It’s Like a Really Bad Disney Movie

Damon Condemns Palin

Yesterday I watched “The Bourne Ultimatum” (YAY free HBO!) and was thinking about the crush I had on Jason Bourne. Today I saw this and, though I usually don’t think much of celebrity involvement in politics, have morphed into having a big braniac crush on Matt Damon.

Media Ignores Massive Voter Purges by Republicans

While the media focuses on the antics of McCain’s chosen VP battleground states are purging their voter rolls.

In Colorado, one fifth of all voter registrations were dropped.

Florida is refusing to accept 85,000 new registrants — overwhelmingly blacks.

Ohio & Nevada are scrubbing tens of 1000s of voters who lost their homes.

read more | digg story

They Don’t Get it in the Biggest Way

Was watching The Daily Show last night, and Newt Gingrich was on. At the end of his clip (below) he says something that so perfectly encapsulates the conservative/Republican viewpoint, I had to point it out.

The point he tries to make with Jon is that there’s a difference between Palin’s “policy” and her child. There’s a difference between “policy debates” and what goes on in families. And what I don’t get how THEY don’t get, is that the policy they make AFFECTS REAL FAMILIES. JUST AS REAL AS YOUR FAMILY. Duh.

You can’t separate your policy and the laws you’d enact from what you want for your own family. This world is made up of other people’s families. You can’t say “This is my public viewpoint, but at my kitchen table it’s all different.”

Well, I guess you CAN say that, but that’s what makes you a dipshitted conservative “nothing applies to me” asshat. Isn’t that really the conservative’s disease? That mindset that rules don’t apply to them? So they can cheat and lie and steal and fuck and drink and do drugs and fuck some more and start wars and talk bad about people and create havoc and Jeebus forgives them and it’s all OK once they go to rehab but there oughta be a law, by golly, to keep anyone else from doing those things?

*head shake*

*sigh*

This isn’t perfectly transcribed, there’s a reason I am not a transcriptionist by trade, I suppose. But the video is below (this convo starts around the 4:30 mark)

Jon: So what she’s in essence saying is “Respect my family’s ability to make this decision, and elect me so that I can keep your family from having the same opportunity.”
Newt: No. That’s not true
John: That strikes me as hypocrisy.
Newt: No. What she’s saying is… you and she can have a policy debate about whether or not Obama’s position defending infanticide by abortion doctors was appropriate in the Illinois legislature…
Jon: No this isn’t about Obama – I’m going by her words, no abortion even in the case of rape
Newt:… That’s right. You can say Obama’s position was one extreme, and her position may be the other extreme. That’s a policy debate. But the minute you mention her child…
Jon: But when it down to her family she says “respect her decision”
Newt: No she says respect the privacy of the family
Jon: “It was Bristol’s decision.” That was their press release.
Newt: She said respect the privacy of her daughter which is very different than…
Jon: She says respect Bristol’s decision. That’s another word for choice.
Newt: And she could make the choice, because I assume they have choice there.

Making the Case for Abstinence-Only Sex Education – 236

Exactly, exactly, exact-o-fucking-lutely.

Making the Case for Abstinence-Only Sex Education – 236 – The Room
LEVI: What are you fuckin’ talkin’ about? I made you. You’re set. Instead of being branded a pinhead by Bill O’Reilly and having conservatives blame your parents for this shit, you’re, like, now the poster child for the right-to-life movement. As though abortion had anything to do with our fuckin’ a lot without a condom. Think about it–you’re getting rewarded for your “morals” by puttin’ out at 17! Most kids our age would get killed for this shit, and I’m going to be on national TV instead. This is greatest bait-and-switch in history. I’m a fuckin’ genius.

Someone Told the St. Paul Police There Was a Zombie Outbreak – 236 – The Room

Pretty much the best post I’ve read in a week or two.

Someone Told the St. Paul Police There Was a Zombie Outbreak – 236 – The Room
Oh, man. The St. Paul Police Department’s face must be red after they confused RNC protesters with a ravenous zombie hoard to be taken down at any cost.

Why else would they be wearing gas masks and more body armor than the dude from Halo? As I marched with other protesters and I saw officers on balconies and vans pointing automatic weapons at us, I realized there had been a really big mix-up.

It’s easy to understand: A large group of people moving at a slow pace repeating phrases they couldn’t understand. Clearly zombies.

Viewing the apocalypse in progress, the police officers decided to valiantly protect their caches of guns, booze, and women by attacking the hungry lost souls. We tried to tell them that we were peacefully marching and not the undead.

But they couldn’t hear us over the sound of how ready they were to kick our asses.

…

Read the rest at link above.

Is Palin the New Harriet Miers?

It’s always been my more-than-sneaking suspicion that the entire Harriet Miers fiasco was deliberate. Bush wanted to nominate a conservative white man, but he was replacing a woman and would get flack for not nominating a woman to the position. So what to do? Take a page of the sleazy PavRovian playbook and nominate a woman who is in no way qualified for the position. That way, when everyone howls that’s she’s an inappropriate pick, Bushie can nominate a conservative white guy (Alito) like he wanted all along and then have the audacity to claim that it’s OUR fault. What? He WANTED to nominate a woman! But WE wouldn’t accept her! Sheesh, can’t we ever be satisfied?

This Palin fiasco is shaping up to be the exact same thing. If she withdraws or is withdrawn from the ticket, McSame can glibly replace her with some old white croney of his, smug with the claim that he WANTED to have a woman on his ticket, but we wouldn’t accept her! The whole nation isn’t ready for a woman VP! Sounds so familiar.

The key being, of course, that he’d get no opposition to a qualified female, which he well knows.

Scumbags.

Oh Jesus Christ Almighty
Do I feel all right?
No, not slightly

- Lily Allen – Everything’s Just Wonderful

Here’s more of that “ER Insurance”

Five mistakes that will land you in medical debt – CNN.com
It took the Trim family of Arlington, Texas, three hours to go $15,000 into debt. One evening last spring, Alex Trim was knocked unconscious when a car hit his bike and he slammed into the windshield. Three hours, many stitches and seven CT scans later, Alex was discharged in pretty good shape.

About a month later, the bill arrived in the mail. “I didn’t have a clue you could go into $15,000 debt in one night,” said Alex’s father, Callvin Trim. “When I saw that bill, I was just kind of numb.”

…

A report out last month from the Commonwealth Fund found that 28 percent of the population said they were paying off medical debt in 2007, up from 21 percent in 2005.

“Two-thirds of the people who go into medical debt have insurance,” said Mark Rukavina, executive director of the Access Project. “When medical debt hits, it hits very quickly. It’s a jolt, and it’s generally not very predictable.”

“These are all honest, hardworking people,” added Jessie Maurer, a medical billing advocate in West Des Moines, Iowa, who helped the Trims. “This could happen to just about anybody.”

McCain Advisor says that there are no uninsured people in America

This has got to be one of the most jackassy things that I ever read. This dipshit who advises McCain on health care policy, claims that there are no uninsured, because people can go to the emergency room.

Texas still leads nation in rate of uninsured residents
But the numbers are misleading, said John Goodman, president of the National Center for Policy Analysis, a right-leaning Dallas-based think tank. Mr. Goodman, who helped craft Sen. John McCain’s health care policy, said anyone with access to an emergency room effectively has insurance, albeit the government acts as the payer of last resort. (Hospital emergency rooms by law cannot turn away a patient in need of immediate care.)

“So I have a solution. And it will cost not one thin dime,” Mr. Goodman said. “The next president of the United States should sign an executive order requiring the Census Bureau to cease and desist from describing any American – even illegal aliens – as uninsured. Instead, the bureau should categorize people according to the likely source of payment should they need care.

“So, there you have it. Voila! Problem solved.”

HELLO FROM EARTH! Lack of access to care and lack of insurance – not the same thing. Yes, if you’ve been shot someone must take care of you. But that’s not the same as being insured. Going to the ER with “holy fuck my appendix just burst” is NOTHING LIKE going to the doctor’s office because you’re having stomach pains. See the difference? It’s called preventive care, and routine health screening. It’s the difference between routine treatment and possibly dying because no doctor would see your uninsured ass until something went desperately, unfixably wrong.

He also makes the  assumption that all uninsured persons are deadbeats who will skip out on their health care bills. Not true. Ever heard of the honest working poor? Sure, if you’re too broke to pay, despite your best intentions, you can stiff the hospital and the gov’t (and the rest of us who DO pay premiums) will have to foot your bill, but it will also ruin your credit.

If you are low-income enough to not have insurance and you do your best to pay after going to the ER, you will probably go bankrupt, since any uninsured ER visit is sure to cost upwards of $5,000.I think my 3-hour visit for my broken foot (for which I wasn’t even admitted) cost upwards of $8,000.

God, what a total fucktard. I mean a TOTAL fucktwatted assfaced baboon. What a clueless dipshit motherfuck. Idiot.

McCain listens to this guy? He had a hand in crafting McCain’s health care policy? WHAT THE FUCK?

I think “right-leaning” is a misnomer for this guy and his group. I think “leaning so far right that they’ve fallen and can’t get up” might describe them better. I would like to put him on the “ER Only” insurance plan for a year, and see what he thinks of it then.

Sheezus.

As if I didn’t love them enough already!

The background music of this Obama ad? THE WEEPIES!

HA!

That’s so goddamned cool. Maybe the reason they’re not out touring in promotion of Hideaway is because they’re out campaigning?

Media coverage, McCain versus Obama

$520 shoes, and he’s right – no one blinks an eye.

Crooks and Liars » $400 haircuts vs. $520 Italian leather loafers
…the media seems to go to great lengths to look for evidence to bolster the far-right meme that Obama is some kind of outsider. From bowling to orange juice to arugula, reporters love to characterize Obama as something less than a “real” American.

Well, McCain has a half-dozen homes and spends on shoes what some families spend on rent. All the while, he advocates more tax cuts for millionaires, opposes increases to the minimum wage, and tells Americans their economic problems are in their heads.

Which candidate is outside the American mainstream?

Get Your Wide Stance Out of My Stall, If You Please.

Because they (presumably) don’t understand how they’re embarrassing themselves, two ridiculously hypocritical politicians are still riding the anti-gay-marriage hobby horse.

On second thought… maybe they DO know what they’re doing, and they each have a public humiliation fetish?

“I can’t get off unless I am being lambasted in the media for my hypocrisy! I need it!”

or

“Oh that op-ed enumerating my many hypocrisies got me so hard, baby! Oh YEAH, criticize me, scorn me, write more about my sexual hijinks, oh GOD that’s good!”

Who knows. Read more at the HuffPo link below.

Dan Sweeney: Chutzpah Defined: Vitter and Craig co-sponsor marriage amendment – Politics on The Huffington Post

This liberal blogging thing just isn’t fun anymore. Where are the demons? Where are the people you look at and say, “Yes, yes. That man. He is evil incarnate.” It seems like the opposition these days consists of little more than sweaty-palmed, mouth-breathing sex addicts or else unapologetic morons whose chief pet peeve in the world appears to be anyone more intelligent than algae.

Daily Kos Rant; Necessary

I don’t know if I could agree more than I do, but I am not sure what the fuck I can do about it. Write a protest letter? Buy a gun? What’s the recommended course of action in times like these?

Daily Kos: It’s Not Yours To Give Away

Like so many others, I am disgusted and ashamed that people we trust with great power, and great sums of our money, have allowed the crimes of the Bush administration to go unpunished, and largely unexposed. But I will not be intimidated, nor will I become a slave to the State. I flatly refuse to be the subject of any imaginary “Unitary Executive” in the land of government that exists only by the consent of the governed. I hereby revoke my consent to be governed by such a pathetic lot, and I will not acknowledge or respect the legitimacy of such a corrupt establishment. Until such time as legitimacy can be restored, from the White House to the State House, I will regard you as a despicable assembly of thugs and accomplices, whose only purpose is to steal my money, monitor my life, and claim the inexplicable authority to imprison my body for completely fabricated reasons. I vow to fight to see that those of you who would sacrifice our Bill of Rights are drummed out of office, and held up in historical effigy as the shameful plutocrats who almost accomplished what no terrorist ever could: killing America as we know her. (read the whole rant at the link above.)

New Girl Crush – Lara Logan

Saw Lara Logan on The Daily Show and fell in love a little.

Just Lay Back and Enjoy?

McCain answers the question: I’m keeping the money – The Jed Report

Yesterday, John McCain cancelled his attendance at a fundraiser with Clayton Williams, who gave the following advice to rape victims: “As long as it’s inevitable, you might as well lie back and enjoy it.”

McCain’s campaign cited that remark as the reason for his cancellation.

But it turns out that Williams had already raised $300,000 for McCain — and now McCain says he is keeping it all.

First of all, this guy should meet up with this guy.

Second of all, I have a friend who dearly loves to strap it on and give it to the guys of her acquaintance. I think it would be rather a good idea for Clayton Williams to experience “just lay back and enjoy” first-hand.

Third of all… fucking McCain. Jesus.

But your honor, I strenuously object!

Bush administration disagrees with ruling on detainees – Yahoo! News

WASHINGTON – The Bush administration disagrees strongly with a Supreme Court decision that gives suspected terrorists the right to go to federal court to seek their release from indefinite detention at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.

Attorney General Michael Mukasey said Friday the deeply divided high court ruling would not affect the Guantanamo trials against enemy combatants and President Bush said he might seek a new law to keep the alleged terrorists in a U.S. prison.

Thursday’s much-anticipated 5-to-4 ruling was the third time the justices have repudiated Bush on his ambitious and hugely controversial schemes to hold the suspects outside the protections of U.S. law.

Speaking at a Group of Eight meeting of justice and home affairs ministers in Tokyo, Mukasey said, “I’m disappointed with the decision, in so far as I understand that it will result in hundreds of actions challenging the detention of enemy combatants to be moved to federal district court.”

He added: “I think it bears emphasis that the court’s decision does not concern military commission trials, which will continue to proceed. Instead it addresses the procedures that the Congress and the president put in place to permit enemy combatants to challenge their detention.”

He said the Justice Department would comply with the ruling while studying the decision and “whether any legislation or any other action may be appropriate.”

In writing for the court majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy acknowledged the terrorism threat the country faces — the administration’s justification for the detentions — but he declared, “The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times.”