when the status quo frustrates.

20 Ways ObamaCare Will Take Away Our Freedom To Screw Other People Over

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

This list is great. I’ve copied and pasted my favorites, helpfully annotated.

You are young and don’t want health insurance? You are starting up a small business and need to minimize expenses, and one way to do that is to forego health insurance? Tough. You have to pay $750 annually for the “privilege.” (Section 1501)

Freedoms being lost: The freedom to have me pay for your uninsured emergency room visits and your freedom to start up a business which can’t bring in enough revenue to cover a single annual expense of $750. Jesus wept!

You are young and healthy and want to pay for insurance that reflects that status? Tough. You’ll have to pay for premiums that cover not only you, but also the guy who smokes three packs a day, drink a gallon of whiskey and eats chicken fat off the floor. That’s because insurance companies will no longer be able to underwrite on the basis of a person’s health status. (Section 2701).

Freedoms being lost: The insurance companies’ freedom to deny coverage to anyone who isn’t young and healthy.

You would like to pay less in premiums by buying insurance with lifetime or annual limits on coverage? Tough. Health insurers will no longer be able to offer such policies, even if that is what customers prefer. (Section 2711).

Freedoms being lost: Your insurance company’s freedom to refuse to pay for you to be cured of most serious illnesses, such as cancer. You are also losing the freedom to have me pay for your uninsured emergency room visits during your downhill spiral. More Jesus tears!

Think you’d like a policy that is cheaper because it doesn’t cover preventive care or requires cost-sharing for such care? Tough. Health insurers will no longer be able to offer policies that do not cover preventive services or offer them with cost-sharing, even if that’s what the customer wants. (Section 2712).

Freedoms being lost: Your freedom to drive up my insurance premiums by needing a lot more expensive medical treatment for conditions that, had you used preventive care, could have been circumvented or caught far earlier in their much less expensive phases.

If you are a physician and you don’t want the government looking over your shoulder? Tough. The Secretary of Health and Human Services is authorized to use your claims data to issue you reports that measure the resources you use, provide information on the quality of care you provide, and compare the resources you use to those used by other physicians. Of course, this will all be just for informational purposes. It’s not like the government will ever use it to intervene in your practice and patients’ care. Of course not. (Section 3003 (i))

Freedoms being lost: Your physician’s freedom to hide from you the quality of the care he provides and how much it tends to cost. I personally am going to miss the current system of finding a physician, which if I’m lucky can be based on a friend’s recommendation but is more often a total crapshoot based on geographic proximity to my home or workplace, where I get to test-drive him on my precious, one-and-only body.

You are a health insurer and you want to raise premiums to meet costs? Well, if that increase is deemed “unreasonable” by the Secretary of Health and Human Services it will be subject to review and can be denied. (Section 1003)

Freedoms being lost: Your insurance company’s freedom to jack up your rates without any explanation or justification. Jesus Tears Mark III!

The government will extract a fee of $6.7 billion annually from insurance companies. If you are an insurer, what you will pay depends on your share of net premiums plus 200% of your administrative costs. So, if your net premiums and administrative costs are equal to 10% of the total, you will pay 10% of $6.7 billion, or $670,000,000. In the reconciliation bill, the fee will start at $8 billion in 2014, $11.3 billion in 2015, $1.9 billion in 2017, and $14.3 billion in 2018 (Section 1406).Think you, as an insurance executive, know how to better spend that money? Tough.(Section 9010 (b) (1) (A and B).)

Freedoms being lost: Your insurance company’s freedom to funnel as much of their profits as possible into “administrative costs” rather than into your medical care.

You will have to pay an additional 0.5% payroll tax on any dollar you make over $250,000 if you file a joint return and $200,000 if you file an individual return. What? You think you know how to spend the money you earned better than the government? Tough. (Section 9015).
That amount will rise to a 3.8% tax if reconciliation passes. It will also apply to investment income, estates, and trusts. You think you know how to spend the money you earned better than the government? Like you need to ask. (Section 1402).

Freedoms being lost: For 98.5% of Americans, absolutely none.

25.03.2010 Punkass!, Filtered Propaganda, Lick My Jackboots of Love, Obamarama, Politics, Shame on you for not being rich white and privileged, This Thing of Ours, What would we do without such great advice?, Ze Goggles! Zey Do Nothing! 16 Comments

WOW, did Obama REELY go into the LION’S DEN?!? huh? wow…

Saturday, January 30th, 2010

I’m sure you’ve all heard of this by now:

Obama makes appearance at annual GOP retreat

Just two days after giving the State of the Union speech, President Obama stepped into the lion’s den at the GOP retreat in Baltimore Friday to make a fresh start with House Republican leaders. Obama accepted the invitation from the Republican leadership to discuss upcoming legislation initiatives and to participate in a question and answer session about some contentious public policy decisions.

(If you haven’t seen it yet, you can get the whole series of videos here.)

I did watch it, and I should also note that I didn’t really watch the State of the Union address other than a few snippets here and there. I suspect I could have just as easily skipped out on watching both of them. President Obama is a great speaker and clearly a very intelligent and articulate man who performs with admirable coolness under fire–but I already knew all that, dating back from before Obama was actually President. I do admit that it is a pleasure to have him be the official face of America both at home and abroad–I spent most of Bush’s eight years in office cringing every time he opened his mouth.

But I wasn’t too impressed by the activity itself. Really, more even than being unimpressed, I found myself wondering why on earth it was occurring at all. To promote bipartisanship..? Not likely. As anyone who has actually dealt with groups of people who disagree while simultaneously being necessary to whatever final goal is being attempted knows (and if you’ve spent any time in corporate America at anything above the level of absolute peon, that’s you), the only way to get people to really cooperate with you is to air your dissention with them in private. Doing so in public will only work if you somehow have their nuts up against the wall anyway so it doesn’t matter what they think or feel. Basically, if you’re doing so in public with someone or someone who has any real power to screw up your agenda, your purpose is actually not to advance your agenda, but either to (a) make yourself look good to your stakeholders or (b) make them look bad to theirs, as publicly as possible.

It is important to realize that, because otherwise you might find yourself wondering why Obama would feel the need to kiss the GOP’s ass with this rather supplicant-scented meeting–my boy Jon did a pretty funny takedown of that attitude a week or so ago, in reference to the Massachusetts special election:

…because you know, if Coakley loses, Democrats will only then have an 18-vote majority in the Senate…which is more than George W. Bush EVER had in the Senate when he did whatever the fuck he wanted to do. In fact, the Democrats have a greater majority than Republicans have had since 1923.

I did go shopping for conservative commentary on the Obama/GOP retreat Q&A, because I found myself wondering if any of them believed it really was ass-kissing, towards them!–turns out that yes, they do indeed believe this.

Michelle Malkin:

But the session has been most compelling — the most transparency and openness we’ve seen since the start of his term.

Good on the House Republicans for throwing the doors open.

And, yes, I’m going to compliment the president: Good on him for taking part.

Yet another dividend of the Massachusetts Miracle.

Forget the staged dog-and-pony campaign rallies…

Redstate:

The GOP is touting the benefits of having the president say – on the record – that they have offered substantive proposals. They also argue that this appearance puts Nancy Pelosi in a tough position: the president promised bipartisanship, and she’s delivering none. They see the chance to knock her down a few more pegs…Republican Members were delighted after the presentation.

Ace of Spades:

It’s funny how our Post-Partisan President only gets around to addressing Republicans when he needs their votes. Funny how he didn’t do that for a year…And it is this asshole — President “I Won” — who has staked his young and now failed presidency on nothing but winning and steamrolling the opposition and ignoring critics and demonizing dissenting voices, all to “win” on this issue, to prove he could win, and so to prove that he was El Supremo Jefe and we all had to buckle under his benevolent dictatorship.

It is this asshole who has denied himself the wiggle room to compromise, and so it is this asshole who is now attempting to persuade us to compromise, because he can’t.

That was the majority response…though not all of ‘em are quite that stupid:

Althouse:

Okay, I will be looking for the strengthful nuance that knocks down all arguments.

More than the State of the Union — or on top of the State of the Union — this may be a pivotal moment for the future of the presidential agenda on Capitol Hill. (Democrats are loving this. Chris Hayes, The Nation’s Washington bureau chief, tweeted that he hadn’t liked Obama more since the inauguration.)

Got it. The Prez’s people loved it. Maybe this wasn’t really about inspiring bipartisanship but firing up the base.

…bingo? I don’t really follow conservative bloggers much, but this chicky may be one for me to watch in future.

All-in-all, color me “meh.”

30.01.2010 Punkass!, A million ways to mortgage the future, Filtered Propaganda, Obamarama, Politics 1 Comment

Well, that’s it then. All Hail the GOP, the true party of righteousness!

Wednesday, November 4th, 2009

The last three times I’ve opened a browser window, the top news headlines have been variations on the above theme. Yep, folks, the brief insanity of the American people in both electing Barack Obama to the White House and purging Congress of its Republican majority has ended! The tide is turning! And here’s the proof!

By seizing gubernatorial seats in Virginia and New Jersey, Republicans on Tuesday dispelled any notion of President Obama’s electoral invincibility, giving the GOP a lift and offering warning signs to Democrats ahead of the 2010 midterm elections.

Wow. A Republican governor in Virginia! When we have a Democrat as president! Because one thing Virginian voters sure are known for is–!

List of Virginia governors, 1982-present

Charles S. Robb (Democrat) 1982-1986 President at time of election: Ronald Reagan (Republican)
Gerald L. Baliles (Democrat) 1986 -1990 President at time of election: Ronald Reagan (Republican)
L. Douglas Wilder (Democrat) 1990-1994 President at time of election: George H.W. Bush (Republican)
George F. Allen (Republican) 1994-1998 President at time of election: Bill Clinton (Democrat)
James (Jim) Gilmore III (Republican) 1998-2002 President at time of election: Bill Clinton (Democrat)
Mark Warner (Democrat) 2002-2006 President at time of election: George W. Bush (Republican)
Tim Kaine (Democrat) 2006-2010 President at time of election: George W. Bush (Republican)

–consistently electing a governor of the opposite party of the sitting president. And nope, it’s not a coincidence; for one, in Virginia, the incumbent governor is barred by law from seeking reelection, and two, Virginia has a large number of voters registered as “Independent” (about a third of all voters), the majority of whom consider themselves “Moderate.” Which means, that whatever direction they percieve themselves as being pushed…say, by the ideology of the Commander-in-Chief of the United States…they will dig their heels in and lean the other way. As you see above.

Now, I already knew all this from simply living smack up against Virginia for about sixteen years now (which is why I engaged in some heavy eye-rolling after the third or fourth repetition in the news of the title meme of this post); however, I can’t claim the same level of familiarity with New Jersey governors and voters–maybe it has some sort of grandiose meaning. But as far as Virginia goes…well, no. Sorry, folks.

04.11.2009 Punkass!, Advice, Filtered Propaganda, Media hackery, Obamarama, Politics 2 Comments

How To Take a Quote Completely Out of Context

Wednesday, October 7th, 2009

I haven’t written much about religion lately, mostly because I am the midst of a personal spiritual journey–saying so just like that here sounds remarkably pretentious, I can’t help but notice. :) BUT the point is, until I’m done…well, I don’t suppose I’ll ever quite be done, but…until I’m rather more settled on the precise direction of said journey, I haven’t wanted to try to tease out any coherent sentences on the topic. But I really couldn’t resist this.

As Jeff at Alas, A Blog says, it is pretty interesting to see Jesus presenting the Constitution of the United States to the admiring multitudes a la Moses and the Ten Commandments…er, what a creative idea! On so many levels. But really, my favorite part is the collection of quotes included on the page, demonstrating that no matter what somebody says, you absolutely can twist it around to mean whatever it is you really want it to mean! (Also, I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings, but Abraham Lincoln? Not a Founding Father. Born, as a matter of fact, 22 years after the signing of the Constitution…I guess all that ancient history just starts to blur together in the minds of idiots the zealous…)

My favorite quote is the one presented from Thomas Jefferson, to wit:

“God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed from their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are a gift from God?” — Thomas Jefferson

HA! CLEARLY Jefferson is saying that atheism is a threat to the liberties of our nation (!!11!) Believe and believe NOW, ye heathens, or the wrath of God and State shall fall upon thee..!

…um. Well. Actually…no…if you want to see the whole, entire quote:

“The man must be a prodigy who can retain his manners and morals undepraved by such circumstances. And with what execrations should the statesman be loaded who, permitting one half the citizens thus to trample on the rights of the other, transforms those into despots and these into enemies, destroys the morals of the one part and the amor patriae of the other. For if a slave can have a country in this world, it must be any other in preference to that in which he is born to live and labor for another: in which he must lock up the faculties of his nature, contribute as far as depends on his individual endeavors to the evanishment of the human race or entail his own miserable condition on the endless generations proceeding from him. With the morals of the people, their industry is also destroyed. For in a warm climate, no man will labor for himself who can make another labor for him. This is so true that, of the proprietors of slaves, a very small proportion are ever seen to labor. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure, when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God?”

Slavery, folks. Slavery was the threat to the liberties of our nation, and Jefferson was actually decrying the Christianity-based reasoning that far too many proponents of slavery used to justify keeping other human beings in a state of mean and miserable servitude. But context, schmontext! The word “God” is in there, dammit, and that’s good enough for us..!

Sigh.

07.10.2009 Filtered Propaganda, Historical Wankery, Wankers, Wingnuts 4 Comments

ChangeSpeak

Wednesday, April 1st, 2009

Remember when Barack Obama beat out Apple for Marketer of the Year?

So then, wherefore this?

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart M – Th 11p / 10c
Redefinition Accomplished
comedycentral.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Economic Crisis Political Humor

A quick glossary:

  • Great War On Terror = “Overseas Contingency Operations”
  • Terrorism = “Man-caused Disasters”
  • Toxic Assets = “Legacy Assets”

Okay, “Legacy Assets” does sound better than “Toxic Assets”. Well done, Team Obama! High fives all around.

But WTF is up with “Overseas Contingency Operations”? How the heck is will.i.am supposed to make an inspirational song out of that mouthful of marbles?

See, when Bush was prez, all the branding and rebranding was about fist-pumping, chest-thumping straight-shooting. Crusades, Shock and Awe, With Us or Against Us, Axes of Evil, Freedom Fighting, Dead or Alive, all that jazz.

Has his advertising team gone on vacation? Language like “Overseas Contingency Operations” is what you’d use to cover something up– that’s no way to sell a multiple-front war! Where’s Obama’s pride? Why, it’s almost like he wants to keep on doing all of the same profitably genocidal things Bush took so much pride in, but he just doesn’t want people to figure it out!

Oh, wait…

01.04.2009 Filtered Propaganda, Lick My Jackboots of Love, Obamarama No Comments

Let’s Keep an Eye on This

Thursday, February 5th, 2009

Hmmm.

Obama made that clear Thursday morning at the National Prayer Breakfast, announcing a new Presidential Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships that will weigh in on matters ranging from funding of social-service providers and poverty alleviation to the more controversial issue of abortion reduction.

Why is “abortion reduction” controversial? “Abortion increases,” now, that would be controversial! It seems like we could look at this one of two ways:

1. The number one cause of abortion is unplanned pregnancy. “Abortion reduction” could be directly translated, then, as “unplanned pregnancy reduction,” which I think everyone except the looniest of the Quiverfull types is in favor of. No controversy there, right? Of course, how to best reduce unplanned pregnancy is a topic full of manufactured controversy, with scientists on one side (who define “best” as “most effective”) and religious fundamentalists on the other (who define “best” as “most acceptable to God”). There’s definitely a corollary to the “controversy” over the Theory of Evolution here.

2. The easiest way to reduce abortions would be to make them legally unavailable. Certainly that’s a controversial idea, but it’s been one for decades–not exactly a new controversy, is it?

Perhaps the controversy lies in nobody’s ability to make out exactly how “abortion reduction” is being defined?

But, moving on:

“The goal of this office will not be to favor one religious group over another — or even religious groups over secular groups,” Obama said.

Or even religious groups over those Godless heathens! Sigh

“It will simply be to work on behalf of those organizations that want to work on behalf of our communities, and to do so without blurring the line that our founders wisely drew between church and state.”

Slightly better tone there at the end, Boss.

One of those controversial points was the question of whether faith-based groups that receive government funding should be allowed to hire only individuals who share their religious beliefs. Early in Bush’s first term, he signed a series of Executive Orders exempting religious organizations from nondiscrimination laws.

That hiring question is the first landmine Obama will face. In Zanesville, he left no question as to where he stood on the issue. “If you get a federal grant,” Obama said then, “you can’t use that grant money to proselytize to the people you help, and you can’t discriminate against them — or against the people you hire — on the basis of their religion.”

The statement caused an immediate uproar within the ranks of Obama’s religious supporters, who pushed him to back off from the promise to undo Bush’s Executive Order. He has not done so publicly, but several of them insist that Obama and his aides have given them private assurances that there will be no rapid movement to change the status quo with regard to religious hiring. If so, it would be a rare case of political ham-handness by the Obama team, because his secular supporters say they have been assured that the hiring change will take place.

It’ll be very telling to me, personally, which way he ends up going, or if he manages to neatly dance around going any way at all for as long as possible.

We’ll see what happens.

05.02.2009 Filtered Propaganda, Godbaggery, Lick My Jackboots of Love, Obamarama, Politics, Reproductive Rights 2 Comments

Did anybody else follow this?

Tuesday, November 18th, 2008

This is Slate’s series of articles, structured as back-and-forth letters between a group of conservative “thinkers,” that began the day after Election Day and ran through the following Friday. I found it rather fascinating, in the dust mite sense.

Just in case you haven’t read it, and don’t have time to wade through all fourteen full-length pages of it, I have summarized the meat of each entry below:

Jim Manzi, chairman of an applied artificial-intelligence software company and contributing editor of National Review: It’s finally happened. The middle class has figured out that voting Republican is voting against their own economic interests. The Reagan mantra appears to be losing its hypnotic effect. We must find a new chant to bamboozle them with. Hey, I know–let’s resegregate public schools, start shooting illegal immigrants on sight and concentrate on recruiting the whitest foreign nationals we can find to fill our immigration quotas instead!

Douglas Kmiec, a professor of constitutional law at Pepperdine University: Barack Obama is Ronald Reagan reborn. Also, could we stop obsessing on abortion?

Ross Douthat, author of Grand New Party and a blogger for the Atlantic: No.

Christine Todd Whitman, former governor of New Jersey and author of It’s My Party, Too: I refuse to believe that the middle class figured that out. Issues, schmissues– to all those people the election was just a popularity contest! and Barack Obama, unfortunately, is much hotter than Bush. All we have to do is make sure they don’t associate Bush with us from now on.

Tucker Carlson, author and commentator for MSNBC and The Daily Beast: I agree that it’s all a popularity contest, Christine–it’s not enough to dissociate ourselves from him, though, we need to find somebody even cooler than Obama to be our frontman. Also, we need to give the middle class a new strawman to hate–that was so effective during the Cold War. Our efforts to replace “Communists” with “Islamofascists” appears to have lost a lot of its oomph.

Ross Douthat: ABORTION, hello?? Abortion!

Douglas Kmiec: Reagan was a god. I really think that Obama is his second coming.

Jim Manzi: You’re probably right, Christine; and Douglas, if you think a single damn one of us is going to do anything other than flatly oppose every last line of Obama’s liberal pinko agenda with our dying breaths, you’re quite mistaken.

Kathleen Parker, author and syndicated columnist who also blogs for the Washington Post: I agree with Christine too and I’ll go even further and say that the deciding popularity factor wasn’t even Bush’s lack of cool or Obama’s abundance of it, but McCain’s horrid, stupid, winking, redneck of a MILF vice-presidential candidate. And no, it’s not fucking elitist of me to say so!

Douglas Kmiec: Ross, Obama is my hero. And I’m pro-choice. Here, let me kiss your ass vigorously to make it up to you in the most passive-aggressive way possible.

Tucker Carlson: Doug, you sound like a woman, and there is no worse insult I could possibly lob at you than that.

Ross Douthat: Well, I loved Sarah Palin because she at least was willing to call out abortion for the baby-murdering slut-enabling conspiracy that it is. But I agree with Tucker that we need to find a man who can compete with Obama for sheer coolness, though I must say that I personally thought Bill Clinton was cooler. McCain? L-O-S-E-R!

Christine Todd Whitman: Maybe if I address this post to everybody, Ross won’t realize I’m speaking directly to him?–look, the abortion bullshit is no longer a winning strategy. The only people who can’t get over it are the Jesus freaks, and clearly, they’re not a majority voting bloc, so screw them. Back to the important topic here–how do we repackage Reaganomics so that the middle class will buy it all over again? Honestly, I’m just praying that the Democrats screw up so badly that every last one of the middle class ends up completely bankrupt. They’ll come running back to us then!

Douglas Kmiec: God, I miss Reagan. Have I said that already?

18.11.2008 A million ways to mortgage the future, Brilliant Ideas, Economy Blues, Filtered Propaganda, Looks like someone needs an intervention, Politics, Wingnuts, Ze Goggles! Zey Do Nothing! 12 Comments

Can “Liberalism” only be a four-letter word?

Saturday, October 4th, 2008
http://www.joebrower.com/PHILE_PILE/PIX/FR/liberal_crap.jpg

In a response to non-liberal visitor Factory, I wrote:

Factory, you’re not a Liberal, or a Communist, or a Socialist. I get that. Maybe my use of the word “Liberal” is sloppy, since there are a lot of things associated with traditional ideas of Liberalism that I’m not on board with either. That’s why I was advocating the idea of re-branding Liberalism… it’s time not just to give it a makeover, but to also to seek to redefine it more narrowly.

Maybe it’s a bad strategy. Maybe it’s too late to redefine it. Maybe there’s just too many people out there, like you, who instantly see bright red the instant anyone uses the word “Liberal”. Because even though I’m sure I don’t agree with you on many issues, the fact is that you and I could be fighting for a lot of the same things. I don’t want to alienate you, I want to work with you. If one stupid word gets in the way of this, let’s chuck out the word.

So you’re not a Liberal. Are you a Lefty?

So, let’s say, hypothetically, that we were trying to build a national non-partisan movement to promote those leftist goals which even social conservatives could agree with. (Of which, if you actually follow the “Are you a Lefty?” link [which, by the way, is a sub-page of here], there are probably more than you’d realize if you hadn’t thought about it before.) What could we possibly ever label the movement’s ideology such that social conservatives, pre-programmed by years of right-wing talk radio and the like, wouldn’t automatically be predisposed to disagree without even thinking?

Despite it being an honest descriptor, I’m not sure that “Lefty” or “Leftist” is any better in this regard.

Perhaps the solution is to avoid naming an overall ideology at all; and just name the individual policy goals in a way that social liberals, social conservatives, social libertarians, and socialists could ALL get on board with (“energy independence”, “government transparency”, “affordable health care for all”, etc.).

Or perhaps there’s no solution at all, at least until such time as the current form of the American conservative movement crumbles apart.

Opinions? (And I don’t suppose there might even be anyone out there wanting to share who doesn’t think of themselves as “liberal”?)

04.10.2008 Filtered Propaganda, Liberal Democrats 6 Comments

Are they trying to make the Democrats LOSE???

Friday, October 3rd, 2008

(Now updated below the fold)

So tell me again why taking a principled stand and threatening to withhold your vote (and meaning it) is just a meaningless symbolic gesture, and could never, ever in a million years affect a politician’s stance on anything?

I just received an e-mail from Democrats.com, quite obviously a group as partisan as they come. Here’s part of it:

Friday: Last Chance to Stop Paulson’s Plunder

(1) Call your Representative at 800-473-6711 or 800-828-0498 or 202-224-3121 and say “No Bailout!”
(2) Find or Organize a “No Bailout” protest near you:
http://bailoutmainstreet.com/
(3) Visit your Representative’s local office

The Senate’s 74-25 vote for Paulson’s Plunder came as no surprise, since the Senate is run by and for millionaires. So now it’s back to the House of Representatives, where we shocked those millionaires on Monday by defeating their bailout bill by 228-205.

A terrified army of corporate lobbyists is working around the clock to switch 13 votes, but only 7 have switched so far – Jim Ramstad (R-MN), John Shadegg (R-AZ), Zach Wamp (R-TN), Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Shelley Berkley (D-NV), Emanuel Cleaver (D-MO) and John Lewis (D- GA). Other possible switches include Pat Tiberi (R-OH), Pete Hoekstra (R-MI), John Yarmouth (D-KY), Brian Bilbray (R-CA), Steve Rothman (D-NJ), Lee Terry (R-NE), Jim Gerlach (R-PA), Tim Murphy (R-PA), Jason Altmire (D-PA), and Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ). But others may switch from Yes to No, including Ed Markey (D-MA), Charlie Melancon (D-LA), and Spencer Bachus (R-AL).

…

(1) Call your Representative today!
First check how your Representative voted on Monday (and note switches above): http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2008/roll674.xml

If (s)he voted NO, say “Thank you for helping stop the Bailout on Monday. Don’t betray us now by voting YES on Friday, or I will vote NO against you on Election Day.”

If (s)he voted YES, say “I’m outraged that you supported the Bailout on Monday, and I will remember on Election Day. If you want my vote on Election Day, you must vote NO on Friday.”

Now maybe I’m reading it wrong, but it looks to me like Democrats.com is claiming that any success they had on Monday, and any success they might have today, is because a nation of energized progressives threatened to withhold their votes from Democrats (AND Republicans) unless they agreed to enact a progressive agenda.

A plan of action I fully endorse, by the way.

(more…)

03.10.2008 Punkass!, A million ways to mortgage the future, Filtered Propaganda, Politics, Remember November 4 Comments

Umm…

Wednesday, July 2nd, 2008

So I was idly paging through CNN.com and came across this headline:

July 2, 2008
Poll shows Americans cool to Michelle Obama
Posted: 10:30 AM ET

Oh brother…aside from the fact that a candidate’s spouse should be a virtual non-issue and so should everybody’s opinion of him or her–

The new Associated Press-Yahoo poll shows 30 percent of Americans view the outspoken wife of Barack Obama favorably while 35 percent view her unfavorably. That compares to the 27 percent of Americans who view John McCain’s wife, Cindy, favorably and the 17 percent who hold an unfavorable view of her. Mrs. McCain is clearly less known than Mrs. Obama — 56 percent said they don’t know enough about the Arizona senator’s wife to render an opinion while only 34 percent said the same for Mrs. Obama. She’s been at times a lightning rod for criticism from some Republicans over the course of the presidential campaign, and a new poll out Wednesday suggests more Americans hold a negative view toward Michelle Obama than a positive one.

White Americans appear particularly suspect of Mrs. Obama. The poll shows those voters hold an unfavorable view of her by nearly 20 points while about 80 percent of black voters reported positive feelings about Mrs. Obama.

Those numbers are reversed for Cindy McCain: whites view her favorably by a margin of 17 points while only 10 percent of blacks like her.

In a similar trend line her husband faced during the primary season, Mrs. Obama’s favorability ratings are higher among unmarried people and college graduates while her ratings are particularly low among senior voters.

Mrs. Obama also appears to drum up stronger opinions among voters than does Mrs. McCain. About 20 percent of voters said they hold a very negative view of her while 10 percent said the same for Mrs. McCain.

Okay, well, I thought, I guess I’m not surprised (the outspoken wife–has any man EVER been referred to as the outspoken husband? sigh)…so I finished the article and continued my random clicking through the site and then–huh?

July 2, 2008
CNN Poll: Candidates’ wives viewed favorably
Posted: 01:40 PM ET

Now waitaminute…didn’t I just read–

According to the new poll, 51 percent of registered voters report a favorable view of the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee’s wife while 28 percent hold an unfavorable view. Just over 21 percent did not express an opinion.

Meanwhile, 39 percent of registered voters hold a favorable view of John McCain’s wife, Cindy, while 23 percent report an unfavorable rating. The poll also shows she is considerably less known than Mrs. Obama — nearly 40 percent report having no opinion of her.

Conclusion: Poll results based on about 1,000 random citizens in a country of nearly 300,000,000 have absolutely no bearing on reality. I’ve always suspected as much.

02.07.2008 Filtered Propaganda, Media hackery, My Brain Hurts, Politics, Wankers No Comments

THE PRESS! Hunh! Good God! What is it good for? ABSOLUTELY NOTHIN’! Say it again…

Wednesday, June 25th, 2008

At least not so much lately in America. Of course, cynics would say that, by merely parroting the propaganda of the powerful, they are doing PRECISELY their job, because that’s what they’re kept around for in the first place. And, well, I guess the cynics would probably be right. But appearances of speaking truth to power must be kept up, and so occasionally some journalists are let off their leash for a little bit to retrieve a juicy story.

And so, although it appears this is Punkassblog Beat-on-the-Press Day, I thought I’d just be a contrarian and point out that there is one big American press chain bucking the trend: McClatchy Newspapers. Now, granted, they’re nowhere as big as AP, but they’re no small potatoes either.

What’s got to be the biggest thing working in their favor was that they were the only major newspaper group who consistently criticized the Bush Administration’s rationales for war prior to the invasion of Iraq. (Well, actually, Knight-Ridder was, but McClatchy bought Knight-Ridder two years ago, and the same staff continues to work for them.)

Now maybe McClatchy doesn’t always manage to “comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable”, as the trope about the press goes, but they certainly have their moments.

Just the other day, they featured this story about the response in Iraq to the complete lack of punishment to seven of the eight US marines charged in the three-year-old Haditha massacre. In which nobody denies that they killed 24 innocent civilians, male and female, of all ages from toddler to elderly.

Iman Waleed recounts the killing of seven members of her family that occurred on Nov. 19, 2005, in Haditha, Iraq.

Iman Waleed lost everyone in her family save her little brother. The 12-year-old tells the story quickly and matter-of-factly now. She’s told it at least 20 times to journalists, investigators and human rights groups.

“The Americans came in and they entered through the kitchen door. My father was in the room reading the Quran and they shot him,” she says in a monotone voice, her green eyes looking at the floor.

(more…)

25.06.2008 Filtered Propaganda, Media, Media hackery, Torture, War HUH! What is it good for? 2 Comments

Barack Obama once roundhouse kicked someone so hard that his foot broke the speed of light, went back in time, and killed Amelia Earhart while she was flying over the Pacific Ocean.

Monday, June 23rd, 2008

…or maybe it was CHUCK NORRIS!!

Apparently though, I am not the only person who has a secret addiction to Chuck Norris jokes. What is the draw..? I totally can’t say. The shameless hilarity, maybe…the unmitigated cheeze factor…it may forever remain a mystery…

I haven’t said much (okay, I haven’t said anything) about the recent Obama news in regards to public campaign financing or the FISA bill. I have my reasons and that’s all I’m gonna say, other than my usual refrain of Please Vote Obama ’08!

However, this did crack me up, and not just ’cause it’s like a big ol’ Chuck Norris joke only BETTER. Also because the hypocrisy with which so many people are fielding the above Obama news items is making me clench my jaw til it aches and this, I thought, was a much better response to the situation than that.

The Barack Obama presidential campaign introduced a new site last week, FightTheSmears.com, that it hopes will debunk persistent myths about the senator: that he’s a Muslim, that he won’t say the Pledge of Allegiance, etc. As we have argued before, restating the myths often reinforces them, no matter how persuasively they’ve been refuted.

Rather than restate untruths about Obama, the campaign would do better to start some rumors of its own.
Here’s a template e-mail the Obama campaign might consider disseminating.

From: [Redacted]
To: [Redacted]
Subject: WHO IS BARACK OBAMA?

There are many things people do not know about BARACK OBAMA. It is every American’s duty to read this message and pass it along to all of their friends and loved ones.

Barack Obama wears a FLAG PIN at all times. Even in the shower.

Barack Obama says the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE every time he sees an American flag. He also ends every sentence by saying, “WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL.” Click here for video of Obama quietly mouthing the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE in his sleep.

A tape exists of Michelle Obama saying the PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE at a conference on PATRIOTISM.

Every weekend, Barack and Michelle take their daughters HUNTING.

Barack Obama is a PATRIOTIC AMERICAN. He has one HAND over his HEART at all times. He occasionally switches when one arm gets tired, which is almost never because he is STRONG.

Barack Obama has the DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE tattooed on his stomach. It’s upside-down, so he can read it while doing sit-ups.

There’s only one artist on Barack Obama’s iPod: FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.

Barack Obama is a DEVOUT CHRISTIAN. His favorite book is the BIBLE, which he has memorized. His name means HE WHO LOVES JESUS in the ancient language of Aramaic. He is PROUD that Jesus was an American.

Barack Obama goes to church every morning. He goes to church every afternoon. He goes to church every evening. He is IN CHURCH RIGHT NOW.

Barack Obama’s new airplane includes a conference room, a kitchen, and a MEGACHURCH.

Barack Obama’s skin is the color of AMERICAN SOIL.

Barack Obama buys AMERICAN STUFF. He owns a FORD, a BASEBALL TEAM, and a COMPUTER HE BUILT HIMSELF FROM AMERICAN PARTS. He travels mostly by FORKLIFT.

Barack Obama says that Americans cling to GUNS and RELIGION because they are AWESOME.

23.06.2008 Filtered Propaganda, Media hackery, Obamarama, teh funny 19 Comments

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