Daily Archives: July 3, 2012

Joe Walsh (R-Deadbeat Dad) says opponent Tammy Duckworth, who’s a combat veteran, isn’t a “true hero”

Posted on by

Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Deadbeat Dad), the tea party favorite of Illinois, disparaged his Democratic opponent, Tammy Duckworth — a combat veteran — at a town hall meeting on Sunday. According to Think Progress, he said:

“Understand something about John McCain. His political advisers, day after day, had to take him and almost throw him against a wall and hit him against the head and say, “Senator, you have to let people know you served! You have to talk about what you did!” He didn’t want to do it, wouldn’t do it. Day after day they had to convince him. Finally, he talked a little bit about it, but it was very uncomfortable for him. That’s what’s so noble about our heroes. Now I’m running against a woman who, my God, that’s all she talks about. Our true heroes, it’s the last thing in the world they talk about. That’s why we’re so indebted and in awe of what they’ve done.”

First of all, SERIOUSLY?! John McCain couldn’t have talked about his military service and POW experience more than he did in 2008 — which is FINE, because that’s part of his background and service to our country. He gets to talk about that and so does Tammy Duckworth — who, by the way, is “a double amputee who lost both her legs in Iraq when insurgents hit her helicopter with an RPG in 2004.”

Fuck Joe Walsh and anyone in his town hall audience who applauded his remarks. It never ceases to amaze me how the tea party “patriots” revere politicians who are anything but patriotic to our country and to our service members.

Here’s what Vote Vets, a non-partisan PAC that supports veterans issues, had to say, in part, to Think Progress about Joe Walsh’s remarks:

“Telling a veteran to shut up on the 4th of July is beyond the pale. We are past the point of calling on Joe Walsh to apologize. He should step aside and and stop embarrassing his district and America.”

The Republican Party reminds you to “Support the Troops!” unless they don’t agree with your conservative political agenda, then screw ‘em.

Mitt Romney agrees with the President on health care mandate: it’s a penalty not a tax

Posted on by

Yesterday, Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom appeared on MSNBC to say that Romney does not agree with the current GOP hissy fit that the health reform mandate is a tax. Like President Obama and the Democrats in Congress, he considers it a penalty:

“The governor believes that what we put in place in Massachusetts was a penalty and he disagrees with the court’s ruling that the mandate was a tax.” Todd expressed his confusion given that this contradicts the existing Republican talking point on the health care law as a tax: “So he agrees with the president that you shouldn’t call the tax penalty a tax?” “That’s correct,” Fehrnstrom said. “But the president also needs to be held accountable for his hypocritical and contradictory statements because he’s described it variously as a penalty and a tax. Lest you fear this does not represent a classic Romney flip-flop, too, fear not. As others have pointed out, Romney previously referred to the Massachusetts law as a “tax penalty” more than once, including in a 2009 USA Today Op-Ed and in a 2008 debate.

Of course this opinion can (and probably will) change at any minute, so prepare to shake the Etch-A-Sketch.

RIP Andy Griffith

Posted on by

“When a man carries a gun all the time, the respect he thinks he’s getting might really be fear. So I don’t carry a gun because I don’t want the people of Mayberry to fear a gun. I’d rather they respect me.” — RIP Andy Griffith (Sheriff Andy Taylor)  (via: con-tem-plate)

File:Cast 01.JPG
image: wikipedia

BREAKING: Actor Andy Griffith has died, friend says

Andy Griffith died this morning in Dare County, North Carolina, according to former UNC President Bill Friday. Friday, a close friend of the actor, confirmed the news to WITN News.

The original opening of the Andy Griffith Show sponsored by Post Cereal. (The show ran from 1960 to 1968.)

…

Great news: Romney might choose Crazy Eyes as a running mate

Posted on by

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Mars) — or as Charles P. Pierce calls her, the Girl with the Faraway Eyes (which is pretty funny) — refused to say whether or not she’s being considered as a running mate for Mitt Romney, according to The Raw Story:

“One thing I know about Mitt Romney, he’s made excellent decisions in the past when it comes to running organizations and I have no doubt, whoever it is, that he chooses, to bring in as his V.P., it will be a highly competent person who could step in at a moments notice and assume the responsibilities of the White House,” she told CNN’s Piers Morgan. “Are you being vetted at the moment?” Morgan asked. “Well, that’s something for the campaign to answer on,” she responded. “That’s not for me to make that decision, and that announcement.”

Mitt and Michele have a lot in common: she has dual citizenship in Switzerland and he has a lot of money in their banks. I welcome more open discussion on the Romney campaign trail about FEMA camps, communists in the United States Congress, the light-bulb conspiracy, and how the Fast & Furious operation was in fact a “political program” implemented by Eric Holder to take away our Second Amendment rights. Plus, it would be great fun to see Marcus Bachmann and Marie Antoinette interact with cookie recipe competitions, etc.

Make this happen, Mitt Romney.

Mitch McConnell on 30 million uninsured: ‘That is not the issue’

Posted on by

Sen. Mitch McConnell’s recently said this to Chris Wallace on Fox Entertainment:

“I just want to ask what specific steps are you going to do to provide universal coverage to the 30 million people who are uninsured?” Wallace pressed. ”That is not the issue,” McConnell insisted. ”You don’t think the 30 million people who are uninsured is an issue?” Wallace wondered. ”We’re not going to turn the American health care system into a Western European system,” the Kentucky Republican replied. “They want to have the federal government take over all of American health care.”

And McConnell said this: “If Republicans take the majority in the Senate in the 2012 elections, McConnell said, he would use budget reconciliation to overturn the law — a move that would not be subject to the 60 votes necessary to overcome a filibuster. “Reconciliation is available because the Supreme Court has now declared it a tax,” McConnell said. “They have unearthed the massive deception that was practiced by the president and the Democrats to constantly deny that it was a tax. … And as a tax, it is eligible for reconciliation.”"

Also, too: “Florida will not implement two provisions of the U.S. healthcare law involving an expansion of Medicaid for the poor and creation of a private insurance exchange, Governor Rick Scott said on Sunday. Two other states with Republican governors, Wisconsin and Louisiana, opted out of the two provisions last week…”

Charles P. Pierce comments: “Last time anyone checked, there were 659.900 of McConnell’s constituents without any health-care coverage of any kind. There were 783,900 of them on Medicaid. These people are not an issue. Mitch McConnell has announced quite clearly that he does not represent these people. Meanwhile, John Boehner wants the system “ripped out by the roots,” and Governor Bat Boy down in Florida has decided that he will be the Ross Barnett of Medicaid. People will still fall ill. People will still die. These are some sick bastards we got here.”

And yet these people, without insurance or on Medicaid who hate Obama, will vote for the McConnells and the Rick Scotts and any other person who promises to overturn something with the President’s name attached to it — even if it’s like shooting themselves in both feet. Good luck with that, tea party.

Air pollution from wildfires mapped by NASA

Posted on by


WHERE THERE’S SMOKE THERE’S PARTICULATE POLLUTION: This map, created using data from a NASA satellite, shows particulate matter released by the wildfires throughout the United States. Reddish-brown areas have the highest levels of particulates. (Photo: NASA)

Air pollution from wildfires mapped by NASA
The instrument on the satellite measures aerosols by analyzing the amount of light scattered and reflected by the atmosphere.

Researchers who’ve analyzed the data used to make the map said that the western wildfires have affected air quality as far away as the East Coast.

Fuzzing up Mittens: riding the tire swing for Mitt Romney

Posted on by

Recently Romney campaign spokesman Lenny Alcivar outlined how the campaign will avoid journalists and cooridnate and communicate their message through Brietbart.com and the Drudge Report, according to Think Progress.

Alcivar said: “When this election is over, one of the lessons that will be learned by the mainstream media is that they no longer have a toe-hold on how Americans receive their news…We no longer allow the mainstream media to define the political realities in America. The rise of Breitbart, Drudge and others, combined with an aggressive Romney campaign is a powerful tool in the arsenal of the conservative movement. …The governor will no longer allow the mainstream media to dictate the terms of this debate. This is just the beginning… We are witnessing the rise of the center right media.”

So how did mainstream journalism take that news? Like a spurned, lovesick 14-year-old girl who would do anything (anything!) if Mitt would talk to her again.

Here are two examples from Political Wire:

The AP takes an interesting look at Mitt Romney’s religion which requires “three hours nearly every Sunday for services.” He attends church nearly every week: ”The family’s devotion to the Mormon faith is a part of Romney’s life that the electorate rarely sees. Romney himself almost never mentions it in public. And his campaign typically bars the media from seeing him participate in a religion with which many Americans are unfamiliar. But it’s a part of his life that could help him connect with an American public that’s only just now starting to get to know him — one that includes many church-goers.”


Photo: AP: The vacation home of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is seen on Lake Winnipesaukee in Wolfeboro, N.H. , Monday, July 2, 2012.

Washington Post: “By day, the Romneys kayak and water ski — one sport at which Mitt excels — play tennis and basketball, stage a “home-run derby” and horse around on a slip-and-slide. Most of the grandchildren (there are now 18) put on a talent show on a stage that Papa, as they call Mitt, constructed in the backyard. And he helps them roast s’mores over a campfire and leads them on treasure hunts. He grills chicken and salmon and teaches the kids how to drive his lawn tractor. At night, the adults gather for family meetings, with each evening focused on a frank and full discussion of a different son’s career moves and parenting worries.”

I’m in a diabetic coma. Ozzie and Harriet live! Before the mainstream media’s new “We Love You Mitt Romney, Please Talk To Us!” campaign makes us convert to Mormonism so that we too can hold treasure hunts and talent shows while enjoying s’mores on the vast acreage of one of our many vacation homes (see above), let’s take a moment to remember who they’re talking about:

This guy:

think-progress: Not a care in the world.

Note: reference for ‘riding the tire swing’

Capitalism will always choose money over morals

Posted on by

via: christopherstreet

If it turns out that this isn’t going to be a problem for the Christian fundamentalists, let’s not hear another word about a woman’s LEGAL freedom of choice. Reference 

Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Deadbeat Dad) says Democrats want “everyone to be the same”

Posted on by

At a town hall event on Sunday, the tea party’s favorite deadbeat dad, Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL), said that his political opponents want everyone to be exactly the same, according to Raw Story:

“You feel like I do. You’re scared. Young, old, middle-class, wealthy, or poor — you’re scared. All I’m going to ask you, and I’ll ask you when I am done, is you gotta take that fear and you better turn it into something really productive, because the other side — guys, I hear it every day — the other side is working every bit as hard as we are who believe in freedom. The side that wants everybody to live in a $200,000 house, and everybody have a blah kind of health care, and everybody to go to college, the side that wants everybody to look and sound and be the same, because that is what they worship, equality, that side is working their tail off.”

Projection, much? It’s as if he’s accusing the Democrats of being the political party known for driving away people who aren’t white, male, conservative, fundamentalist Christian heterosexuals. It seems to me that a political party which scorns diversity in every way imaginable, and which works diligently to create divisions according to wealth and health and race and sexuality, and which attempts to legislate their beliefs onto society as a whole IS ACTUALLY THE POLITICAL PARTY that wants everyone to be the same.   

I’ll just leave this here:

 
 

Source: drunkonstevphen