Cry Meh, And Let Slip The Blue Dogs Of "I'm Not Sure"

West Virginia Dem Sen. Joe Manchin isn't sure if he's going to even vote for President Kenyan Melaninson at this point.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who has done more than any other Democrat up for reelection this year to distance himself from President Obama, said he does not know if he will vote for Obama or presumptive GOP nominee Mitt Romney in November.

“I’ll look at the options,” Manchin said this week. The last three years “have made it pretty rough” for his state, he said.

That stance is at odds with almost every other Democrat who is up for reelection this year or is from a state that Romney is likely to win. And it’s an indication of the unique effort Manchin has made to establish his independence from Obama and other Democrats. The senator has regularly used floor speeches and closely watched votes to, as he puts it, “respectfully” highlight differences with Obama, especially on environmental issues. He said Obama has never called him or sought a one-on-one conversation.

Manchin said his own vote will depend on how his constituents view the contest.

At this point, Manchin should just switch parties and be done with it, except in West Virginia (like Kentucky) he'd immediately be primaried by somebody even more insane.

“I am just waiting for it to play out. I am not jumping in one way or another,” Manchin said. “I’m worried about me. I’ve said it’s not a team sport. You need to go out and work for yourself.”

Translation, screw the black guy.  I've got serious energy lobbyist dollars to harvest in a state where being black is only good if you're a cart full of coal, and I'm in it for myself.  Any questions?

Somehow I Don't Trust These Guys

The latest round of Americans Elect nonsense is at CNN.com this weekend as a technocrat appeals to the iGeneration about voting, the Sensible Centrist Austerity way.  Now with technology!

This digital revolution is more than just innovating for convenience. Something deeper and more significant is at stake: the integrity of our consent, the underpinning of our government's legitimacy and authority.

"Consent of the governed" only exists if it can be expressed, and that is an increasingly difficult task. When we vote for president, we don't simply vote for the best candidate; we vote for the best candidate who has previously been ratified by one of two political parties.

This creates a philosophical "blackout" space in which no candidate, because of his or her beliefs, will ever be elected president (see Jon Huntsman). This blackout space should concern all of us, because of its appeal to the general electorate, who will never get that option. What's worse is that this space is growing with each cycle. It's not clear that either Ronald Reagan or Bill Clinton would get through their primaries today.

That's why the Americans Elect innovation is so exciting -- because it relieves us of anachronistic structures that harm our political system. It's the iTunes of politics.

Status quo apologists and those who benefit from partisan gridlock might pooh-pooh this idea, particularly if the candidate doesn't get to Ross Perot levels in November. But these critics miss the point. Americans Elect is not just about running for the White House in 2012. It's about electing our leaders in a new way so that the governed are truly consenting.

Right, because removing the political party middlemen from the traditional process of the rich buying our elections makes it that much better solely on the purity factor, except for the fact that they are lying about doing it.  Primaries are for suckers, now engage in our primary!

That particular cargo shipload of manure up there was written by Nathan Daschle.  You know, son of former Dem Senate Leader Tom Daschle.  Just a reminder that it's not just wealthy, obnoxiously centrist Republicans flogging the Throw Your Vote Away movement here in an attempt to make the "reasonable" case for crushing austerity amid tax cuts for the one percent because it's our duty, being good serfs, to pay for our lords.  It's feel-good political euthanasia, designed solely to put down resistance to the status quo of "We're your betters, now here's what you need to do for us."  To help you remain tranquil in the face of almost certain electoral death, smooth jazz will be deployed in 3...2...1...

Daniel Larison nails these guys to the wall:

There is a powerful case to be made that a two-party system that operates within the very narrow confines of bipartisan consensus on many major policies is harmful to the country. Americans Elect isn’t making that case or anything like it. What the Americans Elect project represents is an effort to produce the distilled essence of everything that is wrong with the current two-party system and then pretend that it is an exciting, new alternative.

S'truth right there, folks.  By comparison, Paul Ryan is at least somewhat honest about his plans to Soylent Green us all.  And let's remember that there's nothing Centrist about the GOP.

Sleep Stupidity

We have made some advancements in stupdi... er, sleeping.

We have a programmer who learned that staying up late didn't boost his productivity.  In fact, he learned that by sleeping until he naturally woke up increased his production in less time.  He also mastered the trick of making a list of things to resolve before sleep, and in the morning had resolved some of his problems.

For what it's worth, I've done something similar.  When I code too much, I find myself dreaming in code. I will literally write the commands (including inventing variables on the fly) that allow the event in the dream to take place.  I know it sounds crazy.  I've also learned that if I wake up at 4 a.m. and allow myself to doze, I will resolve any problems that are lingering while I drift in and out of sleep.

Lack of sleep has been linked to heart disease, obesity, diabetes and stroke.  We try to juggle so many things in our busy lives that it makes sense to dip out of our snooze time, but that often backfires.

For those who want to try some different techniques, play with different ways to engage your brain before, during and right after sleep.  And if you are willing to spend a few bucks to try it, you can try masks that improve lucid dreaming, which allows you to take control of your dreams by becoming aware that you are in a dream state.

Stupidity Runs Rampant

The Anti-Defamation League wants an apology from Peoria's bishop following a recent homily comparing President Barack Obama's policies to those of despots Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin.

During the message at St. Mary's Cathedral in Peoria, Roman Catholic Bishop Daniel Jenky contended social services for Catholics could be eliminated if Obama's directive to include contraceptives in health insurance continues. Jenky went on to compare the actions to past cultural wars against the Catholic Church.“

Clemenceau, nicknamed ‘the priest eater,’ tried the same thing in France in the first decade of the 20th Century," Jenky said. "Hitler and Stalin, at their better moments, would just barely tolerate some churches remaining open, but would not tolerate any competition with the state in education, social services and health care."

"In clear violation of our First Amendment rights, Barack Obama, with his radical, pro-abortion and extreme secularist agenda, now seems intent on following a similar path,” he said.

 

So let me see if I get this right.  Michele Bachmann makes a tar baby reference and there is little to no outrage from the right.  Then this jackass compares Obama to Hitler and Stalin because he wants to make sure women's prescriptions are treated the same as the fellas.  It's radical and pro-abortion to give women a choice about their bodies.

But Obama says he wasn't born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and Mittens flips out because shit's getting real.

Is that really what we have here?  God help us, I think it is.

What In Tar Nation Is She Doing?

The Bachmanniac strikes again.

During a recent interview with the blog Shark Tank, Bachmann insisted that new legislation wasn’t necessary because Obama “already has the tools and he knows it.”

“So, if there is a problem then president Obama is the problem for failing to utilize these tools that he has,” she continued.

“This is just about waving a tar baby in the air and saying that something else is the problem. I have never seen a more irresponsible president who is infantile in the way that he continually blames everybody else for his failure to, first, diagnose the problem and, second, to address the problem. It’s always everyone else’s fault.”

Bachmann concluded: “The president is a complete and utter fraud and a hypocrite on this issue, with all due respect to the president.”

With all due respect, Congresswoman Bachmann, you're a sad, pathetic, attention-seeking airhead who is a blight on the people of the great state of Minnesota where I once had the privilege and honor of living and working.  The people there are kind, honorable, intelligent, hard-working and honest, and you are the complete opposite of that.

You do them a disservice daily.

Oh, and I'm being far nicer than ABL.

Whatsoever You Do To The Least Of My Brothers

As I've said time and time again, the Republican pro-life position ends on the day of your birth.

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) on Thursday dismissed criticism from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), falsely claiming the group did not represent all Catholic bishops.

Referencing Matthew 25, the USCCB called on Congress to put the poor first in budget priorities and rethink cuts to programs that benefited the least among us.

“These are not all the Catholic bishops, and we just respectfully disagree,” he said on Fox News after being questioned about the bishops criticism of his budget plan.

The USCCB later responded to Ryan’s comment, informing The Hill that they represented “all of the U.S. bishops on key issues at the national level.”

Ryan has said that his Catholic faith helped shape his budget plan. But Catholics have questioned his admiration for the libertarian novelist Ayn Rand, who advocated the “virtue of selfishness” and called Christianity the “the best kindergarten of communism possible.”

Ryan’s House-approved budget for 2013-2022 would cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides food stamps, by $133.5 billion over the next decade. Approximately 2 million individuals would be cut off from the program entirely, according to the Center of Budget and Policy Priorities. Another 44 million would see their benefits cut.

So, I wonder if the bishops will lay into Ryan and all the Republicans who voted for a plan to take food out of the mouths of 46 million people the way they went after President Obama for actually providing contraception for women, including the poor.  Somehow I doubt it.

That's the main reason I don't take the bishops seriously politically.  They rail against the President, but give death-penalty happy and austerity-crazed Republicans a pass.  It's ridiculous.

StupidiNews!

• Florida lawmakers and other state officials will meet in a task force appointed by Gov. Rick Scott to consider the state's "Stand Your Ground" law.
• Vermont becomes the third state where lawmakers have passed resolutions calling for the federal government to overturn the Supreme Court's Citizens United campaign finance decision.
• A new route for the Keystone XL pipeline is being proposed as House Republicans and the President continue to battle over the project's fate.
• Rumors that Apple's iPhone 5 could be on the way as early as this October is pushing the tech giant's stock up...for now.
• An Estonian man charged with leading a ring of computer botnet crooks faces a maximum 85-year sentence if convicted in an Manhattan court.

Last Call

And with Romney the nominee in all but name, the wingers are of course predicting the End Of Liberalism Forever.  First into the future files?  Daily Caller contributor and conservative author Mike Leahy.

Conservatives across the nation should be of good cheer, however. The United States remains a center-right nation. This November, voters will choose common sense over fiscally reckless extremism in what will be a landslide conservative victory. Republicans will retain the House, gain the Senate and win back the presidency with a 2-to-1 Electoral College margin.

The most recent Rasmussen poll shows Mitt Romney ahead of President Obama, 48% to 44%. Obama’s support has softened significantly since 2008, and opposition continues to grow on all sides. In that election, Obama defeated John McCain by a 53% to 46% margin in the popular vote. Since then, as the Rasmussen poll demonstrates, Obama has lost the support of 9% of the voting population. Much of that loss is permanent. Defectors include disappointed voters under 30 who supported him by a 2-to-1 margin in 2008 but can’t find a job in today’s lackluster economy, disaffected Catholics turned off by his high-handed tactics and virtually every small business person in the country, to say nothing of disillusioned Democrats opposed to his individual healthcare mandate.

But the polls are missing one key ingredient: the intensity of feeling and the level of determination among the 28% of American adults (66 million people) who consider themselves part of the tea party or are supportive of it. To these people, 2012 is not “just another election.” It is the defining political battle of our lifetime.

Most of these 66 million tea partiers will vote in November. But they will do much more than vote. They will also make unprecedented personal sacrifices in time and money to help get out the vote. To a person, these 66 million Americans believe that if Barack Obama is re-elected, the constitutional republic as we know it will be destroyed. They are determined not to let this happen on their watch.

Enough e-mails of President Obama dressed as a witch doctor with a bone through his nose and Michelle Obama in a chimpanzee enclosure will make their message of hatred cause their votes to count a whole extra zero percent more than normal.  Bonus points for these fanatics actually believing that everyone in America secretly believes exactly what they believe.

That's all they have, of course.  Mitt Romney will do, say, and lie however and whatever it takes to win, including to the Tea Party.  When they figure that out, November's GOP losses will be exquisite.

Shutdown Countdown: Make My Day

The White House is cutting off the Republican plan for September and October here in April, and it shows an uncharacteristically frank and realistic assessment of what the White House thinks the GOP will do in order to win in November:  shut the government down and blame the President for the misery.

In a major escalation of a slowly building fight over funding the government, the White House has warned House Republicans, in no uncertain terms, that the government will shut down in September if the GOP does not adhere to an agreement they cut with Democrats in August during the standoff over raising the nation’s debt limit.

“Until the House of Representatives indicates that it will abide by last summer’s agreement, the President will not be able to sign any appropriations bills,” writes Jeffrey Zients, acting director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, in a letter addressed to congressional appropriators Wednesday.

The message is simple: The government will shut down just ahead of the 2012 presidential election if Republicans break faith with the debt limit deal. 

In other words, the White House is firing the first major public shot in this fall's Shutdown Countdown wars, which the GOP assures will come.  They've called the GOP's bluff.  Now of course, the GOP will have to prove they aren't bluffing, breaking their deal and shutting thegovernment down six weeks before the election.

Good luck with that plan, GOP.

Let Them Eat Horse Cake

Donald Trump got Cake Boss star Buddy Valastro to make this cake for Ann Romney's birthday party:

Because SHUT UP HORSE CAKE that's why. Not as creepy as these cakes, but close.

We Don't Need No Stinking Wallet

CNN says most experts believe average people will be paying with their phones by 2020.  In seven years, they predict that some sort of swiping or verification scanning will replace credit cards.  And they may be right.  It makes sense that credit cards and identity theft will force people and financial institutions to go through some big changes in the next few years.

However, as we still learn shocking stories of how our information is stored unencrypted on phones, and the many ways that developers and markets lack regulation and industry standards, we are at the mercy of the dumbest app on our phone.  Let's face it, stupid apps are here to stay, and people will have to become more tech savvy to protect themselves, so there are some risks.

I wonder what the future of cash will be.  Because it's not moving currency, its value is in its physical presence. Of course, that's also its weakness, because once cash is taken it's virtually untraceable. Government would benefit from a cashless society, because then our financial transactions would be stored ledger style for their reading enjoyment.  Thieves and hackers can manipulate numbers in a database, where cash cannot be altered.

Just thoughts.  It's neat and all, but I have seen such little respect for privacy and security that I doubt I'll be taking part until I'm forced to.

Pro-Choice Hiding In Strange Places?

Bob Cesca writes a pretty interesting piece about how he came to the pro-choice conclusion, and then makes some thoughtful points about what Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin have to say.  While claiming to be staunch pro-lifers, they have a few verbal missteps.  

It was Carl who gets partial credit for my transformation into a liberal Democrat.

Here's how he did it.

It was one question during a debate about abortion. One interrogative sentence. I remember exactly where Carl and I were standing in the high school library when he asked me this question: "If your girlfriend got pregnant, what would you do?" Almost without thinking, I replied, "Well, it would be her choice to make -- ohhhh." And there you go. I had admitted to being pro-choice without realizing I was pro-choice until that very minute. And of course, being intellectually honest, I conceded the point to Carl.

With that one question, Carl had ignited an epiphany of sorts that led me to liberalism. Naturally it should be "her choice." It was so obvious. What else was I supposed to do? Hold her hostage and force her to birth our (rhetorical) child? Her body, her choice.

In two different instances, Cesca points to Bachmann and Palin talking about "choice" in context of pregnancy.  For Bristol's "choice" to keep her child, to thoughts of her "choice" with Tripp, Palin speaks of an alternative.  Bachmann goes on a nice little rant about how women want their own choices in health care and respect for their medical rights.  Bachmann then says that with Obamacare that may be in danger.


Cesca and I leave each other when he indicates that this demonstrates a belief in choice.  I disagree.  It's a mere acknowledgement that there is one, compounded by their own hypocrisy.  Bachmann would say Obamacare is the reason pickles are green, as she has a contractual obligation to say Obamacare in every single speech she gives.  Palin makes a big deal about her choice and never shows gratitude that she had one.  She implies her choice is right for every woman out there.  As for Bristol, she'll never know what it's like to flip burgers for minimum wage and turn 80% of her check to daycare because dad is either not in the picture or flipping his own burgers to try to pay for rent, groceries, utilities and lack of insurance.  It's just another case of comparing apples and oranges. 


The only thing Bachmann and Palin have in common is that they would sell out all women for their political agenda.  Which makes them so deplorable the mere thought of them makes me shudder with disgust.

The Thin, Stupid Line

Florida Republican Rep. Allen West is the gift that keeps on giving for the Democrats.  He's the poster child of everything wrong with the Tea Party in a swing state like Florida and why the Republicans are in for some shocking and disappointing election results in November.  His contempt for anyone not in his chummy little clique of "patriots" is borderline hatred, and he simply can't contain himself when given a media outlet.

“There is a very thin line between communism, progressivism, Marxism, Socialism,” West said. “It’s about nationalizing production, it’s about creating and expanding the welfare state, it’s about this idea of social and economic justice… it is also about the creation of a secular state.”

He said proposed federal government rules requiring virtually all private insurance policies to cover female contraceptives was “really about” the federal government reclassifying religious organizations so that religion could be manipulated “however they wish.” In addition, West claimed that the government was already in the process of nationalizing production.

“Folks, do your research, understand these ideologies, this is a choice between two very clear futures for the United States of America,” West said. “And I’m not going to back down.”

Allen West wouldn't know the difference among Karl Marx, Richard Marx, and Groucho Marx, frankly.  But it sure is fun watching him spout the same FOX News propaganda over and over again, ensuring he's a national embarrassment to his constituents.  He's being saying moronic things for his entire term so far and has fled Florida's 22nd district for the far redder and safer 18th after drawing some big-league opposition.  So if Florida wants to keep this clown in the House, by all means.

I could use the laugh.  New tag: Allen West Sees Marxists EVERYWHERE.

Veepstakes 2012: Robbie And The Robot

Jonathan Karl at ABC News has updated the list of Romney's possible Veeps, and at the top of the list is Ohio Republican Sen. Rob Portman.

The popular senator from the important state of Ohio has twice been a cabinet level official, as well as a member of the House and Senate. He’s arguably the most qualified person on the list and he helped Romney beat Rick Santorum in the Ohio primary.

I'm not 100% sure about how much Portman's contacts in Ohio helped Romney, but it certainly didn't hurt him.   Portman has a number of Village-types in his corner...after all, he's who they wanted for McCain's veep in 2008.

The problem is Portman doesn't bring much of anything to the ticket other than a couple of points in Ohio. His major draw is that he has the fewest negatives, especially compared to Marco Rubio, Chris Christie, Nikki Haley, Bobby Jindal and the rest of the folks that sat out the 2012 race. He doesn't say stupid and insane things on TV like the rest of the clown car.

That's his selling point.  If anything, he's even more bland than Romney.  He's the safe choice.  Question is, will Romney go for safe, or do what McCain did and go for broke?

He may not have a choice, in the end.

StupidiNews!

• So far three Secret Service agents have lost their jobs over allegations of agents soliciting prostitutes during the President's trip to Colombia earlier this month.
• Ohio has resumed death penalty executions after a six month moratorium despite lingering questions about the methods used and legal exonerations.
• House GOP Tea Party freshmen are fighting back, asking right-wing bloggers to help keep them in office as they face increasingly skeptical voters.
• The IMF believes that European banks may have to sell some $3.8 trillion in assets in order to stay afloat should the worst happen in the EU.
• Photo blogging service Tumblr is growing up: the service will launch ads on all sites on May 2.