The Right Hand Threatens the Left One

More tea party patriot fun. While the big whig wingers plot to steal elections with unlimited secret cash, the white trash wing keeps up their end with racist threats to those registering minorities to vote.

A group trying to register voters in Houston received threats and emails containing racist slurs after being targeted by a local tea party group accusing it of "voter fraud."

In emails obtained by TPM, the group Houston Votes was accused of being "a bunch of white guilt ridden assholes, NIGGERS and greasy mexican spics," "fraudulent Marxist pigs," and "American hating A-holes."

Nope, those white real Americans ain't racist, dontcha know.

via TPM

And So It Begins

via- NYT'S


As the consequences of the SCOTUS Citizens United begin to form into into organized cadres of rich interests to buy our elections and power, this years meager increases into Dark Money politicking will seem like child's play. The plutocrat's will begin having secret meetings in none other than playground of the rich and powerful Palm Springs, CA, to divvy up the cash for all sorts of seedy, and completely secretive operations to defeat democrats beginning in the presidential race of 2012.

A secretive network of Republican donors is heading to the Palm Springs area for a long weekend in January, but it will not be to relax after a hard-fought election — it will be to plan for the next one.

Not surprising that The Koch industries will be leading the pack for undermining 70 years of progressive initiatives from environmental protections to the social safety net. It is what the SCOTUS wingnuts planned when they equated money with speech, to outflank liberals and dems projected demographics gains into the future, fairly near future. It will be The Robber Barons part Deuxe and the bullshit will flow like manna from hell.

Koch Industries, the longtime underwriter of libertarian causes from the Cato Institute in Washington to the ballot initiative that would suspend California’s landmark law capping greenhouse gases, is planning a confidential meeting at the Rancho Las Palmas Resort and Spa to, as an invitation says, “develop strategies to counter the most severe threats facing our free society and outline a vision of how we can foster a renewal of American free enterprise and prosperity.”

Awwe yes, that American standard of "American Free Enterprise and Prosperity". Sounds pretty, doesn't it. But between the lines are more BP oil spills, dirtier air and drinking water, and global warming on steroids. And that is just arena. If you thought politicians were bought and paid for now, it will get much much worse, the pandering to corps for campaign cash, and the ever elusive quid pro quo will overtake any and all efforts to contain it. The goal posts will be moved to another planet, as campaign cash, and it's strings attached, will jigger around every politician who seeks reelection like so many plutocrat puppets. It is going to get very ugly, and along with our enormous problems already caused largely from corporate money in politics will run the profit train right over this country and especially the middle class. Which after all is the only stalwart against full frontal oligarchy. Goodbye American, nice to have known you.

The Kochs also seek to cultivate Americans’ growing concern about the growth of government: at the most recent meeting, in Aspen, Colo., in June, some of the wealthiest people in America listened to a presentation on “a vision of how we can retain the moral high ground and make the new case for liberty and smaller government that appeals to all Americans, rich and poor.”

The Barnum and Bailey approach for suckers born every minute. With the boilerplate "appeals to ALL Americans, rich and poor. A plan that has worked out so well, the country is broke, and those lucky enough to have a job, and stuck with stagnated wages while big corps have seen record profits for the past two or more decades.

Yeh, Annie's Kitty Is Going To Be Okay

From her comment on Balloon Juice

My cat came back from the doctors, and it is her thyroid. I feel like shit because we did not recognize the signs earlier. It seems that as cats approach 12 years it is not uncommon to develop thyroid problems. If caught early, the condition is curable.

Yipee!!
Good news indeed!!!

Great News From the Institute For A Meaningful Apocalypse!!

America's favorite wingnut shows us all how we can make a buck on the coming Obama Holocaust, first horde all your Gold, and, by golly, eat pretty good also too.

If you ever find yourself in a post-nuclear holocaust environment and come across people eating beef stroganoff, odds are they'll be Glenn Beck fans.

You may have heard about Beck's relationship with Goldline International, which urges people to buy gold and stay safe from the supposed inevitable devaluing of the dollar. Now meet Food Insurance, which sells survival kits of freeze-dried food and other items to help people live from two weeks to 12 months, depending on the plan purchased (and post-apocalyptic conditions). Beck has promoted the company's products, is featured prominently on the company's website, and a banner ad for the company, bearing Beck's image, was spotted on his website Monday.

via TPM

Country On the Brink

Here we are, only 2 weeks out from another mid term election, and no one really knows how it will turn out. The CW from polling points to a republican landslide. But how can that be? Only two years ago the country resoundingly showed the door to the GOP, that left the country bankrupt, mired in two unpopular wars, one conducted for no rational reason, and now voters say they plan to hand back congress to the wingnuts. It is a disconnect that has pretty much sent me into the don't give a shit mode, that I truly hope will make me look silly on election day, when democrats retain the majorities in congress. I don't pretend to know what is going on in this country right now, as we have witnessed one of the most productive legislative sessions in the nations history, passing universal health care reform, we are down to 50 thousand troops in Iraq, and headed for the door there. There is the unpopular now war in Afghanistan, and a temporary escalation, but with an expiration date of next summer where we will begin to leave there.

I know the old adage "It's the economy stupid", and that has certainly been a mixed bag for Obama and dems. Staving off a depression collapse we were teetering on just two years ago. Though we are not experiencing a quick bounce back from that severe downturn, we are also not standing in soup lines. I don't know what to think of the American voter, and it's attention span of a grasshopper, and seemingly bottomless pit of willingness to believe the most vapid lies of the Republicans, who have nearly completely abandoned any effort to participate in governing the past 2 years. And have not proposed any new ideas past the ones that led to the current mess we are in. Offering nothing much but conspiracy theories about our first black president, often crossing the line into rank racism.

It is a sad state of affairs for sure, and the activist left seems to be the right wings best ally, validating some of the worst bad faith critiques from the right, and even offering some of their own. Our politics right now just makes me ill, and blogging about them a painful chore that is more like howling at the moon for some sanity and perspective. I have resigned myself to voting and other than that just watching what happens in this apparent crumbling democracy. Seems too late to save to me. Hope I am wrong about that.

America's True History of Religious Tolerance

America's True History of Religious Tolerance

Good article. Great for a lazy Sunday afternoon and as a reminder that despite their attempts to supress sound scholarship and replace it with their version of religious truth and conservative worldviews, good stuff is still out there.

JK Wedding Entrance Dance