One really good way to ruin your Saturday?

Read these articles...

What If the Tea Party Wins?

The 11 craziest things in Rick Perry’s ‘Fed Up’ manifesto

8 Facts That Prove the Tea Party Is Ignorant of the U.S. Constitution

‘Cut Budgets to Kill Jobs’ – And 4 More GOP Schemes to Rig the 2012 Election

11 Reasons Why the Unemployment Crisis Is Even Worse Than You Think

Between Race and Reason: Anti-Intellectualism in American Life

Michele Bachmann unleased

Or uncorked, let loose, uncaged, free range, unadulterated...

It always comes down to sex, doesn't it?

Politicians in Utah get ready to address the most threatened issue in the United States.... sex. This makes me feel so much safer....

Majority Of American Adults Support Same-Sex Marriage so the Republicans try to deny it.

Tea Party Jesus.

Republicans love America

And hate everything in it. Everything.

Defunding Planned Parenthood

And they don't care.

1.94 MILLION UNINTENDED PREGNANCIES AND 810,000 ABORTIONS ARE PREVENTED EACH YEAR BY PUBLICLY FUNDED FAMILY PLANNING SERVICES

Teabaggers and Republicans

How is it that "small government" Tea Party conservatives have so much overlap with the religious right, which wants a sniffer for every woman's panty drawer and a bureaucrat digging around in your sex life to see if you should be denied your full human rights?

Interestingly, the religious right has long had a theory that ties together their desire for a more theocratic state and the rhetoric of "small government" – or at least, ties together their anti-feminism with the small government rhetoric. The idea is that God has set gender roles for men and women, where women stay at home dependent on men. Feminists, the thinking goes, use social spending and reproductive rights to keep women from becoming dependent on men, which upsets God's plan for women. So, in order to return to the natural order of male dominance – which they currently call "complementary roles" – the government should not only deny women reproductive rights, but also cut off social spending in order to force women become dependent on men. No healthcare, no welfare, no spending on education that gets kids out of the home and allows women to work outside of it. And now, of course, no spending on contraception that allows women to delay marriage and limit family size, preserving their independence.

That cutting these programmes wouldn't do anything really to reduce spending doesn't seem to matter. All that matters is that this idea weds fiscal and social conservatism, breaking down any meaningful division between the two. The Republicans get this, which is why they are using spending cuts as a cover to give social conservatives what they want in terms of restricting contraception and abortion.

Now, if only the mainstream media would wake up and see the massive overlap between the Tea Party and the Christian right that the Republicans have always understood.

Money talks

Koch industries orchestrating anti-union 'Tea Party' protests in Wisconsin

The Teabaggers think the eighteenth century

Was a really good time to live:

Tea Party Nation President Says It ‘Makes A Lot Of Sense’ To Restrict Voting Only To Property Owners

Phillips is advocating a policy of voter disenfranchisement that has its roots in the 18th century. When the United States was first founded, ownership of property was one of the requirements to vote in most elections. Many of these restrictions were phased out by the 1820s and replaced with requirements that the voter pays taxes. By 1850, these requirements, too, were phased out. Nashville Scene blogger Betsy Phillips calls the Tea Party Nation president’s idea a “frivolous proposal designed to stoke intergenerational antagonism — as if the people who are older and can afford a home are somehow better citizens than the 18-year-olds who are going off to war to die for our country.”

Weirdness uncorked

In the Era of Stupid:

Judge: Let lesbians into military so male GIs can turn them straight

North Korea/ South Korea /whatever ...

GAFFES VS. DUMBSTUPID

Hey!! The rule was you guys are supposed to go ELSEWHERE around the world and blow things up! Not here at home in Saudi Arabia.

Ryadh--Saudi authorities said Friday they arrested 149 al-Qaeda suspects in a months-long sweep and thwarted attacks inside the kingdom on government officials, media personalities and civilian targets.

And speaking of religious nutcakes:

The Myth of Christian Persecution in the United States

And:

The world is deeply divided on the question of whether religion is a force for good, a survey by Ipsos Reid suggests.

And:

Happy Thanksgiving! Right Jabs Pilgrims For ... Communism?

Bob Herbert of the New York Times warns the rich.

The Era of Stupid continued

WTF?

Energy Committee Chairman Candidate Says God Promised no More Catastrophic Climate Change after Noah

Bush's book (novel):

Still Spinning The Spin

And I thought Georgie didn't pay any attention to polls. In his own words:

PRESIDENT BUSH: (Chuckles.) Well, first of all, you have got to know I don't pay attention to polls. I just don't.

So what is this?

Bush On Social Security: 'Privatization' Was A 'Poll-Tested Word'

Booman:

The Tea Party candidates explicitly opposed all these efforts except the targeted tax cuts, and their number one issue is the deficit, which most tax cuts will only exacerbate. More mainstream Republicans also oppose all these solutions. So, basically, people said they want the government to create jobs but they voted in people who don't support using any of the tools the government has to create them. That's stupid.

Shut up shut up shut up!1!

Or you will get stomped, handcuffed, threatened, and wrestled to the ground. All because teabaggers love God, the Constitution, and free speech....

Update: waterboarded....

Man-pants Christine O'Donnell

Hmmm.... notice a theme throughout her Wiki page? Like... not paying her bills? Why on earth would people want someone like this to be in government with the ability to get her hands on heaps of taxpayers' money?

And she's NEVER been married?

Could she be gay?

Huffington Post: The Craziest Things Christine O'Donnell Has Ever Said

Update: Quick, clean her up!! Delete Delete Delete!! Christine O’Donnell’s Website Stripped Of All Information

There is NO GROUND ZERO MOSQUE

Just how stupid are these people?

Good grief.

The stupidity is flying so fast around the blogosphere, I feel like hunkering down in my bunker.

Did the Era of Bush start this celebration of the Era of Stupid? Does high fructose corn syrup clog our arteries AND slow our brain activity? Did the melamine in our genetically altered food make Americans cease to think?

If the Teabaggery Party is the newest 'revolution', being stupid must be the first tenet on its party platform: Keep your hands off my Medicare but no government health care! Soldiers are dying for our freedoms so we can hunt illegals and prevent mosques from being built! Take us back to the happy age somewhere in our past (but actually only found on tv) where white males were in power and everybody else knew their place!

Stupid is as stupid does.... and that's why I'm stocking up on canned food and catapults.

Update 8/18: Speaking of which...

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Exclusive - Dick Armey Extended Interview Pt. 1
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Update: And even more to the point:

In a new segment called "Jon Stewart And Anderson Cooper Look At Gaping Holes,' Stewart analyzed the plot holes in Rep. Gohmert's story. First of all, wouldn't it be easier to recruit adult Americans than to raise them from scratch? Secondly, Stewart pointed out that raising a terror baby would be difficult because, "you know, when they become terror teens they tune you out."

As always, Stewart introduced a logical solution: hero babies! We can raise our own babies to fight the terror babies to be prepared for the wait-listed attack. "These babies don't run... Yet," Stewart said.

Stewart then took a look at some of Rep. Gohmert's other causes by showing clips of him speaking in Congress. Let's just say the topics ranged from animal protection to sleeping with corpses to Hitler. In that order.

It would be like denying the Quakers a meeting house

Near where the KKK firebombed a building. But nuance is not a teabaggery strength.

Newsmax:

A New York City panel has denied landmark status to a building near ground zero, freeing organizers to build an Islamic center and mosque there.

The Landmarks Preservation Commission's decision allows organizers to transform the 152-year-old building into an Islamic community center blocks from the site of the Sept. 11 attacks.

National and New York politicians and the Anti-Defamation League have come out in recent weeks against plans for the mosque, saying it disrespects the memory of Sept. 11 victims. Mayor Michael Bloomberg has supported the mosque.

The commission voted 9-0 against granting landmark status to the building. Commissioners said the building didn't meet historic criteria to qualify as a landmark.

The mosque would be part of an Islamic community center to be operated by a group called the Cordoba Initiative, which says the center will be a space for moderate Muslim voices.

But opponents say building a mosque near ground zero would be an insult to the memory of those who died at the hands of Muslim extremists on Sept. 11, 2001.

How is refusing a peaceful and religious group of Muslims an area to build a community center a 'Christian' action? What have they to do with 9/11?

Nothing.

Will the wingnuts and teabaggers ever acknowledge the difference?

No. It's too comforting to hate and too profitable to reeducate the haters.

Update: I love to be proved wrong. Go Temecula!

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.

It’s not slander if it’s the truth

Racism in the Teabaggery party.

Gulf Oil Spill Tracker

People have to provide this information to the public because nobody 'in charge' wants to tell you.

BP shows how much it cares about the small people:

BP Launches ‘Aggressive’ Social Media Campaign, But Disables Comments From Users Who Don’t ‘Like’ It.

And even though the ruin is plain to see and getting worse by the day:

Tea partiers wary of regulation, even in BP spill
Congressman's BP 'shakedown' remark resonates with conservatives wanting small government

Governor Barbour knows what side of his bread is buttered:

JACKSON, Miss. -- Mississippi's Republican governor, Haley Barbour, said on Sunday that the temporary moratorium on offshore drilling imposed by the Obama administration is worse than the catastrophic oil spill caused by the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig.

"Governor, what's worse, the moratorium or the effects of this spill on the region?" asked "Meet the Press" host David Gregory on Sunday. Barbour responded, "Well, the moratorium... the spill's a terrible thing, but the moratorium is a terrible thing that's not only bad for the region, it's bad for America."

O'Reilly grills Rep. Michelle Bachmann?!

Black tea party?

Imagine that hundreds of black protesters were to descend upon Washington DC and Northern Virginia, just a few miles from the Capitol and White House, armed with AK-47s, assorted handguns, and ammunition. And imagine that some of these protesters —the black protesters — spoke of the need for political revolution, and possibly even armed conflict in the event that laws they didn’t like were enforced by the government? Would these protester — these black protesters with guns — be seen as brave defenders of the Second Amendment, or would they be viewed by most whites as a danger to the republic? What if they were Arab-Americans? Because, after all, that’s what happened recently when white gun enthusiasts descended upon the nation’s capital, arms in hand, and verbally announced their readiness to make war on the country’s political leaders if the need arose.

I doubt we would see any Republican within 500 miles of the meeting and that the entire group would be surrounded by police taking photos for future reference... People of color are obviously terrorists. White people are sincere, religious and true patriots who regretfully drag their armaments out of the closet to do the Lord's work.

Blog sprinkles

Wil Robinson of the amazing blog International Political Will has an excellent list of books to read.

Via Steve Bates of The Yellow Something Something, women with breast cancer are being deliberately targeted and cut from insurance.

Rachael Maddow points out how very very small the Tea Party is in comparison to the amount of news it gets.

TPM warns us about the Republican backbenchers.

If you agree with Iran and women can start earthquakes, join Boobquake on facebook!!

Bryan of Why Now? warns us how to deal with bull alligators during mating season.... (run away!1!)

Blessings upon the International Justice Mission:

International Justice Mission is a human rights agency that secures justice for victims of slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of violent oppression. IJM lawyers, investigators and aftercare professionals work with local officials to ensure immediate victim rescue and aftercare, to prosecute perpetrators and to promote functioning public justice systems.

Urge major textbook publishers not to publish and distribute, nationally, textbooks that conform to the controversial standards of one state.

10 good reasons to drink more water and how your diet can help prevent Alzheimer's.

Arizona's immigration bill:

HIGH-RISK BILL: SB-1070 would require police to attempt to determine the immigration status of anyone they encounter as part of a "lawful contact" and allow them to arrest undocumented immigrants and charge them with trespass. If residents believe police officers are not enforcing immigration laws, they can sue them. It would also outlaw the hiring of day laborers off the street and prohibit anyone from knowingly transporting an undocumented immigrant for any reason. The ACLU points out that SB-1070 unconstitutionally allows the state to regulate immigration -- a power which the Constitution assigns to the federal government. The ACLU also highlights a provision of the bill that grants police officers authority to conduct warrantless arrests of anyone who cannot immediately produce documents and notes that such action has already been deemed invalid by the Ninth Circuit Court. The ACLU concludes that the bill will "exacerbate racial profiling" and tries to "rewrite the Constitution by turning the presumption of innocence on its head." Several research institutions have also cited the high fiscal costs associated with local immigration crackdowns. The National Employment Law Project pointed out that smaller-scale anti-immigrant ordinances have cost individual localities millions of dollars. The Perryman Group estimates that if all unauthorized immigrants were removed from Arizona, the state would lose $26.4 billion in economic activity, $11.7 billion in gross state product, and approximately 140,324 jobs. The Immigration Policy Center noted that, "with Arizona facing a budget deficit of more than $3 billion, Gov. Brewer might want to think twice about measure that would further imperil the state's economic future." Brewer has until Saturday to sign or veto SB-1070 before it automatically becomes state law.

The Great Gatsby... by beatonna.

The new $100 bill looks European!!11! Obviously this reflects Obama's socialistic.... what? designed during Bush's term? Never mind.....

Chickens for Checkups.