Disgusting people say disgusting things

Somehow, we've gotten to the point where public figures seem to be engaged in a competition to see who can say the most disgusting thing. In a sane society, the only two possible responses to people like Ted Nugent or Micheal Savage would be a) "Oh, that poor man has clearly lost his mind. He should be institutionalized." or b) "Let us all shun this vile bag of ass and drive him from our society. Let him spend his days wandering from town to town being pelted with scorn and contempt."
But of course, this is no longer a sane society so these people are given a forum to spew their filth and then treated with respect by prominent political figures.




So a couple truly disgusting things said by disgusting people caught my eye the last few days.

Thing #1:

Nugent: Obama is responsible for veteran suicide

 “Twenty to 25 of those guys kill themselves every day, and they haven’t told you why and they haven’t told anybody else why but they told me why: because the commander in chief is the enemy.”

How dare you?
Have you really no shame?
Not the tiniest shred of human decency?
You're going to use the tragedy of veteran suicides as an opportunity to score some cheap political, um, I was going to say "point," but there really isn't even any point being made. It's just a cheap shabby insult made using the suicides of men whose service to their nation left them damaged to the point of despair as the set-up for your shameful punchline.

There are any number of reasons that people commit suicide. And for returning veterans, there are all the reasons the rest of the population has compounded with PTSD, serious brain injuries, having seen unspeakable horrors, survivor's guilt, etc etc etc. But no one has ever committed suicide because of who is the President. That's just fucking stupid. And it's disgraceful, indecent and beneath contempt.

Also, it's a fucking lie. No veterans are coming to you, washed-up 70's musician Ted Nugent, and explaining to you the reasons why they are planning on committing suicide. If they were, and you weren't preventing it, you would be an even worse scumbag than you already are. And that hardly seems possible.

Thing #2:

Micheal Savage said this on the public airwaves recently:

“The white man is a quiet man and a peaceful man,” Savage said, “and right now the white man is very, very quiet, and very, very peaceful, and like many dictators before him, Barack Obama thinks the white man will remain quiet and subdued forever. Hitler made that mistake; Hitler boasted that his supermen, his Hitler Youth, would easily wipe the floor with the GI Joes that were being sent over…. But it was the white man who defeated Superman in World War II. Let me tell you something else, you push the white man only so far, you’re going to have a reaction like you’ve never seen.”

Jeezus, didn't these people used to at least try to veil their racism? Also, if you're going to assume the mantle of white supremacy, which you clearly are, it doesn't make a lot of sense to compare the other guy to Adolph Fucking Hitler.

And you're really going to pretend that Hitler's Ubermenschen weren't  also white men? White men get the credit for defeating the Nazis, but somehow don't get the blame for BEING the Nazis?

And when has the white man ever been quiet and peaceful?
When he was colonizing Asia and Africa?
When he was forging a new nation built on the twin evils of slavery and genocide?
Maybe when he was shooting up a college town because girls didn't want to date him?

Maybe when the continent of Europe was soaked in blood for a couple centuries because various groups of whire men couldn't agree on which version of Jesus to follow?

Or maybe it was when he murdered several million Jews, Roma, and anyone else who didn't fit his image of what a perfect white man should be?

Pictured: quiet men of peace.

Yes, white men are currently very very quiet and subdued. Unless their favorite team loses a basketball game.

Or they encounter an unarmed black teenager.

We have a new leader

In the race for the coveted title "biggest right-wing asshole on the planet," wily veteran George Will has just surged into the lead!

George Will: Progressivism Made Rape Victim ‘Coveted Status’ with ‘Privileges

I just . . . I don't even. . . I mean I can't  ---- I'm just trying to even figure out what the logic is supposed to be here.

So here's the opening thesis of his latest stupid, awful column:

Colleges and universities are being educated by Washington and are finding the experience excruciating. They are learning that when they say campus victimizations are ubiquitous (“micro-aggressions,” often not discernible to the untutored eye, are everywhere), and that when they make victimhood a coveted status that confers privileges, victims proliferate. 

Um, okay. . . I suppose maybe that could in theory be true. If "victimhood" was to somehow become a coveted status that would somehow confer some sort of privilege,  I guess maybe you would have people coming out of the woodwork to claim that status, but since that isn't actually a thing that has ever happened anywhere ever, I'm not sure it's a particularly relevant point.

And academia’s progressivism has rendered it intellectually defenseless now that progressivism’s achievement, the regulatory state, has decided it is academia’s turn to be broken to government’s saddle.

Okay, well first of all, for those of us who are not right-wing assholes, the term "regulatory state" doesn't really resonate as such a frightening boogeyman as it does for you.

 

Aieeee! Regulations!

Those of us who are normal people realize that that "regulatory state" is what gives us a reasonable amount of confidence that our breakfast won't give us e-coli, or that the plane we're on won't plummet from the sky,  or that our new house won't collapse around our ears.

Also, the rest of that sentence also makes no sense. 

Consider the supposed campus epidemic of rape, a.k.a. “sexual assault.”

Okay, first of all, fuck you for putting quotes around the phrase sexual assault as if it were some sort of fictional thing to be dismissed out of hand. Second rape is not "a.k.a." sexual assault. Sexual assault can be anything from unwanted groping to  unwanted kissing to actual full-on rape. And where do you get off with the "supposed epidemic" shit?  Because every statistic I've seen indicates that this epidemic is all too real. Also, fuck you.

Herewith, a Philadelphia magazine report about Swarthmore College, where in 2013 a student “was in her room with a guy with whom she’d been hooking up for three months”: “They’d now decided — mutually, she thought — just to be friends. When he ended up falling asleep on her bed, she changed into pajamas and climbed in next to him. Soon, he was putting his arm around her and taking off her clothes. ‘I basically said, “No, I don’t want to have sex with you.” And then he said, “OK, that’s fine” and stopped. . . . And then he started again a few minutes later, taking off my panties, taking off his boxers. I just kind of laid there and didn’t do anything — I had already said no. I was just tired and wanted to go to bed. I let him finish. I pulled my panties back on and went to sleep.’”

Okay, that sounds like a pretty straight-forward description of a rape. certainly not the most horrific account, but still, she said no and he fucked her anyway. Kind of the dictionary definition of rape, isn't it?

 Six weeks later, the woman reported that she had been raped. Now the Obama administration is riding to the rescue of “sexual assault” victims. It vows to excavate equities from the ambiguities of the hookup culture, this cocktail of hormones, alcohol and the faux sophistication of today’s prolonged adolescence of especially privileged young adults.

Um, are you saying that because this woman reported her rape, that is why the Obama administration has decided to get involved? And how exactly is the administration proposing to "excavate equities from the ambiguities of the hookup culture?" Because there really don't seem to be a lot of ambiguities here. She either says yes or she says no. Only a right-wing asshole rape-apologist would try to read any ambiguity into a simple yes or no response.

 The administration’s crucial and contradictory statistics are validated the usual way, by official repetition; Joe Biden has been heard from. The statistics are: One in five women is sexually assaulted while in college, and only 12 percent of assaults are reported.  Simple arithmetic demonstrates that if the 12 percent reporting rate is correct, the 20 percent assault rate is preposterous.

How? how does arithmetic demonstrate that? The percentage of assaults reported has no bearing on the number of assaults that occur. 

 Mark Perry of the American Enterprise Institute notes, for example, that in the four years 2009 to 2012 there were 98 reported sexual assaults at Ohio State. That would be 12 percent of 817 total out of a female student population of approximately 28,000, for a sexual assault rate of approximately 2.9 percent — too high but nowhere near 20 percent.

Oh, well, the American Enterprise Institute, that bastion of honesty! Well then, I guess we can just go ahead and ignore the CDC's report that  "in a study of undergraduate women, 19% experienced attempted or completed sexual assault since entering college."  Because what the hell do they know, compared to the American Enterprise Institute, and their analysis of ONE entire college!

 Also, let's pretend for a minute that your guy at the American Institute of Right-Wing Assholery is right about the statistics being off. How much sexual assault is acceptable? If it's less than 20% should nothing be done? How many women being assaulted are you okay with, because for those of us outside the right-wing asshole bubble, it's generally zero.

 Combine this with capacious definitions of sexual assault that can include not only forcible sexual penetration but also nonconsensual touching. 

Right. Non-consensual touching. Why do you have a problem with that being included? It's like complaining that the non-sexual assault statutes include not only beating with clubs, but even non-consensual punching!

 

Totally shouldn't even count! The guy's not even dead!

 

 Then add the doctrine that the consent of a female who has been drinking might not protect a male from being found guilty of rape. Then comes costly litigation against institutions that have denied due process to males they accuse of what society considers serious felonies.

 
 
Yes, "society." "Society" considers sexual assault to be a serious crime. George Will apparently doesn't, but "society" does. Hey, George, another term for "society" is "all decent human beings."

 Meanwhile, the newest campus idea for preventing victimizations — an idea certain to multiply claims of them — is “trigger warnings.” They would be placed on assigned readings or announced before lectures. Otherwise, traumas could be triggered in students whose tender sensibilities would be lacerated by unexpected encounters with racism, sexism, violence (dammit, Hamlet, put down that sword!) or any other facet of reality that might violate a student’s entitlement to serenity.

 And why would anyone have any objection to this? No one is saying you can't assign Hamlet or Huck Finn. No one says you can't discuss the rape of Nan King. Just that before you do, it's just kind of a decent thing to say "hey, before we start, just a little warning that  the subject matter may be offensive to some of you, Huck uses the N-word a lot." 

This entitlement has already bred campus speech codes that punish unpopular speech. Now the codes are begetting the soft censorship of trigger warnings to swaddle students in a “safe,” “supportive,” “unthreatening” environment, intellectual comfort for the intellectually dormant.

Soft censorship?



 How is that censorship? Censorship is a professor saying "I was going to discuss  the holocaust, but I'm not allowed to talk about it." Trigger warnings means the professor says "Fair warning, we're going to be discussing the holocaust today." It's not even similar.

 It is salutary that academia, with its adversarial stance toward limited government and cultural common sense, is making itself ludicrous

You don't find it just a teensy bit ironic that someone who uses words like "salutary" "adversarial" and "ludicrous" is down on academia? 
Well, maybe not so much ironic as intellectually dishonest, or mendacious. Even prevaricative. (see, I can use big words, too. Doesn't make me any more correct.)

 What government is inflicting on colleges and universities, and what they are inflicting on themselves, diminishes their autonomy, resources, prestige and comity. Which serves them right. They have asked for this by asking for progressivism. 

Yeah, serves them right! Now they're gonna have, um. . . less sexual assault? I guess?
 Um, that'll teach 'em?

Fixing Sean Hannity's Sickening Interview With Murderer George Zimmerman.

Transcript of Sean Hannity's Interview with Murderer George Zimmerman from FOX website with questiuons Hannity should have asked inserted by me:




HANNITY: A lot of time has passed since this incident with Trayvon. How do you feel about it now that you have had some time to reflect on what has happened?
GEORGE ZIMMERMAN: I haven't really had the time to reflect on it.

ME: You haven't had time? You killed someone. How can you think about anything else? What could possibly be keeping you so busy that you haven't had time to reflect on the signature event of your life thus far?

GEORGE ZIMMERMAN: I haven't really had the time to reflect on it. When I was in jail, obviously I was in solitary confinement and I had a lot of time to think and reflect.

ME: so, we're one question in and already you've lied? Because you just said that you hadn't had time to reflect. That was ONE FUCKING SENTENCE AGO!

GEORGE ZIMMERMAN: I haven't really had the time to reflect on it. When I was in jail, obviously I was in solitary confinement and I had a lot of time to think and reflect. I just think it's a tragic situation, and I hope it's the most difficult thing I'll ever go through in my life.

ME: Oh, yeah. I sure would hope that YOU never have to go through anything this difficult again. This must be really tough for YOU. I mean, sure Trayvon's mother and father and his friends and his girlfriend, they're probably going through some tough times right now, but YOU - YOU are obviously having a real difficult time.

HANNITY: Let's start at the beginning.

ZIMMERMAN: I was going to Target to do my weekly grocery shopping. Sunday nights was the only nights -- well, Sunday after we mentored the kids, we would always go grocery shopping

ME: Stop! Stop right there. No one cares if you were mentoring kids. You don't get to weigh the kids you've supposedly helped against the one you murdered and think that you can deduct that from your guilt. Also, who the fuck does their grocery shopping at Target? Who does that?  What, do you live on Froot Loops and Pepsi?

HANNITY: We all have heard the 911 call. On that 911 call, you had mentioned that there had been a number of break-ins in the neighborhood.
ZIMMERMAN: Yes, sir.
HANNITY: Why were you a community watch person? How long were you involved in that and why did you become a community watch person?

ME: Sorry to interrupt, Sean, but George Zimmerman was NOT a community watch person. He never joined any community watch group. Community watch persons do not carry guns. Vigilantes do, but not community watch persons. One does not get to just declare oneself a community watch person. It's not like calling yourself a "journalist."

ZIMMERMAN: In August of 2011, there was a home invasion. A young lady was home with her nine-month-old baby, and they broke into her sliding glass door. She barricaded herself in the upstairs bedroom. And my wife was home by herself, and she saw the people that burglarized her run through our backyard with their belongings. And even though my wife wasn't certain what happened, that was enough to scare her and shake her up. And I promised her I would do what I could to keep her safe.

ME: wouldn't a better way to keep her safe be to stay home with her? Or give her the gun when you go out? Running around the neighborhood playing cops and robbers seems like a terribly inefficient way of keeping your wife safe. While you're out shooting unaremd teenagers, who knows how many criminals could be breaking in to your house where your poor wife sits alone and gunless?

HANNITY: Now, your gun was legal. You had a legal weapon in the state of Florida.
ZIMMERMAN: Yes, sir.

ME: Is there such a thing as a not-legal weapon in the state of Florida?

HANNITY: Why did you feel the need to carry a gun? A lot of people maybe have a weapon inside their home, but you decided to carry yours. Why did you think it was necessary to have a weapon with you? And did you carry it at all times?
ZIMMERMAN: I carried it at all times except for when I went to work.

ME: Sorry, that's not even close to an answer. The question was "why carry the gun?" Your answer can't be "I carry it a lot." I'm sure Sean will want to ask you a follow-up question. . . . No? Really? 

HANNITY: A lot of this case legally -- and we are going to get to Mark in a few minutes here and ask him about a lot of legal aspects, because there are so many of them in this case -- has to do with stand your ground. You have heard a lot about it. And I was just curious, prior to this night, this incident, had you even heard stand your ground?
ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.
HANNITY: You have never heard about it before?
ZIMMERMAN: No

ME: Oh, come on! Seriously? You'd never heard of stand your ground? I live in Georgia and I've heard about it. I don't own a gun and I've heard about it. You're telling me that a gun-nut in Florida doesn't know about Florida's gun-nut law? 

 

HANNITY: Well. Now, on -- it was very interesting, in the 911 call that everybody has heard, you said that all of a sudden you found somebody who looked suspicious, he may be on drugs. That was one of the earlier comments that you made in that 911 call. What made you think he was suspicious, and what made you think that he might be on drugs?
ZIMMERMAN: I felt he was suspicious because it was raining.

ME: Raining? Is that slang for black?

ZIMMERMAN: I felt he was suspicious because it was raining. He was in-between houses, cutting in-between houses, and he was walking very leisurely for the weather. 

 

ME: Yeah, it was raining. Hence the "hoodie."

 

ZIMMERMAN: I felt he was suspicious because it was raining. He was in-between houses, cutting in-between houses, and he was walking very leisurely for the weather. I -- it didn't look like he was a resident that went to check their mail and got caught in the rain and was hurrying back home. He didn't look like a fitness fanatic that would train in the rain

ME: So, it was his gait? He wasn't walking fast enough for your liking so you figured he was on drugs? And how is he walking leisurely and also cutting in between houses. Cutting in-between houses sounds to me like he was in a hurry to get home.

 

HANNITY: Yes. You said he started from almost the beginning in that 911 call, you said he came towards you, and he seemed to reach for something in his waistband. Did you think that was a gun?
ZIMMERMAN: I thought he was just trying to intimidate me.

ME: You said in the 911 call that you were going to follow him and that these guys "always get away." How could you follow him if he was coming towards you? And if he was coming towards you, why would you be concerned about him getting away? 

HANNITY: You said in that tape something's wrong with him, he's checking me out. I don't know what his deal was. So it's almost from the very beginning you felt -- are you saying on that 911 tape that you felt threatened at that moment when you said that to the dispatch?
ZIMMERMAN: No, not particularly.

ME: Of course he didn't feel threatened, Sean you moron. He was the one with the gun! And if he had felt threatened, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't have decided to follow the kid. 

Have you actually read the 911 transcript? Because I just Googled it, and right after he says  "I don't know what his deal is," he says

He’s running. [2:08]
911 dispatcher:
He’s running? Which way is he running?
Zimmerman:
Down toward the other entrance of the neighborhood. [2:14]

So how could Zimmerman possibly feel threatened by someone who is running away from him?
 

HANNITY: You said he's running.
ZIMMERMAN: Yes. He was like skipping, going away quickly. But he wasn't running out of fea

ME: Skipping? He was skipping? Isn't skipping like the least threatening thing a person could do? Isn't skipping usually the province of little girls with pigtails? Can you at least make up your mind whether he was a big scary thug or someone who skips away in the rain?

 

Call 911!

HANNITY: . . . Let me ask you this. At that point, we can hear the unbuckling of the seatbelt, hear you opening the car door, and this dispatch asked you at that point. . . "are you following him?" And you said yes. Explain that.
ZIMMERMAN: I meant that I was going in the same direction as him

ME: Oh my God, we know what "following" means! Even Hannity knows what the word "following" neans! I think he's asking you to explain WHY you were following Trayvon Martin!

____________________________________________________________________________

Aaaanyway, the interview continues in this vein for a while with Hannity not playing the role of the interviewer so much as the role of the sleazy Law & Order defense attorney prepping his client for testimony. 

Then comes the most shocking part of the interview:

HANNITY: Is there anything you regret? Do you regret getting out of the car to follow Trayvon that night?
ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.
HANNITY: Do you regret that you had a gun that night?
ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.

ME: WHAT? How the Hell can you not regret anything? You killed another human being! Even if you really really feel like you were justified in killing an unarmed teenager who wasn't doing anything wrong, how does having killed him not haunt you? What kind of a monster are you?

HANNITY: Do you feel you wouldn't be here for this interview if you didn't have that gun?
ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.

ME: Then you're lying! Because you've been claiming that the only thing that stopped this skinny kid, whom you outweigh by about 50 lbs, from repeatedly bashing your head against the pavement was you shooting him. If that's not alie, then then you would definitely not be here without the gun. So you're either lying about what happened (duh!) or you're just a goddamm idiot! Look, Sean's even going to try to help you:

HANNITY: Do you feel you wouldn't be here for this interview if you didn't have that gun?
ZIMMERMAN: No, sir.
HANNITY: You feel you would not be here?
ZIMMERMAN: I feel it was all God's plan and for me to second guess it or judge it --

ME: God's plan?!?! God's plan was for you to shoot some kid dead for no good reason? How could that be God's plan? I'm glad I'm not there in the studio, because There's gonna be some lightning headed your way. Or at least a defamation suit.

 

Hey, where am I going to find a Lawyer?

 

Anyway, to sum up: Zimmerman is a murderer who shows absolutely zero remorse, Sean Hannity is fuck-awful at his job and at being a human being, and if all else fails, blame God!

I'm kidding, I'm kidding!

Know How I Know?

 1) Know how I know that Anthony Weiner is innocent?

Because Andrew Breitbart is involved.

In the same way that if Hugh Heffner is involved with something, it's going to involve naked women, if Andrew Breitbart is involved, it's a dishonest slander. Not that that's going to keep CNN from having him on and pretending he hasn't been shown over and over again to be a baldfaced liar. Damn liberal media!




Honest to God, how does the coversation in the newsroom not go something like:
"Hey, a congressman is involved in some sort of dong-related scandal!"

"Oh, that could be big news, who's the source?"

"Oh, it's Breitbart, never mind."

You might as well report stories form The Onion. At least there's an off-chance that they might accidentally be true.
But no, you bring this pile of sleaze onto your show to spout even more scurrilous allegations about Rep. Weiner supposedly having "relationships with young women?"

Also: This guy?


This guy is getting lots of young women? This guy? Really?

2) Know how I know that Gov. Rick Perry has ZERO chance of ever being president?

Because Bill Kristol thinks he would be "formidable."



Remember the last wingnut governor that Kristol thought would be a powerful national political force?



How'd that work out again?

 

Oy. Don't remind me!

Oh, and also this:

“If [Hillary Clinton] gets a race against John Edwards and Barack Obama, she’s going to be the nominee. Gore is the only threat to her, then. … Barack Obama is not going to beat Hillary Clinton in a single Democratic primary. I’ll predict that right now.” —William Kristol, Fox News Sunday, Dec. 17, 2006

So, even if Gov. Perry hadn't flirted with the idea of secession, even if he hadn't done this:

Texas, which may balance its budget by firing thousands of teachers, plans to commit $25 million in state funds to Formula One auto racing each year for a decade.

Even if he didn't look like this:




He would still have no chance just because the laws of nature dictate that anything coming from the mouth of William Kristol is necessarily  going to be incorrect. If God Himself had planned on making Rick Perry president, he would have to change his plans after hearing William Kristol put his stink on Perry.

 

Kristol said "formidable?"

Augh, now I have to send Perry to a crushing, humiliating defeat!

Teabaggers In Action -- Michigan Edition

When I first heard about Michigan Governor Rick Snyder's "Financial Martial Law" , I thought there was no way they would actually try to use it. I figured they'd use it as a threat to get municipalities to do what they wanted, threaten to take them over if they didn't fall in line, but there was no way they would actually do it, mainly because I can't imagine this law surviving a challenge in the courts.

I'm so naive.

(from http://peoplesworld.org)

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. - In one of his first acts under the new Emergency Financial Management law, which critics have described as a financial dictator law, Michigan's Republican Gov. Rick Snyder stripped the people of Benton Harbor, Mich., of their voting rights and their elected officials last week.

 

Benton Harbor Emergency Manager Joseph Harris took over Benton Harbor's finances last year, but under new powers granted to Gov. Snyder by the Republican-controlled state legislature, Harris has claimed unprecedented authority.
Appointed to takeover the predominantly working-class, African American city, Harris seized control over the duties and responsibilities held by Benton Harbor's elected officials, its commissions, and its financial resources.

I'm waiting to see how many teabaggers show up to protest against this particular bit of tyranny.  Hmm, none yet. Still waiting. . .Oh, here come a couple!

 

No, they think healthcare reform is tyranny, an entire city being ruled by one man with virtually un-checked power? That's apparently fine, I guess.

Oh, what about her?

  

No, she's upset that elected officials tried to govern according to the principle of majority rule.

So no, no teabaggers seem to be at all concerned about this gross overreach of power by Michigan's scumbag governor. 

So why did Snyder decide he had to take over the city of Benton Harbor?

MSNBC's Rachel Maddow reported that Snyder's emergency powers law allowed Harris to take the city's attractive lakefront public land and give it to a group known as Harbor Shores, which has been linked to the local Rep. Fred Upton, a high-ranking Republican leader in the House of Representatives.

Basically, it seems that they want to seize the town's public beach and give it to a developer to build a private golf course/housing tract. Watch the clip from the Rachel Maddow Show below for the full story. 

 So, yeah, congratulations teabaggers of Michigan! This is the guy you put in charge! Way to go.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I Guess I Had A Pretty Good Year in 2010

Because I paid more taxes than General Fucking Electric.

And so did you, assuming you paid more than zero.

(from the NY Times)

G.E.’s Strategies Let It Avoid Taxes Altogether

By DAVID KOCIENIEWSKI

Published: March 24, 2011 

The company reported worldwide profits of $14.2 billion, and said $5.1 billion of the total came from its operations in the United States.
Its American tax bill? None. In fact, G.E. claimed a tax benefit of $3.2 billion.

 

Where's an angry mob when you need one?

 How much money does GE get from government contracts? How much do they get paid to build weapons to knock down Iraq, and how much are they getting paid to participate in Iraq's "reconstruction?" I don't know, I don't have time to research it, but obviously, it's way too much. If this company is unwilling to pay a cent towards making the US a strong nation, why the hell should it get to profit off of us?

Its extraordinary success is based on an aggressive strategy that mixes fierce lobbying for tax breaks and innovative accounting that enables it to concentrate its profits offshore.

And yet, according to Think Progress:

This year, 14 unions representing more than 15,000 workers will negotiate a new master contract with General Electric. Among the major concessions GE has signaled that it will ask of union workers is the elimination of a defined contribution benefit pension for new employees, a move the company has already implemented for its non-union salaried employees. Likewise, GE is signaling to the union that it will ask for the elimination of current health insurance plans in favor of lower quality health saving accounts, a move the company has already implemented for non-union salaried employees as well.

In addition, General Electric may ask some workers for a wage freeze. Since the recession began in 2007, GE threatened to close plants in Schenectady, NY and Louisville, KY unless workers took wage concessions and adopted two-tier wage structure.

Otherwise, how could they afford to pay all those accountants and lawyers to help them cheat on their taxes?

G.E.’s giant tax department, led by a bow-tied former Treasury official named John Samuels, is often referred to as the world’s best tax law firm. Indeed, the company’s slogan “Imagination at Work” fits this department well. The team includes former officials not just from the Treasury, but also from the I.R.S. and virtually all the tax-writing committees in Congress.

Oh, and it's probably going to get worse:

Such strategies, as well as changes in tax laws that encouraged some businesses and professionals to file as individuals, have pushed down the corporate share of the nation’s tax receipts — from 30 percent of all federal revenue in the mid-1950s to 6.6 percent in 2009.
Yet many companies say the current level is so high it hobbles them in competing with foreign rivals. Even as the government faces a mounting budget deficit, the talk in Washington is about lower rates. President Obama has said he is considering an overhaul of the corporate tax system, with an eye to lowering the top rate.

Oh, boy! Hope and Change!

And Jeff Immelt, the CEO of GE, the man whose company stiffs the taxpayers while screwing its workers? That guy? He's the chairman of the president's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.

 

You're doing a heck of a job, Jeffie!

William Kristol Is Disgusting



This is the opening line from Kristol's column:

And so, despite his doubts and dithering, President Obama is taking us to war in another Muslim country. Good for him..

And he's not being sarcastic.

The president didn’t want this. He’s been so unhappy about such a possibility—so fearful of such an eventuality—that first he tied himself in knots trying to do nothing.

What a dick, trying to avoid additional bloodshed!

Then he decided that, if he had to act, it would be good to boast that he was merely following the Arab League and subordinating American action to the U.N. Security Council. After all, nothing—nothing!—could be worse than the perception that the United States was “invading” another Muslim country.

And why the quotes around the word invading?

Rubbish. Our “invasions” have in fact been liberations.

Seriously, you're still trotting out the liberation b.s.? We're still waiting to be greeted as liberators in Iraq.

We have shed blood and expended treasure in Kuwait in 1991, in the Balkans later in the 1990s, and in Afghanistan and Iraq—in our own national interest, of course, but also to protect Muslim peoples and help them free themselves. Libya will be America’s fifth war of Muslim liberation.

Since when do the neocons give a fuck about Muslim people? Does this sick little prick really think that anyone believes that the Republican party is willing to spend one red cent to liberate Muslims? The people they take every opportunity to demonize and villify?

The modern Republican party has played a key role in these honorable struggles. When in power, Republicans have taken the lead in fighting for liberty.

If by "fighting" you mean "sending other people's sons and daughters off to fight," then yeah, you may have a point.

 

 When in opposition, they have sought to push Democratic presidents to act—in the Balkans, and today in Libya—

Oh, yeah, I remember how you guys pushed Clinton to act in the Balkans. I believe the refrain was "No War For Monica!"

We have supported Democratic presidents when they do exactly what we tell them to do. Well, "support" is a strong word.

On March 17, for example, a few hours before the Security Council voted on Libya, the House of Representatives considered a resolution offered by Rep. Dennis Kucinich, “Directing the President, pursuant to section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution, to remove the United States Armed Forces from Afghanistan.”

God Bless Dennis Kucinich!

The Afghanistan war has had bipartisan support from the beginning.
 The beginning when it was supposed to be about getting Osama bin Laden? Sure, there was plenty of bipartisan support for that. For some reason, there might be a bit less support for keeping troops in Afghanistan indefinitely with no apparent goal.

The Afghanistan war has had bipartisan support from the beginning. The Obama administration and the GOP leadership were both opposed to Kucinich’s resolution

Which probably tells you all you need to know about the supposed lefty/liberal Obama administration.

Kucinich’s resolution—which called not merely for timetables or draw downs, but for the simple and absolute removal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan. Yet close to half the Democrats in the House of Representatives voted for retreat and defeat.

The other half voted to continue to feed our soldiers into the meat grinder of Afghanistan for no earthly goddamned good reason? Who are these assholes?

And the Republicans? 222 to 8 against withdrawal

So there are 8 Republicans with some sense of human decency? That's a little encouraging.

That is what the modern Republican party has stood for. Part of that modern Republican tradition includes, when in opposition, supporting a Democratic administration when it does the right thing. That’s what Republicans have done with regard to Afghanistan. It’s what Republicans will do as the nation prosecutes the effort in Libya. And as Republicans select a 2012 nominee, they should seek a leader who will stand unabashedly for freedom at home and abroad.

It would almost be funny if there weren't people who take Kristol seriously.



Horrible Scumbag James O'Keefe Claims Another Victim

NPR chief executive quits over hidden camera video

By BEN NUCKOLS, Associated Press Ben Nuckols, Associated Press – 3 mins ago

WASHINGTON – NPR president and CEO Vivian Schiller resigned Wednesday under pressure, a day after an undercover video showed one of her executives on a hidden camera calling the tea party racist and saying the news organization would be better off without taxpayer money.

I don't necessarily object to NPR executive Ron Schiller (no relation) being punished in some way, because he does flirt a bit with anti-semitism, although it probably is more a case of mis-speaking (about newspaper owners), but Jeezus Christ, every time this little asshole makes a video, some person or organization gets the axe. It's total BS.

Watch the video, (here)  what does the guy say that isn't true?

Tea Partiers are racist?
Duh!


Um, there aren't enough people being educated in America?
Hard to argue with that.

Muslims deserve a voice?
Sounds right.


Anti-intellectualism on the right?
That's been well documented (even by me!)


NPR would be better off without government funding?
That's a matter of opinion.

The mainstream media has a pro-Israel bias?
Pretty obviously, they do.

And I guess we're supposed to be shocked that the NPR folks are sitting down with affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood? Maybe they are actually educated enough to know that the Muslim Brotherhood is NOT a terrorist organization? (apparently, they were several decades ago, but not now.)

So why does Vivian Schiller need to be ousted?

Schiller said she and the board concluded that her "departure from NPR would help to mitigate the threat from those who have misperceptions about NPR as a news organization."

Goddammit, you gotta stop doing this! Every time some right-wing bullshit artist gins up a complaint about anyone or anything, someone ends up fired. You can't appease these assholes. There is no one that you couls fire that will satisfy their lust for destruction. Do you think that pushing Ms Schiller out the door is going to make them say "well, that takes care of that problem. NPR is fine now, we can stop targeting them." It's never going to happen.



And any news organization who wants to be considered at all legitimate needs to stop running O'Keefe's crap. If you receive a video with some "important investigative whatever" on it, and you see that it comes from O'Keefe, or Breitbart, or "Veritas," throw it in the trash. O'Keefe and his buddies are so pathalogically dishonest, that I wouldn't believe them if they produced a video showing that the sky is blue.

James O'Keefe Continues to be Beneath Contempt

What kind of pathology does it take to be James O'Keefe? What could possibly have gone wrong in this little ratfuck's life to make him decide "I'm going to dedicate my life to defaming and harming people who are trying to do a little good in the world?"

James O’Keefe’s latest victim: A special ed teacher

4:29 pm November 15, 2010, by Jay Bookman

At one point, in a conversation about teacher tenure, Ploshnick told the attentive young man how hard it was to fire a tenured teacher. To prove her point, she told her admirer a story about a fellow teacher who had actually called a student the N-word, but the teacher had merely been demoted, not fired.

As happens with many a bar story, the story itself was apparently false. But in telling it, Ploshnick used the N-word herself.
Ploshnick had no idea that she was being audiotaped. A couple of months later, O’Keefe ambushed her outside her apartment with a video camera, demanding to know whether she’d ever used the N-word. The secretly made audiotape became a central part of an O’Keefe video called “Teachers Unions Gone Wild,” filmed in the same bar during a statewide teachers convention.
(In the O’Keefe video below, the Ploshnick segment begins at 0.25 minutes. The video opens with a secretly taped phone conversation between an assistant school superintendent and an actor who falsely complains that his child had been called the N-word.)

And here's a little somehting about this teacher, Alissa Ploshnick:

(from Bob Braun/Star-Ledger Columnist)

Alissa Ploshnick risked her life to save the lives of a dozen Passaic schoolchildren. She threw herself in front of a careening van to protect her students and landed in the hospital with broken ribs, a fractured wrist, a badly bruised pelvis and glass cuts in her eyes. She could have died.
The president of the United States, Bill Clinton then, sent her a letter. It read:
"I recently heard about your act of heroism and wanted to commend you for your selflessness. True heroes are rare in today’s world. And, all too often, those who are really making a difference in our communities go unnoticed and unrewarded. I am delighted to be able to give you the recognition you deserve. You are an example for all of us, and I applaud you for your sense of duty.’’

 

Amanda Brown/The Star-LedgerAlissa Ploshnick, a special education teacher from Passaic, had her conversation about teacher tenure videotaped without her knowledge. It was posted on the internet.

So that's who O'Keefe is targeting this time. A woman who not only spends her days teaching special-needs children, but once risked her own life to protect some of them. And this little bag of shit James O'Keefe, a man with all the dignity and bearing of a volunteer janitor at a Japanese porn studio, this pathetic little man is going after her. And of course, it works:

Ploshnick was suspended by the Passaic district for nine days
and denied a pay raise worth a few thousand dollars.

All because NJ governor Chris Christie has a hard-on for the teachers' union. 

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, engaged in a political war against the teachers union over pay and other issues, has cited O’Keefe’s videos as evidence that the teachers union is out of control. 

Because why should the people we entrust with the education of our children be allowed to make a decent living, ya know? So sure, let's smear someone who is trying to make the world a tiny bit better. Fuck her! If her career has to be sacrificed in order to prove a false point in the right-wing narrative, hey all's fair in conservative attack politics, right? 

Someone needs to sue this little prick into the poorhouse. I heard that Shirley Sherrod was exploring the possibility. I don't know why whatever remnants of ACORN are left haven't already done it. This is never going to stop unless slimy little rodent droppings like O'Keefe are made to face some kind of consequences. Consequences serious enough that they outweigh the fun of being a FOXified celebrity.

And why hasn't he been prosecuted for his little stunt at Mary Landrieu's office? 

And why isn't he being repeatedly punched in the crotch? 

Dante' will have to invent a new circle of Hell for guys like O'Keefe. In this circle, he stands naked in a cold room while one attractive woman after another comes in and points and laughs at his tiny penis. (I don't know if his penis is really tiny, but I'm sure the Devil could arrange for a shrinkening) Then once an hour someone punches him in the crotch. And all the pretty women laugh and laugh. 

 

How Much Lower Can This Little Prick Possibly Go?

How is it that James O'Keefe is allowed to walk our streets freely without being subject to multiple crotch-punchings everywhere he lays down his slimy trail?
I mean, it's not like you'd do any time.

"Your honor, the defendant is charged with assault and battery.
"Oh? What did he do?"
"He punched James O'Keefe in the weiner."
"Hmm, James O'Keefe, James O'Keefe. . . oh, the cum-stain on Satan's tighty-whities? That James O'Keefe? Case Dismissed! I'm recommending you for a commendation, son!"

Okay, I don't know how the judge turned into the defendant's commanding officer, but you get the idea.

Fake pimp from ACORN videos tries to 'punk' CNN correspondent

Lusby, Maryland (CNN) -- A conservative activist known for making undercover videos plotted to embarrass a CNN correspondent by recording a meeting on hidden cameras aboard a floating "palace of pleasure" and making sexually suggestive comments, e-mails and a planning document show. [sic]

I don't know what a "Planning document show" is, but apparently he was making it.

James O'Keefe, best known for hitting the community organizing group ACORN with an undercover video sting,

Okay, stop. Stop it right there, CNN. That was not an undercover video "sting." That was a fraudulent, dishonest, libelous smear job. You'd think now that this little shit-smear has gone after one of your own reporters, you could drop the bullshit "objectivity" and call a spade a spade.

James O'Keefe, best known for hitting the community organizing group ACORN with an undercover video sting, hoped to get CNN Investigative Correspondent Abbie Boudreau onto a boat filled with sexually explicit props and then record the session, those documents show.

What was the point? Who knows? I guess if he could get a video clip of a reporter near some "sexually explicit props," he could run to FOX, show some deceptively-edited clips and claim that CNN can not be trusted because one of their reporters enjoys sex? Or something? I don't know what the point was, but I'm sure it was some sort of deceitful bullshit.

Apparently, a large part of the plan involved having James O'Keefe


Seduce CNN reporter Abbie Boudreau.

Once again, the foolproof plan involved having this guy:


Seduce this CNN reporter:

How could this possibly not work?

CNN has gotten ahold of a 13-page ridiculous plan for what O'Keefe calls his "CNN Caper"


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'Punking' CNN

The following highlights the relevant portions of a 13-page document obtained by CNN outlining a plan to 'punk' CNN. Click through the pages to see more.

And it just goes on like that. You can see the whole thing here: CNN

And if you see James O'Keefe, go ahead and punch him right in the crotch. No jury would convict you.

Nominees for Horrible, Disgusting Scumbag of the Year

1) Graydon Smith of Seattle, Washington

SEATTLE -- A 31-year-old man arrested for domestic violence-related crimes claims he had a
The Seattle Weekly blog reports that a 31-year-old Seattle man, Graydon R. Smith, in jail awaiting trial on domestic violence charges had previously admitted to making his 19-year-old girlfriend sign a contract giving him permission to beat her up anywhere but on her pregnant belly. Yes, he forced his teenage girlfriend to sign a contract intended to legalize his freedom to assault her when the whim took him.

Back in April, Smith's girlfriend called the police stating that her boyfriend had threatened to kill her. She told them that she believed this was a real threat, because he'd assaulted her and forced her to sign a contract permitting him to attack her. So police gave Smith a ring, and while he denied making the death threats, he readily owned up to requiring the abuse contract. In a display of severe problems with our legal system, law enforcement went oh, sure, an abuse contract, that's not suspicious at all, and decided not to arrest him. (emphasis added)

At the end of last month, they were called again, this time by Smith's stepfather, who was punched when he tried to stop his stepson from choking his girlfriend. Police arrived to find the girlfriend bleeding severely. This time, they did what they should have done in the first place, and which would have spared the pregnant teenager further violence: they arrested Smith.

(source)

2) Dr. Dix P. Poppas, Cornell University

Alternet reports: . . .the head of the pediatric urology department at Cornell University's New York Presbyterian Hospital -- which is often ranked among the top 10 hospitals in the country -- has been operating on young girls who suffer from what he (and likely the girls' guardians) have decided is "clitorimegaly," or oversized clitorises.

In order to relieve these girls from what seems like little more than a cosmestic issue, Dr. Dix P. Poppas cuts out parts of the clitoris' shaft, saving the glans, or tip, for reattachment. Poppas triumphantly calls the procedure -- rebranded a clitoroplasty -- a "nerve sparing" one unlike the FGMs practiced in other countries.

How does the good doctor know that nerves have been spared? Well, Poppas and his nurse practitioner developed a series of sensory followup tests involving Q-tips, their fingernails and vibrators. But don't worry, a family member was always present in the room. As the resulting journal article notes, management of such situations requires a "compassionate and multidisciplinary approach."

3) Gail Posner, Late of Miami Beach, Florida:

When Ms. Posner died in March at age 67, Conchita and two other dogs inherited the right to live in her seven-bedroom, $8.3 million Miami Beach mansion, their comfort ensured by a $3 million trust fund.

In a 2009 interview with a blogger for browardpalmbeach.com, Ms. Posner said Conchita typically accompanied her on lunch dates and then shopping. Ms. Posner said she at one point considered getting the dog her own Range Rover, for transportation to the animal's weekly spa appointments for manicures and pedicures, but Ms. Posner decided to get herself a new car and gave the dog her gold Cadillac Escalade, she told the blogger.

(editor's note: by the way, she never earned a goddamned cent of that money. She inherited it from her late father, who was, according to the Wall Street Journal, "A master of the hostile takeover who became one of America's highest-paid executives, Mr. Posner pleaded no contest to tax evasion charges in 1987 and was later barred from involvement with public companies.")