Today's edition of quick hits:
* Deadly Green-on-Blue attacks in Afghanistan are becoming painfully common.
* Obama is clearly the worst anti-business socialist ever: "Stocks closed Friday near a fresh four-year high, chalking up a sixth straight week of gains, as a drop in Wall Street's 'fear gauge' and gains across all sectors suggested the market has room to move higher."
* White House weighs in on Russian punk band sentence: "The White House on Friday protested the conviction and 'disproportionate' two-year sentence handed down against three members of the punk band Pussy Riot, whose trial in Moscow for 'hooliganism' has sparked an international outcry."
* Israel: "Preparations in Israel for a possible war are focusing new attention on whether Israel will attack Iran's nuclear facilities and forcing an unwelcome debate in the thick of a presidential campaign about the U.S. role in stopping an Iranian bomb."
* It's a start: "The Obama administration will make nearly half a billion dollars available to states to create thousands of construction jobs and fix the nation's aging infrastructure."
* I continue to believe former DHS official Daryl Johnson's perspective is well worth paying attention to.
* The Obama campaign rolls out a "digital whiteboard" on Medicare policy.
* In Uganda, Bill Clinton meets again with Bill Clinton: "In 1998, then U.S. president Bill Clinton met a baby who was named after him in a village in Uganda. Now, fourteen years later, the former president was reunited with his 'Ugandan son'" (thanks to T.K. for the tip).
* The over-the-top affection Fox News personalities are showing for Paul Ryan gets a little creepier every day.
* And best of luck to Jon Ralston, one of the best in the business, in his new venture.
Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
Leave a Comment:
So Hannity is gay.. That's revolting!
and.. When are we going to stop handing weapons over to terrorists (besides the Amercian* public, that is) so that they can turn right around and shoot us??
i'm sure romney/ryan would also condemn the sentence against the russian punk band, except for the fact that they're too embarrassed to say the name 'pussy riot'
Russian treatment of Pussy Riot = Fox News treatment of Dixie Chicks
Regarding Pussy Riot, -with a name like that, they have to be CIA plants...
Kiev,
Everything sounds better in Russian -
"Киску бунт" ("Kisku bunt") or something like that.
Undoubtedly part of the acoustically militant left wing fringe of the Russian Orthodox Church - give me that old time ROC & Roll.
CIA does not have the required talent for this - only the Brits could pull it off with the honey trap branch of their secret service - MI Sex. But one should not focus on unlikely conspiracies - sometimes a "Киску бунт" is just a "Киску бунт".
Adam_Selene
Adam:
I agree. But "Киску бунт" sounds great in any language...:-) Millions of jr high school boys are gonna want that on their T-shirt this fall, and they won't have a clue what the politics is about.
I assume ROC & Roll would be Chinese. Personally, I like J-Rock -performed with visual Kei. Wierd stuff, but sounds great. Some of those "guys" can really smoke a riff. It's Sunday night and I'm bored, so I'll include some off-topic and unnecessary J-Rock links below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1UQChKBj8o&list=UUEZ6aiwifUZaQkrHYjEtBcQ&index=4&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuOfqZi14R4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lrj5Nfw12IA&list=UUNSeAc2MVFXwBZRne-ZJ11A&index=6&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQ-OxRvrirU&lr=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6u4rmZiDVY&list=UUEZ6aiwifUZaQkrHYjEtBcQ&index=7&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZFPyXvl1_M&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1WKkOZXfDM&lr=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHx6S82vPVs&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eg7i1-zPX68&list=UUNSeAc2MVFXwBZRne-ZJ11A&index=5&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlWf6fijJCY&lr=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQdToYpppdo&list=UUxS5IGaiiL70f4hm8fqRV_Q&index=7&feature=plcp
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EQxrDW3vdI&lr=1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKst5s86anw&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSyluuCfN24
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXxJMWsuvic&feature=related
I should apologize, that was completely gratituitous..:-)
Israel: "Preparations in Israel for a possible war are focusing new attention on whether Israel will attack Iran's nuclear facilities and forcing an unwelcome debate in the thick of a presidential campaign about the U.S. role in stopping an Iranian bomb."
What the f*ck is it with you mouthpieces for the corporately owned media? Our intelligence agencies say that Iran is NOT developing nuclear weapons. The IAEA says that Iran is NOT developing nuclear weapons. Senior Israeli officials say that Iran is NOT developing nuclear weapons. Why the f*ck the continual corporately owned media references to 'stopping an Iranian bomb'?
Are the same corporately owned media who were cheerleaders for Bush's wars now subtley (or not) cheerleading for a war with Iran? Is there such a subservience among our politicians (of both parties) to AIPAC and the Likud Party that we cannot do, in the Middle East, what is actually best for our country and the world?
Regarding the subservience role of ameriKan politicians to AIPAC and the Likud Party...
Q: What is the difference between a brown-nose and an @ss-kisser?
A: Depth perception
Congratulations to the brave souls of Wall Street for triumphing despite the strenuous efforts of the dastardly socialist Obama Administration (eyeroll).
One half-billion in infrastructure investment is a good start, but with about 3,000 miles of collapsing water mains under the streets of Philly, we could probably use that up right here just on that alone...
As I'm sure DHS official Darryl Johnson could tell you, sometimes, being able to say "I told you so" isn't nearly as satisfying as one might have hoped.
From one of the comments at mediamatters on Hannity's remarks about Ryan: "So, not only is Paul Ryan a devote of Ayn Rand, he's also a bald face liar." But, you repeat yourself.
Ralston's new commentary site should be interesting. I'll be looking forward to that.
;-)
"Israel: "Preparations in Israel for a possible war are focusing new attention on whether Israel will attack Iran's nuclear facilities and forcing an unwelcome debate in the thick of a presidential campaign about the U.S. role in stopping an Iranian bomb."
Don't believe for a second that the primary caluulus involved in this is Netanyahu trying to figure out how the presidential race is going to turn out, not how soon the Iranians will be able to make a weapon. I'm sure if he thought for certain it would work against Obama he would launch tonight.
Could you read and clarify your 2nd paragraph, please. If you are saying what I think you are saying; I am almost mortified to agree with you.
Ok, Netanyahu wants Romney to be president. Period. What he doesn't know is what effect an Israeli airstrike would actually have on the election, whether or not it would help or hurt Romney.
As a guess if he thinks that Romney no longer has shot at all, then he will launch because waitiing gives him no chance of a better hand, in his own eyes, anyway.
I wonder why Obama hasn't released the infrastructure earmark funds before now. It seems doubtful to me that this stimulus will affect the economy before the election.
Because he was waiting for people to forget that he denounced earmarks and that he said he would put an end to earmarks during his term. All the money will go only to Democratic districts...kind of a farewell gift to them.
Rufus, did you even read the article?
This is "found money" that was signed off on by Bush and passed by a Republican-controlled Congress between 2003-2006. And if the money does only end up in blue states, there's only one reason for it: GOP govenors will continue to refuse federal funds that could help their states, constituents be damned.
Digital whiteboard was great except the loons never listen to facts. They prefer their fuzzy little make believe world with it's anti-Obama fear mongering and its grab your guns carnival atmosphere.
I guess Israel is confident enough to take Iran on all by themselves. I wonder why these two Countries don't like each other, I hope it's not about religion, because there are better ways to handle it besides destroying each other. That would be a sin against both religions.
I cannot understand why both Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney insist on lying about things that can so easily be disputed. It took me all of 1 minute to find the article from the New Yorker by Ryan Lizza doing a profile of Paul Ryan that talks about the $1.2 million in stimulus for an Innovation Center in Janesville, Wis. , Ryan's HOMETOWN. How could he say he didnot know about stimulus dollars used in his hometown and deny that building that center didnot create ANY jobs.His family still lives there and he still has a home there.
"Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan" is an anagram for "My Ultimate Ayn Rand Porn".
Here's some not good news.
Last month I commented about an attack on a gay woman in Lincoln, Nebraska, and I put it in the context of that city's recent(ish) adding sexual orientation and gender identity to it's non-discrimination ordinance. That act gave rise to a backlash in the form of a campaign to put the matter on the ballot in November because, you know, voting on minority rights is what we do in this country.
Anyway, the new development (which I found out about through ThinkProgress, but I'm going to link to the article in the local paper directly) is that the new non-discrimination ordinance won't be on the November ballot after all. It's being pulled until some unspecified future election and maybe in the form of an amendment to the city charter, or who knows what.
The really sad part, other than the whole voting on minority rights thing, is that one of the reasons given for pulling the ordinance from the November ballot was the attack on Charlie Rogers. The thinking (?) being, apparently, that the incident has inflamed emotions too much. I would think that would have inflamed the desire for a more just world, but then maybe the city council members and the mayor know more than I do about the political situation in the city than I do. It wouldn't surprise me a bit, considering, but it still a bitch that progress is so hard to achieve and so easily thwarted by bigotry and political caution.
Maybe I'm not being fair to the people close to the scene, but I'm not sure that I much care about that.
Once again, now is not a good time and we should wait.
When will people understand that fighting discrimination is not "attacking religion"? Just level the WHOLE field and be done with this. People keep getting hurt/killed, the longer we prolong the discrimination.
I do not equate religious freedom with equal protection of the laws for all. No church would be required to change their beliefs. People need to know some churches (or synagogues/temples, etc.) are fine with the LBGTQ folk.
"Bob" knows I've been trying to get that across, but the religious right has done such a number on people's heads that there are plenty of allegedly left-wing people doing the right-wing's work by trashing all religious people as homophobic. And then there are the cries to ban all religion as the solution to bigotry. Yes, ding-a-lings, and gasoline is an excellent fire retardant. And what part of the word "allies" don't you understand?
So, yeah, people need to know that there isn't a perfect overlap between homo- and transphobia and religion, and that there is in fact quite a bit of overlap between religion and acceptance. Not to mention the significant overlap between religious people and their supposed mortal enemies. That fact alone should be enough to kneecap the other side's arguments...if only we could persuade many of our own side to stop sabotaging the effort.
That said, you and I are doing a grand job of preaching to the choir (each other).
We'll do our best to make those points. It's a harder for some folks to be anything but hostile toward religion.
Maybe if we relate it to prejudging a racial or otherwise stereotype, there's no reason to think all (X) are the same, even if a person in category (X) once did something bad to them.
Maybe. But maybe a lot of that hostility comes from disappointed fundamentalists. They reject their old beliefs but retain the same intolerant habits of thought. Or not. My thing has often been just to snap that the answer to bigotry is never more bigotry, but I think I'll give it up because it never has the desired result. You're idea is worth a try, though. Maybe next time the subject comes up, I'll snarkily suggest that in addition to eliminating homophobia by eliminating religion, we can eliminate anti-semitism by killing all the goys. Something like that, anyway.
Israel has the right to protect it's borders as much as the United States does. That's all I am going to say on that one.
That's a pretty specious analogy since the US hasn't had to protect it's borders since 1945. Since that time, it's been trying to redraw everybody else's borders.
Self defense, it's how all wars start.
I saw an interview of a German general at the Nuremberg trials after WWII. When asked why he had so many Jews, gypsies, homosexuals and others killed, he said "self defense."
Don't let the smoking gun be a mushroom cloud.
Frank Luntz told Mitt and Paul to use the words 'Free Bingo Card' instead of 'voucher' when talking to seniors about medicare.
Paul Ryan on Medicare: "It's what my Mom relies on." How shameful - why doesn't she rely on the $20M his Dad left her?
It's like Barbara Bush out selling her son's plan to privatize Social Security: "I want to know it's going to be there for my grandkids." Uh, Barbara, your grandkids will be millionaires why will they need those subsistence level Social Security checks?
This is another first in the history of American Presidential races. This has to be the first time a Vice Presidential candidate used his mother as a shill in his flimflam. This will go down in American Bunko History and American Presidential Race History.
Weeellll not to nit pick, but McCain used his mother as proof of longevity. Sad, really… glad that his family traits support long life. But it was much too risky to have his VP pick pop into our heads.
It might be scary enough to think of the "privatize Medicare and give out more tax cuts".
We need capital invested into economy, not theories of trickle down. Reality is we need tax increases and some cuts, so that is opposite land from theoretical prosperity and GDP growth from tax cuts. The growth is offshored or just parked offshore.
I'm voting for the one that killed Bin Ladin.The America and the world are a safer place since Obama/Biden took office.This has also silanced the normally hawkish Republican Party...they would rather talk about medicare,than defense.Putting two bullet into Bin Ladin change a political party's philosophy........LOL