Hillary Clinton: We Must Donate Money To Relieve The Misery Caused By The Horrible Flooding In Pakistan;
Here's My Donation-- Ten Bucks
— Ace

You know how you get rich? You get rich by spending other people's money, yo!

Only suckas spend their own.

Clinton pushes flood relief for Pakistan, donates $10

By Jordy Yager - 08/04/10 02:50 PM ET

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pressed Americans on Wednesday to donate money to flood relief efforts in Pakistan, saying she is leading by example and just made a $10 donation herself.

“I just texted a contribution myself, because we know from our own experience, particularly in Haiti, small donations can add up to make a big difference,” Clinton told reporters on Wednesday.

Well, she's giving more than me. I would have given more but I already gave billions and a thousand good men's lives to fight the Taliban that the people of Pakistan are supporting.

Hey, I've got an idea -- maybe all that money for the Victory Mosque can instead go to Pakistan?

Thanks to sven1077.

Posted by: Ace at 06:02 PM | Comments (100)
Post contains 197 words, total size 1 kb.

Overnight Open Thread
— Maetenloch

Happy Thursday all. Or is it?

So Which Countries Are Happiest?

Typically the happiness ratings of countries are based on surveys like this one. And usually the scandi countries come out on top especially Denmark. That's a paradox in its own way since the Danes often seem dour and not especially joyful. Mostly they're satisfied internally and value having their lives be hyggeligt which roughly translates as 'cozy'. But are they really happy or are they mostly just convinced they are?

Well David Goldman AKA Spengler has come up with an alternate way to determine which countries are happiest using a more objective way of measuring peoples' happiness with their lives. He surmised that in general happy people would tend to have more children and also not kill themselves and that the unhappy would generally do the opposite. [Note that he seems to have baked in the assumption that the people have access to birth control and reasonable medical care otherwise third world countries would completely skew the results] And when you graph fertility rates versus suicide rates for various countries, you get this chart:

Surprise, surprise - by this measure Israel comes out on top as the happiest country in the world. Well at least based on their actions. It would interesting to see which countries fall lower on the curve. I suspect that people in many European countries are comfortable but necessarily happy. And I would guess that the unhappiest country at the bottom right is probably Russia or one of the former Soviet states. more...

Posted by: Maetenloch at 05:30 PM | Comments (420)
Post contains 718 words, total size 7 kb.

Texas to EPA: Drop Dead and/or FYNQ
— Ace

A strongly-worded letter, but usually softly worded ones are sent.

The EPA is trying to backdoor cap and trade carbon restrictions via executive power since they don't have any, you know, actual constitutionally-promulgated legislative power to do so.

Texas' own board of environmental quality disputes they can do this -- and harshly.

"In order to deter challenges to your plan for centralized control of industrialized development through the issuance of permits for greenhouse gases, you have called upon each state to <>declare its allegiance to the Environmental Protection Agency's recently enacated greenhouse gas regulations -- regulations that are plainly contrary to United States law. ..... To encourage acquiesence with your unsupported findings you threaten to usurp state enforcment authority and to federalize the permitting program of any state that fails to pledge their fealty to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)."

I found the salutation/signoff a little aggressive, too:

But first, you will blow me,

Attorney General Greg Abbot
TECQ Chief Bryan Shaw

/enc

But I like that they added a personal touch.

Thanks to awkward davies and Herr Morgenholz.

Posted by: Ace at 04:24 PM | Comments (158)
Post contains 193 words, total size 1 kb.

Unions: Too Rich And Lazy To Do Their Own F@#*in' Picketing
— LauraW

Gee, I'm sure glad the Obama administration is lavishing hundreds of billions of dollars on his union cronies.

So they can turn around and hire the non-union unemployed up at the lowest possible hourly rates to do their picketing for them.

...the Mid-Atlantic Regional Council of Carpenters is seeking paid demonstrators to march and chant in its current picket line outside the McPherson Building, an office complex here where the council says work is being done with nonunion labor.

"For a lot of our members, it's really difficult to have them come out, either because of parking or something else," explains Vincente Garcia, a union representative who is supervising the picketing.

So instead, the union hires unemployed people at the minimum wage—$8.25 an hour—to walk picket lines.

I don't blame them, really. Parking, ecch. SUCH a bitch in these older cities. Don't get me started.
And you never really feel good about leaving the Escalade on the street, right? You want a nice safe, covered spot, but then...that means walking.

You can't win.
You just can't win.
Fuhgeddaboutit.

Nope, best to hire Jorge to wave your sign that says 'This shop "does not pay area standard wages & benefits,"' and let the little fella make a few bucks for himself while he's down on his luck. It's a good deed. Doing him a favor, two birds, yadda yadda.

The union's Mr. Garcia sees no conflict in a union that insists on union labor hiring nonunion people to protest the hiring of nonunion labor.

Nooooooo. No.

No.

Shut up.

He says the pickets are not only about "union issues" but also about fair wages and benefits for American workers. By hiring the unemployed, "we are also giving back to the community a bit," he says.

Giving back. One uninsured, minimum-wage-hour at a time. Gosh, what a great bunch of guys. Pinky-ring wearing philanthropists, they are.

Thanks to Skylia Ember.

Posted by: LauraW at 03:48 PM | Comments (47)
Post contains 340 words, total size 2 kb.

Pat Caddell: Country's Mood Is "Pre-Revolutionary"
— Ace

Here is what it all comes down to, as he asks:

"Who is sovereign? The people or the political class?"

Let me suggest that in politics, just as in drama, the intellect steers, but the emotion drives.

We would all be intellectually opposed to Obama's and the Democrats' agenda in all possible worlds.

But the intellect steers, emotion drives.

What has people willing to walk on their naked knees over broken glass is the emotion of it. Not just that we disagreed as pointedly (and at first as respectfully) as we could, but that, having lodged our objections as natural-born Americans with the power, we're told, to shape our own political destinies, our input into our own fates was met with a single dismissive fuck-you:

"We. Don't. Care."

Followed up with:

"We. Will. Do. What. We. Please."

That is what is providing the actual emotion here.

When it was just a policy debate, it was intellectual.

But now they've gone and made it personal.

That was a mistake. Because you can sell people down the river if you can keep them asleep while you do it.

When you rouse them...? When you alert them...? When you incense them...?

Tougher.

And it's not just personal, but fundamental: Who decides in America? The people, as the books claim? Or the elite, as common practice seems to have it?

And so the rage.

And soon the fire. more...

Posted by: Ace at 03:19 PM | Comments (452)
Post contains 280 words, total size 2 kb.

You Manga-nificent Bastards: Lurid Asian "News" Animation Now Does Lindsay Lohan
— Ace

Gotta tell ya: If American network news were like this, I'd watch, bias and all.

Highlight? Well, if I can name only one, it would probably be Lindsay crying naked in a prison shower while another naked woman, this one tougher and more "experienced," drops a bar of soap at her feet.

Yeah. Gun to my head, I'd have to go with that part.

No, really. You think I'm making that up, but I'm not.

That. Just. Happened.
more...

Posted by: Ace at 01:52 PM | Comments (101)
Post contains 104 words, total size 1 kb.

Confirmed: Democrats Planting Fake Tea Party Candidates On Ballot To Ensure Own Victory
— Ace

"Fake" sometimes, or real but very fringey.

My fear about the Tea Party has always come down to just this, and the impulse of many who have fringey views -- and feel, then, not included in regular major party politics -- to use the banner of the "Tea Party" as a flag of convenience to get their not-taken-very-seriously ideas greater exposure. And for this sort of person, the fact that their candidacy insures a Democratic victory doesn't matter; for the fringe, there really is no difference between the parties worth considering.

So here's your slate of "Tea Party" candidates, put on the ballots by the Democrats who you know have your best interests at heart.

[E]vidence of campaign tampering in at least two states is hard to dismiss. In Michigan, the party chairman in suburban Detroit’s Oakland County now concedes that one of his top aides played a role in helping nine tea party candidates get onto the ballot for various offices across the state — including the open 1st Congressional District and the 7th Congressional District, held by vulnerable freshman Democratic Rep. Mark Schauer.

...

Recruitment of so-called straw candidates or spoilers is a time-honored, if less than reputable, tradition in American politics. But in this case, some Democrats appear to be in cahoots with ideological adversaries whose ideas they hope to use as weapons against Republicans in the fall.

Now, seven House seats are the subject of controversies that are spawning threats of lawsuits and criminal complaints and even pitting conservative tea party activists against one another.

One of those activists is Jim Schneller, who is running to fill the suburban Philadelphia-based seat left vacant by Democratic Rep. Joe Sestak, who is running for the U.S. Senate.

The seat is among the Republicans’ top targets this fall, and the contest between Democratic state Rep. Bryan Lentz and Republican Pat Meehan is viewed as a tossup. The entry of a third- party candidate, however, could scramble that balance — which prompted Meehan’s campaign to scrutinize Schneller’s credentials.

According to its analysis, 3,800 of the 4,200 voter signatures gathered to put Schneller on the ballot were collected by Democrats. And among those who helped the tea party candidate are Colleen Guiney, the chairwoman of the Swarthmore Democratic Party and a Lentz supporter, and Nicholas Allred, who works for the Swarthmore College Democrats.

Bryan Kendro, Meehan’s campaign manager, accused Lentz’s backers of trying to “split the conservative vote by using Jim Schneller as nothing more than a prop.”

In an interview with POLITICO, Schneller said he’s been disappointed by the Republican assault on his legitimacy. “My signatures were gathered by volunteers,” said Schneller. “We didn’t go around screening signatures or signors.”

Schneller, who once filed a lawsuit to force President Obama to present his birth certificate, said he jumped into the race because he believes he can win it.

“Being someone who believes in the American system, it was difficult to hear people say that I was conniving or actually colluding or even show some disdain for the fact that the vote [margin] could be changed by my candidacy,” he said.

I can't take it with this birth certificate crap anymore.

I say that because I am just guessing here that he thinks giving that "issue" exposure is far more important than actual electoral politics. And, of course, he'll have 5% of the public agreeing with him and pulling that lever.

And won't that be wonderful.

It gets worse:

Yet after the POLITICO interview, a reporter with PoliticsPA presented the Meehan evidence to Schneller, and he took a different tone, calling it “dreadful. I regret that there might be some appearance of badness either to me or the Democrats.”

The secretary of state still must certify the Schneller petitions, and a Meehan spokesman said the campaign is still mulling a challenge.

Challenges already are being lodged against some of the 23 candidates running as part of the newly minted Tea Party of Michigan.

Even before the candidate roster was released last month, the suspicions of tea party activists had been aroused when they learned that the founding father of the new state party is Mark Steffek, a retired United Auto Workers steward.

Among the candidates under scrutiny now are two currently vying for House seats.

One is Danny Davis, a former soldier and police officer, who is running in a race that features a rematch between Schauer and Tim Walberg, the former GOP congressman he defeated in 2008 by just 7,432 votes — one of the closest races in the nation that year.

The Michigan Tea PartyÂ’s other House candidate is Lonny Lee Snyder, who is running for the Republican-leaning district of retiring Democrat Rep. Bart Stupak, whose vote in support of health care reform angered his base and prompted his retirement.

The race to succeed him is expected to be tight, which means SnyderÂ’s third-party candidacy could have an impact. But there is scant information about the elusive candidate.

Snyder doesnÂ’t have a website, the Tea Party headquarters didnÂ’t release biographical information about his candidacy, and grass-roots tea party activists say they have never heard of him. When POLITICO called his home number, a man who answered said Snyder wasnÂ’t home.

The mystery surrounding Snyder and other Michigan Tea Party candidates prompted some conservatives to do some digging. Jason Gillman, a local blogger with campaign experience, requested copies from state election officials of the “Affidavit of Identity” of all 23 candidates nominated by the new Tea Party.

As he perused them, Gillman noticed that nine of the affidavits were notarized by a person named Jason Bauer. When Gillman searched the name on the Internet, he discovered that Bauer worked for the Oakland County Democratic Party — information he quickly disseminated to the local news media and the conservative think tank Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

As questions mushroomed, Steffek, the retired UAW steward, gave an interview to the local media, asserting that his new party and candidates are legitimate and his intentions pure. He said he joined the Tea Party ranks because of his disgust with big government and opposition to free-trade agreements.

Gillman isnÂ’t buying it.

Neither am I.

Know who you're voting for. I'll tell ya that. Know who you're voting for. The "Tea Party" label means even less than the Republican Party label -- at least you know that actual Republicans incorporated the local Republican Party.

You don't know that about any of these so-called "Tea Party" parties popping up coincidentally enough to field candidates in districts where the Democrats are in trouble.

There's more at the article, too -- but I can't excerpt it all. In Florida and NJ too, candidates who until recently were registered Democrats are suddenly fired-up "Tea Party" candidates.

Posted by: Ace at 01:17 PM | Comments (161)
Post contains 1152 words, total size 7 kb.

Perjurious Kagan Confirmed By Supine Senate
— Ace

Check out the lede sentence:

Chalk up another legacy for President Obama, as the Senate confirms Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.

Yet another legacy. Historic, is he.

The vote was 63-37.

The roll of shame:

Only five Republicans voted in favor of Kagan's nomination. Last year, just nine Republicans voted for Justice Sonia Sotomayor, Obama's first Supreme Court appointee.

Today's yes votes included Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., the lone Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee to support Kagan when the panel recommended the nomination to the full Senate on a 13-6 vote. Other GOP yes votes came from Richard Lugar of Indiana, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire.

Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass, one of Kagan's home state senators, voted against her.

Ben Nelson voted against her, by the way. He hears the footsteps.

And yet the Maine Twits and galpal Lindsey voted for her.

Posted by: Ace at 12:09 PM | Comments (261)
Post contains 163 words, total size 1 kb.

Top Ten Reasons David Letterman Is Still the Ratings Champ
— Ace

10. Asked a studio audience about the weather in Muncie, then repeated the word "Muncie" while mugging, because repeating common words is gut-bustingly funny

9. Never fails to tell Tom Brokaw he seems to have "a really good bead on things"

8. Recycled a Wacky Products item from 1982, though the reference to Yahoo Serious was lost on most audience members

7. Set up a "found comedy" bit by cheating on his baby-mama and getting blackmailed over it; then "extended the premise" by the leaking the creepy detail that he has a sex room right above his studio

6. Updated his act smoothly from 1990s to 2000s by revamping classic "Broken-Down Old Man Perving Out On Drew Barrymore" into fresh new comedy rotine "Broken-Down Old Man Perving Out On Zoey Deschanel"

5. Rote repetition of stock homey catchphrases like "Well my Gosh" and "Goodness me" and "Well shucks" just never get old

4. Fascinating to watch the evolution of a self-hating narcissist into a self-hating misanthropic narcissist

3. Exciting comedy bits like "Will It Blend?" and "Is This Something?" followed up with even more daring "What's On TBS Right Now?"

2. Crisp, penetrating interviews continue to reveal interesting details about guests' latest vacation trips, how old their children are and if they have any pets, and if they've heard if Zoey Deschanel is into "mature gentlemen"

...and the Number One Reason David Letterman Is Still The Ratings Champ...

1. Increasingly elderly viewership has mistaken the show for a long unresolved plot arc of Diagnosis Murder

Hm: How good am I? I guessed he would perv out on Zooey Deschanel, and yup, he sure did. (I've never seen this; I've seen the show three times in fifteen years.)

I just knew she'd be the type he'd go after -- pretty, sweet, and young enough to be his daughter's younger sister's niece.

Zooey Deschanel here mentions she once lived in a "socialist dictatorship" and, get this, she means it in a bad way. more...

Posted by: Ace at 11:45 AM | Comments (96)
Post contains 351 words, total size 3 kb.

Is There Anyway I Can Boycott David Letterman Despite The Fact I Already Wasn't Watching Him Because He's A Cranky Old Unfunny Sad Clown?
— Ace

Attacking Breitbart, nodding along with his best buddy Rachel Maddow's assertion that Fox and the GOP are just in the business of "scaring white people."

How do I boycott someone for political reasons if I was already boycotting him for you-haven't-been-funny-since-1991 reasons?

Old and Busted: David Letterman

New Hotness: Soupy Sales

Posted by: Ace at 10:47 AM | Comments (158)
Post contains 99 words, total size 1 kb.