FOLLOW US ON:
GET THE NEWSLETTER
CONTACT US
Must-see chart explaining the budget deficit


 
Graphic via New York Times, text below from James Fallows at The Atlantic:

It’s based on data from the Congressional Budget Office and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Its significance is not partisan (who’s “to blame” for the deficit) but intellectual. It demonstrates the utter incoherence of being very concerned about a structural federal deficit but ruling out of consideration the policy that was largest single contributor to that deficit, namely the Bush-era tax cuts.

An additional significance of the chart: it identifies policy changes, the things over which Congress and Administration have some control, as opposed to largely external shocks—like the repercussions of the 9/11 attacks or the deep worldwide recession following the 2008 financial crisis. Those external events make a big difference in the deficit, and they are the major reason why deficits have increased faster in absolute terms during Obama’s first two years than during the last two under Bush. (In a recession, tax revenues plunge, and government spending goes up - partly because of automatic programs like unemployment insurance, and partly in a deliberate attempt to keep the recession from getting worse.) If you want, you could even put the spending for wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in this category: those were policy choices, but right or wrong they came in response to an external shock. 

The point is that governments can respond to but not control external shocks. That’s why we call them “shocks.” Governments can control their policies. And the policy that did the most to magnify future deficits is the Bush-era tax cuts. You could argue that the stimulative effect of those cuts is worth it (“deficits don’t matter” etc). But you cannot logically argue that we absolutely must reduce deficits, but that we absolutely must also preserve every penny of those tax cuts. Which I believe precisely describes the House Republican position.

After the jump, from a previous “The Chart That Should…” positing, an illustration of the respective roles of external shock and deliberate policy change in creating the deficit.

Obama is a fucking idiot the way he’s played his hand on the debt ceiling. He appears to be an ineffectual fool trying to broker peace with a bunch of schoolyard bullies. The whole thing is so Planet of the Apes. When Mitch McConnell (sensibly, for all parties) tried to offer him the political cover to raise it on his own, he should have jumped at the chance. Now look at the mess he’s in. When is the guy going to act like a Democrat (at the very least!)? It’s becoming harder and harder to support him or even give a shit what happens to his presidency anymore (I’m sure I’ll change my tune closer to November 2012, but voting for Obama with the same “passion” I felt for John Kerry is not something I imagined happening a couple of years ago…)

How the Deficit Got This Big (New York Times)

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
07.26.2011
08:21 pm
|
Michele Bachmann: Gays are ‘part of Satan,’ Westboro Baptists gays’ ‘best friends’


 
At the National Education Leadership Conference in 2004, Michele Bachmann, then Minnesota State Senator, gave a lecture on the effects of same-sex marriage on education. It’s as stupid you you might imagine.

There is not a whole lot of nuance in her words describing homosexuality and LGBT people, is there?

“I am not here bashing people who are homosexuals, who are lesbians, who are bisexual, who are transgendered. We need to have profound compassion for the people who are dealing with the very real issue of sexual dysfunction in their life, and sexual identity disorders. This is a very real issue. It’s not funny, it’s sad. Any of you who have members of your family that are in the lifestyle—we have a member of our family that is. This is not funny. It’s a very sad life. It’s part of Satan, I think, to say this is gay. It’s anything but gay.”

Funny, but her brand of “profound compassion” sounds just like Christianist bigotry to me. Exactly like it, in fact. Is there ANY discernable difference?

Here’s another winner. Bachmann on hate-monger Fred Phelps:

“I almost think that the gay community has hired this guy, or created this guy, to do what he does. He is their best friend.”

Noted and quoted.
 

 
Via Dump Bachmann

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
07.13.2011
02:28 pm
|
Slave labor in America: Union workers replaced by prisoners in Wisconsin


 
The highly controversial new law in Wisconsin gutting collective bargaining rights for state union workers is now in effect and already changes are afoot in the dairy state. Not good ones.

Via Think Progress:

As the Madison Capital Times reports, “Besides losing their right to negotiate over the percentage of their paycheck that will go toward health care and retirement, unions also lost the ability to claim work as a ‘union-only’ job, opening the door for private workers and evidently even inmates to step in and take their place.” Inmates are not paid for their work, but may receive time off of their sentences.

The law went into effect last week, and Racine County is already using inmates to do landscaping, painting, and another basic maintenance around the county that was previously done by county workers. The union had successfully sued to stop the country from using prison labor for these jobs last year, but with [Governor Scott] Walker’s new law, they have no recourse.

The use of free inmate labor to replace public sector workers is truly a disturbing trend. That’s right folks. Forget about the off-shore outsourcing of jobs. Forget about China’s cheap labor. India’s, too. And don’t blame the Mexicans and illegal immigrants for taking your job, either, bub.

Nope. We’ve got a bigger problem now: How are Americans going to compete in the jobs marketplace against slave labor?

Deeply unpopular Gov. Scott Walker promised to create 250,000 new jobs in Wisconsin during his term in office, but he didn’t say these jobs would be created in the county jails!

This is what you get when you vote Republican.

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
07.08.2011
12:14 pm
|
Vile Republican policies set the stage for socialist revolution in America
06.27.2011
02:40 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
If you can watch this without feeling really (really) shitty about what America has become—or just sobbing—then you must be a fucking Republican.

I was so enraged when I watched this that I felt like my teeth were going to break. (Florida governor Rick Scott can thank his lucky stars he was not in my office at the time. The nicest thing I’d like to do to him is spit right in his face).

ONE QUARTER of American children are living in poverty. In the richest country in the history of the world.

One out of four. HOW is this possible? (Hint: It has a lil’ sumpthin’ sumpthin’ to do with the top 1% having most of the wealth and wealth-producing assets and the entire system being rigged for their exclusive benefit. You can probably work the rest of it out yourself.)

It’s not for some “mysterious” reasons that we’re in this situation. The people who decided to give the super-rich tax cuts while these kids got doomed to such impoverished childhoods HAVE FIRST AND LAST NAMES.

And ADDRESSES.

23.7 trillion dollars for Wall Street and fuck all for these kids?

They don’t vote. Yet.

These kids aren’t dumb, imagine what attitudes they’re going to have towards “the system” (and Republicans!) in another decade? Could even the most callous free-marketeer blame them?

They are being shaped now. Their eyes seem wide open to me.

It’s almost funny—-I said “almost”—to ponder that it’s the likes of “conservatives” Rick Scott, Wisconsin governor Scott Walker, Michigan governor Rick Synder—-NOT TO MENTION THE ENTIRE REPUBLICAN PARTY—who history will see as being the ones who set in motion the policies that saw a generation of American children raised in Dickensian poverty. Polices that, historically, will be seen to have set the stage for inevitable socialist uprising in America. (Doubt what I am saying? Let’s talk again in 2021, ‘kay?).

If even 60 Minutes is running stories like this one, how much longer will it take before there are massive demonstrations and rioting in the streets?

This country needs another WPA like it did in during the FIRST Great Depression and it needed it three years ago. I don’t know about where you live, but here in Los Angeles, the roads sure have a hell of a lot of potholes that need fixing (it’s becoming a disgrace). Do you reckon that the fathers of any of these children would turn a state roads job down?

How much longer can the center hold? Is it even worth it to try to keep it together any longer?
 

 
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
THIS is what America has become, a cruel, cruel society

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
06.27.2011
02:40 pm
|
The answer is ‘free gay porn’ & ‘God,’ but what’s the question?


 
As Wonkette ever so drolly points out (so blame them, disgruntled Mississippians, not me):

[E]ver since the nation’s poorest, most obese and reliably Republican-voting state got Internet access last year, the main thing the people of Mississippi have been looking for, on the ‘puter, is “free gay porn” and “God.”

In that order.

Make of that what you will…

See the full chart at Calamities of Nature

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
06.24.2011
04:45 pm
|
Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur schools heartless Republicans on the poor


 

“There is a heartlessness for people who take everything for themselves and turn their backs on the rest of the American people.”

Heroic Ohio Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, known to many of us for her role in Michael Moore’s Capitalism: A Love Story and for speaking her mind to evil Republicans, gave this great speech on the House floor last week and told it like it T. I. is about the poor in America and cruel GOP policies.

“They hurt the Republic. They hurt our country. And they have not been held accountable…

... I don’t have enough power to hold them accountable, but I hope God does. Because what they’ve done is unforgivable. Their rugged individualism is unpatriotic, it’s un-Christian and it hurts this country.”

The whole speech is good, but she get really cooking just before the five minute mark:
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
06.20.2011
09:19 pm
|
Donald Trump viciously pisses on Republican party in new video
06.10.2011
01:38 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
Don’t pass this by because it’s an item about Donald Trump, this clip is totally worth watching. No matter what your political persuasion—or even what you think of the messenger—Donald Trump makes several good and valid points here. There is probably very little else that he and I would agree on, but his assessment of the GOP is deadly accurate, here. It’s downright vicious, too, which is why it’s so much fun to watch.

He who only recently sought the Republican nomination. Fascinating.

Furthermore, I (more or less) believe Trump’s reasons, as stated in the video, for getting himself out of the mess the Republicans have made for themselves. Sure he took some body shots when he flirted with running in the Spring, but the abject stupidity on offer this year from the Republicans has been absolutely staggering. Too much, apparently for even a prominent birther like Donald Trump. Soon even Orly Taitz will abandon the GOP!

Of course, the coda, where Trump hints bluntly tells viewers that he’s pretty much ready, willing and able (once the new season of The Apprentice is in the can, natch) to jump into the race if the GOP can’t get it act together, is the money shot here.

Since Trump’s burning his GOP bridges with such gusto—and we can be 100% certain that he’s not asking for the Democratic nod—that would leave an independent run. (A third party doesn’t seem like his style, plus who would want him?)

I sincerely hope Donald Trump does a Ross Perot and runs. If he really wants to inflict some damage on the GOP—and from what he says here, who’d doubt that?—an independent run would be the most effective way to go about it. Plus, it would just be such an insane, surrealistic spectacle. I was sad when he got out of the race so early, weren’t you?

Run, Donald, run! And here’s hoping that Sarah Palin is your running mate!

Do it for the good of the country! Pretty please?
 

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
06.10.2011
01:38 pm
|
No Virtue in Selfishness: Some Christians do not like ‘The Ayn Rand Budget’


 
Did you see the footage of Republican Congressman Paul Ryan hot-footing it to his SUV to avoid being handed a Bible at the Faith and Freedom Coalition meeting yesterday? The young man who accosted Ryan, I believe is named James Salt. My hat is off to you, James. Bravo, sir! That took balls, and I’ll bet it was fun!

Via Swampland:

These days, when people question a politician’s “morality,” they usually mean his or her personal behavior and choices. But an interesting thing is happening right now around the GOP budget proposal. A broad coalition of religious voices is criticizing the morality of the choices reflected in budget cuts and tax policy. And they’ve specifically targeted Ryan and his praise for Rand, the philosopher who once said she “promote[d] the ethic of selfishness.”

Across the street from the Faith & Freedom Conference Friday afternoon, a group of religious leaders continued the attack on what they now consistently refer to as “The Ayn Rand Budget.” Father Cletus Kiley, a Catholic priest, declared the Ryan budget “does not pass our test” of Catholic teachings, and suggested that supporters of the budget “drop Ayn Rand’s books and pick up their sacred texts.”

Rand’s influence on Ryan’s politics is also the subject of a new ad produced by the religious group American Values Network, which hopes to run the spot in Ryan’s district. It’s a stinging attack, and again, one that was wholly unanticipated by the Republican rising star.

BRILLIANT!!!! 100% gold-plated genius. LET HIM HAVE IT! They need to make it really hot for this guy…

You won’t hear this in the embedded video below, but in another video of the same event from a different camera, James Salt says: “He [Ryan] will have to account for the suffering he will cause.”

I don’t think James was referring to voters here, when he says Ryan will be held accountable, do you? It’s a pity Ryan didn’t hear that bit…

As YouTube commenter Dr. Frank Crosby quipped: “The mistake the conference organizers made was assuming that Representative Ryan with his hate-filled policies is a Christian.”

”+1,” as the kids say…+1.
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
06.05.2011
09:30 pm
|
The GOP’s ‘useless eaters’ solution: No more food for you, poor people!


 
Let them eat… nothing!

There is currently a record number of Americans—14%—relying on federal food stamp assistance programs and that number is probably not going to shrink, but grow, in the near term, as more and more desperate Americans exhaust their unemployment benefit extensions. The number of recipients has risen 11% since last year and over 61% since 2007. At present there are an incredible 45 million people (21 million families) who depend on this assistance to put food in their bellies. So that they and their children do not go to bed hungry. (My parents run a food kitchen for the poor out of their church basement in West Virginia, the stories I’ve heard are sad and pitiful.)

If the evil Republicans get their way, these poor families, school-age children, veterans of foreign wars and disabled people can just… starve… Via ABC News:

The Republicans’ 2012 budget plan proposes changing SNAP [“Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program”] from an entitlement to a block-grant program that would be tailored for each individual state, much like their proposal for Medicaid. States would no longer receive open-ended subsidies and the aid would be contingent on work or job training. It would also limit funding for the program.

“Limit funding”? In certain states (see New Mexico, Florida, Michigan) they’d just eliminate it entirely.

Why should poor people think they have some kind of a right to eat?

Rand Paul would tell you this himself: Food, like healthcare, is not a right! If some Americans have to starve to death, this is what it takes to preserve our freedom!

It amazes me that Republicans think stirring up these kinds of vicious class resentments somehow helps them politically. I mean, sure, the very, very poorest people tend not to vote, but this stuff is just so nasty that I can’t help wondering what is really going to happen if/when these sorts of cuts go into effect. Do they really expect that these folks will simply STOP EATING AND DIE?

Well, judging from the GOP’s behavior, maybe they do! How else do you explain away this particular aspect of “compassionate conservatism”? Well… now that you mention if, it would certainly help balance the budget if a ton of poor people died. Why just think of the tax cuts for the rich!

Will the Republicans finally be happy when we’re all living in a country that resembles Mad Max far more than it does Leave it to Beaver? Is this what the Republicans want? It sure seems that way to me. If not that, then what? What am I missing???

But the thing is, right, is it actually good for them, too? Think of the shitty karma the Republicans unleash by skull-fucking the poor and indigent?

It’s a very black and white situation: Vote a certain way and millions of people go hungry. Vote a certain way and INSURE an increase in misery for the weakest members of society (just like Jesus would want!).

Would you want that stain on your karma? There is a special place in Hell for someone so cruel and ugly.

It’s not really any kind of grand “thought experiment” to imagine another member of Congress being shot—a Republican this time—not by some lunatic like Jared Lee Loughner, but by a broken man who’s completely lost his shit because he can no longer feed his family. Some sad guy, completely depressed walks into a town hall meeting or a political appearance with a gun and decides to confront the cold-hearted bastard who he blames for fucking his life up and shoots him. It’s not difficult to imagine at all. But again, it won’t be a professional lunatic next time, it’s going to be a destitute, desperate John Q type-situation. It’s gonna happen, it’s just a matter or when.

For the record, I’m not a big fan of violence, but it does have its place, historically, in the class war that’s raged since human society began. Admittedly the image of say, Rep. Paul Ryan, being forced to fellate a Colt .45 in front of news cameras and having to beg for his life by a once-proud middle-class father reduced to moving his family into a car is something I’d really enjoy seeing. (I think whoever did that would go down in history as a folk hero and at least THEY FEED YOU IN JAIL)

The Republicans think that they can cut entitlements for the poor with impunity because the poor don’t vote. But they are not immune from the laws of karma: What if a new front in the class war opens up that doesn’t involve the ballot box?

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
06.01.2011
01:07 pm
|
Ayn Rand & the Republican Party vs. Jesus


 
Ha-ha, I always knew this would eventually happen. It was only a matter of time…

Christian voters must choose: Ayn Rand or Jesus

GOP leaders and conservative pundits have brought upon themselves a crisis of values. Many who for years have been the loudest voices invoking the language of faith and moral values are now praising the atheist philosopher Ayn Rand whose teachings stand in direct contradiction to the Bible. Rand advocates a law of selfishness over love and commands her followers to think only of themselves, not others. She said her followers had to choose between Jesus and her teachings.

GOP leaders want to argue that they are defending Christian principles. But, at the same time, Rep. Paul Ryan (author of the GOP budget) is posting facebook videos praising Rand’s morality and saying hers is the “kind of thinking that is sorely needed right now.” Simply put, Paul Ryan can’t have it both ways, and neither can Christians. As conservative evangelical icon Chuck Colson recently stated, Christians can not support Rand’s philosophy and Christ’s teachings. The choice is simple: Ayn Rand or Jesus Christ. We must choose one and forsake the other.

The Republican Party IS in the grips of a long-dead, fanatically anti-Christian cult leader. Straight up, I’d have to say that this message is on point. (I might add that it was Ayn Rand more than ANY other figure who caused me to “lose my religion” when I was a pre-teen. This is about the ONLY good thing that came of my brief junior high school infatuation with Ayn Rand’s books.)

The far-right cultural warriors are turning on each other! Fantastic!

Ayn Rand on why the Christian Message is “Monstrous” and Christ’s Teachings are “Evil” (American Values Network)
 

Via Jesus Needs New P.R.

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.27.2011
03:34 pm
|
George Carlin on the Republican’s ‘Ryan plan’
05.23.2011
02:32 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
Not exactly, but he might as well be talking about the so-called “Ryan plan” from beyond the grave…

The more things change, the more they… oh wait, nothing’s changed!

This video is as evergreen as it is brilliant, a “one size fits all” discourse of the futility of capitalism that lends itself to an infinite number of different blogging contexts. Today, it’s the “Ryan plan.”
 

 
Via Crooks and Liars

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.23.2011
02:32 pm
|
Scott Walker, the Governor of Wisconsin, is a horrible human being


 
Just when you thought Gov. Scott Walker couldn’t get any worse, or do anything stupider than he already has, he doubles down on the dumb!

Walker is currently making moves which would ban hospital visitation rights for same-sex couples. What a creep!

What’s the point of this nonsense? From The Journal Sentinel:

Gov. Scott Walker believes a new law that gives gay couples hospital visitation rights violates the state constitution and has asked a judge to allow the state to stop defending it.

Democrats who controlled the Legislature in 2009 changed the law so that same-sex couples could sign up for domestic partnership registries with county clerks to secure some - but not all - of the rights afforded married couples.

Wisconsin Family Action sued last year in Dane County circuit court, arguing that the registries violated a 2006 amendment to the state constitution that bans gay marriage and any arrangement that is substantially similar.

This is shameful. That’s all it is.

I can’t fathom why Walker thinks this is good politics, either. Oh right, he’s a fucking idiot!
 

 
Via Daily Kos

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.17.2011
11:25 am
|
Rand Paul: Second Dumbest Republican Senator?


 
When one is obliged to come up with four or five items a day under the rubric “Dangerous Minds,” the Republican party are the proverbial fish in a barrel. Low(brow) hanging fruit. There are never slow news days with so many craven GOP idiots in Washington. Apparently there is some kind of “Bizarro World” reverse Republican IQ litmus test that you have to pass—or fail, depending on how you look at it—to be a member these days.

Of course it’s always been bad—and there are many, many deeply dumb Democrats to be sure, stupidity is unavoidable in U.S politics—but I’d have to say that the current crop of GOP politicians is the most imbecilic I can recall during my lifetime. Is there a dumber member of the Senate than Rand Paul of Kentucky? (James Inhofe came immediately to mind, I must admit…)

Witness the “universal healthcare is slavery” comments made at a Senate hearing yesterday by the dimwitted senator named after the author of Atlas Shrugged. They’re… special!.

Via Raw Story:

“With regard to the idea of whether you have a right to health care, you have realize what that implies,” the senator said. “It’s not an abstraction. I’m a physician. That means you have a right to come to my house and conscript me.”

“It means you believe in slavery,” Paul added. “It means that you’re going to enslave not only me, but the janitor at my hospital, the person who cleans my office, the assistants who work in my office, the nurses.”

“Basically, once you imply a belief in a right to someone’s services — do you have a right to plumbing? Do you have a right to water? Do you have right to food? — you’re basically saying you believe in slavery.”

“I’m a physician in your community and you say you have a right to health care,” Paul continued. “You have a right to beat down my door with the police, escort me away and force me to take care of you? That’s ultimately what the right to free health care would be.”

As Max Read pointed observed at Gawker:

In Rand Paul’s America, there will be no slaves, except for the people working to pay off their medical bills.

This guy actually believes this shit!! Breath-taking, ain’t it? Why would a poor state like Kentucky elect a man like this? Uh, don’t answer that….nevermind!

More from Raw Story:

Self-described democratic socialist Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), chairman of the Subcommittee on Retirement and Aging, responded to Paul’s rant by asking witness Dana Kraus, a family physician at a federally qualified health center, if she considered herself “a slave.”

“I love my job,” she answered. “I chose to work there. I do not consider myself a slave. Thank you.”

Sanders and Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) introduced federal single payer legislation Tuesday that would ensure that states implement Medicare-like systems for all residents.

Have a look at the trailer for the Denzel Washington film John Q. Rand Paul needs to strapped to a chair like Malcolm McDowell in A Clockwork Orange with his eyelids pinned back and forced to watch this film until he melts into a puddle of his own pathetic stupidity.
 

 
You really have to hear it coming out of his mouth. The man is completely insane… and stupid:
 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.12.2011
11:38 am
|
Beware of Republicans talking of JOBS: The Jobs, Opportunity, Benefits and Services Act of 2011


 
Those zany, madcap Orwellian Republicans are at it again with legislation known by the acronym, “J.O.B.S.,”  that is to say, the “Jobs, Opportunity, Benefits and Services Act of 2011. ” You have to hand it to these guys, they are shameless.

What this bill will do is give governors in states like, say, Florida… Michigan… Ohio and Wisconsin (shudders) more “flexibility” over how funds are spent for EUC (emergency unemployment compensation) and EB (extended benefits) safety net programs. This, er, “flexibility” would allow states to do other things with the federal monies previously allocated to go to directly to unemployed workers once their initial state jobless benefits period of 26 weeks has expired. Things like paying for state job search bureaus, paying off the debt many states already owe to federal unemployment trust funds and, you know, other things.

One guess what GOP stormtroopers governors like WI’s Scott Walker, Florida’s Rick Scott, Michigan’s Rick Snyder or Ohio’s John Kasich would do given that “flexibility”...? Sorry, all you lazy unemployed people, but it’s their fiscal responsibility to fuck you over.

After all, WWRRD? (What would Ronald Reagan do?)

From The Hill:

Rep. John Larson (Conn.), the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said that with unemployment still soaring at 9 percent, the bill represents “an assault” on the millions of Americans who rely on that safety net.

“It doesn’t make an awful lot of sense to throw them out in the cold and not have them be able to pay their taxes, buy their food, pay their rent,” Larson told reporters in the Capitol. “When we peel away the veneer of what the proposal is — aka ‘We’re going to reduce the deficit’ — really what we find here is an ending of the social compact between the people and their government.”

House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) also took a shot at the proposal this week, questioning how the potential erosion of unemployment benefits will create jobs.

“They are referring to one of their bills on unemployment — to end benefits for long-term unemployment, taking away the assistance to 4 million people who are going to run out of unemployment benefits — they are calling that the JOBS Act,” Hoyer said Tuesday. “I am very interested to see how eliminating unemployment insurance is going to be a jobs bill.”

If the so-called “JOBS Act” is passed, states will be able to cut off benefit checks long before the full 99 weeks have expired. But this isn’t just about screwing over the poor, because the farcically named “JOBS Act” has the potential to eliminate up to $40 billion dollars in economic activity (jobless benefits, like food stamps have a multiplier effect as they are spent on groceries and so forth and taxed as well), As the Congressional Budget Office has pointed out, this could mean a loss of over 322,000 JOBS.

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.11.2011
03:46 pm
|
More than half of Republicans are complete idiots new poll finds
05.10.2011
08:26 pm
Topics:
Tags:


 
I mean, come on, honestly, is there any other way to interpret the news that over half of all Republicans are STILL unsure—if not hostile to the idea—that President Obama was born in the United States? That’s right, a new poll out today from Public Policy Polling (which is a Democratic polling firm) found that an incredible THIRTY FOUR percent of Republicans still believe that Obama was not born on domestic soil. Another 18 percent didn’t know where he was born or were unsure.

This is some stupid, stupid, low IQ shit going on here.

And this is the Republican BASE. Over half of ‘em! Who can argue with that?

My easy to reach, rather unavoidable conclusion: More than half of the Republican party are fucking idiots.

From Slate:

Those numbers are a far cry from the percent who questioned where Obama was born before the White House released his long-form birth certificate last month.

Still, when those who answered the question, “Do you think Barack Obama was born in the United States?” with either a “No” or a “Not Sure” are taken together they represent more than half of those surveyed and, obviously, make up a formidable bloc of primary voters that can’t be discounted in a wide-open GOP primary contest.

Mitt Romney looks to be the candidate most likely to be hurt by the persistent “birther” faction. He placed second in the PPP poll with 18 percent, trailing Mike Huckabee by one point. But if you remove those who remain unconvinced that Obama was born in the U.S., Romney leads Huckabee and the rest of the field with 22 percent. (Huckabee remains at 19 percent.)

It’s…ah… telling which of the current crop of GOP midgets presidential hopefuls circling around the early primary states these flatearthers afterbirthers support:

Meanwhile, the candidates who appear to be benefitting most from the remaining birthers are Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Michele Bachman and, ever so slightly, Donald Trump.  All of those candidates fare better among those who answered “No” than they do overall with GOP voters.

Palin support moves up from 12 percent to 17 percent, Michele Bachman support increases three points to 10 percent, Gingrich climbs two points to 15 percent and Donald Trump inches up from 8 percent to 9 percent.

 

Posted by Richard Metzger
|
05.10.2011
08:26 pm
|
Page 5 of 11 ‹ First  < 3 4 5 6 7 >  Last ›