Labels: a real mensch, football, gay rights, Super Bowl

I don't believe in God
but I believe vitamins work.
I think its because I can see them
and put then in my mouth.
I understand Catholicism.

Okay, okay.
This compulsive eating of ice cream before bed
has to stop.
I mean WTF.
I mean, am I some kind of lonely cat lady
with an eating disorder?

Labels: Comedians, Marc Maron, poetry, Twitterati

During WorldNetDaily Editor-in-Chief Joseph Farah’s Friday night dinner speech, which spent around 10 of its forty minutes on questions about Barack Obama’s citizenship, Andrew Brietbart was among the conservatives in back of the room grumbling audibly about what he was hearing.

After he introduced the evening’s closing entertainment — a film titled “Generation Zero” — Breitbart walked outside to the convention hall. There, I heard Breitbart criticizing Farah, and briefly talked to him about it before I noticed that WorldNetDaily’s Chelsea Schilling was already talking to him, holding up a voice recorder. I backed up to allow her to continue her interview, which consisted of questions on why Breitbart didn’t think Obama’s citizenship was a legitimate issue.

“It’s self-indulgent, it’s narcissistic, it’s a losing issue,” Breitbart told Schilling. “It’s a losing situation. If you don’t have the frigging evidence — raising the question? You can do that to Republicans all day long. You have to disprove that you’re a racist! Forcing them to disprove something is a nightmare.”

“Wouldn’t you say,” asked Schilling, “in this case, that Farah is asking Obama to prove something rather than his disprove it?”

Breitbart rejected the premise. “When has a president ever been asked to prove his citizenship?”

[snip]

“Andrew is my friend,” said Farah. “He has the right to disagree, and he has the right to say anything to a socialist newspaper that he wants. And if he wants to criticize his friend to you, and he’s dumb enough to do that…”

Breitbart raised his eyebrows. “I’m dumb to do what?”

“Criticize your friend to this socialist newspaper.”

“I was talking to her,” said Breitbart, pointing to Schilling. “I was talking to you. And I was saying that I disagreed on the birther stuff.”

“OK, well, did you know that Dave Weigel from The Washington Independent was”–

“I was talking to her,” said Breitbart. “She was asking me if I thought it was wise to bring it up, and I said, no. We have a lot of strong arguments to be making, and that is a primary argument. That is an argument for the primaries that did not take hold. The arguments that these people right here are making are substantive arguments. The elections in Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts were all won not on birther, but on substance. And to apply to this group of people the concept that they’re all obsessed with the birth certificate, when it’s not a winning issue–”

“It is a winning issue!”

“It’s not a winning issue.”

“It is! It becomes even more of a winning issue when the press abrogates its responsibility–”

“You don’t recognize it as a fundamentally controversial issue that forces a unified group of people to have to break into different parts? It is a schism of the highest order.”

“Nothing exposes the president’s–”

“Then prove it!”

“The press isn’t asking the question–”

“Prove it!”

“Prove what?”

“Prove your case.”

Labels: "birthers", wingnuttia

Labels: false patriotism, Sarah Palin, wingnuttia

CBS has picked up a comedy project based on the Twitter account, which has enlisted more than 700,000 followers since launching in August and has made its creator, Justin Halpern, an Internet star.

"Will & Grace" creators David Kohan and Max Mutchnick are on board to executive produce and supervise the writing for the multicamera family comedy, which Halpern will co-pen with Patrick Schumacker. Halpern and Schumacker will also co-exec produce the Warner Bros. TV-produced project, which has received a script commitment.

The comedy's title will change if it gets on the air.

Halpern, 29, had moved back in with his parents in San Diego, and on Aug. 3 he launched "Shit My Dad Says," a Twitter feed featuring colorful -- often profane -- comments and pearls of wisdom made by his 73-year-old father during their daily conversations.

Some examples:

"Sometimes life leaves a hundred-dollar bill on your dresser, and you don't realize until later that it's because it fucked you";

"Why the fuck would I want to live to 100? I'm 73 and shit's starting to get boring. By the way, there's no money left when I go, just fyi";

"The baby will talk when he talks, relax. It ain't like he knows the cure for cancer and he just ain't spitting it out."

Shit My Dad Says is the second hot Internet property to land at a broadcast network this development season as a potential half-hour series.

Labels: pop culture, You can't make this shit up

And then, something really odd happened, mostly because I think that we do not have a civics literacy test before people can vote in this country. People who could not even spell the word “vote,” or say it in English, put a committed socialist idealogue (sic) in the White House, name is Barack Hussein Obama. (Emphasis Eli's, but not the unfortunately-timed misspelling of "ideologue" by whoever at Media Matters transcribed it)

Labels: IOKIYAR, Republican cowardice, Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) has put an extraordinary "blanket hold" on at least 70 nominations President Obama has sent to the Senate, according to multiple reports this evening. The hold means no nominations can move forward unless Senate Democrats can secure a 60-member cloture vote to break it, or until Shelby lifts the hold.

"While holds are frequent," CongressDaily's Dan Friedman and Megan Scully report (sub. req.), "Senate aides said a blanket hold represents a far more aggressive use of the power than is normal."

The Mobile Press-Register picked up the story early this afternoon. The paper confirmed Reid's account of the hold, and reported that a Shelby spokesperson "did not immediately respond to phone and e-mail messages seeking confirmation of the senator's action or his reason for doing so."

Shelby has been tight-lipped about the holds, offering only an unnamed spokesperson to reporters today to explain them. Aides to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid broke the news of the blanket hold this afternoon. Reid aides told CongressDaily the hold extends to "all executive nominations on the Senate calendar."

According to the report, Shelby is holding Obama's nominees hostage until a pair of lucrative programs that would send billions in taxpayer dollars to his home state get back on track. The two programs Shelby wants to move forward or else:

- A $40 billion contract to build air-to-air refueling tankers. From CongressDaily: "Northrop/EADS team would build the planes in Mobile, Ala., but has threatened to pull out of the competition unless the Air Force makes changes to a draft request for proposals." Federal Times offers more details on the tanker deal, and also confirms its connection to the hold.

- An improvised explosive device testing lab for the FBI. From CongressDaily: "[Shelby] is frustrated that the Obama administration won't build" the center, which Shelby earmarked $45 million for in 2008. The center is due to be based "at the Army's Redstone Arsenal."

Though a Shelby spokesperson would not confirm that these programs were behind the blanket hold, the Senator expressed his frustration about the progress on both through a spokesperson to both CongressDaily and the Federal Times.

A San Diego State University professor and Congressional expert told the Mobile paper "he knew of no previous use of a blanket hold" in recent history.

Labels: assholes, earmarks, hypocrisy, Republican id-driven two-year-olds

This proposal addresses the shortcomings of the current system and strengthens the retirement safety net by providing workers with the voluntary option of investing a portion of their FICA payroll taxes into personal savings accounts. Due to the higher rate of return received by investments in secure funds consisting of equities and bonds, these accounts would allow workers to build a significant nest egg for retirement that far exceeds what the current program can provide. Each account will be the property of the individual, and fully inheritable, which will allow workers to pass on any remaining balances in their accounts to their descendants.

Labels: economic death watch, House Republicans, retirement savings, Social Security, We Are So Screwed

The leader of the group of Americans charged on Thursday with abducting children in Haiti is an Idaho businesswoman with a complicated financial history that involves complaints from employees over unpaid wages, state liens on a company bank account and lawsuits in small claims court.

The leader, Laura Silsby, defaulted last July on the mortgage on a house in an unfinished subdivision here in Meridian, a suburb of Boise, according to the Ada County Tax Assessor’s Office. Yet in November, Ms. Silsby registered a new nonprofit, the New Life Children’s Refuge, at the address of the house, which she bought in 2008 for $358,000.

New Life Children’s Refuge is the name of the orphanage Ms. Silsby and the nine other Americans charged in Haiti said they had planned to establish in the Dominican Republic.

Ms. Silsby lost the house in Meridian to foreclosure on Dec. 7, records show, and it now stands empty, with signs in the yard promoting a foreclosure sale.

[snip]

Ms. Silsby and her business, Personal Shopper, which provides shopping services for Internet customers, have faced multiple legal claims.

According to state records and officials, Personal Shopper has been named 14 times in complaints from employees over unpaid wages. Among the reasons cited by the employees for having not been paid were “no money for payroll” and “fully investor funded and investors have been hit hard by the economy.”

Employees won nine of the cases, forcing Personal Shopper to pay nearly $31,000 in wages and $4,000 in fines. The Idaho Department of Labor initially put liens on a company bank account to get the money.

“They didn’t like that so they said: ‘How much do we owe? We’ll pay it,’ ” said Bob Fick, a spokesman for the department, adding that unpaid wage complaints were not uncommon.

State officials said Personal Shopper had paid all the wage claims upheld by the state. But another former employee has sued Personal Shopper in civil court. A jury trial is set for Feb. 22 over a claim by the employee, Robin Oliver, that Personal Shopper owes her more than $22,000.

[snip]

Clint Henry, pastor of Central Valley Baptist Church in Meridian, where five of the Americans charged in Haiti attend services, said Ms. Silsby had attended his church for about two years.

“You wouldn’t find any finer Christian people than these people,” Mr. Henry said in an interview earlier this week.

Labels: 2010 Haiti earthquake, Christofascist Zombie Brigade, hypocrisy, just another outrage

Here's what capitulation to the Republicans will get us: President Jeb Bush.

Don't kid yourself that this "National Council for a New America" is about rethinking, or even rebranding, the Republican Party. This is the greed wing, the Grover Norquist wing, of the Republican Party making a pre-emptive strike against Evita Mooselini, Bobby the Exorcist Jingles, and the rest of the Christofascist Zombie Brigade that hijacked John McCain last year and now threatens to hijack the rest of the party in the upcoming midterm elections and into 2012. And while Mitt Romney has a prominent role, the savior for the interests of the wealthy that is making the Greedmeisters get all tingly in the groin is Jeb Bush.

I've been saying since 1988 that the Bush family regards this entire country as a private fiefdom that's theirs to plunder as they wish for their family and friends. We've seen over the last eight years that it isn't just the country they see as their fiefdom, it's the entire world. Did anyone really think they would go away quietly? Greedy people don't take kindly to having land they think is theirs taken away from them, certainly not by black people they no doubt think ought to be their domestic servants.

And so they, with the help of the Greed Wing of the Republican Party, which has been seeking a candidate to represent their interests in 2012 to go up against the Christofascist Zombie Brigade's Chosen One, Sarah Palin, are already positioning the Bush Family Restoration to the Throne of the United States

When Jeb Bush left office four years ago, his public appearances were as scarce as bi-partisan man hugs.

He didn't want to upstage his successor in the governor's mansion nor his brother in the White House. Instead, he quietly cashed in by joining corporate boards and an elite speakers bureau, penned policy essays and gave infrequent interviews to conservative media.

But in recent months, as the Republican Party of Florida has grappled with a leadership vacuum, Bush's political profile has grown as fast as the national deficit.

He headlined a fundraiser for Bill McCollum's gubernatorial campaign, starred in a YouTube video touting Jeff Atwater's campaign for state chief financial officer and helped install state Sen. John Thrasher as the state party's heir apparent -- all the while looming on the sidelines of the fierce Republican Senate primary between Gov. Charlie Crist and Marco Rubio.

The capper came Thursday when, at the top of the 7 o'clock hour, right after Vice President Joe Biden, Bush made a rare network television appearance on NBC's Today Show. The intensely private Bush's interview with the overly familiar Matt Lauer rattled Florida political circles.

Was this the beginning of a Jeb juggernaut that would culminate in a 2012 presidential bid?

``My wife called me immediately and said he looked presidential,'' said Thrasher, who as the former House speaker helped Bush lay down his agenda. ``I said, `Who knows? We'll see.' I'm ready to go to Iowa any time he's ready.''

A government money market debacle unfolding in Florida is raising questions about former governor and presidential brother Jeb Bush's possible involvement in the mess.

Florida froze withdrawals from a state investment fund earlier this week when local governments withdrew billions of dollars out of concern for the fund's financial stability.

In the past few days, municipalities have withdrawn roughly $9 billion, nearly a third of the $28 billion fund (which is similar to a money market fund) controlled by the Florida's State Board of Administration (SBA). The run on the fund was triggered by worries that a percentage of the portfolio contained debt that had defaulted.

A majority of this paper was sold to SBA by Lehman Brothers. Bush, as the state's top elected official, served on a three-member board that oversaw the SBA until he retired as governor in January. In August, Bush was hired as a consultant to the bank. Lehman spokesperson Kerrie Cohen, speaking on behalf of Bush, said they had no comment and would not say when the bank had sold Florida the paper. SBA did not return calls.

Labels: Bush family, dynastic politics, Jeb Bush, the more things change the more they stay the same, Why even bother any more

When the request arrived in an e-mail last fall, Scott Fujita replied immediately and without reservation. A friend had asked him his opinion. He answered. That was how Fujita looked at it.

The swiftness and certitude of Fujita’s reply stunned Dave Zirin, the friend who sent the e-mail. Zirin had not made a typical request, not for an NFL linebacker. He was looking for a professional athlete to lend his name to the National Equality March, a rally in Washington for gay rights.

On Sunday, Fujita will reach the pinnacle of his football career, playing linebacker for the New Orleans Saints in the Super Bowl. Fujita describes it as “this small moment in time where you have a platform to do some good things.’’ Last fall, that included speaking out in support of gay rights, a rare step in a professional sporting culture that often turns social stances into landmines.

Fujita, who is married, the father of twin daughters, and straight, pushes against the rising trend in sports to remain mum on cultural and political touchstones. His boldness, shaped by his unusual upbringing, makes him an uncommon and effective advocate for what he believes in.

“People asked me a question and I gave my opinion,’’ Fujita said. “People say, ‘That’s so courageous of you.’ To me, it’s not that courageous to have an opinion, especially if you wholeheartedly think it’s the right thing. For me, standing up for equal rights is the right thing to do.’’

Labels: a real mensch, Athletes, football, gay rights, Super Bowl

Labels: geekery, Lost, pop culture

Labels: bloggers, Blogroll Amnesty Day

By President Obama’s own optimistic projections, American deficits will not return to what are widely considered sustainable levels over the next 10 years. In fact, in 2019 and 2020 — years after Mr. Obama has left the political scene, even if he serves two terms — they start rising again sharply, to more than 5 percent of gross domestic product. His budget draws a picture of a nation that like many American homeowners simply cannot get above water.

For Mr. Obama and his successors, the effect of those projections is clear: Unless miraculous growth, or miraculous political compromises, creates some unforeseen change over the next decade, there is virtually no room for new domestic initiatives for Mr. Obama or his successors. Beyond that lies the possibility that the United States could begin to suffer the same disease that has afflicted Japan over the past decade. As debt grew more rapidly than income, that country’s influence around the world eroded.

Or, as Mr. Obama’s chief economic adviser, Lawrence H. Summers, used to ask before he entered government a year ago, “How long can the world’s biggest borrower remain the world’s biggest power?”

He is right. In the early years of the Clinton administration, government projections indicated huge deficits — over the “sustainable” level of 3 percent — by 2000. But by then, Mr. Clinton was running a modest surplus of about $200 billion, a point Mr. Obama made Monday as he tried anew to remind the country that the moment was squandered when “the previous administration and previous Congresses created an expensive new drug program, passed massive tax cuts for the wealthy, and funded two wars without paying for any of it.”

But with this budget, Mr. Obama now owns this deficit.

Labels: deficits, Everybody Knows That the Dice Are Loaded, Greedy Republican Bastards, hack journalism

Labels: bloggers, Blogroll Amnesty Day

For roughly 30 years, since Ronald Reagan opened his 1980 campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, with a speech about states' rights, conservative Republicans have been marked by four traits:

* A willingness to twist the truth for political gain;

* A willingness to act corruptly in order to gain and consolidate political power;

* A willingness to make expert use of the race-based fear card in order to attract middle-class white voters; and

* A tendency to govern in such an incompetent fashion that voters turn to Democrats to clean up Republican messes.

Obama clearly wants to break this dysfunctional cycle. But we fear he's going about it the wrong way.

The president tried to reason with Republicans last Friday--politely, but bluntly, calling them on their false statements. For good measure, Obama seemingly tried to shame them into realizing that they needed to work with Democrats in a bipartisan, constructive fashion.

But here, we suspect, is the ugly truth about the modern GOP: You can't reason with them, and you can't shame them into doing the right thing.

That's because the modern Republican political brand, shaped by Reagan with several dollops of Nixonian skulduggery, remains intact. It never has been discredited the way it should have been long ago.

Labels: bloggers, Bush Administration crimes, President Barack Obama, Republicans