Here We Go Again: Day 2

America's right-wing domestic terrorism problem continues as Oregonian reporter Les Zaitz is covering the standoff in Harney County, Oregon. Armed militia seditionists continue their standoff with the FBI after seizing the Malheur Lake federal bird sanctuary over the weekend, and plan to stay "years" if need be.

Here's a summary of key elements of this unfolding story:

The backdrop: Militiamen from several states came to Burns to protest the impending imprisonment of two Harney County ranchers. They participated in several community meetings and organized a rally and protest march that occurred without controversy on Saturday. The march lasted about an hour and involved about 300 people – a mix of militia and local residents. At the county sheriff's office, marchers threw pennies -- meant to symbolize citizens buying back their government.

The occupation: Some time after the rally, key militia leaders broke off and drove across the high desert basin south of Burns to the wildlife refuge. They said they took over the refuge headquarters, which was unoccupied for the holiday weekend. They also have blocked the access road. Indications are that this has been planned for some time. Accounts of how many militia are at the refuge range from their own claims of up to 150 to accounts from reporters at the scene that there may be no more than 15.

The refuge: Established in 1908, the refuge is one of the premier migratory bird habitats in the U.S., featuring Malheur Lake. Operated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the refuge headquarters includes the main office, a museum, and homes. No workers were on duty when the occupiers arrived.

Who's involved: Ammon Bundy, son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, is acting as the leader, conducting a steady stream of media interviews. Other key militia leaders have joined him, including Ryan Payne, an Army veteran from Montana involved in last year's armed standoff in Nevada with federal agents; Blaine Cooper, an Arizona militiaman who also participated in the Nevada standoff, and Jon Ritzheimer, who made headlines last year for anti-Muslim rhetoric. Days before the refuge takeover, Ritzheimer posted what struck some as a farewell video to his family.

What they want: Ammon Bundy has said in several interviews that the occupiers want federal land returned to Harney County ranchers and loggers. They say the federal government has oppressed local people with its ownership and control of land. Payne and others have insisted that under the Constitution, the federal government has no legal right to Harney County land.

Law enforcement response: During Saturday's rally, not a police officer was visible. And so far law enforcement agencies have not approached the refuge or blocked access to the territory. The FBI is in charge because the refuge is federal property. The Harney County Sheriff's Office and the Oregon State Police are engaged as well.

So yes, this is a direct follow-up to April 2014's Bundy ranch standoff, where armed seditionists faced off against law enforcement agents over Cliven Bundy refusing to pay the feds for grazing his cattle on federal land for 20 years, are now at it again.

They've planned this for a long time, I suspect.  The BLM backed off and the Bundys remained free.  They've struck again.

The question is: now what?

Here We Go Again

I wake up this morning to see that 2016 is starting off where 2015 left off: the armed Gunmerica crowd and our old friend the Bundy Ranch crew are using force to accomplish goals.  You know, domestic terrorism by armed traitors.

The Bundy family of Nevada joined with hard-core militiamen Saturday to take over the headquarters of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, vowing to occupy the remote federal outpost 30 miles southeast of Burns for years.

The occupation came shortly after an estimated 300 marchers — militia and local citizens both — paraded through Burns to protest the prosecution of two Harney County ranchers, Dwight Hammond Jr. and Steven Hammond, who are to report to prison on Monday.

Among the occupiers is Ammon Bundy, son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, and two of his brothers. Militia members at the refuge claimed they had as many as 100 supporters with them. The refuge, federal property managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, was closed and unoccupied for the holiday weekend.

In phone interviews from inside the occupied building Saturday night, Ammon Bundy and his brother, Ryan Bundy, said they are not looking to hurt anyone. But they would not rule out violence if police tried to remove them, they said.

"The facility has been the tool to do all the tyranny that has been placed upon the Hammonds," Ammon Bundy said.

"We're planning on staying here for years, absolutely," he added. "This is not a decision we've made at the last minute."

This ended badly 23 years ago in Waco.  How will it end this time?

Neither man would say how many people are in the building or whether they are armed. Ryan Bundy said there were no hostages, but the group is demanding that the Hammonds be released and the federal government relinquish control of the Malheur National Forest.

He said many would be willing to fight — and die, if necessary — to defend what they see as constitutionally protected rights for states, counties and individuals to manage local lands.

"The best possible outcome is that the ranchers that have been kicked out of the area, then they will come back and reclaim their land, and the wildlife refuge will be shut down forever and the federal government will relinquish such control," he said. "What we're doing is not rebellious. What we're doing is in accordance with the Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land."

So how is this not a terrorist attack on US soil versus the US government?  Oh yeah, these guys are white, so that makes them "armed protesters" or something, right?  With guns.  Who have taken over a federal building and are demanding the government give up land?

C'mon.  Meanwhile, Black Lives Matter protesters who are unarmed get rounded up and tear gassed by cops in SWAT and military gear.  In Oregon?  "Well, gosh, maybe we should leave them alone."

Amazing.

Last Call For The War Of Southern Microaggressions

Why, I can't possibly imagine why putting the flag of a defeated, traitor group dedicated to the preservation of slavery as a basis of economic and social power on a Georgia license plate would piss anyone off.

The state of Georgia has released a new specialty license tag that features the Confederate battle flag, inflaming civil rights advocates and renewing a debate on what images should appear on state-issued materials.

The new specialty tag has stirred a clash between those who believe the battle flag honors Confederate heritage and those, particularly African-Americans, who view it as a racially charged symbol of oppression.

Because it is, thanks.

A spokesman for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference said Tuesday that the state should not have sanctioned the battle emblem to appear on a Georgia tag.

“To display this is reprehensible,” said Maynard Eaton. “We don’t have license plates saying ‘Black Power.’”

Like that would ever be allowed on a license plate anywhere.

For their part, the Georgia Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans said it meant no offense. People have a right to commemorate their heritage, and the state would be discriminating if it rejected the group’s application, said spokesman Ray McBerry.

“By sanctioning the plate, they are not saying they agree with our organization. They’re just saying it’s a level playing field,” he said.

Sure.  Because slavery was a level playing field.

Here's my question, "Heritage Not Hate" people.  You're celebrating a bunch of literal and actual traitors to the United States of America, a group that declared open warfare on the country and did so by engaging in a war that killed three-quarters of a million Americans, or about 2% of the entire population of the country, all over the fact that slavery was the economic powerhouse of the rural South.  Not that the rest of the Union was super awesome to Native Americans, Mexicans, Irish, Chinese and anyone else who wasn't Anglo-Saxon in general derivation, but you don't see people raising "Sons of the Veterans of the Mexican-American War" or "The Trail Of Tears Was Awesome And Stuff" license plates, right?

Why would you want to raise that battle flag?  At the very best, you're saying "I don't want to be part of the United Stated of America" while you're free to tool around in your big ass truck or whatever and can drive to any state in the lower 48, and look like an asshole doing it.  Can't stop you from being an asshole, but you can maybe not get a state-sanctioned license plate declaring it to all of Earth, maybe?

Jesus.

Gotta Break A Few Eggs

Another tragic death of a black teenager, this time for the crime of being a passenger in the wrong car when a man decides he's going to stop people from egging his son's car by drawing and using his firearm.

An Arkansas man faces a murder charge for allegedly gunning down a car filled with teenagers who had wanted to play a prank on his son. One of the passengers, 15-year-old Adrian Broadway, died from a gunshot wound to the head on Saturday.

The teens said they were pranking Willie Noble’s son by covering his car with eggs and leaves, which is when Noble reportedly arrived with a shotgun. “Apparently Mr. Noble’s teenage son had done a prank on some of the kids that were inside the vehicle on Halloween Night,” Lieutenant Sidney Allen said. “As a result they were doing a retaliation prank and it ultimately had deadly results.” In addition to first degree murder, Noble has been charged with committing a terrorist act and five counts of aggravated assault.

“It was supposed to be a prank,” Kortazha Williams, who was in the car with Broadway, told KTHV. “We were supposed to get up right now, and we were supposed to laugh.”

Yes, because the correct response to "Dad, these kids are going to egg my car in payback for a prank I pulled on them last Halloween" is "OK son, lemme open fire on them."  Superior parenting skills there.

But firearms didn't contribute to this death, right to responsibly own a firearm is in the Bill of Rights, yadda yadda whatever you tell yourself when stuff like this happens, right gun advocates?

Last Call For Executive Actions

The paranoid winger right is fully mobilized against the notion that President Barack Obama has any right to issue executive orders, and are doing everything they can to suggest that him doing so is not only immoral, but criminal and even necessitating armed rebellion to stop him.

A retired Army general and Fox News analyst told a Tea Party group that he would lead a military coup against the U.S. government, if only reluctantly.

Paul Vallely, a retired major general and senior military analyst for the conservative news channel, told the Surprise, Arizona, Tea Party Patriots during a Dec. 3 speech that other retired military personnel and veterans groups had contacted him about the possibility.

“I had a call this afternoon from Idaho, the gentleman said, ‘If I give you 250,000 Marines to go to Washington, will you lead them?’” Vallely said as the group laughed and gasped. “I said, ‘Yes, I will, I’ll surround the White House and I’ll surround the Capitol building, but it’s going to take physical presence to do things.”

Vallely, who has suggested a variety of extra-constitutional remedies to remove President Barack Obama from office, said extraordinary means were necessary to achieve the legislative results he wanted.

“Writing letters to these senators and congressmen, I am so frustrated because nothing happens,” Vallely said. “I’m not inciting a revolution, but we’ve got to get more physical and stand up and protest.

He said such a protest would be a continuation of Tea Party activism.

Sure, you're not inciting a revolution.  But you wouldn't have any problem with one, or leading one if given the opportunity.  That seems like a sane, responsible thing to do, right?

But what of Obama's hundreds upon hundreds of executive orders that must spark a second American revolution to bring him down?  Surely these patriots of justice wouldn't be lying about his 923 executive orders, would they, Snopes?

The item reproduced above purports that President Obama has so far issued a whopping 923 executive orders (compared to about thirty each for previous presidents) and offers supposedly alarming provisions of some of those orders. However, the entirety of this item is erroneous.

First of all, the number of executive orders issued by President Obama is grossly exaggerated here. Through the first five years of his presidency (i.e., as of 20 January 2014) the count of all executive orders issued by President Obama was 168, not 923. Moreover, compared to President Obama's predecessors in the White House, this is not an unusually large number of orders for a modern president: President George W. Bush issued 291 executive orders during his eight years in office, while President Bill Clinton issued 364 such orders over the same span of time. 

So then, far fewer executive orders than Bush 43 or Clinton (and it turns out far fewer than Eisenhower's 484, Nixon's 346, or Reagan's 381.)  Poppy Bush issued 166 order in 4 years, Ford 169 in 4.  In other words, Obama has issued the fewest number of executive orders per year of any modern President, not the most.

Turns out if you really do want to see a President who issued a metric crapton of EOs, take a look at either Roosevelt.  Teddy issued over a thousand, and FDR over thirty five hundred.

But Obama is, you know, Kenyan and stuff.  So WOLVEREEEEEEEEEEENES!

Last Call

Nobody likes the IRS, folks.  Republicans especially loathe it, because if the IRS doesn't collect federal taxes, there is no federal government.  That's fine with a lot of them, frankly.  (Medicare and Social Security of course come from some other place, so government better keep their hands off of it, derp.)

But if you want to know why the wingers are full tilt bloodthirsty over the IRS specifically, keep in mind these guys think an army of tens of thousands of IRS agents are going to kick doors down over enforcing Obamacare regulations.  In actuality, it's a form.

Of course, a form is reason enough alone for folks like PJ Media's Rick Moran to advocate violence against the Obama administration.

How many millions of Americans will think the new form junk mail and toss it? How many millions won’t understand they have to file the form with their tax return and be assessed the penalty? How many millions will refuse to fill out some of the information — and probably be penalized?

I am trying to imagine colonial Americans (or Americans of just about any generation prior to WW II) being faced with a government that demands such compulsory behavior in such an intrusive manner. It’s not hard to think that the tar, feathers, and pitchforks would come out and government workers would be subjected to a storm of protests and even attacks.

Most of modern America, however, is not made of such stern stuff. Most will submit to our masters at the IRS — meekly and with hardly a whimper — grateful for this beneficence from Daddy Government and willing to fill the data banks in Washington with our most personal, private information.

Yes, it's too bad the Tea Party folks aren't ready to violently attack government workers.  I'm sure they're just waiting for Rick here to go burn down an IRS office, and then armies of mobility scooters will blitzkrieg the DMV while their at it, because DON'T TREAD ON ME.

I understand assault and battery of a federal worker is one of those federal crime things, enforced by courts and people with guns.  But I'm sure Rick is ready to take them on in the name of watering the tree of Liberderp.

How about it, Ricky?

Naming The WOLVEREEEEEENS In Our Midst

The latest conservative freakout:  gun ownership permits are the new Obama enemies list.

An interactive map showing the names and addresses of all handgun permit-holders in New York's Westchester and Rockland counties has drawn a response from mostly disgruntled readers since it was posted Saturday on a newspaper's website.

The interactive map published by the Journal News, prompting more than 1,300 comments as of Tuesday, allows readers to zoom in on red dots that indicate which residents are licensed to own pistols or revolvers.

"So should we start wearing yellow Stars of David so the general public can be aware of who we are??" wrote one commenter.

Sure.  This is just like the persecution of Jews in Germany, guys, they had guns too.  

What happened to "Bring it on, libtards!"  Aren't you proud of owning your gun, as a warning to all those bad guys out there that you're ready to water the Tree of Liberty at any time?  What about it, Reasonoids?  Isn't this information being free?

Do you own a registered gun? Well, they know where you live. By "they" I mean the government (which you knew), and the Freedom of Information Act-using, technology wielding media, which can with some effort build maps like the one you see on the right, showing the Westchester County addresses of people who have registered their handguns.

You think Matt Welch and his crew of merry pirates would be thrilled.  Nope.

The map, which "does not include owners of long guns — rifles or shotguns — which can be purchased without a permit," was brought to my attention by Twitterer "Russ" (@burnt_wick), who comments that this "is why you should acquire all of your firearms illegally." 

Ahh, there's the pouty anarchist I know.  The freakout is pretty epic:

My guess would be that the number of people in that area who would like more information about food stamp recipients, families on welfare rolls, or other government programs far exceeds the number who want info on gun owners. Why not publish that information?

It's nobody's business whether you've got a gun permit, or if you accept food stamps. This outrageous violation of privacy by ignorant liberals should be denounced by both sides. And if I were not a gun owner and lived in that area, I would be livid. The paper just put that family at risk because the criminal element now knows who is helpless and who can defend themselves.

On the contrary, Republican small-government conservatives think it's everyone's business if you accept food stamps, and as such think you should be drug-tested before you should be allowed to receive food because of course all people on food stamps are potential criminals.  You know, unlike gun owners.

Oh, and these are the same people who want a national database of the mentally ill, but a map of gun owners is just like the Holocaust. 

There's your "outrageous violation of privacy", morons.

Newtown-ian Physics

So what happens now in the wake of Friday's mind-numbing tragedy in Newtown, Connecticut?

A heavily armed gunman killed 26 people, including 20 children from 5 to 10 years old, in a rampage at a Connecticut elementary school on Friday, one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history.

The gunman - who according to a media report carried four weapons and wore a bulletproof vest - was dead inside Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, state police Lieutenant Paul Vance told a news conference.

Vance said authorities found 18 children and seven adults, including the gunman, dead at the school, and two children were pronounced dead later after being take to a hospital. Another adult was found dead at a related crime scene in Newtown, he said, bringing the toll to 28.

President Obama's response to a wounded nation was excellent:

A visibly emotional President Obama offered his condolences to the victims and families of an elementary school shooting in Newtown, Conn. at the White House on Friday.

"We’ve endured too many of these tragedies these past few years," Obama said, appearing to wipe away tears from his eyes.

"We're going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics," he added.

So what can be done?  As Dave von Ebers reminds us in the wake of two vitally important SCOTUS cases decided in the last few years,  any new gun control legislation will be difficult to create, much less pass a GOP-led House.

For what it’s worth, I’d like to see a comprehensive federal gun control statute that encompasses all those principles, too, although the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, popularly referred to as the “Brady Bill,” contains some of those provisions.

But, of course, as my fellow liberals should know (and if you don’t know … why don’t you know?!), the Supreme Court has made that difficult to accomplish. In two recent cases – District of Columbia v. Heller, No. 07-290 (June 26, 2008), and McDonald v. City of Chicago, No. 08-1521 (June 28, 2010) – Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution creates an individual right to keep and bear arms, which, although not unlimited, prevents both the federal government (Heller), and state and municipal governments (McDonald), from imposing the most direct (and perhaps draconian) form of gun control: Outright bans on handgun ownership.

Indeed, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals struck down earlier this month Oak Park, Illinois' anti concealed carry gun control law as a direct violation of the precedent set by Heller.

“The Supreme Court has decided that the amendment confers a right to bear arms for self-defense, which is as important outside the home as inside,” Judge Richard Posner wrote in the court’s majority opinion. “The theoretical and empirical evidence (which overall is inconclusive) is consistent with concluding that a right to carry firearms in public may promote self-defense.” 

So, given that the Executive cannot simply mandate gun control, the Legislative will not pass gun control, and  the Judicial has said gun control violates the Second Amendment, exactly what should Obama do to magically fix this problem?

I'm all ears.  If you want to stop guns, go after the manufacturers and the lobbyists.  Period.  Guns are a product, sold in the US.  They have arguably the most powerful product lobby on Earth.  You're going to need to start with them.

That time has come.

Last Call

What?  You didn’t think you were going to get through the DNC without unsolicited advice for President Obama from The Centrist Concern Troll Twins in the Wall Street Journal, did you?  Oh, you silly dears.  Roll the tape, Claude!

What voters are looking for—and particularly what swing voters, independents, and disillusioned Obama voters are looking for—is a new direction for America based on fiscal discipline, a balanced budget, and economic growth and leadership. 

More than anyone else in this race, Paul Ryan has spoken of the need for fiscal discipline and economic growth—two themes that have been largely absent from the Obama-Biden campaign—which explains a large part of the Ryan-inspired Romney bump.

That bump is like 0.75 points, but who cares.  Dorka Schoen and Give ‘Em Caddell need not your facts.  Centrist Daleks will Tri-ang-u-laaaaate!  And hey, Paul Ryan is a Centrist too!  You should listen to his Very Serious Centrist Positions on tesseract marathon running and the joys of children conceived through coercion and force.

For his part, President Obama needs to change direction—immediately and decisively. His campaign strategy has been to divide the country on the basis of class, demonize the wealthy, call for higher taxes and unceasingly attack Mr. Romney. Yet poll after poll has shown that while voters embrace the idea of higher taxes on the rich, it does not translate into votes. 

In 2008, Mr. Obama promised to help unite America in a “post-partisan” Washington. But the 2012 campaign has been one of the most negative in memory. What he needs to do is acknowledge that he’s made mistakes and that he wants to pursue a substantive approach to governance. Put another way, he needs to bring back “hope and change” and abandon his divide-and-conquer strategy.

Should he do this before or after he announces he’s not running in November because it’s really tragically unfair of him to have broken such a historic streak of white men running the place, you know.  It’s the right thing to do.

It has been said before, but only because it’s so true: Mr. Obama should follow the lead of President Bill Clinton, who emphasized in both his terms in office the need for unity and consensus to achieve fiscal restraint. Inviting Mr. Clinton to speak at the convention Wednesday night is a sure sign that the Obama campaign understands the need to move to the center, if not in substance then in style. 

Yet nothing would appeal to independents and swing voters more than if the president were to embrace the findings of the 2010 Simpson-Bowles deficit-reduction commission and make it clear that he too has a plan to revitalize the U.S. economy, reduce the deficit, reform entitlements and spur economic growth through a fairer and leaner tax system.

So President Obama has the unique opportunity to be the adult in the room by handing control of the country over to the nice folks who aren’t all that sure about evolution because the open-minded scientist must question the theory, but they believe tax cuts magically create additional tax revenues because rich people will spring forth from the nothingness like Orks from Warhammer 40K (and reach a collective critical mass of entrepreneurs, a WAAAAGH! of small business owners who will run around franchising at everything, paint their businesses red because they’ll create jobs faster, and leave nothing but career opportunities in their wake of mass construction.  Sure).

Yeah, I’ll buy that.  President Obama should totally listen to these guys.  (Also, Centrist Daleks versus Small Business Orks.  Somebody make that happen.)

Last Call

Remember, America doesn't have a right-wing domestic terrorist problem.  We have a long string of completely unrelated "mass shooting" events where gunmen declare that various minority groups or random bystanders are the enemy and kill a bunch of them seemingly out of the blue in an attempt to strike fear into the hearts of millions and/or to force political change through bloodshed, but since these folks are FOX News viewers, it's just "unfortunate" when this happens every couple of months or so.   Meanwhile, the real terrorists are the New Black Panther Party because OOGA BOOGA BLOOGITY BLACK.  Cue the scary chyron, folks.

Longtime white supremacist and border vigilante JT Ready saw himself as part of a war that few others would fight. He amassed weapons. He donned a uniform. He formed his own brigade of volunteers to walk alongside him as he hunted what he described as “narco terrorists” flowing across the Arizona-Mexico border.

On Wednesday, reports out of Arizona said Ready died, not at the hands of drug runners, but with his own gun during a mad rampage inside a suburban home just east of Phoenix. Along the way, the reports said, he took the lives of four other people, including a toddler.

The Arizona Republic reported the victims were Ready’s girlfriend, her daughter, the daughter’s boyfriend and the daughter’s 18-month-old baby. Ready still somehow managed to use the event to blame immigrants even after his death. A posting on his Facebook page appeared hours after the massacre took place.

“Reports are unconfirmed that a cartel assassination squad murdered JT Ready and several of his friends and family this afternoon in Gilbert Arizona,” the posting said. “This page’s admin will keep you updated of the situation as soon as possible.”

Don't dare call them racists, don't dare say we need law enforcement to look into the militia and white supremacist movements, don't dare point out the people going on shooting rampages are not young urban minorities, don't dare point out how easy it is to get firearms and ammunition in this country,  don't dare point out the people who actually are mounting up for a shooting war in our midst, because you should really be worried about the fellow down the street with the different religion or no religion at all or the unarmed black kid with the hoodie or the dirty effing hippie Occupy protester on the street corner or the Latino family driving along the border state highway or the people who want marriage equality for their loved ones, or the woman who wants to get rid of the fetus she's going to be unable to care for in six months.

These people, I am told, are the terrorists among us who will kill people, and not REAL 'MURICANS like JT Ready.  And man, this one stomps on all the asshole buttons, he gets all this hardware to play Metal Gear Solid on the border to shoot him some brown people because he has to protect the white way of life, and in the end the person who was the greatest threat to his loved ones was JT Ready him-goddamn-self, who took the chickenshit way out and punched his own clock after murdering a toddler.  Now that's freedom, my droogies.

America, you need a good swift kick in the ass.  Here's hoping this wakes up the somnambulant among us.

Iran, So Far Away Part 10

Well, since John Yoo is on vacation this week or something waterboarding herds of unicorns and John Bolton's Mustache is busy with trying to adapt drone controls for use by facial hair (hard to fly straight and hit the red button at the same time when you're only a mustache) to bomb Syria, it's up to Niall Ferguson at the Daily Beast to yell LET'S BOMB IRAN as loudly as possible at the Village today.

The single biggest danger in the Middle East today is not the risk of a six-day Israeli war against Iran. It is the risk that Western wishful nonthinking allows the mullahs of Tehran to get their hands on nuclear weapons. Because I am in no doubt that they would take full advantage of such a lethal lever. We would have acquiesced in the creation of an empire of extortion.

War is an evil. But sometimes a preventive war can be a lesser evil than a policy of appeasement. The people who don’t yet know that are the ones still in denial about what a nuclear-armed Iran would end up costing us all.

It feels like the eve of some creative destruction.

And really, Ferguson's entire argument is "We could so take Iran because our aircraft carriers have more hit points."   Also, the whole "Oil at $160 a barrel if war breaks out" thing is so 2008 because the Saudis can just make more, or something.  It's like the last 11 years never happened, and he's just expecting us to buy the argument and go "LET'S DO IT!" like we're playing Team Fortress 2.  Our bombs are filled with awesome cartoon sound effects and FREEDOM, so it's cool anyway because AMERICA!

Meanwhile, the really awesome part is 49% of Americans are already on board with Operation Here We Go Again, so before you have a good laugh at Niall here, understand that the universe has spotted him a hell of a spread.

The Walrus, The Walrus's Mustache, And The Carpenter

John Bolton, John Bolton's mustache, and John Yoo think enough American nukes to fry every microbe on Earth hundreds of times over isn't enough, and it's one chunk of government spending we can't afford to cut.  The three of them take to the NY Times to explain to the hippies about force multiplication or deterrent gamesmanship theory or...something.  Anyway, the point is that the Declaration of Independence was all about smaller government that the Founding Fathers would want, and also to nuke Russia and stuff.  WOLVEREEEEENS!

THE sweeping Democratic midterm losses last week raise serious questions for President Obama and a lame-duck Congress. Voters want government brought closer to the vision the framers outlined in the Constitution, and the first test could be the fate of the flawed New Start arms control treaty, which was signed by President Obama and President Dmitri Medvedev of Russia last spring but awaits ratification. The Senate should heed the will of the voters and either reject the treaty or amend it so that it doesn’t weaken our national defense.

The treaty’s supporters are likely to try to rush it through the Senate before Congress adjourns. They worry that since the Republicans have gained six seats, New Start will fail to get the required two-thirds majority when the new Senate convenes in January.

Senators should be in no hurry. The Obama administration’s main strategy in this two-minute drill is likely to emphasize a “resolution of ratification” that the Foreign Relations Committee approved along with the treaty in September. But that resolution, which supposedly addresses concerns about missile defense and modernization of the nuclear arsenal, is a Trojan horse. Any senators who fall for this ploy will not only imperil our safety, they will also undermine the Senate’s formidable powers in the treaty-making process. 

Yeah, the same two guys (and an animate collection of facial hair) that said the plenary power of the Presidency trumped all during a time of war and argued that the President had by definition of the office the power to conduct unrestricted war are now saying that the Senate is the most important government body when it comes to foreign policy.

I'll let that sink in for a minute.  I was unaware that Bolton's mustache could type, let alone ghost write columns either...but there you are.

Senators cannot take these warranties seriously — they are not a part of the text of the treaty itself. As Eugene Rostow, a former under secretary of state, put it, such reservations and understandings have “the same legal effect as a letter from my mother.” They are mere policy statements that attempt to influence future treaty interpretation. They do not have the force of law; they do not bind the president or future Congresses. The Constitution’s supremacy clause makes the treaty’s text the “law of the land.”

Unlike acts of Congress, treaties reorient the balance of power toward the president. His understandings and interpretations of treaties typically have (and should) predominate, as President Ronald Reagan demonstrated in the 1980s debate over the meaning of the antiballistic missile treaty. The president can, after all, completely withdraw from a treaty on his own: President George W. Bush terminated the antiballistic missile treaty in 2002 and President Jimmy Carter ended the Taiwan mutual defense treaty in 1980, both without Senate consent or judicial complaint.

To prevent New Start from gravely impairing America’s nuclear capacity, the Senate must ignore the resolution of ratification and demand changes to the treaty itself. These should include deleting the preamble’s language linking nuclear arsenals to defense systems, and inserting new language distinguishing conventional strike capacities from nuclear launching systems or deleting limits on launchers entirely. Congress should pass a new law financing the testing and development of new warhead designs before approving New Start. 

So yes, to recap Bolton, Bolton's mustache, and John Yoo freely admit that A) the President has all the power when it comes to treaties (and cite examples of such) but B) they think the Senate should ignore that power and do what the three of them want anyway by passing a law that basically scuttles the treaty anyway, so please ignore all that plenary powers of the Office of the President that we pushed with Bush.

For this awesome level of intellectual consistency, Bolton, Bolton's mustache, and John Yoo continue to be treated as Serious Policy Wonks and get columns in the NY Times.

Awesome.

Eighty Billion In Our Intel Budget And We Can't Even Murder One Albino Hacker

With today's news that our 2010 intelligence budget was over $80 billion, Jonah Goldberg wants to know why we can't go all Rainbow Six Vegas on WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and arrange a closed-casket affair.

I’d like to ask a simple question: Why isn’t Julian Assange dead?

No really, that is the opening sentence of his column, verbatim.

In case you didn’t know, Assange is the Australian computer programmer behind WikiLeaks, a massive — and massively successful — effort to disclose secret or classified information. In a series of recent dumps, he unveiled thousands upon thousands of classified documents from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Military and other government officials insist that WikiLeaks is doing serious damage to American national security and is going to get people killed, including brave Iraqis and Afghans who’ve risked their lives and the lives of their families to help us.

Even Assange agrees. He told the New Yorker earlier this year that he fully understands innocent people might die as a result of the “collateral damage” of his work and that WikiLeaks may have “blood on our hands.” WikiLeaks is easily among the most significant and well-publicized breaches of American national security since the Rosenbergs gave the Soviets the bomb.

So again, I ask: Why wasn’t Assange garroted in his hotel room years ago?

It’s a serious question.

Because that's how a serious SOCOM operator like Jonah Goldberg rolls.  Anyone who has pesky facts about the very real war Cheney's fake intel operation drummed up needs to be rubbed out, says the guy in the cushy office chair.

The far more bloody and treasonous act of getting us into a war with Iraq?  Totally justified.  Serious questions from a hard, hard man.

And by "hard", I mean his cogitator is filled with cement.  Flying Spaghetti Monster save us from these idiots.  The country is on the verge of implosion.  We don't have time for this crap right now.  Just put on your black hoodie and sneak around outside Assange's hotel whistling your ninja theme song there Jonah, and take care of the problem yourself, huh?

Taking Out Woodrow Wilson Is Worth Some Phat Points

Via John Cole, we find something of a fascinating social experiment/wargaming/betting on the gladiator pits/drunken College Republican what-if exercise as a big giant pile of wingers decide who they hate the most, and by "fascinating" I mean "Hey, let's put on a live action version of Lord of the Flies only we put a bunch of LIBERALS on this island and then starve them until they eat each other, it'll be GREAT" lizard-brain violence kind of Battle Royale stuff, and there's only one helicopter off the island and it's guarded by the inevitable velociraptor pack, and there's weapons and booby traps and mutant pirahna and exploding barrels and food and medical supplies and Scott Pilgrim Versus The World power-ups hidden all over the island, plus a bunch of video cameras to capture all the wacky fun as it happens.  I'm pretty sure it'll be in HD too and we can add a laugh track in post-production, plus cool SPLAT BOING PEW sound effects.

Anyway, while we're waiting for the video feed to come in on that, it turns out that Barack Obama is only the second most reviled figure in American history behind History's Greatest Monster, a one Mr. Jimmy Carter as we look at the chart from the oddsmakers:

23) Saul Alinsky (7)
23) Bill Clinton (7)
23) Hillary Clinton (7)
19) Michael Moore (7)
19) George Soros (8)
19) Alger Hiss (8)
19) Al Sharpton (8)
13) Al Gore (9)
13) Noam Chomsky (9)
13) Richard Nixon (9)
13) Jane Fonda (9)
13) Harry Reid (9)
13) Nancy Pelosi (9)
11) John Wilkes Booth (10)
11) Margaret Sanger (10)
9) Aldrich Ames (11)
9) Timothy McVeigh (11)
7) Ted Kennedy (14)
7) Lyndon Johnson (14)
5) Benedict Arnold (17)
5) Woodrow Wilson (17)
4) The Rosenbergs (19)
3) Franklin Delano Roosevelt (21)
2) Barack Obama (23)
1) Jimmy Carter (25) 

Dude, my money's totally on Jane Fonda, she has real world experience in this sort of thing from Barbarella.  John Wilkes Booth?  He killed like one guy.  You have to like the manpower/tag-team advantage of the Rosenbergs versus Bill and Hillary and there's Benedict Arnold's military experience too.

You can't count out Tim McVeigh, either.  You know the guy is an expert with improvised weapons and explosives.  On the other hand, George Soros probably already bought the island beforehand, so he knows where all the really good weapons are.

What's Carter going to do, drink a Billy Beer?   Sheesh.

But man, all bets are off should FDR get the bionic battle suit hidden in the cave on the northwestern end of the island...

McNugget McRage

When you want some McNuggets in the morning man, you want some effing McNuggets.  You know, because they were out of McMeth.  Jesus.

(h/t Oliver Willis)

Never Miss An Opportunity For Obama Derangement Syndrome

The crew at MoJo plumbs the depths of the latest tinfoil lunacy on how Obama will drain your precious bodily fluids at FEMA camps.

Is there a covert government plan to forcibly evacuate up to 50 million people from the Gulf Coast and move them into FEMA trailers somewhere in Missouri and elsewhere because of the oil spill? Some of the nation's survivalists are convinced that the Obama administration is plotting just such an operation. Last week, Greg Evensen, a former Kansas state trooper and a regular on the "Patriot" movement talk circuit, appeared on the Internet radio show "Shattering the Darkness" to warn listeners that government is moving to evacuate basically everyone from the coast of Texas to Cape Cod. Evensen says the move will come after these areas become uninhabitable due to an "oversaturation of benzene" from the chemical dispersants BP is using to try to clean up the oil leaking into the Gulf of Mexico.

Yes, even an eco-tragedy can breed conspiracy theories.

Interviewed by a man known only as "the Hawk," Evensen predicted on May 27 that the evacuations would begin sometime around June 15, after the government brings together "people who can be engaged in combat"—possibly including foreign troops—and stations them at 500-mile intervals.  He predicted that people as far north as Cape Cod might have to be evacuated, given that the oil is likely to end up "on beaches of England."  These events, Evensen warned, would show the "rolling thunder effect of how it will bring America to its knees," to which the Hawk responded, "This could be larger than anything we could ever imagine."

In an interview with Mother Jones, Evensen explained that he had heard about this massive governmental operation from a "buffet meal of state and local law enforcement" sources, many of whom find him—rather than the other way around—thanks to his media appearances and Internet postings. (Evensen lives in Michigan.)

The podcast of this show soon made its way into the Tea Party world and was circulating on various listservs this week, with headlines like "Forced evacuations of 40 million begin in less than two weeks. Anyone within a thousand miles of the Gulf of Mexico needs to listen to every word of this." John Kaminiski, a "truther" who believes Jews blew up the World Trade Center, warned in an email that "If you don't leave now, you will never make it. You will either die on the road, or in a FEMA camp. The troops are already in place."

And then only the WOLVEREEEEEEEENS can save us!  Also, I guess this means no more Shrimpfest at Red Lobster.  (There are no Red Lobsters in FEMA Death Camps.)  You thought the 9/11 Truthers were bad?  You thought the Obama Derangement was topped by the Birthers?

You ain't seen nothin' yet, folks.

New Rule For The Old School

The Wingers are in full WOLVEREEEEEEEENS! mode based on Jim DeMint's statement in the Senate health care bill's Reid Amendment that this little subsection is full-out fascism:

Section 3403 of Senator Harry Reid’s amendment requires that “it shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of Representatives to consider any bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that would repeal or otherwise change this subsection.” The good news is that this only applies to one section of the Obamacare legislation. The bad news is that it applies to regulations imposed on doctors and patients by the Independent Medicare Advisory Boards a/k/a the Death Panels.

They're going completely nuts.  Me, I'd like the opinion of folks who aren't still buying the death panels lie.  Thanks.

And then again, these are the folks who believe an Obama-brewed race war is just around the corner...



[UPDATE 11:35 AM] BooMan puts this idiocy to bed:

They are invoking the Declaration of Independence and calling for an insurrection because the Senate parliamentarian ruled that the decisions of the Medicare Advisory Board (whose mission was expanded by the Senate health care bill) can be exempt from repeal or amendment. In other words, to protect the independence and integrity of the Medicare oversight board, the legislation requires a true supermajority of 67 senators to overrule their decisions. But Reid put this bill through at the 60-vote threshold. So, in effect, Red State is arguing that Reid has changed the rules of the Senate even though changing the rules of the Senate normally requires 67 votes, too. The parliamentarian disagrees with this logic, but that's really beside the point. Giving the Medicare Advisory Board (better known as 'Death Panels') some freedom from political influence is reason to "dissolve the political bands" to the federal government and start a guerrilla war? That's just funny.

Yep.  Wingers.  Still not smart enough to read.  Te recap, the 67 vote super-majority is for overruling the Medicare Advisory Board.  Reid is deferring to that with this bill instead of the 60 this bill would pass cloture with.

That's it.  That's supposed to be the end of modern American society.

Idiots.

Tedd Petruna, Action Zero Part 2: First Dud

Tedd!  Petrunaaaaaaaaaaaa hewillsaveeveryoneofus!

Well, only in his own mind.

A security consultant who was a passenger on AirTran Flight 297 says the man who claims he thwarted porn-watching Muslim hijackers clearly fabricated the story, but Brent Brown adds that the airline's version of events underplays the seriousness of what happened.

Brown told WSBTV that Tedd Petruna, who says a group of Muslim terrorists were casing the plane, is "living in a fantasy world." (Petruna now has his own hash tag on Twitter.)

But Brown, whose firm is based in Atlanta, also said that AirTran's explanation of what happened doesn't tell the whole story. He said a group of passengers -- "of obvious Middle Eastern descent, which doesn't concern me" -- were refusing to cooperate with flight attendants and using cell phones while the plane was on the runway. The atmosphere was "extremely tense," and the crew was upset, according to Brown.

He thinks it was some "people who were maybe not the best citizens for flights," and the situation may have been aggravated by a language barrier. The entire WSBTV interview is here.

So what we have here is a failure to communicate.  All indications are that AirTran acted responsibly and correctly, as did the crew on the plane.  The fact remains that a security consultant actually on the plane said there was an incident, but nothing like what Tedd Petruna said happened, because he was still never on the plane.

I want to hear the Winger explanation for this one.  So what, now the passengers actually on the plane like Brent Brown are in on this massive conspiracy too?  Really?  Or are they just going to ignore the fact that Brown has said Tedd Petruna lied about the entire story?

Flying While Muslim.  It will always be a crime to the Wingers.

Tedd Petruna, Action Zero

Oh my my my.  The Petruna Story rocks on...now TPM has gotten a hold of it, and Petruna's sticking with it besides, you know, not being on the plane.

Reached at the Johnson Space Center's Neutral Buoyancy Lab this morning, Petruna told TPMmuckraker that despite AirTran's assertion, he was on the flight. He wouldn't say much, though, because "I'm in the middle of a lawsuit about this right now." We're not sure whether a lawsuit has actually been filed or what it would be about, though Petruna told Schlussel, the right-wing columnist, that he was mulling a defamation suit.
"The whole e-mail went out accidentally; it was not supposed to go nationwide," Petruna told TPMmuckraker. "It was supposed to go out to family and friends, and the next thing I know it's a firestorm."

Gene Hackemack, one of the friends who has apparently been distributing the email, introduced it with his opinion that "the muslims are all getting very brave now, since they have one of their own in the white house......read Tedd's story below."

There's one other wrinkle to the story: Petruna sent the e-mail out from an account marked "Petruna, Tedd J. (JSC-DX12)[RAYTHEON TECHNICAL SERVICES COMPANY]." Raytheon partners with NASA on the Neutral Buoyancy Lab, where Petruna is a diver. And Petruna told us he works for Raytheon as well as NASA.

But Raytheon spokesman Jon Kasle tells TPMmuckraker, "This individual is not a Raytheon employee." Kasle says he's not sure why Raytheon's name is on Petruna's e-mail account, and declined to comment on whether the company is looking into the matter.

NASA and AirTran did not immediately respond to a requests for comment.

Oh brother.  What a sack of crap this is.  Petruna has no choice, the Teabagger beast must be fed, and he's the newest morsel.

Pity there won't be anything left of him after the Wingers wring his soul out when he has to retract.

This Week In Red Dawn Action

Because in the end for the Wingers it always comes back to better democracy through applied ammunition.

One may even begin to speculate on whether we owe them civility for their transgressions, which amount to a fundamental betrayal of oursocial contract as Americans.

Unlike other nations and states in times both past and present, we have the possibility of correcting our mistakes and removing the disloyal via the ballot instead of the barrel of a gun.

Let us hope that our elected officials recognize, however, that our patience is not finite, nor our obligation to bear their indecent assault on our liberties unlimited.

Do what we say, lest we be forced to shoot the people we do not agree with politically. It's always the gun here. WOLVEREEEEEEEENS!

Either this guy's a fool if he's kidding or if he's serious, an unhinged threat advocating violence. Take your pick.