• CLIMATE CHANGE AND GOP STUPIDITY

    Jon Stewart Rips Right-Wingers A New One
  • RIGHT-WINGERS BLAMING THE VICTIMS

    When Unarmed Blacks Are Killed By Cops
  • STILL NO SCANDAL

    No Wrongdoing With Benghazi
  • EBOLA AND ISIS

    Right-Wingers Fuel Racism And Paranoia

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Nothing In

Thomas Lindaman writes:

Leftists have always attempted to paint conservatives of any stripe as mentally deficient. Over the past two weeks, though, they've been positively orgasmic over two studies that "prove" their positions correct.

Orgasmic?  LOL Similar studies have been around for ages and they simply keep confirming what is already blatantly obvious.

The first is a study by WorldPublicOpinion.org that shows (according to them) Fox News viewers are the most misinformed about matters ranging from the state of the economy to who supported TARP. Since its appearance in the media, I, among many, have taken the time to review the study. To put it mildly, the study's conclusions make global warming look like the settled science Al Gore claims it to be. Without going into too much technical detail, the study's major flaw attempted to create a correlation between actual knowledge and whether that actual knowledge agreed with experts those conducting the study deemed to be credible. (Never mind the fact the "experts" chosen may not have been credible on the subject matter themselves, but that's speculation since the researchers never bothered to ask that question.)

When you try to create a link between something concrete and something that is subject to opinion, the argument in favor of the link had better be solid. In this case, it wasn't, judging from the reseachers' own report where they attempt to define what misinformation is. If they were so confident in their conclusions, they wouldn't have needed the disclaimer they added.

Did you even read the study?  The study was not asking people if they thought global warming was real.  They were asking people if they thought scientists agreed on whether it was real.

And vast overwhelming majority of scientists do agree that climate change is real.  There is a consensus.  There is no squabbling among them about it.

But Fox News viewers, being tards, think there isn't a consensus among scientists.  That is absolutely not true.  That is a fact even if you don't believe manmade climate change is real.  That clearly shows that Fox News viewers are misinformed.  Considering Fox News ordered their staff to cast doubt, that's no shock, is it?

The second study was reported in the Telegraph, and it reflects conservatives (at least in England) have a larger portion of the brain that controls fear than liberals do. After a small bit of research, I found a fatal flaw in the study: the sample size was too small. When a study is done, the sample size must be statistically valid, meaning it's large enough to weed out any anomalies that would presumably occur. The sample size for this particular study: 93 people. Out of a country as big as England (and a city as large as London, for that matter), fewer than 100 people were used to support the conclusions in the study.

So, in addition to being a global warming expert, and a crowd estimator expert, you're now a brain research expert?

There's an underlying question that should be asked at this point: Why now? The Left have claimed science as their exclusive intellectual stronghold for decades and they've tried to use it in the past to establish themselves as intelligent. To have two studies come out in two weeks that affirm what Leftists already believe is no mere coincidence, in my opinion. I feel it's a reaction to the recent midterm elections where Republicans made great strides to advance a more conservative vision for the country. Had Democrats won, I doubt either one of these studies would have seen the light of day, save for Leftist blogs. Given the current situation, however, the studies in question are being touted as hard fact.

The problem is when you push flawed science as hard fact, it's only a matter of time before someone finds the flaws and exposes them. Take, for example, the Climategate emails. Even though the Left had the better part of two decades of nodding agreement because of the scientific community, this past year has shown the depths to which the Left will sink to support and maintain their politically-driven "science."

Still waiting for Lindaman to show what exactly the emails showed that proves some vast cover-up. 

I guess Lindaman didn't get the memo: All the inquiries cleared them, and showed they did not tamper with data or exaggerate the threat of global warming.  There was no "Climategate", just as I was saying all along. 

But Lindaman is hoping people won't know or remember that.

Kind of like Fox News.  Not that other media outlets aren't also guilty of spreading right-wing ignorance.

But you're still among the most uninformed.



There's an old computer programming idea that comes to mind here: GIGO. For the uninitiated, it means "Garbage In, Garbage Out." With both of these laughable studies, GIGO appears to be playing out nicely.


With right-wingers and Fox News, it's just "Garbage Out".  You won't even allow information in your clouded noggins.  Your whole philosophy is based on ignorance.

Monday, December 27, 2010

It's Allliiiive!

Thomas Lindaman writes:

Back in the heady days of CommonConservative.com, we would run annual awards celebrating the highlights and lowlights of the year.
CommonConservative.com had "heady days"?

Since CommonConservative.com is no more,

You're the anti-Midas!
Just kidding.  You're a guy who slices into liberal illogic with your "quick wit and logical mind".  At least that's what your blurb always said on CommonConservative.com, a blurb totally not written by Lindaman himself.  After all, it's perfectly logical to ignore facts, and parroting other pundits while tacking ":-)" at the end is the ultimate in rapier-like wit.

I wanted to continue the tradition, mainly because it's so much fun to put them together.

As always, you are welcome to comment or add awards of your own. If they're good enough, they may become part of next year's annual awards. So without further ado...

Democrat to Watch: Harry Reid. After retaining his Senate seat and his party retaining control of the Senate, Reid is in a unique position: the only name-brand Democrat with any kind of political clout. President Obama hasn’t used the bully pulpit to bully anyone stronger than BP, and Nancy Pelosi has been relegated to a leadership position with the minority party in the House. It may not help him overcome gridlock, but watching Reid come away from the 2010 elections in the position he’s in now will be great fun indeed.

Democrat to Forget: Nancy Pelosi. From the first woman to be Speaker of the House to being the first woman to be Speaker of the House who oversaw the wholesale crushing of her party in a midterm election. Nancy, here’s a clue for you. Maybe the reason you’ll no longer be Speaker of the House come January is because you suck as a leader.
"Crushing"?  Really?  The Democrats kept control of the Senate!  Bush, Clinton, and Reagan couldn't do that. 

Oh, noes!  We lost Blue Dogs that shouldn't have been elected in their Conservative areas to begin with!  The Blue Dogs as a caucus have been largely worthless.  Take the health care bill. Polls show that a majority of the public doesn't like the health care reform bill. However, when you decouple the actual parts of the bill from the bill itself, an overwhelming majority supports those parts. Clearly, the public has internalized the GOP line about socialism and government-run health care. The obvious strategy is a coordinated effort to advertise the parts of the bill that the public likes and then leverage that into support for the bill. Instead, we had idiot Ben Nelson running around talking about death panels and terrified Democrats clutching their mikes at town hall meetings while some slavering moron screams at them to keep the government out of our medicare!

We saw the same thing with financial reform, student loan reform, climate change legislation, etc. If it was just one issue, it wouldn't be a big deal. But literally every major policy initiative has run afoul of the Blue Dogs. It's almost instinctive that if the President supports something, some Blue Dog is going to pop up and oppose it.

Now, on Pelosi: Pelosi has been the most successful speaker since the 1960s. She's able to accomplish the impossible and consistently whip the votes to pass legislation.

So what gives?  I am genuinely curious to hear a conservative (a smart, reasonable one, not one of you poop-flingers) explain specifically why they hate Pelosi. I mean, it's entirely possible that I missed something and I'd like to know what it is about her that draws so much ire aside from being effective and for the most part liberal. Of course, people despised Ted Kennedy for precisely these reasons - he was a liberal who generally managed to get shit done.

Conservatives hate her because she's a strong, intelligent liberal woman who makes things happen.  Similar to why they hate Obama because he makes them look stupid.

I suppose that Conservatives would prefer to have Dem opposition that is little more than a sock puppet with whom to trade barbs at a podium, and not someone who actually moves and shakes things.

Republican to Watch: Sarah Palin. Last year I picked her as the Republican to Forget, but this past year has made me think she has something else on her plate that would make a 2012 run the last thing on her mind. In the 2010 elections, she had a pretty good track record in picking the winners (around 70-75% if memory serves), and she was instrumental in helping several candidates win. And there are rumors (not circulated by her, by the way) she’s running for President in 2012. Keep an eye on Palin over this upcoming year.
One better keep an eye on Palin, that's for sure. 



Republican to Forget: Christine O’Donnell. Seriously, hang it up. You may not be a witch, but you sure as heck aren’t a serious candidate for public office.
Palin's no better, so why favor her over O'Donnell?

Independents to Watch: The TEA Party movement. After a year where they were mocked, maligned, and slandered by the Left, the TEA Party movement got the last laugh by fielding winning candidates for public office. Now, comes the hard part: governing by the TEA Party standards. If the TEA Party has any legs at all, this upcoming year will prove it.
Anyone who thinks that a "movement" that has network support is still "grassroots" needs to have their damn head examined. Which pretty much explains a great deal of the folks who joined this Astroturf. Seriously. You cannot call yourself "grassroots" when you have a network shilling for you. You cannot call yourself "grassroots" when you have AEI Fellows shilling for you--or rather, your leaders disguise their own shilling for the AEI as their own positions.

Dissatisfaction in the ranks as folks realize that they've been hoodwinked? Yeah, that's going to be ugly if the hicks realize how badly you rooked them. Which is sort of the point. The Teabaggers is the only way for Neocons to preserve anything like control or power. By harnessing dissatisfaction with the very policies that they advocated, they ride the tiger and point it anywhere that isn't on themselves. Supporting rebranded Neocon ideas and policies ISN'T grassroots. And the record for failure on those policies doesn't make them any more appealing, save if you wrap them up a bit in flag and Jesus, but no matter how you rebrand them, they remain the same policies that have failed.

Neoconservatism can try to hide its agenda within these folks, but it remains the radicalized idiocy that is steeped in ideology over reason. It remains the same policies that have led us to this recession and two wars, while coupling with another radicalized agenda with the Religious Right. It doesn't add up to rationale debate or reasonable policy that is far reaching and forward looking. Rebranding radical ideas as "Conservatism" may work for a while, but it when the risks that you've taken with the economy and domestic policy keep coming home from such a radical position, then you have to examine if these policies have any real basis.

And we keep seeing these radical policies unraveling. Because they are NOT prudent, thoughtful, or particularly Conservative positions. The one thing that these radicals have done is successfully repackaged what are terribly radical ideas that despise our government and Constitution, and painted it as both Conservative and patriotic. And they are truly neither, and I welcome the day when folks realize this and return to reasonable Conservative positions, based on fact, based on the Constitution, and based on long term planning.

“Independents” to Forget: The “No Labels” movement. The great irony of the “No Labels” rally recently was they lamented partisanship…while being partisan attack dogs. You guys are about as independent as Michael Moore, but at least you’re as full of crap as he is.
Notice how Lindaman can't specify how Moore is full of crap, BTW.  What's the matter, can't link up to some bullshit freeper anti-MM website?

As far as the "No Labels" movement: It's only non-partisan when promoted by Fox news, right?



But, unlike the "non-partisan" Tea Party, this at least has opposition members in it.

Reality tends to have a liberal bias. The nature of conservatism makes it irrational, and as such it is inherently opposed to reality.

This isn't a surprise; any party that wants to focus on inclusion is naturally going to appear liberal when compared to the party of "Screw everyone else, I want mine."

Thanks to the radical goalpost-shifting of modern conservatism, "non-partisan" and "Democratic" are essentially equivalent. Bernie Sanders is the most left-wing politician in Congress but by objective standards he's a center-left technocrat.

There is no left-wing in the US and we're in worse shape because of it.
Why am I not surprised that the people who feel most threatened by a group that pushes for non-partisan solutions are... the Republicans? lol

Underreported Story: the Obama Administration’s bungling of the Gulf Coast oil spill. It’s no secret (except to those who still worship Obama) the President lacks certain leadership skills, not the least of which being knowing when to lead. The Gulf Coast oil spill was a ready-made issue he could have used to showcase his leadership, but instead he let others take care of it for him, and they blew it. Sending lawyers and Homeland Security personnel to the Gulf Coast before sending down the EPA? Monumentally dumb.
It's not the EPA's job, dingaling. 

Blaming BP? Dumber still.
BP is to blame because it's THEIR fucking responsibility.

The photo ops in lieu of actual policy? Even dumber.
First you blame Obama for not being vocal enough, then when he is, you say it's a "photo-op" just as I predicted you would.  Idiot.

Pushing for a moratorium of offshore oil drilling? The mother of all stupidity.
That's capitalism, bub.  If you show you can't drive, you can't have the keys.  Sorry!

For you Leftists who think Michael Brown was a disaster for the Bush Administration, he was competent compared to the multiple missteps by the Obama Administration to address the Gulf Coast oil spill.


They were on the scene as soon as the accident occurred and immediately started saving workers, and trying to contain the spill once they learned that it was leaking as much as it was. The Coast Guard rescued scores from that doomed platform before it sank.  That's with no notice at all.  Brown had two weeks.
And Obama got a shitload of money for the victims.  Which I'm sure pisses you right-wingers off to no end, since in your eyes, the victims are BP.  You know, the ones that killed eleven workers.
They handled things just fine.

Overreported Story: Wikileaks. With the release of secret and embarrassing information, Wikileaks became a major story overnight, and it seems as though every day there’s some new scandal arising from Wikileaks (“Lindsey Lohan Consulted on China Policy”). Given the amount of attention paid to this matter, Julian Assage couldn’t have asked for better advertising, but I think we could have done with a bit more actual reporting instead of the multitude of half-stories regarding Wikileaks.

That's what's great about getting news from the internet, you can filter the junk.

Unreported Story: the overuse of the race card. The Left has never been scared to play the race card whenever it was useful to their agenda. This year, anything became an excuse to use the race card. Obama getting criticized? It’s because of racism.

But Beck's the one that wondered if Obama hates white people and white culture.  Remember?

People opposing the Ground Zero mosque? It’s because of racism.
No, bigotry.  Two different things.

The TEA Party movement gaining favor with the American people? It’s because of racism.
And stupidity and ignorance, don't forget that.

And the more they use it, the less effective it became.
1. Right-wingers take video of Al Sharpton talking about equality, and state it's about black people wanting free stuff.
2. Right-wingers fall over themselves to keep an AZ law that has racial profiling.
3. Black male John Lewis states he was called the n-word and was spat upon. Right-wingers fall over themselves and say he's lying by default.
4. Right-wingers post old National Geographic footage of a New Black Panther party member being a dick, and say that's somehow connected to the NAACP.
5. Right-winger Breitbart posts video deliberately cut down to falsely imply a black member of the NAACP is racist. Right-wingers add on and falsely say the NAACP is cheering and applauding her racist comments.
6. Right-wing Fox News's website and right-wing Fox Nation immediately run with the right-wing Breitbart story. After the video is proven deceptive, Right-wingers pretend this didn't happen.
7. Right-wingers want to stop a community center that's two city blocks away from Ground Zero, because it's Islamist and has a prayer room.
8. Dr. Laura spews the n-word, and right-wingers defend her.
And that was just within about a month.

Man of the Year: George W. Bush. When the Left isn’t attacking him for every bad thing that has ever happened from the economy to them not getting a bike for Christmas when they were 7, Bush is starting to carve a place in history by being right. One of the funnier aspects of the Wikileaks scandal that isn’t getting covered by the media is how Wikileaks actually produced proof there were WMDs in Iraq.
Nope.  It was nothing that wasn't already known.  And regarding that, here's a brief primer for the tards.

Combine that with the fact President Obama publicly joined the pro-tax cut bandwagon by pushing for an extension of the Bush tax cuts, it’s clear Bush has earned the Man of the Year Award for being a better and more influential President than his critics want to admit. Miss him yet?
You mean the tax cuts that cost more than the stimulus?
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2010/12/10/the-number-858-billion/

Again, the GOP is willing to let everyone's taxes go up rather than give up tax cuts for the highest income bracket. They will blame Obama for this bullshit because they are lying, disingenuous assholes.

You are aware that the Republicans now control the House, aren't you? That means the Republicans can simply present Obama with a choice: either veto any extensions to the cuts, or accept extensions to all the cuts. Raising taxes during an economic downturn is hardly orthodox left-wing economics. The Democrats have long wanted an extension of the "middle class" tax cuts--they only opposed extending the tax cuts on the top brackets. Obama, indeed, promised not to raise taxes on those earning less than $250,000 during the election. So to present this as a simple black and white, good and evil choice for Obama is fatuous. He can either raise taxes on everyone, which certainly has some good effects from the p.o.v of the deficit, but which also risks putting the brakes on the economic recovery at a dangerous time, and definitely hurts the middle class that Obama had promised to try to help. Or he can extend the tax cuts for everyone, which is probably better from the p.o.v of the economic recovery, but which makes the deficit problem worse.

This is a tricky political and economic calculation, and it has absolutely nothing at all to do with whether or not Obama is "willing to play hardball" or "is being wimp" or any of the other no-brain children's playground analyses you are so wedded to.

So how much of a surrender was Obama's deal with Republicans? 48% of the compromise was stuff Obama wanted, 13% was stuff Republicans wanted, and 39% was stuff both parties wanted going in.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/12/why-obama-won.html
It had to be done.  Franken explained this best.

R. I. P.: global warming as a scientific certainty. For decades, the Left has been riding its high horse on global warming by citing scientist after scientist stating global warming was real and manmade. Three little words changed that forever: “hide the decline.” With the Climategate scandal where climate scientists out of England were caught fudging results and weren’t able to produce their evidence (a big no-no in the scientific community, by the way), the Left’s high horse has become a Shetland Pony. Ginning up results to promote a position that cannot be justified isn’t good science.
Yet when I asked Lindaman what "hide the decline" meant, and what was wrong with it, he didn't answer.  Why?  Because he didn't know.  Right-wingers just repeat soundbites like "hide the decline" and hope nobody else knows what it means, either. 
Here's what it meant:  The "decline" was the decline of reliability of tree ring data compared to instrumental temperature data after 1960 (the data becomes more and more divergent). So they didn't use that unreliable data, in order to maintain accuracy. Again I ask: what's wrong with that? If they didn't hide the decline, the output would've been inaccurate. Heck, they're not even hiding the unreliable data, because you can get it elsewhere. They're just not using the unreliable data. Would you prefer they used the decline? That would make things inaccurate! So again I ask: what's wrong with hiding the decline?

If they didn't "hide the decline", it would have made global warming look WORSE.  Are you getting it through your fat head yet?  You're criticizing them for not using unreliable data that would have made the case for manmade global warming even stronger!  You are criticizing them for not having a manmade global warming propaganda agenda, and being honest.
I also remember when Lindaman was cheering for Penn State's inquiry of Dr. Mann.  I said "Good!" because I also wanted an inquiry, as I knew he would be cleared (because I actually read the emails, ya see).  Sure enough, Mann was cleared.  Lindaman clammed up and said nothing.  Big shocker!  Of course, even if Lindaman had said anything, he would just say they were in on the Big But Simple Conspiracy.

Flash in the Pan: Obama’s global presence. Since his election, Obama has been touted as a departure from George W. Bush’s “cowboy diplomacy,” which would (according to his followers) bring about America’s return to dignified status in the world community. Of course, that isn’t what happened. World leaders treat Obama as badly, if not worse, than they treated Bush. Even our allies have a hard time taking Obama seriously. A stark contrast to the fawning media coverage of Obama’s European trip when he was running for President, to be sure.
He backs this up with nothing.

The Real Deal: net neutrality. You may not have heard a lot about this subject this year, but it is a vital issue. Leftists are suggesting the government needs to step in to guarantee Internet service providers treat all data the same way instead of picking and choosing what data gets preferential treatment. On the surface, it’s a nice idea, but after a deeper review, it loses a lot of its appeal when you think about the implications of the federal government dictating to private industry how they are to provide a service. And just think, kids. There are some Leftists who think the “net neutrality” proposal already on the table isn’t strict enough.
The use of the term Net Neutrality is just wrong in 99% of its applications in the media when they refuse to differentiate between content filtering and bandwidth capping/throttling.

Since the barrier to entry in the ISP market is so high, it is likely necessary to have some regulation necessary to preserve the openness of the market and preserve the free-flow of information.

But yeah, get people worked up over this by being dishonest instead of getting them worked up over the absolutely PATHETIC state of broadband access in the United States. Great idea!

To recap: In 2010, Net Neutrality suddenly became a huge talking point with right-wing crazies. Right-wingers going on big rants about how this was apparently Obama taking control of the Internet. Apparently the week or so before Christmas the Rush Limbaugh show and several other right wing talk shows got marching orders from their friends at Comcast. There was no actual mention of net neutrality or what the FCC was trying to do, it was all a bunch of nonsense about how Obama was trying to single handed take control of the Internet, and how the FCC would start blocking access to websites of opponents.

Do you want your internet provider to be able to limit your access to certain websites unless you paid a higher amount every month?  No?  Then clam up. The government isn't 'regulating the internet'. The FCC is trying to make sure that various corporations don't fuck over consumers.

You see, right-wingers have an irrational fear of the "Government" and believe that the "free market" will save them, despite the fact that there's very little ISP competition in most areas. Nobody is asking for the FCC to take control of everything, but merely make a statement that no one shall discriminate among web traffic and that consumers are entitled to the bandwidth that they PAID FOR. You see, right-wingers?  This stance actually supports your position to have unfettered access to FreeRepublic and Glenn Beck's site.

For the last time, retards: It's regulation of the actions of ISPs to prevent them from manipulating the content of the internet. It's not regulation of the content of the internet.

Raw Deal: The TEA Party being responsible for the GOP not taking back the Senate. A common theme with the Left and some members of the Right is that the TEA Parties cost the GOP control of the Senate, thanks to the campaigns of TEA Party favorites Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell. The problem with that line of thought is the TEA Party wouldn’t be necessary if the GOP (especially those who claim the TEA Party cost the GOP the Senate) hadn’t sold out to the Left. Some of the people the GOP establishment were pushing were nothing more than the same RINOs the party faithful have been complaining about for decades. And given how the GOP Establishment wasn’t too keen on helping Angle and O’Donnell on winning, maybe the TEA Party wasn’t the problem. Maybe, just maybe, it was the GOP Establishment.

Missed Opportunity: For the second year in a row, Republicans completely botched the TEA Party situation. Political operatives on the Right started acting and sounding like Leftists when it came to the TEA Party’s influence on the 2010 elections. Instead of taking their concerns seriously, Republicans treated them like lost children needing to be taken home (i.e. back to the GOP voting ranks). They just don’t get it. There wouldn’t be a need for the TEA Party if Republicans acted like, well, Republicans. Until Republicans get this concept, watch for more missed opportunities with the TEA Party.
Teabaggers: The Republicans are ignoring you:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/02/us/politics/02teaparty.html?_r=1

Courting the Christian rubes and then ditching them when it's over is a Reagan invention. And they still support him, being the uneducated retards that they are.

And you can tell the Tea Party is being dumped. Palin is being dumped too. There's at least 21 months left until the next election and the Teabaggers will be called on when their Republican Masters tell them who to vote for. The Teabaggers never got that when you threaten not to vote or to vote for the other guy, sometimes you have to show an example of that power they speak of. That power, according to 2010, is that they can put their people into high places only when they do it on the sly or among other Republicans. If they threaten the Party Masters and then all vote for Obama in 2012, that might get them some juice to use for 2014. But as it stands, the Teabaggers are the base, like it or not. You don't have to cater to them at all. All you need to do is promise them the moon or offer them to vote for the Other that they hate. Not rocket science, and it works when your base is full of people who are deaf to any opposition, think that the Republican Party is 'their own' that they have to free, and are toothless because their threats simply don't matter.

The Teabaggers are the very emblems of the sad Republican base in this country: they have a lot of talk, but no action. They threaten violence, they threaten a lot, but in the end they're ineffectual fatasses without any teeth. They like to play revolutionary but they are the essential shiat of the American populace: useless, shiftless, projecting their own hatred onto others, but unable to do anything because they are simply too lazy. Even the Party Masters know this and use it to great effect. Now, when Palin's out of the way, they'll simply vote for whomever has the R in their name. Rinse and Repeat, it seems, is what the R really stands for.

I would laugh, but it's so sad. It'll be wiped from history in a few months anyway, right after they start the cheering chorus for their next Master to be pushed into the White House unsuccessfully.
You know... the rich people who need the Republican Party have got to be sick from all this Teabagger nonsense.

In order to garner enough votes to control anything, the rich folks have had to align themselves with all of the right-wing kooks -- the fundies, tea baggers, "Constitutional conservatives", etc...

When you boil it down, it all amounts to one thing: Money. The rich people don't want to pay taxes. They want to keep all of their money to themselves and live in comfort and opulent luxury. That's it. They don't care about "conservative issues" and they don't care about any of the other baloney hot-button topics. It's about not wanting to pay taxes. It's about making as much money as possible and piling up as much wealth as possible and not having to give/pay anything back to the country for it.

The problem they're having is, that as they consolidate true wealth into the hands of fewer and fewer people, the Republican Party must come up with more creative ways of drawing in the numbers of voters they need to stay in control. This means that they've had to go after every right-wing nutjob they can find, using every trick they can come up with. They incur a tremendous amount of baggage having to associate themselves with these people, but they need the votes.

I wonder what all the kooks in the GOP would think if they knew how the true party leadership (the folks with the money) really feel about all of their petty causes.

It's all about the money. It's not about the Constitution... or abortion... or guns... or small government... or religion... or any of that stuff. It's about money.

Defining Moment: Glenn Beck’s 8/28 rally in Washington, DC. Although the TEA Party gatherings had an impact on this year, it was Beck’s 8/28 rally that opened a lot of people’s eyes to just how many people felt America needed to get back on a proper course. Hard attendance numbers vary from the laughable CBS-concocted number to the overly optimistic conservative numbers, but it’s safe to say Beck’s rally was somewhere in the neighborhood of 300,000 people gathered together for a non-partisan purpose. That showed people on both sides of the political aisle there are people unhappy with the way the country’s being run, and they will be holding everyone accountable.
CBS didn't "concoct" the number, liar. 

CBS News was the only media outlet to hire a professional overhead photography company (AirPhotosLive) that specialized in estimating crowd size. Their consultant used well-established methods in making his estimate, which was double and triple checked. They also do documented time-lapsed aerial analysis of people entering/exiting. They have done similar crowd estimates for Homeland Security in the past. They're as close to unbiased as it comes.

The other crowd estimates for Beck's rally were completely anecdotal.

All of the neutral professional estimators put the Beck rally at under 100k. The three professionals hired to estimate the crowd averaged out at 76k. The “liberal” CBS went with the highest estimate of 87,000.

Here's the methodology by AirPhotosLive. Try to dispute it (he won't): http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20015214-503544.html
And you lost the ability to call it "non-partisan" when you right-wingers marching in lock-step with the Republicans tried to half-assed compare the Beck rally with a little known liberal rally (while leaving out that the actual counter-rally had two and a half times more people than Beck's).

Stuck on Stupid: Anthony Weiner (D-NY). With a virtual one man war against Glenn Beck and Goldline, Weiner has shown himself to be arrogant, dismissive of any opinion that doesn’t match his own, and completely in over his head against anyone with a lick of sense. In other words, Democrats have a new Alan Grayson to replace the original after he got booted in the midterm elections for…well, for acting like Weiner is now. At least in Anthony’s case, his last name is pretty accurate for the kind of man he is.
Ooooo that's original!
You hate Weiner for the same reason you hate every Dem that doesn't roll over for Republican retards: Because he calls you shitkickers out.  Funny how you don't dispute anything Weiner or Grayson said.
Now sit down.



The Bottom Line Award: Chris Christie. The New Jersey Governor has raised a lot of eyebrows since taking control of the state, but he has maintained his brutal honesty and lack of concern over the opinion of those predisposed to condemn him for his political ideology.
Of course, if he was a Democrat, you would say he was "arrogant, dismissive of any opinion that doesn’t match his own, and completely in over his head against anyone with a lick of sense."

He’s shown integrity in government, honor in defending women against Leftist boors, and generally shown the traits that make up the Bottom Line Award.
Yeah, like going to Disneyworld while Jersey freezes to death.  "HURR HURR, SO MUCH FOR ALL HANDS ON DECK!"

The Anna Nicole Smith Lifetime Achievement Award: Christine O’Donnell. From cute-as-a-button spoiler in Delaware to cute-as-a-button buffoon, all in the span of a few months. In retrospect, it seems she never quite understood the media environment that came after her and continues to make Joe Biden-sized gaffes at the most inopportune times. And with rumors surrounding her lack of financial acumen (read: potential misappropriation of funds), O’Donnell has certainly set back women in politics significantly.
Meh, the stuff coming out of her mouth wasn't much different from what we normally hear from right-wingers.

The Dan Rather Award for “Excellence” in Media: Rick Sanchez. The former CNN anchor made quite an impact this year, mainly because of his ham-fisted buffoonery. He lost his job at CNN because he said Jews run the media, as evidenced by Jon Stewart. Of course, Stewart caused a stir by pointing out just how vapid Sanchez was and then laughing about it on “The Daily Show.” Here’s a clue for you, Rick. Maybe the reason you were mocked for being such a moron…is because you’re a moron. And now, you’re an unemployed moron because you let your ego get in the way of doing your job. Congratulations, Rick. You’ve earned this award.
Rick Sanchez is just a poor man's Steve Doocy anyway. At least Doocy is dumber than a box of old dentures AND unintentionally funny.

The DEE DEE DEE Award: Alan Grayson. Take a smug Congressman, add a Leftist mean streak to beat the band, and throw in a tone-deaf approach to the electorate…and you’d have a pale imitation of Alan Grayson. He may have been the darling of Leftist radio and TV shows, but he forgot to consider what the electorate wanted him to do and it cost him his job. At least he’ll have a future on MSNBC.
The only reason Grayson got elected in such a Conservative area, was because the incumbent he beat was a crook.  Republicans hate Grayson because he does the same things they do, only better.

The “It Looked Better on Paper” Award: Obamacare. Any time the government gets involved in health care, the results usually don’t turn out that well (case in point: Medicare). Now, thanks to Obamacare, we’ll all get the same attention to swift, quality customer service in health care that we get at the DMV. And when you get to the bottom of it, Obamacare really doesn’t do anything to address the problems in the health care arena, but does a lot to enrich the very people Obama and his Democrat allies were demonizing throughout the debate over Obamacare.
"Doesn't do anything"?  Here's five things that have already kicked in:

1. Insurance companies can't deny children coverage for pre-existing conditions.
2. Children can remain covered under parents' policies until 26.
3. Insurers can't terminate coverage.
4. Insurers can't cap lifetime benefits.
5. Insurers can't charge for preventive services like mammograms and colonoscopies.
That's five more things than you guys would ever bring to the table.  You're too busy desperately trying (and failing) to defend BP's murdering of workers.

The Padded Resume Award: Barack Obama. The more we see him try to be Presidential, the more we see how little actual experience he brings to the table. From “Hope” and “Change” to “Hope we can change Presidents soon.”
Backed up by nothing.

The 14:59 Award: Andy Warhol once said everyone would be famous for 15 minutes, but some personalities are quickly running out of their allotted time. This award celebrates one such personality. This year’s award goes to the “Octomom,” Nadya Suleman. Her claim to fame is dubious at best, and it seems she’s on the verge of eviction from her home in Southern California. Wow. Who would have guessed a media-created “celebrity” could be so bad with money?


One word: Idiocracy.  That's why I know the Republicans will have another president someday.

Monday, December 6, 2010

Chickity China The Chinese Chicken

Thomas Lindaman writes:

I've often said Leftists aren't good with an economy because they don't understand the basics of economics.

TARP has been an overwhelming success. The same goes for the Stimulus, which has apparently saved somewhere around 3 million jobs. The car bailout turns out to have been a good thing too. The bailouts kept us from going off the cliff. The lack of bailouts in Europe still have them toeing the edge. History will show who was right.  Healthcare reform will also ultimately save this country a good deal of money, if you self-absorbed corporate anarchist bastards don't manage to kill it in the House.

Essentially the Republican plan is to keep things just the way they are now--no better, no worse--until they can get into office in 2012 and take credit for fixing the economy. If the American people have to suffer, so be it. After all, we had the gall to elect a Democrat in 2008, we deserve whatever befalls us.

Republicans are the party of people who don't know how to manage their (inherited) wealth, and rapists. The rapists thing really surprised me, but they are what they vote.

Republicans understand the basics of economics? Are you going to fix it the way you fixed it last time?

Almost Zero Job Creation Under Bush

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2009/06/a_lost _ decade_f.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/01/AR2J1196.html

Stock Market Was The Worst Ever Under Bush

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704786204574607993448916718.html

Bush Produced The Worst Economy In Decades

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/11/AR2009011102301.html

IMF Declared America To Be In A Depression 2 Weeks After Bush Left Office

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=a6aaWZ8ab8yU

But tell us more about "the basics of economics", you REPUBLICANS you.

This was made abundantly clear recently with a quiet little event that caught very little attention.

The EU's economy is tanking as badly as ours is. To help matters, America is sending money to some of the EU's banks as a means to help them along. Of course, the first big question is where we are going to get the money since we're still recovering from our own economic downturn. The short answer is...we don't know.

There's another question that should concern us all. As we've seen, the dollar has been losing its value in recent years. While the Left said it was bad under George W. Bush, the Left has said it's great under Barack Obama because a weak dollar stimulates trade by making our products cheaper. However, no one will be forced to buy our products, even if they are cheaper because it's a free market. People have a vested interest in buying products at a lower price, but they're not bound to it.

Now, for the question. What impact will a weak dollar have on the money we're sending to the EU? The answer lies with the Chinese. Right now, China owns a lot of our debt, due to the political and economic bungling of both President Bushs, Bill Clinton, and now Obama. By granting Most Favored Nation status to China, we've given them access to our economy.

And here's the punchline, kids. China will use that against us.

At any time, China can call in our debt, meaning we either need to pay them in full or they essentially own us. And they have told us to watch our spending in recent months. Extending a monetary helping hand to the EU isn't exactly being miserly, especially considering how poorly the dollar has fared against the Euro.

Now for the question. What would happen if China decided to call in our debt after floating a loan to the EU?

The short answer: nothing good.

The longer answer: it would ruin two major global economies, leaving China as a sole economic superpower. America would be unable to pay its debt to China and unable to pay its loan to the EU. The latter, in turn, would cause the EU's economy to continue its death spiral until it either pulled itself together and pulled out of it or crashed and burned. The instability of the EU right now makes the latter the more likely outcome. China will have beaten us and the EU without even firing a shot.

So, does anyone else want to rethink our generosity to the EU?


Well, the United States could do the same thing and "demand payment" of all our debts. 

It won't happen.  Not by us or by China.  Because we both know that doing so would destroy the worldwide economy.

How could China remain an economic superpower, if the economy of the world has collapsed?  It would ruin their own economy, as well.  Fortunately China understands economics better than right-wingers.

As far as the EU: Allies help each other out, that's what allies do.  Helping to stave a worldwide economic collapse not only helps them, it also helps us.

And one last thing: It's a loan.  We're not just "sending money."

I say let's finally start calling out the Chinese for the problems their currency manipulation has caused for industrialized economies all over the world. America could use a good scapegoat these days anyway, and the Chinese are infinitely more deserving than the (very ugly) anti-Islam sentiment going around lately.