Costa Rica
United States of America

Here's another ranking from Business Insider that ranks the USA better than WHO.  In their ranking we're not #38, we're #37!



U.S. Ranks Last Among Seven Countries on Health System Performance Based on Measures of Quality, Efficiency, Access, Equity, and Healthy Lives

"New York, NY, June 23, 2010—Despite having the most expensive health care system, the United States ranks last overall compared to six other industrialized countries—Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom—on measures of health system performance in five areas: quality, efficiency, access to care, equity and the ability to lead long, healthy, productive lives, according to a new Commonwealth Fund report. While there is room for improvement in every country, the U.S. stands out for not getting good value for its health care dollars, ranking last despite spending $7,290 per capita on health care in 2007 compared to the $3,837 spent per capita in the Netherlands, which ranked first overall."


New Health Rankings: Of 17 Nations, U.S. Is Dead Last

Throughout the battle to pass legislation to bring the United States in line with other developed western democracies, President Obama received not one vote for the ACA from the GOP.  And yet that same political party has offered nothing as an alternative except to vote to overturn the only legislation that addresses our health care crisis. That's not political opposition; that's self-destructive obstinancy and insanity.

The GOP will pay dearly for it as the benefits of Obamacare continue to be reported. 
 


UPDATE:  More evidence of a party in its death throes:


“Some of my Republican colleagues are already saying we won’t raise the debt limit unless there’s repeal of ObamaCare. I’d love to repeal ObamaCare, but I promise you that’s not going to happen on the debt limit. So some would like to set up another one of these shutdown-the-government threats. And most Americans are really tired of those kinds of shenanigans here in Washington,” – Senator John McCain.

"He Spoke Plain Truth"

President Obama's impromptu remarks yesterday on the Trayvon Martin case: 


 "But I did want to just talk a little bit about context and how people have responded to it and how people are feeling. You know, when Trayvon Martin was first shot, I said that this could have been my son. Another way of saying that is Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago. And when you think about why, in the African- American community at least, there's a lot of pain around what happened here, I think it's important to recognize that the African- American community is looking at this issue through a set of experiences and a history that -- that doesn't go away. There are very few African-American men in this country who haven't had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me. And there are very few African-American men who haven't had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. That happens to me, at least before I was a senator. There are very few African-Americans who haven't had the experience of getting on an elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her breath until she had a chance to get off. That happens often. And you know, I don't want to exaggerate this, but those sets of experiences inform how the African-American community interprets what happened one night in Florida. And it's inescapable for people to bring those experiences to bear.The African-American community is also knowledgeable that there is a history of racial disparities in the application of our criminal laws, everything from the death penalty to enforcement of our drug laws. And that ends up having an impact in terms of how people interpret the case. "



After this heartbreakingly honest impromptu speech, the flying monkeys were let loose from the rightwing blogsphere, screeching, honking, and wailing that President Obama is Divisive! Racist! Narcissistic! And other words not fit to print.

But what President Obama spoke is the plain truth.  And damn those who can't handle the truth.  He spoke with sincerity and with a depth of feeling because he has had the awful experience of being a black youth and man in America.  He has had the experience of walking while being black, and he's seen what can happen when a teen, minding his own business, acting without malice, can be profiled, and lose his life.

For those who will come here and go off on how bad the black on black and black on white crime is here in America, save your fingers.  It's not the president's job to control crime in America's cities and towns, it's the job of law enforcement and the mayors of those cities and town.  

The president spoke, to me anyway, of injustices people suffer because of the color of their skin; and to those who will say things are better than they were during Jim Crow when African-Americans were routinely beaten, tortured, and murdered in the south, with impunity, I say that there is still that element in our American consciousness that a black man or woman is not fully "one of us." 

No other president in the history of this country has had to deal with the disgracefully racist birther issue, and no other president in the history of this country looked like President Obama.  

Also, this president urges young men and women--and that means African-American youth--to stay in school, study hard, be responsible young people.  I've read speeches where he emphasizes the importance of doing the right thing and avoiding the wrong.  Some African-American advocacy groups actually FAULT President Obama because he always targets, in particular, the black community to BE responsible.  But the folks who went coo-coo bananas over President Obama's speech don't know that, and they don't care to know this fact, because it would create cognitive dissonance in their determination to demonize this man.

I applaud President Obama for being honest with the American people and for saying what needed to be said and in the way he said it:  from his heart.

As always, the great Charlie Pierce expresses it perfectly:

"But this swill is going to get some traction in more respectable circles because, in making those remarks, and in sounding for one of the very few times like what once was called a Race Man, the president broke what a lot of people assumed was a covenant he'd made with them when they permitted him to be president. 

That covenant was fashioned for him during his speech to the Democratic convention in Boston, wherein he told a divided country everything it really wanted to hear about itself. He was going to be the living demonstration of the progress the nation had made. His job, in addition to being president, was going to be as a redemptive figure. That was the deal by which the country would allow him to be its president. 

 I always thought that speech was overrated. I thought it was dreamy utopian nonsense that did not take into account the well-financed virulence that would be brought to bear on him, and on his policies, and on his entire public career. (I think the fact that he bought it has a lot to do with how stuck in the mud his administration has been, and is, on several important issues.) 

Remember, in his big speech on race during the campaign, he made it a point to mention how his grandmother would tense up when she saw black men on the street. That was the Barack Obama of the 2004 speech. That was the Barack Obama of the redemptive covenant. That was how the country would allow him to speak on race, if he wanted to be its president. 

Today, there was none of that. He didn't even obliquely try to justify sidewalk profiling of the kind that set off the chain of circumstances by which Trayvon Martin was made dead. 

He spoke plain truth, and the reason you know it is so many smart people already are saying how politically unwise it was that he spoke at all. He broke the covenant, once and for all, which ought not to matter, because it was counterfeit all along."


Also, on another note, Dan Riehl is an exquisitely clueless, moronic wingnut not fit to own a box of crayons, let alone an internet platform for spreading his stupidity:

"White victimhood has become the cause du jour for many on the political right and nowhere was it more evident than in a tweet from influential conservative blogger Dan Riehl who tweeted “If you ever had any doubts, Obama is the first Racist in Chief.”

In the delusional white mind of Mr. Riehl no president in our history has ever been as racist as Mr. Obama whose apparent verbal hate crime is that he had the temerity to point out that 35 years ago he was a black teenager. Wow, has any President ever done anything so racist in the history of our nation?

Well, actually yes. Worse even. Much worse.

 Perhaps Mr. Riehl maybe has not heard of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, Andrew Jackson, John Tyler, James Polk or Zachary Taylor. All eight of these men owned black slaves while they were President.

 However, in Riehl’s world maybe there is nothing racist about owning people as chattel property based on the color of their skin. Maybe Mr. Riehl is also oblivious to presidents Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren forcibly removing 15,000 American Indians from their homes in the Trail of Tears.

In addition, Dan Riehl is no doubt unaware that Woodrow Wilson screened the pro Ku Klux Klan movie “Birth of the Nation” at the White House and gave it enthusiastic reviews. Two thumbs up from the then Racist in Chief. Maybe Dan also forgot that FDR signed an executive order to put Japanese Americans in internment camps. I suppose Mr. Riehl has been so isolated from access to historical documents that he also never heard Richard Nixon on tape spewing racist venom. 

 And let us not leave out Dan Riehl’s presidential hero, Ronald Reagan who stereotyped black “welfare queens” to rally aggrieved racist white voters to embrace his campaign. Prior to becoming President, Reagan opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, calling them “humiliating” to the South. 

According to Lisa Mcgirr, in the book Suburban Warriors: The Origins of the New American Right, when Reagan campaigned for governor of California in 1966 he vowed to eliminate the state’s Fair Housing Act proclaiming that “if an individual wants to discriminate against Negroes or others in selling or renting his house, he has a right to do so.”

The Kids Are All Right

I didn't follow the recent controversy that surrounded a Cheerio commercial, but apparently it showed an interracial couple whose little girl wanted her daddy to be healthy, so she dumped a box of Cheerios on his chest, so his heart would stay healthy.  

That's the whole commercial.

The YouTube site, according to the interview below, exploded with racial slurs and invective so horrible that they had to shut the comment section down.  The comments blasted Cheerios for the ad because it showed a normal family that happened to feature an African-American daddy and a non-African-American mommy, and the comment section seethed with the most disgusting racist language and slurs imaginable. 

In this video, someone interviews a number of children of various ages and backgrounds to solicit their opinions of the whole controversy.  The interviews with these adorable and wise children give me hope and much consolation after a week of rancor and blistering enmity.

The kids are more than all right; the kids are beautiful, and it is their generation that will, finally, fulfill this country's greatest promise--equality for all.

"These People Are F***ing Crazy!"

This is a typical comment seen on a typical conservative blog concerning the Zimmerman trial: 

 "Ed Bonderenka said... 
Trayvon deserved to die. He earned it. 
Not for being black. Attack someone and threaten their life, 
give them no recourse, you've brought it on yourself. 
Define deserve. Had it coming."


We don't have a serious problem in this country?  

The character who posted this comment believes Trayvon Martin deserved to die because he bloodied Zimmerman's nose.  Zimmerman "felt" his life was in danger, so he shot and killed Trayvon Martin. 

I wonder if the commenter Bonderenka would "feel" the same way if, say, a person walking down the street at night in Conceal Carry and Stand Your Ground Florida saw Commenter B. reach inside his pocket and that said pedestrian "felt" the commenter was going for a weapon, and because that pedestrian "felt" threatened, took out his/her gun and shot said commenter B. quite dead.   

We could all then say, Commenter B. "had it coming."  Afterall in Conceal Carry and Stand Your Ground Florida, who knows when someone reaches into his/her waistband or pocket if he or she isn't going to pull out a gun? So if we "feel" threatened, we shoot and kill!  It's the American way.

What a country!