The Republi-CON Obamacare Hypocrite(s)

UPDATE:  "Senate Republican leaders are seriously considering legislation that would extend health insurance tax credits through the 2016 election even if the Supreme Court invalidates them later this year."

Read Bloomberg, GOP Leaders Consider Preserving Obamacare Subsidies Until After the 2016 Election.

Remember, it was their idea to begin with, as I first noted in 2011.  Just ask Romney. 

"Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), who announced his run for president on Monday . . . the right’s champion of 'no compromise' assault on Obamacare and much of the rest of the federal government admitted that, yes, he would be going on Obamacare. . . 

The law does not require Cruz to get health insurance on the exchanges. Instead of going through the exchanges, he could have paid the tax penalty for not having insurance, 'likely cheaper than buying an insurance plan,' but at the cost of being uninsured. Or his wife could have applied to COBRA and extended her benefits from Goldman Sachs for up to 18 months, though she would have to pay all of the premium. Or he could bypass the exchanges and buy insurance directly from a private insurer. Sure, he’d have to spend time navigating the market himself, but I’m sure the Princeton graduate can figure it out. . .

Cruz is not just anyone. He wants us to vote for him for president. He has consistently demanded that his Republican colleagues never compromise. He not only thinks that Obamacare, which he says puts the government 'between you and your doctor,' is a bad policy; he thinks that it is such an existential threat to the United States and its health-care system that it was worth shutting down the government in an attempt to undermine the law. But suddenly the law and the health system it created is not scary enough for his family? If Cruz really wants to run as the candidate of righteous convictions, he’ll have to do a better job of following his own."

Read the Washington Post, Yes, Ted Cruz is a hypocrite for going on Obamacare. 

The Republi-CON "We Love Our Nazi Gestapo Military" Hypocrites

The latest Republi-con conspriacy, the U.S. Army Special Operations Command is planning "an attempt to institute martial law, possibly in collusion with Wal-Mart. . .

'It’s the same thing that happened in Nazi Germany: You get the people used to the troops on the street, the appearance of uniformed troops and the militarization of the police.'"

Read the Washington Post, Jade Helm 15, a military exercise, brings wild speculation in Texas about 'martial law'.

Luther For President in 2016

"The White House Correspondents' Dinner has become a strange event. It is, ostensibly, an evening when the president and the press can come together to share a few lighthearted laughs. But it's evolved into a recital of brutal truths — albeit one neither side ever really admits happened.

The joke of President Obama's performance on Saturday was that he wasn't joking. Everyone just had to pretend he was. Take this section, from the official White House transcript:

After the midterm elections, my advisors asked me, "Mr. President, do you have a bucket list?" And I said, "Well, I have something that rhymes with bucket list.’" (Laughter and applause.)

Take executive action on immigration? Bucket. (Laughter.) New climate regulations? Bucket. It’s the right thing to do. (Laughter and applause.)

The tip-off there is, "It's the right thing to do." That's not a joke. That's Obama's actual justification for the aggressive executive actions of his second term — "fuck it, it's the right thing to do." But the norms of politics are such that he typically has to frame his actions as routine, dull, even necessary. He has to search for precedent and downplay the consequences.

It's only on the evening of the White House Correspondents' Dinner when he can say what everyone already knows: his actions are huge, they are controversial, they push the norms of American politics, but fuck it, at a moment when American politics seems increasingly broken, Obama has decided to just go ahead and do what he thinks is right.

Then there was this line:

A few weeks ago, Dick Cheney says he thinks I’m the worst President of his lifetime. Which is interesting, because I think Dick Cheney is the worst President of my lifetime. (Laughter and applause.) It’s quite a coincidence.

It's funny, sure. But he's not kidding. It's just the thing Obama can't usually say. The humor is in the shock of him actually saying it.

But the place where Obama stopped being polite and started getting real was when he brought out Luther, his personal anger translator. This was, itself, a way of giving up the game. The Luther joke comes from the Comedy Central sketch show Key and Peele, and the point of it is that Obama, as the first black president, is not allowed to express his anger, as America is terrified of angry black men. And so he's got Luther — the angry black man who can say what he can't. . .

There are no jokes there. There's just Obama saying what he has to say and Luther saying what Obama actually believes.

And what Obama believes is that the press is often sensational, trivial, and fearmongering. He thinks they hype negative stories for weeks on end and then refuse to admit their mistake when the horror fizzles. He thinks he gets the blame for catastrophes but little credit for solutions. He thinks the media has a deep bias toward negative stories (which, of course, we do).

But if Obama is annoyed at the press, he is appalled at Republicans who deny climate change — and are trying to block him from taking action to stop climate change. Obama believes global warming a generational threat, and so when he sees James Inhofe, the chair of the Senate's Committee on Environment and Public Works, throwing snowballs on the chamber's floor, well, his thoughts on that would likely be seen as unpresidential if he gave them voice."

Read Vox, The joke was that Obama wasn’t joking. 

Thank God We Saved the Banksters, But Why?, Cont.

UPDATE:  Get a job at the U.S. Treasury, use the treasury to bailout the Banksters, and then retire from government and the Banksters hire you for an obscene salary. 

And they call it 'public service'.

Read the Washington Post, Ben Bernanke scores another Wall Street payday, which notes that this is "yet another example of the revolving door between Wall Street and Washington. Just to name a few, former Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has joined the private equity firm Warburg Pincus, former Fed governor Jeremy Stein has enlisted with the hedge fund BlueMountain Capital Management, and former Office of Management and Budget chief Peter Orszag has jumped on board with Citigroup." 

"The Federal Reserve lent billions to rescue banks during the financial crisis, but it has done little to help American taxpayers." Read The New York Times, The Rescue That Missed Main Street.

The 'low-down, no-good godawful' bailout worked (for the banksters).

The Republi-CON "Guns Make You Safer" Myth

UPDATE:  Read also the Los Angeles Times, We all pay: The high costs of gun violence, which notes, "[g]un violence's cost: About $229 billion a year".

"After the Sandy Hook tragedy, reporters often called me to ask for information on firearms. They wanted to know whether strong gun laws reduced homicide rates (I said they did); and, conversely, whether permissive gun laws lowered crime rates overall (I said they did not). . .

[A] large majority of gun researchers have arrived at the same conclusion about firearms . . .

[A] gun in the home increases the risk that a woman living in the home will be a victim of homicide (72% agree, 11% disagree) and that a gun in the home makes it a more dangerous place to be (64%) rather than a safer place (5%). There is consensus that guns are not used in self-defense far more often than they are used in crime (73% vs. 8%) and that the change to more permissive gun carrying laws has not reduced crime rates (62% vs. 9%). Finally, there is consensus that strong gun laws reduce homicide (71% vs. 12%)."

Read the Los Angeles Times, There's scientific consensus on guns -- and the NRA won't like it.

Read also, How Dare He Try To Prevent Another Massacre of Little Children

A Final Word On Torture?

UPDATE: V: A "new report issued this morning by Amnesty International charges that the Obama administration has effectively granted impunity to the practitioners of torture, and that its reluctance to address the issue 'not only leaves the USA in serious violation of its international legal obligations, it increases the risk that history will repeat itself when a different president again deems the circumstances warrant resort to torture, enforced disappearance, abductions or other human rights violations.' . .

At this point, it certainly doesn’t seem inconceivable that in response to a major national security threat, the U.S. could once again decide it needs to 'torture some folks.'"

Read Slate, Could America Torture Again?

UPDATE IV:  "Dick Cheney gave an interview that illustrated why it was so imprudent to abandon the taboo against torture and indulge in implausible hypotheticals. 13 years ago, Americans were arguing over whether it should be legal to torture a known terrorist if we knew it could stop a mass casualty attack on a major city. Now a former vice-president is defending the torture of innocent people."

Read The Atlantic, Dick Cheney Defends the Torture of Innocents.  

UPDATE III:  "The Senate's report on torture describes the Central Intelligence Agency as not just nauseatingly brutal, but also dishonest and ineffective. The report finds that the agency lied to the Bush administration, Congress and the public to hide the fact that an incompetently managed program of torture was failing to produce useful intelligence."

Read the Washington Post, Rectal feeding is exactly what it sounds like.  

UPDATE II: Reading "the stomach-churning findings of the 500-page executive summary [of the the Senate intelligence committee’s report on torture], the only part cleared for declassification, reinforces its importance. No one can review this account without feeling horror and shame, and without feeling anger at the degree to which public officials and the public itself were misled about what was being done in the name of national security.

Among the conclusions: So-called enhanced interrogation was 'not an effective means of obtaining accurate information.' Instead, “multiple CIA detainees fabricated information, resulting in faulty intelligence.”

Meanwhile, the interrogations 'were brutal and far worse than the CIA represented to policymakers and others.' The techniques included, in addition to waterboardings that amounted to near-drownings, detainees being kept awake for up to 180 hours, detainees subjected to 'rectal rehydration' and detainees kept shackled in total darkness in dungeon-like conditions.

Even as the CIA mistreated detainees, it submitted false claims about the effectiveness of the interrogation techniques and misled the Justice Department and others about what it was doing. Its claims of counterterrorism successes were 'wrong in fundamental respects,' at best corroborating information already available or acquired before the application of enhanced interrogation."

Read the Washington Post, Exposing the CIA’s stain on America.  

UPDATE: One shameful example of our "endless borderless war against an emotional state," and its constitutional travesty, the military tribunals "designed by President Bush, implemented by President Obama and inspired by President Kafka". 

Read Slate, The Guantánamo Memoirs of Mohamedou Ould Slahi, How the United States kept him silent for 12 years.

And read these previous posts:

Does the Star-Spangled Banner Wave Over the Land of the Torturers?

WWJT (Who Would Jesus Torture) and

Bush, the Hypocrite-in-Chief

Then read this article from the Washington Post, Treatment of Terror Suspects a 'Collective Failure.'

47 Traitorous Republi-CONs Just Gave Iran the Nuclear Bomb

UPDATE VI:  Read Slate, Why Is the U.S. Backing a War That’s Helping al-Qaida.

What a mess!

UPDATE V:  "If you study Republican behavior over the past quarter-century, you’ll find that the image of conservative lawmakers standing resolutely for American strength and unity is a myth. Republicans support wars launched by Republican presidents. When Democratic presidents undertake wars or negotiations, Republicans generally attempt to sabotage them. In fact, Republicans often side with our enemies. . .

If a political party wanted to tear America apart, weaken its position in the world, reduce our capacity to influence events, and encourage our adversaries, it would look exactly like what the Republican Party has done under Democratic presidents. "

Read Slate,  Foreign Saboteurs.

UPDATE IV:  "More sanctions are unlikely to produce a better nuclear agreement."

Read The Atlantic, What's the Alternative to Obama's Iran Deal.  

UPDATE III:  "Should we be arming ISIS? Or let me ask that differently: Why are we, for the third time since 9/11, fighting a war on behalf of Iran?

In 2002, we destroyed Iran’s main Sunni foe in Afghanistan (the Taliban regime). In 2003, we destroyed Iran’s main Sunni foe in the Arab world (Saddam Hussein).  But because we failed to erect a self-sustaining pluralistic order, which could have been a durable counterbalance to Iran, we created a vacuum in both Iraq and the wider Sunni Arab world. That is why Tehran’s proxies now indirectly dominate four Arab capitals: Beirut, Damascus, Sana and Baghdad."

Read The New York Times, Go Ahead, Ruin My Day.

Read also, Was It Worth It?

UPDATE II:  Of course, there is always war, which the chickenhawks and warmongers want.

Beware though, "[i]f the United States attempts to destroy Iran’s nuclear capacity by air, the mission would not be like Israel’s 1981 single-day strike on Iraq’s Osirak reactor. A U.S. attack would have to target multiple complexes, and planners would need to prepare the battlefield by destroying air defense radars, interceptors and much of Iran’s air force. Such an operation could require hundreds of sorties over several days.

Iran would probably respond by threatening shipping in the Strait of Hormuz, potentially touching off a global oil crisis. The U.S. Navy would be forced to patrol the Persian Gulf and possibly undertake a lengthy operation to destroy Iran’s navy and its arsenal of anti-ship cruise missiles.

Iran would be unlikely to capitulate even with its air force and navy out of commission. It would probably turn to terrorism to strike at U.S. targets around the globe. If such attacks were successful, they would generate enormous public pressure to escalate the conflict, perhaps including demands for regime change in Tehran. That, in turn, could mean yet another U.S. ground war in the Middle East, this time against a nation of more than 80 million. As we learned in Iraq and Afghanistan, the costs of such a conflict could be measured in decades, tens of thousands of U.S. casualties and trillions of dollars. Such escalation is not a certainty, but it is a real possibility."

Read the Washington Post, Don’t sugarcoat the costs of war with Iran.

UPDATE:  What the Senator Cotton did defied "the chain of command in what could be construed as an illegal act [see the Logan Act] . . . [It was a gross breach of discipline, and especially as a veteran of the Army, [Cotton] should know better. . . I have no issue with Senator Cotton, or others, voicing their opinion in opposition to any deal to halt Iran’s nuclear progress. Speaking out on these issues is clearly part of his job. But to directly engage a foreign entity, in this way, undermining the strategy and work of our diplomats and our Commander in Chief, strains the very discipline and structure that our foreign relations depend on, to succeed. . . The breach of discipline is extremely dangerous, because undermining our diplomatic efforts, at this moment, brings us another step closer to a very costly and perilous war with Iran."

So say retired Army Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton, "now a senior advisor with National Security Network, a Washington, DC-based foreign policy think tank."

Read the Washington Post, Tom Cotton picked apart by Army general over ‘mutinous’ Iran letter.

Republ-cons sent a letter of support to their brother Iranian hardliners "in the middle of a high-stakes negotiation, with all the gravity and deliberation of a blog posting. In timing, tone and substance, it raises questions about the Republican majority’s capacity to govern." 

It weakened the U.S. and will undermine sanctions.

Read the Washington Post, The true scandal of the GOP senators’ letter to Iran. 

Read also Slate, An Open Letter to 47 Republican Senators of the United States of America from Iran’s Hard-Liners, stating they "look forward to working with [the Republ-cons] in the future on other matters of common interest, such as prayer, capital punishment, and troops in Iraq."

The Republi-CON "Obama Hates America" Myth

UPDATE:  "Conservatives will harrumph to the contrary, but relative to his peers, Obama has had a remarkably clean, scandal-free presidency."

Read Slate, Obama’s Gift to Hillary Clinton.  

"There is simply no question that, in his own telling, Barack Obama believes that the United States is an exceptional, great, splendiferous nation—the world's most powerful force for good. And he will be happy to explain to you, at great and occasionally repetitive length, why he holds that belief, as the video above indicates. (Among his America-themed speeches, some of which we took clips from: Obama's 2004 Democratic National Convention keynote in Boston, his March 2008 speech on race relations in Philadelphia, his 2008 nomination-acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, his election night remarks at Chicago's Grant Park in 2008, his inaugural address in 2009, his June 2009 speech in Cairo, his 2012 State of the Union address, his 2012 Democratic National Convention speech in Charlotte, his 2012 election-night speech in Washington D.C., his 2013 inaugural, his September 2013 address to the United Nations, his December 2013 speech on economic mobility in D.C., his 2014 State of the Union, his May 2014 commencement address at West Point, and his post-election press conference in November 2014; click links for transcripts.*)

. . . [N]no one could seriously read or watch Obama's remarks and come away with the overall impression that he is anything but relentlessly positive about the United States."

Read Slate, Watch Barack Obama Talk About How America Is the Greatest Country on Earth in 13 Different Speeches, or watch

The 2016 Republi-CON Primaries -- Time to Pledge Allegiance to Charlatans and Cranks

UPDATE II:  "The 2016 Republican candidates can already be sorted into roles that tell us a lot about their chances of winning the nomination."

Read The New York Times, The G.O.P Presidential Field Looks Chaotic. Its Not., which reviews the 'invisible primary leaders, mainstream alternatives, and factional favorites.'

UPDATE:  The Republi-con's first candidate is "a guy with a big mouth and no results . . . [h]e oversimplifies, he exaggerates ... he doesn't provide leadership and he has no real experience," and that according to his party comrade.

Let the circus begin!

Read CNN, GOP Rep. Peter King dismisses Ted Cruz as 'carnival barker'.  

And who will be next, possibly a deadbeat "publicity-hound billionaire and reality TV host"?  We can only hope.

"[W]hat does it say about the current state of the G.O.P. that discussion of economic policy is now monopolized by people who have been wrong about everything, have learned nothing from the experience, and can’t even get their numbers straight?

The answer, I’d suggest, runs deeper than economic doctrine. Across the board, the modern American right seems to have abandoned the idea that there is an objective reality out there, even if it’s not what your prejudices say should be happening. What are you going to believe, right-wing doctrine or your own lying eyes? These days, the doctrine wins.

Look at another issue, health reform. Before the Affordable Care Act went into effect, conservatives predicted disaster: health costs would soar, the deficit would explode, more people would lose insurance than gain it. They were wrong on all counts. But, in their rhetoric, even in the alleged facts (none of them true) people like Mr. Moore put in their articles, they simply ignore this reality. Reading them, you’d think that the dismal failure they wrongly predicted had actually happened.

Then there’s foreign policy. This week Jeb Bush tried to demonstrate his chops in that area, unveiling his team of expert advisers — who are, sure enough, the very people who insisted that the Iraqis would welcome us as liberators.

And don’t get me started on climate change.

Along with this denial of reality comes an absence of personal accountability. If anything, alleged experts seem to get points by showing that they’re willing to keep saying the same things no matter how embarrassingly wrong they’ve been in the past.

But let’s go back to those economic charlatans and cranks: Clearly, failure has only made them stronger, and now they are political kingmakers. Be very, very afraid."

Read The New York Times, Cranking Up for 2016.

As noted before, Republi-cons never let reality spoil a good delusion.

How Many Days Since Birther Fool's Day?

UPDATE IV:  Happy Second Birther Fool's Day! 

It has been more than a year since the first Birther Fool's Day, and still no  'universe-shattering' revelation(s).

UPDATE III:  Now we'll see if the Birthers were motivated by principle or race.

Read the Washington Post, Everything you need to know about the Ted Cruz ‘birther’ movement.

UPDATE II:  Two weeks until Birther Fool's Day, and still no  'universe-shattering' revelation(s).

Can you say sucker!!

UPDATE:  It has been almost a year since Sheriff Joe’s Scooby Doo Gang and Pastor Truthiness (aka Huckster and Con Man) started the con, promising 'universe-shattering' revelation(s) soon.

On Fact-Free Friday, maybe the pastor will tells us when the 'universe-shattering' revelation(s) will be made.

Bwahahahaha!!!!

Birther Fool's Day was the first day after the month that the universe was to be 'shattered', as promised by the "Sheriff Joe’s Scooby Doo gang" to 'Gallups' gullibles' on 'fellatio Friday' in mid-December 2013 (the 'universe-shattering' twist was being promoted elsewhere in late November).

It is no coincidence that Birther Fool's Day was April 1st.

And how much time has past since the promised 'universe-shattering' revelations:


That sound you hear is the growing laughter at the Birther delusions.

The Republi-CON "Religious Freedom and Heritage" Myth

Slavery was "God’s will, desegregation was Satan’s work, and the federal government was the Antichrist [and the Confederate flag as a historic symbol] . . .

[So said] a hard-working, Christian man that loves God and wants to further (God’s) work throughout the world . . .

[Who could] doubt [his and other's] sincerity. Why wouldn’t they believe racism was God’s will? We white Southerners heard that message on weekends from the pulpit, on school days from our segregated schools, and every day from our governments. When Richard and Mildred Loving left Virginia to be married, a state trial judge convicted them of violating the Racial Integrity Act. That judge wrote that 'Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents … The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.'

That’s a good background against which to measure the uproar about the Indiana Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which was signed into law by Governor Mike Pence last week. I don’t question the religious sincerity of anyone involved in drafting and passing this law. But sincere and faithful people, when they feel the imprimatur of both the law and the Lord, can do very ugly things."

Read The Atlantic, What Makes Indiana's Religious-Freedom Law Different?

One man's so-called religion is another man's discrimination.

"The F--k Barrel": America's Modern Fuedalism

Learn how "excessive policing and municipal fines can ruin" the poor.

Watch Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Municipal Violations (HBO):

Find the #1 Song on the Day You Were Born

Enter your birthdate (or any date) and find the #1 song for that date here!

The results will include a link to the #1 song nine months earlier, if you know what I mean ;-) or care to know.

Rick Perry, R-Murderer and Believer of Junk Science

UPDATE VI:  "What happens in Texas when you get a man executed on the basis of bad testimony?"

Read Slate, Justice Deferred.


Perry, the former prosecutor John H. Jackson, and others should be prosecuted for conspiracy to commit murder.

UPDATE V:  "In a major turn in one of the country’s most-noted death penalty cases, the State Bar of Texas has filed a formal accusation of misconduct against the county prosecutor who convicted Cameron Todd Willingham, a Texas man executed in 2004 for the arson murder of his three young daughters.

Following a preliminary inquiry that began last summer, the bar this month filed a disciplinary petition in Navarro County District Court accusing the former prosecutor, John H. Jackson, of obstruction of justice, making false statements and concealing evidence favorable to Willingham’s defense.

'Before, during, and after the 1992 trial, [Jackson] knew of the existence of evidence that tended to negate the guilt of Willingham and failed to disclose that evidence to defense counsel,' the bar investigators charged."

Read the Washington Post, Prosecutor accused of misconduct in disputed Texas execution case.

UPDATE IV:  "More than a decade after Cameron Todd Willingham was executed for the arson murder of his three young daughters, new evidence has emerged that indicates that a key prosecution witness testified in return for a secret promise to have his own criminal sentence reduced. . .

In two days of interviews recently with the Marshall Project, [the witness, Johnny E] Webb gave the most detailed account to date of how he came to testify against Willingham. He said that [the prosecutor, John H.] Jackson threatened him with a life sentence in the robbery case — a possibility under Texas law because Webb had several prior convictions — unless he testified. . .

During Willingham’s three-day trial in August 1992, Jackson pointedly asked Webb on the witness stand whether he had been promised a lighter sentence or some other benefit for his cooperation. Webb told the judge and jury that he had not."

Read the Washington Post, Letter from witness casts further doubt on 2004 Texas execution. 

UPDATE III: For those Republi-cons who are reading challenged, a reminder that you can watch the PBS Frontline documentary on the Willingham case.


UPDATE II: Read the report of the Arson Review Committee, A Peer Review Panel Commissioned by the Innocence Project regarding Willingham’s case, and another case of alleged arson. One executed, but one not, based on junk science.


UPDATE: "There is little dispute that the arson evidence in Willingham’s case, based on myths that had permeated fire investigations for years, was invalid. Every independent expert, including the top experts in the country, has concluded that there was no evidence of arson." Read SSRN, The Execution of Cameron Todd Willingham: Junk Science, an Innocent Man, and the Politics of Death.

"Faith and reason are not mutually exclusive, but Perry makes you think they are." Read the Washington Post, Rick Perry, the Republicans’ Messiah?

And Perry's no messiah, he rushed to have the man executed for political reasons, his reelection.

Read a previous post, Executing an Innocent Man and Trying to Hide It.

More Pandering to Birther Buffoonery

UPDATE III:  He's back for 2016.

Read Slate, Donald Trump Will Save America From Boring Grownup GOP Primary, which notes that Republi-cons hoped "to avoid having such "eccentric" candidates this time around might be cringing at Trump's continued harping on President Obama's birth certificate, but there's not too much they can do to keep him under wraps."

UPDATE II:  Is your local congressman a birther?

It seems our congressman can't decide.  Read the Pensacola News Journal, Rep. Jeff Miller suspends Twitter account over 'birther poll'. 

UPDATE:  Donald Trump has helped Obamney win over the birthers, now all he needs is America's '9/11 truthers, alien abductees, doomsday preppers, Sasquatch hunters, and Sasquatches or Sasqui.'

Watch the Colbert Report, Donald Trump's Creative Truth & Mitt Romney's Poll Numbers:

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

Of course, some doubters think the Trump is bloviating ignoramus.  

Based upon the Pastor's self professed 10-year law enforcement background and experience, I'm waiting for the arrests that he claims are imminent.

In the meantime, the birthers are proving themselves buffoons again, with their racist lies.

Did you know that in 1990, "an obscure publication known as the New York Times had written about his election as head of the Harvard Law Review, and noted, 'His late father, Barack Obama, was a finance minister in Kenya and his mother, Ann Dunham, is an American anthropologist now doing fieldwork in Indonesia. Mr. Obama was born in Hawaii.'"  (From the Washington Post, The birthers are back! The birthers are back!)

Yet in Arizona, the Arizona secretary of state, Ken Bennett and former Republican president of the Arizona Senate, who is planning to run for governor in two years, is 'pandering to crackpots — and humiliating himself in the bargain.' 

"Never mind that Hawaii has confirmed publicly and repeatedly, since before the 2008 presidential election, that Mr. Obama was born there; that the Hawaii Department of Health has released both the short and long forms of the president’s birth certificate; and that all this information, along with clear-as-a-bell explanations, is available to the public online. [To birther buffoons] none of that is sufficient proof for the Show Me Your Papers State. . .

Everyone knows that birthers — the few that remain against the overwhelming facts of documentary evidence — are half-baked clowns who live for their pet conspiracy theory. . .

Fine. Let the buffoonery play through its final act. We’re confident that, in the end, Mr. Bennett will ensure that Arizona’s ballot includes the name of the president of the United States, all the while insisting, disingenuously, that his actions were merely an instance of due diligence.

But by threatening to exclude Mr. Obama from the ballot, Mr. Bennett transformed what should have been a farcical sideshow of the 2012 election into an actual menace to democracy. He legitimized the lunatic leanings of the United States’, and his party’s, most extreme elements. He put it in the minds of radicals everywhere that elected officials, for the shabbiest reasons (or none at all), can float the idea of bending ballot rules and suffer no adverse consequence.

In the process, he shamed Arizona on the 100th anniversary of its statehood, giving it the appearance of a banana republic that’s come unhinged under the influence of partisan fever."  (From the Washington Post, In Arizona, more birther buffoonery.)

And while one would think that "[w]henever the “birther” movement rears its head, sensible people argue that the press should just ignore it, since it’s so far out on the lunacy spectrum. . .

Mr. Bennett is not just your ordinary, garden-variety birther. He is co-chairman of the Mitt Romney campaign in Arizona. "  (From The New York Times, The Romney Campaign Joins the Birther Brigade.)

Alas, after embarrassing Arizona once again (you may remember that a "bill requiring presidential candidates to provide proof of citizenship in Arizona was vetoed last year by" the Republican governor), Bennett "received the 'verification in-lieu of certified copy' from officials within the Hawaii Department of Health that we requested in March . They have officially confirmed that the information in the copy of the Certificate of Live Birth for the President matches the original record in their files.'"  (From the Washington Post, Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett satisfied Obama was born in United States.)

I can't wait to hear how our Resident Pastor-to-the-Dictators (AKA Pastor Truthiness (formerly known as Pastor Poppins)), who plagiarize lies to salvage his malicious fantasy campaign to brand Obama as an outsider, as un-American, as non-American, will explain it all to his sycophants on Friday.

For more on the birthers racists fantasies, see these prior posts:

This Post is For All You Birthers Out There

Republi-Cons Have No Shame, Judge Edition

The Spin of Pastor 2+2 Does Not = 4, AKA Pastor Dred Scott or Pastor Truthiness (Formerly Known as Pastor Poppins)

Don't Be Duped by the Birthers

The Republi-CON 'January 2014 Disproves Global Warming' Myth

UPDATE III:  So, because it is cold outside, global warming is a hoax.

"As Stephen Colbert wrote, brilliantly mocking this kind of ridiculosity, "Global warming isn't real because I was cold today! Also great news: World hunger is over because I just ate.'

Read Slate, Ted Cruz Goes Full Orwell.

UPDATE II:  Read USA Today, Earth had warmest winter on record.

Read also, So You Don't Believe in Global Warming, Then Explain What Happens to 35 Gigatons of CO2 Each Year.  

UPDATE:  "The climate numbers are in from January and, on a global perspective, it actually wasn’t that cold at all.

In fact, for the 347th month in a row, planet Earth was downright toasty.

Yep, the last month in which Earth’s average temperature was below the 20th-century average was during the Reagan administration. February 1985, to be exact: 'I Want to Know What Love Is' by Foreigner was the No. 1 song in the country. Sally Field had just been nominated for best actress for Places in the Heart. The author of this piece celebrated his fourth birthday party. That’s a long time for a planet to run a fever.

Since that moment 29 years ago, there’s been an unbroken stretch of planetary warmth. Almost as if the entire globe was warming. Hey, maybe we can call it 'global warming'".

Read Slate, Don't Let the Snow Fool You. January Wasn't Cold at All.  

In the continental U.S, the "average temperature of the U.S. was just 0.07°F below the 1981-2010 average according to NCDC. . .

[In fact Alaska] had its 3rd-warmest January, with temperatures 14.8°F above average. During a late January warm spell, the daily high reached 62°F in Port Alsworth, tying the highest January temperature recorded in the state."

Read Climate Central, Never-Ending Winter? Nah, January in U.S. Was Average.  

Happy π Day!

Today "is March 14, or, as it’s written in the U.S., 3/14. That makes it Pi Day, because the mathematical constant π is roughly equal to 3.14. Nerds celebrate this date every year, because, well, we’re nerds. Duh.

But this year’s π Day is special: It’s the year 2015, so the date is 3/14/15, giving us two more decimal places of the famous constant. In fact, if you celebrate it at 9:26:53 today, you get π to nine decimals: 3.141592653. Since the next digit is a 5, you can even round up and celebrate π Day for an extra second. Woohoo!"

Read Slate, 8 Things About Pi for Pi Day. 

Read also Slate, A Very Special Pi Day. 

Happy Friday the 13th!

"This year will see three Friday the 13ths, the most possible in a calendar year. Recently, the holiday has been mostly used for themed bar nights and marathons of a certain movie series. But what led people to associate this day and date with unfortunate fates in the first place?

In the video [below], some common explanations."

Watch Slate, What’s So Bad About Friday the 13th?:



FYI, paraskevidekatriaphobia is fear of Friday the 13th

The Repbli-CON Plan to Destroy the Economy

UPDATE IV:  Read Bloomberg View, Best State for Business? Yes, California.

Read also Slate, The States Where Second (and Third, and Fourth) Marriages Are Most Common. 

UPDATE III: More proof that God hates the South.

Read The Huffington Post, These 9 Maps Should Absolutely Outrage Southerners. 

UPDATE II:  "In perhaps the least shocking economic data point to be released this month, American consumers were sharply less confident about the economy in early October than they were in September. Turns out, shutting down the government for 16 days while using the threat of a government debt default to battle over the nation's budget isn't great for peoples' psyche."

Read the Washington Post, Consumer confidence collapsed this month. Thanks, Congress!

UPDATE:  Want proof that Republi-cons are bad for the economy?

"On average, the economy in the districts those Republicans represent is significantly worse than it is in the nation at large.

The median income in those districts last year was 7 percent lower than the national median, according to the Census Bureau. The unemployment rate averaged 10 percent. That was almost two percentage points higher than the national rate, and two percentage points higher than the overall rate in the states that contain each district."

Read the Washington Post, At the source of the shutdown, the economy falters — and anger at Barack Obama runs high.

Of course, it could be that God just hates the South (new link).

As suggested by former Bush administration speechwriter Marc Thiessen, who urged Republi-cons (at the Washington Post, The GOP flunks Hostage Taking 101) "to release the government hostage and instead jack up its demand for the debt ceiling":

"'[O]ne of the first things they teach you in Hostage Taking 101 is that you have to choose a hostage the other side cares about saving' . . a debt-ceiling breach would potentially destroy millions of jobs, making it the perfect threat."

Read New York Magazine, Why the Shutdown Is Leading to Debt Default; or, What Happens When You Take Hostages Without a Plan.

The article states that "Boehner resembles William H. Macy’s character in Fargo, who concocts a simple plan to have his wife kidnapped and skim the proceeds, failing to think a step forward about what happens once she’s actually seized by violent criminals. He doesn’t intend for her to be harmed, but also has no ability to control the plan once he’s set it in motion. In the end, Boehner's Speakership is likely to end up in the wood chipper, anyway."

For a preview, watch the wood chipper scene:

The Republi-CONs Ugly Political Cynicism

"Questioning this affirmation involves a serious charge — an accusation of the worst sort of cynicism. And it is simply not the role of a Christian layman to publicly dispute the self-identification of other Christians, especially in a political context. It is a practice that can lead down ugly alleys of sectarianism."

Read the Washington Post, Scott Walker and judging the faith of another.

Republi-cons might also read the Constitution they claim to so dearly love.