Today's Definition

Religion: A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to the Ignorant the nature of the Unknowable. --Ambrose Bierce

About Those Women

Popular Myth holds that sometime back in the 6th century, 43 Catholic Bishops and 20 Bishops' Reps got together (in France - for a long weekend at the spa I guess?) in order to debate and then to decide on one of the truly pressing questions of their era - "Is woman human?"

The vote was 32 For and 31 Against.  Whew - that was close.  Hard to imagine what kind of (even more) unnecessarily lousy things might've happened if just 1 of those Shit-For-Brains-In-A-Satin-Hat had voted the other way.

This story is denied by the Church, but y'know what?  I don't care.  Is it any less believable than the crap they spin out every fuckin' day?

Today's Important Thought: Religion can't sell me their bullshit cure if I don't accept having their bullshit disease.

New Music

Making a joyful noise.

There's a lot goin' on here, and it's almost unbelievable how hard it is to make this happen live.  Coupla glitches here and there, but fuck.

Lucius:

Music

A coupla tunes from 2 slightly opposite perspectives:

Today's Smartest Thing

(My 2¢ - politicians take positions; abandon positions; and/or change positions when they recognize either political opportunity or political threat)

From a Balloon Juice post:

But there’s at least one difference between Portman and Obama on this specific issue: Portman did it because changing his position will lead to a clear and direct personal gain–his actual gay son might get an real benefit from the state based on his father’s position. As far as we know, Obama’s change in position gives him no such benefit. For you freshman logic fans, that’s the fallacy of equivocation. Glenn’s trying to say that one of Obama’s stated reasons (his empathy for friends and staff who are gay) is the same thing as Portman’s (a real parental interest in the outcome of the debate).

The Donald Speaks

The scene from the Maryland suburbs yesterday wasn't exactly all a-buzz.  CPAC is known for its rosters of All-Star Nutball speakers, and so far this year, they've not disappointed.

Best moment so far - this "crowd" shot of the room when it was Lil Donny Trump's turn to deliver the words of awesomeness.

hat tip = Addicting Info

Today's Pix

Dead Americans YTD

An update from Slate's crowd-sourced interactive Gun Death Database:

2089 Dead Americans so far this year - including 145 Kids

Something always to remember:  The NRA does not represent Gun Owners - The NRA represents Gun Makers.

Today's Nonsense

So the DumFux News affiliate in Hartford CT ran a story about Women's Day at the Capitol, and the 'b-roll' (the video they run so you have a visual to go with the copy being read) - yeah you prob'ly already guessed - it was nuthin' but tits.

Don't get me wrong here: I like boobies; bazongas; headlights; cans; melons; honkers; breasts; mammaries etc ad infinitum.  I like female, and I like all that 'female' implies which happens to include the tasty sensual and sexy bits.

I am also not stupid, and so I know about a little thing we grownups like to call "appropriate to time and place".  We also call it "respect for the wholeness of a human being", and sometimes we call it "trying not to think with your dick once in a while".

But I digress.  Take a look:



First, this kinda crap doesn't happen by accident. Some producer sat in a meeting and made a decision about what b-roll to put on the air; and even if that producer delegated the actual decision to an underling, that underling chose clips from the file footage that he/she knew to be in keeping with whatever is Standard Operating Procedure according to the station's and/or the network's style book. Those jiggle shots didn't happen by accident. Of course, the affiliate's PR folks tried to claim otherwise:

Second, this shit happens a lot at DumFux News, but somehow the "apology" never includes a mention of any disciplinary action being taken against the Producers, Associate Producers, Reporters, Editors, Interns, et al.

The kicker though is that a majority of viewers who called the station about the story were pissed off and that's what prompted the apology.

When 51% of DumFux viewers find something on Dumfux News objectionable, I have to take it as a good sign.

(more than a) hat tip = Crooks & Liars

The People's Music

Another one from (by, actually) Billy Joel - as performed by a guy outa left field who knows what he's doin' and sings the crap out of it.




And here's the album cut:

Today's Numbers

Black people make up 22% of the poor, and they get 14% of government benefits.

White people make up 42% of the poor, and they get 69% of government benefits.

I 'spect you've heard all that before, but I think it's one of those things that bears repeating. 

And y'know, when "conservatives" can get us to swallow their bullshit just by saying it over and over and over again, how is it that things which are actually true and verifiable are so easily dismissed and forgotten?

hat tip = Crooks & Liars

Music

Put on the headphones and crank it up.

Today In Faithiness

If Jesus was a live today, he'd probably have a lawyer and an agent and a publicist who'd all be working hard to keep hucksters like Sarah Palin from moochin' off his fame and his public image.

My hero, Charlie Pierce:

Will o'god, it's the week of St. Patrick's Day, is there no respite, no brief truce, no fragile ceasefire, in the War On Christmas?

Apparently not. 

Today's Gun Nut

From Addicting Info:

One of the few absolutes from the pro-gun advocate side of the gun violence conversation is that they demand that we believe that gun owners are responsible people. That it is just “them”, the nebulous of bad people, or crazy people who kill with guns. They further say “Law-abiding gun owners will not accept blame for the acts of violent or deranged criminals.”…Wayne LaPierre at the January 30st Senate hearing on gun violence.

But reality and history prove them wrong. Over 230,000 guns [reported] of “law-abiding gun owners” end up in criminal hands each year because gun owners don’t properly store their weapons. And hundreds of kids die and thousands are wounded each year with unattended firearms. These are not responsible “law-abiding gun owners” and they are a big part of the gun violence problem and the pro-gun community acts in their words and deeds as enablers to them.

Beltway Bubble-Think

Wonkette has a good takedown on Paul Ryan and the Very Serious People - and the Press Poodles who just can't give up on the extremely minuscule probability that somebody in the GOP might come up with some proposal that doesn't closely resemble something you stepped in as you were walking through the park.

It is budget season again in Washington, D.C., which means it is time for the villagers in our nation’s capital to pretend that a plan written by Congressman Paul Ryan, who was last seen on election night icing down his tuchus after being spanked hard by Barry Bamz and Old Handsome Joe Biden, is not the legislative equivalent of a rotting whale carcass washed up on a beach.

And, as suggested, here's our new National Anthem:

The Seven Godly Sins

Wrath: God condemns those who don't believe in him to eternal damnation and torture.
Envy: God punishes those who believe in other gods.
Sloth: God allows tragedies and disasters to occur which he could easily prevent.
Gluttony: God has plenty while millions go hungry.
Pride: God demands his followers' complete devotion.
Greed: God's followers must pay tithes and make offerings in exchange for his blessings.
Lust: God insists on being party to every marriage.

Sounds like a great gig - where do I get an application?

Today's Silly

CollegeHumor's Favorite Funny Videos

The Rising Fuss

Part of what's coming back around is racism, which is really just another manifestation of the kind of class-bashing that's gone on in this country from the beginning.  (the whole concept of Racial Difference was invented in the Antebellum South as a handy mechanism for keeping poor white trash separate from the blackfolk, which helped keep everybody focused on something other than how they were all slaves to the interests of the landowners in one way or another)

And we're seeing it blossom all over again with this continuing beat-down of working stiffs who put in longer hours (and soon maybe, longer than the usual 50 years on the job), who are being made to feel they're just not worthy of anything but the meagering crumbs left over when the Executive Committee's done with their latest circle jerk - oops, I mean spreadsheet reviews that indicate there's another 3/10ths of a penny per share in dividends to squeeze out of the labor force.

Melissa Harris-Perry:

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Something else that keeps popping into my head:  Take a good look at a few movies from the 1970s sometime, and pay a little attention to the background they were filmed against. Try The Taking Of Pelham 123 or Harry And Tonto - movies that weren't just trying to show the blight, but were supposedly showing "The Real America" at the time.  Any of it look familiar?

The underlying point is to keep us thinking, "Things are kinda shitty, and it seems like I'm gettin' fucked over pretty bad, but maybe it's partly my own fault because I'm not working hard enough or I'm not smart enough, or I wasn't prescient enough to see what was coming; but hey - at least I ain't black".

I dunno - maybe I see threads and connections that aren't really there.  Maybe I'm just being paranoid.  But I don't think it's unreasonable to expect people who play politics at any level of any real consequence to know enough to look for ways to consolidate their own positions and to try to keep their opposition from uniting against them.

Besides, I may be a little paranoid but that doesn't mean nobody's out to get me.

Today's Smartest Thing

They're talking about the sausage-making in DC, and at around the 4:45 mark, Alexis Goldstein (OWS) makes an observational analogy that just knocked me my off my chair.

Paraphrasing - lobbyists get in to see the Congress Critters so regularly and so often - effectively pushing constituents and consumers and "regular people" off to the side - that it starts to look like a Denial of Service Attack.

Watch, and gape - and then try to explain to me how you think your Reps in congress are there to serve you.

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About That Dead Elephant

It's generally not a good idea to predict the actual demise of a whole political party.  I wanna say I recall a time not that long ago when lotsa people were saying the Dems wouldn't survive, and gosh, just look at 'em now.

However, there's plenty to be gained politically by making the Cool Kid appeal - ie: "nobody votes for those guys anymore because they're terminally lame and def un-cool", or "they're so 2006", or "I'll bet they're all Nickelback fans", or whatever.

An awful lot of us just run with the pack.  We pay little or no attention until some encounter when we might say something previously considered hip or evenhanded or otherwise stylish and end up getting the feeling we've made some kind of social error by not being in step with a change in political fashion.  That's why yard signs and bumper stickers work - they give people permission to vote a certain way without having to invest much time or effort in making a committed decision. When we see enough evidence of a sufficient number of other people doing the thinking and taking action, and formulating the rhetoric, we start to feel safe enough to go along with the crowd.

I know a woman who told me straight out last summer that she wouldn't be making up her mind on voting for Obama or Romney until she was sure about "who the nation was backing".

So anyway, from an old(ish) post at Addicting Info, here's some speculation about what's eating the GOP from the inside out:

What Reed, and other party bosses, are ignoring is that in their grab for political power, they attempted to blend together three opposing factors, and the pressure between these groups is about to blow the lid wide open.
These groups are:

Libertarians vs. social conservatives – Social Conservatives want more government intrusion in to people’s lives, the opposite of the Libertarian government-out mentality.

Right-wing populists vs. the pro-business crowd – Populists are against the subsidies which the pro-business groups live on, and they are at each others throats.

Deficit reduction hawks vs. small government activists – Deficit hawks want to reduce the deficit, but a small government cannot manage its deficit due to the lack of revenue. With such opposing demands, it is only a matter of time before they come to blows.

In the recruitment of the radical fringe, what, in ages past, would be the Know-Nothings or the Dixiecrats, the GOP has sown the seeds of its own destruction. Now the party has come to accept it.