Shame on Bill Donohue- Catholic League

Bill Donohue was on Larry King defending the Pope. (video here) He claims that since the boys who were raped by the priests were "post-pubescent" then it was not pedophilia... according to him, it was merely homosexuality (and I assume, therefore not a crime.) Donohue claimed to be an expert in this area.

I have a thought (if I use Bill Donohue's logic)... if a priest rapes a teenage girl, then it's merely heterosexuality (and not the crime of rape) because she is post pubescent?

Bill Donohue seems to be forgiving priests who rape victims over the age of 12 or 13. I believe the age of consent is about 16 or 17, isn't it? I'm surprised no one brought that up on King's panel.

The fact that the RCC hasn't come out publicly to shut Donohue up only makes me believe that they condone this asshattery.

What do you think of this?

Fred Phelps, the leader of the Westboro Baptist Church held an anti-gay protest at a Marine's funeral. He died in Iraq. The marine's family sued them and lost the case. The court ordered the family to pay the the appeal costs of the protesters.

Man ordered to pay appeal costs of protesters at his son's funeral

Couple REQUIRED to use township water!! OH MY!!!

From the Pittsburgh Post Gazette

An elderly couple from Hollidaysburg, Pa. is fighting an order requiring them to purchase and use water from a public municipality over their well water. Chlorine in the tap water causes the woman to get sick.
And there's this:


A township attorney told the judge on Monday that the ordinance requires the couple to use township water "for all human consumption."


Imagine that! A government entity ordering, nay, requiring that people must purchase and use government provided services! Of course, they don't have to drink the water, but they still have to pay for it whether they drink it or not. Can you beat that? And here someone told us that no one in this country is required to purchase anything.

I guess they can dehydrate to death, that would be their choice. But they still have to pay for the water they didn't use!


Shucks! The same ordinance is in effect where I live. My well water (which I'm no longer allowed to use - by law), is purer than the tap water the municipality provides. Even so, I am required to buy and use their water. But I better check with a plainsman to see if that's correct, you know. Because he KNOWS that I'm not required to buy anything from the government.


Isn't it amazing what those on the right will say or lie about to try to impress others with their lack of knowledge? Although I didn't consider the obvious fact that a reputable paper doesn't know as much as some small businessman who sells parts in a red state. It's also possible the reporter for the AP isn't as smart as the prairie home companion businessman because as we all know, the businessman KNOWS what is fact and what isn't. Therefore the AP reporter must wrong telling us this because no one is required to buy anything from the government!


Maybe the red state plainsman can get a few of his teabag friends together and put up some of their money to defend this (probably conservative) couple from the tyranny Obama and Congress impose. Oh Wait! I did check with the locals and, yep, you betcha, it's a right fine, legal ordinance. It was enacted by a local Republican controlled group of elected officers, in a very Republican part of the state during the reign of a Republican Representative and Republican State Legistature. But I'm sure it's still Obama and the Demorcatic Congress's fault.

Calling David Rose...

Why won't the Republican Powers That Be get rid of Michael Steele? Goodness knows he's given them ample opportunities.
With the latest incident, paying for a visit to a West Hollywood Strip Club,(see the info - everywhere) you might think they would want his, er, head. But you'd be wrong.
Various media postulate it would make the Republican Party (what's left of it) look bad? Right! Or that it would take away a lot of donor money. Or, whatever.
Many times he's come out and told the Republicans to either fire him or shut up! That attitude says that he's either nuts or...maybe he has something on the Republicans they don't want out in the open.
Now that could be interesting.

And yet another GOP addition to the health care reform bill that sucks

Did you know that 250 million bucks was buried in the health care reform bill for abstinence only education? Previously, only 150 million was spent on abstinence only sex education. (Way to go Dems.) It's been proven that it doesn't work and isn't based on fact or science. It does not reduce AIDS, STDs, abortions or teen pregnancy. Like all "faith based" initiatives, it's a tool the GOP uses to get dumb people to vote for them because there aren't enough rich voters to get Republicans elected.

This was forced into the bill by the GOP who didn't vote for the bill anyway. So far there are 2 crappy things in the health care bill that were thrust upon the legislation by Republicans and the stupid Democrats fell for it.

Memo to Democratic lawmakers- the religious types are never going to vote for you anyway and you're just pissing off your base.

All the conservative whining is turning boring now. I don't even make popcorn, turn on the cable news and watch their heads explode anymore. yawn.


Bill Maher summed it up so nicely on Friday night's episode of Real Time:

New Rule: You can't use the statement "there will be no cooperation for the rest of the year" as a threat if there was no cooperation in the first half of the year.

Here's a word the president should take out of his teleprompter: bipartisanship. People only care about that in theory, not in practice. The best thing that's happened this year is when President Obama finally realized this and said, "Kiss my black ass, we're going it alone, George W. Bush style.".

Easter Season Food Binge

Today's Palm Sunday in A Certain Religion. We saw His Hypocrisy parading around Rome with a woven palm frond, which reminds me that "palm" can also mean a slap to the face.

Palm Sunday is also the start of the Easter season, which I like to celebrate as the first real breakout of Spring.

I'm all about fertility rites, ya know. That makes me pro-life. ::evil grin::

Anyway, I celebrate with foods I consider traditional, so here's what was on the menu:

1. Leg of lamb, about 5 1/2 pounds, trimmed, deboned and butterflied, and smeared all over with a pesto made of basil, rosemary, Parmesan cheese, toasted chopped walnuts, garlic, kosher salt, black pepper and olive oil (makes a nice paste in the processor). Roast fat side up at 325 degrees for 2 hours and it came out deliciously tender, flavorful and medium.

2. Baked sweet potatoes with butter and cinnamon

3. Sweet corn with butter sauce.

4. Homemade cherry pie. I added a tablespoon of Amaretto to the filling, and lined the pie dish with butter and sugar before adding the crust. Tasty!

Meanwhile, Elsewhere in the World

While we've been occupied with the Health Care Reform Law (yes, it's a law now, so get over it, my fellow Republicans), there have been a few things going on in the rest of the world. Important things, too.

A nuclear weapons reduction treaty between the United States and the Russian Federation expired back in December, and we've been negotiating for the past few months. Well, it was announced that Presidents Obama and Medvedev have agreed to a new treaty.

The new reduction pact cuts our nuclear arsenals down to 1,550 warheads each, because let's face it, if you can't destroy Civilization with 1,550 nuclear weapons you may as well hang it up and go fishing.

So Obama has two victories under his belt this month - the centerpiece of his domestic agenda was passed, and now he has a real, bona fide foreign policy accomplishment under his belt. Bravo!

A South Korean warship suffered an explosion and sank near the maritime demarcation line between the two Koreas. That begs the question - how do you draw a line in the water? The matter's being investigated, but with the North having made threats, including a nuclear first strike ... well, this situation bears watching, big time.

Iraq had an election this past week, with Ayad Allawi showing a possible majority over incumbent Nuri al-Maliki. Recounts are being called for, and Iraq's government is showing signs of queasiness. I wonder if we can persuade a bunch of GOP staffers to drop by and intimidate the vote counters, like they did in 2000?

Elections are coming up in Britain on May 6th, and things are getting a bit nuts over in Blighty. There's an airline strike, and scandals are dogging the incumbent Labour Party and PM Gordon Brown. There's been some criticism by the military that Brown, when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, had short-changed the Army and other branches by giving them substandard equipment (sound familiar?)

Well, Brown's upped the ante by having a new rule issued - all military personnel, regardless of rank, now have to travel second class. Even generals and admirals, which really has them foaming at the mouth. Of course, Members of Parliament and Ministers still have first class travel privileges. This is going to be fun to watch.

One high-ranking Cardinal in the Catholic Church is saying that a thorough 'housecleaning' is required to get the pedophiles out of the Church, while some are calling on Pope Benedict to resign. Well, folks - that probably won't happen. One of the last papal resignations was about 600 years or so back, and it caused a lot of trouble.

And finally - oh yeah, this is so wrong on so many levels.

WOW: Mandatory Health Care Insurance is a GOP idea

This is rich.

You can use it as a talking point when the wingnuts argue.

According to the AP, it was the GOP that wanted mandatory health care insurance for all Americans before a black man was elected president. When a Democrat agrees to it, then it's "government overreach" but when a republican suggests it, it's fine with them.

In summary, the republicans turned against it only because the Democrats agreed to it. Obama wasn't really for mandated health care insurance originally. He wanted all children to have health insurance but not necessarily all adults. It was the GOP's idea (as well as Hillary's) according to this story. Mitt Romney says he's against it yet instituted the same thing in Massachusetts when he was governor. A dozen GOP attorneys want to sue to make this illegal.

WASHINGTON – Republicans were for President Barack Obama's requirement that Americans get health insurance before they were against it.

The obligation in the new health care law is a Republican idea that's been around at least two decades. It was once trumpeted as an alternative to Bill and Hillary Clinton's failed health care overhaul in the 1990s. These days, Republicans call it government overreach.

Mitt Romney, weighing another run for the GOP presidential nomination, signed such a requirement into law at the state level as Massachusetts governor in 2006. At the time, Romney defended it as "a personal responsibility principle" and Massachusetts' newest GOP senator, Scott Brown, backed it. Romney now says Obama's plan is a federal takeover that bears little resemblance to what he did as governor and should be repealed.

Republicans say Obama and the Democrats co-opted their original concept, minus a mechanism they proposed for controlling costs. More than a dozen GOP attorneys general are determined to challenge the requirement in federal court as unconstitutional.

....

Unbelievable.... get this...

"The idea of an individual mandate as an alternative to single-payer was a Republican idea," said health economist Mark Pauly of the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School. In 1991, he published a paper that explained how a mandate could be combined with tax credits — two ideas that are now part of Obama's law. Pauly's paper was well-received — by the George H.W. Bush administration.

"It could have been the basis for a bipartisan compromise, but it wasn't," said Pauly. "Because the Democrats were in favor, the Republicans more or less had to be against it."

Obama rejected a key part of Pauly's proposal: doing away with the tax-free status of employer-sponsored health care and replacing it with a standard tax credit for all Americans. Labor strongly opposes that approach because union members usually have better-than-average coverage and suddenly would have to pay taxes on it. But many economists believe it's a rational solution to America's health care dilemma since it would raise enough money to cover the uninsured and nudge people with coverage into cost-conscious plans.

Romney's success in Massachusetts with a bipartisan health plan that featured a mandate put the idea on the table for the 2008 presidential candidates.

Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton, who failed in the 1990s to require employers to offer coverage, embraced the individual requirement, an idea advocated by her Republican opponents in the earlier health care debate.

"Hillary Clinton believed strongly in universal coverage," said Neera Tanden, her top health care adviser in the 2008 Democratic campaign. "I said to her, 'You are not going to be able to say it's universal coverage unless you have a mandate.' She said, 'I don't want to run unless it's universal coverage.'"

Obama was not prepared to go that far. His health care proposal in the campaign required coverage for children, not adults. Clinton hammered him because his plan didn't guarantee coverage for all. He shot back that health insurance is too expensive to force people to buy it.

Obama remained cool to an individual requirement even once in office. But Tanden, who went on to serve in the Obama administration, said the first sign of a shift came in a letter to congressional leaders last summer in which Obama said he'd be open to the idea if it included a hardship waiver. Obama openly endorsed a mandate in his speech to a joint session of Congress in September.

Aha! The Republicans are caught once again to be lying sacks of you know what. Their sole purpose is to oppose anything that a Democrat would propose even if it would normally appeal to conservatives.

On the other hand, I am not thrilled with the idea of mandated health insurance coverage because I think it may impose hardships on some or many families. I knew that this mandate clause had the stink of the GOP on it. The only good thing to come out of it is that insurance companies hate it because they don't think the penalties for not buying it are high enough.

Favorite Poll This Week

Poll: ‘Anti-socialist’ Teabaggers want government to create jobs

Once again proving that these idiots are on the wrong side.

Separate But Equal Rears Its Head Again

Yes, indeed, gentle readers, here in America everything old can be brand new again.

Take, for example, the Commandant of the Marine Corps and his Congressional testimony on "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

General James Conway told the panel that if gays were allowed to serve openly in the military, his Marines would have to have segregated housing. Keep The Gay isolated, so it doesn't infect or bother the Normals.

(I'm condensing what he had to say a bit, of course.)

Needless to say, this will go a long way to destroying the Marines as an effective fighting force by wrecking the very unit cohesion the General seeks to preserve. Other nations manage quite well having integrated units in their military. Unless, of course, General Conway would like to characterize the Israeli Defense Forces as a bunch of mincing nancy boys.

And, of course, all this bother masks a very real problem in our military - sexual assault.

No, I don't mean our clean-cut lads getting jumped by out-of-control perverts (although what do we have a Navy for, I shouldn't wonder). I mean, of course, the current and probably increasing plague of sexual assaults by American men on American women serving in the military. I say "probably increasing," as it's rather hideously under-reported, whether through shame or fear of reprisal.

Unfortunately, that also damages unit cohesion. Maybe General Conway should be asked whether he thinks we should get women out of the military, too.

The Story of Bottled Water

The Story of Bottled Water

Posted using ShareThis

It's not nice to fool Mother Nature...

Update: Take a look at this article by the Huffington Post that shows some of the anti-nature nature of Palin. And let the 2nd Grade educated Eileen O'Neill know you can't understand why she would agree to let a fool like Palin be allowed to spread her garbage on what used to be a respectable channel.

Not sure who to thank for the picture but it came from Attaturk over at FDL.

Palin's Anti-Nature Resume





Sarah Palin's Alaska


Discovery Channel has gone around the bend. They've picked up a series called "Sarah Palin's Alaska" to give her a paid arena to plug the state she tried to screw. (I didn't know Alaska was hers. I sort of thought it belonged to all of us. Silly me!)

"TLC is grounded in great storytelling, strong characters, and passionate audiences drawn to extraordinary people doing extraordinary things," TLC boss Eileen O'Neill said. "We are confident Sarah Palin's Alaska will be another compelling television event."

"I can't think of anyone more compelling than Sarah Palin to tell the story of Alaska," said Mark Burnett of Survivor Fame.


Yep! You betcha! There'll be SOME story telling. Can't wait to hear that "down-home talkin', leavin' all them 'g's' offin them wordzes." This actually comes as no surprise since the PTB on the Discovery Circuit have employed right wingers to make Nature "Fair and Balanced."

Evidently what makes someone an Alaskan Expert is to ride snow machines, kill wolves from a helicopter (some sport there!), and try to destroy the wilderness to drill for drops of oil. Yeah! Somehow that seems to go with the new theme of the Discovery Channel; "The hell with Nature, Drill Baby, Drill! - We want money!" And she was the BEST that could be found to showcase Alaska? The stupidity of the Republican miniature brain is truly mind-numbing.

There are many, many pages of comments, nearly all of which pan the idea and ask why. They also suggest writing Discovery's sponsors and telling them to dump the show. If you are so inclined, here is the link to let them know whether you agree with this farce or not:

Viewer Relations


Why would any channel other than Fox hire someone who so obviously lies unless they have ulterior motives? This is almost as idiotic as the SciFi, excuse me, SyFy Channel airing Studio Wrestling!

If the Discovery Channel is really intent on showing Sarah Palin's Alaska, they should show the destruction the Oil companies have wrought; update what the Exxon Valdez did; the numerous oil spills on the North Slope; the horrible way she treated the poor in Alaska; the way she wanted to exploit the state for business; and don't forget the expensive bridge to nowhere that she supported before she didn't support it.. THAT...is Sarah Palin's Alaska!

If millions of other morons out there can boycott shows because they think the shows are too liberal, I can join the rabble from the left and boycott a channel that showcases a brainless shill and mindless producers that have no class and don't give one damn about the image their predecessors built.

On the other hand, to be honest, if this is anywhere close to real life Sarah Palin, she'll quit half way through...but keep the money!

Mandated Health Care Coverage

Found this story at New Republic about mandated health care coverage. Virginia's attorney general is going to court to nullify the part of the bill that requires everyone to purchase health care insurance and claims it's unconstitutional. Here's the argument by E J Dionne Jr:

The Republican attorney general's move reveals how far into the past America's New Nullifiers want to push the nation. They don't just want to abandon a more than seven-decade-long understanding of the Constitution's interstate commerce clause that has allowed the federal government to regulate a modern, national economy. They also want to resurrect states' rights doctrines discredited by President Andrew Jackson during the nullification crisis of the 1830s and buried by the Civil War.

There are two issues here. One is whether the federal government can require individuals to buy health insurance. The other is the states' rights question. In a suit separate from Cuccinelli's, 13 state attorneys general -- 12 Republicans and a conservative Democrat from Louisiana -- also challenged the mandate. But their main argument is that the federal government cannot force states to pay for an expanded Medicaid program and take other steps the law requires.

It would take a rashly activist court to find the individual mandate unconstitutional because it is structured as a tax. No one will go to jail for not buying insurance. Starting in 2014, people who refuse will have to pay a penalty to the federal government, administered by the IRS. There are subsidies for those who cannot afford coverage on their own, as well as hardship exemptions.

The idea is simple: Most people without insurance currently receive at least some medical help, and the mandate is designed to get everyone paying into the system. One of the best defenses of a health insurance mandate came in a Wall Street Journal op-ed piece published in April 2006.

• "By law, emergency care cannot be withheld," this commentator wrote. "Why pay for something you can get free? Of course, while it may be free for them, everyone else ends up paying the bill, either in higher insurance premiums or taxes."

I'd still like to know more about this so called mandate and I'm expecting that the president will go on national tv and explain it. I understand why they want everyone to pay into the system because we ultimately are paying for emergency room visits for the uninsured as it is. Obviously, the very poor will be covered. I'm curious as to how it will pan out for renters and homeowners who work but live paycheck to paycheck... how will they be able to muster up insurance premiums? Would they have to sell their homes in order to pay for the premiums? How would you have to prove that an extra $500/mo expense in your budget would bankrupt you? Who would set up the guidelines as to what constitutes hardship?

It remains to be seen.

GOP Backlash- the party of Waaaaaa!

What a bunch of babies!
(no offense to babies)


Just peruse Think Progress and see all the Republicans going on and on like it's the end of the world. Now they say they will obstruct everything the Democrats try to do from now on.... and this is new? How? Teabaggers are threatening those who voted for health care reform. I wonder if any of them actually read the details of the bill. I would bet that most of them would benefit from some of the parts of the bill.

This has to be easily the most destructive group of Republicans in the House ever.... and we thought that the ones who were in power during the bush years were bad (while they had all the power yet whined incessantly.)

And Sara Fucking Palin twittered: 'Don't Retreat, Instead - RELOAD!'"

Have these people no pride? I realize they work for corporations, but there has to be limit to how much public crying one would do for financial compensation. I don't know folks. They are a different breed. There is no way on earth that I could be paid enough to humiliate myself in public in front of millions of people and be forced to lie, deceive and pretend that I was devastated. (Well maybe they are really devastated because their corporate masters threatened not to have them be re-elected.) It's really no wonder that decent people don't get involved in politics.

These are death panels?

From The Democratic Policy Committee

Immediate Benefits
From Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education
Reconciliation Act include health insurance market reforms that will bring immediate benefits to millions of Americans, including those who currently have coverage. The following benefits will be available in the first year after enactment of the two bills.

Small Business Tax Credits
Offers tax credits to small businesses beginning in 2010 to make employee coverage more affordable. Tax credits of up to 35 percent of premiums will be immediately available to firms that choose to offer coverage. The full credit will be available to firms with 10 or fewer employees with average annual wages of $25,000, while firms with up to 25 or fewer employees and average annual wages of up to $50,000 will also be eligible for the credit. Effective calendar year 2010. Later, when Exchanges are operational, tax credits will be up
to 50 percent of premiums

No Pre-existing Coverage Exclusions for Children
Prohibits health insurers from excluding coverage of pre-existing conditions for children. Effective six months after enactment, applies to all employer plans and new plans in the individual market. (This provision will apply to all people in 2014).

Access to Affordable Coverage for the Uninsured with Pre-existing Conditions
Provides $5 billion in immediate federal support for a new program to provide affordable coverage to uninsured Americans with pre-existing conditions until new Exchanges are operational in 2014. Effective 90 days after enactment.

Closing the Coverage Gap in the Medicare (Part D) Drug Benefit
Provides a $250 rebate check for Medicare beneficiaries who hit the ‘donut hole’ in 2010. Effective calendar year 2010. (Beginning in 2011, institutes a 50 percent discount on brand- name drugs in the donut hole; also fills the donut hole by 2020.)

Patient Protections
Protects patients’ choice of doctors by allowing plan members to pick any participating primary care provider, prohibiting insurers from requiring prior authorization before a woman sees an ob-gyn, and ensuring access to emergency care. This provision applies to all new plans. Effective six months after enactment.

Re-insurance for Retiree Health Benefit Plans
Creates immediate access to re-insurance for employer health plans providing coverage for early retirees, helping to protect coverage while reducing premiums for employers and retirees. Effective 90 days after enactment.


Extension of Coverage for Young Adults
Requires insurers to permit children to stay on family policies until age 26. Effective six months after enactment, applies to all plans in the individual market, new employer plans, and existing employer plans if a young adult is not eligible for employer coverage.

Free Prevention Benefits
Requires coverage of prevention and wellness benefits in all new plans and exempts these benefits from deductibles and other cost-sharing requirements in public and private insurance coverage. Effective six months after enactment.

Free Prevention and Wellness Visits in Medicare
Medicare beneficiaries will receive a free, annual wellness visit and will have all cost-sharing waived for preventive services. Effective January 1, 2011.

Access to Quality Care for Vulnerable Populations
Makes $11 billion investment over five years in Community Health Centers to provide the funding needed to expand access to health care in communities where it is needed most. Effective Fiscal Year 2010.

Ensuring Value for Premium Payments
Establishes standards for insurance overhead and requires public disclosure to ensure that enrollees get value for their premium dollars, requiring plans in the individual and small group market to spend 80 percent of premium dollars on clinical services and quality activities, and 85 percent for plans in the large group market. Health insurance plansthat do not meet these thresholds will provide rebates to their policyholders. Effective January 1, 2011. This provision applies to all plans, including grandfathered plans, with the exception of self-insured plans.

No Lifetime Limits on Coverage
Prohibits insurers from imposing lifetime limits on benefits. Effective six months after enactment, applies to all plans.

Regulated Annual Limits on Coverage
Tightly regulates plans’ use of annual limits to ensure access to needed care in all group plans and all new individual plans. These tight restrictions will be defined by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. Effective six month after enactment, applies to new plans in the individual market and all employer plans. (When the Exchanges are operational in 2014, the use of annual limits will be banned for new plans in the individual market and all employer plans.)

Protection from Rescissions of Existing Coverage
Stops insurers from rescinding insurance when claims are filed, except in cases of fraud or intentional misrepresentation of material fact. Effective six months after enactment, applies to all new and existing plans.

Prohibits Discrimination Based on Salary
Prohibits new group health plans from establishing any eligibility rules for health care coverage that have the effect of discriminating in favor of higher wage employees. Effective six months after enactment.

Public Access to Comparable Information on Insurance Options
Enables creation of a new website to provide information on and facilitate informed consumer choice of insurance options. Effective not later than July 1, 2010.

Health Insurance Consumer Information
Provides assistance to States in establishing offices of health insurance consumer assistance or health insurance ombudsman programs to assist individuals with the filing of complaints and appeals, enrollment in a health plan, and, eventually, toassist consumers with resolving problems with tax credit eligibility. Effective Fiscal Year 2010.

Appeals Process
Requires all new health plans to implement an effective process for appeals of coverage determinations and claims. And, states will provide an external appeals process to ensure an independent review. Effective six months after enactment.

Increasing the Number of Primary Care Providers
Provides new investment in training programs to increase the number of primary care doctors, nurses, and public health professionals. Effective Fiscal Year 2010.

New, Voluntary, Long-Term Care Insurance Program
Creates a long-term care insurance program to be financed by voluntary payroll deductions to provide benefits to adults who become disabled. Effective January 1, 2011.

Terrorists Threaten Democrats Who Voted For Health Reform

From Think Progress

Vandals hit at least five Dem offices nationwide, threaten to ‘assassinate’ children of pro-reform lawmakers.

Yesterday, ThinkProgress reported that several Democratic offices around the nation had been vandalized in the days surrounding the House health care vote. Vandals have struck the Tuscon office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), the Monroe County Democratic Committee headquarters in upstate New York, Rep. Louise Slaughter’s (D-NY) Niagara Falls office, the Knox County Democratic headquarters in Ohio, and the Sedgwick County Democratic Party headquarters in Wichita, KS. The local Rochester ABC affiliate now has more information on the upstate NY vandalism, including an assassination threat against the children of lawmakers who voted for health reform:

• No one was inside when the brick was hurled through the Democratic Patry Headquarters on University Avenue. Attached was a note quoting conservative Barry Goldwater: “Exremism [sic] in defense of liberty is no vice”. [...]
• 
  
• [Rep. Louise] Slaughter has been at the center of the push for reform. Last Thursday she received a chilling recorded message at her campaign office. “Assassinate is the word they used…toward the children of lawmakers who voted yes.”
• 
  
• The FBI is now investigating.
  
• 
  
• more at this link

Republican extremists are indeed terrorists. Who is going to take responsibility for the creation of these wackos?

SCARY GOP POLL

The extremists are out of control. We don't call these uninformed, mostly undereducated people wingnuts for nothing. Here are poll results:

57 percent of Republicans (32 percent overall) believe that Obama is a Muslim. 45 percent of Republicans (25 percent overall) agree with the Birthers in their belief that Obama was "not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president". 38 percent of Republicans (20 percent overall) say that Obama is "doing many of the things that Hitler did" Scariest of all, 24 percent of Republicans (14 percent overall) say that Obama "may be the Antichrist."

...

The poll, which surveyed 2,230 people right at the height of the health-care reform debate, also clearly shows that education is a barrier to extremism. Respondents without a college education are vastly more likely to believe such claims, while Americans with college degrees or better are less easily duped. It's a reminder of what the 19th-century educator Horace Mann once too-loftily said: "Ignorance breeds monsters to fill up the vacancies of the soul that are unoccupied by the verities of knowledge."

The full results of the poll, which will be released in greater detail tomorrow, are even more frightening: including news that high percentages of Republicans—and Americans overall—believe that President Obama is "racist," "anti-American" "wants the terrorists to win" and "wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States to a one-world government." The "Hatriot" belief that Obama is a "domestic enemy" as set forth in the Constitution is also widely held—a sign of trouble yet to come. It's the same claim made by Marine Lance Corporal Kody Brittingham in his letter of intent to assassinate the President Obama.

Oh good lord. I have not been thrilled with his presidency but these claims are simply out of this world. There are plenty of important reasons to be terribly disappointed with this administration and none of these reasons above are worth one minute of concern. This is just proof that the corporate media and the corporate legislators are doing one hell of a bang up job dividing the good people of this country.

You are what you eat

The new health bill will make chain restaurants and fast food joints post their calorie counts on their menus.

I am rather shocked at the ridiculous comments made at the bottom of this story at yahoo news. No, it's not a government plot to regulate what we eat because they are commies. It's actually quite helpful. We still get to make choices and they are informed choices. We can choose to get fatter or not. I think the bad reaction to this part of the bill is simply because so many people fear that Obama and the Democrats are going make the US into Soviet Russia before long. Enough already. Grow up.


I would like to express right here that this is the kind of stuff I expect my government to do- look out for my fat ass and not allow corporate restaurants to feed me meals without divulging exactly what those foods consist of. I should have a right to know what's in what I eat. We know that corporations go out of their way to trick us into buying their products. So many restaurants pretend they are serving you something healthy when in fact, the food is anything but healthy.

No one has a problem when the government spends trillions of our money to invade a sovereign country under the guise of keeping us safe but they have a problem when the government wants us to be informed about what we put in our mouths.

We are being poisoned and made obese from the crap and mega calories hidden in food we order in restaurants. It is no wonder we are fat and sick in this country. Some of us don't want to be fat and sick and yet we like to go out to eat as much as anyone else. Those of us who actually give a shit about what we put in our bodies should be thrilled about this. Those who don't care, don't have to read the calorie counts.

I recently read Eat This, Not That and belong to their Facebook group. You can find out a lot of information right here too. You have no idea what sort of calories are hidden in seemingly harmless foods you order in restaurants. Look at this- the worst foods in America. You may have eaten them unaware of the horror on your plate. I was shocked when I read the books. It was no wonder that I was so huge. Here I thought I was ordering some low calorie salad or chicken dish and somehow the restaurant managed to stick 94 g's of fat in there and thousands of calories. I found out that I once ate a Taco salad that had 2000 calories at a Mexican restaurant! Try to find a safe salad in TGI Fridays. Fat chance. Lately, I check the calorie counts for most restaurants online before I go out. If I don't do that, I may be lured into ordering something with 2000 calories that looks pretty healthy.

In actuality it's best to cook your own food and avoid processed foods altogether. I do that most of the time, but I also find that I am away from my kitchen a lot and have to grab a bite when I'm out. Eat this, Not That also has a book about the garbage sold at supermarkets with healthy options.

Beautiful

Take a moment and enjoy Earth Art With Google Maps.
It's quite striking.

Want to see how the new bill affects you?

Interesting Calculator over at the WaPo.

Remember, you have to have insurance otherwise you suffer the fine.

And the tax credits will do a lot of good when they kick in the following year after you file your income tax. So it's pay your bills now, THEN we'll give you credits. With the out of pocket requirement, and they're all different depending on the calculation, that could be disastrous in the first year if you suffer a catastrophic illness or accident.

We need more information on this.

Sauve qui Peut!

That's French, by the way. It essentially means "Every man for himself!" and was the cry heard after the French line broke under the Allied charge at Waterloo.

So, what does this mean? you may ask.

Well, I'll tell you.

David Frum is a former speechwriter for George Bush the (very) Lesser and a conservative columnist. In the wake of the health care vote he penned a column titled "Waterloo." Allow me to share it with you:

Conservatives and Republicans today suffered their most crushing legislative defeat since the 1960s.

It’s hard to exaggerate the magnitude of the disaster. Conservatives may cheer themselves that they’ll compensate for today’s expected vote with a big win in the November 2010 elections. But:

(1) It’s a good bet that conservatives are over-optimistic about November – by then the economy will have improved and the immediate goodies in the healthcare bill will be reaching key voting blocs.

(2) So what? Legislative majorities come and go. This healthcare bill is forever. A win in November is very poor compensation for this debacle now.

So far, I think a lot of conservatives will agree with me. Now comes the hard lesson:

A huge part of the blame for today’s disaster attaches to conservatives and Republicans ourselves.

At the beginning of this process we made a strategic decision: unlike, say, Democrats in 2001 when President Bush proposed his first tax cut, we would make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. We were going for all the marbles. This would be Obama’s Waterloo – just as healthcare was Clinton’s in 1994.

Only, the hardliners overlooked a few key facts: Obama was elected with 53% of the vote, not Clinton’s 42%. The liberal block within the Democratic congressional caucus is bigger and stronger than it was in 1993-94. And of course the Democrats also remember their history, and also remember the consequences of their 1994 failure.

This time, when we went for all the marbles, we ended with none.

Could a deal have been reached? Who knows? But we do know that the gap between this plan and traditional Republican ideas is not very big. The Obama plan has a broad family resemblance to Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts plan. It builds on ideas developed at the Heritage Foundation in the early 1990s that formed the basis for Republican counter-proposals to Clintoncare in 1993-1994.

Barack Obama badly wanted Republican votes for his plan. Could we have leveraged his desire to align the plan more closely with conservative views? To finance it without redistributive taxes on productive enterprise – without weighing so heavily on small business – without expanding Medicaid? Too late now. They are all the law.

No illusions please: This bill will not be repealed. Even if Republicans scored a 1994 style landslide in November, how many votes could we muster to re-open the “doughnut hole” and charge seniors more for prescription drugs? How many votes to re-allow insurers to rescind policies when they discover a pre-existing condition? How many votes to banish 25 year olds from their parents’ insurance coverage? And even if the votes were there – would President Obama sign such a repeal?

We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat.

There were leaders who knew better, who would have liked to deal. But they were trapped. Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the Republican voting base into such a frenzy that deal-making was rendered impossible. How do you negotiate with somebody who wants to murder your grandmother? Or – more exactly – with somebody whom your voters have been persuaded to believe wants to murder their grandmother?

I’ve been on a soapbox for months now about the harm that our overheated talk is doing to us. Yes it mobilizes supporters – but by mobilizing them with hysterical accusations and pseudo-information, overheated talk has made it impossible for representatives to represent and elected leaders to lead. The real leaders are on TV and radio, and they have very different imperatives from people in government. Talk radio thrives on confrontation and recrimination. When Rush Limbaugh said that he wanted President Obama to fail, he was intelligently explaining his own interests. What he omitted to say – but what is equally true – is that he also wants Republicans to fail. If Republicans succeed – if they govern successfully in office and negotiate attractive compromises out of office – Rush’s listeners get less angry. And if they are less angry, they listen to the radio less, and hear fewer ads for Sleepnumber beds.

So today’s defeat for free-market economics and Republican values is a huge win for the conservative entertainment industry. Their listeners and viewers will now be even more enraged, even more frustrated, even more disappointed in everybody except the responsibility-free talkers on television and radio. For them, it’s mission accomplished. For the cause they purport to represent, it’s Waterloo all right: ours.

****

Or, in the words of the immortal Walt Kelly's Pogo, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."

Good news: 32 million uninsured Americans will now have health insurance

Bad news: The majority of the rest of us still have to deal with crappy private insurers.

The health care reform bill passed last night. It doesn't do a whole hell of a lot for most of us and doesn't hurt the insurance companies as I had hoped it would. I suppose it's a step in the right direction and hopefully will spur more reform as well as rigorous regulations for private insurance companies who make tremendous profits off the suffering of millions of people.

Bart Stupak who championed against reform because he had claimed (and falsely so) that abortions would be covered, relented and voted for the bill. Stupack rose and said that forcing the abortion amendment to the bill would do nothing except deprive 32 million Americans of health care insurance. The good thing about the bill is just that. I'm glad that so many people will be able to seek medical help when they need it.

After Stupak spoke against the abortion amendment, an unidentified, chickenshit Republican called him "Baby killer!" loudly but refused to come forward after it was asked who said it.

Stupak also said, "The Democratic Party is pro-life; this bill is pro-life for millions of Americans... What you are advocating is a political trick to kill this bill... You are not for life – you are politicizing life."

The Republicans are always ready to dredge up a wedge issue when there is any type of measly bill out there that may indeed help a citizen (or in this case, millions of them) rather than a corporation.

Every single time I have the opportunity to speak to a Republican senator or congressman, I have asked him or her this question:

"When Republicans held all the power in all levels of government and the filibuster proof majority, which you did for many years, why didn't you ban abortions right there and then? You claim to have the support of the majority of Americans and yet, you have never introduced a bill that outright bans abortion."

As of yet, I have not received an adequate response from a Republican congresscritter, a right wing talking head or a so-called "pro-life" person who votes Republican all the way. I heard all sorts of blather about Democratic obstructionism and the like, but there were plenty of times that they could have done something to make abortions illegal as well as prosecute both the doctors who performed them and the women who sought the procedure.

This only proves that "pro-life" politicians do not care whether or not a woman gets an abortion at all. They simply want votes from people who do care and they enjoy using abortion as a wedge issue to stop any legislation that may be put forth which doesn't benefit them personally or the corporation that sponsored their election. It seems to me that Republicans wouldn't even have a voice in politics if it weren't for the wedge issues that they use so well.

Tonight's the Night!

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, tonight is the night when we see if the centerpiece of President Obama's domestic legislative agenda will succeed, or be sent down to defeat.

No matter what, this is the closest we've come to health care reform in over a hundred years. Quite an accomplishment, and it could have been done a lot faster had not Obama insisted on trying to accommodate the Republicans.

Yeah. About those Republicans.

The Tea Party 'astroturf' movement, quietly subsidized by various conservative leading lights and the GOP itself, has started to get uglier. Two leading African-American members of Congress were subjected to racist epithets, and one managed to scream "Kill the bill!" from the House gallery as debate began.

Yesterday, Rep. John Boehner (R-Coppertone) said that "Armageddon" would follow if the bill passed. You really have to love the apocalyptic language, which buys into the radical racist yahoo fringe of the Party and their fixed contention that Obama is the Antichrist.

I know he's not. He's far too nice.

Anyway, we'll know one way or the other by tomorrow.

Buckle up; it's going to be a bumpy night.

The House Republicans kept squealing that we needed to see what the Congressional Budget Office (a non-partisan beancounter group) had to say about the bill. In the past, the GOP has accepted the figures of the CBO as gospel. This bill? The CBO's assertion that it would lower the deficit was derided as an 'estimate.'

Bismarck famously said that laws are like sausages - you don't want to watch either being made, and in truth this has been one truly ugly process.

I just hope no one ends up dead. Considering the penchant of the teabaggers to scream about revolts and civil wars, not to mention wave guns around and make variously implicit and explicit threats of violence, I fear it's only a matter of time.

And if you thought this process was ugly, wait until you see the immigration reform.

I dare anyone to prove to me that the US is going to turn socialist in our lifetimes.

For anyone who doubts that the US is a fascist country or quickly becoming one, read this telling piece by Jim Hightower: Two Right-Wing Billionaire Brothers Are Remaking America for Their Own Benefit.

But if you're sick and tired of being poor and don't really care about anyone else, you might want to work for these guys... it seems like the right wing propaganda machine is being funded by the Koch's.

Oy vay.

I found this on a wing nut blog. I don't know if this is what most people who oppose health care reform believe will happen or not. There's nothing about forcing insurance companies to pay for these services with my dime in the bills. (Although I am shocked that wing nuts would consider open heart surgery or therapy to be so whimsical.) The insurance industry and big pharm have certainly done a bang up job with misleading PR and paying off the legislators. So far, from what I've read about the "reform", it isn't going to help me or my family at all. We will still be paying enormous premiums to private insurers who just about deny every claim we submit as well as sacking us with thousands upon thousands of dollars in out of pocket expenses for procedures that are not covered and huge co-pays for drugs.

I am most offended when I hear politicians claim that if the government runs health care insurance that we will have death panels. We already have death panels and there are 25 year old bimbos making $8/hour determining whether or not I should be treated for an ulcer. I have the NYS Attorney General's office working on a claim that has been repeatedly been denied by my insurance company. The bimbos who answer the phones won't even put me through to someone in charge. Maybe there's no one in charge?

Speaking of bad PR, I have gotten the impression lately from non-liberals that they believe the first thing we liberal women do when we get pregnant is have an abortion. I laughingly agree and then add that we libs deliberately get pregnant so we can have abortions... not only that, we wait til the 3rd trimester to do so. Then when their mouths are stuck open, I tell them that blue states actually have lower abortion rates than red states because we atheistic, liberal sluts use birth control, ya know. I can be such a bitch.

7th Anniversary of the Iraqi Holocaust

http://www.sott.net/articles/show/205119-Iraqi-Holocaust-Iraqi-Genocide-And-7th-Anniversary-Of-Invasion-Of-Iraq

Short and not so sweet

If you read the PDF fact check over at FDL concerning the so-called Health Care Reform POS, you should wonder why the Republicans are pretending to be sooo against this.


FDL's fact check on the Health Care Reform whatever...

From Huffington:
Boy Scouts may have kept "perversion files" that covered up ex abuses of scouts for years.


Didn't the SCOTUS say that the Boy Scouts could keep gays from becoming scouts? Guess they didn't consider scout leaders "Scouts." We'll see how this on goes.
And did you know that most local Boy Scout groups are sponsored by religious and church groups? Those brown shirts go way back, eh, John?

Obligatory Friday Sex Post - Support the Troops! Edition

see more Epic Fails

The True 'Death Panel'

The Preamble to the US Constitution states, among other things, that the people of the United States set up the Constitution in order to "promote the General Welfare."

If that isn't a ringing endorsement for the idea of health care reform, I'm not sure what is.

Now, to be certain, the health care reform bill before the Congress - either version - isn't perfect. It's more insurance reform than any attempt to create an actual health care plan along the lines of, say, Australia/Costa Rica/Germany/Canada/etc. But with insurance companies causing a lot of the ruckus with our health care system it's at least a start.

That doesn't sit well with Certain Serious People - and you can tell they're Serious because they have The Serious Look on their faces.

The Look that says "We're so sorry that you had to see this."

Surprisingly, most of the people having the Serious Look regarding health care reform are Republicans. Imagine that. These wonderful conservatives, who currently enjoy majorities in the Congress (at least, if you listen to Fox News they do) are complaining that the Nasty Evil (EVIL!) Democrats are trying to "ram" the bill "down our throats."

The bill - in both incarnations - has been hanging fire for months now, so long that the alternatives of reconciliation or 'deem and pass' have been bruited about in order to get the bugger to the President before Easter. 'Deem and pass' - sounds like a small defile in the Old West: "We'll head 'em off at Demon Pass, old geezer."

'Deem and pass' is a perfectly legal maneuver, by the way. It's been used a lot in the past 30 years, and a lot of those times the GOP's been in charge of the process.

Another point you keep hearing is that the USA has the best health care system in the world, extolling the quality of care while at the same time bemoaning the skyrocketing costs and massive disparity between those who have medical care and those who have to haunt emergency rooms. Cognitive dissonance used to be painful - guess you can get used to anything.

So the Party of Screw You (which used to be the Party of No, a/k/a the Republican Party) will not be any help, not that that's a great surprise. The GOP has voted largely en bloc in the negative since Obama was sworn in. Of course, that hasn't stopped Congresscritters (both Seniles and Reprehensibles) from boasting to their constituents about bringing them stimulus money that they voted against. Gotta love that bitter tang of hypocrisy.

In fact, the chief GOP Reprehensible, Rep. John "I'm An Orange Smurf!" Boehner and the top leadership of the Republican caucus managed to stand up on their hind legs and stop masturbating furiously to Sarah Palin / Michelle Bachmann slash fiction long enough to swear that they'll repeal the health care legislation if they regain control of the Congress.

That's why I'm calling the GOP - my Party, by the way - the Party of Screw You. That's what they want to do, you know. Bend you over and screw you, so long as they continue to line their pockets and those of the Upper One Percent of the economy. Rep. Patrick Ryan's GOP budget proposal (sort of a "Contract On America" redux) actually spells that out: if you make less than $20,000 a year, you get a tax break, and if you make more than $200,000 a year you make out like a thief. For those of you in the middle, myself included - we'd better get used to spending lots more on Preparation H.

Idaho Governor Butch Otter (Otter? So THAT'S where he went after Animal House!) has weighed in, saying that his state will sue the Federal Government if the bill passes, and the Mafia Don masquerading as Virginia's Attorney General is also making noises about it. Naturally, guess which Party these fools belong to?

That's right.

Of course, we've seen this before, with Medicare and with Social Security way back in the 30s. But once people get over the shock of the new (and we iron out the bugs in the bill; like I said earlier, it ain't perfect) things will settle down. According to the CBO, the program actually lowers costs and decreases the deficit.

Which brings me to the death panels, use of which term has reared its misshapen head again this week. The GOP started this crap, as usual - that there'll be a shadowy cabal of faceless bureaucrats who will arbitrarily decide who gets medical care and who doesn't.

News flash, people.

There already are death panels.

But they aren't faceless government bureaucrats.

They're faceless insurance company bureaucrats.

That's why we have to reform the system.

Meet the real Government Death Panel, folks (partial list only):

Senator Mitch McConnell
Senator Lindsay Graham
Senator Ben Nelson (token Democrat)
Senator Jim DeMint
Rep. John Boehner
Rep. Eric Cantor
Rep. Mike Pence
Rep. Michelle Bachmann
Gov. Butch Otter
Sarah Palin

St. Patrick's Day - Fox News Style

Fair ...



... and Balanced.



Erin go Bragh!

Same as in town...

It used to be that as a whore or gigolo, male or female, once your services were over, you got paid. Sometimes you negotiated a price beforehand, sometimes the fee was understood. The better you were at satisfying the customer the more you charged. Street walkers average 20 to 50 bucks for varying services to the clientele. Suburban visiting providers can charge upwards of a hundred. And of course there are the “pros” who service the important people, CEOs and talk show hosts. Thousands of dollars aren’t even worried about there.

But what about those who provide a service but don’t charge? Don't believe it? In fact, there is a group who would rather pay to be the proverbial whore. They complain that they’re being taken advantage of but still, after the fact, they gleefully hand over cash to the clients rather than accept anything for their act.

What is it about these “reverse prostitutes”? When people do this, some claim it’s because they have low self-esteem. Others suggest they simply enjoy the self deprivation, the masochistic pleasures. But I think it goes beyond that. I think it’s a product of their environment, their everyday life and their inability to cope due to a limited intellect. If they have less awareness of their existence, chances are they have very limited to no comprehension of how life works. Most just go on their merry way through life totally clueless as to why they do what they do. More, or maybe most probably don’t care so long as they can continue their petty survival in a world they may not be capable of understanding.
Constantly being treated as less than human by those above them, from the time they are very young, the only way to get attention is to prostrate themselves to the “haves” in the hopes someday, something may trickle down to them.

While laws are created to prevent such abuse, those above (the "haves") understand this tendency and take full advantage of it by finding loopholes. Today, many even flaunt the law openly. They are comfortable enough in their position that virtually nothing will be done to them.

The numbers of these reverse prostitutes, whores, trollops, tramps, doxies, hookers, bimbos or dozens of other monikers they go by, have increased tremendously over the last 60 years. By some estimates, we now have close to 300 million of these more than willing reverse whores. Sadly, those 300 million seem to enjoy getting screwed and can’t get enough of it. Even sadder is they don't care whether they pass this affliction to their kids.

Grayson: "Palin is the most-intelligent leader that the Republican Party has produced since George W. Bush"

I like Alan Grayson. He's running for congress in central Florida.

Brilliant commentary from his web site. You'll laugh. You'll cry. You'll agree.

On Friday night, Sarah Palin came to Orlando, and attacked Rep. Alan Grayson. This is what she said:

"I got to meet quite a few candidates who are lining up in a contested primary who want to take out Alan Grayson. And I think Alan Grayson -- what can you say about Alan Grayson? Piper is with me tonight, so I won't say anything about Alan Grayson that can't be said around children. [Good one, Sarah!] But thank you, Florida, for allowing candidates in a contested primary to duke it out over ideas and principles and values, all with the same goal, and that is unseating those who have such a disconnect from the people of America. That's what the goal is here in this race against Alan Grayson. Please fight hard, and do this for the rest of the country. Fight hard, and send a conservative to Washington, DC."

Palin, the former half-term Governor, current-nothing and future-even-less, charmed the all-Republican audience with her folksy folksiness and her homespun homespunnery. Atypically, Palin was wearing clothes that she had paid for herself. At the end of the event, she shared her recipe for mooseface pie.

In response to Palin's attack on Rep Grayson, Grayson actually complimented Palin. Grayson praised Palin for having a hand large enough to fit Grayson's entire name on it. He thanked Palin for alleviating the growing shortage of platitudes in Central Florida. Grayson added that Palin deserved credit for getting through the entire hour-long program without quitting. Grayson also said that Palin really had mastered Palin's imitation of Tina Fey imitating Palin.

Grayson observed that Palin is the most-intelligent leader that the Republican Party has produced since George W. Bush.

When asked to comment about what effect Palin's criticism might have, Grayson pointed out, "As the Knave's horse says in Alice in Wonderland, 'dogs will believe anything.'" Earlier, as the Orlando Sentinel reported, Grayson said, "I'm sure Palin knows all about politics in Central Florida, since from her porch she can see Winter Park," which is part of Grayson's district.

Grayson said that the Alaskan chillbilly was welcome to return to Central Florida anytime, as long as she brings lots of money with her, and spends it. "I look forward to an honest debate with Governor Palin on the issues, in the unlikely event that she ever learns anything about them," Grayson added, alluding to Politifact's "liar, liar, pants on fire" evaluation of much of what Palin has said .

Scientists are studying Sarah Palin's travel between Alaska and Florida carefully. They hope to learn more about the flight patterns of that elusive migratory species, the wild Alaskan dingbat.

Official Vatican Stance on Child Abuse- the crime is in reporting the crime

by blondesense liz

I cannot express adequately how very much I want the Roman Catholic Church to be exposed for all its hypocrisy and lies. So you'll just have to imagine.

According to "The Great Catholic Cover-Up- The pope's entire career has the stench of evil about it" by Christopher Hitchens it's revealed that when Ratzinger (Pope Benedict aka Joey Ratz) was the Vatican Inquisitor under Pope John Paul II, he deemed that the real crime when it came to child abuse was the reporting of the crime... not the crime itself. Well I guess I figured that out but just needed to read it.

"...In 2001, Pope John Paul II placed this department in charge of the investigation of child rape and torture by Catholic priests. In May of that year, Ratzinger issued a confidential letter to every bishop. In it, he reminded them of the extreme gravity of a certain crime. But that crime was the reporting of the rape and torture. The accusations, intoned Ratzinger, were only treatable within the church's own exclusive jurisdiction. Any sharing of the evidence with legal authorities or the press was utterly forbidden. Charges were to be investigated "in the most secretive way ... restrained by a perpetual silence ... and everyone ... is to observe the strictest secret which is commonly regarded as a secret of the Holy Office … under the penalty of excommunication." Nobody has yet been excommunicated for the rape and torture of children, but exposing the offense could get you into serious trouble. And this is the church that warns us against moral relativism! (See, for more on this appalling document, two reports in the London Observer of April 24, 2005, by Jamie Doward.)

I'd also like to see the Catholic nuns get slammed for all the emotional and psychological abuse they inflicted on millions of Catholic kids, but it would be much harder to prove.

Wow ... Just ... Wow.

First it was the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Now we have this. (h/t Pharyngula).

I'll nominate myself as First High Priest.

More From Big Brother

by blondesense liz

Newsweek: The Feds can track you via your cell phone.

It's not enough that they can access your credit card spending, bank account information and email content... no... not enough. They want to know more.

excerpt: "How many of the owners of the country's 277 million cell phones even know that companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint can track their devices in real time? Most "don't have a clue," says privacy advocate James X. Dempsey. The tracking is possible because either the phones have tiny GPS units inside or each phone call is routed through towers that can be used to pinpoint a phone's location to areas as small as a city block. This capability to trace ever more precise cell-phone locations has been spurred by a Federal Communications Commission rule designed to help police and other emergency officers during 911 calls. But the FBI and other law-enforcement outfits have been obtaining more and more records of cell-phone locations—without notifying the targets or getting judicial warrants establishing "probable cause," according to law-enforcement officials, court records, and telecommunication executives. (The Justice Department draws a distinction between cell-tower data and GPS information, according to a spokeswoman, and will often get warrants for the latter.)"

Happy Birthdays to my fellow Pisceans .....

February19 - March 20

But theres a temple on an island
I think of all the Gods and what they feel
You can only find them in the deepest silence
Ive got to get off of this big wheel

And Ill be swimming until I can find those waters
Thats the one unbounded ocean of bliss
Thats flowing through your parents, sons and daughters
But still an easy thing for us to miss

Blades go skimming through the water
I hear the coxon shouting his instructions about
With this crew oh, it could be a tall order
Have we time to sort all these things out ?

Sometimes my life it feels like fiction
Some of the days its really quite serene
Im a living proof of all lifes contradictions
One halfs going where the other halfs just been

And Im a Pisces fish and the river runs through my soul
Im a Pisces fish and the river runs through my soul
Im a Pisces fish and the river runs through my soul

-------------------------------------------------

My name is Sally O'Malley. I'm pleased to say I'm 50 years old...

Molly Shannon at her best.


So I'm a little over 50.

I think 50 is the perfect age to stop counting.

Texas Board of Education- Thomas Jefferson doesn't belong in history books

by blondesense liz
(humming the theme to Deliverance)

Remember all those futuristic movies where the government dictates everything you should read or think or believe? Texas is getting there quickly.

The board has been working on social studies of late and this is what they have come up with from THink PRogress

– To avoid exposing students to “transvestites, transsexuals and who knows what else,” the Board struck the curriculum’s reference to “sex and gender as social constructs.”

– The Board removed Thomas Jefferson from the Texas curriculum, “replacing him with religious right icon John Calvin.”

– The Board refused to require that “students learn that the Constitution prevents the U.S. government from promoting one religion over all others.”

– The Board struck the word “democratic” from the description of the U.S. government, instead terming it a “constitutional republic.”

From C&L, another summary about future Texas public school graduates:

• They don't know who Thomas Jefferson is and why he's significant, but they do known who John Calvin is and believe he was instrumental to the formation of our nation.
• 
  
• They believe the terms church and state are interchangeable.
• 
  
• They do not believe in evolution as fact, but are inclined to embrace creation theory or intelligent design as the explanation for how the universe came into existence.
• 
  
• They believe the right to bear arms is a first AND second amendment right granted by the Constitution. (see 11:12 entry)
• 
  
• They do not understand the term "democracy", but can define "constitutional Republic" and apply it to the American system of government.
• 
  
• They don't know that the United States Constitution bans placing one religion over others.
• 
  
• They can name at least three pro-free market factors contributing to European progress in medieval times.
  
• 
  
• They cannot define capitalism, but are completely familiar with the idea that taxation and government regulation inhibits free enterprise.
• 
  
• They ignore Hispanics and their role in various historical events in the United States, such as the Alamo.

Pray For A Liberal Today

by blondesense liz

I'd like to pray that liberals grow some balls and use them....

Meanwhile from the WaPo: Christian law firm issues Adopt a Liberal card to encourage targets of prayer

Attention, Californians: Your governor has just been adopted. Next up: your bleeding-heart senator, Barbara Boxer, and not far behind Boxer, her Senate colleague Dianne Feinstein.

Not by a new set of parents, mind you, but rather an army of conservative prayer warriors committed to restoring "poor leaders to right thinking."

The Republican governor's alleged sins? Supporting abortion funding, "imposing same-sex 'marriage' " on the Golden State and allowing "out-of-control liberal spending." Boxer, a Democrat, is cited as a "radical environmentalist" and as embracing "ultraliberal" positions. Feinstein, also a Democrat, "encourages closing Guantanamo" and shipping terrorist suspects to her home state.

And we haven't even mentioned the views of San Francisco's Nancy Pelosi, another Democrat and the speaker of the U.S. House. Or Oprah Winfrey's sit-down with a transgender man who had a baby, Hillary Clinton's support of global abortion rights, Warren Buffet's "open marriage" or New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's support of gun control.

For the Christian law firm Liberty Counsel, the new Adopt a Liberal trading cards puts the power of prayer -- quite literally -- in the palm of conservatives' hands.

...

Now, for $20, you can shuffle through a collection of liberals, including former vice president Al Gore, HBO's Bill Maher, Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington and the now-Democratic Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.


The 51 standing in the need of prayer include the president, who is identified as "Barack Hussein Obama," White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.), Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), actress Anne Hathaway, documentary filmmaker Michael Moore and MSNBC pundits Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow.

Just four of the 51 are known Republicans: Schwarzenegger, Maine's U.S. senators (Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins), and Senate candidate Mark Kirk of Illinois, who is misidentified as already an elected senator.

(Christ Matthews? Get outta here.)

Wow. I wonder what religion these prayerful people belong to? Can't wait to see if it works. But I'm not sure exactly what they're praying for... that these so called liberals harden their hearts?

What other liberals should be adopted?

What constitutes "having sex?

by blondesense liz

What constitutes "having sex?

According to a latest Kinsey study which was from Indiana, most people would say that actual intercourse between a man and a woman is "having sex", but after that, responses vary. The only group that thought sexual intercourse where a man is wearing a condom was not "Having sex" were males over 65.

Many people don't consider oral sex as actually "having sex." If your spouse has oral sex with someone else, then it's having sex. If you have oral sex with someone other than your spouse, then it doesn't count. If Bill Clinton even looks at you, it's "having sex."

Where I come from, having sex means you had sexual intercourse. Everything else is either foreplay or messing around. That's Catholic school upbringing. Of course we didn't have sex or foreplay or mess around until long after we were married.

Here are the stories
Study: Adults Can't Agree What 'Sex' Means

You call that having sex? by Mark Morford

Weird Science wonders whether or not it was sex

Time to replace the Uncle Sam "I Want You" with this.....

Courtesy of Project For The Old American Century

If you threaten Elton John You're a Terrorist. If you threaten Nancy Pelosi, you are not

by blondesense liz

Do you remember this guy, Neal Horsley of Georgia who founded the Creator's Rights Party and said on a television interview that his first love was an actual mule? Well anyway, he was arrested for making terrorist threats for posting a video on the internet holding a sign that said "Elton John must die". Why?

Horsley was upset that John, who is gay, told Parade magazine in an interview last month that he thought Jesus was a "compassionate, super-intelligent gay man who understood human problems."

Make no bones about it, the guy is a lunatic. But how come he gets arrested for threatening Elton John on a you tube video while each and every day the corporate news media gets away with inciting violence against Pelosi, Reid, Obama, et al? Why is that not terrorism then? It's definitely sedition. When did sedition not become a crime? How do we define terrorism these days? I Must have missed the change in the dictionary.

hat tip to Peter of Lone Tree

It's the Wild West All Over Again

by blondesense liz

I watched this on BBC World News last night and it was alarming. The US is going bonkers. We are fostering a culture of fear and loathing. Or maybe it always was and I just wasn't paying attention.

The story is about Wisconsin where there is a movement called "Open Carry" and folks are wearing holsters everywhere they go. They interviewed a couple in a supermarket who were openly packing heat. The female said that she feels since she openly carries a gun that anyone who wishes to harm her while she's walking in a parking lot or street will probably not do so.

The following is just my opinion. I could be wrong:

I ask you, what kind of crime laden city does she live in where people are afraid of being gunned down or attacked? Why does she feel that she is such a target? Does she go around deliberately pissing people off? Is Wisconsin so dangerous? Maybe they need a better police force. I don't know.. And what kind of world are we living in that we can only co-exist if we're armed?

The movement wants to make it so that in the future, no one will think twice when they see someone walking around wearing a gun holster... they want it to be the typical American way!!! Wasn't that the typical American way when people were ravaging Indians and each other on the westward expansion? HFS. I'm askeered of people in this country.


It must be media like Faux News that is giving Americans the impression that it is so dangerous here. Or maybe it's because they are flaming racists and terrified of Obama. Or maybe the politicians are getting so much kickback from the NRA that they are pushing through all these laws to make it even easier to own guns.

In previous posts over the years, I mentioned that I live in NY where there is so much gun control that we mostly don't have guns, let alone carry them around. (If the supreme court makes it so that states can't decide whether or not to control guns, I really can't even imagine most of my neighbors running to the store to buy some.)

I am also of the opinion that since we are so crowded in downstate NY and the NYC metropolitan area, that it's a good thing we're not armed or it would be a bloodbath. Seriously, we're on top of each other and always bumping in to each other. A simple flip of a bird or a passionate "fuck you" is about as violent as anyone gets... or we hire lawyers and sue the pants off ya. Quite civilized, don't you think? (If I'm not mistaken, most of the violent crimes here happen between people who know each other or over drugs which if were legalized would probably put an end to that. The crime rate here is pretty low compared to the rest of the country, but then again NY is a police state and we are always being monitored.)

Do you think openly packing heat is a good idea? Is it that dangerous here?

Says it all

"God watching the 24 hour news cycle and deciding he is an atheist."

hat tip to Lisa Ranger

Kinks- Don't Forget To Dance

A musical interlude



I recently saw Ray Davies perform at the Westbury Music Fair (or whatever corporate name they are calling it these days, I lost track). He has still got it at 65 years old. I used to rock my son to sleep to this song when he was a baby.

We shouldn't forget to dance.


I have to add this song just for the hell of it, "Money and Corruption" from the Kinks- Preservation Act I. It's just sooooooo right on.



lyrics are here. Brilliant.

Words fail...

We all make fun of Beck; crazy, insane, unbalanced. But this may be the absolutely indescribable piece of loon that's come along since the Catholic Church defended Inquisitions.
It would be an injustice to post a snippet. This has to be read to be enjoyed.

Secret Messages from Woody Guthrie

Lush Bimbo Is Really A Socialist

by blondesense liz

One of the biggest lying hypocrites in the world, Lush Bimbo, recently told his listeners that if healthcare reform passed in the US, he'd flee to Costa Rica. I was hoping that it would pass so he would leave. But wait a minute. I want to go there. NOW!

Interesting that he should pick Costa Rica since their values are anything but the regressive conservative values that he claims to embrace and promote so vehemently on the free public (socialist) airwaves in the US convincing millions of listeners that they should always vote against their own best interests.

I just learned a few things from Limbaugh endorses socialist paradise at A World Of Progress

There is socialized medicine in Costa Rica- cradle to grave-- the kind where your doctor literally works for the government. If something like happened here, he'd be apoplectic, but he'd be happy to jump on the gravy train in another country. They must have death panels if the government runs healthcare too. Right?

The literacy rate in Costa Rica is 97%. It is THE highest in the world. Everyone goes to college and even grad school on the government's dime. It's in their constitution.

There is NO military in Costa Rica. It's in their constitution.

It's the greenest country in the world. They believe in global warming and are doing something about it.

Economy? Co-ops. Everyone benefits.

There are over a dozen political parties (unlike in the US where there is one which goes by 2 names). Several have the word “socialist” or “communist” in the title!

They don't speak English and probably wouldn't understand his lardness when he tries to explain to them that their lives suck.

So Lush Bimbo freely admitted on the air that he indeed endorses socialism and wants it for himself but not for his listeners. Of course, his listeners probably didn't bother to look up Costa Rica on Google to see just how full of shit their leader is.