Government Shutdown Link-dump

Tea party Republicans blame Obama for the shutdown they planned

Seven key points about the shutdown

Government Shutdown Was Planned For Months By Ed Meese, Koch Bros

GOP blocked 19 requests to negotiate before the shutdown.

The shutdown is political blackmail. If Democrats give in, the GOP will keep putting the US democracy and economy at risk

Here's the 'Defunding Obamacare Toolkit' PDF made by the Tea Party. Includes sample tweets, letter templates, and possible responses to the question "What happens when you shut down the government and you are blamed for it?":   http://www.teapartypatriots.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Tea-Party-Patriots-Defund-Obamacare-Toolkit-Final.pdfPDF Properties > Author: Shonda Werry.  A former Republican Staffer and a Lobbyist. Definitely a Grassroots movement...

JD Curtis links to hate site

In another case of moumentally missing the point, JD Curtis was upset recently because he felt the mainstream media were "glossing over" the idea that George Zimmerman is not white or not white enough (as if this was the most important part of the story).  Zimmerman is half Peruvian and half white American but this is beside the point.  JD linked to a site called VDARE.  

It's symbol is a white doe and the site is named after Veronica Dare the first English child born in America.  Their webpage claims "immigration policy drives whites into a minority" and that "to defend the interests of American whites" is the purpose of some of their authors.

The site is run by Brimelow who described the role of race as "elemental, absolute, fundamental." He saids that white Americans should demand that U.S. immigration quotas be changed to allow in mostly whites. 

This is how SPLC describes the site "VDARE"

Once a relatively mainstream anti-immigration page, VDARE has now become a meeting place for many on the radical right.
One essay complains about how the government encourages "the garbage of Africa" to come to the United States. The same writer says once the "Mexican invasion" engulfs the country, "high teenage birthrates, poverty, ignorance and disease will be what remains."
Another says that Hispanics have a "significantly higher level of social pathology than American whites. ... In other words, some immigrants are better than others." Yet another complains that a Jewish immigrant rights group is helping "African Muslim refugees" come to America.
Brimelow's site carries archives of columns from men like Sam Francis, who is the editor of the newspaper of the white supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens, a group whose Web page recently described blacks as "a retrograde species of humanity."
It has run articles by Jared Taylor, the editor of the white supremacist American Renaissance magazine, which specializes in dubious race and IQ studies and eugenics, the "science" of "race betterment" through selective breeding.
Recently, VDARE has even begun to publish the writings of Kevin MacDonald, a psychology professor at California State-Long Beach. MacDonald accuses Jews of "dominating" the "movement to change the ethnic balance of the United States by allowing mass, non-traditional [i.e., non-white] immigration."
He writes that Jews, believing "the masses ha[ve] to be deceived," frame their appeals in universalistic language. But behind that are "the Jewish agendas" of the deceivers. MacDonald also mentions "the famously heavy Jewish role" in television news.

Fake Trayvon Martin Photo

Right-wing blogs have been circulating a photo of Trayvon Martin sticking up his middle fingers.  This is not the Trayvon Martin that was murdered.  This other Trayvon lives in another city and has not been murdered.

http://blogs.miaminewtimes.com/riptide/2012/03/trayvon_martin_no_thats_not_hi.php

Misleading photo

JD Curtis, in his latest anti-abortion screed, has yet again used another misleading photo.

He claimed the photo is "Baby Samuel at 21 weeks grasping the finger of the surgeon operating on his mom's uterus"

But the surgeon in the photo says differently.

"It has become an urban legend," says Bruner, the Vanderbilt University surgeon who fixed the spina bifida lesion on Samuel.

Samuel and his mother, Julie, were under anesthesia and could not move.

"The baby did not reach out," Bruner says. "The baby was anesthetized. The baby was not aware of what was going on."

 The surgeon is actually putting the arm back in after performing the spina bifida surgery.

If JD wants to be taken seriously he needs to stop referring to women as "Femi-Nazis".

Brave New World or 1984?

Amusing Ourselves to Death is a short comic by Stuart McMillen which examines 1984 and Brave New World and asks which book the present resembles.  Go read it now.

Margaret Sanger and the phony KKK picture

 

The first picture is the original photo.  The second is what appears on JD Curtis' blog.   The third is a view from another angle.  JD Curtis seems to think Obama's birth certificate is phony but doesn't even notice how badly faked this picture is!  I don't know who faked this picture but it seems to be everywhere.

Judgment Day Link-dump and pic-dump

Just a few more days and these people will have to think of something to do with all these trucks.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/05/14/new-york-man-spends-life-savings-ahead-21-doomsday/

http://www.npr.org/2011/05/07/136053462/is-the-end-nigh-well-know-soon-enough?sc=fb&cc=fp
http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/h6hvo/iknow_that_may_21st_will_be_the_rapture/
http://www.armageddononline.org/failed.html

Right wing bitterness over Obama taking out Bin Laden.

From "5 Responses to Right Wing Bitterness Over Obama Gettin’ Osama"

Here is a quick primer in dealing with the right’s bitterness today:
1) They will lectures you not to politicize terrorism. You write, “So, you’re flip flopping from when Bush blamed Clinton for not getting Bin Laden? Oh, and by the way, President Obama got Osama.” (Never let them steer the topic away from the very thing they are trying to avoid.)
...
4) The Fox News watching set will say that Obama shouldn’t be trying to take credit for this and they bend over backwards to pretend like they care about the troops. They may say he “snubbed” Bush and has “no class” (you know how the repeat everything their masters tell them). You say, “God Bless Our troops. If only Bush had cared about getting Osama way back after 9/11, eh? But then, we tried it your way and it didn’t work so the President decided to use intelligence and look where that got us. Shocking, I know! Would you prefer we keep giving Bush credit for things he didn’t do, just to make you feel better, sort of like oh, gee, I dunno, an handicap or reparations for Bush’s failures? Oh, and by the way, Obama got Osama.”

Link 

Here's how the conservative's correspondence bias works:
Conservative President, Great Economy: President is doing a great job.

Conservative President, Poor Economy: President don't really control the economy.
Liberal President Great Economy: President doesn't control the economy.
Liberal President Poor Economy: OMFG, This idiot is killing the country!!!

Conservatives saying that Obama shouldn't take any credit is expected, just as expected as them crediting and praising Bush if he had accomplished the task.


I've already had this conversation more than once:
"Why can't Obama take credit?"
answer is something like "Because the SEALs did it, all he did was order it/etc."
Ask "Why did we kill Osama?"
Answer "Because he ordered 9/11"
"But by your own logic, he cannot take credit. He did not fly the planes himself, only ordered it."

Judgment Day in less than a month.

"It is April 30th. They are predicting the end of the world in less than 30 days. Why do they still solicit recurring donations?"  arkanus on Reddit.

dueling billboards

Peter Hitchens and Serial Mom

Peter Hitchens in his column says:

"I might add that Christ himself was subject to the death penalty, and his sayings were recorded when sentence was passed on him and while it was being carried out, and He did not take the opportunities offered to condemn it in principle. I agree that arguments from silence are not always reliable. But in this case, the silence is pretty eloquent."

Compare his quote to this one from "Serial Mom", a 1994 comedic movie.

Father Boyce: Jesus said nothing to condemn capital punishment as he hung on the cross, did he?
Congregation: No.
Father Boyce: If ever there was a time to go on record against the death penalty, wasn't it that night? Capital punishment is already the law in the state of Maryland. So what are we waiting for, fellow Christians? Let's just do it.
Congregation: Amen.

We laughed at this idea in 1994.  What's happened to the world that now people are taking it seriously?