The Idiots R Us

One of the things you'll discover in the following paragraphs is that many of our so-called leaders or wannabe leaders really believe in the ancient religious mythologies. This is especially scary because to believe in these things means you have given up thinking rationally and have become detached from reality.

When such people get elected and put in charge of running our country, our states, our cities, we no longer have much chance of dealing viably with the problems that confront us.

Consider the problem of global warming. In spite of the deniers, every reputable scientist in the world agrees it is a fact, it is to some degree caused by humans, and it is a major threat to the continuation of civilization on earth. Or, consider how the fundamentalist/conservatives have made evolution a problem. Evolution is not a problem. It is the theory upon which all of biology and most other scientific endeavors are based upon. It is as real as the theory of gravity! Consider environmental protection which is an absolute necessity if we are to survive. But conservatives/fundamentalists don't see it as a problem because as one senator from Oklahoma said, god would never allow his creation to be undermined. I guess this gentleman forgot the mythical Biblical tale of Noah.

Reviewing various news sources over the past few days has turned up many wingnuts screwing with  our nation and the world; fools who prance about while mouthing inane and insane predictions and predilections.


Phil Jensen is one of these fools; a Republican Senator from South Dakota. He thinks it is a good thing to allow for-profit businesses to be able to deny service to LBGT persons and/or blacks. It's all about the "free market." To this dipshit, the free-market is the most important thing. But he's so unhinged that in 2011 he tried to amend South Dakota's "justifiable homicide" laws to allow for the murder of doctors who perform abortions. This is what it means to be "pro-life" in his pathetic, sick mind.


Several states, including Florida, mandate drug testing for welfare recipients. Of course, in Florida, the governor (at least originally) had ties to the company that would do the testing. Republicans in several state legislatures around the country are excited about the possibilities of drug testing in their states even though studies have shown that it is basically a waste of money. Very few people have tested positive.  Florida has tossed hundreds of thousands of tax-payer dollars down the toilet pursuing this nonsense.

If we're going to test welfare recipients, then lets test them all.  We should drug test all governors and state legislators because every single one of them depend upon the federal government for money to run their states.  Texas actually gets back more money from the feds than they send to Washington in taxes.  Governors and state legislators are big-time "welfare recipients"!


Chris Christie, the Republican governor of New Jersey, has bashed and broken the unions in his state and has crippled the state's public education system and would like nothing more than to deplete the state pension fund because public employees, everyone knows, are free-loaders who don't deserve a pension.  This is the man who knew nothing about that recent infamous bridge closure.  Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!


Forty-five percent of uninsured Republicans say they'd rather pay a fine than buy health care under the Affordable Care Act.  Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.  But Republicans these days have reached a level of stupidity that is mind-boggling.


Since 2007, the number of homeless students in this country has increased by 72%.  As Paul Ryan would say, "No big deal.  Their parents are lazy and don't want to work."


In the past five years, the number of Republicans who believe in evolution has declined by 26%.  In other words, these Republicans deny the basic facts as to how life was created on earth in favor of some ancient mythologies devised by ignorant desert nomads 3,000 years ago!


The NSA had a "terrorist" list which involved 17,836 phone lines which were monitored daily from 2006 to 2009.  Eleven percent of those lines met the agency's "reasonable ... suspicion of terrorism."   The NSA can't even follow its own rules!  Just know that all of your emails and most of your phone calls are being scanned by Big Brother!


Ted Cruz, the religious fundamentalist ultra-conservative myth-believing moron from Texas has been in Iowa recently testing the waters for a possible presidential run in 2016.  And to think that when I first read about this guy, I thought he was such a loser that not even Texans would vote for him.


It appears Florida's governor, Rick Scott, might be fined $82 million for violating campaign finance law.  He's also under fire for a $500,000 check he received from the huge sugar company Florida Crystals.  Wait, it appears there was no such check although it was was reported in 2013.  It has gone missing from state records.   Now ain't that something?


Fourteen billion years ago the universe was formed in an explosion known as the Big Bang.  What came immediately after that has been a mystery to astronomers until now.  They have discovered evidence "that a split-second later [after the Big Bang], the expansion of the cosmos began with a powerful jump-start."

"It's just amazing," said Lawrence Krauss (a theoretical physicist) from Arizona State University.  "You can see back to the beginning of time."


Meanwhile, Ken Ham, of the Creation Museum, insists, "No, no, no.  My piddly-ass little god did it all in six days 6,000 years ago.  The answers are all in Genesis.  In fact, god got so tired creating the universe that he had to rest on the 7th day after he started!  


Much of Europe and Asia are using high-speed trains that travel about 350km an hour.  We are using trains that move at the same speed they did in 1950.  Slow.


Talk about spoiling your own nest.  Research indicates that 77% of the world's fish stocks have either disappeared or are in trouble.  More troubling, perhaps, is the fact that 90% of our large fish have been removed from the oceans.  It's not just that we're overfishing, we also waste fish.  One-quarter of our yearly marine catch is thrown overboard, dead!


CNN - Don Lemon suggested that maybe God had something to do with the missing Malaysian Airlines flight.  Which god, I wonder.  Might have been Zeus?


Wage theft at Amazon.  Amazon is increasing coming under fire for not being a very nice company.  Workers are claiming that they are forced to "work" an extra 25 minutes per day in order to go through a screening process for which they are not paid.  They've sued and the case is heading to the Supreme Court (the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with the workers).  This case might end up involving some 500,000 people working in 50 Amazon warehouses.


Paul Ryan, that intellectual giant from Wisconsin, said that "inner city" men are too lazy to work.  It's the "culture," he explained - not their race.  Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!


Pat Robertson.  Just when you think this old SOB is dead, he pops up to spout more creepy nonsense.  Horror movies, says Robertson, can lead to demon possession.  What does that even mean?  What demons?  And all this, claims Pat, is because folks involved in the entertainment biz are "very susceptible to Satanic influences."

Oh, the myth of it all.   


Jim Brown.  He's running for Congress from Arizona, the state where the heat shrinks the brains of Republicans down to the size of a wrinkled little pea!  "Basically," says Brown, "slave owners took pretty good care of their slaves and livestock and this kept business rolling along."

Yeah, slavery was good for the poor blacks.  Plus even god approves of slavery.  It's in the Bible!  And if it was good for bizness, the Republicans love it. 


Austin Ruse, who headed up the conservative Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute, said that "the hard left [whatever that is], human-hating people that run modern universities, should all be taken out and shot."  What?  Yep.  I do believe he's since lost his job.  Shoot!


Eddy Lepp grew marijuana in northern California which he handed out to anyone who needed it.  He was arrested and given a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison.  He is currently serving that sentence in the federal prison in Colorado where the sale of marijuana is legal.  Oh, the irony of it all!


Israel's Supreme Court says movie theaters must close on Shabbat.  Israel is a "free" country, but it is under the thumb of the ultra -orthodox in many instances.


Billy Graham's daughter, Anne Graham Lotz (not known for her powers of perception) has possibly solved the mystery of Malaysian Airlines Flight 370.  It is, thinks Ms. Lotz, just a preview of what we might expect of the "Rapture."  Yep.  The Rapture, when millions of Christians will just disappear from the world.

There's some inconsistencies here.  Why would god make this flight disappear?  Were all the people on board fundamentalist Christians?  Oh, the mythology of it all.  Actually, it's eerie to think that there are people like Ms. Lotz out there teaching other people how to think.


Dr. Jim Garrow.  I don't know who this clown is but he is convinced that Obama plans to destroy the world before he leaves office.  It's part of Obama's muslim identify thing and is his "jihad."  Why Obama would want to destroy the world is not clear, but Garrow is certain that Obama blew up the Malaysian plane as part of his evil plan.


I've save the best for last.  Or the craziest.  Susanne Atanus.  From Illinois.  She's an Illinois congressional candidate and even though more sane Republicans were calling on her to withdraw, she won the primary!

Here's what she said in a recent interview:

"'I'm a conservative Republican and I believe in God first.'  She said she believes God controls the weather and has put tornadoes and diseases such as autism and dementia on earth as punishment for gay rights and legalized abortions.

"'God is angry.  We are provoking him with abortions and same-sex marriage and civil unions.  Same-sex activity is going to increase AIDS.  If it's in our military it will weaken our military.  We need to respect God.'"


Considering the number of fools in our political system, it's hard to know whether to laugh or cry.  But too soon, I'm afraid, we'll be on the verge of tears as these numbskulls and their god drive us further from reality and real solutions to our problems.

  

Bill Maher's take on a new movie about the Biblical character, Noah

[Note:  Photo from the Washington Times]


Bill Maher, in a video clip from his show, said this about the new Noah movie:

Although the movie has been condemned by both Christians and Muslims, so it must be doing something right.  And they say it also may lose a fortune for the studio, which would put it in hot water with the Jews too.  (audience laughter and applause)

Now, I don't know about the elephants on Noah's Ark, but the elephant in the room in 2014 is that we are now a full four centuries removed from the scientific revolution.  Four centuries after Copernicus, after the time humans realized that through science, we could actually get a real answer to almost every question about our world, like where does the sun go at night?  And why does disease spread so quickly on a cruise ship?  (audience laughter)

And speaking of cruise ships, you know I don't mind that the Noah story is impossibly childish.  OK, I do mind.  What am I saying?  I mind very much.  I mean, seriously people?  You believe a man Noah lived to be 900 years old — that's what the Bible says — and when he was 500, he decided to have three kids, just like Clint Eastwood.  (audience laughter)

And when he was 600, he and his three 100-year-old sons built a boat onto which in one day, they loaded over 3 million animals, all of which were apparently indigenous to within 5 miles of the boat. (audience laughter)

But get this.  What the Christians who are now protesting this movie are upset about is that it doesn't take the Biblical story literally enough.  They're mad because this made up story doesn't stay true to their made up story.

But the thing that's really disturbing about Noah isn't the silly.  It's that's it's immoral.  It's about a psychotic mass murderer who gets away with it, and his name is God.  Genesis says God was so angry with himself for screwing up when he made mankind so flawed — rrrrr — that he sent the flood to kill everyone!  Everyone!  Men, women, children, babies.  What kind of tyrant punishes everyone just to get back at the few he's mad at?  I mean, besides Chris Christie.  (audience laughter and applause)

Hey God, you know you're kind of a dick when you're in a movie with Russell Crowe, and you're the one with anger issues.  (audience laughter)

You know, conservatives are always going on about how Americans are losing their values and their morality.  Well, maybe it's because you worship a guy who drowns babies!    (nervous audience laughter)  And then, God's genius plan after he kills everyone is to repopulate the world with a new crop of the same assholes who pissed him off the first time!  With predictable results.  He kills millions more.

If we were a dog, and God owned us, the cops would come and take us away.

Why are we getting our morals out of this book?  Why do people follow any of it?  You know, I'm reminded as we've just started Lent that conservatives are always complaining about too much restraining regulation and how they love freedom, but they're the religious ones who voluntarily invent restrictions for themselves.

On a hot summer day, Orthodox Jews wear black wool.  On a cold winter night, Mormons can't drink a hot chocolate.  Isn't life hard enough without making shit up out of thin air to fuck with yourself?(audience cheering and applause)

Don't we have enough rules to follow and enough asses we have to kiss in reality?  Your boss, your spouse, the tax man, your parole officer, your horny cellmate?  Without fabricating made up new ones?  Jews can't eat ham.  Jehovah's Witnesses can't buy Girl Scout cookies.  The Amish can't drive cars.  Catholics can't masturbate.  Scientologists can't go to therapy.  Baptists can't dance.  Sikhs can't shave.  And Lord knows, Muslims can't take a joke.  (audience laughter)

An open letter to the people who hate Obama more than they love America

By Jesse LaGreca

 

I meet you all the time. You hate Obama. You hate gay people. You hate black people, immigrants, Muslims, labor unions, women who want the right to make choices concerning their bodies, you hate em all. You hate being called racist. You hate being called a bigot. Maybe if you talked about creating jobs more than you talk about why you hate gay people we wouldn't call you bigots. Maybe if you talked about black people without automatically assuming they are on food stamps while demanding their birth certificates we wouldn't call you racist. You hate socialism and social justice. You hate regulations and taxes and spending and the Government. You hate.

You like war. You like torture. You like Jesus. I don't know how in the hell any of that is compatible, but no one ever accused you haters of being over-committed to ideological consistency. You like people who look like you or at least hate most of the things that you hate. You hate everything else.

Now, I know you profess to love our country and the founding fathers (unless you are reminded that they believed in the separation of church and state), but I need to remind you that America is NOT what Fox News says it is. America is a melting pot, it always has been. We are a multi-cultural amalgamation of all kinds of people, and yet you still demonize everyone who is not a rich, white, heterosexual christian male or his submissive and obedient wife.

You hate liberals, moderates, hell, anyone who disagrees with Conservative dogma as espoused by Fox News and Rush Limbaugh. You hate em.

Well, here are the facts, Jack. If you hate the Government then you are unqualified to manage it. If you hate gay people more than you love America than you should take your own advice and get the hell out. There are several countries that are openly hostile to gay people, but they are full of brown people and you don't like them much either from what I understand. It looks like you are screwed, but that's not what I am here to tell you.

Now that you have thrown everything and the kitchen sink at President Obama and it still hasn't worked you are panicking. Obama's approval ratings are still near 50% despite your best efforts to undermine the economy and America's recovery at every step you can.

You tried to hold the American economy hostage to force America into default on its' debts, debts that YOU rang up under Bush, so you could blame it on Obama and it failed. You've used the filibuster more than any other Congress ever, going so far as to vote against providing health care access to 9/11 first responders. You remember 9/11, don't you, it's that thing you used to lie us into a war in Iraq, and then when Obama killed Bin Laden and ended the war in Iraq you told people that he hates America and wants the troops to fail. You monsters. You hate Obama with a passion, despite the fact that he is a tax cutting, deficit reducing war President who undermines civil rights and delivers corporate friendly watered down reforms that benefit special interests just like a Republican. You call him a Kenyan. You call him a socialist. You dance with your hatred singing it proudly in the rain like it was a 1950's musical.
 
Frankly, you disgust me. Your hatred nauseates me. Your bigotry offends me. Your racism revolts me. Dear haters, I am openly questioning your patriotism.

I think you hate gays, Obama, black people, poor people, all of us, women, atheists and agnostics, Latinos, Muslims, Liberals, all of us, I think you hate every one who isn't exactly like you, and I think you hate us more than you love your country.

I think you hate gay soldiers more than you want America to win its wars.

I don't even think you want America to win wars, you just want America to have wars, never ending wars and the war profiteering it generates. You love that kind of spending, you love spending on faith based initiatives and abstinence based sex education (George Carlin would have loved that one), you love spending on subsidies for profitable oil corporations, you spend like drunken sailors when you are in the White House, but if it is a Democrat then suddenly you cheer when America doesn't get the Olympics because it might make the black President look bad. 

But oooh you love your country, you say, and you want it back. Well listen here skippy, it isn't your country, you don't own it, it is our country, and America is NOT the religiously extremist Foxbots who hate science, elitist professors and having a vibrant and meaningful sex life with someone we love if Rick Santorum doesn't approve of it. Rick Santorum isn't running for America's fucking high school dance chaperone, he should probably just shut the hell up about sex, but he can't because he has nothing else to run on.

Republicans can NOT win on the issues. They've got NOTHING. All they have is a divide and conquer class war that pits ignorant racist and bigoted people against the rest of us in a meaningless battle of wedge issues and the already proven to fail George W. Bush agenda again of tax cuts for the rich, deregulation, privatization and war profiteering and nothing else, so all they can do is blame black people, gays the government, anybody and everyone else for their own failings. The party of personal responsibility, my ass.

But they love multi-national corporations, just ask a gay hating and racist religious extremist if they think Corporations are people and they will gladly agree, but if you ask them if gay people are people they aren't so sure.

Dear haters, you are the cruel, heartless misinformed assholes who would sell America out to Haliburton in a heartbeat, you would rather pay ZERO taxes than you would see a newly born baby get access to quality health care, you cheer when we discuss denying health care to young people with preventable diseases, and you boo when we discuss the First Ladies plan to cut back on childhood obesity. 

You are a cross to carry and a flag to wrap yourself in away from being the people who Sinclair Lewis warned us about, but I guarantee that if Fox News told you to dress that way you would, because you are the same blind, ignorant and closed minded dunces who drove this country into a civil war years ago because you are bound to the notion that some men are more equal than others. In short, the reason I proudly wear my union army hat is because of seditious sell outs like you who constantly fuck over working class Americans so a foreign entrepreneur like Rupert Murdoch can get a bigger tax break. If corporations are people, they are neither American patriots nor capable of love. Just like you.

So stop wearing your hate with pride. Stop celebrating your anti-science, anti-math ignorance. Stop using code words to mask your bigotry like "family values", especially when you hate my family and when you stand on the same stage as a guy who has had three marriages or if you share a seat in the Senate with a guy who cheated on his wife with hookers while wearing diapers. 

You should be ashamed. I know that you are just doing this to motivate your misinformed hate cult base because if they actually knew that your ideas will make them poorer than they are now, they would never vote for you. You are doing your best to impoverish your countrymen so rich people can get bigger tax breaks and you can keep on delivering corporate welfare to the special interests who have bribed you, and I am disgusted by the way you gleefully parade your hatred with aplomb. I don't think you do love America. At least, not as much as you hate everyone in America who isn't exactly like you.

You should think about that, and maybe get some help.

And for the record, I do not hate you. I am embarrassed by you and nauseated by your cruel and thoughtless behavior and your all consuming greed, but I do not hate you. I forgive you and I hope you can change someday, but I don't hate you. You have enough hate in you for the rest of us as it is.


You can follow me on twitter @JesseLaGreca

Originally posted to MinistryOfTruth on Mon Jan 09, 2012 at 01:57 PM PST.This piece was used with permission of the author. 

This piece was used by permission of the author.

The strange world in which we live - Part II

Today a Russian court convicted eight people for participating in an anti-Putin protest in 2012 on the eve of his inauguration for a 3rd term as president.  So far as I know their sentences have not yet been decided.  Following that event in 2012, Mr. Putin set up stiffer laws regarding protests in the new, "democratic" Russia.

It looks as though that kindly Russian bear we see at Sochi has a big bite!


What I learned from reading a golf instruction book:   Adam Scott, the wonder golfer from Australia, wrote that one must keep the head level during the swing.  Then he noted "Hovering the clubhead prevents jerks."  Oh, if only it were that easy.  I've tried keeping my head level, almost missed the ball, and some jerks standing nearby starting laughing.


On to Miley Cyrus.  What to do about Ms. Raunchy?  She's currently on her Bangerz tour and she does some fairly raunchy things in her act.  Pay your money and you can watch her "straddle a flying hot dog, stuff a thong in her mouth and simulate oral sex on a Bill Clinton impersonator while accompanied by mom and dad."

Some parents find this vulgar and upsetting and unsettling and want the Bangerz tour to go away - permanently.  Said parents and other protestors have caused some U.S. arenas to consider dropping Bangerz and Ms. Miley on her pert, little backside.

But, hey, if you don't like her show, don't go.  Lock your kids up at home.  Ms. Cyrus does nothing for me.  I think she's a sad little person who's probably in over her head and perhaps not too sure of her singing talent which is why she includes the raunchy stuff, but I don't have the need to shut her down.  If enough people don't attend her shows, she'll have to shut down on her own.  But I don't think that's going to happen no matter how many pious parents piss on her.


John McCain.  You may remember him.  He's the guy who flew a plane over North Vietnam although ordered not to do so, got shot down and spent five years or so in a North Vietnamese prison camp where, although he was treated pretty well, somehow came back a "hero" and parlayed that old "wounded hero" bit into one hell of a long political career.

There are two other notable things about Sen. McCain.  One is his involvement in the old Savings & Loan scandal.  Although deeply involved he came out of that smelling like a rose, too.  Well, a damp, wilted rose, but a rose nonetheless.  The other is his failed candidacy for the presidency known mainly for his monumentally stupid decision to cast Sarah Palin in the role of his running mate.

McCain down through the years has been on the wrong side of history over and over again which isn't surprising since he is a Republican.  He championed our disastrous adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan.  He thought we should have sent boots into Syria.  He's agitating for U.S. military action in Syria.

This week he also called Mr. Obama "the most naive president in history."  McCain was unhappy with the way Mr. Obama treated Mr. Putin and because Mr. Obama has used restraint in reacting to the crisis in the Ukraine.

McCain really has no itch to scratch.  Obama shut down the war in Iraq and brought (most of) the troops home.  It's complicated, thanks to the bunch of morons who ran the country from 2000 to 2008.  Obama is also in process of extracting our troops from Afghanistan.  Mr. Obama, contrary to Mr. Bush and Mr. McCain, does not find it necessary to engage our military wherever in the world a violent conflagration pops up.

Mr. McCain sits on his hands and complains.  And if ain't one thing, it's another.  It doesn't matter what our President does, McCain will not like it.  But what can we expect?  You can't make a statesman out of someone who lacks the character and intelligence of a statesman.  Remember he's the guy who signed on Sarah Palin.  Ha!


I read yesterday that according to a Gallup Poll, North Dakota is our happiest state?  What?  North Dakota?  The state with the climate that makes Alaska look positively balmy?  Gallup based its assessment on "work environments, health and access to food and water."

At first I thought this was a crock.  I thought Florida has to be the happiest state.  But then I remembered that Florida is inundated with grumpy old retired folks who hate cold weather and complain about the heat, go out to eat every night jamming up the restaurants, drive like ignorant maniacs and leave a dollar tip for a $50 meal.

But it is sunny here.  That's why they call Florida the Sunshine State.  I'd like to see the sun shining on the rear ends of a lot of these folks heading back north - to North Dakota, maybe.


My grandmother lived on a farm in northern Minnesota.  The house had no indoor plumbing.  When we went to visit her we had to do our business in a stinky, old wooden outhouse across a driveway from the main building.  And yes, the only toilet paper available was most often pages torn from a Sears Roebuck catalog.  It was a crappy situation.

But we've come a long way since those primitive days.  There's a new company starting up in New York city which will offer members luxury toilet facilities.  These facilities are very fancy schmancy with private privys, showers and even a special room for mothers with young children.  Members will pay $6.00 and up per day for the privilege of doing their business like the One Percenters.


Boeing, you may recall, is a big airline company.  It's been manufacturing airplanes in the Pacific Northwest (Washington State) for many years.  But Boeing thinks it does not need to pay its way because, I suppose, it provides a number of jobs for people in that area.

Boeing, however, is a taker not a giver.  It gets a huge number of federal contracts every year.  In fact, 4.4% of ALL federal contracts go to Boeing.  Last year the company made $5.9 billion in pretax profits, which is pretty good considering Boeing paid NO federal income tax.  It had a federal tax rate of -1.4%.

Not only so, but Washington State, which believes Boeing to be a great asset to the community, has given the company $8.7 billion in tax breaks through 2040 to get the company to build a new manufacturing plant in Washington.  That was after Boeing threatened to build elsewhere and then went on to break the back of the union.


Pakistan has a lot of trained monkeys who entertain people in public or private places by doing tricks while held on a leash.  When I first read that story I thought immediately of the U.S. House of Representatives and how much fun it would be to find out whose leash was holding whom!


If you see an ad that promises to show you a special trick which in a few easy lessons will add 20 yards to your golf shots, don't believe it!


If you see an ad that promises to save your soul, especially if it comes from a religious institution, don't believe that, either.


Meanwhile, keep smiling and watch out for the jerks.

The strange world in which we live

So many things have changed in the past 40-50 years. Some changes have been good, others not so much. In certain instances, we seem to be moving backward to a more uncertain, dangerous and unscientific time.

Who would have thought after Roe v. Wade that we'd still be fighting abortion?  Who could have foreseen that contraception would again become an issue and that some medieval minds would argue that a fetus is a person? The teaching of evolution, which was widely accepted, is now being attacked by religious zealots who care nothing for science and truth but only for the writings of ancient desert munchkins who adapted wild tales about a deity creating everything in six days and then becoming so tired he had to rest; or a deity who regretted creating humans at all, so arranged for a genocidal flood saving only certain animals and a degenerate old fool named Noah, who immediately following the flood proceeded to fire up the wrath of his god friend.  There are ignorant folks today still looking for the mythical ark on a mythical mountain.


I've always thought it a bit strange that we legalize alcohol but put people in jail for most of their lives for the mere possession of a few grams of a weed called marijuana. Alcohol causes more death and depravity in one year that marijuana has caused since the beginning of time.

But the light has dawned in certain of our states who have legalized or intend to legalize the sale and consumption of marijuana. Colorado is one such state and it turns out that the tax monies received from marijuana sales have exceeded all expectations to the delight of those who worry about budget deficits.

But certain politicians just cannot leave people alone and continue to attempt to regulate all kinds of personal behavior. I'm no fan of tobacco because of the fact it can cause so many medical problems, but we need to allow people to live their lives and make their own decisions about such things. The abolition of alcohol did not work, nor will the abolition of tobacco.

A step toward the abolition of tobacco has been taken by the States of Colorado and Utah. They are getting ready to raise the smoking age to 21. One not too bright Utah person by name of Marla Breenum said, "By raising the age limit, it puts them [young people] in a situation where they're not going to pick it up until a much later age." Can anyone really be this stupid?

As mentioned, I've got nothing good to say about smoking. But I've nothing good to say about a lot of things, like religion, the Republican Party, Utah in general, rutabaga, George W. Bush, or brandy.

I do find it interesting, though, that certain pathetic patrons of pious nonsense feel they have the right to limit the freedom of other people - especially those powerless to resist, such as teenagers.  Why the hell can't our so-called legislators leave our personal behavior alone and get busy passing laws that ban discrimination rather than allow it; that protect the 99% from the predatory 1%, that instigate job creation rather than boosting the wealth of the already rich?

Along those lines: Several states have attempted to pass laws protecting business owners who wish to use religion as a shield behind which to discriminate against people they don't like or with whom they disagree: Gays, for instance. Idaho, Kansas, South Dakota and Tennessee have tried to do this without success. Arizona, however, has actually passed such a law. And it's very likely Arizona's dim-witted governor will sign it.

It seems to me a better idea, if we have to pass such laws, to enact a statute to allow the rest of us to discriminate against asshat legislators who write and vote for anti-gay laws or anyone else we dislike on "religious" grounds.  If I owned a business, I might be emboldened to discriminate by not allowing anyone into my establishment who was a politician, or carried a gun, or wore a cross around his/her neck, or sported a crew-cut, or had a visible tattoo on his/her body, or drove a Ford, or had a connection with the so-called Tea Party.


Is it just me, or do other people find the winter Olympics mostly boring? I mean, really, if you've seen one skier, you've seen them all. If you've seen one bobsled run, you've seen them all. The same goes for figure skating, cross-country skiing, luge contests, snow-boarding, Russian presidents and NBC hosts.

And who would conduct a winter Olympics where the temperature in February is warmer than it is in Central Florida? And who would put together a winter Olympics that cost his country $50 billion? Fifty billion dollars!!!


Texas is always fun to write about because so many crazies live there and so many crazy things go on there. Guess who's down in Texas these days trying to help certain Republican politicians win their political races? Ted Nugent! Who is Ted Nugent? If you don't know, that's probably for the best. Think of the south end of a horse traveling north that has diarrhea.

Ted Nugent is the lowest of the low. He's a musician and his latest stunt to gain more notoriety was to call President Obama a "subhuman mongrel." Why couldn't the press ignore him? We have enough fools we have to suffer. Nugent isn't one of them. Being a heavy-duty supporter of the NRA, Nugent probably carries a gun in his guitar. Maybe one of these days he'll play the wrong string and put himself out of our misery!


Alaska is a lot like Texas in that the people there, probably due to brain-freeze, elect really weird politicians. For example, once upon a time the people elected a governor who made a lot of noise, blew a lot of the peoples' money like she had done when merely a mayor of a piddly little town in the hinterland, and who failed to finish out her term.

It seems she desired a TV career and money more than serving the public. But it turned out nobody who mattered cared much about her. An empty head, even if blessed with bouffant hair, only goes so far. But Ms. Palin is not going quietly into the night. She can't go anywhere quietly. Nope. She's got a new Teevee reality show called "Palin's a Pumkinhead." Nah, I'm just kidding. Almost as strange, though, is the real title: "Amazing America with Sarah Palin."

This is really true! It's perfect, though, 'cause no one, absolutely no one, knows as much about 'Murica" as does Ms. Palin. So "Prepare to be amazed," warns Ms. Palin, the invincible preppy pinhead who used to live in a northern state where she shot unsuspecting and innocent wolves from helicopters.


More stuff from the strange world in which we live tomorrow. Stay tuned.

On rights, freedom and military heroes

[According to Snopes, the story told below is essentially true.  The email by which it is being disseminated in recent days was taken from a 2007 speech by Mike Huckabee at a conference of right-wing conservatives.  Some students who were present in the classroom back in 2005 state that there were not as many veterans as indicated in the story and they were not in uniform.  It seems the teacher has a mission to honor our veterans for their service, which is not an unworthy goal.  But...]


Here's the story sent to me by a friend.

It's about a high school teacher in Arkansas who, in 2005, with permission from the powers-that-be, removed all the desks from her classroom on the first day of school.  Her students were understandably confused and concerned and questioned the disappearance of their work sites.

The teacher explained they couldn't have their desks back until they could tell her how they "earned" the "right" to sit in them.  They responded with a number of possible answers, such as good grades, good behavior, etc., but the teacher rejected each and everyone.

Finally, as the day drew to a close, and when the last period kids had taken places on the floor, the teacher said she would tell them what they had done to earn the right to sit at a desk in her classroom.

She went to the door, opened it and 27 military vets, in uniform, walked in, each one carrying a desk.  These vets set down the desks, then went and stood against a wall.

The teacher told the students "You didn't earn the right to sit at these desks.  These heroes did it for you. ... They went halfway around the world, giving up their education and interrupting their careers and families so that you could have the freedom you have."

She went on to blather about their responsibilities to be "good citizens" and "good students" because these vets "paid the price so that you could have the freedom to get an education."


Well, not so.  Rather than be applauded the teacher should have been rapped on the knuckes and sent back to college to study American history and the Constitution!

First of all, let's dispense with all this hero nonsense.  For some time now, I've noticed that every one in a uniform is considered a "hero."  That is not true.  A hero is someone who goes out of his/her way at great risk to himself or herself to help others in need.  Enlisting in the military doth not a hero make.  Wearing a uniform is not the mark of a hero.

In fact, these days many of our military personnel are on the bottom of the goodness scale.  That's probably always been true, and we've heard of terrible atrocities committed by our troops during WWII; we know what happened at My Lai in Vietnam; and the horrible things our military (and the CIA) did to those confined to the Abu Gbraih prison in Iraq (sexual assault, sodomy, murder) are still fresh in our mind.

Other of our so-called heroes have been behaving despicably by attacking other so-called heroes within the military itself.  The Department of Defense reports that in 2013, there were 19,000 cases of sexual assault.  In 2014 sexual assault remains a huge problem and it seems the military establishment is having a difficult time stopping it.

The suicide rate among our military and our veterans is also a problem.  Some statistics report that 22 veterans take their lives every day.  This is very sad, but if nothing else, it indicates severe problems among our so-called "heroes."

To call everyone in uniform a hero diminishes those who have served and continue to serve heroically!


Secondly, the military does not provide for our freedoms.  Military service or military might or military action does not guarantee that high school kids can have a desk in a classroom or get an education.  Our misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan have nothing to do with our freedoms.  In fact, because of the hornet's nest these military actions have created among the more radical groups in the Middle East, the U.S. is at a higher risk for terrorist attacks.

Neither Iraq nor Afghanistan represented or represent a threat to our freedoms.

World War II was the last time that we sent our military to war where freedom in any sense was involved.  Our military fought to defeat totalitarian dictators and states which had as their goal the conquest of our country which would have doubtless resulted in the loss of our freedoms.  That was not true in Korea, Grenada (the Gipper's little war), Vietnam, Iraq or Afghanistan.


Our freedoms are given to us by the Constitution of the United States.  That is the foundation of our country, the bedrock upon which our freedoms rest.  So, unless there is a threat to undo our Constitution which might require a military response, these "heroes" carrying desks into the classroom had nothing to do with our freedom!

And this is where the teacher really goes off the rails.  The laws of our land and our states provide for a free public education through the 12th grade.  Nobody has to "earn" that; nobody can "earn" that.  It is a right given to every child and it is free.  Nobody has "paid the price" so that our children can get an education.

It's as much of a "right" as the right of free speech!


Perhaps the teacher's heart was in the right place.  But the road to hell is paved, I've heard, with good intentions.  As a veteran and as a retired teacher, I get tired of reading this kind of sentimental nonsense which indicates not just a lack of common sense, but a serious lack of learning.  It would be interesting to know what other misguided lessons she has imposed on her students.

No loaded guns at gun show

h/t to Crooks & Liars.

Sarah Silverman talks to Jesus

MLK: Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence (Full)

The Republican Party Rape Advisory Chart

 Thanks to Daily Kos. This is by brainwrap. View the original here.

President Obama's Proclamation on Religious Freedom Day - January 16, 2014

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM DAY, 2014
 
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF
AMERICA

A PROCLAMATION

In 1786, the Virginia General Assembly affirmed an ideal that has long been central to the American journey. The Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, penned by Thomas Jefferson, declared religious liberty a natural right and any attempt to subvert it "a departure from the plan of the Holy Author of our religion, who being Lord both of body and mind, yet chose not to propagate it by coercions on either."

The Statute inspired religious liberty protections in the First Amendment, which has stood for almost two and a quarter centuries.

Today, America embraces people of all faiths and of no faith. We are Christians and Jews, Muslims and Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs, atheists and agnostics. Our religious diversity enriches our cultural fabric and reminds us that what binds us as one is not the tenets of our faiths, the colors of our skin, or the origins of our names. What makes us American is our adherence to shared ideals -- freedom, equality, justice, and our right as a people to set our own course.

America proudly stands with people of every nation who seek to think, believe, and practice their faiths as they choose. In the years to come, my Administration will remain committed to promoting religious freedom, both at home and across the globe.

We urge every country to recognize religious freedom as both a universal right and a key to a stable, prosperous, and peaceful future.

As we observe this day, let us celebrate America' s legacy of religious liberty, embrace diversity in our own communities, and resolve once more to advance religious freedom in our time.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim January 16, 2014, as Religious Freedom Day. I call on all Americans to commemorate this day with events and activities that teach us about this critical foundation of our Nation's liberty, and show us how we can protect it for future generations at home and around the world.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have here unto set my hand this fifteenth day of January, in the year of our Lord two thousand fourteen, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty - eighth.

BARACK OBAMA

Rachel Maddow and Christie (Not Julie)

The Fakirs of Duck Dynasty

The language is pretty raw but the message is important.

House Republicans "12 Days of Congress"

This video courtesy of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee

Ethnic cleansing in the Middle East

Every once in awhile you might hear an ignorant person complain that Israel is guilty of "ethnic cleansing" in the Middle East.

Not so.  Over 1.5 million Arabs live in Israel.  Compare that with the number of Jews living in other countries shown on the map above.

Note:  Click on the map to enlarge it.


h/t to my friend, Bob Poris

Musings during the holiday season

     1.  Have you ever seen a real estate ad that said a house for sale was in a bad or
          deteriorating neighborhood?

2. I've seen lots of articles lately about how stress can really mess you up. All those articles have created a lot of stress in my life!
   

3. Why is it that Republicans in Congress are suddenly deeply concerned about the deficit when we heard nary a word from them when George W. Bush was waging wars with China's money?
   

4. Did you ever notice that “gourmet” restaurants serve smaller portions of food that doesn't taste very good?
   

5. Why is Ted Yoho (R-Fla) sponsoring a gun safety event instead of helping to create jobs in our county? And on the anniversary of the Newtown tragedy yet.
   

6. Who are the Kardashians and why should we care?
   

7. Could we please send Sarah Palin off into the woods where nobody would have to listen to her inane blather?
   

8. Isn't it interesting that the “bipartisan” budget deal is built on the backs of the poor?
   

9. Just read about a Ted Cruz coloring book. Some stupid people are buying it. I would buy it just for fun but I don't know which colors represent reprehensible, mean, greedy, unChristian, nasty, hateful, spiteful, and snobbish behavior.
   

10. This morning an old man driving a hybrid car dashed into a parking space at the supermarket going the wrong way just as I was entering the space going the right way. He wouldn't move back to his proper space. Just because you're old doesn't mean you get a pass so you can be stupid and onery! [By the way, he spent most of his time in the store buying lottery tickets.]
    

11. Some folks in my town want to build a baseball stadium to entice a minor-minor (NY Yankees) league team to relocate from another town in this state. The county commission thinks the county/city should pay for the stadium, i.e., the taxpayers. It will involve a half-cent tax. The New York Yankees have more money than god. Why should taxpayers build that flourishing enterprise a stadium? If day follows night, the team will leave in a year or two to another, more promising city and we'll be stuck with a monstrosity that sits vacant most of the time.
    

12. Re the previous item: It's possible that the taxpayers will approve this half-cent tax for a baseball stadium. What would be the reaction if the politicos proposed a half-cent tax for new schools or to help pay teacher's salaries? As Santa would say, “Ho, ho, ho! No, no, no!”
    

13. Please NEVER call my social security or Medicare an “entitlement.” That implies I did not earn it nor deserve it! Mitt Romney's paycheck can be called an entitlement for most of what he has comes from his family and the avoidance of taxes.

14. We have another “battle of the cross.” In San Diego. On a hill at a veteran's memorial. Why do some people insist on flaunting their religious beliefs in the face of the rest of us? There's nothing wrong with a veteran's memorial but a cross remains a Christian symbol and disparages all non-Christian veterans. We have enough pagan religious icons in this country. A judge said “take it down.” Sort of. His decision will be appealed and Justice Scalia implied that if it hits the Supremes all will be well and the Christian symbol can stay on the hill. This is a Christian country, right?
    

15. The Hawaii state health official who released President Obama's birth certificate was killed in a plane crash on Wednesday. She was the only one killed in the crash. Her name was Loretta Fuddy. A tragedy. Donald Trump, however, showing how much he cares about real people and those who loved Ms. Fuddy, implied that Obama's birth certificate was a fake and that Ms. Fuddy was implicated in forging the certificate and was killed to ensure her silence about the matter. Would it be too much to ask that the media not publish anything that comes from the sick mind of Mr. Trump?
    

16. The city of Detroit has received judicial permission to move forward and cut the pensions of city retirees. The city of Detroit, while cutting pensions, plans to spend $444 million dollars to build a new hockey arena.  Is there a way to lock up the brainless turds that despoil our country?
    

17. Some of our media people are really stupid. Many of those folks work for FAUX News. Not all, though. Just watch NBC and CNN, especially. One of the stupidest is Megyn Kelley of FAUX News. A woman wrote her that Santa did not have to have white skin. Well, Ms. Kelley knows damn well that Santa was white. And, for that matter, so was the other mythical guy, Jesus. Perhaps Ms. Kelley has been so indoctrinated at FAUX News that she thinks people can't have faith in a person of color. I mean, FAUX News constantly points out that President Obama, a man of color, is not worthy of praise or worship or even respect.  And it's too bad he should get a decent night's sleep!
    

18. In Bullock County, Georgia, teachers were told they could not promote their Christian beliefs in the classroom or in their lessons or on their computers. A right-wing legal group complained that this violated the first-amendment rights of the teachers. Why do Christians insist on promoting their religion in the public sphere? A ban on such behavior does not deny anyone their first-amendment rights! Teachers who try to make little Christians out of their students are violating the United States Constitution. What's so hard to understand about that?
    

19. Why do people driving cars with little Jesus fish attached drive 20 miles over the speed limit on the highways? Doing so makes them criminals.
    

20. Finally, some tidbits from the latest issue of Harper's Magazine.
    

• 942,000 U.S. fast-food workers receive federal and state aid.
  
• The cost of this aid is more than $7,000,000,000.
  
• 71 percent of Tea Party crackpots think Obama is destroying the country.
  
• Cancer prevention gets a mere 11% of the NFL's pink breast-cancer awareness merchandise sales.
  

Merry Holidays!

The Republicans and Nelson Mandella - Once again on the wrong side of history

This, from the Huffington Post.

1986.  Congress put together a Comprehensive Anti-apartheid Act which was designed to show U.S. disapproval of apartheid in South Africa.  It had teeth which involved sanctions, among other things.

The bill passed Congress with bipartisan support.  The Republican Party, however, opposed the act, and it was vetoed by President Ronnie Reagan, the B-grade movie actor who somehow stumbled his way into the presidency.

Congress overrode the veto.

One of those who voted against the act was none other than Dick Cheney, then a Wyoming congressman.  Today, he maintains he did the right thing, that the African National Congress was a terrorist organization and Nelson Mandella was a terrorist.

In 2004, John Nichols, a Cheney historian, spoke to Mandella about Cheney's "record and worldview."  Nichols summed up Mandella's response this way:

He’s very blunt about it he says one of the many reasons why he fears Dick Cheney’s power in the United States, and Mandela does say, he understands that Cheney is effectively the President of the United States, he says, one of the many reasons that he fears Dick Cheney’s power is that in the late 1980’s when even prominent Republicans like Jack Kemp and Newt Gingrich were acknowledging the crime of Apartheid, Dick Cheney maintained the lie that the ANC was a terrorist organization and a fantasy that Nelson Mandela was a terrorist leader who deserved to be in jail. Frankly it begs very powerful question. If Dick Cheney’s judgment was that bad in the late 1980’s, why would we believe that it’s gotten any better in the early 21st century?


As we have discovered over the past several decades, Cheney's bad judgment and bad attitude and downright nastiness never has changed.  He's still the sniveling, creepy war criminal who should by all rights, be behind bars!


And the Republican Party continues it's long trek through time on the wrong side of history!

[Read the entire article at the Huffington Post, here.]

Those Were The Nights (of Chanukah) - The Yeshiva Boys Choir

A rousing, rollicking celebration of Chanukah!

Do the right "Christ" thing this Christmas!

Bill Maher zings Repugs who talk about "their" Kennedy

Bill Maher had a few words for the Republicans who still "get a lump in their throat" for "their Kennedy" Ronald Reagan during his New Rules segment this Friday night.

MAHER: Now, I don't know if all politics is local, but I do think all politics is tribal and just as some people are dog people and others are cat people, some have a chip in their brain to be Democrats and others to be Republicans. We have Kennedy, you have Reagan. We have marijuana, you have Metamucil.

We want gays in the military. You want them in the airport restroom. [...]

The one reason we looked uglier in the '80's, is because we were uglier. It was when the baby boomers, the generation that was supposed to be different, just gave up and sold out completely. Kennedy's time was the time of "Ask not what your country can do for you." Reagan's was the time of "Greed is good."

JFK was far from perfect, but he was a true wit and a sex machine and he knew how to wear a pair of shades. Reagan was an amiable square in a cowboy hat who had sex with a woman he called mommie.

Kennedy was James Bond. Reagan was Matlock.

Love him or hate him, we win. Republicans can call Reagan their Kennedy all they want, but it's like calling Miller High Life 'the champagne of beer. It's why calling someone your Kennedy will never really cut it, because our Kennedy, is Kennedy.

Thanks to Heather at Crooks & Liars.