Name Those 22 Congressional 'Tea Party' Republi-CON

UPDATE: "The road to Washington is paved with broken campaign promises. But few are so rich in hypocrisy as those of House Republican freshmen caught engineering hometown pork even as they vow to slash the federal budget for the supposed good of the nation." Read The New York Times, Pork? That? What Do You Mean?

First there was the Florida Republi-CON, but he has friends in Congress.

"House Republicans who rode a wave of voter discontent into office last year may be pushing for spending cuts, but they’re also quietly funneling millions of federal dollars back home." Read The New York Times, Cost-Cutters, Except When the Spending Is Back Home.

Fear, Anger, and Hatred = Violence, Again

UPDATE: "Racism is stupidity’s recourse. There are plenty of stupid people in the world. . .

[In the past, it was the persecution of blacks. And today Jews] seemed to have forgotten that not being a race but a religion had scarcely saved Jews from racist persecution.

Hatred of Muslims in Europe and the United States is a growing political industry. It’s odious, dangerous and racist. . .

The settings change, the vile stupidity does not."

Read The New York Times, The Racist Scourge.


UPDATE V: "Evil's larger narrative, and why we must guard against it." Read The New York Times, A Madman and His Manifesto, which notes the "alternative is war under the banner of heaven, as both Breivik and his hated Islamists advocate."


UPDATE IV: Despite his denials, our shameful pastor was just one of many who preach their Islamophobic ideology of fear, anger, and hatred and initially tried to blame Muslims for the massacre:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Of course, he is now trying to back track, and claim he prophesied the identity of the real killer, a professed Christian 'crusader', and in a very nuanced argument offered only for Christians states that the killer was not really a Christian.


UPDATE III: "Breivik is no loner. His violence was brewed in a specific European environment that shares characteristics with the specific American environment of Loughner: relative economic decline, a jobless recovery, middle-class anxiety and high levels of immigration serving as the backdrop for racist Islamophobia and use of the spurious specter of a 'Muslim takeover' as a wedge political issue to channel frustrations rightward. . . [and] to enlist [Christendom] in apocalyptical warfare against an 'infidel' enemy supposedly threatening the territory, morals and culture of an imagined community of devout believers." Read The New York Times, Breivik and His Enablers.


UPDATE II: "How many people can assert [civilization-threatening jihad] before small numbers of the disaffected take them literally? If all that were true, wouldn't a lot of people respond violently? Overheated, hyperbolic rhetoric must come naturally once you've immersed yourself in the hard core anti-jihadist blogosphere. Regulars there lose the conviction that words have precise meanings, and the belief that arguing with integrity requires staying within their bounds. Shortcuts are so much easier, hence the frequent descents into ad hominem, the constant reliance on hyperbole, and the crutch of playing on the civilizational anxieties of the audience, in an effort to shake them into awareness." Read The Atlantic, Anders Behring Breivik and the 'Anti-Jihadist' Blogosphere.

Our shameful pastor and his ilk should repudiate their Islamophobic ideology of fear, anger, and hatred.


UPDATE: "Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian man who apparently justified last week’s mass murder of helpless teenage campers with a 1,500-page 'compendium' calling for a right-wing revolution against Europe’s ruling class. . .

His compendium quotes repeatedly from conservative writers on both sides of the Atlantic, and it’s filled with attacks on familiar right-wing targets: Secularism and political correctness; the European Union and the sexual revolution; radical Islam and the academic left. . .

Conservatives on both sides of the Atlantic have an obligation to acknowledge that Anders Behring Breivik is a distinctively right-wing kind of monster. "

Read The New York Times, A Right-Wing Monster.

For years our Resident Pastor-to-the-Dictators (AKA Pastor Truthiness (formerly known as Pastor Poppins)) has waged a campaign of fear, anger and hatred by hosting professional purveyors of hate.

He is one of many "anti-Muslim bloggers and right-wing activists" that influence people to violence. Read The New York Times, Killings in Norway Spotlight Anti-Muslim Thought in U.S.

And "their response to the attacks is nonetheless revealing, in that they are now demanding the kind of nuanced analysis of the Norway shootings that they’ve always failed to offer when implicating jihadism or all Muslims for terror attacks." Read the Washington Post, In response to Norway attacks, right-wing bloggers suddenly demand nuance.

I find it no coincidence that this incident was done on Friday, just before the Pastor's show.

The formula is old: Republi-con fear, anger, hatred = violence. But the Republi-CONs have no shame or concern for the violence they may incite.

We Discuss and Debate to Find the Truth

"It’s salvation of a kind: our apparently irrational quirks start to make sense when we think of reasoning as serving the purpose of persuading others to accept our point of view. And by way of positive side effect, these heated social interactions . . . can lead to the discovery of the truth." Read The New York Times, Biased but Brilliant.

No Kidding, An 'Amazing' Ad Campaign Featuring Vaginal Puppeteering

For mature audiences only:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

As noted before, nobody is better at satire than Colbert. Remember his roast of Bush at the 2006 White House Correspondents Dinner.

The Republi-CON's Economic No Recovery Plan: Destroy Jobs and Pay Workers Less

UPDATE II: Recent GDP "numbers solve the mystery in the labor market. This isn’t about confidence or uncertainty or regulations or any of the other bankshot explanations we’ve been using to explain why unemployment seems stuck even as the economy rebounds. The economy isn’t rebounding. Demand isn’t returning. And without demand, there can’t be jobs." Read the Washington Post, The recovery-less recovery.

Hello globalization, good-bye jobs.


UPDATE: "Hard as it can be to land a job these days, getting one may not be nearly enough for basic economic security." Read The New York Times, Many Low-Wage Jobs Seen as Failing to Meet Basic Needs.

"A Republican report argues that slashing government spending and employment in the face of a deeply depressed economy would actually create jobs." Read The New York Times, The Mellon Doctrine.

All part of the Republi-con war on the middle class.

Doo Wop Test

From an email:

1. When did ''Little Suzie'' finally wake up?
(a) The movie's over, it's 2 o'clock
(b) The movie's over, it's 3 o'clock
(c) The movie's over, it's 4 o'clock

2. ''Rock Around The Clock'' was used in what movie?
(a) Rebel Without A Cause
(b) Blackboard Jungle
(c) The Wild Ones

3. What's missing from a Rock & Roll standpoint? Earth _____
(a) Angel
(b) Mother
(c) Worm

4. ''I found my thrill . . .'' where?
(a) Kansas City
(b) Heartbreak Hotel
(c) Blueberry Hill

5. ''Please turn on your magic beam, _____ _____ bring me a dream,'':
(a) Mr. Sandman
(b) Earth Angel
(c) Dream Lover

6. For which label did Elvis Presley first record?
(a) Atlantic
(b) RCA
(c) Sun

7. He asked, ''Why's everybody always pickin' on me?'' Who was he?
(a) Bad, Bad Leroy Brown
(b) Charlie Brown
(c) Buster Brown

8. In Bobby Darin's ''Mack The Knife,'' the one with the knife, was named:
(a) MacHeath
(b) MacCloud
(c) MacNamara

9. Name the song with ''A-wop bop a-loo bop a-lop bam boom.''
(a) Good Golly, Miss Molly
(b) Be-Bop-A-Lula
(c) Tutti Fruitti

10. Who is generally given credit for originating the term ''Rock And Roll''?
(a) Dick Clark
(b) Wolfman Jack
(c) Alan Freed

11. In 1957, he left the music business to become a preacher:
(a) Little Richard
(b) Frankie Lymon
(c) Tony Orlando

12. Paul Anka's ''Puppy Love'' is written to what star?
(a) Susan Gibbs
(b) Connie Francis
(c) Annette Funicello

13. The Everly Brothers were ........
(a) Pete and Dick
(b) Don and Phil
(c) Bob and Bill

14. The Big Bopper's real name was:
(a) Jiles P. Richardson
(b) Roy Iddings Jr.
(c) Marion Michael Morrison

15. In 1959, Berry Gordy, Jr. started a small record company called...
(a) Decca
(b) Cameo
(c) Motown

16. Edd Brynes had a hit with ''Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb''. What TV show was he on?
(a) 77 Sunset Strip
(b) Hawaiian Eye
(c) Surfside Six

17. In 1960 Bobby Darin married:
(a) Carol Lynley
(b) Sandra Dee
(c) Natalie Wood

18. They were a one hit wonder with ''Book Of Love'':
(a) The Penguins
(b) The Monotones
(c) The Moonglows

19. The Everly Brothers sang a song called ''Till I ______ You.''
(a) Loved
(b) Kissed
(c) Met

20. Chuck Berry sang ''Oh, ___________, why can't you be true?''
(a) Suzie Q
(b) Peggy Sue
(c) Maybelline

21. ''Wooly _______''
(a) Mammouth
(b) Bully
(c) Pully

22. ''I'm like a one-eyed cat . . . ."
(a) can't go into town no more
(b) sleepin' on a cold hard floor
(c) peepin' in a seafood store

23. ''Sometimes I wonder what I'm gonna do . . . . .....''
(a) cause there ain't no answer for a life without booze
(b) cause there ain't no cure for the summertime blues
(c) cause my car's gassed up and I'm ready to cruise

24. ''They often call me Speedo, but my real name is ..... . . .''
(a) Mr. Earl
(b) Jackie Pearl
(c) Milton Berle

25. ''You're my Fanny and nobody else's ......''
(a) girl
(b) butt
(c) love

26. ''I want you to play with my . . . ''
(a) heart
(b) dreams
(c) ding a ling

27. ''Be Bop A Lula .......''
(a) she's got the rabies
(b) she's my baby.
(c) she loves me, maybe

28. ''Fine Love, Fine Kissing ...''
(a) right here
(b) fifty cents
(c) just for you

29. ''He wore black denim trousers and . . .''
(a) a pink carnation
(b) pink leotards
(c) motorcycle boots

30. ''I got a gal named . ... .''
(a) Jenny Zamboni
(b) Gerri Mahoney
(c) Boney Maroney

See comments for the answers.

Class Today at NoBullU on WEBY

Listen to the voice of wisdom and reason in a wilderness of partisan rhetoric -- No political insanity, no conservative hypocrisy, no liberal foolishness -- Just straight talk, straight at you, and that’s no bull!!

NoBullU will broadcast today from 4:05 to 6:00 p.m. at 1330 AM WEBY and on line.

Topics:

Local Business Shout-Out: TBD.


Follow-up:


Fact-free fantasies: : don't be duped by the Birthers, including our very own Pastor Dred Scott (you may remember the infamous Dred Scott decision of 1857, which asserted that African Americans were "beings of an inferior order" who "had no rights which the white man was bound to respect." That ruling declared that African Americans could never be U.S. citizens and therefore could never be President), and

Church support for slavery and opposition to civil rights (4 major American Churches split over the issue of slavery, forming northern and southern factions, including:

The Methodist Church: In 1861, the North Carolina Christian Advocate wrote of "the demon spirit of abolitionism" and how Southern Methodists had "tested it fully, and found it to be heartless, inhuman and Christless." Although the two factions reunited in 1939 as the Methodist Church, they retained racial segregation.

The country's Presbyterian Church also split into two.

The Baptist Church: The Southern Baptists are the largest and most reactionary christian denomination in the USA. They split away from the Baptists in 1845 over slavery, because they thought that slavery was okay. After the civil war, some Southern Baptists founded the Ku Klux Klan. In the 1960s, the Southern Baptists supported segregation laws and opposed the black civil rights movement. In 1995, the Southern Baptist Convention issued an apology to all African-Americans and asked for their forgiveness.)

Local and regional: school district lawsuit update, ransom paid, lawsuits dismissed, and hello globalization, good-bye jobs, Clearwire jobs headed overseas, that makes two county employers, Lumber 84 in the Santa Rosa County Industrial Park is closing;


National and international: I'm waiting, where's the balanced budget, don't hold you breath because the Republi-CONs Con the Tea Party, there'll be no $100 billion budget cut, and let's admit the obvious, the Republi-CONs are not serious about deficits, and who's responsible for the debt

'What would Jesus cut?'

Don't be duped by CONgress

Damn the unemployed, Republi-CON polly wants a tax cut

The myth of expansionary austerity

Let play you choose: who gets paid (and who doesn't),

To balance the budget, end tax expenditures, better known as tax deductions, which amounted to about $1 trillion in 2009,

To balance the budget, do nothing

Choose your medicine

Call the Republi-CON bluff

Let's play the Republi-CON game of 'spot the contradiction', can you explain the Republi-CON contradiction as regards the economy, the debt ceiling, or deficits, or national security, or health care costs, or or even jobs


Fear, anger, and hatred = violence, again


150 years later

Congressional government reform hypocrisy

More Republi-CON family values hypocrisy

Name that Florida Republi-CON,

Beware the so-called fair tax


The myth of voter fraud

Who is your favorite 2012 GOP candidate, or do you have a favorite not-yet-a-candidate?, or none of the above,

President Sexpot?

More premarital sex and another shotgun wedding for the Palin clan


The health care industry bottomline, the reason Republi-CON want to repeal the new health care law

Believe it or not: DUI/DWI at the demolition derby

CSI dog poop,

Who you callin a Neanderthal

Giving new meaning to navel gazing,

Another Republi-CON myth buster, no the government isn't banning incandescent light bulbs

Big brother is watching you,

and 'The Great Stagnation' and our broken political system;


Fun stuff: twelve things that a motorcycle can teach, do I look fat responses before the divorce, random thoughts, questions a dog might ask God, did you ever wonder . . ., the liquid nitrogen burger, paraprosdokians, the Y Generation, Husband Day Care, and cute little cats in 'It Could Be Worse';

and

Donate to a good cause: help the friends of a former instructor at the Naval EOD school at Eglin Air Force Base, Gunnery Sgt. John Hayes, who was detachment company gunnery sergeant from June 2007 to June 2010 and taught several courses and was recently wounded in Afghanistan.

I'll discuss anything, but expect a no mercy take down if you are a shrieking hatemonger of right-wing rhetoric and partisan hackery, pandering to fear, anger and hatred, because the truth sure makes it hard out there for the party pimps.

So tune-in, call-in, but only if you can handle the truth and some ass kickin' discussion of politics and current events.

Choose Your Medicine

UPDATE II: The longer the Republi-CONs refuse to compromise, the bigger the debt. See the Washington Post, The incredible, shrinking debt deal in one graph, which shows:




UPDATE: "Over the last several weeks, leaders in Washington have proposed various plans to address the nation’s growing deficit as a condition of raising the debt ceiling by Aug. 2. [Review a] running comparison of some of the major proposals or ideas that have been released" at The New York Times, Comparing Deficit-Reduction Plans.

From the New York Times, A Debt Ceiling Cheat Sheet: 8 Possible Plans, which are nicknamed:

1. The Grand Bargain,
2. The Half-Bargain,
3. The House Cuts,
4. The White House Cuts,
5. The Stop-Gap,
6. The Balanced Budget Plan,
7. The McConnell Option, and
8. The Hybrid McConnell.

And as I've said before, there is the NoBullU solution for the federal deficit and debt is: restructure the federal government (to end Congressional free lunchism), reform the federal tax code (so that revenues pay for ALL government spending), and amend the Constitution to require a balanced federal budget (because Congress can't control its spending).

Congressional Government Reform Hypocrisy

"Like many members of Congress, Rep. Michele Bachmann has been a fierce critic of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, blaming the government-backed loan programs for excesses that helped create the financial meltdown in 2008.

And like millions of other home purchasers, Bachmann took out a home loan in 2008 that offered lower costs to the borrower through one of the federally subsidized programs, according to mortgage experts who reviewed her loan documents."

Read the Washington Post, Bachmann benefitted from federal home loan program.

Beware the So-Called Fair Tax

Do you believe the myth that your boss will raise your salary when the income tax is eliminated? Fat chance.

When "various federal [aviation] taxes expired, most airlines lifted prices by an amount equal to the customer’s savings." Read The New York Times, A Bonanza for Airlines as Taxes End.

The Health Care Industry Bottomline, the Reason Republi-CON Want to Repeal the New Health Care Law

UPDATE III: More proof that it's all about the health care industry bottomline.

"One of the nation’s largest providers of kidney dialysis deliberately wasted medicine in order to reap hundreds of millions of dollars in extra payments from Medicare, a former clinic nurse and a doctor are charging in a whistle-blower lawsuit." Read The New York Times, Lawsuit Says Drugs Were Wasted to Buoy Profit.


UPDATE II: Speaking of health care industry profits, "the nation’s bloated annual health-care tab would swell by more than $4 billion" after a company raised the price of a medicine from $20 to $1,500 per dose. Read the Washington Post, Critics slam cost of FDA-approved drug to prevent preterm births.


UPDATE: "In a world where the two parties' top priority on health care was providing answers for the uninsured and cost control, an argument over the best way to do health-care reform would be a very healthy thing. But that's not what we've got. We've got the Democratic Party, whose top priority is to try and solve our health-care problems and who've shown their commitment to that by moving steadily rightward over the last century in a bid to pick up Republican support for some sort of solution, and the Republican Party, whose top priority is that we shouldn't do whatever the Democrats are proposing and have proven their commitment to that by abandoning previously favored policy proposals as soon as the Democrats demonstrated any interest in adopting them."

Further prrof that Republi-CONs want to repeal the new law to protect health care industry profits.

"Opponents of the health law sometimes suggest that cutting costs would be easy, with common-sense ideas. Several writers -- David Wessel, most recently -- have recently explained why that's not so. " Read The New York Times, Wishful Thinking on Health Costs.

So why the push to repeal the new law -- as I noted in an earlier post, without reform the cost of health care is projected to rise about 75%. But to the health care industry those higher costs mean higher profits. And since half the people in the country cheat and get their health coverage courtesy of Uncle Sam, the taxpayers pay. This is the reason the health care industry opposed reform and want their Republi-con political lapdogs to repeal the new law.

Of course, it make no difference to Congress, you pay for their health care, which they gladly accept even while claiming to oppose 'socialized medicine.'

Can you say sucker.

Twelve Things That a Motorcycle Can Teach

From an email:

1. The only good view of a thunderstorm is in your rear view mirror.

2. Four wheels might move the body... but two wheels move the soul.

3. I'd rather be riding my motorcycle and thinking about God than sitting in Church and thinking about my motorcycle.

4. Life may begin at 30 but it doesn't get interesting until about 95 . . . mph.

5. Midnight bugs taste just as bad as noontime bugs.

6. Sometimes it takes a whole tank of gas before you can think straight.

7. A bike on the road is worth two in the shed.

8. Young riders pick a destination and go, old riders pick a direction and go.

9. When you are riding lead, don't spit.

10. Catching a yellow jacket in your shirt at 75 mph can double your vocabulary.

11. I've never seen a motorcycle parked outside a psychiatrist's office.

And Finally:

12. Only Bikers know why dogs stick their heads out car windows.

Don't Be Duped by CONgress

"Congress’s own budget has risen 55 percent over the past 10 years, from $1.2 billion in 2000 to $2.3 billion in 2010 . . . [and] Senate staffs swelled 'by nearly 25 percent . . . On the House side, staff was up 11 percent." Read the Washington Post, Coburn’s cuts: Congress should 'lead by example'.

Do I Look Fat Responses Before the Divorce

From an email:

Not to Stevie Wonder.

Big time! That's why I'm sleeping with your best friend.

No way! You look least fat in that outfit!

I guess there's not much point in asking if you mean fat with an 'f' or phat with a 'ph.'

No hablo ingles.

Yes, but it also makes you look like a pricey hooker, so things balance out.

No, but taking it off sure does.

Okay, listen: What's important is that you not focus in a negative way on the comparison I am about to make.

Not if you were travelling at the speed of light.

Yes, but in my country obesity suggests prosperity.

Let me jog around to your front and take a look.

Whoa! A talking couch!!

May I consult the Iraqi Minister of Information before answering that?

Republi-CON Polly Wants a Tax Cut

UPDATE III: Why can't the fat lady get a job? Globalization. Read The New York Times, Is There Hope for the Unemployed?, which compares employment growth in "those sectors whose output is traded across international borders (the tradable sectors) and is thus subject to competition from foreign producers, and those sectors whose output is not traded across international borders (the nontradable sectors)."


UPDATE II: "Our failure to create jobs is a choice rationalized by an ever-shifting set of excuses." Read The New York Times, No, We Can’t? Or Won’t?, which notes:

"The economy isn’t fixing itself. Nor are there real obstacles to government action: both the bond vigilantes and structural unemployment exist only in the imaginations of pundits. And if stimulus seems to have failed, it’s because it was never actually tried."

UPDATE: "The nation’s economic woes boil down to this. Compared with a healthy economy, about 7 million working-age people and 5 percent of the nation’s industrial capacity are sitting idle, not producing what they could. The economy is growing again, but at a rate — less than 2 percent in recent months — that’s too slow to keep up with a population that keeps increasing and workers who keep getting more efficient." Read the Washington Post, Why it doesn't feel like a recovery, which includes a great interactive graph showing the the output gap.

Ask any Republi-con politician for his/her solution for the economic downturn and inevitably s/he will parrot the Republi-con economic elixir: tax cuts, tax cuts. But supply-side economics isn't the answer this time, the system is awash in cheap money. Read The New York Times, Cheap Debt for Corporations Fails to Spur Economy.

As I said in February 2009, tax cuts are not the answer, this downturn won't be over 'til the fat lady gets a job.

Sub Today at NoBullU on WEBY

Usually on Thursdays you can listen to me, the voice of wisdom and reason in a wilderness of partisan rhetoric -- no political insanity, no conservative hypocrisy, no liberal foolishness -- just straight talk, straight at you, and that’s no bull!!

But I can't make it today. I'll be back next week to deprogram you.

Random Thoughts

From an email:

Age doesn't always bring wisdom. Sometimes age comes alone.

Some days you're the dog, some days the hydrant.

Being healthy is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.

Kissing: Uptown shopping for downtown business.

Hell hath no fury like the lawyer of a woman scorned.

People never grow up; they just learn how to act in public.

I didn't say it was your fault, I said I was blaming you

In a nuclear war, all men will be cremated equal.

Meet the Republi-CONs

"They fall into a few categories:" The Beltway Bandits, The Big Government Blowhards, The Show Horses, and The Permanent Campaigners. Read The New York Times, The Road Not Taken. My favorite:

"The Big Government Blowhards. The talk-radio jocks are not in the business of promoting conservative governance. They are in the business of building an audience by stroking the pleasure centers of their listeners.

They mostly give pseudo Crispin’s Day speeches to battalions of the like-minded from the safety of the conservative ghetto. To keep audience share, they need to portray politics as a cataclysmic, Manichaean struggle. A series of compromises that steadily advance conservative aims would muddy their story lines and be death to their ratings." (Link added.)

Sound like someone we know here at WEBY.

For Mom and Pop Tammy

UPDATE: As noted before, and discussed yesterday on the Dennis Prager Show, "[t]he Middle East fell behind the West because it failed to produce commercial institutions—most notably joint-stock companies—that were capable of mobilising large quantities of productive resources and enduring over time."

Sorry Tammy, but modern commerce would not exist with only Mom and Pop stores.

"Every day, Americans visit chain stores in search of bargains. A world without them might seem implausible. Even as the District of Columbia debates whether to welcome Wal-Mart, Washingtonians can buy Cheerios on special at Safeway and shop at the Liz Claiborne sale at Macy’s. From a Whirlpool dryer to Lady Gaga’s latest recording, the best price on name-brand merchandise is rarely found at independent neighborhood stores. But what would a world without chain stores look like?" Read the Washington Post, Imagining a world without chain stores.

Who You Callin a Neanderthal

UPDATE: "If your heritage is non-African, you are part Neanderthal." Read Discovery, All Non-Africans Part Neanderthal, Genetics Confirm.

DNA evidence suggests human-Neanderthal interbreeding. Read The New York Times, Our Inner Neanderthal and Kissing Cousins.

So what happened to Neanderthals? One commenter to the article stated: "Who says the Neanderthals disappeared? They all have jobs in the U.S Congress."

Who can argue with that.