MERGED: The Politics Thread

[3deroticer]

Most of the blues are near any university!

[SamV]

politics... is when tailless monkeys fling poo at each other until someone is determined to be more correct by smell.

It's interesting how this recent comment about politics popped up in this tread seeing what happen in the latest Florida GOP debate.

After the two (three? ) main contenders traded barbs and jabs with one another for most of the night as the other GOP (don't have a snow-ball's chance in hell) dark horse candidates more or less stood by for the evening, one got his chance to take his shot for the evening when he quipped "his neighbor's dogs have created more shovel ready jobs than Obama".

But then a politician should never bring up any mention of feces, manure, shit, etc. as someone will more than likely point out how the two are married to one another.  

-----
BTW, where the heck did this Johnson guy come from? Talk about an unknown dark horse; he must have been running his campaign while standing under a shade tree during a total solar eclipse. Of course if by some chance he should win, with a name like Johnson he could end up as the GOP version of Weiner for all the late night comics.  

[TheZookie007]

Yahoo! Sports: "ESPN pulls Hank Williams Jr. after he compares Obama to Hitler"

"Hank Williams Jr., the singer whose various videos for the hit song "All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Over Monday Night" has served as the intro to Monday Night Football for 23 seasons, compared President Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler during a Monday morning appearance on Fox and Friends. The statement led to ESPN pulling his popular intro segment, best known to fans for its "Are you ready for some football?" ending, for Monday night's game between the Indianapolis Colts and Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

During a discussion on the 2012 presidential race, Williams began discussing Obama's golf outing with Speaker of the House John Boehner. He said it was a political mistake, on par with "Hitler playing golf with [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu."

Even if using Hitler in an analogy was something that was socially acceptable, the comparison still doesn't make any sense.

If you watched until the two-minute mark of the clip, you'll notice that Williams doesn't seem particularly coherent throughout the segment. He stumbles over words and declared Obama and Joe Biden to be "the Three Stooges." ("That's only two," host Steve Doocy dryly noted.)

ESPN released a statement expressing disappointment in Williams' comments. The network said the intro will be pulled for one game and any further decision will be based on how contrite the singer-songwriter is in the immediate future.

Stories like this can blow over quickly or burn slowly for a few days before building into a major news story. If it's the former, Williams' intro could be back for next week's game between the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions. If it's the latter, Monday Night Football may just have become a little less rowdy.

Update: ESPN skipped over the intro without mentioning the controversy. Instead of leading into the opening bars of Williams' song after a pre-packaged 15-second promo, the network cut to Mike Tirico in the booth and proceeded like nothing had happened.

Also, Williams released a statement late Monday explaining he was "misunderstood." It reads, in part:

"Some of us have strong opinions and are often misunderstood. My analogy was extreme — but it was to make a point. I was simply trying to explain how stupid it seemed to me - how ludicrous that pairing was."

They're polar opposites and it made no sense. They don't see eye-to-eye and never will. I have always respected the office of the President."

So, just because the two men are in rival political parties, "it makes no sense" for them to go golfing together? Wha...?

[pedonbio]

.

[TheZookie007]

Who says The Daily Show doesn't skewer all politicians equally? In the aftermath of the Rick Perry "rock with a racial slur" brouhaha:

"Watch: The Daily Show Exposes America's Racially Insensitive Cartographers"

[pedonbio]

 

[TheZookie007]

Peter King is a nitwit.

[TheZookie007]

'Nuff said.

[TheZookie007]

Washington Post: "The birthers eat their own"

Say what you will about the birthers, but don’t call them partisan.

The people who brought you the Barack Obama birth-certificate hullabaloo now have a new target: Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a man often speculated to be the next Republican vice presidential nominee. While they’re at it, they also have Bobby Jindal, the Republican governor of Louisiana and perhaps a future presidential candidate, in their sights.

Each man, the birthers say, is ineligible to be president because he runs afoul of the constitutional requirement that a president must be a “natural born citizen” of the United States. Rubio’s parents were Cuban nationals at the time of his birth, and Jindal’s parents were citizens of India.

The good news for the birthers is that this suggests they were going after Obama, whose father was a Kenyan national, not because of the president’s political party. The bad news is that this supports the suspicion that they were going after Obama because of his race.

When I heard of the birthers’ latest targets, from a participant in my online chat, I figured it was a joke. But, sure enough, Alex Leary of the St. Petersburg Times reported that various bright lights of the birther community – Mario Apuzzo, Charles Kerchner and Orly Taitz – were casting doubt on Rubio’s eligibility.

“Senator Marco Rubio is not a natural born citizen of the United States to constitutional standards,” Kerchner writes on his blog. “He was born a dual citizen of both Cuba and the USA. He is thus not eligible to serve as the president or vice president.” A few months ago, Kerchner used the same logic to proclaim, “Jindal is NOT a natural-born citizen of the United States. His parents were not U.S. citizens when he was born.”

This relies on a rather expansive interpretation of “natural born.” At this rate, it is surely only a matter of time before birthers begin to pronounce candidates ineligible if they were born by C-section, or if their mothers were given pain medications during childbirth. Will Donald Trump demand to see their medical records?...

If this doesn't convince you that birthers are the most irrational, the most unlettered, and the most unabashedly racist bastards in the country, I don't know what will. Where were George Washington's parents born?

[brakblake]

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/pat-robertson-republican-candidates-extremism-down-notch-ya-194714069.html


Now you know they must be REALLY overboard if Pat Robertson is telling them to tone it down

[TheZookie007]

Well, crazy knows crazy

[TheZookie007]

Got this in the mail today:

"If you think "both parties are equally to blame", you have not been paying attention.

In Ohio people are voting to block Republican legislation that would suppress workers rights. (http://tiny.cc/3b1cx)

In Mississippi people are voting to stop Republican legislation that would make having a miscarriage criminal manslaughter. (http://tiny.cc/i6bxp)

In Michigan Republicans are attempting to pass a law that says bullying is ok as long as you have a religious reason. (http://tiny.cc/iracp)

And those injustices, my friends, those are just today. What will the Republican party be doing tomorrow?

Both parties are to blame? Not even close. Not even in the same galaxy."

[SamV]

Given the huge vein of anti-intellectualism that seems to flow these days on the right, it is little wonder when self-righteous morons look to pass completely moronic laws like the ones in Mississippi and elsewhere. 

Sam "wondering would it still count as assault if while holding a Bible one hit one of these Michigan dunderheads in the puss with it" V

[pedonbio]

Given the huge vein of anti-intellectualism that seems to flow these days on the right, it is little wonder when self-righteous morons look to pass completely moronic laws like the ones in Mississippi and elsewhere. 

Sam "wondering would it still count as assault if while holding a Bible one hit one of these Michigan dunderheads in the puss with it" V

Asimov was serious:

[rtpoe]

GOOD GOD! What is that stuff coming out of his IBM Selectric?

[pedonbio]

GOOD GOD! What is that stuff coming out of his IBM Selectric?

I love my Selectric II (Self-Correcting)! Magic things come out of them!! 

[pedonbio]

Or as Barry Goldwater put it,

[JJ]

Given the huge vein of anti-intellectualism that seems to flow these days on the right, it is little wonder when self-righteous morons look to pass completely moronic laws like the ones in Mississippi and elsewhere.
=======================================================================

Oh really?

Given the huge vein of political correctness and pure vanity that seems to flow these days on the left, it is little wonder when self-righteous morons look to pass completely moronic laws like the ones in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, California and elsewhere. 

[DruulEmpire]

  Well, at least we've moved off David Gregory looking like some puppet.  (By the way, if you ever met David Gregory you might not think "puppet" -- the man is a TALL son of a gun.)

There might even be a punchline here -- if you could ever, I don't know, SPECIFY a law in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, California or, as you put it, elsewhere. ( )

Druul "there are quite a few, you know " Empire

[TheZookie007]

Back on to some serious matters now.

[pedonbio]

 

[rtpoe]

It seems that in the knock down, drag out melee that is the Republican Hyper-Extended Campaign, Newt Gingrich has burbled to the top for the moment.

Just in time to spew out this whopper at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government:

"It is tragic what we do in the poorest neighborhoods, entrapping children in, first of all, in **09** laws, which are truly stupid," he said. "You say to somebody, you shouldn’t go to work before you’re what, fourteen, sixteen years of age, fine. You’re totally poor. You’re in a school that is failing with a teacher that is failing. I’ve tried for years to have a very simple model…. Most of these schools ought to get rid of the unionized janitors, have one master janitor and pay local students to take care of the school. The kids would actually do work, they would have cash, they would have pride in the schools, they’d begin the process of rising."

Seriously? **09** labor laws are "truly stupid"? Why not just bring back sweat shops? And can't you get enough *adults* who want to work? I know the Republicans want to undo everything that Roosevelt did, but these laws go back to Theodore Roosevelt... a Republican....

[CarlTL]

It seems that in the knock down, drag out melee that is the Republican Hyper-Extended Campaign, Newt Gingrich has burbled to the top for the moment.

Just in time to spew out this whopper at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government:

"It is tragic what we do in the poorest neighborhoods, entrapping children in, first of all, in **09** laws, which are truly stupid," he said. "You say to somebody, you shouldn’t go to work before you’re what, fourteen, sixteen years of age, fine. You’re totally poor. You’re in a school that is failing with a teacher that is failing. I’ve tried for years to have a very simple model…. Most of these schools ought to get rid of the unionized janitors, have one master janitor and pay local students to take care of the school. The kids would actually do work, they would have cash, they would have pride in the schools, they’d begin the process of rising."

Seriously? **09** labor laws are "truly stupid"? Why not just bring back sweat shops? And can't you get enough *adults* who want to work? I know the Republicans want to undo everything that Roosevelt did, but these laws go back to Theodore Roosevelt... a Republican....

May the ghost of Theodore Roosevelt comeback and haunt them..and maybe beat some sense into them.

[pedonbio]

I really wish our Republican friends would quit making such a fuss about being anti-gay and anti-drugs. Then we could ignore stories like this, although the fact he's being held in a jail named for him is an extra layer of irony:

wonkette.com/457329/and-now-this-weeks-republican-caught-in-gay-sex-4-meth-sting-story

[3deroticer]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-december-1-2011/america-s-next-tarp-model?xrs=playershare_fb

The secret TARP program by the govt! 7.7 Trillion dollars.

[TheZookie007]

Cain pulled out. Which is why he only has mistresses and no kids born out of wedlock.

-- TheZookie "heigh-oooooo!" 007

[pedonbio]

Cain pulled out. Which is why he only has mistresses and no kids born out of wedlock.

-- TheZookie "heigh-oooooo!" 007

There goes my dream of giving America its choice of which African-American man it wanted, thereby causing heads to explode all around in my family.

[SamV]

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/thu-december-1-2011/america-s-next-tarp-model?xrs=playershare_fb

The secret TARP program by the govt! 7.7 Trillion dollars.

Actually it wasn't so much "the Government" (note big "G") who only voted on approving around 700 billion dollars for asset relief; but by the Federal Reserve, an agency of the government (little "G") who has under its Congressional ordered purvey a directive to promote and preserve the public financial (aka banking) market which is one of the prime divers of our economy. So when the debt crisis hit in 2007, the Fed printed money (another of its functions) to the tune of trillions of dollars flooding the banks to keep the afloat over the huge losses they were incurring over issuing mortgages with questionable security, and then taking those same mortgages and selling them to other financial businesses. These people then re-packaged them in to derivatives and credit default swaps and resold them as grade A investment vehicles to wealthy and institutional investors, and even back to the same banks.

All this has been known for quite sometime along with estimates that the banking industry was/has/still carrying 7 trillion dollars or more of losses on their books from their actions in this idiotic business. So while the Fed prevented the US economy from collapsing entirely with their actions to keep US banks afloat, you can't take some 7 trillion dollars of even perceived wealth in an economy and have it disappear essentially overnight without having some serious repercussions. And the resulting chaos always effects the people the worst who have the smallest asset reserves. So many people in the lower and middle class only economic assets were having a job, and a home (that might have been purchased at a highly inflated value) with a mortgage. Any disruption of one or the other for them will result in precisely what we have been witnessing in this country over the course of the last few years. More so it will take a considerable amount of time for this economy to recover to the point where the lost wealth everyone thought was there can be generated again.

So I love how the Repub Prez contenders keep saying they have the quick fix solution to all this economic mess we've gotten ourselves in to. YEAH, RIGHT!

[DruulEmpire]

With Gingrich leading all the GOP polls right now, and all this hypothesizing that he's some living old-school symbol of what liberals are supposed to hate and evidently that's all that's required to in any way recommend him, a puzzle strikes me.  Wasn't there ever a push to draft Dick Cheney?  After all, Chris Christie had his die-hard supporters, and even Glenn Beck had some people who wanted him to be President.  One could, of course, argue that Cheney ALREADY served his eight years as our President -- but seriously, Lord Vader can't seem to stop mouthing off anyway, so why hasn't he run?  He's the purest encapsulation of the reactionary GOP I can think of.

V to rtpoe below: even so, Cheney would be a coldblooded enough plotter to make sure to have one hell of a Vice-President to carry on when he goes.  Some people out there would adore something like a Cheney-Ryan (Dick, Paul) ticket.

[rtpoe]

Perhaps he's thinking of his tricky ticker, and is staying out of the race since the stress of running could kill him.

[pedonbio]

Perhaps he's thinking of his tricky ticker, and is staying out of the race since the stress of running could kill him.

Poe, there is some debate about that, what with him being as close as he is with The Undead.

[TheZookie007]

Reporter: "Some of the Republican candidates have taken aim at your foreign policy, particularly the middle east and Israel, and accused you of appeasement. I wanted to get your reaction to that..."

Pres. Obama: "Ask Osama bin Laden and the 22 out of 30 top al-Qaeda leaders who've been taken off the field whether I engage in appeasement...."

-- TheZookie "Burn!" 007

[TheZookie007]

Addicting Info: "Chi1d Labor Applauded By Audience During Republican Debate In Iowa"

The audiences at GOP debates this year have told us many things about the Republican Party. In the last few debates, Republican crowds have cheered for letting a sick uninsured man die, booed a gay soldier, and cheered wildly for executions. During the GOP debate at Drake University in Iowa on Saturday night, the audience once again made their feelings known by cheering for chi1d labor.

Newt Gingrich has been calling for an end to chi1d labor. He thinks poor chi1dren should work part-time as well as go to school and has suggested that even chi1dren as young as five years old should be put to work. Gingrich has even stated that chi1dren should replace New York City janitors. Gingrich used that same talking point again during the debate while talking about chi1d labor laws.

Gather: "Poetic Justice: Rick Perry's anti-gay ad uses music composed by a gay Jew"

Rick Perry certainly has a lot to say about homosexuals in his 31-second campaign video. If you're one of the lucky few who haven't yet seen it, the presidential hopeful rails against gays openly serving in the military, chi1dren not being allowed to pray in school (wrong!), and Obama's "war on religion." Which religion, Perry? Hinduism? Islam? Christianity? There's a lot of religions out there, sir, so it might be helpful to your cause to specify which religion Obama's got a war against.

To get back to the topic at hand, not a lot of people paid attention to the background music. It turns out, a music major from Harvard was one of the first to notice it was composed by Aaron Copland, one of the most successful composers of the 20th century. Copland was an American born of Jewish Lithuanian immigrants in 1900. So, not only is the music in a pro-Christian, anti-gay ad written by a gay man, that composer was also Jewish.

Copland wasn't just gay, he was flaming gay. He was famous for traveling and living openly with his much younger boy toys, flouting societal rules and disapproval. His relationships lasted only a few years, but he remained lifelong friends with many of his former lovers. Some of his most famous works include Billy the Kid and Fanfare for the Common Man....

Addicting Info: "Republicans: A Profile of the Classic Abuser"

...The behavior of the Republicans most recently around the debt ceiling debate, and just in general, reminds me vividly of the abusive personality that I engaged with daily, for years, until my divorce. No compromise was ever allowed, it was his way or his other way. He never talked about the many ways in which he was wrong, it was "look what you made me do." In his mind, the only one whose behavior needed changing was mine. Any abusive behavior of his was justified because, in his warped thinking, I provoked him. He used bullying, fear tactics, threats and intimidation to get his way. In the end, although never abusive to them directly, he used my kids as pawns in his abusive game. He refused to share responsibility in any part of our relationship breakdown. I owned it, lock, stock and barrel.

If you break it down, how different is the behavior of a classic abuser than the behavior we've seen within the Republican Party, most notably, the Teabaggers? When Mitch McConnell says that they'll hold the debt ceiling hostage again down the road, I know what that means: Just as abusive personalities aren't generally capable of rehabilitation, neither are the Republicans. Rehabilitation implies that there is a point of normalcy in the past to which one can return. I have yet to see that point for Republicans, they're beyond redemption. Paul Krugman aptly pointed out that this recent debt ceiling debacle demonstrates that "raw extortion works and carries no political cost,” and that "irresponsible brinksmanship" is now "a proven effective negotiating tactic."

An abusive personality really doesn't care who is caught in the crossfire. His desire for control, his low self-esteem and irrational, desperate need to be the winner at any cost trumps any scrap of humanity. Despite the fact that Republicans raised the debt ceiling more than 25 times under Republican presidents, their classically abusive personalities have risen to the fore under this President. At any cost, regardless of any harm to others, they will win. So what if the U.S. defaults? No biggie, if it makes President Obama look bad. If it increases the chances that he'll be a one-term president, they'll make a pact with any devil. So what if their newly-discovered "fiscal conservatism" trashes an already fragile economy, tanking the markets and creating even less of a chance of job creation? If that's what's required to be the victors in the game of chicken they've been playing with our lives, that's what they'll do. Their lack of humanity and lack of a moral center, is truly breathtaking....

These guys...

[rtpoe]

Buzzfeed's 40 Best Protest Signs of 2011

[TheZookie007]

The Atlantic Wire: "Mitt Romney Tells a Gay Vet Why He Opposes Gay Marriage"

I simply cannot believe that this set of clowns is the best that the Grand Old Party can produce to run for President. It totally boggles my mind.