Both Sides Do It

...except when they don't.  The centrist meme is that Repubs and Dems are equally fucked up because they all engage in some kind of demagoguery or dirty tricks or whatever.  My own sense is that while there's a kernel of truth to it (at least in the Political Mode O'Day), when I look closer, one side is a quite a bit wackier, and a lot more authoritarian, and a boatload more likely to be totally batshit fucking crazy.

From Wonkette:

Arguably the worst person permitted to make laws on behalf of America, Tennessee State Senator Stacey Campfield, author of the “Don’t Say Gay”bill, recently took part in an interview on Sirius in which he not only defended his already nightmarish views on homosexuality and AIDS...

-snip-

"Most people realize that AIDS came from the homosexual community — it was one guy screwing a monkey, if I recall correctly, and then having sex with men. It was an airline pilot, if I recall. My understanding is that it is virtually — not completely, but virtually — impossible to contract AIDS through heterosexual sex…very rarely [transmitted]."

Also from Wonkette:

A RESOLUTION
Declaring 2012 as the “Year of the Bible” in Pennsylvania.

WHEREAS, The Bible, the word of God, has made a unique
contribution in shaping the United States as a distinctive and
blessed nation and people; and

WHEREAS, Deeply held religious convictions springing from the
holy scriptures led to the early settlement of our country; and

WHEREAS, Biblical teachings inspired concepts of civil
government that are contained in our Declaration of Independence
and the Constitution of the United States; and

WHEREAS, Many of our great national leaders, among them
President Washington, President Jackson, President Lincoln,
President Wilson and President Reagan, paid tribute to the
influence of the Bible in our country’s development, as
exemplified by the words of President Jackson that the Bible is
“the rock on which our Republic rests”; and

WHEREAS, The history of our country clearly illustrates the
value of voluntarily applying the teachings of the scriptures in
the lives of individuals, families and societies; and

WHEREAS, This nation now faces great challenges that will
test it as it has never been tested before; and

WHEREAS, Renewing our knowledge of and faith in God through
holy scripture can strengthen us as a nation and a people;
therefore be it

RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives declare 2012 as
the “Year of the Bible” in Pennsylvania in recognition of both
the formative influence of the Bible on our Commonwealth and
nation and our national need to study and apply the teachings of
the holy scriptures

Please, gentle readers, go out there and find something I can put in my little blog here that shows Dems or Indies doing anything even remotely like any of this. Tell me where to look.  Tell me what I'm missing.  Enlighten me.  Let's put it all side-by-side for a real comparison.

For all you centrists and all you freeloadin' poseurs who say "fuck 'em all, I refuse to take part" while the rest of us do all the work - try to remember that this is the shit we get when we don't pay attention; when we don't own our responsibilities as citizens.

And lastly, don't be fooled by the rhetoric of (mostly) the Repubs when they tell you we need to beat down the Federal Gov't and let all the power devolve to the states.  State governments are chock full of shit-heels like Stacey Campfield, who call themselves conservative, but are truly radical.  They don't want you to be free, they want you to be obedient.  They don't want reform, they want revolution.  And what is it they're likely to deliver to us if their revolution against American Democracy succeeds?

Confirmation Bias Update

Another great example.  Newt scores points in a TV debate by getting huffy with John King for asking a question he doesn't like - big points because the rubes in the crowd are well-conditioned to cream their jeans whenever somebody publicly spanks a Press Poodle.  Later, on CNN, King follows up and tells us Gingrich's campaign staffers confirm the story.

But it doesn't fucking matter.  The rubes don't watch CNN, and nothing they see on DumFux News is ever going to contradict their preconceptions.  It seems the Fox commentators have been instructed to slam Newt, but you're not going to see anything on their air that gives the rubes any reason to question the cult's orthodoxy of Fox Good; All Others Bad.

(hat tip = Crooks and Liars)

Differentiatin'

I've been watching politics for a while now, and one of things that's been hard to miss in the last 25 years or so is that Repubs and Dems are a lot more sharply divided.  (Brilliant observation, Mikey - please tell us more)  Right.  No news there, but the way it's evolved into the current depiction of GOP=Man, and Dem=Woman is pretty interesting.

It was there back in the 90s when the narrative was "Dad's the hard-working Republican who puts food on the table and protects the family, while Mommy is the Democrat who spends all the money."  We've heard that repeated in one iteration or another for what's getting to be a long time.  Hell, Ahnode Schvartzenbooger said it straight out when he called the California Legislature a bunch of girlie men.  It could be that the Dems now have a chance at turning it back on the Repubs.

So here's what we should all push the Repubs to ask of their candidates:  I'd like to see Gingrich shoot a few baskets, and I wanna see Romney throw a football.  Seriously, take a look at how these guys carry themselves some time and then try to convince yourself you're not thinkin' about the kid in grade school who always got picked last when you were choosing up sides for kickball - even if you do feel a little guilty when you're thinking it.

The point is that the rubes are so macho-centric, I'm thinkin' it won't take more than 30 or 40 seconds of Newt and Mitt playin' a little catch on YouTube to make sure nobody ever hears from either one of those buttheads ever again.

It's A Wonderment

In a democracy - Representative Democracy; Democratic Republic; Republican Democracy; whatever - shouldn't it actually be a good thing for the government to grow in size appropriate to the population?

In 1790, there were about 33,000 people for every Congress Critter in the House of Representatives.  Right now, every Critter "represents" more than 700,000 Americans.

If we're supposed to be self-governed; if the individual is supposed to have the power; then why do we insist on diluting that power by keeping the number of Reps the same while the population increases?  Every Critter "represents" 21 times the number of citizens now as they represented in 1790.  It may not be a straight 1-to-1 thing, but to me that means each Critter's power is something like 21 times greater than it used to be, and each citizen's power has gone down by 95%.

I don't like Big Government any better than I like Big Union, or Big Oil, or Big Anything - but if we simply go blindly along with this knee-jerk rhetorical aversion to 'gubmint', then we're delivering more and more power into fewer and fewer hands - which makes the government "bigger" in the only way that matters - thereby accomplishing the very thing we say we're trying to avoid.

It's a wonderment.

Divide And Conflate

In the Age of Bias Confirmation, the duplicity game can actually be easier to play.  Case in point: Jan Brewer meets Obama at the airport; there's a bit of conversation away from the press that nobody hears; and it produces this graphic:

Cue the raging speculation as the blogosphere goes batty.

Gov Brewer tells 'the mainstream media' (eg: CBS) one thing, and then tells a very different story when she pops up on DumFux News.

Brewer scores the points - and scoring points is really the only thing that matters anymore - because she capitalizes on the opportunity to ambush Obama in public, and because the rubes won't see or hear anything that might contradict what they're led to believe.

It's Over

...and we lost.

(hat tip = truthdig)



Voters go to the polls to confirm an outcome that was decided for them well in advance of "Election Day".  Control the message and you control the decision.

Campaign Contributions by all Americans
.26% give more than $200
.05% give more than $5,000
.01% give more than $10,000

That Pussy, Obama

He's just a typical Librul wuss - always walkin' around all timid and uncomfortable when it comes to knockin' shit over with his dick.  Except when you look at his actual record of  fuckin' up the bad guys.

From AP/WaPo, via Balloon Juice:
(even DumFux News has this at the top of their page this morning)

Newt's Run

Molly Ball put up a good piece at The Atlantic yesterday, deconstructing Newt's 4-part plan to beat Obama (thus):

1) 3-hour debates
Seriously?  We watch an awful lot of our TV on DVRs - partly because we're busy and we're prob'ly doing something else when the show is aired, but mostly because we can't stand wasting our time watching commercials or listening to politicians while they blow smoke up our skirts.

2) Gingrich presents a greater contrast to Obama than Romney does.
People don't buy 'different'; they buy 'better'.

3) He goes after the "Swing Voters"
Guess what, Newt?  We're all swing voters.

4) Obama loses no matter what.
Not when he's winning the Tax issue, and not when he's winning the Jobs issue, and not when he's won the Foreign Policy and Terrorism issues all together.

Obama has much to atone for.  There're plenty of reasons not to vote for him.  But he's totally outflanked the GOP on every front.  If you criticize him for Gitmo and Military Commissions and Habeus Corpus, you're making his 2008 arguments for him.  Likewise with practically everything else.

The main slam on Obama is that he hasn't done enough, and the main reason for that is you.  So let's try this instead: Get the fuck outa the way and let the man work.

Domestic Terrorism

From Crooks and Liars today, a story about another incident of political violence.

See the video here (the embedding code isn't working for me today)

Did you catch the operative phrase in the video?  At about :55, the News Poodle says, "Burris admits he's liberal".  Well, there ya have it - he admits it!  And so then, of course, the rest of the piece is all about Animal Cruelty, and not a word about the crime as an obvious act of terrorism against a political opponent.

There are red flags popping up in lots of places.

Distracted

We definitely need to be arguing about this instead of all the real shit that's goin' on.  For one thing - because, well, you know, it worked so well against Obama last time he ran for president (which is when this pic was taken).

But really, why does it seem like somebody somewhere wants us to concentrate on this shit?  It's almost as if they don't want us to talk about real issues.  Hmmm.

Quick Tho't

Don't be too hasty to condemn "the do-nothing Congress".  Remember that if they manage to do nothing for the next couple of years, the Bush Tax Cuts will expire which means the deficit starts to go away, which in turn means the debt starts to go away.

Can You Spot The Difference?

With Apologies

..to Mel Brooks.

GOP Pollster: "Sir, the base voters are revolting!"

Willard: "You're tellin' me - they stink on ice"

(hat tip = Crooks and Liars)

The Power Of Myth

Seems like this shows up on facebook every few months.  I've debunked it more than a coupla times, and it just never sinks in - the same guys keep putting it up in ever so slightly different iterations.

"Conservatives" are usually pretty big on trying to boil down the problems (of government, or culture, or people) to one overarching concept.  You know the drill:
"the problem with the economy is too much government regulation"
"the problem with the schools is the Teachers Union"
"the problem with unemployment is that taxes are too high"

So here's mine:  The problem (with everything) is the insistence on remaining ignorant.

And btw, why do "conservatives" always cheer when Romney inveighs against "wealth envy", and then piss and moan about some imaginary retired senator getting a fat pension?

Today's Pix etc

Colbert

Chock full o' goodies, but my fave so far is "...east coast Hollywood elite..."

Censorship

Intellectual property is an important thing.  You have a reasonable expectation to own your work, and to profit from it.

That said, I tend to take a fairly expansive view of The Fair Use Doctrine.  I think the creator of the content usually derives benefits from the use of his creation which - again, usually - outstrip the costs of lost revenues and/or watch-dogging.

The reflex of jealously guarding your proprietorship generally has the effect of narrowing your audience, which is kinda not the fucking point, now is it?


PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.


Anyway, the larger point is that ceding control over the internet to anybody other than the users is just a bad idea.

The Naughty Bits

I just had to do one more.

Mr Deity

From the Mr Deity collection

Today's Civics Assignment

Moyers has rehabbed himself in pretty good shape in the last 45 years.  For me, he stands among the last of the straight news guys.


Moyers & Company 101: On Winner Take All Politics from BillMoyers.com on Vimeo.