Conservative Pundits, Pols, and Bloggers...

say "Who, MOI?" when they're accused of supporting the ex-Soviet KGB strongman, Vladimir Putin, over their American President Obama.  


"Who has said anything like THAT?" They protest.  "I don't know ANY conservative who's praised and admired Putin!" They lie.

So, for those feckless, refusing-to-see-what's-in-front-of-their-noses conservative pundits, pols, and bloggers, HERE YA GO:

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

Who, MOI? 

 Oui, VOUS! 

The Tee-Gee-Oh-Pee-ers are a damaged brand, and their schizoid relationship with our American president is a large part of why they are so disliked by many rational people.

The GOP hates President Obama more than they love their country, and their current love affair with a REAL dictator shows how far down the road to Crazytown that hatred has taken them.

So you want to get cofirmed by the U.S. Senate for a political appointment?

UPDATE BELOW


Well, if it's for a position in the Justice Department, for gawdsakes, don't be a lawyer!


Seven Senate Democrats joined the Republicans in denying President Obama's choice, Debo Adegbile, to head the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division because he represented a convicted cop killer.  IOW, Attorney Adegbile was practicing US law, so that disqualified him?



"Lawyers hoping for a political appointment in the future, take note: the U.S. Senate is now judging attorneys based on their representation of politically unpopular clients. 

 In a move sure to rattle the legal community, a majority of senators voted Wednesday to block the confirmation of a respected civil rights lawyer to a top Justice Department spot because he helped get a convicted murderer off death row. 

 All Republicans and a handful of Democrats voted to sink Debo Adegbile’s nomination to lead the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division. 

The overriding reason for their opposition was that he once represented Mumia Abu-Jamal, a death row inmate convicted 30 years ago of killing a Philadelphia police officer.

Adegbile did not make the decision to take on the case. When he became the head of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund in 2012, the group was already representing Abu-Jamal, and Adegbile continued to do so on a narrow constitutional issue. In other words, he was just doing his job by advocating for his client."

[skip]


"Ahead of the vote, members of the Bar of the Supreme Court warned senators against sinking Adegbile’s confirmation based on his representation of Abu-Jamal. 

In a January letter to Leahy and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee, they argued that taking such action could send the wrong message to attorneys everywhere. “LDF’s advocacy on behalf of Mr. Abu-Jamal does not disqualify Mr. Adegbile from leading the Civil Rights Division,” reads the letter. 

“To conclude otherwise would send the wrong message to any lawyer who is affiliated, or might be asked to become involved, with a difficult, unpopular case for the purpose of enforcing and preserving important constitutional principles.”


Would the Senate Democrats and Republicans have voted against the confirmation of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Roberts?   In his career, he did pro bono work and defended a mass murderer.

"In 2008, a federal appeals court unanimously held — with two Reagan appointees on the panel — that procedures used during a convicted cop killer named Mumia Abu-Jamal’s death penalty hearing violated the Constitution. 

Specifically, the panel of predominantly Republican judges concluded that the trial judge gave the jury a confusing form that could have been read to require a death sentence unless every single juror agreed to a life sentence. 

The NAACP LDF filed an amicus brief on Abu-Jamal’s behalf. At least one of the Democrats who opposed Adegbile, Sen. Casey, cited his work to overturn this unconstitutional death sentence as the reason for his opposition. 

As MSNBC’s Adam Serwer points out, the Senate was not always so critical of lawyers who help bad people fight potentially unconstitutional death sentences. Indeed, as an attorney in private practice, 

Chief Justice John Roberts “devoted 25 pro bono hours” to representing a mass murderer recently executed in Florida.--Think Progress



This is foolish and incredibly stupid.  The seven Democrats are cowards and should be ashamed of themselves for denying a well-qualified lawyer because he did his job as a lawyer in his limited representation of the defendant.  Work, by the way, that is guaranteed by the US Constitution.  

What would those Democrats and Republicans have done with our second president, John Adams. People apparently do not read history.  John Adams defended the British soldiers who were involved in the Boston Massacre.  He won that case, from which he was famously quoted, "Facts are stubborn things,"   And he was castigated for doing so and terribly unpopular with the colonial patriots at the time.   Adams defended the hated British! Would those Democrats and Republicans have denied John Adams the presidency because he did his job?

There is no reason except cowardice on the part of the Democrats and the Republicans' usual obstruction to deny a lawyer who practices law under our Constitution and who is clearly qualified for the position in the Justice Department.

UPDATE:

James R. Silkenat, president of the American Bar Association (ABA): 

"As the Senate Judiciary Committee prepares to deliberate over the nomination of Debo Adegbile to be Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division, I write to address the criticism this nominee has received regarding the legal representation he provided to a death-sentenced prisoner.

A fundamental tenet of our justice system and our Constitution is that anyone who faces loss of liberty has a right to legal counsel. Lawyers have an ethical obligation to uphold that principle and provide zealous representation to people who otherwise would stand alone against the power and resources of the government - even to those accused or convicted of terrible crimes.

The American people understand this obligation, and the corollary principle stated in rule 1.2(b) of the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct that "[a] lawyer's representation of a client does not constitute an endorsement of the client's political, economic, social or moral views or activities."

I was alarmed to learn that there is some opposition to Mr. Adegbile's nomination based solely on his efforts to protect the fundamental rights of an unpopular client while working at the Legal Defense Fund.

His work, like the work of ABA members who provide thousands of hours of pro bono legal services every year, is consistent with the finest tradition of this country's legal profession and should be commended, not condemned. [American Bar Association, 1/13/14]" --M.M.

Hey TeaPublicans! Make Up Your Minds!

The weak-tyrant, indecisive-dictator, appeaser-war mongerer President Obama is driving them crazy!

No one actually knows what will happen vis-a-vis the Ukraine.

But the TeaPublicans know it'll all turn out WRONG, 

Because Obama!

h/t DemocraticUnderground

Rudy Has The Hots For Vlad!

UPDATE BELOW


Former Republican Mayor of New York City (and cross-dresser) Rudy Giuliani praised commie ex-head of the KGB Vladimir Putin over our American President Barack Obama.

Yes.  You read that correctly.  Julie Annie actually said on FAUX NOOZ that the ex-head of the Soviet Union's KGB is "what you call a leader."    The unlawful invasion of a sovereign country is real leadership, so says "America's Mayor" and famous drag queen.

And there you have it, my fellow Americans.  During a very tense and dangerous time, this man of questionable allegiance to the United States of America, praised the aggression of the commie, giving aid and comfort to Russia's strongman instead of to his country.

It may be understandable why someone like Giuliani, who enjoys the feminine qualities of the opposite sex and who even went to the extreme of dressing like a glam-girl, would feel all tingley and aflutter over a shirtless guy who invades other countries. It's soooo reminiscent of those giddy, nostalgic days of the Anschluss and the Sudetenland!

Oh Rudy, Rudy, Rudy!  You're such a girlie-man-girl!  Losing your heart to Vlad the Invader!

"Julie Annie" enjoys being a girl!   And has a "thing" for a shirtless Commie!

UPDATE:


As stated in the comments in response to RN's and an Anonymous comment, this post is NOT about the "complex situation" in the Ukraine.  It is about a former mayor of a major American city praising an ex-Soviet Union head of the KGB and his invasion of a sovereign country while disparaging our American president and, thereby, insulting the United States of America.

If you want thoughtful, informed comment on what's happening in the Ukraine and the Russian people's reaction, I suggest you read Infidel753's posts HERE and HERE.  

He knows much, much more about the situation than do the people cheering on Putin, the Soviet strongman .

"Hitler, Newton and Barnum" by Capt. Fogg of The Swash Zone

I. Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it. 

That's true for things above the level where quantum physics makes hash of such laws but for things which are not things, but lies, it has no bearing.  Promoters of things for which there is no evidence whatever and promoters of lies, hoaxes and propaganda rely on the fact that no external force will impede, delay or arrest the appointed rounds of  lies while truth often demands too much of us. Every day a new crop of gullible witlings and angry little twits is born to be deluded. Call it Barnum's Law.

I saw this once again the other day, it's been defaming anyone with any intention and a great number of people without the intention of  modifying the national policies on private ownership of firearms.

One might expect that anyone trying to equate Hitler with liberal philosophy isn't dealing with words as we generally accept them and is using definitions of terms like "liberal" that steer us away from rational dialog and into the corral to be fleeced.  and like all humans those who don't like liberals and don't want any interference with gun ownership will simply latch on to anything that seems internally cohesive in some blurry way without further question.  We're all guilty of it to one degree or another, but in this case it's more likely to be questioned by the people it's directed against and guess what.  There isn't a germ of truth to it.  There is no evidence that Hitler ever said it and the history of Post WW I German gun laws contradicts it.  Hitler in fact made guns much more available (except to Jews) in 1938.  The Weimar Republic required registration but that was only some time after the Victorious allies forbade Germans to have guns at all.  Some one made this up, probably during the Clinton years, and no opposing force has been able to stop it.  Facts don't matter. Barnum's Law prevails.

Fact is never the test of belief, if it were, this thing wouldn't keep appearing all over the place.  I've been seeing it for years and so far it seems more ridiculous every day, but as long as the need for Obama to be scandalous exceeds the supply of  scandals, it might as well be a perpetual motion machine.

There's as little evidence that it will cease to orbit and burn up in the atmosphere as there is for any actual scandal to have occurred, but it doesn't matter in a nation where half of us are so greedy for scandal, desperate for outrage and hungry for something, anything to anchor our prejudice and feed our greedy need to feel superior by knowing things we don't care enough about to research.

So sure, Hitler will always have said what he didn't say and the Obama scandal will always be quickly approaching and  your God and your Guns  and your freedom to ignore decency, the law and the tenets of both Capitalism and Christianity will continue to make a stink that no fact will diminish and no test of logic impair.

Capt. Fogg, The Swash Zone

TROLLZ, FAKES, AND STUPIDS

UPDATE BELOW


Conservatives, Progressives, and other bloggers:

There's a new fake commenter trolling conservative blogs and "she" calls herself "Frieda Van Wiener."

"Frieda" has taken an image of Karin Dorrepaal from the internet and used it as "her" avatar attached to "her" name:

This faker, Freida Van Weiner" has also commented on conservative blogs under the name "Just Joanna," "Right Klik," and "Hildegard Hammerasshat"(or something like that).  

The guy pretending to be "Freida Van Weiner" is a troll and probably a person who's been doing this for years: Stealing photos from the internet for his profile pictures and using a fake name.

Here's what the troll left on a conservative's blog:

Frieda Van Wiener said...

All the person has to do is claim "a sincerely held religious belief", and as the law is written it doesn't even need to be dogma within a major religion - it is the individuals belief. From the law ""Exercise of religion" means the practice or observance of religion, including the ability to act or refusal to act in a manner substantially motivated by a religious belief, whether or not the exercise is compulsory or central to a larger system of religious belief." And Service can be refused to races, religions, interracial couples, service can be refused basically to anyone.

And here is where the stupid troll copied and pasted that from:

U.S. MESSAGE BOARD

   

It's interesting that today on a conservative blog, the discussion is about trolls.  And today we have another newly hatched little reptile of a troll making a fake debut.

Welcome to blogging troll "Freida!"  Now everyone knows you're a fraud!

UPDATE:

NEWS FLASH!  Freida the Weiner made a long, boring explanation for "her" trollology on "her"  blog, talking about her exquisite sense of humor and how progressives don't get it, blah, blah, blah.  "She" then changed "her" avatar to this:

Hmmmmmm.  Why didn't Freida's highly developed sense of humor and all-around knee-slapping hilarity tell "her" to use the "wiener joke" image in the first place instead of using Karin Dorrepaal's photo?  I'll make a stab at the answer.  It's because "Freida" is a fraud and got caught at "her" deception.  And if anyone believes "her real name" is "Joanna," I've got a bridge in New Jersey I'd like to sell you.

PS.  The faker never addressed why "she" copies and pastes other people's comments from U.S. Message Board as "her" own.  

Let's review:  "Frieda" stole a woman's image from the internet; "Frieda" stole someone's comments from the internet.  

That's the fake "Frieda the Wiener!"

Hot Dog! 

The Constitution Wins in Arizona -- On This One.

UPDATE BELOW

Arizona Republican Governor Jan Brewer vetoed the anti-gay bill passed by both houses of the Arizona legislature.

The crazies in the TeaPublican Party, quick to accuse President Obama of "shredding the Constitution," propose outrageously unConstitutional legislation every chance they get.  Their latest unAmerican, unConstitutional bill would have allowed businesses to refuse service to Americans whom they believe would injure their religious sensibilities.  Their target was, of course, the LGBT community, but the legislation was so poorly written that it would have allowed discrimination against any group of Arizonans for any religious reason. It was a bill that codified bigotry.  And the amazing thing is that a majority of Arizona Republican law makers passed it.

And they're not the only anti-Americans trying their best to "shred the Constitution."  Some idiot in another state wants to make it illegal for gay athletes to play football. As long as these morons are voted into office, we'll see more attempts made to enact laws based on religious bigotry.  Think about that when these hate-based zealots and bigots want your vote. 

And think about what they'd do should they gain the power of the presidency.

(CNN) -- Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer vetoed a bill Wednesday that would have allowed businesses that asserted their religious beliefs the right to deny service to gay and lesbian customers. 

The controversial measure faced a surge of opposition in recent days from large corporations and athletic organizations, including Delta Air Lines, the Super Bowl host committee and Major League Baseball. 

Fiercely divided supporters and opponents of the bill ramped up pressure on Brewer after the state's Republican-led Legislature approved it last week. 

On Wednesday, the governor said she made the decision she knew was right for Arizona. "I call them as I see them, despite the cheers or the boos from the crowd," Brewer said, criticizing what she described as a "broadly worded" bill that "could result in unintended and negative consequences." 

Brewer said she'd weighed the arguments on both sides before vetoing the measure, which is known as SB 1062."



So the governor weighed the arguments on both sides? Why it took this long for Brewer to veto this repulsive bill should be frightening to any American who believes in liberty and justice for all and who entertains the idea of putting more TeaPublicans in charge of government.

MORE HERE.


 UPDATE:

The proposed bill passed by the two legislative houses in Arizona was not about religious liberty.  

All one has to do is look for any proposed legislation crafted by religious zealots that would have allowed people to refuse to serve divorced Americans, or Americans who took the Lord's name in vain (that's against the Ten Commandments and these people claim the Constitution and this country is based on those ten prohibitions), or people who bore false witness, or people who committed adultery.

(Imagine a business in Arizona refusing to serve Newt Gingrich or any other serial divorced American?)  

Adultery is prohibited by the Ten Commandments, so any God-fearing, God-obeying Christian would have to find a state FORCING him or her to serve adulterers a state that practices fascism!

Of course no laws were ever proposed to protect Christians from having to serve or do business with people who broke those particular Commandents. That's why it is so disgustingly obvious that the Arizona "Hate The Gays" bill was nothing more than an attempt to shred the Constitution and encourage hatred against a minority.

Governor Brewer did the right thing for the wrong reasons. Faced with the loss of millions and millions of dollars in revenue for Arizona from businesses and the NFL, she vetoed the bill. Had she warned the Arizona legislature against passing the bill at the start, I'd believe she did this for the right reason. She didn't. So I'm not waving the flag for her. 

Let this be a warning to the other red states that would use "religious freedom" to denigrate and marginalize minority Americans. Your religion does not give you the right to institutionalize what Jim Wright of Stonekettle Station aptly calls religious apartheid.

Thank you, Mrs. Obama...

for your efforts in bringing attention to childhood obesity. You chose an excellent subject, as the FLOTUS, to focus on:  the health of America's children.

The ignorant hatemongers among our fellow citizens never let up in criticizing you for suggesting that our children should go outside and move; for suggesting they drink water rather than sugary sodas; for suggesting they eat healthy snacks like fruit, rather than fat and sugar laden processed foods.  All of your efforts are appreciated by Americans who understand the consequences of ignoring childhood obesity.

According to the New York Times, your campaign to call attention to and encourage America's young people to form healthy habits may very well be having a good affect on America's kids, and for that, all of us who care about our future generations, thank you.



NY Times on a 43% drop in obesity levels in the youngest children: 

Experts point to several possible explanations for the fall, but say a full understanding remains elusive. Children now consume fewer calories from sugary beverages than they did in 1999. 

More women are breast-feeding, which can lead to a healthier range of weight gain for young children. 

Federal researchers have also chronicled a drop in overall calories for children in the past decade, down by 7 percent for boys and 4 percent for girls, but health experts said those declines were too small to make much difference. 

Another explanation is that some combination of state, local and federal policies aimed at reducing obesity is starting to have an effect. 

Michelle Obama has led a push to change young children’s eating and exercise habits and 10,000 child care centers across the country have signed on. Many scientists doubt that anti-obesity programs actually work, but proponents of the programs say a broad set of policies applied systematically over a period of time can affect behavior.

MORE HERE.

Fun With The Stupids

As noted on my side bar, five conservative bloggers are so obsessed with what I publish here at Progressive Eruptions that they've wasted their time by setting up parody blogs, using unimaginative, doltish parody names for my blog and blognym, in addition to stealing my name and my avatar. This is sad because of the lamentably underdeveloped creativity these hopelessly half-witted efforts have produced.  

Parody can be funny and incisive when done by sharp minds, and it can produce biting wit.  Sadly, none of these sites produce any of that.  Perhaps we can attribute that to the lack of, well, keen intelligence and a facility for language and grammar.  I know it's not politically correct to make fun of the intellectually challenged, but the blog post below from "Shaw Keewee" just screamed "Make Fun of Me, Puleeeeze!"

And so I did.

First, the blog entry by some wingnut who "cleverly" calls himself "Shaw Keewee --Progressive Twerking."


"Monday, February 24, 2014

A Lesson To The Simple Minded Repyblicans! *

And That Means All Of You)

Socialism and Communism are two completely things, that’s what people fail to understand! Some people ( especially Republicans) are really stupid. they obviously haven't even understood that socialism and communism are NOT at all the same, but they’d rather just sit there behind their computer’s and throw out all the nasty terms and words that their week little minds can muster up.

Under communism, all people are considered equal and are provided for equally, regardless of their contributions to the economy or to society. This is different from Under communism, all people are considered equal and are provided for equally, regardless of their contributions to the economy or to society. This is different from socialism The word alone seems to send shivers down the spine of the American people, but for no reason. It’s because these idiots fail to understand what it really means. They imagine America turning into China or the USSR. NOT TRUE! Well I hate to be the one to tell you, but Socialism has been alive and well in America and it has been here for a very long time, in fact since the days of the GOP’S Hero Ronnie Reagan.

The Teebaggers would love socialism if they knew that! War would not be possible without socialism. Your tax dollars are used to fight wars for your country. You pay a tax to help ensure that our grandparents and senior citizens of America have money to live off of when they are retired or too elderly to work. I love hearing rich people bitch about this one because the truth is that they do not pay a social security tax, like most payroll taxes. This little piece of socialism helps prevent our senior citizens from sinking into poverty and starving to death. We live in a mixed economy- get over it and get on with it already.

 On another note: Is the modern Republican Party really “the party of Lincoln,” and responsible for freeing the slaves? I don’t think so. But the GOP regularly, routinely, and with a straight face makes that claim.."

My answer:


A Lesson To The Simple Minded Repyblicans! * 

 Do you always show off your spelling aptitude in "pyblic?" 

 "And That Means All Of You) 

 Socialism and Communism are two completely things," 

 Really? I've heard Repyblicans say they were differently things!

 "that’s what people fail to understand! Some people ( especially Republicans) are really stupid. they obviously haven't even understood that socialism and communism are NOT at all the same, but they’d rather just sit there behind their computer’s and throw out all the nasty terms and words that their week little minds can muster up." 

We're making a citizen's arrest (to you that would be a "citizen arrest's") for illiterate use of an apostrophe. 

 "...their week little minds?" 

Are you talking about their Monday minds or their Saturday minds? Which day of the week little minds would that be? 

 " Under communism, all people are considered equal and are provided for equally, regardless of their contributions to the economy or to society. This is different from Under communism, all people are considered equal and are provided for equally, regardless of their contributions to the economy or to society." 

Would you mind repeating that? Oh, wait. You already did. Would you mind repeating that? Oh, wait. You already did. Would you mind...oh never mind. 

 "This is different from socialism The word alone seems to send shivers down the spine of the American people," 

The spine of the American people? One nation under one spine, with lumbago and plurals for all! 

"..but for no reason. It’s because these idiots fail to understand what it really means. They imagine America turning into China or the USSR. NOT TRUE! Well I hate to be the one to tell you, but Socialism has been alive and well in America and it has been here for a very long time, in fact since the days of the GOP’S Hero Ronnie Reagan. The Teebaggers would love socialism if they knew that!" 

Are you speaking about those "Teebaggers" wearing tee shirts with misspelled words and illiterate slogans--sorta like what's here in your post? Those "Teebaggers?" 

The old saying "If you had a brain, you'd be dangerous," seems to apply here. But we'd change it a bit to "If you had a brain AND spell check, you'd be dangerous." 

Never you mind, Shaw Keewee parody guy, keep on writing your moronic and unimaginative little screeds. 

At least when you're doing that you're not hanging around grammar schools begging little girls to look at your special foam noodle.

Best and Worst U.S. States

According to Politico, which "rounded up 14 different state rankings from reputable sources like the Census Bureau, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the FBI, and on important factors such as high school graduation rates, per capita income, life expectancy and crime rate."



New Hampshire came out as THE BEST, followed by 

Minnesota
Vermont
Utah
Massachusetts

as the top five, based on the above-mentioned criteria.

THE WORST state, unhappily, is Mississippi, followed by

Louisiana
Arkansas
Tennessee
Alabama

Comments?

Sunday Night Poetry

In Celebration

BY MARK STRAND

You sit in a chair, touched by nothing, feeling   

the old self become the older self, imagining   

only the patience of water, the boredom of stone.   

You think that silence is the extra page,   

you think that nothing is good or bad, not even

the darkness that fills the house while you sit watching

it happen. You’ve seen it happen before. Your friends

move past the window, their faces soiled with regret.

You want to wave but cannot raise your hand.

You sit in a chair. You turn to the nightshade spreading

a poisonous net around the house. You taste   

the honey of absence. It is the same wherever   

you are, the same if the voice rots before   

the body, or the body rots before the voice.

You know that desire leads only to sorrow, that sorrow

leads to achievement which leads to emptiness.   

You know that this is different, that this   

is the celebration, the only celebration,   

that by giving yourself over to nothing,

you shall be healed. You know there is joy in feeling

your lungs prepare themselves for an ashen future,

so you wait, you stare and you wait, and the dust settles

and the miraculous hours of childhood wander in darkness.

The First American Woman to Become a Self-Made Millionaire

was Madam C.J. Walker:

And here's her story as part of Black History Month.




NAME: Madam C.J. Walker 

OCCUPATION: Civil Rights Activist, Entrepreneur 

BIRTH DATE: December 23, 1867 

DEATH DATE: May 25, 1919 

DID YOU KNOW?: Madam C.J. Walker was the first American woman to become a self-made millionaire. 

DID YOU KNOW?: In 1913, Madam C.J. Walker donated the largest amount of money by an African American toward the construction of an Indianapolis YMCA. 

DID YOU KNOW?: Also a civil rights activist, in 1917, Madam C.J. Walker was part of a delegation that traveled to the White House to petition President Woodrow Wilson to make lynching a federal crime. 

PLACE OF BIRTH: Near Delta, Louisiana 

PLACE OF DEATH: Irvington-on-Hudson, New York 

ORIGINALLY: Sarah Breedlove 
AKA: Madam C.J. Walker
AKA: Madame C.J. Walker

The TeaPublicans' Hero, Ted Nugent, Sings "Jailbait."

Your modern Republican Party has embraced the guy who proudly sang this song:




I've got no inhibitions 
So keep your keys out of your ignition 
I steal a car like I got the curse 
I can't resist the old lady's purse 

 Jailbait you look so good to me 
 Jailbait won't you set me free 
 Jailbait you look fine fine fine 
 I know I've got to have you in a matter of time 

 Well I don't care if you're just thirteen 
 You look too good to be true 
 I just know that you're probably clean 
 There's one lil' thing I got do to you 

 Jailbait you look so good to me 
 Jailbait won't you set me free 
 Jailbait you look fine fine fine  




Nuget doesn't appeal to the crazy "fringe" of the GOP.  He has been embraced by no less than Mitt Romney, who ran for POTUS, by Sarah Palin, who hoped to be VPOTUS, a former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, the guy who's running for governor of the state of Texas, and the GOP's newest presidential hopeful, Ted Cruz.

Every one of those mainstream and admired Gee-Oh-Pee-ers consider Ted Nugent a "friend" and have no problem with him and his brand of rhetoric.

The T-GOP owns Ted Nugent.  He's a great representative of its character.

Arizona Passes Bill Legalizing Bigotry

Don't like "teh gaii"?  Arizona's got your back!  As long as you couch your bigotry in "religious freedom" terms, it's okay to refuse to do business with the LGBT community and treat gays like second-class citizens. The Bible tells these upstanding "Love Thy Neighbor Christianists" so!  


"SB 1062 permits discrimination under the guise of religious freedom. 

With the express consent of Republicans in this Legislature, many Arizonans will find themselves members of a separate and unequal class under this law because of their sexual orientation. 

This bill may also open the door to discriminate based on race, familial status, religion, sex, national origin, age or disability. 

 "Legislation of this kind has been attempted this year in Kansas, South Dakota, Tennessee and Idaho. Each of those attempts failed after prominent members of the business community spoke against the measures. While our state continues to recover from the public relations nightmare of SB 1070, the Republican supporters of this bill are willing to elicit the inevitable backlash and boycotts that will result from its passage." 

 



Remember when bigots used religion to defeat interracial marriage? How'd that work out?




"The Lovings were supported by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the Japanese American Citizens League and a coalition of Catholic bishops.

In 1958, Richard and Mildred Loving had married in Washington, D.C. to evade Virginia's anti-miscegenation law (the Racial Integrity Act). Having returned to Virginia, they were arrested in their bedroom for living together as an interracial couple.

The judge suspended their sentence on the condition that the Lovings leave Virginia and not return for 25 years. In 1963, the Lovings, who had moved to Washington, D.C, decided to appeal this judgment. In 1965, Virginia trial court Judge Leon Bazile, who heard their original case, refused to reconsider his decision. Instead, he defended racial segregation, writing:

"Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, Malay, and red, and placed them on separate continents, and but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend the races to mix."

The Lovings then took their case to the Supreme Court of Virginia, which invalidated the original sentence but upheld the state's Racial Integrity Act. Finally, the Lovings turned to the U.S Supreme Court. The court, which had previously avoided taking miscegenation cases, agreed to hear an appeal. In 1967, 84 years after Pace v. Alabama in 1883, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Loving v. Virginia that:

"Marriage is one of the 'basic civil rights of man,' fundamental to our very existence and survival.... To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State's citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not to marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State."

The Supreme Court condemned Virginia's anti-miscegenation law as "designed to maintain White supremacy".


The bigots in the Republican Party of Arizona may have a small victory in their soon-to-be-passed law that codifies legal discrimination against a group of American citizens, but it will eventually be overturned as unConstitutional, and the GOP will look like the confused and misguided, hiding-behind-"religion" bigots that they truly are in this matter.

I hope a national movement to boycott Arizona as a state for conventions, vacations, sports, and other activities will be the result of this stupid unAmerican, unConstitutional law, should Tea Party GOP Governor Jan Brewer sign it into law.  Maybe the citizens of Arizona will then face the consequences of their shameful bigotry.

However, I sincerely doubt it.




Thursday 2/20/14, 7:30pm EST: The Arizona House just passed this bill tonight. The fate of anti-LGBT segregation in Arizona now rests in the hands of the state's Tea Party Republican governor, Jan Brewer, who has five days to decide whether to sign or veto it. 

h/t Infidel753

Your Modern Republican Party

UPDATE BELOW
Yeah.  We know Ted "I crapped my pants to get out of serving my country" Nugent is not supported by everyone in the Gee-Oh-Pee.  But too many of the Republican Party's leaders have no problem being seen in his company or associating with him -- including the presidential nominee of the Republican Party, Mitt Romney.   It is true that he has found a comfortable home within that political party, even to the point where the Attorney General of the State of Texas, Greg Abbott, is not ashamed to be seen with and encourage a self-admitted sexual predator to campaign for him.

A very larger chunk of Gee-Oh-Pee-ers love the Nuge.

Quoted below is what Sarah Palin and Sean Hannity's friend, Ted Nugent, had to say about the President of the United States of America.  (Oh yes, it is a free country and our Constitution allows any crackpot to say any loathsome thing about America's president, as long as it doesn't contain a death threat.)  This sorry waste of a flesh and blood is definitely a Gee-Oh-Pee-er, and apparently no one who belongs to that once great party is ashamed of the jackass or is brave enough to call him out on his repulsive idiocy:

Ted Nugent: 

 "I have obviously failed to galvanize and prod, if not shame enough Americans to be ever vigilant not to let a Chicago communist-raised, communist-educated, communist-nurtured subhuman mongrel like the ACORN community organizer gangster Barack Hussein Obama to weasel his way into the top office of authority in the United States of America.”


There you go, Republican Party!   One of your very own! 

And what a role model for your children! 

Will you read this fine piece of Republican sentiment about the President of the United States of America to your darling little ones at night before they say their prayers and fall into sweet, innocent slumber?




“If he [Greg Abbott] is good enough for Ted Nugent, he is good enough for me!” Palin wrote.




Oh, Sarah! EXACTLY the sort of guy you'd agree with: a foul-mouthed, underwear-pooping draft-avoider and self-admitted sexual predator.  

Good on you, Sarah!  "Classy."

UPDATE:

Oh this is sweet. Apparently little soiled prissy-pants Nugent is really brave when he's shooting off his filthy mouth but he was too chicken to face Wolf Blitzer? Hahahahahahahaha!  What a little yellow weasel.

Cowardly Ted Nugent can’t take the heat. After getting called out by Wolf Blitzer for calling President Obama a “subhuman mongrel,” Nugent canceled an interview on CNN 2 hours before it was supposed to air.


Here's what Blitzer said about Nugent's slur, "subhuman mongrel" on President Obama:

“That’s what the Nazis called Jews to justify the genocide of the Jewish community,” Blitzer said in a Feb. 18, 2014, interview. “They called them untermenschen, subhuman mongrels. If you read some of the literature that the Nazis put out there, there is a long history of that specific phrase he used involving the president of the United States.”

"And so it goes." Part II

Things Michael Dunn and any sane person could have done, by Anthony C.: 


He could have moved his car further away, ignore the music, see the car as being full of young kids that were doing the same thing he was doing at the same age. 

He could have gone inside the convenience store; 

He could have acted like an adult and not inflamed the situation. 

He could have avoided bravado even though he knew he could back it up with a gun. 

He could have taken his girlfriend to a different store. The kids were being typical teenagers irrespective of their race, God knows that I’m in my sixties and still pump Prodigy Eminem, Nine Inch Nails and Nick Cave hard when I’m in my car and have a thumping sound system that can be heard from afar. 

Dunn could have just walked away instead of demanding his way in a public place but when it came down to it he pumped 7 shots into the car and 3 while the kids fled in pure dread. 

It was murder pure and simple and he probably meant to kill them all. 

 Nobody fires so many shots into a crowded car without the intention of homicide. 

Nobody still feels threatened enough to fire 3 more shots as the kids fled in fear. 

They were the ones who were threatened, they were the ones that felt real fear, they were the ones whose lives were in danger, not Dunn. 

Dunn instigated the conflict with malice of forethought, deliberate and calculating. 

Dunn escalated his rage into homicide.

"And so it goes." *

.



Welcome to the New Jim Crow south:



The jury in the Michael Dunn case — the man in Florida who fired 10 shots at a car full of teenagers because they were black he was “scared” of their loud music, before heading back to his hotel, ordering a pizza, and declining to phone up the police — has come back with guilty verdicts for four charges of shooting a gun and attempted murder (the teenagers he did not succeed in killing), and a hung jury on murder in the first degree (the boy he did). 

This means they also deadlocked on lesser included charges, such as manslaughter — meaning at least one person on the jury agreed that Michael Dunn was reasonably scared for his life while shooting 10 bullets at a car speeding away, and with no return fire. 

Jordan Davis would have been 19 tomorrow."

[skip]

"Dunn claimed he acted in self defense, under Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law. 

On the upside, we have only seen one asshole on Twitter save her salty tears for poor Michael Dunn, in the name of “love” and “healing” and “what good does it do for him to rot in prison.” 

The obvious answer — that with one less person on the streets who loves shooting at children, maybe a few more children won’t be shot at — did not seem to have occurred to her. 

Must be too many love rays swirling around her head. As for Michael Dunn, Jordan Davis’s mother forgives him. She is a better woman than we are. "

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

In 2012, Marissa Alexander was sentenced to a mandatory 20-year prison sentence for firing what she insisted was a warning shot during a fight with her husband. She tried to invoke Florida's "stand your ground" law but the judge threw out her self-defense claim, noting that she could have run out of the house to escape her husband but instead got the gun and went back inside

\Alexander, who had never been arrested before, has said she fired a bullet at a wall in 2010 to scare off her husband when she felt he was threatening her. No one was hurt, but the judge in the case said he was bound by state law to sentence her to 20 years in prison after she was convicted of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Alexander had rejected a plea deal that would have resulted in a three-year prison sentence and chose to go to trial. A jury deliberated 12 minutes before convicting her." 


"And so it goes."

The story (Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut) continually employs the refrain "So it goes" when death, dying, and mortality occur, as a narrative transition to another subject, as a memento mori, as comic relief, and to explain the unexplained.

Caturday

Light posting over the weekend as I prepare a going-away party for a very special person in my life who will be leaving in a few days to serve his country.

Teddy Desperado

UPDATE BELOW



Senator Ted Cruz (R-CrazyTown) wants everyone to know that he's against teh gaii marriage, and he will affirm this by introducing a bill that will allow individual states to prohibit teh gaiis from entering into a mutually agreed upon relationship that has nothing to do with heteros or the state or him.

What Teddy Desperado doesn't get is the fact that when people want to marry the persons they love, it doesn't diminish any other couple's marriage.  Marriage equality does not stop any hetero couple from marrying.  But Teddy Desperado's proposed legislation will allow states to interfere with those marriages he and his TeaPublican Christianists hate.  IOW, he's for a statist interference with individual rights.

This will go nowhere.  Enlightened people understand that Teddy Desperado is engaging in interference with individual choices that have no impact on other peoples' marriages in order to make his bones with the Tea Party.

"Never let a opportunity to grab headlines and ingratiate oneself with the Holy Fearers when the opportunity arises."  Teddy Desperado's motto.





Ted Cruz Introduces Anti-Gay Marriage Bill

Teddy Desperado and his intellectual equal.

UPDATE:


 McCain Hints That Ted Cruz Is Ruining The GOP