Palestinian Statehood

The United Nations voted yesterday to recognize Palestine as a “non-member state.”  The U.N. vote was overwhelmingly in favor of Palestinian statehood, with the U.S. and Israel being practically the only countries frantically clinging to the 1900s by voting No.

The biggest political advantage of being recognized as a state is that Palestine might be able to become a member of the International Criminal Court (ICC).  Membership in the ICC would enable Palestine to charge Israeli leaders with war crimes or crimes against humanity.

“Lawfare” is the term used by Western leaders who don’t like this idea.  After all, who needs some sort of newfangled international court when it’s so much easier to just assemble a Coalition Of The Willing and stomp the shit out of any country you don’t like.

According to a director of the International Crisis Group, prominent Israelis are afraid to leave the country for fear they’ll be hauled to The Hague and arrested as war criminals.

Meanwhile, the Israeli government — in a perfect demonstration of exactly WHY the U.N. voted the way it did — has just authorized 3,000 more Israeli settler homes in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.  And thousands more settler homes in that region, already in the planning stage, will be expedited.

Gee, why has the rest of the world turned against Israel?  It’s just mind-boggling.

Those Who Count Voted for Mitt Romney

Yes, we know, most of the riffraff voted to re-elect Obama so they can keep on getting free stuff.  But among Real Americans — those who amounted to something — Mitt Romney got more votes.

Stuart Stevens, a Romney advisor, pointed out that Romney won the election among every economic group except those despicable lowlifes who earn less than $50,000 a year.

Less than $50,000 a year — eww, peon alert!  Why do they even allow those dirty-hands blue-collar types to vote?!?  Isn’t there some way to keep them out?

No wonder Republicans kept passing all these Voter I.D. laws.  Too bad those commie federal courts kept overturning them.

“John Kerry Hasn’t Supported Enough Wars to be Secretary of State”

If Susan Rice doesn’t become the next Secretary of State, the next most likely contender might be John Kerry.  Fortunately, Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol has nipped that idea in the bud:  John Kerry hasn’t supported enough wars to be Secretary of State.

On Fox News, Bill Kristol said:

“I rather think [President Barack Obama] will appoint Susan Rice and I think — I’m not a huge fan of hers — but I think she’s likely to be confirmed by the Senate.  And an awful lot of people might decide, you know, given the range of alternative appointments, maybe she’s not — John Kerry, in my opinion, might be a worse secretary of state. Maybe one just goes ahead and lets him have the secretary of state he wants.  I think Susan Rice has been a little more interventionist than John Kerry.  John Kerry was a guy who loved the Assad regime in Syria. John Kerry has been against our intervening in every war we’ve intervened in, the first Gulf War. In Iraq, he was for it before he was against it.”

Somewhere underneath all that doddering and halting and rambling, Bill Kristol has a point.  We need a secretary of state who’s just champing at the bit to start a war.  And the more wars, the merrier.

In addition to being “against our intervening in every war we’ve intervened in,” John Kerry has an even larger blight on his record:  John Kerry himself has actually fought in a war (Vietnam).

Disqualified!  A true warmonger would never ever join the military and do his own fighting.  That’s for lowly working-class people, the unwashed masses, you know, blue-collar types.  The Secretary of State needs to be a foaming Neocon who loves war, but recoils in horror at the thought of actually taking part in it.

Texas Highway Pileup on I-10: What Caused It?

Heavy fog was undoubtedly the main cause of the Thanksgiving pileup near Beaumont, TX that killed two people and injured eighty.  The linked article speculates about other causes:  speeding, whether truck drivers or motorists are more to blame, etc.

But they skipped something.  There’s a certain type of driving I’ve seen in that part of Texas — anywhere within about a 100-mile radius of Houston — that I’ve never seen anywhere else:  Everybody follows too closely.

I’m not talking about tailgating the slow F#$%!#%$!!$ in front of you; everybody does that.  But in this part of Texas, there seems to be about six inches between every two cars on the road.  I-10 looks like a train barreling down the freeway at 90 m.p.h.

When I’ve been on that part of I-10, if there’s a slower car in front of me and I see another vehicle coming up behind me, I get over to the right lane ASAP.  And it’s not limited to I-10.  It was the same thing on the north-south route between Galveston and West Columbia.

I’ve never seen this mass tailgating at 90 m.p.h. — with six inches between every two vehicles — anywhere else, even southern California.

Has anyone else noticed this?  I haven’t been in Texas since 2000, but unless there’s been a mass personality shift in that area, I can only assume all of the vehicles on that fateful Thanksgiving were snuggled up close together as they went barreling through the fog.

I’m not pointing fingers or trying to use this tragedy to make a point.  It just seemed odd that the linked article didn’t mention this.

The Original Thanksgiving: What Really Happened

I always assumed the original Thanksgiving was somewhat different from the warm-and-fuzzy-fest we all learned about in grade school.  Was it ever.

Tisquantum (Anglicized into Squanto) was the Native American who enabled that famous banquet for the Pilgrims in 1621 and taught them survival skills for the upcoming winter.  Squanto was a member of the Patuxet Nation, which was part of the larger Wampanoag confederacy.  He was kidnapped by a British seafarer, Thomas Hunt, who was serving under Captain John Smith (of Jamestown and Pocahontas fame).

This site goes into greater detail.

Thomas Hunt sold Squanto into slavery in Spain.  Squanto escaped from his captors, and boarded a ship bound for Newfoundland.  He worked as an interpreter on the ship.  When he eventually made it back to New England, he discovered that the entire Patuxet Nation had died of smallpox, courtesy of their new “visitors” from across the Atlantic.  He was the last living Patuxet.

Nevertheless, Squanto taught fishing and planting and other survival skills to his new “friends.”  The resulting much-celebrated First Thanksgiving was in 1621.  Squanto died of smallpox in 1622.

I’ve read “Lies My Teacher Told Me” and “A People’s History of the United States” — not recently — but I don’t remember reading anything about Thanksgiving.  Having read those two books, the above description of the original Thanksgiving makes perfect sense.

The linked article (the first one) also contains a 42-minute film, “Reclaiming Their Voices: The Native American Vote in New Mexico.”  (I haven’t watched it yet.)  It’s about the Laguna Pueblo and their historic battles against oppression, from Spanish Colonial days to the present.  The film was created by Dorothy Fadiman and is narrated by Peter Coyote.

Tea Party News Network: the True Voice of FREEDOM

If Fox News is too liberal for you, and you think the Republican Party has deteriorated into a bunch of moderate squishy RINOs — there’s still a place for YOU.

The Tea Party News Network (TPNN) will tell you everything you need to know.  Contributors include Judson Phillips, founder of Tea Party Nation (designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center).  Judson Phillips has famously pointed out that renters and other lowlifes should NOT be permitted to vote.  Voting is only for property owners, as God intended.

As of this writing, TPNN’s current headlines include:

“Thomas Sowell on the danger of unions” — oooooohhhh!!!!

“No negative Obama stories by MSNBC in final week of campaign.”

And the scariest of all is this dire warning in the upper right corner:

“Obama’s Third Term?  An unstoppable economic force is underway right now that has nothing to do with Obama or his policies…He will be credited for this massive creation of wealth and will use it to push his socialist agenda.”

And right underneath that frightening information, they want you to click on “Learn More Here.”  But I’m, I’m afraid to click on it.  Oh God, what could it be???

Anyway, knock yourself out.  I have this site linked to my blog under “Comedy,” along with Townhall.com and WorldNetDaily.

Boycott Cyber Monday?

Several activist groups are urging consumers not to do any online shopping on Cyber Monday — that’s next Monday, the first Monday after Thanksgiving.

Two groups, American Rights at Work and Jobs With Justice, have joined forces on an anti-Cyber Monday campaign.  Their main objection is “dangerous, sweatshop-like working conditions facing U.S. warehouse workers who fulfill online orders for retailers like Wal-Mart and Amazon.”  Complaints include the “backbreaking pace of work,” “extreme temperature,” and “expendable employment.”

These problems need to be corrected, but I think a boycott would only accomplish mass layoffs and firings.  What say you?

I have a totally different reason for opposing Cyber Monday and online shopping in general.  I live in a small town — population just under 20,000 — and the downtown is thriving.  (Knock wood.)

Needless to say, online shopping is about as popular among local merchants as Greenpeace at a frackers’ convention.  The common wisdom — I’ve never seen any proof of this but it makes sense — is that when you shop at a locally-owned store, sixty cents of every dollar you spend stays in the community.

If you shop at a large chain or Big Box, only SIX cents of every dollar stays in the community.  And obviously if you shop online, ZERO cents stays in your community.

If nobody in your area has the item you’re looking for, then obviously you’ll have to buy it online.  But other than that…

GOP’s Stunning New Realization: Women, Minorities and Workers are People Too

Republican leaders have been re-evaluating their campaign, soul-searching and trying to reboot their party’s image.  And in the process, they’ve reached some incredible new insights.

Republican Congressman Charles Bass — who was defeated on November 6th — stunned the audience with:

“Republicans have to start understanding that small business and entrepreneurs are important, but the people who work for them are also important.  We've got to be compassionate conservatives.”

Huh???  Workers, important?!?  But, I mean, eww, they’re dirty, they work with their hands, they don’t belong to country clubs and they don’t make campaign contributions.  And they’re part of that icky 47% that just mooches and whines for more handouts.  They’re takers!

Ron Kaufman, one of Mitt Romney’s campaign advisors, said:

“We need to make sure that we're not perceived as intolerant.  The bottom line is we were perceived to be intolerant on some issues. And tone-deaf on others.”

What???  No!!!  You mean we have to tolerate those godless uppity — oh, you’re just saying, OK, I get it now.  “Not perceived as intolerant” — Gotcha.  Read you loud and clear.  [wink]  It’s OK to BE intolerant and tone deaf, as long as the voters don’t pick up on it.  Whew!  Had me worried for a minute there.

Other GOP leaders pointed out that Republicans need to change the WAY they communicate their message.  Obama’s campaign was very good at talking directly to voters.  The Republicans’ top-down method of communicating — TV ads, direct mail — is less effective.  You’re talking at people instead of to them.

Yuck, we have to talk to them?  We don’t have to shake hands with them, do we???  I mean, some of them have dark skin, or their hands might be dirty from working at one of those messy labor jobs, or they might be homosexuals and we could catch… [shudder]

It’ll be interesting to see the GOP’s new outreach campaign toward Blacks, Hispanics and Asians.  At second thought, don’t go there.

Occupy Wall Street’s Newest Project: Steal This Debt

Occupy Wall Street has begat a debt relief program — the Rolling Jubilee.

(Here’s their website.)

As you probably know, collection agencies operate by purchasing a debt for pennies on the dollar; then they hound the debtor for payment of the full amount.

Rolling Jubilee starts off the same way:  they purchase a debt for pennies on the dollar.  Then, instead of trying to collect, they forgive — i.e. abolish — the debt.  As one of the comments at the linked article said, this is the exact opposite of vulture capitalism.

So far, Rolling Jubilee has raised $294,422 with which to purchase — and wipe out — $5,893,271 worth of debt.

There was a fundraising concert yesterday which sought to raise $50,000 in order to purchase and eliminate $1 million worth of medical debt.

Strike Debt is the organization behind the Rolling Jubilee project.  Needless to say, Strike Debt is keeping a low profile and is NOT naming the industry insiders who make their debt purchases possible.  Some powerful banking interests are not pleased with their new competition and would love to squish it.

Apparently these “invisible hand of the marketplace” conservatives are only happy when the “Free Market” is rigged in favor of the banking industry.

Obama Won the Election by Doling out Gifts to Brown People and Wimmins

Yesterday President Obama extended an olive branch to Mitt Romney, saying some of Romney’s ideas “could be very helpful” in shaping future policies.  He said:

“My hope is, before the end of the year… that we have a chance to sit down and talk.  He presented some ideas during the course of the campaign that I actually agree with. And so it'd be interesting to talk to him about something like that.  There may be ideas that he has with respect to jobs and growth that can help middle-class families that I want to hear.”

But Romney saw through the President’s phony gesture, and fired back with:

“The President's campaign focused on giving targeted groups a big gift — so he made a big effort on small things.  Those small things, by the way, add up to trillions of dollars.”

You tell ‘em Mitt.  Unlike Mitt Romney, who campaigned on behalf of ALL Americans, Barack Obama only cares about:

Labor Unions and other lowly working-class types.

Uppity womenfolk with their insatiable thirst for birth control pills and other free stuff.

Swarthy minorities who just want to mooch off of Real (White [wink]) Americans.

The Year 2028: The New 2012

Now that we’re pretty sure the world won’t be ending in the next month and a half, we have a new Armageddon:  2028.  The world isn’t exactly supposed to “end” in 2028, just life as we know it.

Or as environmentalist Bill McKibben puts it, “Game Over for the planet.”  In 2028 — unless immediate action is taken on a global level — the global temperature will have risen by two degrees Centigrade.  It’s already been established that a temperature increase of two degrees Centigrade will have catastrophic consequences.  You already know all this:  massive floods, droughts, storms, famine — I don’t need to walk you through it.  Google it if necessary.

Needless to say, conservative politicians hate these climate change warnings.  The most obvious reason, of course:  their pimps in the fossil fuel industry get mad when people talk about climate change or global warming.  And when these pimps get mad, their congressional prostitutes start pissing and shitting all over themselves.

Even worse:  These climate change warnings are based on that there newfangled math and science.

Here’s how it works:  The global temperature will rise by two degrees Centigrade when 565 gigatons of carbon dioxide have been released into the atmosphere.  The world’s fossil fuel reserves currently contain 2,795 gigatons of carbon dioxide.

And as the linked article says, “their business model depends on that fuel being sold and burned.”

At the current rate of fossil fuel consumption, it will take sixteen years for the Earth's atmosphere to reach the 565 gigaton milestone.

Bill McKibben’s nationwide tour is called “Do the Math.”

It’s gotta be done.  The math isn’t pretty.  But remember, if we don’t act now, it’s Game Over.

Aw, heck with all that leftwing Chicken Little nonsense.

Drill Baby Drill.  Drill Here Drill Now.

Curbing the Filibuster

There could be a showdown this January over Senate Democrats’ threats to curb the filibuster.  Republicans have turned the filibuster — and every other stalling/obstruction tactic — into their standard method of legislating.  The filibuster was originally just an occasional, and very dramatic, undertaking.  It didn’t become Standard Operating Procedure until Barack Obama got elected to the White House.

I’m kind of leery of changing the rules.  Democrats won’t always be in control of the Senate.  For that matter, Republicans might very well have taken the Senate last week if a few of their bone-stupidest candidates hadn’t spilled their true philosophy of “aw come on, a little rape never hurt anybody.”

Instead of limiting the filibuster, I think any senator who wants to stage a filibuster should be required to stand up and talk nonstop, for hours; days even.  As soon as he/she sits down, the filibuster has ended and the Senate resumes its business.  This is what the term filibuster originally MEANT.  It has nothing to do with just teaming up with 39 other senators to vote No on something; or everything.

Check out some of the famous filibuster speeches listed here. 

If a senator has the balls and the persistence to stand there and read the Constitution over and over for three days, or read names out of the phone book, or whatever, go for it.  What needs to be stopped is the practice of forty senators bringing the Senate to a grinding halt every time they're against something.  No action, no sacrifice, no effort expounded — nothing.

That’s not a filibuster.  It’s the difference between running in a 26-mile marathon, and sitting on the couch with a doobie in one hand and a bottle of whiskey in the other, and saying “I’m running a marathon right now.”

Anyway, that’s my take.  Don’t limit the filibuster, but require a filibustering senator to actually get up there and talk nonstop.  When the talking stops, the filibuster is over.

What say you?

Romney Admits Defeat, Then Shits All Over the Help

I was planning to give politics a rest for a few days.  But this story is just too funny.  Or sick, or appalling, or something.

As soon as Mitt Romney finished giving his concession speech Tuesday night, the first thing he did was cancel all the credit cards that had been issued by the Romney/Ryan 2012 campaign.

God only knows how many jillions of Romney/Ryan campaign staffers were left suddenly stranded, twisting in the wind.  Oh I’m sorry, were you planning to check out of your hotel?  You wanted to purchase an airline ticket back home after a grueling campaign?

Tough shit.  You don’t exist any more.  Mitt Romney says you’re last week’s newspaper; yesterday’s coffee grounds.  Buh bye now.

Somehow, this just figures.  The Gordon Gekko clone who bought, chewed up and spat out companies (and their employees) left and right, the sheltered Blueblood who dismisses half of the population as moochers and parasites because they don’t earn enough money to pay federal income taxes — it makes perfect sense that this self-absorbed sociopath would shit all over his employees the minute he doesn’t need them any more.

The more stories like this that are trickling out — and there are a lot of them — the clearer it gets:  We dodged a bullet.  The election wasn’t close, and yet, forty-eight percent of the voters wanted Marie Antoinette to take over the White House.

And no, it’s NOT standard procedure for a candidate to drop his/her campaign staff like a hot potato the minute the campaign is over.  A Forbes Magazine columnist wrote:

“In case you are wondering, this did not have to happen.  The Mitt Romney for President entity does not end with Romney’s Tuesday night loss. There are papers to be filed with various federal commissions and bills to be paid.”

This incident — and dozens of others — speaks volumes about what kind of person Mitt Romney is.  Thank God, Allah, the Unified Force Field, whoever/whatever that this arrogant puke didn’t get elected.

On Election Night, Mitt Romney didn’t have a concession speech prepared.  But he DID have $25,000 worth of fireworks with which to celebrate his certain victory.

The hubris before the fall.

The White House is Not For Sale

America’s most powerful industries spent a record amount of money to purchase the White House and install an empty suit that would take orders directly from them.  Didn’t work.

Sure, the Kochs and Adelsons and Wall Street barons can pump three times as much money into the next election.  Ten times as much.  But what good will it do?  There’s only X number of TV channels and radio stations to run their commercials on; only X amount of space in newspapers and magazines and on billboards.

Critical Mass times ten isn’t any more critical or more massive.

During the last week of this election, the PACs still had millions of unspent dollars they had to spend.  Since the swing states were already saturated with 24/7 commercials on every station, all the PACs could do was start bombarding the solidly red and blue states with their ads and hate messages.  For what?

I wasn’t as alarmed by the Citizens United decision as most people were.  I figured our “elected” officials were already drowning in bribes and “campaign contributions.”  How much worse could it get?  And we could always follow the money and see who’s bribing whom.

Then came the Dark Money:  hundreds of millions of dollars “contributed” by anonymous bedwetting cowards who didn’t even have the balls to identify themselves.  All they had to do was donate their money to a political organization that was disguised as a “charity” group.  Charity organizations are tax-exempt and aren’t required to disclose the names of their donors.

It’s just a matter of time before the IRS comes to the no-brainer decision that these political organizations have ZERO to do with “charity” and therefore they have to pay taxes and they have to reveal the names of their donors.

And in the past few days, several of the above-mentioned bedwetting cowards have already been pulled out from under their rocks and dragged kicking and squealing and writhing into the sunlight.

Here and Here are two examples.

It’s a start.

Obama Re-Elected. WOOT!!!

Whew!!!


Is this a great country or what?

There IS a god.

I’m too relieved to type anything else right now.  More later…

Mitt Romney’s Concession Speech

Starting with the final presidential debate, Mitt Romney has been “acting as if” he’s already President of the United States.  This practice of “acting as if” you’ve already achieved your highest goals — visualizing what you want clearly, down to the minutest detail — goes back at least to the 1930s.  “Think and Grow Rich,” “The Magic of Believing“ and “Psycho-Cybernetics” are three books (among many) that have taught this.

This is a very effective technique.  We’ll just have to hope it doesn’t work for Romney.  For the hundreds of millions of us who DO NOT want the United States of America to become just another subsidiary of Halliburton/Exxon/Koch Industries, we all need to ACT AS IF Mitt Romney has already gone down in flames.

My meager contribution will be a clearly visualized transcript of Mitt Romney’s concession speech on the night of November 6th, 2012.

OK then…

There’s just one problem:  I have no idea what Mitt Romney will say when he concedes the presidential election on the night of November 6th.  Which Mitt Romney will we get, and how will he react to getting trounced — obliterated! — by President Barack Obama?

Will Mitt Romney’s concession speech be conciliatory?  Magnanimous?  Philosophical?  Angry?  Bitter?  Sulking?

Mitt Romney said last May that running for president “is like a sport for old guys.”  He told the Wall Street Journal:

“I like competition, and I think the game is like a sport for old guys.  I mean, you know, I can’t compete in competitive sports very well, but I can compete in politics, and there’s the — what was the old ABC ‘Wide World of Sports’ slogan? ‘The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat.’  The only difference is victory is still a thrill, but I don’t feel agony in loss.”

Hold that thought.

Does Mitt Romney really think of this election as just a sport?  If so, maybe he’ll use a few sporting analogies and congratulate President Obama for playing a better game.

“I threw my wickedest fastball at Barack Obama and he knocked it out of the park!”

 “I threw a haymaker at the President; he ducked, and countered with a body blow that broke three of my ribs and ruptured a kidney.  I’m down for the count.”

We’ll see.

Any other takes?  What do you think Mitt Romney will say in his November 6th concession speech?