Yeah, America sure is a Christian Nation all right...

As explained by Betty Bowers, America's Best Christian!

Running Behind, getting caught up...

Not surprisingly, I've been a fan of Keith Olbermann for MANY YEARS now, but this might be the single best broadcast I've ever seen from him...




And here's some other funny, and vaguely relevant stuff for your enjoyment...

Boys have swag, men have style, GENTLEMEN have CLASS.  Patrick Stewart is THE MAN.

If Obama has any balls at all, Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning will receive full pardons by the end of his administration.  (Spoiler: They won't.)  And when they don't under Hillary either, maybe the Right will begin to understand what the Left doesn't like about her.

I probably hate anti-vaxers more than any other camp in the legion of science denialism.  They do orders of magnitude more harm than the Creationists and Climate-Deniers combined.  (And as the parents of two autistic boys, my wife and I have had more run-ins with "Autism Andy's" than I can count. It's all I can do not punch them in the face. If you won't (notice I didn't say"can't"!) vaccinate your children, they should be taken away form you. PERIOD. FUCK YOU. STICK 'EM, JAB 'EM and IMMUNIZE 'EM.(And while you're rotting in jail for child abuse/neglect, we'll immunize YOU while we're at it.) (Asshole.) I am so sick of hearing the media (and fucking OPRAH!) coddle these ignorant fucking morons, and I'm glad the press is FINALLY beginning to call them out on their genocidal bullshit, even if it is about Seventeen Years too late!

Best argument against religion that I've even heard:

Yep.

Kung-fu Panda... (lol)

Probably. (I love both. What the hell, people?!)

It would put me out of a job, but they've got a point!

Life in the bubble; OR: Would the modern GOP appall George Washington?

This is some pretty backwards, delusional stuff.  (William should love it.) Though I still do fully encourage everyone to read it in full:

The Modern GOP Would Appall George Washington

In case the author's comment I quoted gets buried, here it is in full. (Bold = parts read aloud.)

I have no problem with "the possible." What I have a problem with is the "refuse to try" or worse still, the "working for the enemy." 

The modern GOP isn't interested in compromise; they are interested only in surrender. Like a battered woman, they foolishly think if they cry "Don't hurt me" enough, liberals will be nice to them. What complete idiots. And that's just the ones who aren't enemies in the camp--liberals who wear an "R" to get elected, then betray the documented values of the Republican Party (if people really liked RINOs, RINOs wouldn't pretend to be conservatives, lying about their positions and their records). 

Compromise? Heck, that would be a big improvement over the "Surrender Caucus" that is running things right now. And surrendering to the evil of the Left is just evil itself. 

~Bob Ellis

And, for reference, from his BIO:

Bob Ellis has been the owner of conservative media company Dakota Voice, LLC since 2005. He is a 10-year veteran of the United States Air Force, a political commentator for the past decade, and has been involved in numerous election and public policy campaigns for 20 years, including a founding Tea Party leader and organizer starting in 2009. He lives in Rapid City, South Dakota with his wife and two children.

Oh, and apologies: Obviously I was referring to the Heritage Foundation, not the Heritage Institute. Despite what William will tell you, I'm not perfect and I DO sometimes make mistakes. But fuck it: You know who I was talking about, so I'm not re-recording it! ;)

Alignment Meme's

As a one-time huge D&D nerd, one of my absolute favorite memes is the "alignment meme." That's the one where you take nine people or characters fitting a given theme and arrange them according to the twin spectrums of AD&D's character morality model: From Good to Evil and from Lawful to Chaotic.

Here's a particularly relevant one (for this blog) that I came across recently:

What I love about these is the possibility for interesting debate.  (Among HUGE NERDS, granted but still...)

For example, I didn't really see Truman as "Lawful Evil." Until I read his quote. Then I was was like... "Oh... Yeeeeah. Riiiiiight." (awkward)

Also... I REALLY can't see JFK as "Lawful." Don't get me wrong, I like Kennedy but if he belongs anywhere it definitely on the Chaotic spectrum. (But yeah... TR and Jackson? PERFECT choices already.  For Lawful Neutral, I'd have gone with either Franklin Pierce or James Buchanan, both of whom supported the legal, yet morally reprehensible institution of slavery.  (And sure, one can argue that they belong in the 'Evil' category of that, but there actions were taken to AVOID a war, whilst Truman's were taken to WIN one, so I can see leaving it as it is as well.

Another brilliant one was this:

Now calling the media "True Neutral" is not suggesting, in the least, that they have been unbiased. On the contrary, the fact that they have even tried to maintain the appearance of neutrality here is proof-positive of the Systematic Conservative bias of our Corporate Press: THIS WHOLE MESS IS ENTIRELY THE FAULT OF CONGRESSIONAL REPUBLICANS.

PERIOD.

It's not even a question of who supported what during the debate, or whether one side of the other (or Obama) supported the sequester deal or not. If the Republicans did play bullshit politics with what should have been a routine piece of maintenance-level legislation, namely RAISING THE DEBT CEILING, then none of this would have happened.

And make no mistake: It WILL harm the economy. (Not our security though: We spend twice as much on defense as France, England, Russia and China COMBINED. So we'll be FINE, militarily. The problem of defense spending is entrierly an ECONOMIC one, just as all other spending questions are!) (What do you know? Eisenhower was RIGTH!)



(Too bad we didn't listen!)

And remember: The Debt Ceiling has NOTHING, at all, to do with either the national debt or the federal budget deficit.  Raising the debt ceiling only allows the US to pay the bills it has ALREADY RUN UP when Congress drew up the budget. It has NOTHING, at all, to do with "blank checks" or "new spending" or ANYTHING like that.

But hey: Just as Rush Limbaugh (and his ilk) have contended form the beginning that Obama it "trying" to wreck the economy, in order to adopt some [straw-man argument that they keep harping about which has no basis in reality], I have also contended that the Republicans actually WANT to forestall economic recovery, and even force us back into recession.  The difference between me and Limbaugh?  I can demonstrate actual MOTIVE, and can point to ACTUAL ACTIONS, both taken and obstructed, by the Republicans to demonstrate MEANS and OPPORTUNITY.

Motive: Tank the economy on Obama's watch and the Dem's will get blamed for it.  Hey - it has some precedent. (George Bush Sr. in 1992, for example.) And it's also why you only hear about austerity and reducing the deficit when there's a Democrat in the White House: Because the ONLY possibly result of Government Austerity is a shittier economy! There is no other possible result! And when there's a Republican in the White House?

"I think Reagan proved that deficits don't matter."

~Vice President Dick Cheney

As for means & opportunity?

- Obstructed the American Re-Investment and Recovery Act, and sought only to weaken it.
- Unprecedented use of the filibuster
- All this nonsense about the debt ceiling
- All the anonymous holds on Presidential Appointees, also unprecedented both in terms of number, and the positions in question
- All their talk about cutting spending. Where was that under Bush? Nonexistent, because they wouldn't want to tank the economy under Bush!

(Though they managed to anyway!)

(Now watch as anonymous forces us to rehash the debate over the CRA with the same, tired debunked talking points we already beat in to the ground! LOL)

Evil indeed. Without a doubt in my mind.