Rep. Huelskamp is a racist. I know this for two reasons:

1, he's a Republican

2, MSNBC declared he must be really bothered at the thought of biracial families.

So, granted: Rep. Huelskamp is a terrible racist.

But being a Racist was just Count One of the Racist Indictment against him. He produced even more evidence of his racism when he posted a picture of family.

Well, My God. Most of us are just normal Racists, but this guy is an Eternal Jade Ninja of Racism. He's so racist, he adopted a bunch of black kids just so he could keep being racist and then when people called him a racist he could show this picture of his family and thereby advance the cause of his racism under the guise of not being racist.

Think about how horribly racist that is. That shows commitment.

And speaking of commitment...

Note he put this picture up to rebut @MSNBC's claim that "the right wing" would be upset to see pictures of a biracial family.

Well, says one Twitter user -- How dare you. The insult we lodged against you wasn't really about you.

Psst: I think he was trying to prove that "the right wing" was not freaked out by biracial families. I know his logic is kookoobananas, but I think that's what he was thinking.

Posted by: Ace at 08:22 AM | Comments (485)
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I'm Ashamed My Son Likes Football

Peter Beinart is a bad, bad father. Because he allowed his son to watch and enjoy a football game. Which apparently is only slightly less shameful than taking his son to a back-alley cockfight and handing him a starter-flask of Thunderbird.

Last Saturday night, he [Beinart's 8-year-old son] proudly dug out a long-unused Patriots jersey and joined me on the couch late into the night as the Patriots dispatched the Indianapolis Colts.

It was wonderful. And it made me a little sick.

It made me sick because I could see the game through his eyes. And it wasn't pretty. My son, unfamiliar with the NFL's pieties, assumed that hurting the other team's players was the goal. To his untutored eye, the violence that guilt-ridden fans like myself decry was a feature, not a bug. He didn't cheer the injuries; he's too sweet for that. But despite my insistence to the contrary, I suspect the message he took from the experience was: The only thing you need to know about the large man writhing in agony on the screen is whether he's on our team.

Bad British NFL Commentary

On The Intelligence of Football Players 

At five-eight, a hundred and eighty-eight pounds, the Bills safety Jim Leonhard, a nine-year veteran, is among the smallest and also the slowest starting defensive backs in the game. And yet, watching him on film, he appears to teleport to the ball. Leonhard's name seems to enter any conversation about football intelligence; he knows every teammate's responsibilities in every call, and understands the game as twenty-two intersecting vectors. "He'd walk off the bus and you'd think he was the equipment manager," Ryan Fitzpatrick said. "He's still in the league because he's the quarterback of the defense."

Obama: I Would Never Let My Imaginary Trayvon-like Son Play Football

But note that Obama still enjoys watching football. Because he can handle it while you can't.

NY Pols Propose Law to Ban Youth Football

So football now seems to have quickly joined smoking and junk food as one of those uncool, distasteful activities that only the underclass publicly indulge in. The next stage will be regulation and legal harassment which are waypoints on the path to eventual effective banning. For the children.

So if all goes according to plan this is the football your kids will be watching:

Posted by: Maetenloch at 06:42 PM | Comments (439)
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What a stunt. What an idea.

Let it be copied a thousand times.

Will it be? Well, dramatizing the news is generally a TV news imperative. They like moving pictures, don't they? But I don't know if too many people in the news business want to dramatize (and thereby increase interest in) the effect of Obamacare on the typical American worker.

Here's hoping, though.

This is a really amazing report.

MSNBC just tweeted that racists would "bust nut" while watching this, then they apologized and said the responsible party had been fired and also promoted to host of their new weekend show. more...

Posted by: Ace at 04:53 PM | Comments (385)
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• Just Wait, The GOP Will Conservative The Sh*t Out Of America After The 2014 Elections
  
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• Obama's Unserious Foreign Policy And America's Permanent War Footing
  
• NYC School Cuts Gifted Program Over Lack Of Diversity
  
• Gallup: Fewer Americans Want Stricter Gun Laws
  
• Virginia Prepares To Check In To Medicaid's Hotel California
  
• Cooke: What Would The Founders Think
  
• Williamson: Space Monkeys
  
• Man Survives Going Through Wood Chipper
  
• 9 Questions About Ukraine You Were Too Embarrassed To Ask
  
• Nearly Half Of Americans Live Paycheck To Paycheck
  
• The Power Of No
  
• Rutgers Offers University Class On Beyoncé
  
• Pittsburgh Police Dog Succumbs To Stab Wounds And Dies
  
• I Guess The Message Is Don't Skip School
  
• Democratic P.O.W. In The #War On Women Still In Jail
  

Posted by: Open Blogger at 05:04 AM | Comments (529)
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Per PPP, who are pretty low in the trust rankings for pollsters, but what the heck.

MSNBC and its subsidiary NBCNews have earned every inch of their low regard.

By the way: NBCNews is dead last. The joke channel MSNBC ties Comedy Central for second-to-last-place.

NBC News and sister cable network MSNBC rank at the bottom of media outlets Americans trust most for news, with Fox News leading the way, according to a new poll from the Democratic firm Public Policy Polling.

In its fifth trust poll, 35 percent said they trusted Fox news more than any other outlet, followed by PBS at 14 percent, ABC at 11 percent, CNN at 10 percent, CBS at 9 percent, 6 percent for MSNBC and Comedy Central, and just 3 percent for NBC.

The next time someone on MSNBC or its kid brother NBCNews makes a crack about low Congressional approval ratings, someone should respond by citing NBC's 3% public trust rating.

Regarding MSNBC's latest foray into race-conscious juvenile razzing, the staffer "responsible" for the tweet-- whatever that means -- has been fired.

Responsible? Did this person write it?

And this is not a problem with a particular staffer. This is an MSNBC problem, and an NBCNews problem more generally. This is a... how do I put it? A Culture of Corruption.

Firing a staffer does not fix this when MSNBC's "stars," and I do use that term with reservation, say the exact same things night after night after night.

Will Queen Maddow be cautioned, I wonder? How about spittle-spraying fat drunk Chris Matthews? What about red-faced raging imbecile Ed Schultz?

Will these people be informed that daily provocations and crudities do "not represent the values of msbnc," as MSNBC President Phil Griffinclaimed?

The problem, obviously, is not that such statements don't represent the values of MSNBC. The problem is that they do.

Supposedly he's getting angry at having to drop everything twice a week to check out what the goons at Faber College's Animal House have done this time.

And it has, according to two sources at the network. Griffin, says one of the sources, is as “angry” as his colleagues have seen him. In a meeting, he warned of serious and immediate repercussions and ripped the staff about the recent bout of stupid actions, according to the sources.

But previous reports say he's a milquetoast who has no interest in news, only ratings, and just defers to Queen Rachel.

So we'll see if Queen Rachel is interested in cleaning up Delta House.

Posted by: Ace at 03:35 PM | Comments (248)
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Horrible.

In the video below, "Juif" -- their favorite word -- means Jew, of course. The first thing said is Juif, casse-toi, La France n'est pas à toi!

This means something like: "Jew, get the hell out, France is not for you."

I didn't know what "casser" meant in this context. It usually means "break." It can also mean "get the hell out of here" when used as a command.

But it also, wonderfully enough, turns out to to have a vile double meaning:

(familiar)to kill (esp. if motivated by prejudice)

Because of the grammar of it, I think they mean the "get the hell out" meaning, but it also seems to me they don't mind this other meaning being suggested.

This "Jour de Colère," or Day of Rage, was called for by supporters of that idiot anti-semitic comedian Dieudonné.

Many protestors did the "quenelle," the inverted Nazi salute which they claim is not a Nazi salute. However, if you watch the video, you can see some of his supporters making explicit that it is a Nazi salute-- because they don't bother doing the Double Secret Nazi Salute of the quenelle, but instead do the full, real, Hitler Nazi salute.

It was part of a "Day of Anger" called by extremists in support of Dieudonne last Sunday. French police estimated that around 17,000 people had attended the march, and said that 150 had been arrested. Police told AFP news agency that 19 police officers were injured in clashes with demonstrators, one seriously.

Despite claims by Dieudonne and some of his supporters that it is simply an innocent "up yours" or "anti-establishment" gesture, [the quenelle] has been adopted by a vast range of anti-Semites, from the far-right to Muslim extremists, many of whom post online pictures of themselves making the salute in front of sensitive sites such as Holocaust memorials, synagogues, and even the school in Toulouse at which an Islamist gunman murdered a rabbi and three Jewish children.

That last incident happened just in 2012.

What is there even to say?

Oh, and let me just bookmark this post for the next time Bill Maher blabbles on about how enlightened the Europeans are.

Oh: They shout about "LICRA," too. That's the League Against (Contre) Racism and Antisemtism.

It's amazing to me that people claiming there is no anti-semitism would simultaneously walk down the streets demanding that Jews get out of the country and making Nazi salutes. Or that they would claim "The gas chambers are a lie (bullshit)," even as they're demonstrating exactly how gas chambers come into being.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 02:46 PM | Comments (290)
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And they're compelling reasons, too.

This is part of the reason I gave up on politics and stopped identifying as a Republican. There is no point supporting a Team of Losers who furthermore don't even actually have the same goals in mind I do. Not that that would make a big difference, as they are Losers, and cannot advance their goals.

Posted by: Ace at 01:18 PM | Comments (604)
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Amanda Knox is in America and she's not going back to Italy.

However, Rafael Solecitto -- every bit as innocent -- is an Italian citizen, and they're determined to jail Amanda Knox, but they can't, so they'll jail the guy no one cares about, Rafael.

The Italian judicial system has a quirk unlike ours. When a trial court pronounces you culpable, you're not actually convicted of the crime -- not yet. The actual conviction only occurs when a court, sitting in review, confirms the conviction.

I believe I read that Italy considers this trial finding of culpability less seriously than our own countrymen would find a jury verdict, because it's not actually yet a verdict.

Thus, Rafael is in this odd twilight, again, where he stands to be convicted of murder, and yet is not actually convicted of murderer, while the actual murderer, a drifter and repeat burglar named Rudy Guede, whose DNA was found all over the crime scene (and yet none of Rafael's or Amanda's-- the prosecutors wisely explained that they had cleaned the crime scene of their own DNA, while managing to leave behind a great deal of Guede's; the prosecutors have never explained what type of bleach could permit this selective removal of genetic material), remains in jail, but with a reduced sentence in exchange for implicating Knox and Solecitto, because all he did was burglarize, sexually violate, and then slaughter Meredith Kercher, whereas Rafael Solecitto and especially Amanda Knox provided the inspiration and stage direction for this crime, even though they weren't even there, but who cares, it's Italy, and she's a Foreign Whore, and Foreign Whores must pay.

Oh by the way: Rudy Guede fled the country the day after the murder, and he had committed a series of burglaries, armed with a knife of the exact same size as used to slaughter Meredith Kercher, with which he threatened one victim. Because he burglarized the home when the occupant was in residence. Because he was a stupid, low-impulse control, rapist, burglar, and idiot thug.

The fact that he did the same thing to another victim (without proceeding to the sexual violation and rage slaughter phase) just a month before he murdered Meredith Kercher is taken as some kind odd, but ultimately unimportant, coincidence by Perugia's All Star Prosecution Squad.

Anyone Interested in a Great True Crime Book About Italy's Own Jack the Ripper... ... should read Monster of Florence, by Douglas Preston and Mario Spezzi.

There is a strong connection to Amanda Knox, though the book is not about her.

If you want to read about this case specifically, the Hellman-Zanetti Report (the official report of the court of appeals that freed Knox and Solecitto) is great. But it is a court document, not a novelistic narrative.

But it is great reading.

Posted by: Ace at 12:03 PM | Comments (583)
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We discussed this dynamic on the podcast last night, not knowing another pig-faced shoe was about to drop. It's no fun to serve in the minority -- small staff, smaller offices, small influence -- and when it becomes clear that a party will not be capturing a house of Congress, some Congressmen decide to retire. Conversely, older Congressmen in a party in-power are more likely to stay on.

Politico reported late yesterday that Democrats had decided on a triage strategy-- they would abandon their quixotic efforts to seize control of the House in order to direct all resources to attempting to hold the Senate.

Democrats: Cede the House to save the Senate

With Democrats’ grasp on the Senate increasingly tenuous — and the House all but beyond reach — some top party donors and strategists are moving to do something in the midterm election as painful as it is coldblooded: Admit the House can’t be won and go all in to save the Senate.

Their calculation is uncomplicated. With only so much money to go around in an election year that is tilting the GOPÂ’s way, Democrats need to concentrate resources on preserving the chamber they have now. Losing the Senate, they know, could doom whatever hopes Barack Obama has of salvaging the final years of his presidency.

The triage idea is taking hold in phone conversations among donors and in strategy sessions between party operatives. Even some of the people who have invested the most to get House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi back into the speakerÂ’s chair are moving in that direction.

“There is no question that Democratic donors are shifting towards the Senate in 2014. They will continue to support Nancy, but everyone agrees that the emphasis is going to be on the Senate,” said Joe Cotchett, a prominent San Francisco trial attorney and friend of Pelosi’s who has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Democratic Party candidates and causes. “When you see people like [longtime California Democratic Rep.] George Miller announcing that they are not running again, you know where the money will be going.”

And now the swinish brute Henry Waxman decides that after decades of doing his best to destroy American democracy, he too wants to spend more time with his K Street lobbyists.

“I just think it’s time to move on,” Waxman [said].

He specifically denies that he's dropping out of congress after nearly thirty years of, um, "service" due to the fact that Democrats have no chance of taking the House.

“I don’t accept the idea that Democrats won’t get the House back,” Waxman said. “I think that the Republicans have nothing to offer. They’re against everything. They’re against everything Obama wanted. They have no alternatives on health care policy. They have nothing to say, they have nothing to offer.”

But I can tell he's lying because he has a "tell." That tell is that he's Henry Waxman, three-decades-long Democratic Congressman from California.

More: @JohnEkdahl notices Freddoso's Conservative Intel noticing something.

On a related note, Waxman holds a D+11 district. But Waxman still had a rough time of it last cycle — practically nobody noticed, but he almost lost his seat. A wealthy candidate named Bill Bloomfield (a longtime-moderate-Republican-donor-turned-unaffiliated-voter) put $7.6 of his own money into an independent bid against Waxman and held him under 54 percent in the general election. Bloomfield has actually raised $75,000 already this cycle, but he might just be paying himself back some of the loans he made his campaign.

Posted by: Ace at 09:53 AM | Comments (365)
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ICYMI, State Senator Nathan Dahm, appeared on Piers Morgan's show a few nights ago. Dahm, as you may recall, has sponsored the Piers Morgan Constitutional Right to Keep and Bear Arms Without Infringement Act bill in his home state of Oklahoma.

Catchy title, eh?

Well, Piers being Piers, he set out to make Dahm look the fool and Dahm, somehow, managed to make it through the interview without bursting into hysterical laughter or ever raising his voice. The majority of the interview can be found at You Tube but the real gem can be found in the video clip below wherein Piers attempts to analogize gun control to Kinder Eggs. It goes about as well as you might imagine.

I think Piers is trying to argue that if even a chocolate egg can be deemed hazardous to society, why aren't guns. Again, I think that's what he's trying to say but, frankly, it was such a convoluted piece of word-vomit I'm not really sure at all. No matter his point, he seems clearly okay with the idea that the federal government should be in the business of protecting us from ourselves.

My guess: He'd be happy banning the toys in Cracker Jacks and cereal boxes as well.

So.... Dahm. What are your thoughts about that guy?

Also, open thread.

Posted by: Open Blogger at 09:05 AM | Comments (279)
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