Look at that stupid, stupid face for a moment, won’t you?.
In case you forgot, Republican Senate candidate Todd “Legitimate Rape” Akin doesn’t actually know how pregnancy works.
On doctors who perform abortions, he’s even hazier:
“You find that along with the culture of death go all kinds of other law-breaking: Not following good sanitary procedure, giving abortions to women who are not actually pregnant, cheating on taxes, all these kinds of things.”
Cheating on taxes??? This was all from 2008, so I’m sure we won’t get much additional insight into this particular crazy misogynist pseudo-science theory, but if I had to guess, I’m pretty sure he’d say something about how those baby-killin’ doctors just looooove a good, medically unnecessary womb-rootin’.
I admire the slavery-to-war-to-terrorism-to-abortion transition though- it’s like a Dada game of “Seven Degrees of Kevin Bacon” with insane right-wing bullshit.
Conservative talk show host Glenn Beck says that GOP hopeful Mitt Romney’s poll numbers have fallen as a part of a plan from God to make it obvious to the American people that divine intervention was responsible when Republicans take the White House in November.
“I know Mitt Romney wasn’t your first choice, nor was he mine,” Beck recently told controversial “historian” David Barton in a video clip highlighted by Right Wing Watch on Monday. “I am to the point that — A — God is trying to make this so clear to us that if it happens, it’s his finger. Because nothing looks good.”
“And yet, everybody I know who I consider a spiritual giant feels good,” he continued. “And it bothers me that I feel good because, I’m like, there’s no reason that I should feel good on this.”
Laugh all you want, but if Romney—who is behind in all nine battleground states according to the most recent polls—does manage to squeak out a win in November, it would indeed be a good argument for the existence of God. But what if he loses? Would this mean there is no God or that God is a Democrat or what? When Romney loses it seems like it might be a tad traumatizing for Beck and Barton, don’t you think, after watching this?
Now of course Beck won’t be held accountable for these ridiculous statements after the election. No one will even recall that he made them in the first place.
Richard Hayes is a City of San Diego sanitation worker whose route includes Mitt Romney’s $12 million oceanfront villa in La Jolla. You know, the one with the elevator for all of his cars.
My name is Richard Hayes, and I pick up Mitt Romney’s trash. We’re kind of like the invisible people. He doesn’t realize that the service we provide—if it wasn’t for us, it would be a big health issue, us not picking up trash.
Residents do come out and shake our hands. Sometimes they give us hugs and thank us for the job we’re doing, hand us water and Gatorades. Tell us we’re doing a good job and keep up the good work. Picking up 15, 16 tons by hand, that takes a toll on your body. When I’m 55, 60 years old, I know my body’s gonna be break down [sic]. Mitt Romney doesn’t care about that.
I doubt that it’s ever crossed his mind.
Here’s a second San Diego sanitation worker’s take on Mitt. Meet Meet Joan Raymond:
Both testimonials via AFSCME, the nation’s largest and fastest growing public services employees union with more than 1.6 million active and retired members.
Mitt Romney’s VP running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan was booed repeatedly throughout his speech at the AARP convention today. Some of the loudest boos followed Ryan’s claim that the Affordable Health Act “turned Medicare into a piggy bank for Obamacare.”
Ryan’s lying to them. He knows that he’s lying to them and they obviously know that he’s lying to them:
“The first step to a stronger Medicare is to repeal Obbamacare. I had a feeling there would be mixed reaction, so let me get into it. It weakens medicare for today’s seniors and puts it at risk for the next generation. First, it funnels $716 billion out of Medicare to pay for a new entitlement we didn’t even ask for. Second, it puts 15 unelected bureaucrats in charge of medicare’s future.”
Congressman Ryan has included the exact same $716 billion savings from Medicare in his own infamous “Ryan Plan” budgets. Repealing Obamacare would take away several popular benefits for senior citizens included in the law, such as ending the “donut hole” exemption that required seniors to pay more out of pocket for brand name prescription drugs. And they know it.
Fuck Paul Ryan. What a smug Republican shithead he is.
While the media is busy focusing on the idiotic “47% of Americans are lazy bums looking for handouts” comments made by Mitt Romney in the “secret” videotape from that $50,000 per plate Republican donor luncheon back in May, now that Mother Jones has published the full transcript of the tape, new turds of “wisdom” from Shit Romney are starting to float to the top. Like this one:
“So we can capture women’s votes, we’re having a much harder time with Hispanic voters. And if the Hispanic voting bloc becomes as committed to the Democrats as the African American voting bloc has in the past, why we’re in trouble as a party and, I think, as a nation.”
Just when you think he can’t possibly get any worse, he gets way worse!
The GOP has finally seen that silver bullet. Only it’s not aimed at the guy they were trying to take out.
That it’s a fuckin’ self-inflicted wound, makes this all the more delicious!
Elizabeth Heath tried to get her head around this latest Romney gaffe at Mamiverse, a website for Latina mothers:
Whoa. It’s one thing to say that the Republican Party will struggle without the Hispanic vote. But to say that “we’re in trouble…as a nation” if Hispanics become committed Democrats suggests that Mr. Romney is nationalistic and maybe, just maybe, a little racist. Perhaps he’s worried about the U.S. becoming a nation of Democrats, as Hispanics, who already make up the country’s largest and largest-growing minority, continue to lean Democratic in their politics. Or is he worried about Hispanics taking over and the white males who make up his constituency becoming a minority? One has to wonder.
One does!
Good luck trying to back-pedal this one Mittens. You’re going to need heaps of it.
Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter… start your “spingines.”
Rumors have been floating about for a few weeks now that Chick-fil-A’s CEO Dan Cathy has been interested in wiping the shit he stepped in earlier this year—when he declared himself “Guilty as charged” for supporting anti-LGBT political groups like Focus on the Family and the National Organization for Marriage, including some that heave been called “hate groups”—off his corporate shoes.
Although I commend Mr. Cathy for stopping his multi-million dollar donations to anti-gay groups—if this rumoris in fact true and doesn’t turn out to be a Yes Men-style prank aiming to “punk” the delicious fast food chicken sandwich chain preferred by bigots, homophobic Christians, Fox News viewers, Drudge and Breitbart readers and talk radio fans—I can’t help but wonder how this news will play in red states and in the far right blogosphere.
The Civil Rights Agenda (TCRA), Illinois’ leading lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) civil rights advocacy organization, has learned that Alderman Moreno has finalized his negotiations with Chick-Fil-A. Alderman Moreno has confirmed that Chick-fil-A will no longer give money to anti-gay organizations and that they have clarified in an internal document that the company will treat every person equally, regardless of sexual orientation. The Civil Rights Agenda worked closely with the Alderman in an advisory role as he negotiated these concessions with the executives at Chick-fil-A. Additionally, members of TCRA spoke directly with executives at Chick-fil-A during negotiations to aid in educating their decision makers about anti-discrimination policies and issues affecting the LGBT community.
—snip—
Additionally, they have sent an internal memo to franchisees and stakeholders that states that as a company, they will “treat every person with honor, dignity and respect-regardless of their beliefs, race, creed, sexual orientation and gender” and that their “intent is not to engage in political or social debates.” This statement was placed into an official company document called “Chick-fil-A: Who We Are.
Last Friday, Tara and I went to see Aziz Ansari’s wicked good stand-up show at the Orpheum Theater in downton Los Angeles. At one point, he was riffing on the whole Chick-fil-A controversy and lamenting that he could no longer, in good faith, eat there and indirectly support bigoted organizations that oppose full civil rights for his LGBT friends. Many of you reading this feel his pain.
As he did the bit—I’m embarrassed to admit to this, but it’s true—I did the mental calculation in my head of how much of the price of a single peach milkshake would end up going into the coffers of an anti-gay group and debated on whether or not it was okay if I had one, just one, on the way home (My beautiful wife nixed this idea before it even got all the way out of my mouth, incidentally).
So if this new news is true, then Aziz Ansari and I can eat at Chick-fil-A again with clear consciences. Bearing this in mind, the flipside of feeling GOOD about the today’s announcement, or the widely-reported rumor I should say, that Chick-fil-A will no longer donate to anti-LGBT groups, is how this information might be processed by the far reich crowd?
Tell me that the likes of Dana Loesch, or Michelle Malkin won’t feel BETRAYED and FIRE-SPITTING FURIOUS by the fast food chain COWARDLY WITHDRAWING FROM THE FIGHT FOR ‘TRADITIONAL CHRISTIAN VALUES.’ It’s gonna happen.
All the assholes who giddily participated in the Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day, waiting hours in line to stuff their faces full of fried chicken sandwiches to stick it to them uppity gays (and in support of “free speech” and Jeebus of course) are going to feel, well, butthurt by the news. Can a Sarah Palin-led Chick-fil-A backlash be far behind?
I hope Palin goes for the (fool’s) gold. It’s probably her very, very last chance to be relevant again. Her fifteen minutes of fame has about five seconds left, but leading a populist revolt against Chick-fil-A could re-start the clock for the fading celebrity of the half-term Alaska governor. Glenn Beck is probably wondering how he can hop on this train himself. Mike Huckabee, Herman Cain, Rush Limbaugh, Rep. Allen West, Michael Savage… who will be the first one of them to go there and accuse Chick-fil-A of cowardly betraying Christian Conservatives?
I’m also counting down the seconds before I get an “email alert” from wingnut central, WorldNetDaily, asking (because they always phrase things in the form of a question there, just like I did with the title here, in their honor): “GUESS WHO is no longer supporting the traditional Christian marriage definition of “one man, one woman”? The answer will SHOCK YOU” and then you’ll have to link to their website for the answer.
Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia. I hate this fucking guy
In this 100-second “trash compactor” prepared by TPM editor Michael Lester, you can get a pretty good idea of what went down at the Value Voters Summit last Friday.
The thing that usually strikes me about any grouping of Republicans is not how blindingly white they all are, but rather how pinch-faced, nasally and shrew-like most of them seem to be. They’re a very specific type of Caucasian, I suppose. “Cowardly” isn’t the exact word I’m looking for, but Republican men have always struck me as the opposite of what I picture a “hero” to look like.
(*No, that’s not what he said at all, but hey, Matt Drudge can do it, so why can’t I?)
I was as much amused by Rick Santorum’s comment yesterday—“We will never have the elite, smart people on our side”—during his speech at the ultra conservative Values Voter Summit as I was by this paragraph—or some variation thereof—that invariably followed without any need for further comment or elaboration:
“Rep. Michele Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Kirk Cameron, Gov. Jan Brewer, Sen. Rand Paul and Rep. Steve King are among other scheduled speakers.”
On nearly every blog, the ingredients of the report were the video of Santorum (see below) and a mention of some of his fellow far-right fuit loops who would be speaking at the conservative Christian political confab. Perhaps they were trying to be droll—I decided to take it that way—or maybe they were just dryly reporting the facts. Either way, a list of those particular Republican names speaks volumes, doesn’t it?
Former GOP presidential candidate Santorum’s full quote was:
“We will never have the media on our side, ever, in this country. We will never have the elite, smart people on our side, because they believe they should have the power to tell you what to do.”
Well, Rick, that’s one way to look at it, but there’s an obvious—or what should be obvious—flip-side to that equation that you might want to take into consideration: WHY do you reckon that it’s difficult for these “elite, smart people” to acquiesce to the will of a bunch of folks who they perceive as a bunch of ignorant hicks who have decided that they’re going to “take back our country” and so forth?
Take it back from…? And where will these science-denying dumbshit Tea party Taliban types take it back to? Before African Americans had the vote or before they were allowed to play Major League Baseball? Just how far back are we talking, here?
His delightfully candid remark calls into question how Mr. Santorum and other Christian conservatives define “freedom,” a word and concept that was thrown around—and shit on—by at least half of the Values Voters Summit’s speakers: Should “the elite, smart people” stand silently by and do nothing and simply allow, without protest or objection, a group of people they consider to be rank ignoramuses and dangerous buffoons to run roughshod over what they see as THEIR OWN RIGHTS (or the rights of others)?
If you take only the example of marriage equality, one groups wants to get married for a variety of benefits that will have virtually ZERO effect—none—on the lives of conservative religious straight people, so why A.) do the people who attend the VVS even care and B.) why do they think that THEY should have final say over what gay people do, simply because they “don’t agree with it”?
Because… Jebus?
That’s not a reason!
What I don’t get, and what is making me laugh, is how it doesn’t seem to phase Rick Santorum even one tiny little bit that he’s is, in essence, defining himself as being a member of the STUPID TEAM that the evil smart elite people want to subjugate with stuff like gay marriage and insurance being required to cover birth control. His argument isn’t “We’re smarter than they are so they should listen to us,” it’s more like… well, to be honest, I don’t even know, really, how the fuck to parse what Santorum believes. Once someone admits that they’re hositle to intelligence itself, I don’t really feel it’s incumbent upon me to search out the nuance of their blinkered, unsophisticated worldview.
Mr. Santorum doesn’t seem to have noticed the causality between his own position of being against birth control and the fact that he lost—and lost miserably—to a man who now seems set to lose handily himself in the general election. But he has made an important observation: “Smart people” and Republicans don’t have a whole lot in common anymore.
In any case, why aren’t the right wing bloggers and peanut gallery commenters at Breitbart, The National Review and WorldNetDaily absolutely up in arms about Santorum calling them stupid?
Tee-hee! Personally, I think Rick Santorum has inadvertently hit on THE defining reason for the GOP’s problems with “the elite, smart people”: Intelligent, NON-GULLIBLE voters will, never, ever cede the control of their lives to the likes of Michele Bachmann, Steve King or Todd Akin. Any Republican politician who could carry Mississippi, Alabama or Arkansas in a national election IS GOING TO LOSE in the more populous, better-educated coastal states. You can stuff your face with Chick-fil-A until you puke, but nothing is going to change that fact, bunky. The GOP has backed itself into a demographic corner, a demographic that’s literally dying off.
So what advice will those multi-million dollar consulting and marketing firms come up with to help the GOP keep winning elections after they get absolutely trounced this November? Forget about them, I say to you, Republican overlords: It was those top dollar marketing smarty-pantses that gave you guys Mitt fuckin’ Romney in the first place
Nope, Rick Santorum has already got it all figured it out for ya, you shadowy reptilian Republican druids who pull the levers of power behind the curtain: It’s all coming down a simple matter of smart vs DUMB and Santorum defined the battle yesterday in a single sentence of crystal clear truth:
“We will never have the elite, smart people on our side.”
That’s right, NEVER.
Gutting the educational system is the far right’s very last chance of even holding the ground they have now. The Republican establishment pretty much knows that they can’t win national elections strictly along racial demographic lines anymore. Richard Nixon’s so-called “Southern Strategy” is kaput after this current election cycle. But since blockheads tend to vote as a bloc, in the long game, taking advantage of “The Great American IQ Stratification” (which is inevitably how history will see it, unless history is written by future David Bartons) and trying to encourage deeper ignorance and more widespread stupidity is the GOP’s only hope.
A common refrain seen in comments across the blogosphere of late is that an Obama win in November would be the best thing that could possibly happen for “opposition” Fox News.
I’m not so sure about that.
Even as but a “casual consumer” of what Fox News has on offer—I’m someone who usually only sees the gnarliest Fox clips belched up by the Internet—I can’t help but notice just how fucking tired it all seems lately. The same people saying the same damned things over and over and over again. It goes without saying that Fox News viewers tend not to be the sharpest, or best informed, marbles in the bag, but I would imagine that even those low IQ Jim-Bobs and Billy-Joes are getting tired of hearing the same people saying the same damned things over and over and over again. The obvious repetition of Republican talking points and constant, never-wavering anti-Obama kvetching—can it really go on like this for another four years without a major reinvention and a totally clean slate of new faces?
Fox’s audience share, while still strong, has been falling for years. Even if its audience doesn’t exactly desert Fox News, it’s an unavoidable fact of the yawning grave awaiting us all that their audience is dying off in great number with every passing year. Cranky old white guys aren’t being generated by the gene pool fast enough anymore. Certainly not in number enough for the Republican Party to survive, that’s seems demographically assured, so why should Fox News be any different?
Not only is Fox News becoming mind-numbingly repetitive—or even MORE mind-numbingly repetitive than it’s been for years, I should clarify—which is quite difficult, if you think about it, being a business which should theoretically thrive on novelty, it’s increasingly feeling completely anachronistic, like seeing the Spice Girls turning up again at the Olympics. Moving forward who is going to advertise on the network save for Geritol, Depends adult diapers or those “Help, I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” informercials? Fox News has a demographic every bit as, um, finite, shall we say, as print newspaper subscribers.
Fox News saw an overall 17% decline in viewership in March 2012 and there was a 27% drop with younger viewers from the year before. In May, Fox News was down about 21% during prime time in the 25-to-54 group. The only demographic sticking with Fox seem to be Social Security beneficiaries. I’d love to see the numbers for the percentage of Fox News viewers puttering around with portable oxygen tanks or who drive one of those scooters you always see advertised on the network.
Sean Hannity? Sarah Palin? Laura Ingraham? Ann Coulter? Who the fuck cares anymore what these people think? We already know. They must be bored saying this shit. Are you in the least bit curious, or do you really wonder how much Sean Hannity will hate on anything and everything that Obama says or does? Do you expect any surprises from his show? EVER? I mean this is some of the worst, weakest shit on offer. No one watches CNN anymore (it’s good for the treadmill as far as I am concerned) but compared to Fox News, it’s like at least they try!
Doesn’t this clip from last night’s O’Reilly Factor feel like you’re watching some sort of “nostalgia” news channel for old people? How much longer will Fox News president Roger Ailes think Sarah Palin is doing his network more good than harm? AIles should try to renew his network’s mission and inject some fresh blood into the team before it’s too late. If he’s legacy-conscious, it’s imperative that he act now. Ailes needs to get rid of the deadwood and dead-brained Fox “talent” who still think it’s 2009. If he doesn’t reinvent Fox News soon, at 72, he runs the risk of seeing his brainchild croak before he does.
It might. Since there is no third party candidate to split the vote this time around, kooky Michelle Bachmann of Minnesota, one of the best conservative fundraisers in the Republican party is starting to look extremely vulnerable in her district for the first time since her 2006 election to the House. Although Bachmann is still in the lead, her margin over Democrat challenger Jim Graves has completely collapsed in two months. Via Salon:
Despite her national fan base and a massive war chest, Rep. Michele Bachmann may be in more danger than most suspect, with a new poll showing her lead diminished to just 2 points. Independent voters have swung against her by nearly 20 points in just two months, from a 4 percent advantage to a 15 point disadvantage. The internal poll, conducted by Democratic pollsters Greenberg Quinlan Rosner at the behest of Democrat Jim Graves’ campaign and shared with Salon, shows that Bachmann’s favorability rating has tumbled since their last survey in mid-June, and finds Graves gaining ground with independents as his name recognition grows.
Overall, the poll shows Bachmann leading Graves 48-46 percent, within the margin of error. The race has moved significantly among independents, with a 20-point net shift toward Graves, from a 41-45 percent disadvantage in June to a 52-37 percent lead now. Among independents, Bachmann’s favorability rating has slipped 4 points while her unfavorability rating has jumped 7 points. Overall, she’s viewed mostly negatively. Among all voters, 40 percent give her a positive job rating, while a sizable 57 percent give her a negative one, with a plurality of 35 percent giving the most negative answer possible — “poor.”
Graves’ campaign manager (and son) Adam Graves told Salon that the numbers show his candidate is well positioned to beat Bachmann. “Obviously, we’re very excited about it. The first thing that’s notable is that obviously her recent comments, the stories that she’s created for herself, have really hurt her among folks in the middle,” he said. Bachmann, who had tried to keep a lower profile after aborting her presidential bid, grabbed headlines this summer for her implication that Muslims in the U.S. government may be secret agents of the Muslim Brotherhood.
As Salon points out, there has been no other public survey of the district’s voters, although one might expect that the Bachmann campaign has commissioned its own polls. That none have been released might be an indication that they aren’t exactly what the zany Republican congresswoman wanted to hear. Bachmann, the former GOP presidential candidate who claimed that God “told” her to run before dropping out of the race, performed poorly in the Republican primary last month.
