Politics
Democrats Surge In Latest Polls!
The “Stupid Years” Have Come To An End
On the night the Trump was elected in 2016, I turned off cable news and most other news sources and decided that I wasn’t going to let Trump dictate my daily life. I refused to be outraged and angry every day, which is what he wanted. “Owning the libs” has become the guiding principle of the Republican Party, along with white nationalism.
I think the GOP should change the name of their party to the “Bootlicker Party”. The last four years have shown us just how authoritarian they are. They can’t seem to win the popular vote in a presidential election so they followed along with Trump as he tried to take it by any means necessary.
So now that the “Stupid Years” are over, I might post my thoughts on here again to spare my friends and family from too many rants. Enjoy this picture of my eagle friend near the university where I work. As usual, my photos are public domain and you can feel free to grad them and use them.
The Birth Of A Republican Lie/Smear – Rep. Ed Markey Edition
The Republican party has no shame. They lie, cheat and steal their way into office. They embody such good Christian values…cough, choke, spit.
I often fantasize about a movie in the style of “Oh God”, where George Burns (God) confronts people like Michelle Bachman and Louie Gohmert or a long list of Republicans who blatantly tell falsehoods, repeatedly and even after being called out on it. If there is a hell, I imagine there will be an especially hot place reserved for these people.
It’s not often that we get to see the birth of one of these lies, placenta and all. From Steve Benen…
The National Republican Senate Committee accused Markey yesterday of claiming he “invented the satellite dish, low-cost mobile phone calls, and the ability for cable companies to provide long distance service.” The NRSC added, “Perhaps Markey can use the technology he invented to call, tweet, or message his friend Al Gore, inventor of the internet.”
Conservative humor is just so droll, isn’t it?
The problem, of course, is that the National Republican Senate Committee is lying. For one thing, Al Gore never claimed to be the inventor of the Internet. It just never happened — Republicans distorted a Gore comment, the media uncritically ran with it, and a ridiculous smear quickly entered the public consciousness.
For another, Markey didn’t say he “invented the satellite dish.” Matt Yglesias sets the record straight.
What Rep. Ed Markey helped to do in the 1992 Cable Act was to force the cable companies to license content to satellite companies in order to compete with the vertically integrated cable systems that were beginning their takeover of television markets. Competition being a good thing, right?
I guess it’s hard to blame them for attempting it, since the “Al Gore invented the internet” lie worked so well for them in 2000. And with the superficial media, who I’m beginning to think are illiterate, gladly helped to perpetuate that lie.
The sad thing is, the media is much worse than it was in 2000. Let’s see how they handle this one.
More Liberal Gloating On A New Extremely Liberal Podcast!
This was recorded on November 8, 2012, two days after the election. It marks the return of my insightful friend and colleague John to chat it up about the historic day of November 6, 2012. Topics include: The Fox News meltdown, the fun of watching it on the tube, looking forward and many other things. It’s a good one.
Talking Politics on the Extremely Liberal Podcast
Here is the latest Extremely Liberal podcast with my special guest, a colleague who teaches a class on politics and the media. He brings great insight and experience to our discussion. Check it out, I bet you will like it.
The Face of the GOP!
A picture is worth a thousand words! Thanks to BAGnewnotes.
FOX News and Firedoglake – Together Again!
On Friday, as any political junkie knows, President Obama and 140 Republicans from their caucus came together to have a discussion about a wide range of issues. The result of the meeting has spread around the internet and revealed the extreme biases that exist in our media. I found it curious that FOX News and Firedoglake, the brain child of Jane Hamsher, found common ground by trying to ignore that it ever really happened. FOX News reaction was predictable and in my mind so was FDL’s. I went over to FDL (even though I hate giving them clicks) and found they basically ignored the whole event on Friday. All the other progressive blogs were ablaze with clips, commentary, analysis and a lot of glee. It was a reminder to many of them of the skills of our president at framing issues, pushing pack against Republican talking points and a reaffirmation that we elected the best person for the job, Barack Obama. Once FDL did put up a post on the event, it reeked of their bitterness towards the president. They truly are following through with their idea during the election that if they can’t have Hillary Clinton, they don’t want anyone. From their first post mentioning the event entitled “It’s Called Debate, Not Hero Worship.” (I’m not linking to them because I don’t want them to get any more clicks, that’s what they want.)
To be sure, Obama and the WH staff deserve high praise for his performance yesterday, and they are rightfully getting it. I personally think it’s one of the best moves they’ve made. But let’s not respond to this event with the kind of undisguised and embarrassing hero-worship that was on display last night on MSNBC.
Although it may be true that Chris Matthews, Rachel Maddow and Kieth Olbermann were a bit excited about the event and praised the president’s skills in this setting, but to portray it as hero worship harkens back to the election. Remember when the Hillary folks used that line over and over again because candidate Obama was soooooo popular and was able to get people fired up about his candidacy. Jealousy, bitterness anyone. The next post that FDL posted about the event was titled “Obama Debating Dummies Is Easy; How About Debating the Grownups on the Real Issues?” No snarkiness there, huh? Here is a chunk from that post…
Debates with deluded dummies in the hope of convincing them is not just pointless; it is a distraction from the more important discussions we need to be having.
It is mindless to debate phony Republican talking points about government health takeovers, with people who not only lied about death panels but cannot even acknowledge that every universal coverage/care system in the advanced world relies on extensive government structure, funding and price/quality regulation.
So it’s mindless to go on national television and take on these Republican talking points? Really? It’s mindless to confront the republican lies with well reasoned, factual information? Mindless? This post reveals the real motives of the folks at the Firedoglake, to damage the president as much as they can to prove that Hillary really should have been president, the votes of the people be damned. This post finishes up with even more drivel, pure shit…
The President has run away from real debates on these and a dozen other national issues. His refusal to engage genuine, credible critics while playing instead on the dummies’ anti-intellectual turf is what is crippling his credibility and sabotaging his ability to govern and actually solve these hard problems.
Dismissing the dummies should be the media’s job. If the President wants to have a debate on the real issues facing America, how about confronting the grown ups, and not just the 12-year olds?
So by taking on the opposition (Republican Party), you know, the ones with votes in the house and senate, he is “crippling his credibility and sabotaging his ability to govern”? By presenting his case to the American people and sharply shooting down the Republican talking points, he’s crippling his credibility? Wow, talk about spin. So he would have been better off debating the idiots at Firedoglake (not all are idiots I must say)? And then the final sentence reveals how naive these bitter people are by retreating to their fantasy world “Dismissing the dummies should be the media’s job”….how’s that working out for you. The media hasn’t done it’s job for many years, it’s a reality we all have to live in and as progressives, we must find ways to get our message out to the masses without relying on the media to do it. This forum was an awesome way to do it, I hope it happens more but I am doubtful that the Republicans will put themselves in that position again.
5.7% Growth In 4th Quarter, The Stimulus Worked!
I’m sure all the haters will have reasons why this isn’t real, or wasn’t because of the stimulus, or was because of some other reason…..BITE ME!
Real gross domestic product -- the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States -- increased at an annual rate of 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009, (that is, from the third quarter to the fourth quarter), according to the "advance" estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
I’ve been watching the signs of the recovery for the last 6 months, lots of good or “not so bad” news has been coming for a while, but it has basically been ignored by the media because it doesn’t fit into their current narrative, that President Obama’s presidency has been a failure. Chew on this, bitches. When I see the slanted journalism that paints this picture of failure, I find comfort in the fact that reality will catch up with them and make them look like fools. You can only hide the truth for so long, eventually it finds its way into the public consciousness. President Obama’s speech the other night was one of the first steps in showing the reality of the last year, not what the right wing, Jane Hamsher, Arianna Huffington and Cenk Uygur have been trying to paint. I wonder how they are reacting to this?
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