NBC News: “An image of Russian President Vladimir Putin speaking to a child, who then appears terrified, has people asking what exactly Putin said that may have generated such an expression.”
The child is clearly terrified:
But the boy isn’t the only one. At least three women are using side-eye to watch Putin, but is the couple right behind the child his parents? Look at their faces while Putin bends down, as if they’re thinking, “Don’t look. Don’t look… anywhere but down. Nope… not looking down.”
“Quiet down or you go to gulag.”
“Sarah Palin is watching us right now.”
“Joey, do you like movies about Gladiators?”
“I killed Santa with my bare hands”
“I will have the KGB murder your family if you do not sit quietly.”
“If you pick your nose once more I will have it removed.”
“You’re not getting adopted.”
“…There are a lot of people whose livelihoods depend on keeping lots of conservatives terrified and ill-informed. The groups that exist to raise funds raise more funds when they endorse the crazier candidate. So even if you don’t particularly care that regular conservative Americans are constantly being scammed by their media apparatus, you should still worry about the influence of the scammers. The fact that there is a lot of money to be made in acting like Michele Bachmann is part of why the House seems poised to blow up the U.S. economy. The fact that conservatives have that much contempt for their own true believers neatly explains how they govern when they actually have power.”
Of course, in an enormous mansion somewhere in this great country, Bill O’Reilly is sitting on a pile of money and already preparing for next year’s War on Christmas. It’ll begin just after Halloween, when the first lights go up on people’s houses and trees. And it’ll end, as every year, when the Christmas holiday is celebrated without a hitch. — kohenari
“Every year about now I watch “It’s a Wonderful Life” again to remind myself what Frank Capra understood about America — its essential decency and common sense. In many ways the nation is better than it was in 1946 when the movie first appeared. Women have gained economic power and reproductive rights; we enacted Civil Rights and Voting Rights and, through Medicare and Medicaid, dramatically reduced poverty among the elderly; we began to tackle environmental devastation; we stopped treating gays as criminals and have even started to recognize equal marriage rights. We elected and then re-elected the first black president of the United States. But we are still in danger of the “Pottersville” Capra envisioned as the alternative to what happens when Americans fail to join together and forget the meaning of the public good. The craven and cynical bullies symbolized by Lionel Barrymore’s “Mr. Potter” are threatening our democracy and our common morality. We must continue to fight them.”
“…when fundamentalists say that their God is excluded from public schools, they are speaking the truth. The God they worship is not the true God, the one that is omnipresent and ultimate, but political power and coercive imposition of their views on others. That is what fundamentalists worship and serve. That is what they lament seeing expelled from public schools. And that is what they opportunistically use tragedies like the recent one to promote. Those who know or seek the true God will not bow before such idols, and will call those who do so out, and seek to expose them for what they are, namely worshippers of false gods.”
After the hate group, Westboro Baptist Church, decided to turn their attention from desecrating fallen soldiers to desecrating the victims in Newtown, CT, Anonymous released private contact information on Fred Phelps Sr, as well as the rest of the group’s membership (all of whom seem to be related).
Salon: Westboro Baptist Church, notorious for picketing the funerals of fallen troops with “God Hates Fags” placards, announced Saturday that they would picket Sandy Hook elementary school, where 20 children and six adults were shot dead Friday. Tweets from the Phelps family suggest they believe the horrors in Connecticut are a punishment from God for gay marriage. Hacker collective Anonymous was swift to respond, releasing private information of Westboro members including email addresses, phone numbers and home addresses.
Mike Huckabee: Newtown Shooting No Surprise, We’ve ‘Systematically Removed God’ From Schools – “We don’t have a crime problem, a gun problem or even a violence problem. What we have is a sin problem,” Huckabee said on Fox News. “And since we’ve ordered God out of our schools, and communities, the military and public conversations, you know we really shouldn’t act so surprised … when all hell breaks loose.”
Charles Johnson: Bryan Fischer echoes this theme, saying God could have protected the children in Newtown, but“God is not going to go where he’s not wanted,” because God is a “gentleman.”
I’ll tell you what’s a true sin: believing God is a petty, vindictive bastard just like you. And a society that encourages more guns, less mental health care, and even more spending cuts out of our country’s social safety net, just so the wealthiest among us can keep their tax breaks.
“Since you asked the question, “Am I nuts to think there’s a war on Christmas?” it’s only polite for me to offer you a resounding, “Yes, you’re f*cking nuts.” Because, for whatever annoying local ticky-tac Christmas-abolishing story you and your merry band of persecution-seeking researchers can scour the wires to turn up, the rest of us can’t swing a dead elf without knocking over an inflatable snow globe or a giant blinking candy cane. For god’s sakes! Fox News itself is located in Midtown Manhattan, the epicenter of all that is godless, secular, gay, Jewy, and hellbound. And yet, even here, all around your studio, it looks like Santa’s balls exploded. In the olden days, before the “war on Christmas” the celebration of the birth of Jesus lasted a day, like birthdays do. … There’s a war on Christmas? Has anyone told Thanksgiving? ‘Cause this year, Black Friday, AKA Christmas’ opening bell, got pushed back a day to “Black Thursday.” Or as we used to call it: Thanksgiving. Christmas is so big now it’s eating other holidays.” — Jon Stewart, 12/3/2012
Steve Benen: Pat Robertson assured his followers that Republicans would win the White House and Congress in 2012. Robertson knew this with certainty, he said, because God himself told the televangelist what would happen. This week, Robertson suggested there may have been a divine miscommunication. For those who can’t watch clips online, Robertson conceded, “So many of us miss God. I won’t get into great detail about elections but I sure did miss it. I thought I heard from God; I thought I had heard clearly from God. What happened? You ask God, ‘How did I miss it?’ Well, we all do and I’ve had a lot of practice.” The next time Robertson claims to speak for God, and to receive special messages about the future directly from Heaven, the televangelist’s followers may want to keep this incident in mind.
…
Hunter DailyKos: [Rev. Franklin] Graham [(yes, that one)] equated the Obama years with a national rejection of God. “In the last four years, we have begun to turn our backs on God. We have taken God out of our education system. We have taken him out of government. You have lawyers that sue you every time you mention the name of Jesus Christ in any kind of a public forum. …Maybe God will have to bring our nation down to our knees—to where you just have a complete economic collapse. And maybe at that point, maybe people will again begin to call upon the name of almighty God.”
Hunter: There’s no way around it—religious conservatives are a sadistic lot. Everything’s all smiting and hellfire. If a hurricane happens, it’s because God was ticked off that you were treating gay people as if they were normal humans. If you lose your pension to a group of thieving banksters, it’s because you didn’t sing loud enough in church last week, you jerk. And if God has to wreck the whole country—just take his Holy Economic Pruning Shears and lop the whole thing off at about ankle-height—in order to get a little positive press from you people, then by Him that’s what he’s going to do.
The meanness of these people never ceases to surprise. The bitterness, the persecution, and the absolute insistence that if America doesn’t run exactly according to their way, and to hell with every other sect and sub-sect and sub-sub-sect of Christianity because the only true way to do it is according to the guy on channel three hundred something, then ‘Merika As We Noh Iht is well and truly boned. I don’t know who it is religious conservatives think they’re praying to, but if it’s all about chanting and damning people and about constant magical vengeance being brought down on anyone who doesn’t chant enough or damn people enough, that sounds positively morbid. A good grift, though.
It’s interesting that these conservative “Christians” never see outcomes they dislike (Obama winning the election) as being the Will of God. Shouldn’t they at least consider the idea that God is trying to tell them something and they’re the ones who are wrong, they’re the ones who aren’t listening?
“We feel that even though Walmart has low prices, they pay lousy wages, they’re anti-union and they have a detrimental effect on the survival of small businesses,” Brian Flagg, who runs the Casa Maria Free Kitchen in Tucson, told The Arizona Daily Star. “We consider that blood money.” Flagg said it wasn’t just him making that decision, either. After consulting the charity’s board, they decided it was only appropriate they turn down the money, a first for the group. “The consensus was not to accept the money,” he reportedly added. “Hopefully we’re modeling good Catholic, Christian behavior.” — Catholic charity shuns Walmart’s ‘blood money’
Critics often cite Walmart for having a detrimental effect on the small business community in areas where it sets up new stores, which often employ workers for minimum wage, offering little in the way of benefits. The retailer has even been caught actively helping employees sign up for food stamps (PDF), much of which is returned to Walmart through actual food purchases.
