A Man Still Fighting For His Principles

Philip Spooner, American.

A lifelong Republican and World War II veteran, making the case for gay marriage in Maine. Equal rights for everyone, a cause worth fighting for.

Chuck Hagel On Target. His Party Shooting Blanks

Republicans don't want to make things better, they just want to destroy the opposition.

"As some Republican senators have said publicly -- that if we kill Obama on this, and we destroy this, and we defeat his, that will drive a stake through his political heart on this administration. I just find that about as irresponsible of a thing as I can think of."

-- Former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE), quoted by The Hill, on the health care reform efforts.

This kind of stuff happens, you try to weaken your opponent, but usually there is an alternative position, not just the baseless attacks and fearmongering. Just goes to show how Conservatives stay on message no matter the popular opinion or facts. Just keep repeating the same BS.

Hagel was the last of the decent GOP. Too bad he is out of office. The party has lost its' way.

Source: PoliticalWire

75,000 Tea Baggers Does Not Equal 75,000 Activists

A questionable 75,000 Tea Baggers in DC and Fox News covers it 24/7, not to mention has producers hyping the crowd and promoted the rally on-air every day for weeks.

75,000 Gay Rights activists in DC and it gets 3 minutes of coverage, via an ABC feed.

Jon Stewart has a great piece on Fox' idealogical pick-and-choose news service, including covering events with zero protesters just as long as they are anti-Obama.

I know it is not a surprise but just think how much Fox edits their "news" to fit their GOP base audience. How many stories are left out, how many issues they are turning a blind eye towards.

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Source: Daily Dish

Rachel Maddow Puts Perspective On "Deranged" Criticsim

Rachel Maddow puts President Obama's Nobel Peace Prize -- & the "deranged" criticism of it -- in proper perspective.

I understand not liking a guy, but at least Bush critics had 2 failed wars, 9/11, complete meltdown of the economy, torture, secret prisons, warrantless domestic wiretapping, Katrina/New Orleans debacle, turning a surplus into the biggest deficit, blocking stem cell research, denying global warming and destroying the middle class while fiendishly rewarding the uber rich. The Bush defenders who are now Obama haters need a slap.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Quote Of The Day: Claire McCaskill

The bizarro world that is the GOP. Pure haterz.

"I feel that I’m in an alternative universe. For eight years some people called anyone who disagreed with the President’s foreign policy or war in Iraq unpatriotic. Then in the course of two weeks, those same people cheer when the United States does not get selected for the Olympics and boo when our President is the unanimous choice for the Nobel Peace Prize."-- Sen. Claire McCaskill

Glad that someone in middle America Missouri is keeping it real. The Bush legacy of divisive politics will take some time getting over. The calm, coolness of Obama is not what immediately attracts the opposition, but over time, they will see that the President is not the boogie man they want him to be.

Source: Constant Weeder

Are You With Us Or Against Us?

For all the douche bag "Country First" and "you're either with us or against us" Bush ball-suckers, try to belittle Obama's Nobel Peace Prize all you want: You FAIL. Obama ran a historic election, was the first black US President, he is the international symbol of hope, all at the worst point in time inheriting a devastated economy and failed global banking markets, and the haters on the Right have a "what have you done?" attitude?

Have some class. You try to undercut the guy every step of the way. Your objectivity is so shot, just step out of the way, you no longer have a clue on how to lead. In your own rhetoric, "why do you hate America?"

The words you're looking for are, "Congratulations, Mr President".

"Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future. His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world's population." -- The Nobel Committee

Rep. Alan Grayson Showing Democrats Have Balls

Rep. Alan Grayson [D-FL]. Keeping it real.

If had given that speech today he could have added how the Republicans will spin Obama getting the Nobel Peace Prize as a bad thing.

Every "Option" Except Ending The War[s]

The narrow White House debate on Afghanistan:

Apparently, "all options" does not mean "all options." As usual for American wars, examining "all options" means everything other than "ending the war." - Glenn Greenwald

The cost-benefit of occupying Afghanistan and Iraq, but not Pakistan, is pretty obvious. We send our troops, money and technology over there, the local governments have no legitimacy, the locals don't seem to show any interest in influencing their situation, the cycle continues with no uptick in "success". America as War Inc. has to end.

Here's some context:



Source: Glenn Greenwald

Campaign For Olympics=Bad, Campaign For War=Good

Obama may have appeared to look after his friends in his home city Chicago for the 2016 Olympics and caught holy hell for being arrogant by the Conservatives and Right Wing media shit-munchers.

George Bush and Dick Cheney started a few billion-dollar endless wars and outsourced a shitload to look after their friends and didn't catch any flack from the same people.

Must be nice being a clueless shill.

The Under-reported Context Of Obama's Olympic Trip

Obama, the 2016 Olympics and some context. Obama haters will never be pleased.

"The heads of state of all four nations that were in consideration to host the 2016 Olympics went to Copenhagen: the President of Brazil, the Prime Minister of Japan, the entire Royal Family of Spain, and the President of the United States.

The trip may indeed have been a mistake on Obama's part. But do you honestly believe that, if Obama had not gone, the same people who celebrated Chicago's loss and branded Obama with the failure would not instead be bemoaning Chicago's loss and branding Obama with the failure to promote America's interests abroad?"

The story has been spun that Obama is a narcissist and made the trip out of ego. You don't hear too often, if at all, that all four potential host cities were represented.

[But without a birth certificate, how did Obama get a passport to leave the country?]

Source: Daily Dish

The Re-Branding Of America

The real power of the President. Let's see SNL do a skit on this. [Then have CNN "grade" it]

The United States is the most admired country globally thanks largely to the star power of President Barack Obama and his administration, according to a new poll. It climbed from seventh place last year, ahead of France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Japan which completed the top five nations in the Nation Brand Index (NBI).

"What's really remarkable is that in all my years studying national reputation, I have never seen any country experience such a dramatic change in its standing as we see for the United States for 2009," said Simon Anholt, the founder of NBI, which measured the global image of 50 countries each year.

It's not really hard to make USA #1, but just think how hard it is to make it #7.

Can't wait to hear those America-as-Exceptional neo-con chants of "we're #1, we're #1!"

Source: Yahoo

Report: Guns N' Poseurs

Consider me not shocked, says the man who never touched a gun.

"In a first-of its-kind study, epidemiologists at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine found that, on average, guns did not protect those who possessed them from being shot in an assault. The study estimated that people with a gun were 4.5 times more likely to be shot in an assault than those not possessing a gun."

"Live by the gun, die by the gun" my Grandma would say. Having a gun amounts to having a false sense of security. The classic "wingnut" situation is where a gun owner has to protect himself. Over what? Someone taking your stuff? They into your double-wide to take your Skynyrd collection? Your coveted beanie babies set? Your Ron Popeil juicer you paid 3 easy installments of $29.95 for?

If that is worth dying over, you better reconsider your life. As for the people who take gun ownership serious, get the training and respect the weapon, fire away. But let's be real that there is a distinction between the two. Just don't tell the NRA.

Source: Oliver Willis

"Obama Failed" vs "GOP Roots For America's Loss"

"Country first" my ass.

I'm sure people on the Left loved when Bush failed at things, but I'm pretty sure they didn't go nuts when NYC lost the 2012 Olympics bid back in 2005. I guess the Conservatives didn't want those hundreds of millions of dollars coming into the US economy with all those international travelers in town.

"The unseemly cheering on the right for America losing its Olympic bid I think is going to be the taste that lingers a long time after this failure. Certainly the president tried to get something and he didn't get it, and people who hate the president feel like that's a cause for celebration. But to see, for example, the Weekly Standard post 'Chicago loses, Chicago loses, cheers erupt at Weekly Standard headquarters' I think says a lot more about the Weekly Standard, it says a lot more about the right right now than it does about this loss." — Rachel Maddow on Meet the Press

As Paul Krugman said today, "The Conservative Movement has the emotional maturity of a bratty, 13 year old."

Source: Bob Cesca

Top 10 Things You Didn't Know About Iran

Juan Cole busts up the myths the West has with Iran. Here's example #2:

"Belief: Iran is a militarized society bristling with dangerous weapons and a growing threat to world peace.

Reality: Iran's military budget is a little over $6 billion annually. Sweden, Singapore and Greece all have larger military budgets. Moreover, Iran is a country of 70 million, so that its per capita spending on defense is tiny compared to these others, since they are much smaller countries with regard to population. Iran spends less per capita on its military than any other country in the Persian Gulf region with the exception of the United Arab Emirates."

As per Republican policy, you always build the threat, real or imagined, to the point where you use it to push your own agenda. Scare Americans so they feel you have to "save" them.

Leo Strauss, father of the Neo-con movement would be proud. He thought, "A political order can be stable only if it is united by an external threat . . . . Following Machiavelli, he maintained that if no external threat exists then one has to be manufactured".

I wonder what the equivalent would be for Israel, which the US partly pays for.

Source: Juan Cole

Obama's Dimplomacy vs Bush's Sabre Rattling

It's nice when your President is a diplomat with a cool hand, rather than some goof with a cowboy fetish. Take dealing with Iran for instance, via McClatchy:

"Iran also pledged that within weeks it would allow the inspection of a previously covert uranium enrichment facility near the holy city of Qom, and the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mohamed ElBaradei, announced that he'd head to Tehran to work out the details."

and this massive change:

"Iran agreed in principle Thursday to ship most of its current stockpile of enriched uranium to Russia, where it would be refined for exclusively peaceful uses, in what Western diplomats called a significant, but interim, measure to ease concerns over its nuclear program."

So to put this in context, a real President versus a God-Squad huckster:

"Obama WH already got more from one buffet lunch with Iran than Bush WH did in 8 years of saber-rattling." - Steve Hynd.

This is pretty big news. I wonder if the failed neo-cons and racialist GOP base will obsess on Chicago not getting the 2016 Olympics?

Source: Salon

Rep. Alan Grayson Has A Set

A Democrat with balls. Take heed.

Florida Democrat Rep. Alan Grayson yesterday said (with charts!) on the House floor that, "The Republican's healthcare plan for America is -- Don't get sick.... If you do get sick..., die quickly."

Republicans demanded an apology.

Here is his apology, "but not to Republicans for his remarks last night. Instead, he apologized for those who died because they didn't have health insurance."



Source: http://www.realitychex.com/

Kaiser Foundation: Health Care Reform Support Rising

The Kaiser Foundation finds that support for health care reform is rebounding.

Also interesting is that the September rebound included both an increase in support and a drop in opposition

Source: Ezra Klein