Last Call

Harry Reid bemoaned last night the missed opportunity of busting the Senate filibuster last year, considering the GOP invoked its use pretty much every second over the last five and a half years.  Ezra Klein recaps:

Reid’s comments came after Republicans filibustered his attempt to move a House-passed compromise reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank. But the proximate cause of Reid’s ire hardly matters. The point is that he’s concluded he was wrong to oppose filibuster reform when Democrats had the chance.

Election wonks I know think that if President Obama wins re-election, Democrats have even odds -- and maybe even a bit better -- of retaining control of the Senate. Their margin will be slim. But a slim margin is all they’ll need for filibuster reform if they follow the Merkley/Udall plan, which uses a process called “the Constitutional option” to change the rules with 51 votes. More on that here.

Ahh, but there's a down side, as I've been saying.  That 53-47 current margin is 3 lost seats from being a tie, and 4 from being the end of the filibuster if the GOP keeps the House (which if they retake the Senate they certainly will).

Consider, though, what this means if Republicans retake the Senate. The leader of the Senate Democrats appears to have endorsed some version of filibuster reform. That doesn’t make filibuster reform an inevitability. But it does make it likelier. And wouldn’t Republicans prefer it happen on their watch than when the Democrats control the institution? Probably.

It's very likely if the GOP takes both chambers of Congress and 100% guaranteed if that happens and Romney wins.  Now that Reid has opened the gates, the Republicans will start making the argument that if they do take the whole ball of wax, the only way to get rid of all that "Obama socialism" is to axe the filibuster.

Of course, as voters, we ultimately determine that fate.  Get out there and register a friend to vote this week.

Another Milepost On The Road To Oblivion

Bring on the meteor. Thanks.

ORLANDO, Fla. -- An unidentified entrepreneur admits he is trying to profit off Trayvon Martin's death by selling gun range targets featuring the teen who's death has sparked a nationwide controversy. Although Martin's face does not appear on the paper targets, they feature a hoodie with crosshairs aimed at the chest. A bag of Skittles is tucked in the pocket and a hand is holding a can resembling iced tea.

The wall of fire resulting from impact will be nifty.

"This is the highest level of disgust and the lowest level of civility," said Zimmerman's attorney Mark O'Mara. O'Mara said he is worried about how Martin's parents will react to the image of their son on a target intended to be used for shooting practice. The attorney is also concerned the targets will further inflame the community. "It's this type of hatred -- that's what this is, it's hate-mongering -- that's going to make it more difficult to try this case," said O'Mara. Local 6 has been unable to determine the identity of the seller, who had also set up a website to sell the gun range targets. In an email exchange with reporter Mike DeForest, the seller wrote, "My main motivation was to make money off the controversy."

It can't come soon enough, I figure. Going to print this story off and place it in a bowl of delicious Purina Meteor Chow and see what comes 'round.

Ghost In The Moose-chine

Bristol Palin's Facebook ghostwriter has declared open season on the Obama daughters.

In a new blog post entitled "Hail to the Chiefs – Malia and Sasha Obama," Bristol takes issue with the influential role Obama's daughters supposedly played in helping him "evolve" his opinion on same-sex marriage.

"In this case, it would've been helpful for him to explain to Malia and Sasha that while her friends parents are no doubt lovely people, that's not a reason to change thousands of years of thinking about marriage," she writes. "Or that – as great as her friends may be – we know that in general kids do better growing up in a mother/father home. Ideally, fathers help shape their kids' worldview."

This coming from an unmarried single mom who had a kid out of wedlock, who knows everything about the sanctity of marriage better than Barack Obama, happily married to Michelle Obama for more than 2 decades.   Ed Kilgore sums it up:

To be clear, I am not mocking Bristol Palin when I offer these responses. She has the last laugh on me, and on all of us. Like her mother, she has a knack of luring people who know better into paying attention to her rants. In my defense, I’ll say that some of Sarah Palin’s most casual, fact-free rants have wound up in national GOP talking points, leading millions of anxious seniors to believe that the President of the United States wants to have them euthanized. It’s sometimes best to get a head start on Palin-generated nonsense, or in this case, on the next generation of Palins.

In other words, for the rest of their lives, the Palins can spout whatever vapid, moronic moose crap they want and the machine makes it become the pulse of the heartland.  America is a truly great country, where proxy fight attacks over policy are led by the children of political has-beens on the kids of the President.

Nice.  Also, bonus points for going after the President's teenage daughters.  That's how Republicans roll, you see.

Twisted Sisters

A scientist caught the birth of rare twin waterspouts on camera as the twisters churned to life over Louisiana waters yesterday (May 9). One of the powerful and unusually long-lived twisters damaged homes and cut power as it barreled across Grand Isle, a long, narrow island along the southeastern leg of the state's Gulf coastline.

The tornadoes formed at the front edge of a powerful storm system that moved across the region yesterday afternoon.

"You could clearly see them forming in the sky," he said, "and I was able to get them on the camera as they were starting to drop."

The pictures are cool, and the full article gives some background information on waterspouts and the levels of danger they pose.

While these occurred in Louisiana, they are not rare around the shores of the US.  While stuck behind a wreck in Florida, I watched one develop about a mile from me.  It was one of the bad kind, but it stayed out in the water and went parallel to the coast.  The storm had already driven the boats away, so nobody was hurt.  Still, I was humbled by its raw power.  As far away as I was, you could feel the strangeness in the air.

One of these sisters ventured onto land, but so far the damage is relatively light.  For two dangerous twisters to form and sustain for so long, it's the best outcome one could hope for.

A Pretty 70-Year-Old Virgin Worked As A Cabaret Dancer... And Then It Gets Weird

Pam Shaw is old enough to be a great-great-grandmother, and yet she has retained her virginity despite years working in the entertainment industry.  It's hard not to take this with a grain of salt, but her story is interesting.  Virginity aside, I bet she is a hell of a character with some stories to share.

"Now's the time. I'm ready to take the plunge for the right bloke," Pam Shaw tells the Sun."My standards are still very high, though. I'm hoping to bag a tall, dark and handsome millionaire."

Shaw says she doesn't believe in sex before marriage and has been too busy with her career as a cabaret dance to settle down. "I feel I am ready to give marriage a go and maybe go to bed with a man," she said. "You are never too old for anything. Just look at Joan Collins."

That she believes in such a romantic man is her greatest indicator of genuine inexperience.  I'm just saying, most women stop believing in that particular dream early into things.

Also, I have to point out that there is no trace of judgment or cruelty to those who do have sex outside of marriage.  Shaw states her beliefs without implying anyone should follow her choice to such an extreme.  That alone is enough reason that I hope she does find that fella, and teaches him a thing or two.

Meanwhile, Back At The Lunatic Ranch...

House Republicans have now officially trashed last year's budget agreement by eliminating all agreed upon Pentagon cuts and replacing them with cuts on the poor, because screw Obama, that's why.

The House voted Thursday to override steep cuts to the Pentagon’s budget mandated by last summer's debt deal and replace them with spending reductions to food stamps and other mandatory social programs.

While doomed in the Senate and opposed by the White House, the legislation, which would reduce the deficit by $243 billion, is a Republican marker for post-election budget talks with the White House.

Members approved the Sequester Replacement Reconciliation Act in a party-line 218-199 vote. As expected, the bill was supported by nearly all Republicans — only 16 opposed it, and no Democrats supported it.

So at this point, the House GOP is probably going to work towards another shutdown in an election year as things get increasingly grim for Mitt Romney.  After all, what will they have to lose since they're going down anyway?  What makes anybody think they would ever follow through and keep their word?

We'll see how it goes.  I bet I'm using Shutdown Countdown again before too long.

Dimon Dog Days

That stink yesterday night after Wall Street's close was JP Morgan Chase crapping the bed to the tune of nearly a billion in a bad hedge fund deal.

Since the end of March, the company's Chief Investment Office "has had significant mark-to-market losses in its synthetic credit portfolio," the company said in a filing late on Thursday.

Chief Executive Jamie Dimon called the mistakes "egregious" and apologized to stock analysts on a conference call that the company suddenly scheduled after making the disclosure in a quarterly filing to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.

Dimon acknowledged that the errors are especially embarrassing in light of his public criticism of the so-called Volcker rule to ban proprietary trading by big banks.

"It plays right into the hands of a bunch of pundits out there, but that is life," Dimon said. He said he still believes in his arguments against the Volcker rule. The problem at JPMorgan, he said, was with the execution of the hedging strategy.

The strategy "morphed over time" and it was "ineffective, poorly monitored, poorly constructed and all of that," Dimon said.

"This violated our principles. This trading violates the Dimon principle."

Apparently the Dimon Principle is "if you lose big enough at Big Casino, the house will pay you back anyway."  We'll see how markets react today to this one.  I'm betting it's going to be a very bad Friday on Wall Street.  But remember, we can't have the Volcker Rule because our super smart titans of Wall Street wouldn't be able to make any money.  You know, instead of losing billions and making you pay for it, that's perfectly okay.

Sorry about crashing your economy and all, but DIMON PRINCIPLE, that's why.

StupidiNews!

• The Obama administration is directing the EPA to relax standards on vapor recovery fuel pump nozzles, saying newer cars don't need them and that gas station owners shouldn't have to pay for them.
• The Senate will hold public hearings in July on a constitutional amendment to overturn the Citizens United ruling allowing unlimited campaign contributions.
• Oil and gas industry experts are saying the half-century old US embargo on Cuba is threatening the safety of offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
• European Union officials are predicting the eurozone will begin to enter recession in 2012 as Spain and Italy contract.
• Microsoft is bringing IE9 to the Xbox 360, powered by the Kinect motion sensing system for browsing by gesture.

Last Call

And the Team Obama rope-a-dope of the Romney campaign into the Wingnut Event Horizon took just 100 hours or so from Joe Biden's statement on Sunday.

Ed Gillespie, senior adviser to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, told Chuck Todd on MSNBC’s Daily Rundown that the campaign would make President Obama’s support for marriage equality an issue this November and that Romney will actively push for a constitutional amendment to take away the right of states to voluntarily extend marriage equality to same-sex couples.

Gillespie told Todd that same-sex marriage “will be another bright-line difference in this campaign.” He added that the GOP intends to campaign on the issue.

In other words, Mr. Etch-A-Sketch here just got drawn all over by a giant Sharpie and the manic scrawl reads I AM A BIGOTED NUTJOB JUST LIKE THE REST OF THEM.  Good luck with that pivot to "small government centrist" there, Mittastrophe.

Or in other other words, this just happened.



Muahaha.

Willful Ignorance On Display

If after nearly 3.5 years as President and two campaign silly seasons you still believe President Obama is a Muslim, then I have no sympathy for your ignorance or closet racism.  One in six Americans still freely admit it according to a new Public Religion Research Institute poll

After nearly four years in the Oval Office, President Obama is incorrectly thought to be Muslim by one in six American voters, and only one quarter of voters can correctly identify him as a Protestant, according to a new poll.

“Wow. He said it 100 times that he’s not a Muslim,” said Zainab Al-Suwaij, executive director of the American Islamic Congress, expressing surprise over the persistent number of American voters (16 percent) who make the mistake.

Is there something insidious behind the belief, a concerted attack to link the president with a religion that's considered alien -- or worse -- by some Americans?

“I think it’s more a lack of information than an attack on him,” said Al-Suwaij.

While Americans across the board get the president's religion wrong, the religious group that most often thinks Obama is Muslim is white evangelical Protestants (24 percent). American unaffiliated with a religious group make the error least often: just 7 percent identify Obama as Muslim.

Daniel Cox, PRRI’s research director, said the small but not insignificant sliver of Americans who still believe Obama is Muslim is “fascinating.”

It's not a "lack of information".  It's not "fascinating".  It's plain old racism, pure and simple, where the sadly more socially "acceptable" anti-Muslim religious bigotry in society is used as a proxy for racial animus. 

Most of the nutjobs on the right will fight you tooth and nail if you call them racist.  But say they are Islamophobic bigots and they wear that badge with pride.  Some have for over a decade now.  Homeland Security profiling for Muslims of Middle-eastern or north African descent still remains a popular idea among Republicans like Rick Santorum and has come up during this campaign.

Over the last decade the screaming nimrods over in the GOP (and more than a few Dems, mind you) so thoroughly demonized Islam in this country that considering the President to be one is a calculated insult, especially given the dozens upon dozens of times the President has talked about his Christian faith, has gone with the First Family to church services, and was attacked for his relationship with the Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

The best part is Republicans will continue to do nothing to smother this zombie lie among their base.  Why should they, when they are powered politically almost solely by hatred and bigotry?

The number of Americans, particularly Republicans, who believe the President is a Muslim simply remains too high to be dismissed as "lack of information".  If that were true, the numbers across all political groups would be somewhat close.  Instead, where one in six voters overall think the President is a Muslim, one in four Republicans remain convinced he is.

In both the cases of Obama and Romney, about 40% of Americans are unsure.  The difference is over half of Americans correctly know Mitt Romney is a Mormon...and given the President and his faith have had far more exposure in the last four years, for Mitt Romney to have far more people "know" about his faith than the President's is no accident.

It's willful.  Period.

Profiles In Etch-A-Sketching

Mitt Romney has immediately fallen into the trap President Obama has laid out for him.

Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney on Wednesday said he unequivocally opposes "marriage between people of the same gender," drawing a contrast to President Obama's "evolving" position on the issue.

Later, in the afternoon, Mr. Obama said in an interview with ABC News that he now supports same-sex marriage.

Romney was asked Wednesday morning about the failure of a ballot measure that would have allowed same-sex civil unions in Colorado. In an interview with Denver-based KDVR-TV, he said, "I indicated my view, which is I do not favor marriage between people of the same gender, and I do not favor civil unions if they are identical to marriage other than by name," Romney said. "My view is the domestic-partnership benefits, hospital visitation rights, and the like are appropriate but that the others are not."

Romney had no choice.  His party would have flayed him and left him out in the sun to rot if he had voiced anything less than permanent second-class citizenship for the LGBT community.   And please note, this is a position "flip-flopping" Mitt is now 100% on the record as being against.

If this is Romney pivoting towards the center, Barack Obama is going to do better than he did in 2008 provided the people who begged him to take this position now follow up with their support.  There's a clear divide now between the parties, and the whole "both sides are the same" argument just died screaming.

So now marriage equality is an issue in the election?  Good.  It needs to be.  And there is no doubt that wingnut Mitt Romney is on the wrong side of history.

Show Me Getting It Right (For A Change)

Missouri's position on labor laws and minimum wage issues has always been shameful.  We are one of the worst states when it comes to reasonable practices and protective legislature.  However, as the cost of living rises in this area, the wages must as well for those scraping by to survive.  Minimum wage should ideally allow modest living and regular meals, and heaven forbid a few dollars to sock away for emergencies like auto repairs or illness.  Right now, workers earning minimum wage are unable to meet the minimum living standards for someone who works full-time.  If a worker holds up their end of the bargain and is productive, they should feel entitled to earning enough to stay off the streets and eat a balanced diet.

Republicans have shown their disconnect with the working class, with at least two candidates proving their ignorance by not knowing the actual minimum wage.  Sarah Steelman guessed wrong, and Todd Akin admitted he did not know.  However, they were all quick to say they were against it because it was a burden on businesses. 

"My guess is its somewhere in the 6 or 7, but I don't know the exact number right now," replied Akin, who, as a congressman, is currently responsible for helping to set federal policy.

Imagine my surprise when I learned that there is real movement towards raising the minimum wage above the federal requirement.  Instead of the current $7.25 this would raise minimum wage to $8.25 and raise tipped workers up to 60% of that instead of the current 50%.  This would be a major boon to struggling people who are working hard for businesses that cut benefits or rely on customers who skimp on the tip even when the service is excellent.  Anyone who has worked for tips can tell you it's incredibly difficult to budget with a variable like that, and a short week can mean the utilities are shut off for millions of workers living check to check.

People who vote against workers fail the system.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics tells us that in 2008  twice as many women were earning minimum wage or earning below minimum wage than men.  The young and single were more than twice as likely to earn minimum wage.  Young single women were at a fair disadvantage.  These are the women who don't have any money left at the end of the month.  The guys Republicans voted against unanimously, so that they wouldn't be guaranteed fair pay for doing the same work and bearing the same responsibilities as male workers.  The women who now may have to pay money they don't have for birth control in a responsible attempt to avoid bringing a child they cannot possibly support into the world.  Birth control that was once funded  in an attempt to encourage responsibility has now become subject to the religious views of some quacking assholes who have decided they should save us from our moral failures, all at the cost of a few minimum wage bums.

Akin, who said he did not believe government should be setting prices, is still  in favor of government  telling us who we can marry and restricting women's health care options for cancer screenings and routine preventative care.  Oh yeah, and protecting businesses so that it's legal for businesses to discriminate against gays.  He's a real man of the people.  His kind of people.  The rest of you can breed a labor force and keep his folks in the style to which they are accustomed.  And hey, if the fruits and slutty women would gripe a little less, that would be greatly appreciated.  It's interfering with his work, like think of catchy slogans such as "stage three cancer of socialism" in reference to federal student loans.  His actions will keep the minimum wage workers stuck forever, unable to afford to live and no hope of working their way out of the circumstances.

One last fun fact: Michele Bachmann endorsed him.  She who denies that there is a war on women would be just stupid enough to do that.

In Which Bon Is Shocked By Some First-Time Events

Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean ripped into Michele Bachmann on Sunday, calling the Republican congresswoman's prediction that women will vote for Mitt Romney "perfectly ridiculous."

"Frankly, Michele Bachmann has never had much command of the facts and that shows us exactly why," Dean said on "Face the Nation," in response to Bachmann's claim that female voters would turn out for Romney. "Women are terrified of what the Republicans are talking about. They're talking about basically stripping away their ability to have insurance pay for their birth control pills."

Earlier on the CBS News program, Bachmann said the so-called "war on women" is a myth concocted by Democrats.

"The myth is there is a Republican war on women," Bachmann said. "There's not a Republican war on women. That's coming from the Obama reelection team."

You can read the full article, complete with video goodness here.

Let's explore some exciting, groundbreaking events here.

1.  Someone finally calls Bachmann out on the fountain of bullshit she calls "a speech".  Dean is eloquent, factual, and without remorse as he rips her a new one.  And deservedly so, Bachmann is a cancer among her own kind, a woman who will sell out other women for her dreams of power.  She is also a babbling idiot and a cavewoman in her ideas of how the world should work.

2.  Bachmann did not say "Obamacare" in the snippet I watched.  I kid you not, folks, that is the first time since I became aware of it that she has not used every single question ever to point back at Obamacare.  I have joked about it being part of her contract somewhere because she just could not help herself.  Now that I have given credit where it is due, I would like to point back to the "babbling idiot" measurement of her speaking abilities.

3.  Bachmann has mostly dodged gender-related questions, because even the slightest nod is a step on the path to illuminating her hypocrisy.  So for her to state outright that the war on women is a myth, and one set in motion by Democrats, is pure folly on her part.  She doesn't smear the Dems, she sets herself further from women, reality, and truth.  She makes herself look completely ridiculous and actually elevates Democrats in the same breath.  I feel like I should thank her for that, but well... again we go back to the "babbling idiot" remark.

Compromise Is You Do Exactly What I Want And I Approve Of It

Compromise?  Indiana Republican Senate candidate Richard Mourdock has your gorram compromise right the hell here.

Richard Mourdock, fresh off of defeating Dick Lugar in the Indiana Senate primary, hit the ground running with a quote everyone is talking about this morning:

MOURDOCK: I certainly think bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view. … If we [win the House, Senate, and White House], bipartisanship means they have to come our way, and if we’re successful in getting the numbers, we’ll work towards that.

That’s the Republican nominee on MSNBC.

"If we win, screw the Democrats.  If the Democrats win, they must have cheated and the people really demand the Republican point of view.  What's the problem here, anyway?"

There are no moderate Republicans.  There are no compromise artists left.  They will all be gone by 2014 or 2016 at the latest, and the remainder will all be exactly like Richard Mourdock, who will tell you straight out that mandates only matter if the Republicans have one, and if you don't agree with them, you don't matter, you're not American, and you should really stop thinking you have any place in the political process.

This is bipartisanship.  But both sides are guilty of this, right?

Hot Plate Special

The record warm spring we had was hot enough to give us a new 12 month temperature record for the United States according to new NOAA data:

The past twelve months were the warmest twelve months in U.S. history, said NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) on Tuesday, in their monthly “State of the Climate” report. Temperatures in the contiguous U.S. during May 2011 – April 2012 broke the previous record for warmest 12-month period, set November 1999 – October 2000, by 0.1°F. The past twelve months have featured America’s 2nd warmest summer, 4th warmest winter, and warmest March on record. Twenty-two states were record warm for the 12-month period, and an additional nineteen states were top ten warm. NOAA said that the January – April 2012 period was also the warmest January – April period since record keeping began in 1895. The average temperature of 45.4°F during January – April 2012 was 5.4°F above the 20th century average for the period, and smashed the previous record set in 2006 by an unusually large margin–1.6°F.

But yelling SUNSPOTS and GLOBAL COOLING and THE SCIENCE ISN'T SETTLED will solve all our problems.  The country was nearly 2 degrees warmer for the first 4 months of the year than 2006's record heat,  but we should probably wait another 100 years or so until we have a clearer picture of climate in the long run because really all this is just about weather data points, and REAL SCIENTISTS know that weather changes!

I'm sure our great-grandkids will be thrilled with us by then.