Like so…
 
The nice girl and her Schlep Labs posse have done it again for America…
 

 
After the jump: remembering The Great Schlep…

 
Hank Williams Jr. should learn to shut his fucking mouth before he puts his foot so far down his throat he’ll dislodge the impacted turd called Ted Nugent that’s lodged in his lower intestinal tract. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, he accuses President Obama of hating America and in a fit of Tea Party-style paranoia (probably induced by an overdose of chewing tobacco and Jim Beam) fears that the President is out to strip Americans of their Christian names.

Here’s a tidbit of hillbilly wisdom from Bocephus as featured in the RS interview:

On “Keep the Change,” you sing, “I’ll keep my freedom / I’ll keep my guns /  I’ll keep my money / and my religion too/ I will keep my Christian name and you all can keep the change.” What did you mean by that?
Exactly what I said, cousin.

Yeah, but when you talk about your Christian name …
You know, we’ve got a President that does a call to the Koran or Mecca or whatever. That’s what I meant. That’s exactly what I meant. I won’t be changing my name to whatever. That’s exactly what I meant.”

Why do you think he (Obama) hates America?
Oh, you know I don’t know. I don’t know about that but it’s kind of obvious. I guess when you take a tour, a world tour, to apologize for America. He did that, you know?”

Hank Jr. is an asshole with the soul of a nasty drunk.  And if there’s any doubt about that, just listen to the mean-spirited prick recorded in Kansas some time in the early nineties during an alcohol-fueled performance of his ode to guns, booze and pick-up trucks, “Country Boy Can Survive.” This is not the country music of his father. This is music to kick shit by.  
 

 
Although we are still several months away from the November general election, and this new Bloomberg poll certainly bucks the trend of most of the polls we’ve been seeing lately (which show a much tighter race), it’s interesting to note that its underlying implication is that Thurston Howell III Mitt Romney has gained almost zero ground with likely voters after an entire year of campaigning.

Although this obviously bodes rather poorly for the millionaire Republican presumptive nominee, enthusiasm to re-elect Obama looks tepid, too.

Barack Obama has opened a significant lead over Mitt Romney in a Bloomberg National Poll that reflects the presumed Republican nominee’s weaknesses more than the president’s strengths.

Obama leads Romney 53 percent to 40 percent among likely voters, even as the public gives him low marks on handling the economy and the deficit, and six in 10 say the nation is headed down the wrong track, according to the poll conducted June 15- 18.

The survey shows Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, has yet to repair the damage done to his image during the Republican primary. Thirty-nine percent of Americans view him favorably, about the same as when he announced his presidential candidacy last June, while 48 percent see him unfavorably—a 17-percentage point jump during a nomination fight dominated by attacks ads. A majority of likely voters, 55 percent, view him as more out of touch with average Americans compared with 36 percent who say the president is more out of touch.

Taken together, the results suggest an unsettled political environment for both Obama and Romney five months from the November election, with voters choosing for now to stick with a president they say is flawed rather than backing a challenger they regard as undefined and disconnected.

If this poll is an indication of any sort of trend—and I’m not saying it is, because until more polls confirm its results, it should be viewed as an outlier—then all Obama would need to do to coast to re-election is to keep hammering away at Romney as a vulture capitalist, corporate raider who will most certainly bend tax reform to benefit his own family’s vast fortune and future investment income, as a guy has no idea what the poor and middle class are going through, and portray him as the Grinch who will steal healthcare. (Well, that and praying to fuck for no unforeseen bad news about the economy, scandals, oils spills, terrorist attacks, natural disasters, etc.).

The Romney campaign ads SUCK, they aren’t even SHITTY, and are totally ineffectual at redefining a guy who we’ve all seen daily on our tee-vee sets for the past four years, whereas the Obama campaign has unleashed some hilariously nasty, viciously scathing—but quite true—ads, just excoriating Romney. Some of them are mini-masterpieces of political ridicule.

Nothing quite like the nuclear bomb (”When Mitt Romney Came to Town”) that Newt Gingrich threw in Romney’s face back in January, however, although I am sure that Obama’s own version of this political Kraken will unleashed by say, late August.

Wait for it, it’s coming. They’re just sharpening their knives and Romney’s such a fucking dipshit that he gives them new material to work with on an hourly basis. If this is the Obama campaign’s definition of “lighthearted” I can’t wait to see what they come up when the gloves are really off.

Jackson Browne at Occupy DC

Veteran Democratic fundraiser Jackson Browne says that he’ll still vote for Obama in November, but the legendary Laurel Canyon singer/songwriter is not exactly prepared to raise any more money for him as he told Sharon Waxman at The Wrap:

Are you involved in the presidential campaign?
No, I’m not. Actually I sort of turned a corner and decided that one of the problems in our political system is the money. However, I’m involved politically, and I’m very interested in the Occupy (Wall Street) movement.

I’m very interested in what people do individually and in groups, and it wouldn’t and shouldn’t be a fucking surprise to anybody that I’m going to vote for Obama—but honestly Obama once again has joined the ranks of the lesser of two evils. The great parade of people that the progressives get to vote for who are the lesser of two evils and who don’t really represent what I believe in any overwhelming balance.

But you’re not gonna—
No, I’m not going to raise money for people who don’t really… Look, Obama told me in a personal conversation that he wasn’t up for any new (nuclear) plants. Obviously, he changed his mind at some point. But what a surprise that one of his main supporters is the energy company, Exelon—which has nuclear plants—and that he would suddenly change his policy.

I don’t know what we would expect. He’s just as a beholden to the people who put him in office as any of the Republicans would be. But what’s a mystery to me is how he installed pretty much the exact same infrastructure in his administration that deals with finances as the administration that we thought we voted out. That’s really a shocker.

It’s a game of chicken. So I’m not going to participate. Every day it’s like a fever. Like, “Oh my God, if we don’t have $27,000 by tonight the DCC won’t think we’re being effective.” I mean I’m sorry, I can’t.

Read the entire interview at The Wrap

Jackson Browne performs acoustic versions of “These Days” and “Running on Empty” on Later with Jools Holland in 2004.
 

 
YouTuber wingnut Projectinsighter uploaded an in-depth video breakdown about the reptilian thing-a-ma-bobber implanted on the back of President Obama’s head.

Notice the Days of Egyptian Gods..The Alien in the back of the Head. Then look at the new scars of Obama and his alien in the back of his head..Hell is upon us.

BarondePencier points out in the YouTube comments, “As a reptilian alien symbiote, working in the ancient Anti-American conspiracy department, I’d like to say that this video is insulting to reptilians everywhere.”

Agreed.
 

 
Via The Daily What

Meet the Hon. James David Manning, PhD, a minister and Internet podcaster from New York City who HATES President Barack “Hussein” Obama. I mean really hates him. Manning has called Obama a pimp, a “homo” crackhead and Hitler.

His favorite thing to call the President, however, is “the long-legged Mack Daddy.” Manning also hates Michelle Obama, has called her ugly, a slut and has even suggested she visit the same plastic surgeon as Michael Jackson. Manning’s Trinity of Hell is comprised of Obama, Oprah Winfrey and the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. It should probably come as no surprise that he’s been a guest on Sean Hannity’s Fox News and radio shows.

Manning is proud to call himself an extreme right winger and is beloved of birthers, survivalists, Obama haters, the NRA and other assorted wingnuts. On his five days a week, three hours per day talk show, which he co-produces with his wife, he does bizarre and extremely unfunny “mock interviews” with Fidel Castro, prays fervently for Bristol Palin and he even had “author” Lawrence W Sinclair (“Brother Lawrence” as Manning calls him) of Barack Obama & Larry Sinclair: Cocaine, Sex, Lies & Murder? infamy on as a guest.

Manning is nuttier than the proverbial fruitcake and there is no low he’s not tempted to reach for. Irresponsible, not-in-any-way grounded in reality speculation abounds on his podcasts. His ignorance is astonishing. Sound like anyone familiar? To my mind, Manning is the black Glenn Beck! Even more to the point, he’s like some weird, bizarro world hybrid of Beck and Uncle Ruckus from The Boondocks! I mean, wow, this guy shocked even me. I also laughed until I cried. Manning is so ridiculous that they need some new words to describe him, the old standbys just won’t do any more.

Here’s his latest crackpot conspiracy theory about Newton Leroy Gingrich and Willard Mitt Romney both being biracial, featuring a Jimmy Castor Bunch sample from “Troglodyte”... His proof is interesting, to say the least!
 

 
After the jump, Manning explains why the white folk are getting ready to riot…

 
After mulling over Obama’s (surprising? uncharacteristic?) plan to raise taxes on millionaires—and his threat to veto any “Super Congress” budget cuts to entitlements—he can’t really go back on that, can he? He’d be crucified on the right and left, and justifiably so—I must say I feel greatly relieved…

At last the guy is punching back—and hard: The so-called “Buffett Tax” is a well thought out way to drive a wedge between the class alliance strange bedfellows that comprises today’s Republican party. America’s GOP blue-collar workers are about to see EXACTLY what they have in common with the rich.

Well played! (Hint: It’s not money or political influence, but you knew that)

Personally, I’d soak the rich (during the Eisenhower administration, the top tax rate was nearly 90%) and this won’t go nearly far enough for my particular Bolshie tastes, but for a President who has proven himself time and again to be a shitty negotiator, THE WORST, like a bad joke, this was still an impressive move, I thought. A veto threat is the definitive presidential line in the sand. He actually HAS decided to take on the Republicans in the class war (which frankly was his sole option anyway).

In the words of Dana Milbank, writing in the Washington Post:

At last, the president hasn’t conceded the race before the starter’s gun, hasn’t opened the bidding with his bottom line, hasn’t begun a game of strip poker in his boxer shorts.

Sums it up so far, doesn’t it? For now let’s just hope that Obama isn’t proven by events to have some sort of “bad negotiator” Tourette’s syndrome where he shoots himself in the foot again, nervously blurting out pre-compromises and ceding ground he wasn’t even asked to cede…

For the past three years, it felt like Obama had almost completely abandoned the Americans who had happily voted for him (union members, progressives, greens, African-Americans, Latinos, middle-class Democrats, etc, etc) in favor of some Quixotic effort to woo the most ideologically rigid bunch of Reich wingers to come along in several generations. He could have done so much in his first 100 days and he, I think, fucked it up royally. The Democrats controlled the White House, the House and the Senate. The held all the keys cards, but mostly folded. If there was a strategy, I was unable to discern it and I’m not alone.

It was his own damned fault, not the Republicans. They TOLD Obama that they wanted to see his presidency fail. They told him this straight up and he refused to take that boldly declared statement—as they most assuredly meant it—at face value. What was subtle about the GOP position? It can be summed up in two letters, N and O. How would it have benefited their goals in any way to do or to be seen doing anything bipartisan by their constituency? That would have only served to make Obama more popular and yet nearly every move he made was to cater to them. It’s been maddening to watch. Are his advisers so lame that they can’t parse a statement as simple as “Fuck you, asshole” and take it to its logical conclusion vis-à-vis national politics, then James Carville was most certainly right, they all should be fired. Bill Maher said that Obama could personally save Republicans from drowning and they still wouldn’t vote for him! As Maher repeatedly exhorted the President, it was high time for Obama to “flip the script.” 

It was as if over the summer, Obama (finally!) had an epiphany about the Republicans, at long last realizing that they fucking hate his fucking guts. It’s as if he’s been reading Daily Kos, AlterNet and MoveOn, taking to heart what Maher, Carville, Paul Krugman and just about every lefty talking head and blogger has been shouting at him at the top of their lungs and finally decided to DO SOMETHING LIBERAL. For a change.

Don’t get me wrong, this is a great start and if Obama sticks to his guns this time, it’ll be more than that: nothing less than the return of a truly progressive President Obama, the one we voted for and thought showed up for work on Inauguration Day. That man has been curiously absent for much of Obama’s first term, it’s nice to have him back. He made that veto threat and now it’s up to progressives to make sure he lives up to his words, without compromise this time. If Obama lets the base down again, he’s fucking toast, but I think he finally realizes that.

Below, Bill O’Reilly says he might QUIT if Obama raises taxes on millionaires like him. CALL HIS BLUFF, MR. PRESIDENT!
 

Obama as Lincoln portrait by Ron English

Political commentator and humorist, Tina Dupuy has written one of the best summaries of the Obama presidency so far. This woman deserves her own TV show on Current or MSNBC, she really does…

There was a 90 percent top marginal tax rate under President Dwight Eisenhower. Ronald Reagan raised taxes nearly every year he was in office and still managed to quadruple the national debt. Teddy Roosevelt was an anti-business trust-buster who snatched Yosemite away from private profits. Gerald Ford ended a long pointless war in Vietnam even though pontificators like Pat Buchanan claim we could have won…eventually. George W. Bush bailed out the banks and the auto industry. I won’t even utter the names Herbert Hoover or Richard Nixon (Republicans sure won’t).

Historians agree the best Republican President was also the first: Abraham Lincoln. Who’s second runner up? Which President has represented Republican values best? Easy. President Barack Obama.

First off – his signature legislative accomplishment was to implement a Republican/Heritage Foundation idea from 1989. Assuring Affordable Health Care for All Americans reads, “[N]either the federal government nor any state requires all households to protect themselves from the potentially catastrophic costs of a serious accident or illness. Under the Heritage plan, there would be such a requirement…A mandate on households certainly would force those with adequate means to obtain insurance protection.”

The Heritage Foundation has since recanted and even filed friend-of-the-court briefs against the mandate. This is only after an alleged Democrat was for it. There’s been a pattern of this partisanship before policy since Obama was sworn in.

But if you ignore the misplaced (and often misspelled) vehemence against the first African-American president as a communist/socialist/Marxist/bad “ist” du jour and instead just look at the policy – we have a stellar Republican in the Oval Office.

Obama renewed the Bush Tax Cuts. Republicans love those tax cuts even more than they love being against something once Obama has signed it. In fact the President hasn’t raised taxes at all – just like Republicans say they won’t (see: “Read my lips – no new taxes.”). The only tax he’s raised is on smokers. Obama increased the tax on cigarettes even though he’s an admitted (reformed) smoker. But even that is ideal in a Republican hypocrite kind of way (see: too many anti-gay Republicans in gay sex scandals to list).

And on top of the Bush Tax Cuts – Obama cut even more taxes for 95 percent of Americans.

Plus, he’s cut the size of government! Yes. Regardless of all those email forwards your kooky great-aunt sends you from her decades-old AOL account – the public work force has been reduced under an Obama presidency – therefore “shrinking the size of government.” The reason we had no net jobs in August is because the public sector (i.e., the government) lost jobs due to cuts. The private sector gained the exact amount resulting in a push.

President Obama has managed to quell all anti-war protests and even start a new conflict. That is surely to be the envy of any Republican president who’s ever served.

Guantanamo Bay? Still open. Osama bin Laden? Shot in the head.

Talk about getting 98 percent of what they wanted. If the GOP didn’t have to change their goal post so Obama could never score in their view – Republicans could be dumping Gatorade on Rush Limbaugh by now.

Read the rest of “Obama is the Best Republican President Since Lincoln” (Tina Dupuy.com)

 
As eloquent a summary of the left’s collective raspberry of Obama as I’ve yet heard articulated.

No idea who this guy is, if he’s a real person, a real candidate, etc. Nevertheless, few people have said it better in recently memory.

Totally worth a listen, but the best points are made during minutes four through seven.
 

 
Via The Atlantic

 
Listen as Bill Maher says the truest shit you’ve ever heard about Obama…

“There is a good 40% of this country who wouldn’t vote for you if you personally saved them from drowning. So get rid of that baggage of caring about the people who will not vote for you anyway and be a strong liberal Democratic president. You owe it to us.”

The whole thing is worth watching, but he starts to really get cooking at about 3:20 in.
 

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

 
Just thought I would check in and report on how it’s going on the other side of the world on this momentous day. And I just LOVE this “Prairie-Dog Rapture” pic! Well, so far so good… unless you are a fundie, I guess. No sign of any earthquakes or bodies being mysteriously sucked up into the sky. Yet. There’s still two hours to go ‘til the official kick-off time so you never know, it might happen, but reports from the expanses of the planet that have already hit that 6pm deadline report nothing unusual. Oh, wait, there WERE a couple of earthquakes in the Pacific, but they were small (3-4 on the Richter scale, surely not God bothering size?) and apparently there tends to be a small earthquake somewhere in the Pacific every day anyway.

I am in Ireland at the moment and interestingly (for such a predominantly Catholic country) no one seems too fussed by this whole rapture malarky. Maybe the populace have had other things to think about. This week has seen a royal visit by Queen Elizabeth, the first visit to this isle of a British monarch since Ireland fought for, and won, independence way back in 1922. Now THAT is a momentous occasion. People who would normally be described as “patriots” and who within their own lifetimes have seen periods of real animosity against the British were seen cooing and ahhing at the British monarch’s presence. There were protests, of course, but the turnouts were small, estimated at around the 200 mark. This is what they looked like from the inside:
 

 
By all accounts the visit was a roaring success. Liz had a tour of ghostly Dublin, where roads were blocked off to keep people away from her highness. She was brought to Croke Park, the 80,000+ capacity sports arena that has a very special significance in the history of Irish nationalism. Bought by the Gaelic Athletics Association in 1913, it was used to encourage the playing of indigenous sports hurling and Gaelic football (at a time when the country was under strict British rule) and was seen as a hotbed of anti-British conspiracy by the then powers-that-be. It was at Croke Park that the infamous original Bloody Sunday occurred in 1921 when, in retaliation for a number of assassinations by the IRA, the British army and the Royal Irish Constabulary indiscriminately shot into the crowd during a Dublin-Tipperary football match killing 13 spectators and the Tipperary football captain. It was this incident that turned the tide of the war of independence against the British and ultimately led to the withdrawal of British troops from most of the island. The fact that the Queen visited this specific arena says a lot about how far relations between the Irish and the English have come in the resulting ninety years. 

Her Madge also stopped off at the Coolmore Stud, the world’s largest breeding centre for thoroughbred horses, and in Cork city made a visit to its famous English Market. That bit was of particular significance to me, as my mother’s family have had a fruit and vegetable stall there for over 100 years. The English Market is a beautiful, hidden treasure in the vastly under-rated city (Cork is MUCH nicer than Dublin!) and could dearly use a boost in visits and trade in this era of multinationalization.
 

The English Market - the white haired man is my uncle.

Even more excitingly though, for me and a lot of people other people anyway, on Monday we will be being graced by a visit from President of the United States and the First Lady Barack and Michelle Obama. It’s only a flying visit really, as he is on his way to the UK for 4 days, but while here he will be travelling to County Offaly to look up some of his ancestors, and giving a public address on College Green in Dublin city centre. I expect the turn out for this to be very strong, and even though there will be a stepped up security presence, I really don’t think he has anything to worry about. In fact I think he will be greeted by a very warm Irish welcome, something that eluded President Bush a few years back. I won’t be here then, unfortunately, but the Irish media will be supplying day-long rolling coverage of his visit if you are interested in watching. I expect there to be protests too, but they will most likely be Queen-sized.

Anyway, so where was I… oh yes! The Rapture. Hmm, well there’s still a bit of time to kill before believers get hoovered up (or not). If there is any breaking news on this side of the pond I will dutifully report it. Or I might not actually, preferring to spend that time with my family. But for some reason or other all day I just haven’t been able to get this bloody song out of my mind. Any ideas why? Answers in a comment to the usual address…
 

 
Brazilian Obama impersonator, Ananias Rodrigues da Silva, posed for some photos with a local São Paulo man named Francisco Helder Braga Fernandes who looks eerily like Osama bin Laden. Apparently folks who live in São Paulo have been begging Frenandes for years to cut his beard because of his striking resemblance to bin Laden. It’s probably a good thing he resisted, because this amusing photo-shoot would not have taken place.

 
More Osama and Obama palling around after the jump…

 
Update: It appears the woman is probably a sign language interpreter.
 
(via Wonkette)

 
In a 2007 campaign stop in Spartanburg, South Carolina, then-candidate Barack Obama told a crowd:

“f American workers are being denied their right to organize when I’m in the White House, I will put on a comfortable pair of shoes and I will walk on that picket line with you as president of the United States.”