This could get old

This is twice in three days or so I've put a link up here to one of these, but this Olbermann response to an execrable column from a professional dipshit at CBS Sports is damn good and if the subject had a conscience (which his history leaves in doubt) he'd crawl into a whole hole*.


*yeah, yeah, I didn't proofread.

Anniversaries

Couldn't help notice that the 28th was the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington and Martin Luther King's monumental speech.

Republicans declined to participate.

Meanwhile, the 29th was the 5th Anniversary of Sara Palin twerking on to the American scene.

Republicans declined to note that one too.

The Legacy...

While many people were still on the internet to figure out either where Damascus is, or what twerking is, the legacy of the rush to war in Iraq had its legacy shown in Great Britain.

A rather tepid piece of legislation to get to the next stage of saber rattling against Syria was narrowly defeated.

 It's not too often in my recollection...perhaps going back to the Ford Administration just before Saigon fell that I remember a political leader admitting defeat so quickly.

And herein lies perhaps the one positive legacy of the Bush (and Blair) years, headlong rushes into futile new acts of war, for the time being, have become more difficult.

But not impossible.

 [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Something to check out during the Daily Show Hiatus

Olbermann's back...on ESPN2 and it's pretty good -- and sportscentric. Still, nice little segment on the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington and how it related to his father and Satchel Paige. Moving.

Meanwhile,

Actual known criminals on Wall Street also have a lot of police around...they are just looking the other way.

The New York Police Department has secretly labeled entire mosques as terrorist organizations, a designation that allows police to use informants to record sermons and spy on imams, often without specific evidence of criminal wrongdoing.

Designating an entire mosque as a terrorism enterprise means that anyone who attends prayer services there is a potential subject of an investigation and fair game for surveillance.

When your official policy is pretty much simpatico with the Cheney family...maybe you should take a moment for self-reflection?

Saltpeter all around

Once again, the international community is getting in the way of the United States obtaining full-release!

Britain and the other four permanent members of the security council have begun talks in New York on a resolution proposed by Britain that would authorise the use of military force in Syria as a response to its use of chemical weapons last week. Russia and China are firmly opposed to a security council resolution allowing force, and British government officials admit their initiative is likely to fail. But Labour said on Wednesday it would not support the government in Thursday's Commons vote unless ministers had tried to win security council agreement.

Oh, the joy of killing nameless, faceless, foreign folk DENIED by the pretense of doing something less noisy and visually arresting for broadcast. Hell, even France is on board this time!

I guess we'll have to go stretch the limits of our media commentators' limited imaginations (very very tiny and inadequate) and start renaming other ethnic foods this time.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

I'm no marriage expert

But I'm just guessing that implying to a reporter that it is possible your partner's "privates" caused you to become ill, is NOT a good move in regard to your future marital situation.

Catherine Zeta-Jones And Michael Douglas Separate

On the other-hand -- now we have something else to focus on instead of who are leaders are going to bomb now?

Meanwhile...

As they give the company's of the superrich bailouts and tax breaks...

Congressmen Tells The Elderly ‘We Do Not Have The Money’ To Fund Meals On Wheels

Mitt Romney's "non-takers"

On the mark...as always, that guy:

More than one-third of the nation's highest-paid CEOs from the past two decades led companies that were subsidized by American taxpayers, according to a report released Wednesday by the Institute for Policy Studies, a liberal think tank.

And then they all went home to their children; Hank, Dagny, and Galt.

(pic via by monkey_bob99x at flickr.com)

Precious based on the novel, Prick, by Sapphire

Oh this is rich, rich indeed:

BP Accuses Deepwater Horizon Settlement Victims Of Taking ‘Money They Don’t Deserve’

Your Representative Democracy in Action...circa 2013

Few want military action in Syria. So we're gonna have military action in Syria. Few, even Republicans, wants the government shut down. So we're gonna shut down the government.

Meanwhile, our awesome media has focused on the real threat.

Miley Cyrus.

(BTW, I'm so old and unhip -- or perhaps the better phrase is well-adjusted? -- that I had to look up "twerking" and it is thankfully slightly less sexual than I thought.  Slightly.)

Yet another cunning plan

Mike Huckabee, between prayers and gastro-bypass defying sausage gravy, recently suggested how Republicans could defeast "Obama-care" but good.

Mike Huckabee is so fed up with hearing President Obama claim that the Republicans have made preventing people “from getting health care their holy grail,” he is calling on the GOP to adopt an innovative solution to solving the nation’s health care crisis: cure cancer!

Cure cancer? Who ever thought of ever trying to do that...other than everyone. Except these guys:

Making good on election promises to reduce federal spending, the Republican-led House of Representatives recently approved a spending package (H.R. 1) that contains massive reductions in discretionary spending for the remainder of the current fiscal year 2011, which will expire Sept. 30...approximately $640 million is proposed as a “general reduction to 2008 levels,” and would directly impact the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

Yeah, I'm sure this will all come to pass. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Hard to believe "Meet the Press" is struggling

When the editorial process of David Gregory and company decide the best way to celebrate Martin Luther King,Jr. and the March on Washington of 1963 is this pairing.

Snoop Lion and Mitt Romney.

Having a Dream-Weavers

In the spirit of "good timing" the Republican Party's becoming known for, America's almost least popular governor, Bobby Jindal -- who five years ago didn't stop Republicans from touting his ethnicity to prove the Party didn't dislike all people of color, picked the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington to say this:

Yet we still place far too much emphasis on our “separateness,” our heritage, ethnic background, skin color, etc. We live in the age of hyphenated Americans: Asian-Americans, Italian-Americans, African-Americans, Mexican-Americans, Cuban-Americans, Indian-Americans, and Native Americans, to name just a few. Here’s an idea: How about just “Americans?”

Yeah -- are you Republicans going to paint that one on the fence you want to build on the Mexican border, or just knit a place-setting for Travon Martin's parents with that one stitched in? [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Part of a long-standing history of "blowing it"

Meanwhile Fred Hiatt is still obsessing about how to curtail civil liberties, make the poor's life more miserable, and which countries to bomb:

On Saturday, Robert G. Kaiser, a former managing editor at The Washington Post and current associate editor and senior correspondent, authored an op-ed describing how the paper "blew it."

Kaiser, who was then a summer intern, was one of 60 staffers assigned to cover the 1963 March on Washington. Many people expected a riot. When it didn't materialize, the paper was caught off-guard. While the lead story stressed that participants had remained 'orderly,' it failed to mention King or his history-making speech:

In that paper of Aug. 29, 1963, The Post published two dozen stories about the march. Every one missed the importance of King’s address. The words “I have a dream” appeared in only one, a wrap-up of the day’s rhetoric on Page A15 — in the fifth paragraph. We also printed brief excerpts from the speeches, but the three paragraphs chosen from King’s speech did not include “I have a dream.”

In comparison, the New York Times led with "I have a dream" on its front cover. Reporter James Reston wrote that King "touched all the themes of the day, only better than anybody else."

Good thing he doesn't have the complexion level of say, Samuel L. Jackson then huh?

Because he's just light enough to get by apparently.

During a Wednesday town hall in Muskogee, Oklahoma, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) told a member in the audience that while he didn't "have the legal background" to know whether Obama carried out any high crimes and misdemeanors, the president certainly was getting "perilously close."

Oh, Hi everybody

Yes, I am alive...just haven't posted yet.

Apparently my Obsessive Compulsive Disorder was under control.

Until now.

So a day ending in "Y" then?

I understand they also ate and crapped.

Feel the "Homeland" is made safer?

So cuddly and adorable:

Ayo Kimathi works as a small business specialist for the Department of Homeland Security. After work, he reportedly runs a website called War on the Horizon, which features your standard federal employee opinions, like describing President Obama as "a treasonous mulatto scum dweller … who will fight against reparations for Black people in amerikkka, but in favor of fag rights for freaks in amerikkka and Afrika."

On Wednesday, the Southern Poverty Law Center published a report about Kimathi, who goes by the name "Irritated Genie" online, describing him as “a gay-bashing, revenge-seeking black nationalist who advocates on his website – War on the Horizon – the mass murder of whites and the 'ethnic cleansing' of 'black-skinned Uncle Tom race traitors.' "

The various targets of Kimathi's rage include, among others, Rev. Al Sharpton, Lil Wayne, Oprah Winfrey, Whoopi Goldberg, President Obama, Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell, "the smallhates (white so-called ‘jews’) and the white homos like Gay Edgar Hoover.” 

Kimathi's co-workers at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement told the SPLC that “everyone in the office is afraid of him."

Golly, cannot imagine why.

On the other hand, sounds like National Review found a new hire -- "Black Derbyshire".

Get those RAINBOW UMBRELLA'S off a Russian Beach

Yes, this happened...in Russia.

Well...yup, sums it up

And I bet when he said that ... the "group" of Republicans probably cheered -- standing orgasm even.

Don't worry about your rights...

I'm sure your dick & boob pics and responses to Nigerian emails are in that unmonitored quarter.

The NSA's enormous surveillance system can access around three-quarters of all U.S. internet traffic, snaring in some cases even email sent between U.S. citizens and domestic web phone calls.

Seriously, you KNOW that much of the 25% that is not monitored is made up of Nigerian email scams, viagram mass emails, "reverse mortgage" offers, and that email your right-wing uncle sends you about Obama being born in FILL IN AFRICAN NATION HERE.

And if your name is Mohammad, Ali, or Khalid I'd guess your internet traffic is 100 fuckin' percent monitored.

FREEANCE everybody!

One of the least reported stories of the last few months...here at least

I imagine it has received more coverage in parts of Asia.

Japan's nuclear crisis escalated to its worst level in two years on Wednesday, with its nuclear watchdog saying it feared more tanks were leaking contaminated water and China expressing its shock over the disaster.

Japan's nuclear regulator also said it feared the disaster exceeded the ability of the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co, to cope "in some respects".

A spokesman for the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) said earlier on Wednesday the agency plans to upgrade the severity of the crisis from a level 1 "anomaly" to a level three "serious incident" on an international scale for radiological releases.

Such a move would be the most serious action taken since the plant was destroyed by an earthquake and tsunami in 2011.

"Any way you look at it, this is deplorable," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said at a regular news conference on Wednesday. "The government will make every effort to halt the leak of contaminated water as soon as possible."

And how's that cancer cure coming?

Science!

After weighing 10 Double Stuf cookies both with and without their chocolate wafers, the class plugged the numbers into mathematical equations and came up with the horrifying truth: Double Stuf Oreos were only 1.86 times larger than regular Oreos.

The Bathtub Gin of Politics

And Chris Christie is a "moderate" because no one, especially the media, cares to frame it any other way -- but the radio talkers do, and Christ Christie wants to fit into the White House.

After months of pressure from both sides of the gun control debate, Gov. Chris Christie today refused to sign three controversial gun control measures sitting on his desk — including a version of a weapon ban that he had called for.

Somebody just doesn't want to have to face the withering scorn of Rand Paul...so he's tough on something, just not being principled.

(William Howard Taft's bathtub via Whitehousemuseum.org]

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Congratulations to Canada

Edging out the United States and all of Latin America this year for having the continent's biggest asshole.

Conservatism unaffected by Conscience

I suppose if your criticism of the Obama Administration's drone policy is that it isn't used on enough weddings and funerals, making an 11-year old girl cry is a piece of cake (that you yank out of a child's hands of course).

Rep. Scott DesJarlais (R-Tenn.) told an 11-year-old girl who spoke out at a town hall meeting last week that her undocumented father should be deported, saying "we need to follow" current immigration laws.

Of course, given DesJarlais' history, deporting the father means one thing quite clearly...the mother is available.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Move over "sideboobs", Huffington Post's right-side has a new prototype!

Dick move

Seems a pretty clear cut case of petty intimidation.

I'm sure Ray Kelly approved though.

"Stand your ground"? How about "Lost your mind?!"

I'm sure we can all have "confidence" that Florida's law will lead to justice in this case...

In July 2012 Gulf County was rocked by the news that 32-year-old Everett Gant had been fatally shot at the Pine Ridge Apartments off Garrison Avenue in Port St. Joe by Walton Butler.

Gant died six weeks to the day after being shot between the eyes with a .22 caliber rifle.

Butler was charged with second degree murder with a firearm, evidencing prejudice based on race, or a hate crime specification.

According to the arresting affidavit, Butler acted as if “inconvenienced” when put under arrest, saying he could not understand the problem as he “had only shot a (racial epithet).”

In the ensuing year, the case has seen a series of starts and stops and in the most recent developments, Butler has invoked Florida’s controversial “Stand Your Ground” law and plans to contend that deadly force was his last resort and that he is entitled to immunity from arrest and prosecution.

Journalism? Eh, close enough...

Thank goodness modern American journalism "brighter lights" are maintaining the integrity long lauded in the profession...by journalists. Take it away Michael Grunwald of Time Magazine:

Okay, loves drones, irrationally hates Assange...that seems objective enough for David Gregory and such. But it does seem rather inappropriate for y'know sanity, so after twitter unleashed "shame" he saw the light...the very dim light.

Yeah, having people wish they could be killed by drones can do that...but as the twitteratti pointed out, still quite a jerk-move. Try again?

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Are you experienced

Via Roy Edroso we see the supreme intellectual fitness of the modern conservative movement:

Here’s Ben Shapiro with his own formula for conservative victory:

Ask anybody who’s ever broken up with a girlfriend, no matter what you say to your girlfriend after you break up with her, she’s going to think you’re a jerk. Right? And the same thing is true with the American people.

The American people have broken up with conservativism. You’re not going to convince them that conservativism is the way to go by being really nice. The way that you’re going to convince them that conservatism is the way to go is because this is a two-party system, and we can paint the other side as mean and nasty as they are. And they are. They’re mean and nasty and they’re horrible people. I mean, they truly are.

Yep, the "Virgin" Ben knows as much about how to treat a voter as he does how to treat a woman.




Via Balloon Juice.

Inspiring slogans -- and probably useful

Tengrain over at Dependable Renegade sums up the New Jersey Senatorial Contest involving Corey Booker and the extreme right-wing nut job named Steve Lonegan.

He is running against Democratic candidate Corey Booker, who indeed carries water for Wall Street, but is not a Xristian Xrazie fundie teabagger.

This is hardly the most inspiring advertisement the Democratic Party could come up with...but it probably would be the most accurate.

Great Moments in headline placement

Good Job Talking Points Memo:

Just wondering

Between Bob Filner and Arnold Schwarzenegger has every California woman been groped or verbally abused?

Deadweight

Robert Samuelson, one of the Washington Post's legendarily deep-bench of shitty columnists has spent years proclaiming the wonders of the free market...especially when it hurts others.

So this summary from Jonathan Chait is well-done now that Samuelson sees an 'internet guy' buy the WaPo:

Samuelson has spent 30 years lecturing Americans threatened by competition that they should suck it up. Only now, in the twilight of his career, does he see himself among them, and his response to this misfortune — a still-theoretical threat to his comfortable sinecure — is to wish the source of that competition out of existence.

That's how you capitulate

Well, thank goodness the International Olympic Committee has shown us the bravery we've come to know them for.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) reiterated yesterday that it would ban any Olympic athlete guilty of spreading “propaganda” at the 2014 Winter Olympics to be held in Sochi, Russia next February. Using the same unfortunate language that is in Russia’s draconian new anti-gay/anti-trans “propaganda” law, the IOC appeared to stand by the decision, reported earlier this week, to ban the LGBT Pride House at this year’s Olympics.

So I hope every athlete during the parade of nations comes out, well at least comes out in a rainbow flag. Try banning everybody you Avery Brundage Legacies.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Rhymes with "Poo"?

Obama is going to address the 500 plus murdered in Egypt in a matter of hours.

I bet they still get money from the US Treasury.

Morning thought

There is no dissipated thought of Maureen Dowd that Richard Cohen cannot make worse...three months later...and every other month thereafter.

Clever

Anyone who ever visited a chat room or the comment section at YouTube or Yahoo News knows one thing...it is a pit of irrationality so vile only the deranged would truly hang out there. Unlike here, of course, where only heroes and scholars ("Scholars of Heroism"!) reside.

So suck on this Clapper!

Al-Qaida fighters have been using secretive chat rooms and encrypted Internet message boards for planning and coordinating attacks — including the threatened if vague plot that U.S. officials say closed 19 diplomatic posts across Africa and the Middle East for more than a week.

This clever plan will only have a few guaranteed results...(1) Less Security (2) more Security Laws (3) reveal which Al Qaeda members think 9-11 was an inside job and/or have Bieberfever or just like typing B()()BS.

 Cunning, those international terrorists.

[Cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Good for this guy

I hope more athletes speak up...and if Americans are going to the Winter Olympics I hope they wave little Rainbow Flags or something.

American track and field star Nick Symmonds has become the first athlete to criticize Russia's new anti-gay laws while competing on Russian soil. 

After he won a silver medal at the World Championships yesterday, Symmonds told R-Sport he was dedicating the win to his gay and lesbian friends.

He said, "As much as I can speak out about it, I believe that all humans deserve equality as however God made them. Whether you're gay, straight, black, white, we all deserve the same rights. If there's anything I can do to champion the cause and further it, I will, shy of getting arrested."

Cannot let Steve King have the spotlight all to his stupid self

It's a race to the ample bottom:

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.) told constituents over the weekend that climate change "is a total fraud" designed by liberals to create "global government." Now Rohrabacher wants to have a public debate where he would presumably be expected to present facts that could help him prove this statement.

Dana Rohrabacher...as right about climate change as he was about the Taliban.

The potential rise to power of the Taliban does not alarm Rohrabacher, because the Taliban could provide stability in an area where chaos was creating a real threat to the U.S. Rohrabacher says that under the previous situation Afghanistan was becoming a major source of drugs and a haven for terrorists “an anarchistic state of narco-terrorism.” In contrast, the Taliban leaders have already shown that they intend to establish a disciplined, moral society.

Rohrabacher calls the sensational media reporting of the “harsh” imposition of strict Islamic behavior, with the underlying implication that this somehow threatens the West, “nonsense.” He says the Taliban are devout traditionalists, not terrorists or revolutionaries, and, in contrast to the Iranians, they do not seem intent on exporting their beliefs.

Isn't Larry David in this movie?

Well, what a surprise

We must get that "terrible traitorous whistle-blower Edward Snowden" for the crime of informing people what their government does. Meanwhile,

Former JPMorgan Chase employee Bruno Iksil will not be prosecuted by the Justice Department, the Wall Street Journal reports, citing a person close to the situation. Iksil is the so-called "London Whale" at the center of the trading scandal that lost JPMorgan, the country's biggest bank by assets, some $6.2 billion in 2012.

If the government isn't careful we might start to suspect a double-standard. Or is it a triple-standard?

In response to the information released by Edward Snowden and resulting public outrage, President Obama has decided to set up an intelligence review panel to assuage fears that the government is abusing its surveillance authority. Unfortunately Obama has chosen General James Clapper, who misled Congress under oath about the NSA, to set up the panel.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

As intelligent and eloquent as he is handsome

Texas, the Florida of Arizona-like states that are not actually Arizona.

The Republican-led House of Representatives would impeach President Obama “tomorrow” if it came to a vote, a GOP congressman revealed during a town hall over the weekend. “I’ll give you a real frank answer about that,” Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-TX) told constituents on Saturday on the topic of potentially impeaching Obama for high crimes and misdemeanors. “If we were to impeach the president tomorrow, you could probably get the votes in the House of Representatives to do it,” Farenthold announced.

... In a sign of just how far to the right Republicans like Farenthold, who was first elected in the Tea Party wave of 2010, have swung, he didn’t even feel the need to give a reason precisely why President Obama should be impeached. Indeed, readers could be forgiven for assuming that House Republicans would go along with any rationale, so long as the end result was impeaching Obama.

Some irony

Iowa's strangely iconic "Butter Cow" was doused with blood by a - wait for it - extreme Vegan.

This is opposed to the usual scenario where butter douses your blood.

Coming and going

In the last couple days I wrote about the Nuclear Power Industry and the ramifications of years of deceit and deliberate overstatement of the benefits versus the cost of nuclear power.

Well, guess what...can't live with 'em, the power company's will may you pay to live without 'em:

Closing the San Onofre nuclear power plant is in the "best interests" of Southern California Edison's 4.9 million customers and those ratepayers should be prepared to pay a portion of the shutdown costs.

That's the message in a public letter published as a full-page advertisement in the Los Angeles Times on Monday.

"If a utility asset must be retired before the end of its expected life, the utility recovers from customers its reasonable investment costs," Edison wrote.

We billed you extra to build it -- even if you didn't want it -- and now we'll bill you to tear it down...sucker.

This seems an appropriate metaphor for modern American business somehow.

Uh, wait a minute...

You need to learn how to hang t-shirts?

People hang their t-shirts?

Now, I know folding clothes is not my strong point (I am very very bad at it) -- but I've never hung a t-shirt in my life.

THAT'S strictly dresser material.

That and underwear (and jeans and shorts) are why the dresser was invented.

It's like he got flipped over on the beach of the Galapagos...

Awww....

Sen. Mitch McConnell's (R-KY) re-election campaign manager Jesse Benton told a local Louisville, Ky. news outlet that he "could see hurt" in the Senate minority leader's eyes over the aide's recently reported remarks about reluctantly serving in that position.

"He wasn't angry, he wasn't upset, but I could see the hurt in his eyes," Benton told WHAS, according to tweets by reporter and political editor Joe Arnold.

When facts don't matter anymore

Krugthulu's latest accurate point.

Jonathan Chait finds Rand Paul talking about the evils of “running a trillion-dollar deficit every year” — which, as it happens, is not at all what we’re doing; the deficit is at around $600 billion and falling fast. This follows on Eric Cantor’s talk about “growing deficits”, when deficits are in fact shrinking.

I think it’s pretty clear that Paul actually has no idea that the deficit is falling; it’s quite possible that neither does Cantor. The whole incident reminds me of 2011, when supposedly well-informed candidates like Tim Pawlenty went on about soaring government employment during a time of unprecedented cuts in the public payroll. Once you’re inside the closed conservative information loop, you know lots of things that aren’t so.

What I’m curious about, however, is what the public knows. Larry Bartels likes to cite a 1996 poll in which voters were asked whether the deficit had increased or decreased under Clinton (it had, in fact, fallen sharply). A plurality of voters — and a heavy majority of Republicans — thought the deficit had gone up.

When was the last time David Gregory or any of the other Sunday Morning Wankers actually pointed out the fact the deficit is shrinking so maybe the poor need not be flogged so much?

Never you say?

When common wisdom dies uncommonly fast

As I wrote a few days ago, for years the Nuclear Power Industry and it's paid servants in Congress have been singing the virtues of countries like Japan and Asia in general and their nuclear power use.

About two years ago those refrains got Fukishimaed royally...but not nearly so much as the people who lived in Northeast Japan.

But it is becoming apparent that tsunami's alone haven't been upending this myth.

A nuclear power plant in Taiwan may have been leaking radioactive water for three years, the government has said, adding to a growing crisis of confidence in North Asia about nuclear safety.

Japan is struggling to contain radioactive water pouring out of the Fukushima nuclear plant that was wrecked by a 2011 tsunami. In South Korea, prosecutors are conducting a massive investigation into forged safety certificates and substandard parts at many of its reactors.

I'm sure our Nuclear Power Industry is anxious to start talking up France now.

' [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Hey, look, Putin bought himself FoxNews Ultra...

Maybe somebody should do something?

Dmitri Kisilev, the anchor of the #1 news show in Russia, Vesti, called for gays to apparently be put to death recently on state-controlled Russian television.

...here is the transcript:

“I think that just imposing fines on gays for homosexual propaganda among teenagers is not enough. They should be banned from donating blood, sperm. And their hearts, in case of the automobile accident, should be buried in the ground or burned as unsuitable for the continuation of life.”

Note the wild applause in the video, below, from the those in attendance when Herr Kiselev finishes detailing his final kampf.

Time for Good News Sunday!

Inspiring!

At 3:45 in Paul Gunter director of the reactor oversight project at Beyond Nuclear: Indications are right now that the reactor structures themselves have been breached.

It’s very likely that some of the radioactive material — the melted cores — have moved into the earth.

So it’s beyond containment right now.

I think that’s the tragedy that we see unfolding as Fukushima’s radioactive water crisis is only beginning. [...]

That...is...not...reassuring!

That is way way way too much:

On the day President Barack Obama proposed reforms to the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, the National Security Agency shared a paper claiming legal authority for its spying and revealing that it "touches" 1.6 percent of Internet information.

Oh, only one out of every 65 things or so I do on the internet is something the government is paying attention to.

Ugh.

Good!!!

A group of publications are refusing to refer to Washington's NFL franchise by their racist slur of a name.

I was listening to some radio sports guy trying to claim he "researched" the team's use of the pejorative recently and he tried to claim it was to "honor" brave warriors.

Of course, I'm doubtful of both the research and his sources.

Look up "George Preston Marshall" the guy who changed the name from "Boston Braves" a name which could probably be somewhat justified today because it is at least a descriptive not unique to Native Americans to "Boston Redskins". 

Marshall was a full-blown racist who wanted the Washington NFL franchise to be "the South's team", would only integrate the team in the early 1960s (the last team to do so) under threat to not be allowed to use the new stadium (the now old RFK stadium); and once forced that first black player, Bobby Mitchell to sing the then words of the fight song which concluded "Fight for Old Dixie!".

Hey, good luck, seriously

In recent years I've noticed that John Cole has turned the political blogging over to his ever increasing series of co-bloggers at Balloon Juice as he focused on writing about his pets, what he was cooking and/or growing.

This contrast with me, of course, I just plug away and post and post and post as I have one pet, cook badly, and cannot grow anything. Meanwhile, co-bloggers fall away, their lives just fulfilling enough to not need to blog.  Well, thank goodness, I'm dull and uncomfortable because I've been blogging for more than nine years -- even though I ran out of things to say about five years ago!

But John Cole has another less mentioned issue, and he's decided to deal with it. Brave to admit, and braver to do something about it. Good luck.

Yeah, "oops"

Apparently having a tepid audience of non-thinking assholes makes you think you say anything, even when it is clear that even in these circumstances you cannot actually say literally anything.

Rush Limbaugh Claims 3 Day Slutzkrieg on Sandra Fluke was an Accident

Well, five people over 75 will agree.

I'm glad Georgia is on someone's mind

Because they could use all the brain power they can get. One can almost detect the state as reflective of a regional pattern...and that pattern is a giant boat anchor on human progress.

A new Public Policy Polling (PPP) poll finds that a majority of Georgians believe in creationism over evolution. Entitled "Georgia Miscellany," the Thursday item surveyed a pool of 520 voters on 32 questions. On the issue of creationism vs. evolution, 53 percent believe more in the former, compared to 29 percent choosing the latter, and 18 percent voting not sure.

When that question was transferred over to party lines, Republicans had a staggering split -- 70 percent for creationism, 17 percent for evolution and 13 percent not sure. Democrats split along closer lines -- 43 percent for creationism, 33 percent for evolution and 24 percent not sure. Independents held an even narrower divide -- 46 percent for creationism, 40 percent for evolution and 14 percent not sure.

Great...uniformly AND regionally depressing. Like this.

If only there was a web page that could summarize the appropriate feelings for this reoccurring phenomena.

[Cross-posted at Firedoglake]

"Let them eat cake...oh, they cannot afford cake?"

Then LET THEM EAT EACH OTHER!

Sincerely,

The International Austerity Association (i.e. Banks)

Unemployment in Greece rose to a new record high of 27.6 percent in May, leaving almost two thirds of young people without a job, the Hellenic Statistics Authority said Thursday. The jobless rate rose from 27 percent in April and 23.8 percent in May last year. Young people were by far the worst affected, with unemployment among job-seekers aged 15 to 24 standing at 64.9 percent. Greece has been depending on funds from international rescue loans since May 2010, after years of profligate spending and fiscal mismanagement left it with a massive budget deficit.

Oh noz!

A minor little problem that will soon be brought to an end…

"No problem with nuclear power ever...why look at the Japanese", says no one anymore. For not only is the Fukishima plant still leaking radioactive waste into the ocean, it's providing stark and morbid evidence of the wonders of such efforts.

A survey released today by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said water laced with caesium and other radioactive materials is flowing into the ocean at a rate of 300 tons a day. The ministry, which oversees the nuclear industry, said it could not rule out the possibility that the water has been leaking into the Pacific since the crisis began more than two years ago. Critics have accused the NRA of allowing Tepco off the hook. After months of denials, the embattled utility was finally forced to admit the groundwater leaks last week.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Child Obesity is down...but unlike Global Warming, somebody can do something

Taco Bell will not be stopped.

Last May, Taco Bell announced that it was taking tacos too far with the creation of waffle tacos, which would be available at just five Southern California locations as part of a test run. Good news for those in Southern California, bad news for everyone else. Until Tuesday, when the fast food chain said they were expanding the waffle tacos' test run to at least 100 other stores. On Thursday, the new tacos will be available at locations in Fresno, Omaha, and Chattanooga.

Irony not only dead, but down to a skeleton

Oh boy.

Serving his own lifetime ban, Pete Rose has some advice for Alex Rodriguez and everyone else suspended for their roles in the Biogenesis scandal: come clean.

Starving them into the black

After months and months of austerity the prospects for Greece are as bleak as ever.

The Greek government is urging its departments to speed up the process of laying off staff, in a bid to meet the targets set by its lenders.

Administrative reform minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the man tasked with slashing 15,000 civil servants from the payroll by the end of 2014, has written to ministries to tell them to accelerate disciplinary processes to get errant staff out of the door.

 Yes, fire more people, because things are going so well otherwise.

"I had no idea and was shocked to learn that people in this neighbourhood, on these streets, in all the buildings that I pass every day, were suffering so," said Panaghiota Mourtidou, 54, the organisation's co-founder, busily packing food boxes. "After all, we're talking about the middle class, people who for a long time were too ashamed to admit they had such problems."

Malnourished children eventually gave the secret away amid reports nationwide of pupils fainting in schools. "Teachers were reporting cases of kids who had turned up at school with nothing more than rice or stale rusks for months," Mourtidou recalled.

I'm sure they'll be no long-term implications in this.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

The LOLing

"WHERE'S YOUR GOD NOW, SALLY QUINN?"

Quinn said that Graham's sale to Bezos brought an end to "the family-owned newspaper era," noting that the New York Times is now "the last family owned newspaper." "We've seen L.A. Times and Boston Globe go. But that's the new media," she said. "Everything I know about Bezos tells me he's a fabulous guy, he's committed to the excellence and standards of the Washington Post. There will be no massive changes, except more resources."

And hopefully fewer awful columnists.

Unleash your snare drum...

Oh dear, how very unfortunate:

A former Los Angeles County Republican Party official was arrested Friday on suspicion of engaging in sexually explicit chats with a teenager on a social media website, authorities said. Scott Hounsell, former executive director of the Republican Party of Los Angeles County, was arrested and booked on a misdemeanor charge of sending harmful matter to a child...

WAIT FOR IT

In late May, he weighed in on embattled New York mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner, asking: “Is it just me, or does every #Weiner headline for the NY Mayors race seem like an intentional dirty pun?”

Oh good plan

NBC and CNN are planning on developing respectively a miniseries and documentary about Hillary Clinton.

I know you all can barely contain your lack of enthusiasm.

But not Reince Priebus, head of the RNC, he's very angry:

If you have not agreed to pull this programming prior to the start of the RNC's Summer Meeting on August 14, I will seek a binding vote of the RNC stating that the committee will neither partner with you in the 2016 primary debate no sanction primary debates which you sponsor.

Golly, threatening to limit the "majesty" of the Republican Party's rallies pageant to FoxNews only.

It must be a day ending in "Y" or something.

Although, I understand Roger Aisles is working on the heroic story of Marco Rubio maintaining a 34-inch waist -- just to make Chris Christie cry.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

ATTENTION! FRED HIATT AND RICHARD COHEN

I do hope you haven't let those knee-pads lie in a forgotten place. Your gonna need 'em. Oh, and remember your camera, came in handy last time.

Shhhhhhh....

We're supposed to think they were exclusively just all Muslimy and shit:

The programme discovered that Tamerlan Tsarnaev possessed articles which argued that both 9/11 and the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing were government conspiracies. Another in his possession was about "the rape of our gun rights". Reading material he had about white supremacy commented that "Hitler had a point".

Inspired choice

Oh to hear Dr. Who wax philosophically like Malcolm Tucker. A dream come true.

Thanks conservatives!

Although I'm sure it is all fat Al Gore's fault:

Some taken solace in the notion that this amount of sea level rise might take more than a thousand years. But a second study finds, “stretches of ice on the coasts of Antarctica and Greenland are at risk of rapidly cracking apart and falling into the ocean.” The lead author, Jeremy Bassis from the University of Michigan, explained that if this new analysis is right, “we might be closer to the higher end of sea level rise estimates for the next 100 years.” That “higher end” is about 5 or 6 feet.

There is some solace -- it will be very harsh on those in Florida who wish to "stand their ground".

Drone on...

It seems like just a couple days ago the Administration was saying we were having unbelievable success in droning all manner of weddings, funerals, and other family gatherings to the point where we'd stop it soon...honest. Oh right, that's because it was just a couple days ago. Since then:

A meeting of President Barack Obama's top security officials on Saturday concluded that intelligence apparently gathered from overseas communications intercepts showed a serious but unspecified threat against Western and US interests. The administration moved to shut the embassies across North Africa and the Middle East as a precaution. Intelligence committee members in Washington who had been briefed on the alert said it was the most serious they had seen for years and repeatedly cited the threat during Sunday's political talk shows as a reason to resist growing calls in Congress for reform of the NSA's sweeping powers.

Of course it was. The "war on terror" has a lifespan greater than any mere mortal so apparently, therefore, must the NSA and drones. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Semi-circling the logic drain

And now is the time that the rest of us in America can legitimately start telling right-wing assholes to "why don't you move to Russia if you don't like it here".

 American Family Association (AFA) Director of Issues Analysis Bryan Fischer this week called on LGBT activists to "celebrate diversity" by supporting Russia's law banning "propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations."

I always unintentionally giggle whenever I see Bryan Fischer's title.  That guy has not ever  "analyzed" an "issue" beyond "paper or plastic?"

Oh I'm sure it is all TOTALLY safe too

And I'm sure this clause is totally enforceable against a pair of minors.

When drilling company Range Resources offered the Hallowich family a $750,000 settlement to relocate from their fracking-polluted home in Washington County, Pennsylvania, it came with a common restriction. Chris and Stephanie Hallowich would be forbidden from ever speaking about fracking or the Marcellus Shale. But one element of the gag order was all new. The Hallowichs’ two young children, ages 7 and 10, would be subject to the same restrictions, banned from speaking about their family’s experience for the rest of their lives.

Frankly, those kinds of restrictions are not uncommon ("heirs and assigns"... but unlikely enforceable in many contracts or settlements).

I'd like to see Range Resources try to enforce a restrictive covenant on speech for the two when they are in their twenties.

But then again, with all the fracking who says they are able to live that long?

It also allows these company's to buy off people and say there are no "documented" complaints about how awful fracking is.

People love their water-taps to burst into flames.

I'll take the two-ply wetsuit and dildo up his butt guy...

Ugh.

A Christian puppeteer who regularly used his long-running Christian Television Network show to warn children about the sin of pornography was sentenced this week to 20 years behind bars for possession of child pornography.

More troubling still is Largo, Florida resident Ronald William Brown's involvement in an alleged conspiracy to kidnap, cook, and eat a child whom he met through his affiliation with the Gulf Coast Church.

This, seriously, required an article -- and needed a question mark?

A fawning article in the New Republic asks why people dislike Luke Russert?

Back to the mother-country

Hey, I thought we had a revolution for a reason?

The US government has paid at least £100m to the UK spy agency GCHQ over the last three years to secure access to and influence over Britain's intelligence gathering programmes.

The top secret payments are set out in documents which make clear that the Americans expect a return on the investment, and that GCHQ has to work hard to meet their demands. "GCHQ must pull its weight and be seen to pull its weight," a GCHQ strategy briefing said.

"Hey mate, you want to do what our Bill of Rights says we cannot?

Thanks."

Sincerely,

The United States of Hypocrisy

John Kerry is in Pakistan to repair the US-Pakistan relationship through bribery diplomacy. And to "reassure" the Pakistanis, we now have a plan for when to end drone-strikes:

“The program will end as we have eliminated most of the threat and continue to eliminate it,” Kerry said today in an interview in Islamabad with Pakistan TV. “I think the president has a very real timeline and we hope it’s going to be very, very soon.”

You see, hope really is a plan. Since drones have a tendency to reign fiery death from the sky...and quite often upon civilian non-combatants.

This tendency, as you might expect, does a really good job of recruiting people with a valid and very real grudge against the United States. The kind of people we like to call "terrorists".

So hope is a plan...and as good a plan as it it ever has been.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

In Russia Pogroms are once again the rage!

Once again, maybe somebody with some sort of microphone should say something at least?

Russian anti-gay extremists, emboldened by (and many suspect, in cahoots with) the Putin government’s crackdown on gay and trans Russians, have reportedly begun kidnapping and beating gay men, especially teenage boys, with ads on gay social networks.

Could come in handy

The NSA can at least let you know your Brazzer's password...because I am really sure you've forgotten it.

Your Moral Arbiters

Yesterday Cardinal Timothy Dolan spent his time tap-dancing around the welcoming statements of Pope Francis toward homosexuality by engaging in the sin of extreme parsing. Of course, Dolan has been good at avoidance before.

A New York Times editorial has described as “shocking” revelations that the Cardinal Archbishop of New York, Timothy Dolan, while archbishop of Milwaukee, moved $57 million off the archdiocesan books into a cemetery trust fund six years ago to prevent the money being paid to victims of clerical child sex abuse.

Well thanks to Republican appointee Judge Rudolph Randa, Dolan has another message he can provide toward abuse victims. Free touches!

A federal judge in Wisconsin handed down an opinion yesterday granting the Catholic Church — and indeed, potentially all religious institutions — such sweeping immunity from federal bankruptcy law that it is not clear that it would permit any plaintiff to successfully sue any church in any court. While the ostensible issue in this case is whether over $50 million in church funds are shielded from a bankruptcy proceeding triggered largely by a flood of clerical sex abuse claims against the Archdiocese of Milwaukee, Judge Rudolph Randa reads the church’s constitutional and legal right to religious liberty so broadly as to render religious institutions immune from much of the law.

I do believe some appeals to a higher power, or at least an appellate court is in order.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]