Crank It Up

The fact that there are 100,000 gun casualties in the US every year starts to look like little more than prelude.

Quick Review: We have a self-sustaining cycle where the NRA floods our election process with money to peddle the bullshit about how Da Gubmint is coming to take yer guns, which riles up the rubes who go to the polls to put their local gun freaks in office, who then press for ever-more liberal "gun rights" and gun-related policies, which makes a shitload more money for the gun makers, who then boost the NRA, which collects more money from the whole Ammosexual Community in order to flood the next election with more money...

Not that the NRA's the only outfit that does this, mind you - that's how the game is played.

But there's a nasty little twist when it comes to the guns.

The NRA has had to contend with it's own bit of paranoia for a good long time; afraid that people would eventually wise up and see that simply having access to a gun is a big part of the problem we have with gun violence.  So every time there's been a big deal shooting, they've had to spend significant time and money and energy on damage control, which kinda cuts in on the profits, y'know?

Anyway, they hit on the brilliant notion of doubling down (big surprise, right?), but that's getting to be old hat now, so they had to dress it up in a fresh new jumper and smear even more lipstick on it by sloganizing it with, "Good guy with a gun vs bad guy with a gun", which of course is hooey because once everybody has a gun, how the fuck are you supposed to know who's who?

Enter Gary Kiehne, running in the GOP primary for the nomination in Arizona's 1st district:

“If you look at all the fiascos that have occurred, 99 percent of them have been by Democrats pulling their guns out and shooting people. So I don’t think you have a problem with the Republicans.”

“But I can assure you that if you don’t have a firearm, you ought to go buy one.”

So there it is:  The Good guys with guns will stop the bad guys with guns, and the bad guys are Democrats.

We are so fucked.

Today At Fox Nation

Here're 3 of the top stories at Fox Nation today, and I've circled the numbers of the comments for each article.

OK - we're all about hyped up nationalistic pride and compulsory expressions of patriotism, so yeah - yay, troops!

But wait - problems at the VA?  Problems that are real; and problems that probably can actually be laid at Obama's feet?  But crap, that means I'd hafta consider acknowledging that I want Da Gubmint to do something - it just confuses me.  So y'know what?  Uhm... if these guys didn't have the guts to die on the battlefield like they were supposed to, then they can't expect me to go outa my way to do anything special about it now.  Buncha moochers.  Fuck 'em.

Now you're talkin'!  All we need is a little glimmer of daylight and we'll be able to find some quack to speculate wildly about Hillary's "condition", and that means we can go on ignoring our problems while we squat in the dirt chanting Benghazi! Benghazi! Benghazi!

No soul and no honor.

About That Spring Thing

"Conservatives" are always telling us that Da Gubmint is too big; that we need to down-size congress and if we could just spend a lot less money on it, government would shrink back to a more manageable thing - like what we had back in the - whatever the fuck - 1920s(?)

So, how come what they wanted was a massive collection of 10-30 million "Patriots" to show up in DC in order to take down the Kenyan Usurper's International House of Tyranny?

Well - Operation American Spring turned out to be a demonstration of just how powerful the idea of "small is better" can be.  And wow - they caught us way off guard this time.

Word is that almost a thousand Strict Constitutionalist Warriors rallied on the mall, and then, when they amassed by the nearly dozens in front of the White House, it took all of Washington so completely by surprise that the TeaBillies were able to pull it off beautifully, and everybody's pretty sure Mr Obama and Cruella Moochelle are packing up and leaving for exile in Morocco any minute now, because who could witness such a compelling thing and not be moved to comply with the will of the (several cement-for-brains) people?

But wait - ya gotta figure an awful lot of these yahoos were probably wearing camo. So maybe they really did number in the several millions, but we just couldn't see 'em!?!

Damn clever.

Today's Pix

Larry Wilkerson

"...the invisible hand of Adam Smith in "Wealth of Nations" is not an invisible hand - it's now the hand of oligarchs..."

One of the great mysteries of the colossal cluster fuck known as the George W Bush administration is that (apparently) nobody was listening to Larry Wilkerson.

Or was it that Larry wasn't speaking quite as clearly then as he is now?  Dunno, but we'd better start listening to him now if we're to have any real chance of stickin' around long enough to find out.

Anyway, from The Real News:

Little Wing (cover) --The Corrs (Jimi Hendix)

Sweet Harmony (cover) --Maria Muldaur (Smokey Robinson)

If you can dream it, it can be done
And tho' a task was made for two,
It can still be done by one

New From Heckbender

Logical Fallacy # 13 - The Gambler's Fallacy

The gambler's fallacy, also known as the Monte Carlo fallacy or the fallacy of the maturity of chances, is the mistaken belief that if something happens more frequently than normal during some period, then it will happen less frequently in the future; likewise, if something happens less frequently than normal during some period, then it will happen more frequently in the future (presumably as a means of balancing nature). In situations where what is being observed is truly random (i.e. independent trials of a random process), this belief, though appealing to the human mind, is false. This fallacy can arise in many practical situations although it is most strongly associated with gambling where such mistakes are common among players.

Today's WTF

Idaho.  (That's it - I've got nuthin' else cuz there's just nuthin' else to get.

Watch this clip and then tell me there's anything anybody can say to make sense of what's going on up in here.



You might be able to make one point:  Gov Butch "insisted" on including the Wacko Biker and the Old Bible Sage, and maybe he did that to try to show people he's inclusive and not threatened by out-lying opinion, but - seriously, I mean...just...holy fuck, Idaho.