Tuesday's Traumas

Fun with guns.

Dick Cheney.

The Koch machine.

What the poor must do every day.

Mary Poppin's creator was cantankerous and grumpy.  And didn't like Disney's take on her book. 

Failure and how to deal with it.

Republican's to do list.

One way to honor the children of Sandy Hook without bothering the community.

Tramping through Tuesday

This week in FAIL.

How to have an argument on Facebook.

How To Spot And Out A Pro-’Lifer’ That Really Just Hates Women And Sex

More about CISPA

The loosey-goosey retirement of Georgie Bush.

BP Gulf disaster... worse than we thought.

Maybe we need to fail as a country

To learn what was important to us.

Postcards from Hell

Images from the world's most failed states. 61 countries teetering on the brink or already lost to the abyss.

On the Eschaton threads...

Do you hope for republicans to fail?

Republicans HAVE failed. It was Harding-Hoover that pushed tax cuts and deregulation leading to 2 stock market crashes in 1929 and 1931, collapse of the banking system, and the great depression.

It was Reagan-Bush that pushed tax cuts and deregulation that led to 2 stock market crashes in 1987 and 1989, the S&L meltdown and the ensuing recession.

It was Gramm-Bush-Cheney that pushed tax cuts and deregulation that to the stock market crash in 2008 and ????, the banking system collapse and the global depression we are now in.

An honest look at history reveals that the idiot republicans have pushed the same failed policies over and over, and have gotten the same results every time.

And now you fucking morons are pushing the exact same bullshit again, hoping the results will be different. Wishful thinking IS NOT A STRATEGY FOR SUCCESS!!! Deal with it.
left field, barack the house | 03.06.09 - 4:24 pm

Thank you for apologizing, Keith

But you had nothing to do with the astonishingly crass video of 9/11 that made the crowd at the RNC cheer.

9/11? Osama bin Laden to attack within the US? Covering your ass? Sitting stunned in a second grade classroom shows leadership? Running away? Inept pursuit of bin Laden?

Just who was in charge that day? Republicans. Who diverted troops to an unnecessary and ineptly run war with Iraq when we could have stayed in Afghanistan and actually helped the country? Why is Osama alive right now? Who has been in control of all three branches of government for most of Bush's eight years? How are our two wars on terror going? How's the economy? How's the housing market? The job market? How's the environment? How's our 'freedoms': freedom of the press, freedom of and from religion, privacy, habeas corpus? Warrantless wiretaps?

(And by the way, while they were in power, why didn't the Republicans jam through legislation outlawing abortion and jail time for those women who have them, prayer and religion in schools, and the teaching of intelligent design,if these are so important to them?)

McCain is no maverick. He has voted with Bush more than 90% of the time. Supported Bush and his actions. Bush, who mishandled the intel on al-Qaeda and thus allowed 9/11 happen.

So why would crowd at the Republican National Convention stand up and cheer?

The Republicans own the failure of 9/11 outright.

Good

...bye and good riddance.

Howie Klein of Crooks and Liars put this beautiful music to grace these evil bastards as they flee the sinking ship:

In honor of the announcements of the 27 or 28 House members– and a handful of senators– who have decided it’s time to say goodbye… here’s a version I just put together for tonight. And after I put the clip together, right-wing extremist Ron Lewis (R-KY) cut and ran.

Wanted: One manly macho tyrant to take over by force and tell us what to do

The mess has gotten so great the wingnuts are hoping for a strongman to march in and save them. Digby at Hullabaloo:

This is a psychological problem more than an ideology, perhaps even some sort of massive sexual identity crisis. When frustrated that they cannot convince the people to conform to their will, they simply force them. That is simple authoritarianism and it's become quite the rage on the right of late, (which is darkly amusing considering their years of railing against totalitarian communism.)

We are not going to hear the end of it for a while. Their failure so total, and the embarrassment so complete, that the yearning for a rightwing tyrant on a white horse is palpable. You hear things like this every day now:

When I see the worsening degeneracy in our politicians, our media, our educators, and our intelligentsia, I can't help wondering if the day may yet come when the only thing that can save this country is a military coup.

I guess that whole "they're evil and we're good and they hate us for our freedom" thing didn't work out.

Update: I did post about this earlier, btw.

Soldiers speak out

And talk back:

A British soldier has broken ranks within days of returning from Iraq to speak publicly of the horror of his tour of duty there, painting a picture of troops under siege, "sitting ducks" to an increasingly sophisticated insurgency.

"Basra is lost, they are in control now. It's a full-scale riot and the Government are just trying to save face," said Private Paul Barton.

The 27-year-old, who returned from his second tour of Iraq this week along with other members of 1st Battalion, the Staffordshire Regiment, insisted that he remains loyal to the Army despite such public dissent. He said he had already volunteered to go to Afghanistan later this year.

But, he said, he felt strongly that somebody had to speak out: "I want people to see it as it is; not the sugar-coated version."

His public protest is a sign of the groundswell of anger among the troops, and predictions that more will come forward to break the traditional covenant of silent service. Just last month, Pte Steve Baldwin, 22, a soldier in the same regiment, spoke to The Independent about the way he had been "pushed aside" since being injured by a roadside bomb which killed three others during the Staffords' first tour of Iraq in 2005.

And then (via Bryan at Why Now?):

For the second time in a generation, the United States faces the prospect of defeat at the hands of an insurgency. In April 1975, the U.S. fled the Republic of Vietnam, abandoning our allies to their fate at the hands of North Vietnamese communists. In 2007, Iraq's grave and deteriorating condition offers diminishing hope for an American victory and portends risk of an even wider and more destructive regional war.

These debacles are not attributable to individual failures, but rather to a crisis in an entire institution: America's general officer corps. America's generals have failed to prepare our armed forces for war and advise civilian authorities on the application of force to achieve the aims of policy. The argument that follows consists of three elements. First, generals have a responsibility to society to provide policymakers with a correct estimate of strategic probabilities. Second, America's generals in Vietnam and Iraq failed to perform this responsibility. Third, remedying the crisis in American generalship requires the intervention of Congress.

Broken promises

Are a matter of course for Georgie. Promise to help fight AIDS in Africa, help bring the good life to Afghanistan and Iraq, help the poor, help the sick, show some compassion somewhere to somebody.....

Because he's the Compassionator!



That means he actually doesn't have to do anything. Just go around comforting on people....

The New York Times via Karen McL at Peripetia:

"President Bush has reneged on his promises to Katrina’s victims. Shamefully, the president has chosen the interests of bureaucracy over those of American towns on the brink of failure.

Over a year and a half later, there are 64,000 people still sleeping in trailers in Louisiana and far too many communities without schools, hospitals and other basics. These are unacceptable failures. At least part of the problem is a law that requires states to contribute 10 percent of the cost of most federally financed reconstruction projects. Mr. Bush waived that requirement after the Sept. 11 attacks (as his father did after Hurricanes Andrew and Iniki) but he refuses to do so for the Gulf Coast.
...
The State of Louisiana estimates the gap between the devastation there and the federal and private payouts at $34 billion.

Compile Georgie's promises from when he was selected prez. I can't think of one that he fulfilled in any way ... except to Cheney.