Bailout, Lies and Videotape

On CBS' The Early Show S.C. Gov Mark Sanford said Thursday the sheer size of the stimulus package will end up hindering any economic recovery. "I think the problem that was created with too much debt will never be solved by adding yet more debt," he said. "I think there are a number of wrinkles that have caused a number of us to say 'Wait a minute, let's take a long look at whether or not this really makes sense for our state.'"

Still, Sanford said he would accept the funds.

"Being against it doesn't preclude taking the money."

Sanford ignores several things.  Number one, he doesn't state who it was that actually created this problem "with too much debt" (Bush).  Two, he never offers a solution.  It's easy to be against something.  My question to the governor is 'what are you for'?

Additionally, Republican Governors such as Sanford, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Haley Barbour of Mississippi, Sarah Palin of Alaska and Rick Perry of Texas - all of whom are lining up to run against Obama in '12 - are contemplating refusing the money.

Nice job. Put your political interests ahead of your constituents.  Isn't that impeachable?

However it's all a sham. U.S. Rep. James Clyburn (D-S.C.), the No. 3 House Democrat, put language in the bill that allows state legislatures to overrule their governors and take the bailout money.  It was designed to prevent one shortsighted governor from tanking their entire state to maintain a dogma.

Clyburn's language allows these governors to have their cake and eat it too. Refuse the money, and when your legislature overrules you and takes it, you can accept the benefits of it.

This is all political hackery.

Howard Dean, former DNC chair, has dared these governors to decline the money and then explain to voters why their taxes went up because of a political stunt.

Then there's just plain ol' crazy.  "The sky is falling" crazy.  Batshit crazy.  Michelle Bachmann crazy.

Michelle Bachmann, she of the Hardball comments insisting the government should investigate the political leanings of it's own members, is back.

Now, she's issuing the crazy. Obama is stealing money from Republican districts and passing it out to Democratic ones. He's giving ACORN, an organization working against inner-city poverty $5 billion (untrue).

Unfortunately, she runs into Keithiness.

However, there is uber-blogger Bob Cesca.  I referenced his HuffPost column in here yesterday.  A rightwingnut named Denise decided to start an e-mail conversation with Mr. Cesca.  She was, unfortunately, fighting unarmed.

Read.

Rival church factions argue about who gets to carry losing doll in a rigged race

(Scranton Times)

JESSUP — It’s long been an annual rite of spring steeped in Italian-American tradition. Teams of men, both young and old, race through the borough’s streets with saintly statues of their heritage held aloft. But this year the competition has begun months before the annual Race of the Saints takes place.

A rivalry between two groups has degenerated into a growing schism involving supporters of St. Anthony.

Both groups — the Brotherhood of St. Anthony and the Family of St. Anthony — claim the right to carry the statue of their patron saint during the May 23 race between statues of St. Ubaldo, St. George and St. Anthony.

The big question: What will happen if two teams show up to carry St. Anthony?

“It’s going to be a problem,” said Mark Mariani, president of the St. Ubaldo Society, which is the governing body of the event. It voted unanimously last summer to recognize the Family of St. Anthony, not the Brotherhood of St. Anthony.

...
So basically, there's a rigged race in honor of St. Ubaldo, the patron saint of Gubbio, Italy being run in a little town in Pennsylvania. And two different organizations, ahem "Italian-American gentleman's clubs" are arguing over who gets to carry St. Antny Anthony, who will lose because he's always lost because the race is as legit as pro wrestling.

You can read the story if you want, but the real humor comes from the comments section under the story.

Ted wrote on Feb 18, 2009 9:17 AM:
" If you sue your neighbor over the right to carry a doll up and down the streets of your town...you may be a redneck. "

Martini wrote on Feb 18, 2009 9:43 AM:
" Leave the Saint. Take the cannoli. "

Vito C wrote on Feb 18, 2009 1:25 PM:
" All I know is that someone going to wake up and find the head of a statue in their bed. "

Russian General warns U.S. on Afghanistan: Impossible to solve political problems using force

(Yahoo News)
Twenty years after Red Army troops pulled out of Afghanistan, the last general to command them says the Soviets' devastating experience is a dismal omen for U.S. plans to build up troops there.

In retired Gen. Boris Gromov's view, (it was) an unwinnable battle.

"Afghanistan taught us an invaluable lesson ... It has been and always will be impossible to solve political problems using force," said Gromov, the last soldier to leave Afghanistan two days after the Kabul pullout.

He told reporters that U.S. plans to send thousands of new troops to Afghanistan would make no difference against a resurgent Taliban, who came to power in 1996 in the chaos after the Soviet withdrawal.

"One can increase the forces or not — it won't lead to anything but a negative result," Gromov said.

George Will runs into the dual brick walls of data, science

Thanks to Nate Silver, the best person on the planet, George Will is again left looking like a troglodyte.

Friendo George tries to assert that since the 70's there has been a global cooling trend and that 70's scientists (no doubt suffering from polyester poisoning and exposure to too much boogie) were predicting an ice age. Will's assertion is: if they were wrong then, why should we believe them now.

To quote H.I. McDonough: "then, the roof caved in".

Nate Silver of 538.com uses DATA! and SCIENCE! and FACTS!, and lots of spiffy, spiffy charts to deconstruct, rebut, challenge, obliterate (yeeeesss! obliterate) Will's nonsensical argument.

read. Read! READ!

Hannity: There's a goblin on the wing!

Let's start with Hannity's 2 minute version of the apocalypse. Rather than "O Fortuna", perhaps a better backing track would be Iron Maiden's "Run to the Hills".

War! Pestilence! Death!

(Unfortunately HuffPost doesn't allow embeds, so you have to click here to see the video)

Next, let's proceed to the segment he calls "Socialism You Can Believe In", where "the American way of life is being hijacked".

But the best part: After eight years of the largest government expansion in American history, Sean Hannity complained last night that the recovery bill is (say it with me)..."the largest government expansion in American history".

Here's part of the great Bob Cesca's HuffPost piece "Sean Hannity's Ridiculous War Against Socialism".

When I watched the video of Sean Hannity's Tuesday night show, I was half expecting him to leap out of his chair, grab his producer by the lapels and scream something about a goblin on the wing of the airplane -- all puffy and bloodshot -- hair mussed, tie undone -- spittle and sweat flying all around.

I'm calling upon Sean Hannity to use his prime time television program as a platform to rally Republican politicians, cable news hacks and citizens alike to refuse delivery of not just recovery bill spending, but all so-called "socialist" government programs. Send it all back. End American socialism now! All of it.

Refuse to send your kids to socialized public schools and universities; refuse to use socialized roads and highways; refuse to call upon socialized police and fire departments; shut down the socialized air traffic control; refuse to visit socialized national parks; tell grandma that her Social Security and Medicare will have to be sent back to the government; demand the immediate dismantling of our socialized American military. Sarah Palin and her supporters in Alaska should refuse all forms of "redistributed wealth" by sending back their checks from the socialized oil program there.

Send it all back. I'm sure the entire roster of Neo-McCarthyite pundits enumerated above -- Limbaugh, Scarborough, Hannity and the like -- have already forgone their usage of these socialist services so we can assume they've figured out a ways to get by. How hard can it be really? I mean, who needs roads when there are hot-air balloons and jet packs. Socialist fire departments? A house fire will eventually burn itself out, won't it? As for the pre-socialist 50-percent poverty rate for the elderly? If we can put a man on the Moon (also a socialist program), we can invent some bootstraps that'll fit over grandma's therapeutic stockings.

Zany hijinks from the sporting world, chaps

#1

Category: Consciousness

Background: Carlos Beltran of the Mets responds to Phillies god-like pitcher, World Series MVP, husband-of-hottie-Heidi-Strobel (link NSFW) Cole Hamels. Cole called the Mets "choke artists".

Carlos responds: 

"The only thing that I know is he will be watched every time he faces us. Hopefully we kill him, and then he'll have to deal with the situation."

#2
Category: Earnestness, nervousness and spelling issues

Background: New 49'ers coach/bears Hall of Famer was trying to answer a question from an audience of season ticket holders about his commitment to smash-mouth football and the defense's lingering tendency to hold back. 

He summed up his philosophy thusly: We're going to be "Physical with an F"

#3
Category: Someone had to use it... I guess. Fox couldn't resist.
Background: The Saints cut RB Deuce McAllister
Headline:


Thanks to Deadspin for making me laugh

Lansing mayor takes Fox Nation to task

When asked 'have unions given up enough?', Lansing mayor Virg Bernero lays into one of the Fox Stepford Anchors. Bernero asks why cuts come from middle-class workers while Wall Street execs - who started this mess - are clawing to preserve their bonuses.

This is instant classic.

I think Virg watched Rocky II on TBS just before this interview.

Rush is a traitor. Really

On Friday, Rush Limbaugh was - again - wishing for the recovery bill to fail:

"I want everything he's doing to fail... I want the stimulus package to fail.... I do not want this to succeed."

Steve Benen of Washington Monthly points out that if, in 2003, a Democrat - or anyone - expressed a similar sentiment about the war on terror, they would lose all credibility, allies, advertising revenue or jobs they held. And rightly so.

But in the hypocritical world of GOP politics, they sit by while FatBoy hammers at America. Read what he said - he hopes the recovery fails. He's willing to see this nation go down the drain so Obama doesn't get credit, and votes, for savin our economy.

Rush Limbaugh is a big, fat traitor.

From Benen:

Limbaugh is, without ambiguity, rooting for failure. In the midst of an economic crisis, Limbaugh quite openly admitted that if Obama's economic policies are successful, it would undermine the talk-show host's worldview. As such, Limbaugh wants desperately to see more Americans suffer, more workers unemployed, more businesses close up shop. The key here is philosophy -- if government spending can stimulate the economy, as it always does, then the right is wrong. Limbaugh would much prefer a suffering nation than a reevaluation of conservative ideas.

Keep in mind, of course, that such talk under Bush's presidency would force someone from the airwaves. If a prominent progressive figure said, just as the president was sending troops into war in early 2003, "I want everything he's doing to fail. I want the war in Iraq to fail. I do not want the president's national security agenda to succeed," he or she would lose all advertising revenue and be fired. In the midst of a crisis, Americans rooting against America, based on nothing but ideological rigidity, are pariahs.

Radiohead

I think Radiohead is Latin for "brilliant"

Just


My Iron Lung (live)


Paranoid Android

Gitmo guard: Bush allowed rape of prisoners

(Harper's Magazine - with further links after the jump)
Army Private Brandon Neely served as a prison guard at Guantánamo in the first years the facility was in operation... “The stuff I did and the stuff I saw was just wrong,”

Neely describes the arrival of detainees in full sensory-deprivation garb, he details their sexual abuse by medical personnel, torture by other medical personnel, brutal beatings out of frustration, fear, and retribution, the first hunger strike and its causes, torturous shackling, positional torture, interference with religious practices and beliefs, verbal abuse, restriction of recreation, the behavior of mentally ill detainees, an isolation regime that was put in place for child-detainees.

He describes body searches undertaken for no legitimate security purpose, simply to sexually invade and humiliate the prisoners. ... The Bush White House vehemently objected to provisions of the law dealing with rape by instrumentality. When House negotiators pressed to know why, they were met with an embarrassed acknowledgement that a key part of the Bush program included invasion of the bodies of prisoners in a way that might be deemed rape by instrumentality under existing federal and state criminal statutes.

Jon Stewart: Hypocrisy Buster

Jon Stewart takes down former Republican Senator John Sununu on Judd Gregg and the bailout. How do these guys espouse this crap with a straight face?

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

John Sununu

Eddie Murphy: Italians and Rocky

Definitely NSFW:

Obama: I am an optimist, not a sap

(Ron Brownstein - National Journal)

In a conversation early Friday evening with a small group of columnists, Obama was flexible about tactics and unwavering in his goals. He signaled that he's open to consultation, compromise and readjusting his course to build inclusive coalitions, but fixed on the results he intends to produce. 

...

(Regarding the stuimulus:) "The end product is not 100 percent of what we would want," Obama said. "But I think it is a very good start on moving things forward."

...

 "I think that there were some senators and House members who have a sincere philosophical difference with the idea of any government role in boosting demand in the economy. They don't believe in [economist John Maynard] Keynes and they are still fighting FDR." Some was tactical: "I also think that there was a decision made... where [Republican leaders] said... 'If we can enforce conformity among our ranks, then it will invigorate our base and will potentially give us some political advantage either short-term or long-term." He paused. "Whether that's a smart strategy, I think you should ask them."

...

Yet while promising to continue to seek peace with congressional Republicans, Obama also made clear he's prepared for the alternative. "I am an eternal optimist [but] that doesn't mean I'm a sap," he said pointedly. "So my goal is to assume the best but prepare for a whole range of different possibilities in terms of how Congress reacts."

C-SPAN's Presidential Rankings

Surveying 65 historians, the presidents were ranked in order, being judged as effective (10) or not effective (0). The results, as compared with the 2000 rankings.

PRESIDENT            2009  2000

Abraham Lincoln         1  1
George Washington       2  3
Franklin D. Roosevelt   3  2
Theodore Roosevelt      4  4
Harry S. Truman         5  5
John F. Kennedy         6  8
Thomas Jefferson        7  7
Dwight D. Eisenhower    8  9
Woodrow Wilson          9  6
Ronald Reagan          10 11
Lyndon B. Johnson      11 10
James K. Polk          12 12
Andrew Jackson         13 13
James Monroe           14 14
Bill Clinton           15 21
William McKinley       16 15
John Adams             17 16
George H.W. Bush       18 20
John Quincy Adams      19 19
James Madison          20 18
Grover Cleveland       21 17
Gerald R. Ford         22 23
Ulysses S. Grant       23 33
William Howard Taft    24 24
Jimmy Carter           25 22
Calvin Coolidge        26 27
Richard M. Nixon       27 25
James A. Garfield      28 29
Zachary Taylor         29 28
Benjamin Harrison      30 31
Martin Van Buren       31 30
Chester A. Arthur      32 32
Rutherford B. Hayes    33 26
Herbert Hoover         34 34
John Tyler             35 36
George W. Bush         36 NA
Millard Fillmore       37 35
Warren G. Harding      38 38
William Henry Harrison 39 37
Franklin D. Pierce     40 39
Andrew Johnson         41 40
James Buchanan         42 41

SNL: Akroyd returns to rip Conressional Republicans

Dan Aykroyd returned to Saturday Night Live last night to guest star in the show's opening skit, as John Boehner, with Darrell Hammond as Mitch McConnell. The skit pokes fun at Republicans for being the party of opposition and literally nothing else. They argue over whether Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh are smarter and decide the best line of attack is against the Obama kids.

The sketch isn't funny, but neither is the shit the Republicans are trying to pull.  But I can't say I give SNL enough credit to be actively trying to make that comparison.  It's just more lame writing.