I dunno...maybe men should be more intelligent?

Ugh.

The former president of The George Washington University on Tuesday joined the chorus of individuals telling college women to simply drink less in order to avoid sexual assault.

During a discussion of Greek life at U.S. colleges on The Diane Rehm Show, Dr. Stephen Joel Trachtenberg weighed in on the issue of sexual assault, Jezebel noted on Wednesday. Trachtenberg tried to hedge his remarks on drinking and rape by first noting that sexual assault victims should not be blamed, but he still asserted that women really need to learn to drink less.

Double ugh.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett (R) thinks his state should reform its liquor laws. That way, he argued, women would have an easier job making dinner.

But don't drink any of that liquor ladies...that liquor is for dudes, enabling sexual assaults...just water for you, as to stave them off. 

 Oh and...

USA!   USA!   USA!

Hard to believe such a typically classless organization

Would exercise poor taste...

Less than two days after a 9-year-old girl in Arizona accidentally shot and killed a gun range instructor who was showing her how to fire an Uzi, the National Rifle Association on Wednesday touted new ways for children to "have fun" at shooting ranges.

Shoot gun nut somehow not one of the examples.

Not looking too good for the 20th or earlier Centuries

A three-judge panel of the 7th Circuit heard arguments of the conservative Attorney's General of Wisconsin and Indiana Tuesday as the latter sought to forbid same sex marriages from occurring in Madison or Indianapolis.

This is clearly not 2008 anymore.

Judge Richard Posner, who was appointed by President Ronald Reagan, was dismissive when Wisconsin Assistant Attorney General Timothy Samuelson repeatedly pointed to ‘tradition’ as the underlying justification for barring gay marriage.

“It was tradition to not allow blacks and whites to marry – a tradition that got swept away,” Posner said. Prohibition of same sex marriage, he said, is “a tradition of hate ... and savage discrimination.”
Posner frequently cut off Indiana Solicitor General Thomas Fischer, just moments into his presentation and chided him to answer his questions.

At one point, Posner ran through a list of psychological strains of unmarried same-sex couples, including having to struggle to grasp why their schoolmates’ parents were married and theirs weren’t.
“What horrible stuff,” Posner said. What benefits to society in barring gay marriage, he asked, “outweighs that kind of damage to children?”

The answer has to do with “procreation,” Fisher answered.

Yes...that's all they have left now...sex just isn't sex if a baby isn't made.

That's some powerful logic.

And Posner is THE conservative on that panel.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Way to take Irony right to the grave

The Second Amendment, is the Darwin Award catch-all for the illiterate Amendment reader (who needs an opening clause anyway?).

Anyhow there's this.

And ALSO this.

The Daily Show
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"We're not going to repeat the mistakes that led to World War Two!"

And engage in appeasement. No instead we're going to have a series of actions that repeat the mistakes that led to World War One! This one's for you Franz Ferdinand!

Nato is to deploy its forces at new bases in eastern Europe for the first time, in response to the Ukraine crisis and in an attempt to deter Vladimir Putin from causing trouble in the former Soviet Baltic republics, according to its chief. Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the former prime minister of Denmark, said that next week's Nato summit in Cardiff would overcome divisions within the alliance and agree to new deployments on Russia's borders – a move certain to trigger a strong reaction from Moscow

I'm sure this will all work out just dandy for everyone. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Hobbies

Aside from being rather creepily obsessed with his female producers, middle-eastern grains, and killing people...I mean especially the latter, Bill O'Reilly styles himself as the premier old white guy expert on all things African-American (or as he says "Negro"). It gets rather embarrassing...this embarrassing.

Bill O'Reilly brought Megyn Kelly on his Monday show to have a discussion about the concept of "white privilege."

He asked Kelly if she believed it was real. "There's a lot of evidence behind it," Kelly said. No, this wasn't a rift in the space-time continuum.

Nostradumbass

One could literally put up post after post on the tragic stupidity of Paul Wolfowitz (still getting paid to utter his ever-erring pie whole)...and I guess I will take part.

There has been a good deal of comment—some of it quite outlandish—about what our postwar requirements might be in Iraq. Some of the higher end predictions we have been hearing recently, such as the notion that it will take several hundred thousand U.S. troops to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq, are wildly off the mark. It is hard to conceive that it would take more forces to provide stability in post-Saddam Iraq than it would take to conduct the war itself and to secure the surrender of Saddam's security forces and his army—hard to imagine

And...of course, in spite of that little thing known as reality...Paul Wolfowitz declared "VICTORY!" (and HE went home). Behold the fruits of the easy victory.

The United Nations said on Sunday it had evidence that fighters from Islamic State (Isis) had killed as many as 670 prisoners in Mosul and had carried out further abuses in Iraq that amounted to crimes against humanity.

And least we can take comfort in Wolfowitz's other prediction that the Iraq War would pay for itself...at least if you are ISIS.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Just so you know where you stand

In Ferguson...

...the recent actions of other police officers have revealed the depth of the rift between the Ferguson community and local authorities On Wednesday, police officer Lt. Ray Albers was suspended after video surfaced of him threatening and pointing a weapon at a crowd of Ferguson protesters. Then on Friday, police officer Dan Page, who worked in Ferguson during the protests, was suspended after video surfaced showing him making racist, sexist and homophobic comments during a speech addressing the Oath Keepers of St. Louis and St. Charles. During the speech, Page unapologetically called himself "a killer." Around the same time, another St. Louis-area police officer, Matthew Pappert, was suspended for posting incendiary messages on Facebook, including a statement that reportedly said Ferguson protesters should be "put down like rabid dogs."

Meanwhile no criminal charges filed yet filed in the death of Michael Brown. But, hey, speaking of dogs...

A Wyoming police officer has pleaded not guilty to animal cruelty charges tied to the death of a dog left inside a sweltering patrol car for more than six hours, local media reported.

Priorities, I guess. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

"It was the best of times, it was the "Giuliani Time(s)""

One of the advantages of being soulless and ignorant is that you are not governed against the stench of your own stupidity in the past.

Hannity: "Let me educate you about the legal system in America." Bynes: "I don't need your kind of education."

Yes, if nothing else Sean Hannity can "educate" about the legal system in America and how it works for a person of color.

The father of chief defendant Justin Volpe, an NYPD police officer, regularly appeared on show during the 1999 trial. And Hannity and various guests repeated rumors that Louima's injuries resulted from a "gay sex act" and not from police brutality. Playing on the homosexual rumor and inconsistencies in Louima's story, Hannity and his producer sang a parody of Lionel Richie's song "Three Times a Lady," changing the words to "you're once, twice, three times a liar." Hannity stopped referring to the victim as "Lying Louima" only after Volpe confessed to sodomizing Louima with the help of another officer

I'm sure the "education" extends to the numerous times Louima's (and Michael Brown, Travon Martin etc.) treatment is compared to the contract FoxNews gave Oliver North. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

For more than a thousand words worth

This week's cover of Time.

If there's anything government haters can succeed at

It's bad, bad governing.

More than three times as many women have died here at the hands of current or former lovers than the number of Palmetto State soldiers killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars combined. ... The beat of killings has remained a constant in South Carolina, even as domestic violence rates have tumbled 64 percent nationwide over the past two decades, according to an analysis of crime statistics by the newspaper.

Maybe Lincoln should have just let 'em go? There is a lot more in the linked article that will make you sick...especially if you live in South Carolina. If nothing else, it's evidence that no policy and virtually no government serve the interest of one type of person most of all, a white male...or as that particular type of person too often calls it, "the good old days". Those days never ended in South Carolina, whose State Flag should perhaps replace the Palmetto Tree with a simple prehistoric club. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Yes, it has come to this

A proud day indeed.

Egypt on Tuesday urged U.S. authorities to exercise restraint in dealing with racially charged demonstrations in Ferguson, Missouri

In our defense (via FoxNews, naturally) it is possible that many political protesters in Cairo had not had a "one-hitter" within several weeks of when they were shot six-times at point blank range. It's all about context (as you wish to fashion it from reality). [Cross-posted at Firedoglake]

I'm guessing his remedy is "those people should be shot!"

What a bunch of assholes condensed into but one "ass-container":

Breitbart.com, a prominent far-right website, reported this morning, “Republicans are criticizing efforts by liberal organizers to set up voter registration booths at the site where Missouri teenager Michael Brown was shot and killed by a local police officer.”

In an interview with Breitbart News, Missouri RNC executive director Matt Wills expressed outrage about the reports.

 

“If that’s not fanning the political flames, I don’t know what is,” Wills said, “I think it’s not only disgusting but completely inappropriate.”

Wills is described by the RNC as the executive director of the Missouri Republican Party.

Of course he is.

'Murica 2014...(not "literally" Ferguson edition)

Delightful, nothing like an abhorrent technicality to help the wealthy stay in their bubble. This, after all, was a close one.

One new Manhattan skyscraper will greet residents of pricey condos with a lobby in front, while renters of affordable apartments that got the developer government incentives must use a separate side entrance — a so-called poor door. In another apartment house, rent-regulated residents can't even pay to use a new gym that's free to their market-rate neighbors. Other buildings have added playrooms and roof decks off-limits to rent-stabilized tenants.

I imagine the doors well at least replace Arbeit Macht Frei with the respective terms "takers" and "makers". [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Worrying story...needs more "panic"

One of the historical claims that is rooted into our social DNA about the plague (which seems to come around about once of twice a millennium, long enough to forget about the last time) is this one.

The plague started in China and made its way west across Asia to the Black Sea by 1347. One theory is that a group of infected Tartars besieged a Genoese outpost on the coast. To harass the trapped townspeople, the Tartars used their catapults to hurl the dead bodies of their comrades over the town walls spreading the epidemic among the Genoese. The panicked inhabitants fled the scene by ship showing up in the ports of northern Italy and bringing the Black Death to Europe.

Or just this not quite as old an allegation.

... Captain Simeon Ecuyer had bought time by sending smallpox-infected blankets and handkerchiefs to the Indians surrounding the fort -- an early example of biological warfare -- which started an epidemic among them. Amherst himself had encouraged this tactic in a letter to Ecuyer.

Public worry about Ebola just isn't World War Z-enough...so how about this claim?

Liberian officials fear Ebola could soon spread through the capital's largest slum after residents raided a quarantine center for suspected patients and took items including blood-stained sheets and mattresses.

[Cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Iowa's shame, part infinity

Oh sure, you have your Michelle Bachmanns and Louis Gohmerts, and even God forbid next year a fellow Iowan Jodie Ernst, but still no member of Congress is more proudly ignorant than Steve King...representative of Iowa's Fourth District. King's long run of racism is but one of his many low points -- and no situation like Ferguson can occur without King adding his less than two cents.

Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) claimed that racial profiling is not a concern in Ferguson, Missouri, because all of the protesters are of a "continental origin." Speaking on conservative network Newsmax TV on Wednesday, King disagreed that racial profiling played a role in the fatal shooting of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown or the targeting of those protesting his death because, King claims, everyone protesting the situation is black.

Yep, just another dead African-American teen cared for only by his fellow "Continentals" [King loves all form of racial statements, but his default is the "old timey" phrases]. At least he didn't discuss the size of their calves. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Ever "Tricky" but he's just the trend setter

As noticed by these folks, George Will had a pretty startling reveal of one of Richard Nixon's less famous crimes.

On Nov. 2 at 8:34 p.m., a teleprinter at Johnson’s ranch delivered an FBI report on the embassy wiretap: Chennault had told South Vietnam’s ambassador “she had received a message from her boss (not further identified). . . . She said the message was that the ambassador is to ‘hold on, we are gonna win.’ ” The Logan Act of 1799 makes it a crime for a private U.S. citizen, which Nixon then was, to interfere with U.S. government diplomatic negotiations.

So Richard Nixon...delayed the end of the Vietnam War so he could help win himself the right to order the illegal bombing of Cambodia.

The fact this comes from George Will, makes one wonder whether a column in coming out in about six years revealing that Ronald Reagan and his campaign advisers mucked up the process of liberating Americans held prisoner in Iran.

Of course, those were the old days when the GOP felt it necessary to commit war crimes in the dark, as opposed to openly as part of the new Fall rollout.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

America 2014

"Land of the Free"*

"Home of the Brave"

Ironic...in that this doesn't even reflect the world's highest incarceration rate.

You cannot usually have strange bedfellows if the bed is on fire

What could be more comforting than plans going badly for those who primarily make the plans...why it's almost as if we don't know what we're doing so much that eventually we find a common ground of "hey, we haven't bombed this guy yet!?"
I bet Iran would have been even more supportive of our "soft-Dieming" if we'd followed the McCain/Graham plan of bombin' Iran 'till the rubble bounced. After all, to the frustration of many repressed unindicted war criminals, a bombing leading to even more bombing is the prescription to all ills so bomb as often and as many as possible. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

One of the useful aspects of Twitter

Is it allows you to recognize just who is a huuugggggge asshole, based on what they for no other reason than they just have to write something completely gratuitous.

Oh...hooray!

Well this surprises nobody.

Jobs growth in the U.S. since the 2008 recession has been undermined by lower wages, with workers earning an average 23 percent less than from jobs which were lost, a report by an organization representing U.S. cities said on Monday.

Middle-class, now with a quarter less value.

Meanwhile.

America's richest 0.1%, who have at least $20 million (£11 million) in net wealth, had at least 23.5% of the country's wealth in 2012, up from 21.5% from previous estimates.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Well, now we know

The sorts of things that give Lindsey Graham a chubby.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) warned on Sunday that militants in Iraq and Syria would attack the U.S. mainland if President Barack Obama did not immediately take military action to stop them.

“I think of an American city in flames because of the terrorists’ ability to operate in Syria and Iraq,” Graham told Fox News host Chris Wallace.

I believe an American city in flames (the sequel) is the kind of "HOPE" that Lindsey Graham not only believes in, but ejaculates to as well.

Good to know you can maybe get around to that...eventually

When it comes to the Fukushima reactor, it is comforting to know that TEPCO, the company running the thing always gets back to you...eventually...to let you know they were wrong the last several times but they've got it all under control...someday.

Almost all of the nuclear fuel in the No. 3 reactor of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant melted within days of the March 11, 2011, disaster, according to a new estimate by Tokyo Electric Power Co. TEPCO originally estimated that about 60 percent of the nuclear fuel melted at the reactor. But the latest estimate released on Aug. 6 revealed that the fuel started to melt about six hours earlier than previously thought.

Thanks TEPCO, any further words of reassurance you can provide those concerned about the safety of nuclear power?

The utility plans to start fuel removal operations at the No. 3 reactor no earlier than in the latter half of fiscal 2021.

Oh, sure, sounds swell...and quite an endorsement on the safety of radioactivity.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

He's also the Queen of Hearts and the awesomist member of Manudo!

In case you wondered whether he is not only allowed out in polite society...but also unaffected:

Paul Wolfowitz, a former senior George W. Bush administration official and one of the chief Iraq War architects, said on Tuesday that the U.S. "won" the war in Iraq. When asked his thoughts about the current situation in Iraq and whether the war was a mistake, Wolfowitz replied, "We have won it — in 2009." The Bush administration’s troop surge in Iraq in 2007 and a moderate Sunni movement against al Qaeda extremists helped quell sectarian violence throughout the country. The U.S. began to draw down combat troops in 2009.

In a room full of people worried about Ebola it figures Paul Wolfowitz is still the deadliest pathogen in the room. [cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Watching you, watching me, watching them

A real trust circle.

Israel eavesdropped on US Secretary of State John Kerry during doomed peace talks with the Palestinians last year, German news weekly Der Spiegel reported Sunday.

Of course they did. It's called Pollarding!

Or something like that...after all we undoubtedly knew the Germans were watching us, while we watched them...it would make a great movie about the ol' fashioned ways we used to go on about those totalitarian states that used to be...the states, not the totalitarianism.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

And then on to a "Gathering of Juggalos"

But all of them are far better behaved than the modern GOP he helped wrought.

 Churlish hamster Grover Norquist nearly brought the U.S. to the brink of default three years ago, pressuring legislators with his "Taxpayer Protection Pledge" into a debt ceiling battle that was both dangerous and inane. This year, Norquist plans to attend Burning Man, which he sees as a stateless capitalist Utopia.

What's old is new again

I appreciate the fact that you are calling them out in asking for balance, but... Were you people at the Guardian born yesterday, or have never watched American news before?

p [cross-posted at Firedoglake]