"when truckloads of organized groups of heavily armed men drive into my town—or your town—it is time to uphold the civil power."

The Domestic Terrorism Danger: Focus on Unauthorized Private Military Groups By Philip Zelikow

Bundy's Bozos blunder into boobies' base

Bundy militia standoff escalates when another heavily-armed group arrives to provide ‘security’

Audubon Society of Portland Statement on the Occupation of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge

Bundy's Bozos caught using government computer, may have accessed social security numbers.  And are harassing government employees.

That'll show'em!

Update: a discussion on what the Oregon idiots are about.

And they are well regulated...

What he said.

Getting riled up by Fox News and the GOP

Is an excuse for:

Trying to burn down a mosque.

Killing people because you believed the fake video and Fox News' story about selling baby parts.

Believing Carly Fiorina or Ted Cruz.

Thinking white Americans can't be terrorists.

Thinking that people of color means terrorism but white people?  Mental illness.

Thinking like Huckabee and immediately start claiming pro-lifers are the victims.

George Washington would not be pleased if he were here today....

Trouble in the American Psychological Association, where an independent review reported they were 'complicit in brutal military and CIA interrogation.'

A beautiful letter to Amy Schumer about the shooting at the Trainwreck movie.  Because apparently we just love our guns more than our children.

And some of those gun-lovers really really want a war with somebody.  Anybody.

9/11 NSA coverup?

You must eat MORE sugar!

Fetal-tissuegate

What Windows 10 will do whether you are aware of it or not.

Racism is in our national DNA.

How do we re-engineer our genes to stop the fear and the hatred?  Can we even address the stupidity that we send drones over other countries to 'protect' Americans but have to accept our own home-grown terrorism?  And then we have an idiot NRA board member suggesting that the pastor asked for his death by being against concealed carry, exposing the fact the NRA lives in more anxiety and debilitating fear than the pastor.

The bodies were hard to identify, which speaks to the culture of hatred this young man marinated in.

From books to pork

The 10 most challenged books of 2013.

Sticking with XP..  if you care.

Jesus's wife.

Super rats?

Showtime's climate change scientist:

An evangelical Christian, married to a pastor, living in conservative West Texas, and widely regarded as a top-notch climate scientist, Dr. Katharine Hayhoe is a rare breed on paper — in person, she’s even rarer. Deftly moving between topics like science, religion, and gender with equal parts insight and levity, Hayhoe is an unassuming force of nature.

Rabid Christianists trying to get rid of no-fault divorce.  As if making it harder to divorce will make marriages better....

What democracy?

We're number one!

How safe will our pork be if the Chinese are in charge of production?  Here are the companies that Smithfield owns:

The acquisitions have caused concern among regulators in the United States regarding the company's control of the food supply. After Smithfield's purchase of Murphy Family Farms, the Agriculture Department described it as "absurdly big."[6] As of 2006 four companies – Smithfield, Tyson, Swift & Company, and Cargill – were responsible for the production of 70 percent of pork in the United States.[14] 

The company had 46,050 employees in the United States, Mexico and Europe as of 2012, and an annual revenue of $13 billion. It raises 15.8 million pigs a year, producing 3.8 billion pounds of fresh pork and 2.7 billion pounds of packaged meat, sold as 50 brands of pork products and 200 gourmet foods.[15] Along with specialty brands such as Paula Deen Collection, and international brands such as Weight Watchers, the company's 12 core brands are Armour, Carando, Cook's Ham, Curly's Foods, Eckrich, Farmland, Gwaltney, Healthy Ones, John Morrell, Kretschmar, Margherita, and Smithfield.[16] The company also operates The Genuine Smithfield Ham Shoppe and a restaurant, Taste of Smithfield, both in Smithfield, Virginia.[17]

Boston

Video of the bombs. Reporting the news.

Hope for the future by how we've behaved today.  How we should handle it.

I knew it!

I KNEW it was a government commiepinkosocalist islamofacist plot to steal my apricots and ruin my tomatoes!!

U.S. Renews Contract With Spotted Ground Squirrels Through 2015

WASHINGTON—The Department of the Interior announced this week that ongoing negotiations with the nation's population of spotted ground squirrels have been resolved and that the rodents are now contracted to continue activities on U.S. soil through Dec. 31, 2015.

"We're happy to have finally reached an agreement with this vital American species, and we thank all the ground squirrels who have been carrying on in good faith for the past 18 months while we worked this out," a jubilant but visibly exhausted Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told reporters at a press conference Tuesday. "Their continued participation in our forests, meadows, and prairies is an integral part of our natural world, and I think our generous offer reflects that fact."

Under the terms of the agreement, which was conducted through third-party labor mediators, the ground squirrels will be responsible for scurrying up and down trees; rustling in undergrowth; chittering; and eating a variety of seeds, berries, and nuts.

The contract stipulates the nation's spotted ground squirrels be paid $345 million over five years and also provides for performance-based bonuses.

Clearly it's exactly what the Right wants.

Otherwise the GOP WOULD tone down the rhetoric. Especially if the unleashed teabaggery crowd turns on them, as revolutions often do.

Steve Benen of the Washington Monthly on the latest moronic shoot-out guy Byron Williams: (my bold)

Remarkably, no one was killed, though Williams was firing a rifle with ammunition that "could penetrate ballistic body armor and vehicles, police said." He was in court yesterday, and will face all kinds of criminal charges, including the attempted murder of four police officers.

But stepping back, every time there's violence like this, I'm reminded of the concerns raised by the Department of Homeland Security last year, about potentially violent anti-government extremists -- concerns that appear increasingly prescient.

These examples of politically-motivated attacks seem to keep piling up. Just this year, John Patrick Bedell opened fire at the Pentagon; Joe Stack flew an airplane into a building; Jerry Kane Jr. and his son killed two police officers in Arkansas; and the Hutaree Militia terrorist plot was uncovered. Last year, James von Brunn opened fire at the Holocaust memorial museum; Richard Poplawski gunned down three police officers in Pittsburgh, in part because he feared the non-existent "Obama gun ban"; and Dr. George Tiller was assassinated. In 2008, Jim David Adkisson opened fire in a Unitarian church in Tennessee, in part because of his "hatred of the liberal movement."

Let there be no doubt: deranged madmen are responsible for their own violent actions. But in the wake of these attacks, I don't think it's unreasonable to wish that some of the leading far-right voices would lower the rhetorical temperature a bit, helping to cool the tempers of those who might be inclined to hurt others.

Not to be cynical, but I'm sure the manipulators of the teabaggers and those who rant against the liberals really do want a shoot-out. Then they could yell about law and order and how the shooter was obviously a islamofascist socialist or dirty fucking hippie and only Republicans will bring peace and contentment back to America.....

We've been here before.

I think the answer is yes.

Is the NRA Encouraging Anti-Government Extremism?

Apparently the actions of National Rifle Association member Timothy McVeigh didn't teach the organization that its violent anti-government rhetoric can have dangerous consequences. On a day when thousands of Tea Party activists are taking to the streets to protest Tax Day, the Violence Policy Center has released a report today chronicling the increasing ties between the gun lobby and the Tea Party movement, and the NRA's adoption of much of the "Patriot movement's" anti-government language. The center sees direct parallels between the NRA's current activities and those in the years leading up to McVeigh's fateful decision to blow up the Oklahoma federal building:

"The gun lobby is once again embracing—and, equally important, validating—the anti-government rhetoric being offered by activists that range from Tea Party members, through pro-gun advocates, to members of the militia movement. And as was the case with Timothy McVeigh, the risk lies not so much with the organized members of these groups, but with the "lone wolves" who not only embrace their rhetoric, but are willing to act on it with violence."

I thought when a vice president became an EX vice president

He was out of power. Apparently not.

A half-dozen former senior Bush officials involved in counterterrorism told me before the Christmas Day incident that for the most part, they were comfortable with Obama's policies, although they were reluctant to say so on the record. Some worried they would draw the ire of Cheney's circle if they did....

Wow. All that warrantless wiretapping of Congress still gives Cheney power. Blackmail is quite handy even after you've had to give up your own private hit squad.

....one of the things that's most annoying about the most recent instance of Politico's Mike Allen taking dictation from former Vice President Dick Cheney is that Cheney is in no way attempting to influence counterterror policy or make the nation more secure. That can't be done by following his advice, which is to use the word "war" more often.

Rather, what Cheney is clearly trying to do is influence the politics, so any reporter worth his salt should be able to simply listen to Cheney and accurately report that the former vice president has been reduced to demagoguery. It's really just stupid to pretend that there's some great policy debate unfolding between the current White House and the previous White House.

dem⋅a⋅gogue

  /ˈdɛməˌgɒg, -ˌgɔg/ [dem-uh-gog, -gawg]
–noun
1. a person, esp. an orator or political leader, who gains power and popularity by arousing the emotions, passions, and prejudices of the people.
2. (in ancient times) a leader of the people.
–verb (used with object)
3. to treat or manipulate (a political issue) in the manner of a demagogue; obscure or distort with emotionalism, prejudice, etc.
–verb (used without object)
4. to speak or act like a demagogue.

So... old warmongers don't just fade away, they spew lies, bile and contempt from their secret secure super duper undisclosed locations.

Remember this article posted in June '09:

Cheney probably thought he wasn't being that obvious:
But I'm sure he has his 'I-told-you-so' speech already written and locked in one of his man-sized safes...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - CIA director Leon Panetta says it's almost as if former vice president Dick Cheney would like to see another attack on the United States to prove he is right in criticizing President Barack Obama for abandoning the "harsh interrogation" of terrorism suspects.

"I think he smells some blood in the water on the national security issue," Panetta said in an interview published in The New Yorker magazine's June 22 issue.

"It's almost, a little bit, gallows politics. When you read behind it, it's almost as if he's wishing that this country would be attacked again, in order to make his point."

Poor torture-loving guy.... It must be so hard to have been president and then be reduced to snarling from the forests of Wyoming...

Now if this guy had a Muslim name....

As David Neiwert points out, he'd be all over the news. But because he's just a homegrown white domestic terrorist, we can ignore him.

CUYAHOGA FALLS, Ohio – Following a pipe bomb explosion Monday night, police and federal law enforcement officials are trying to figure why a Center Avenue man turned his apartment into a bomb factory.

Police said no charges have been filed against Mark Campano, 56. Police found 30 completed pipe bombs in his apartment along with components to make more, plus 17 guns and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.

Campano is in an Akron hospital with injuries received when one of the bombs exploded.

Thank god no one got hurt by this idiot.... except him.

Gee... homegrown terrorists.

I wonder what the Republicans will do to these guys? Gitmo? Torture? Declaring them unlawful combatants? Or maybe just let the judicial system take care of it?

Police received a call just before midnight about a suspicious car with weapons on the backseat, he said. Police surrounded the car, a Mercedes, and pulled the two men out. A bomb squad detonated the pipe bomb.

The men, John Iannucci, 38, of Branford, Conn., and Jessup Bowllinger, 27, of New Haven, were charged with the manufacture of bombs, illegal possession of explosives, illegally transporting explosives and having a shotgun in a vehicle. Bowllinger was also charged with criminal possession of a firearm. The two are being held on $500,000 bond each, said New Haven Police spokesman Officer Joe Avery, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms is also investigating.

The New Haven Register has reported that one of the men was arrested earlier this year for making a bomb, and his case is still pending in Superior Court.

Avery could not confirm the report.

In February, that man was allegedly driving when a homemade bomb exploded, injuring his hands and torso. Police searched his home and found equipment for modifying smoke bombs and arrested him in March.

Late update: Court records show that a John Iannucci, also born in 1970, is facing charges for the illegal manufacture of bombs and explosives. His pre-trial is set for Oct. 22. He has plead not guilty to the charges.

Obama becoming president has tipped the wingnuts into madness

And out into plain view for all to see:

The shrieking Birthers are sure, just sure that Obama CAN'T be the rightful president. He cheated on his exams! He faked his Illinois driver's license! He was born less than 35 years ago in a foreign land! Like Hawaii! I mean, who knows what foreign island types lurked about in those days planning to lie about the birth of a black child just to get him into the White House 47 (I mean 35) years later?/!!

Excellent overview of the Birthers' conniptions:

Barack Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, on August 4, 1961. Here is is birth certificate. Hawaii was and is an American state. When Barack Obama was elected, he was 47 years old and had lived in the US since 1971. According to the Constitution, the president must be a natural-born citizen 35 years old or order who has lived in the US for 14 years. Barack Obama is eligible to be the president. It's that simple. Unless you're in America's fastest-growing group of nuts with modems, the Birthers! Then it is much more complicated, and stupid.

Wonkette notes that the government is going to be overthrown by the righteous indignation of the wingnuts:

The person who runs FreeRepublic.com is cold gonna overthrow the U.S. government — that means you, blackenstein — and ho ho, no more taxes on the millionaires! Hooray! Anyway, folks, things are getting Seriously Weird with the wingnuts, birthers, paultards and other middle-aged white suckers who bought into that whole Reagan thing 30 years ago and, whoops, are still poor and doomed.

And then, in 2008, Americans mysteriously voted in droves for a common African Soviet from, er, Hawaii, who has been president now for what, six months? And this NON-PRESIDENT is, uhm, trying to get some health coverage for these poor dumb AM-radio listeners, so …. OVERTHROW THE GUBMINT.

And then we have the breathtaking insights of 'The Family' with its roots deep into the workings of elected officials of Congress:

Jeff Sharlet continues his brilliant reporting on the bizarre christo-fascist cult called "the Family" which counts among its members some of the most powerful people holding elected office in the United States. How bizarre and extreme is the Family?

Attempting to explain what it means to be chosen for leadership like King David was -- or Mark Sanford, according to his own estimate -- [Doug Coe, son and heir-apparent to Family leader David Coe] asked a young man who'd put himself, body and soul, under the Family's authority, "Let's say I hear you raped three little girls. What would I think of you?" The man guessed that Coe would probably think that he was a monster. "No," answered Coe, "I wouldn't." Why? Because, as a member of the Family, he's among what Family leaders refer to as the "new chosen." If you're chosen, the normal rules don't apply.

And Randall Terry decides that domestic terrorism is the best way to show his love of America:

Randall Terry took time out of his twelve-city, "Defeat Sotomayor" tour yesterday to grace the National Press Club's podium. His message? Expect more domestic terrorism in response to health care reform.

Christy Hardin Smith has more:

Randall Terry is at it again. Because apparently the half-skull poster of Sonia Sotomayor and exhortations to his unstable flock about the Angel of Death weren't nearly enough to get him the fundraising haul attention he needed.

In any polite society, his brand of dangerous stoking of the fires of hell would get him shunned by decent people.

In fact, it's well past time that GOP lawmakers were asked -- clearly and without any ambiguity -- what they think of Terry's fire and brimstone violence stoking on behalf of their policy agenda.

Because they cannot have it both ways any more that Terry can.

Using Terry's dangerous rhetoric to push the Republican policy agenda makes them just as responsible for the ends of those means as Terry is.

Not to be outdone, the book burners demand libraries be cleansed of evil:

(CNN) -- A fight over books depicting sex and homosexuality has riled up a small Wisconsin city, cost some library board members their positions and prompted a call for a public book burning.

The battle has stirred much of West Bend, a city of roughly 30,000 people about 35 miles north of Milwaukee. Residents have sparred for months on blogs, airwaves and at meetings, including one where a man told the city's library director he should be tarred and feathered.

The row even spread to this year's Fourth of July parade, which included a float featuring a washing machine and a sign that read "keep our library clean."

"If you told me we would be going through a book challenge of this nature, I'd think, 'Never in a million years,' " said Michael Tyree, director of the West Bend Community Memorial Library.

The strife began in February when West Bend couple Jim and Ginny Maziarka objected to some of the content in the city library's young-adult section. They later petitioned the library board to move any sexually explicit books -- the definition of which would be debated -- from the young-adult section to the adult section and to label them as sexually explicit.

Ginny Maziarka, 49, said the books in the section of the library aimed at children aged 12 to 18 included homosexual and heterosexual content she thought was inappropriate for youths.

She and her husband also asked the library to obtain books about homosexuality that affirmed heterosexuality, such as titles written by "ex-gays," Maziarka said.

"All the books in the young-adult zone that deal with homosexuality are gay-affirming. That's not balance," she said.

So... instead of trying to work with our first black president, the rightwingers will ignore any kind of proof that Obama is who he says he is, they plan massive book burnings, the tar and feathering of librarians, domestic terrorism, homophobia, and destruction of the government.

This will show everybody just how much they love America and its freedoms.

Next?

Witch trials and hangings!