Cool, Cool Considerate Men.... or, "Why I'm Glad to Live in Costa Rica, Part 3,235"

Because the following are all candidates for election who have already passed the primary hurdle:



Via Dr. Monkey


Post title from this:

Revisionist Much?

You may remember the Texas Board of (mis)Education, controlled by people with -- at best -- a tenuous grasp of reality ... and a huge rightwingnutty bent? We've seen before that they removed Thomas Jefferson from the Enlightenment influences, the term "capitalism", and inflating the importance of Conservative Causes over the last 30 years.

Well, I just came across this tidbit:

The education board has dropped references to the slave trade in favour of calling it the more innocuous "Atlantic triangular trade", and recasts the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as driven by Islamic fundamentalism.

As disgusting as this is, it does give me the opportunity to post a clip from Teh Bestest Movie EVAR, aka 1776:

Truth in Cartooning

Dear Republicans, Are There Any Adults Left In Your Party?

Because the ones in Congress have officially become 5 year-olds:

But Boxer cannot hold the markup unless at least two Republicans show up, and EPW [Environment and Public Works Committee] ranking member James Inhofe (R-Okla.) signaled that he has unanimous support among the panel’s minority members to boycott the session until they get more data on the legislation from U.S. EPA and the Congressional Budget Office.

Inhofe said he will wait for Boxer to file an official notice of the markup — expected today — before responding with his own declaration of the GOP’s markup strategy.

They're not even attempting to hide the fact that all they're doing is being petulant.

“As soon as we find out what her announcement is and what she wants to do, we’ll have our response,” Inhofe told E&E last night. “We’ll have our unanimous expression ready.”

Why don't they just take their ball and go home, and leave taking care of pressing concerns to some more mature people.

More at EnviroKnow (blockquotes from NY Times article, h/t to C&L)

Conversations With A Table

I was going to post about something else entirely, but I saw this clip (h/t) and was reminded, once again, that a) the people protesting against health care reform are clueless sheep who do whatever Faux Noise and Hate Talk Radio tell them to do -- sans any relation to reality -- and, b) I wish Barney Frank was my Congressman.



From the YouTube page:

At a Barney Frank town hall meeting in Dartmouth, MA, a constituent asks, "Why are you supporting this Nazi policy?" Frank responds: "On what planet do you spend most of your time?" He then calls her approach "vile, contemptible nonsense." He closes by saying: "Trying to have a conversation with you would be like arguing with a dining room table."

Are There Any Non-adulturous Republicans?

Having lived my whole life -- until three months ago -- in North Carolina, I have a more than passing familiarity with South Carolina. It is a state that has been near the bottom of the list in education, income, and, well, a lot of things. So, it really comes as no surprise to me that, during his career-ending press conference today, Governor Mark Sanford exhibited extremely poor speaking skills.

What? You hadn't heard? The Governor was "missing" for several days last week. Turns out he was with his mistress.

On Wednesday, he admitted he had been on a private visit to Argentina because he had "wanted to do something exotic".

Now, whilst rambling on about God and family, Sanford mentioned that his staff did not lie to anyone, that they were actually told he was off hiking the Appalachian Trail. I'm not sure I believe that though. You remember that game you played as a kid where one person whispers something to the person next to them, and you go around the circle and see how the original message comes out?


In this case, the end message was "Hiking the Appalachian Trail."...

A Most Serious And Valid Question

How long do you think it will be before the Republican Party will once again begin functioning as an actual political party and not a high school clique?

Troll Rules

Taken in entirety from Alexander Ryking at schizokultura, h/t to Bob Cesca regular commenter "∇•B=0 Silly Ratfaced Git ∇•D=ρ".

How to Be a Right-Wing Troll in Ten Easy Steps 1. Always act superior, even when your opponent clearly outclasses you intellectually (this will happen frequently). 2. Demand that your opponent provide evidence to prove their point, then dismiss the evidence based on its source when they do, no matter how widely-accepted or valid that source happens to be. If you can’t do that, lie and deny that you said what you said, or lie and say your opponent misinterpreted your statement and is now off topic. Failing those tactics: Change the subject. 3. Lie about all scientific and historical facts when they can’t be ignored; facts often get in the way of right-wing ideology. And don’t forget: No lie is too outrageous. Repeat the same lies loudly and often. 4. Project. A lot. 5. Take many, many cheap shots at prominent Democrats and your opponents, then decry the lack of civility in political discourse. 6. Be proud of your hypocrisy; being a hypocrite is essential to being a right-winger — and a troll. However, don’t acknowledge being a hypocrite. Instead, characterize yourself as being “principled” and try to rationalize your hypocrisy. Also, try to ignore that pesky cognitive dissonance! 7. Blame Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and the Democratic Party for everything. EVERYTHING. The Huronian glaciation? Clinton’s fault. The Lindbergh kidnapping? Obama. The eventual supernova of Earth’s Sun billions of years from now? Nancy Pelosi and Russ Feingold. Nothing, absolutely NOTHING, is the fault of a Republican, even when it is. 8. Continually initiate contact with your opponents and, whenever they respond, falsely accuse them of cyberstalking you. 9. Abandon well-known Republicans (i.e. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney) when they become incredibly unpopular, and claim that they aren’t “real” conservatives while ignoring that they’re so far-right they make white supremacists look like members of the ACLU. 10. Secretly accept that you’re a minority and let yourself be consumed by your deep and abiding hatred of everyone and everything that doesn’t conform to your worldview (currently 99.99% of reality).

You Can't Have A Revolution Without Breaking A Law Or Two, You Know

"We have a million tea bags here, and we don't have a place to put them because it's not on our permit," said Rebecca Wales, lead organizer of D.C. Tea Party.

h/t to Bob Cesca, who adds: "The same thing happened to the Sons of Liberty. Except for the fact that it didn't."

If these teabagging idiots weren't also semi- to abso-fucking-lutely nuts (not to mention owners of assault rifles), then this would be the most hilarious thing ever.

The Republican Budget Proposal

Bob Cesca nails it to the wall over at HuffPo.

A sample:

Yes, the Democratic budgets will be so out of control they'll eventually make little curly-cues and travel backwards in time -- adding to past deficits -- while also looping around the word "government" -- you know, because the Democrats love government.

You really should read the whole thing.