And Alito just turns the volume louder during his Real Housewives marathon

Truer words...never spoken.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said Thursday in an interview on Yahoo News that five men on the court have a "blind spot" when it comes to discrimination against women.

Who cares, it's just the general public!

In a world left with few things that are not completely predictable, there are some things more predictable than others.

Ancient water and sewage lines will be about as well maintained as your average post-collapse Roman Aqueduct, until they finally break. 

Unless, of course, something like the Keystone Pipeline suffers the inevitable catastrophic leak...in which case the government will totally give your tax dollars to fix that thing you totally did not want so its corporate ownership doesn't have to reduce their profits.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

In a nutshell...in a multitude of metaphors

It's long been noticed that the anti-choice crowd obsesses about fetuses until the umbilical cord is cut, then they could care less.

So why shouldn't Hobby Lobby just sum up the whole conundrum in one predictable case?

When a very pregnant Felicia Allen applied for medical leave from her job at Hobby Lobby three years ago, one might think that the company best known for denying its employees insurance coverage of certain contraceptives—on the false grounds that they cause abortions—would show equal concern for helping one of its employees when she learned she was pregnant.

Instead, Allen says the self-professed evangelical Christian arts-and-crafts chain fired her and then tried to prevent her from accessing unemployment benefits.

Why if she'd just taken birth control...oh, right.

Hobby Lobby's PR person will get back to you as soon as he goes and gets his plan-supported Viagra from the Walgreen's next door.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

I'd say I'm surprised

But I'm not at all surprised.

According to recently unearthed court records, Bob Dowlut—who for 30 years has been the architect of the National Rifle Association's legal and cultural agenda—was sentenced to life in an Indiana prison for shooting a shopkeeper during a robbery before murdering a single mother with the same gun.

Mr. Dowlut...I'm sorry, "Convicted Murderer...by gun" Mr. Dowlut, is however a very very white guy, so he didn't serve all that much of a sentence and got a job allowing guys...especially white guys...to carry all the guns and ammo they can carry, especially when they should not carry any of it.

Oh and it's not as if he has not long had an obsessive gun fetish...it's just he really really liked to put his fetish into action.

Dowlut was already well-known to police in his hometown of South Bend, Indiana, having escaped jail time after a juvie judge gave him a pass for robbing a local museum of several guns and using them to hold up a restaurant for $135. So when the mother of Dowlut's longtime girlfriend ended up shot twice in the heart and he was caught in a lie about his whereabouts that night, he explained how he'd come to kill her after trying to rob a store and shooting its proprietor in the stomach.

Well this is kind of embarassing

First their old leader loses a primary...and then...

"Listen, this whole talk about impeachment is coming from the president's own staff, and coming from Democrats on Capitol Hill. Why? Because they're trying to rally their people to give money and to show up in this year's election," the Ohio Republican told reporters, in response to a question.

Which means this can only mean one thing.

Rep. Lou Barletta of Pennsylvania said Monday that a resolution to impeach President Obama would “probably” pass the GOP-controlled House if brought up for vote.

Man, even the crazy Republicans are Democrats now.

Agent of Change

In the wake of a World Cup that showed the importance of building stadiums over the needs of the populace, FIFA was encouraged to consider moving the 2018 World Cup out of Russia in the wake of the shooting down of a Malaysian Airlines flight.

They refused with this statement:

The hosting of the FIFA World Cup with the global attention it attracts can be a powerful catalyst for constructive dialogue between people and governments, helping to bring positive social developments.

Behold the positive social developments.

Officials in Qatar's Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy [ed. the group helping to organize the 2018 World Cup] have been using offices on the 38th and 39th floors of Doha's landmark Al Bidda skyscraper – known as the Tower of Football – which were fitted out by men from Nepal, Sri Lanka and India who say they have not been paid for up to 13 months' work.

I did not realize the reinstitution of slavery was considered a positive social development. But then again, I'm not a FIFA Official getting money in brown envelopes either.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Silly

The way the American-political world works now -- the leader of the Israeli government CANNOT BE QUESTIONED...but the American President is a never-ending threat to be a traitor...especially to Israel, because for some reason another country is more important than our actual country and if you believe otherwise you are just enabling the next Holocaust and are worse than Hitler, or at least would be if this version of events was supported by anything resembling a viable fact.

Just so we have the irreality straight.

Complain all you want

But FIFA Officials' well-lined pockets are going to really enjoy the 2026 Men's World Cup in Somalia.

Glad to see the person who lost their "PR JOB" with Carnival Cruise Lines a couple years ago has found a new gig.

Ugh.

With Ukraine route off-limits, Malaysia Airlines plane flies over Syria instead

Will Sociopath for Votes

Jan Brewer, who was a heartless troll of an elected official before it was de rigueur, is back to remind us of the not so original article. First, the banality of evils.

A condemned Arizona inmate gasped and snorted for more than an hour and a half during his execution Wednesday before he died, his lawyers said, in an episode sure to add to the scrutiny surrounding the death penalty in the U.S. Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne's office said Joseph Rudolph Wood was pronounced dead at 3:49 p.m., one hour and 57 minutes after the execution started.

But it's all good.

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) said Wednesday that she had ordered an internal review of the nearly two-hour-long execution of an inmate, but she said she believed the condemned man who gasped and snorted throughout most of the ordeal "did not suffer."

Soon Jan Brewer will launch her "I'll take your dog to a farm upstate Initiative". [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

The Circle of Strife

For every over the top offensive reaction, somewhere there's an equally offensive counter-reaction, and then a just as offensive counter-counter reaction will happen somewhere else.

Paris, for example.

Eighteen people were arrested for attacks on shops, including a kosher supermarket, a Jewish-owned chemist and a funeral home. Rioters, who carried batons and threw petrol bombs according to eyewitnesses, were yards from the synagogue when they were driven back by riot police who used tear gas.

“They were shouting: ‘Death to Jews,’ and ‘Slit Jews’ throats’,” David, a Jewish sound engineer told The Times. “It took us back to 1938.”

And about every year before that one too.

plus ça change.


[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Just lemme know

When a person in 'Murica can criticize Israel on rational grounds (even while also blaming Hamas as much or more) without being accused of being anti-semetic.

Especially if your pseudonym is "Attaturk".

Thanks.

Won't be holding breath.

Crazy Train, a neverending story

While the right-wing finds a way to go crazy over becaue children as less worthy than others...no not those children, these children...there remains a ever fertile field of insanity.

For example...

"And as to Secretary Kerry, he gave the most ridiculous and delusional summary of American foreign policy I could imagine," Graham said on NBC's "Meet the Press" while discussing Israel's ground operation in Gaza...

Host David Gregory then asked Graham how the Kerry has failed in addressing the Malaysian plane and evidence that pro-Russia separatists likely shot down the plane with Russian weapons.

"One, he didn't call Putin the thug that he is. He didn't call for arming the Ukraine so they can defend themselves against rebel separatists supported by Russia," Graham responded.

Yes, throwing arms around and threatening, or actually, bombing is the only "rational" course of action.

You betcha.  I guess it all started with Benghazi right?

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Not in the way I imagined

I have figured his adventurism in the Ukraine would come back to bite Putin in the ass, because they almost always do. But I was imagining the intermediate future. But I agree with Josh Marshall, the inevitable has happened, just in a different way than most anyone imagined.

But what about the fantasies of the gun-infatuated?

Damn that reality...somebody should put a cap in its ass!

Homicides increase under the "castle doctrine" or Stand Your Ground laws, according to two studies published since 2012, while the laws do not appear to deter crime in any significant way. Researchers at Georgia State and Texas A&M universities used different methodologies and data sources to reach their conclusions, but they ended up in the same place: More people are killed after these laws are passed. Researchers at Texas A&M University, for a study published in the Journal of Human Resources, concluded that homicides had increased by 8 percent in the more than 20 states that had passed "castle doctrine" laws, many of which include Stand Your Ground provisions. That equals 600 additional homicides every year in those states, they wrote. At the same time, however, the researchers found no detectable decrease in burglary, robbery or aggravated assault.

So, in short. Not having a gun but masturbating while thinking about one, more effective public policy for gun-nuts than masturbating while thinking about guns and actually having one.

It's like a victim of car theft was going to come forward

Darrell Issa's Marsupial Inspired Court hit sad trombone levels today.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, seemed to catch everyone off guard Wednesday when he suddenly pulled the plug on his committee hearing before witnesses could even testify...

But two things were apparent to those following the hearing: First, Issa began the hearing irritated that the White House had dismissed his subpoena to compel Obama's political office director, David Simas, to testify. He called it "deeply disturbing" that White House counsel Neil Eggleston said Simas was immune from a congressional subpoena. Second, and perhaps more tellingly, Issa may have wanted to prevent Lerner from testifying since, based on the written testimony she provided ahead of the hearing, she was planning to say the White House Office of Political Strategy and Outreach had done nothing inappropriate, which contradicted Issa's claims leading up to the hearing.

Lerner's shop is charged with enforcing the federal Hatch Act's prohibitions against federal employees engaging in political activity, which makes her the go-to person in the event of allegations of wrongdoing by the White House political office. She was prepared to tell the committee she did her homework and found nothing wrong.

On the other hand she really hate hate hates affirmative action

And wants to do away with all those things that are not based solely on merit (...y'know like merit-based Nepotism)

The best summation of the state of Republican discourse of climate this week came in Mike Allen and Politico’s friendly promotional luncheon for the Cheney family. Asked what to do about climate change, Liz Cheney quickly replied.

“Nothing.”

Scary thing is...

That seems kind of low...

A new Public Policy Polling survey found that 37 percent of Republicans who voted in the Mississippi primary runoff election between incumbent Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) and state Sen. Chris McDaniel (R) said they would back the Confederate side if there was another Civil War.

Rebels without a Clue.

You'd think he'd know this already, they are called "Sam's Clubs"

So many faces, so few available palms.

A senior Republican [ed. Michael McCaul, Texas, naturally] has proposed that the US government should build “warehouses” in Central America where thousands of unaccompanied children who have attempted to seek asylum in the US could be deported and processed on their return to their countries of origin.

Uh, what?

I'm sure those countries would be all in with that idea, right? I mean what could go wrong?

But at least he's not showing any signs of paranoia.

"It’s very heart-wrenching as a father to see that — mothers with their babies," McCaul said on "Fox News Sunday." "I also saw some 17-year-olds that I thought looked more like a threat to coming into the United States."

Yeah...

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

The "WHAT?!" percent solution

I mean, really?  You wanna go with that number?

Speaking to Italy’s La Repubblica daily, Francis also condemned child sex abuse as a “leprosy” in the Church and cited his aides as saying that “the level of paedophilia in the Church is at two percent”.

“That two percent includes priests and even bishops and cardinals,” he said.

Uh, you are saying that the PRESENT level is one of of every 50 priests is a what?

Blessed are the poor...

Apparently the only part of the New Testament that the modern conservative takes literally...outside of creationism which they are just told to take literally.

Today, more than three-quarters of American conservatives think the poor "have it easy," while fewer than 10 percent believe the "poor have hard lives"

Yeah, it's the rich who suffer...just like always!

Being poor, in fact, is so popular in modern America that many of us seem to be moving that way!

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

The rubble, make it bounce higher!

Because clearly years of overwhelming firepower have done the trick...if the trick is to keep escalating to exercise your overwhelming firepower.

Binyamin Netanyahu has instructed the Israeli military to "intensify even further" its assault on the Gaza Strip... The air assault continued throughout Wednesday morning bringing the Palestinian death toll to 32 in two days, including several senior Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants. More than 150 people have been injured. There have been about 440 air strikes since the beginning of the week.

And I'm sure it has worked and sure I am overstating whether the retaliation is disproportional?

Well, no and no.

One hundred and sixty-five rockets have been fired from the Gaza Strip into Israel in the past 24 hours, according to Israeli military estimates.There have been no reports of deaths from the rocket attacks.

To be continued...apparently indefinitely...and profitably for a few.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

NRA's dream "Good Guy vs. Good Guy" circle jerk

I imagine this makes Wayne LaPierre orgasm so hard in David Carradine/Michael Hutchence fashion (sadly without what would be a happy ending for the rest of us).

A North Carolina man was shot to death allegedly by his 11-year-old grandson Monday night after the man shot his son during a family dispute, Raleigh TV station WRAL reported.

The Shape of Wanks to Come

Only a couple years ago, this was the headline.

Bolivia's child workers unite to end exploitation

That was the Fall of 2012, how'd that work out for everyone?

Bolivia to allow 10-year-olds to work

Yep, power to the people.

I'm guessing the Koch Brothers will take notice -- good luck, once again, oh let's just guess, Mississippi.

[Cross-Posted at Firedoglake]

Yeah, not racist just like Adolph Rupp

Yeah, this is the test.

A newspaper editorial in Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel's (R) home county argued that McDaniel couldn't possibly be a racist since he played basketball in college.

As opposed to varments, blackguards, scoundrels and ne'er-do-wells!

Apparently the 19th century robber barons of the GOP are adopting the language of the time as well -- some heavy projection too.

Republicans such as Senator Tom Coburn have argued that the disability program is being “gamed” by “scalawags,” and that a third of claims are bogus, putting the program in financial trouble. Republicans may use the coming hearing to argue for benefits cuts.

May?

Oh the purposeful naivete is rich.

A headline that pretty much sums it all up

Congress May Spend More On The Benghazi Panel Than On The Veterans Affairs Committee

Bullshit before people.

Live and learn...nah, just open gob, swallow air

Oh the profundity.

Yeah, not quite that simple...but it was tragic.

What can we learn from that about the stupidity of jingoism and not considering the consequences of our actions or the morality of war in general?

If you are Jonah Goldberg...not much.

"Every ten years or so, the United States needs to pick up some small crappy little country and throw it against the wall, just to show the world we mean business."

That was Jonah's endorsement of going to war with Iraq.  Now he gets to come back and pass judgment on other wars -- after all he's a self-proclaimed expert.

Say what you will about the Black Hand, Gavrilo Princip, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire at least they exited the scene eventually.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Funny how all that works

On the one hand Conservatives told us that if the minimum wage gets raised it hurts job growth.

As CEPR noted in March and April posts, economists at Goldman Sachs conducted a simple evaluation of the impact of these state minimum-wage increases. GS compared the employment change between December and January in the 13 states where the minimum wage increased with the changes in the remainder of the states. The GS analysis found that the states where the minimum wage went up had faster employment growth than the states where the minimum wage remained at its 2013 level.

Continuing the timeless level of inaccuracy the right-wing has had in America, from how awesome Iraq would be to how Americans will always hate soccer, a really really high rate of being wrong. But hey, when it works it works, even though it plainly does not actually work.

The Great Recession and Not-So-Great Recovery have been bad news for most Americans, but some people have suffered more than others. We call those people "Southerners." North Carolina and a handful of other Southern U.S. states saw the biggest increases in the number of people living in what are known as "poverty areas" between 2000 and 2010, according to a new Census Bureau report.

The GOP also knows this as "their base", their gullible, gullible base. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

If at first, and then repeatedly, you fail to succeed

Cash in, cash in, and cash in again.

Tony Blair has agreed to advise the Egyptian president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who came to power in a military coup last year, as part of a programme funded by the United Arab Emirates that has promised to deliver huge "business opportunities" to those involved, the Guardian has learned.

Blather, rinse, repeat.

Time for Blair to get booked on Meet the Press and dance closely with Dave.

Good to know that 238 years after independence we can reunite in mutually profitable exploitation of others.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

This report just covers up BENGHAZIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Start the Impeachment Hearings!

Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 288,000 in June, and the unemployment rate declined to 6.1 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Job gains were widespread, led by employment growth in professional and business services, retail trade, food services and drinking places, and health care.

Health care too?

Damn you Obamacareghaziiiiiiiiiiii!

The Darjeeling Tea Party

It only makes sense that all that Koch Brothers' money eventually went to India to create politics that would feel right at home in any number of States.

An Indian MP who threatened to kill opposition workers and have women raped has apologised, saying it was a "gross error of judgement".

You think?

And about that being just the kind of language you'd expect in this country.

LePage denies he discussed ‘executing’ Maine Democratic leaders

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Well, so much for that...

I took a small bit of solace in the fact that the Hobby Lobby ruling seemed to be limited to four particular forms of birth control, such as the morning after pill. But noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo...

The Supreme Court on Tuesday confirmed that its decision a day earlier extending religious rights to closely held corporations applies broadly to the contraceptive coverage requirement in the new health care law, not just the handful of methods the justices considered in their ruling.

Meanwhile at Hobby Lobby, the company happily allows its "dude" employees to continue to get their viagra and vasectomies.

And when will Sammy Alito ask whether the guard was a Christian or not?

After all, a mere border cannot keep him from practicing his "faith" -- in treating foreign teens as cannon-fodder.

A federal appeals court ruled Monday that a Mexican teenager killed by a Border Patrol agent was protected by the US constitution, even though the teen was on Mexican soil when he was shot. The ruling from the fifth US circuit court of appeals means the family of 15-year-old Sergio Adrian Hernandez Guereca can move forward with a civil lawsuit against the agent.

The next step for this process is the Supreme Court...and one can be pretty confident the five-vote cast of subjects who usually don't believe in international law, will have at least one find it a real convenient contrivance when killing a foreign kid is a possibility. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Some minds think alike

Not so great.


Isis announces Islamic caliphate in area straddling Iraq and Syria Meanwhile, in this country and with slightly less fanfare (and only slightly less gunfire) Samuel Alito announced roughly the same thing. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

How to make sure you elect a Lunatic

Make sure you split your major parties into fractions then you can get a 33% elected...and that person is often crazy. Minnesota got by somewhat luckily with Jesse Ventura...and I say that ONLY in relation to what Maine has obtained with their current dangerous lunatic in charge.