Left click on image to enlarge.Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Monday, June 28, 2010
Americans Love Corpo-Cola to Death
Left click on image to enlarge.Listed in the fake ad are the 20 largest corporations by revenue in 2010, according to Fortune magazine and CNN Money. The real Coca-Cola ranks at 72, Wall Street bad boys Goldman Sachs Group peg in at 39, and BP has dropped off the top 100 list entirely; it was consistently in the top 20 until this year.
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Friday, June 25, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Is Gore Gay? GOP Barton Smartin' and the NV Angle Tangle Edition
-- Al Gore sexually assault a woman? I don't buy it, but this is the tale some Oregon masseuse was trying to sell to the National Enquirer for a cool million, according to Col. Howie Kurtz at the WaHoPo. As a mantra of fact, my friend who has very advanced 'gaydar' – she called out Ted Haggard months before it was revealed he was regularly visiting a male prostitute and snorting meth – has long thought Al was a closeted gay man, something like Kevin Spacey's character Jim Williams in "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil." She thinks the marital break-up of the Gores probably has more to do with Tipper catching Al with a man than a woman. (And leave us not forget that weird groping public kiss at the Dem Convention in 2000. Awkward? You bet.) Ah, Tipper – apparently playing the beard to the last.
-- If it were any organization other than the current Dem Party collection of timid halfwits, I'd say Texas Oil Republican Rep. Joe Barton just sunk the GOP in the 2010 elections, but then we've seen how often these Washington Jackasses have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, so let's not get our hopes up.
In case you've been meditating in a cave for the past week (and who could blame you?), here's what Barton publicly said to BP CEO Tony Hayward during a Congressional hearing:
-- If it were any organization other than the current Dem Party collection of timid halfwits, I'd say Texas Oil Republican Rep. Joe Barton just sunk the GOP in the 2010 elections, but then we've seen how often these Washington Jackasses have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, so let's not get our hopes up.
In case you've been meditating in a cave for the past week (and who could blame you?), here's what Barton publicly said to BP CEO Tony Hayward during a Congressional hearing:
"I'm ashamed of what happened in the White House yesterday," said Rep. Joe Barton (R-Tex.) during a hearing on Thursday morning with BP's CEO Tony Hayward." I think it is a tragedy in the first proportion that a private corporation can be subjected to what I would characterize as a shakedown -- in this case a $20 billion shakedown -- with the attorney general of the United States, who is legitimately conducting a criminal investigation and has every right to do so to protect the American people, participating in what amounts to a $20 billion slush fund that's unprecedented in our nation's history, which has no legal standing, which I think sets a terrible precedent for our nation's future.
"I'm only speaking for myself. I'm not speaking for anyone else, but I apologize," Barton added. "I do not want to live in a county where anytime a citizen or a corporation does something that is legitimately wrong, [it is] subject to some sort of political pressure that, again, in my words, amounts to a shakedown."
-- Sam Stein at Huffington Post, as quoted by Ben
Dimiero at Media Matters.
BP and Tony Hayward are less popular than O.J. Simpson and here's Strokin' Joe embarrassing himself and his party by apologizing to them. Imagine if the tables were turned and some bubblehead Dem said this – the GOP would have it on a tape loop with wall-to-wall negative ads running all over the country and every Republican who popped up on a news show would find a way to mention it ten times. True, the Dems do have an ad up, but they haven't gone all in yet on linking Barton with the Republicans and particularly pointing out the fact that Joe has yet to be relieved of his position as ranking minority member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. After initially renouncing Barton's goofy apologia, some Republicans are now actually coming to his defense! Gee, that wouldn't make a bad basis for an ad, either, especially in the Gulf States. But, then, the 'bipartisan' Democrats apparently find chasing their tails more attractive than hunting the predator that's trying to kill them.
-- The Angle of Attack on Sharron: You'd think someone who wants to dump Social Security and Medicare (but thus far not in favor of bartering for medical care with chickens, thank God), eliminate the IRS without any plan to replace it (how do we pay off the deficit without collecting taxes, Sharron?), still wants to 'drill, baby, drill' even after the BP Gulf disaster, and has 'shifting' positions on the prohibition of alcohol and fluoridation of water (among other wacky notions), would be pretty easy to beat in a statewide election. Well, she probably will be as even doddering old bumbler Sen. Harry Reid has finally seen fit to call her "crazy" and run a TV ad showing what a hallucinatory teabag of unfounded WorldNetDaily opinions is his Republican opponent. Reid's no FDR, but he's George Burns compared to Sharron Angle's crazy-crap Christopublican Gracie Allen. Sure, the GOP rinse-and-spin machine is busy trying to make her ready for prime time, but this woman's a political Lady Gaga at the ballpark who can barely hold her own in Fox-friendly interviews and irritatingly insists on calling any legitimate query regarding what she would actually do as senator a "Gotcha" question. In open debate with Reid, she'd be Sarah Palin without the wink; Dan Quayle without the hairdo; Ronald Reagan without the acting experience. But, since Reid's a twenty-first century milquetoast Democrat, the election will be closer than it should. Still, I think he'll pull it out.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
The Tattlesnake – It's McChrystal Clear: The General is Running for President Edition
By publicly making derogatory comments about his superiors in the chain of command – President Obama, VP Biden, Defense Secretary Gates, White House National Security Adviser Gen. Jim Jones -- US Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal has committed an act of rank insubordination, and I think he did it intentionally.
Subsequent apologies for his loose-lipped Rolling Stone interview notwithstanding, McChrystal knows Obama must, in order to maintain what little credibility he has with the military as commander-in-chief, relieve McChrystal of his command and he should break him in rank down to a Colonel or, at least, Brigadier General, but, considering Obama's reticence in such matters, he likely won't do the latter.
McChrystal well knows that if he wants to criticize his superiors there is a legitimate and honorable way to do so – resign his commission and fire away as a civilian. Instead, the wily general has manufactured a situation wherein Obama must relieve him or lose all respect with the military establishment and a good portion of the public, as well.
Why would McChrystal set up such a situation? The easiest answer is that he's planning on running for president as a Republican in 2012 and he can use it to a) play the aggrieved victim of a president and administration that doesn't know what it's doing in the Middle East; and b) insulate himself from charges of incompetence when we are forced out of Afghanistan. "I told the president the strategy he was pursuing to defeat the Taliban was naïve and wrong and that I had a better plan. This so angered him he found a flimsy reason to dismiss me."
This is the line I believe McChrystal will employ following his resignation after Obama has relieved him of his command. Such criticism dovetails nicely with the GOP's probable angle of attack on Obama in 2012 – arrogant, incompetent, headstrong, vengeful, naïve – and McChrystal will go to the head of the class of potential presidential candidates in a so far thin field for the Republicans -- Romney's no barn-burner; Palin's a sour joke; Gingrich is stuck in the mud of 1994; Pawlenty's a calamitous bore, and no one else is really on the radar.
Of course, the GOP establishment would welcome McChrystal with open arms as the second coming of Dwight Eisenhower, but even the various Teabaggers, quasi-Libertarians and Christian zealots who are now the party's foundation would most likely not much contest nominating a 'military hero' such as the general. His campaign would also provide some lengthy (and stable) coattails for other Republicans to ride, a surcease from the almost daily factional friction of a minority party in turmoil.
The question: Will former Pentagon black-ops chief McChrystal's new strategy to gain the White House work any better than did his plans to tame Afghanistan?
The answer: For a man as arrogant, incompetent, headstrong, vengeful, and naïve on public matters as Stanley McChrystal -- who also, according to Rolling Stone, thinks Bud Light Lime is a great beer – is a resounding no.
Read more:
"The Runaway General"
-- Michael Hastings, Rolling Stone, June 8-22, 2010.
Stanley A. McChrystal's Wikipedia bio.
"New Afghanistan Commander Ran Secret 'Executive Assassination Ring' Under Cheney"
-- Tom Englehardt, TomDispatch.com, May 21, 2009, by way of The Huffington Post.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Subsequent apologies for his loose-lipped Rolling Stone interview notwithstanding, McChrystal knows Obama must, in order to maintain what little credibility he has with the military as commander-in-chief, relieve McChrystal of his command and he should break him in rank down to a Colonel or, at least, Brigadier General, but, considering Obama's reticence in such matters, he likely won't do the latter.
McChrystal well knows that if he wants to criticize his superiors there is a legitimate and honorable way to do so – resign his commission and fire away as a civilian. Instead, the wily general has manufactured a situation wherein Obama must relieve him or lose all respect with the military establishment and a good portion of the public, as well.
Why would McChrystal set up such a situation? The easiest answer is that he's planning on running for president as a Republican in 2012 and he can use it to a) play the aggrieved victim of a president and administration that doesn't know what it's doing in the Middle East; and b) insulate himself from charges of incompetence when we are forced out of Afghanistan. "I told the president the strategy he was pursuing to defeat the Taliban was naïve and wrong and that I had a better plan. This so angered him he found a flimsy reason to dismiss me."
This is the line I believe McChrystal will employ following his resignation after Obama has relieved him of his command. Such criticism dovetails nicely with the GOP's probable angle of attack on Obama in 2012 – arrogant, incompetent, headstrong, vengeful, naïve – and McChrystal will go to the head of the class of potential presidential candidates in a so far thin field for the Republicans -- Romney's no barn-burner; Palin's a sour joke; Gingrich is stuck in the mud of 1994; Pawlenty's a calamitous bore, and no one else is really on the radar.
Of course, the GOP establishment would welcome McChrystal with open arms as the second coming of Dwight Eisenhower, but even the various Teabaggers, quasi-Libertarians and Christian zealots who are now the party's foundation would most likely not much contest nominating a 'military hero' such as the general. His campaign would also provide some lengthy (and stable) coattails for other Republicans to ride, a surcease from the almost daily factional friction of a minority party in turmoil.
The question: Will former Pentagon black-ops chief McChrystal's new strategy to gain the White House work any better than did his plans to tame Afghanistan?
The answer: For a man as arrogant, incompetent, headstrong, vengeful, and naïve on public matters as Stanley McChrystal -- who also, according to Rolling Stone, thinks Bud Light Lime is a great beer – is a resounding no.
Read more:
"The Runaway General"
-- Michael Hastings, Rolling Stone, June 8-22, 2010.
Stanley A. McChrystal's Wikipedia bio.
"New Afghanistan Commander Ran Secret 'Executive Assassination Ring' Under Cheney"
-- Tom Englehardt, TomDispatch.com, May 21, 2009, by way of The Huffington Post.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Friday, June 18, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Hayward Ho, Joe Blows It, Michele's Glow Dims and All That Glitters Edition
-- Why Ask Me? Thanks to Tony Hayward's appearance before Congress, we now know the qualifications for a CEO of British Petroleum apparently are to be completely uninformed about your business and the details of the greatest man-made oil disaster in US history that your company caused. For maintaining this extraordinary level of blissful ignorance, Hayward was paid $4.7 million in salary last year. Note to BP: Seems like you could find someone just as empty above the neck for considerably less – I know several people looking for a job who know nothing about the oil business and would gladly accept $50K per annum to stay just as dumb as Tony.
-- Speaking of Tony's eye-rolling Congressional performance, crackpot Texas Republican Congressman Joe Barton, coincidentally the recipient of at least $27,000 in campaign cash from Big Oil, took the occasion to dump on Obama for making sure BP paid for its disaster with a $20 billion escrow fund (which Joe hilariously called a 'shakedown') and then apologized to BP for any inconvenience the people of the US might have caused the oil giant by holding them responsible for destroying the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 Americans and ruining the lives of millions of others. President Obama may not have had his finest moment in his speech last Tuesday, but with the opposition spearheaded by half-baked corporate cheerleaders like Barton; Mississippi Gov. Haley "You Sure These Here Tar Balls Are From BP?" Barbour; Louisiana Gov. Bobby "I'm Against All Federal Bail-Outs Except When My State Needs One" Jindal; Alabama Gov. Bob "The Oil Will Never Reach Our Beaches" Riley and other GOP space cadets echoing the same forehead-slapping "Let's not be so hard on BP" line, Obama looks like FDR in high-gear in comparison. The delusional, pop-eyed, tongue-lolling crazy GOP is committing suicide in the Gulf States; seems like the political opposition could take advantage of that by running ads simply showing what the various Republican pols have said in defense of the hated BP, especially Barton. (Just imagine the spittle-flecked furor on the right if a Democrat apologized to BP.) But, then, these are today's Democrats who have made 'bipartisanship' with the lunatic Republicans their religion. FDR would not have approved. (Incidentally, GOP House Minority Leader John Boehner forced Barton to apologize for his BP apology; even the Ohio SunTanMan knew what a stench of electoral defeat Strokin' Joe's words left in their wake.)
-- Speaking of losers, I think it's a cinch that dipsy-doodle Republican wingnut Michele Bachmann will lose her bid for reelection in Minnesota's Sixth Congressional District. Given a strong Democratic challenger (for a change) and the embarrassment she's caused to her constituents by her public bouts of delusional babbling, paranoid hysteria, and defense of BP's unethical and destructive practices, she may very well be retired to a Fox News berth, or a sinecure as a lobbyist for the Focus on the Family's Anti-Woman League.
-- Gold Rush and Bust: For those who think buying gold will be a hedge against disaster if the economy melts down even further, keep in mind it is just a tradable commodity like corn, and actually worse than corn because at least corn is edible. Gold is a soft metal not good for much except jewelry and spacecraft and the price is high only because, for now, there are more buyers than sellers. However, if in the future the number of sellers exceeds the number of buyers, the price will plunge, which is exactly what I think will happen as things worsen. Although most economists think there's no chance the price of gold will drop precipitously, these are some of the same seers who thought real estate values would perpetually increase. Unless you can find a way to eat it or wear it for warmth, investing in gold is just another junk bond scheme where the little guy will end up holding the bag. (Gold purveyors are now Glenn Beck's primary sponsors – what does that tell you?) As John Kenneth Galbraith once said, "In economics, the majority is always wrong," and Galbraith has been proven right, again and again.
BTW, those who favor a return to the gold standard for US currency don't seem to realize that the price of gold is unstable and fluctuates daily and, therefore, so would the value of the dollar. Besides, the US doesn't own enough gold to make this a viable notion.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
-- Speaking of Tony's eye-rolling Congressional performance, crackpot Texas Republican Congressman Joe Barton, coincidentally the recipient of at least $27,000 in campaign cash from Big Oil, took the occasion to dump on Obama for making sure BP paid for its disaster with a $20 billion escrow fund (which Joe hilariously called a 'shakedown') and then apologized to BP for any inconvenience the people of the US might have caused the oil giant by holding them responsible for destroying the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 Americans and ruining the lives of millions of others. President Obama may not have had his finest moment in his speech last Tuesday, but with the opposition spearheaded by half-baked corporate cheerleaders like Barton; Mississippi Gov. Haley "You Sure These Here Tar Balls Are From BP?" Barbour; Louisiana Gov. Bobby "I'm Against All Federal Bail-Outs Except When My State Needs One" Jindal; Alabama Gov. Bob "The Oil Will Never Reach Our Beaches" Riley and other GOP space cadets echoing the same forehead-slapping "Let's not be so hard on BP" line, Obama looks like FDR in high-gear in comparison. The delusional, pop-eyed, tongue-lolling crazy GOP is committing suicide in the Gulf States; seems like the political opposition could take advantage of that by running ads simply showing what the various Republican pols have said in defense of the hated BP, especially Barton. (Just imagine the spittle-flecked furor on the right if a Democrat apologized to BP.) But, then, these are today's Democrats who have made 'bipartisanship' with the lunatic Republicans their religion. FDR would not have approved. (Incidentally, GOP House Minority Leader John Boehner forced Barton to apologize for his BP apology; even the Ohio SunTanMan knew what a stench of electoral defeat Strokin' Joe's words left in their wake.)
-- Speaking of losers, I think it's a cinch that dipsy-doodle Republican wingnut Michele Bachmann will lose her bid for reelection in Minnesota's Sixth Congressional District. Given a strong Democratic challenger (for a change) and the embarrassment she's caused to her constituents by her public bouts of delusional babbling, paranoid hysteria, and defense of BP's unethical and destructive practices, she may very well be retired to a Fox News berth, or a sinecure as a lobbyist for the Focus on the Family's Anti-Woman League.
-- Gold Rush and Bust: For those who think buying gold will be a hedge against disaster if the economy melts down even further, keep in mind it is just a tradable commodity like corn, and actually worse than corn because at least corn is edible. Gold is a soft metal not good for much except jewelry and spacecraft and the price is high only because, for now, there are more buyers than sellers. However, if in the future the number of sellers exceeds the number of buyers, the price will plunge, which is exactly what I think will happen as things worsen. Although most economists think there's no chance the price of gold will drop precipitously, these are some of the same seers who thought real estate values would perpetually increase. Unless you can find a way to eat it or wear it for warmth, investing in gold is just another junk bond scheme where the little guy will end up holding the bag. (Gold purveyors are now Glenn Beck's primary sponsors – what does that tell you?) As John Kenneth Galbraith once said, "In economics, the majority is always wrong," and Galbraith has been proven right, again and again.
BTW, those who favor a return to the gold standard for US currency don't seem to realize that the price of gold is unstable and fluctuates daily and, therefore, so would the value of the dollar. Besides, the US doesn't own enough gold to make this a viable notion.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Monday, June 14, 2010
The Tattlesnake -- The Alvin Greene Fraud (and More) Edition
Just How Stupid Are South Carolina Republicans?
"I'm the Democratic Party nominee. I mean, I mean, the people have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina."
-- Alvin Greene, apparently accepting the Dem nomination for US Senate from South Carolina, as quoted by CommonDreams.org.
Did the South Carolina GOP really think they could sneak this poor hapless vet through without anyone noticing? Regardless of what the Bias-Belted Insider Punditocracy says, I think the SC GOP, including cynical rump-pimple Sen. Jim DeMint, are a lot more vulnerable than the Big Media Babblelonians realize. It's the only reason the GOP dirty tricksters would try a lame stunt like this – what with the aftermath of the Mark Sanford scandal and the Republican-run state cratering economically mired in record unemployment, they're getting desperate.
Sadly, 13-year military vetetran Greene resembles an advanced PTSD case in the way he speaks and acts. He may also have a drinking or drug problem that needs servicing. Such people are easy to hornswoggle for money into buffoonish charades such as this. If the SC Republicans abused a brain-damaged vet this way, they should be boiled in BP's Gulf oil. (They should anyway, but that's another story.)
It shouldn't be too hard to find out how an unemployed man who had declared himself indigent a couple of months ago came up with $10,400 to put his name on the ballot, didn't spend a dime for anything else in his 'campaign' (even his t-shirt reads 'Greene Family Reunion,' although he wears it as if it had something to do with his senate run), and somehow won against an experienced former judge and state legislator, Vic Rawls, who actually went out and campaigned across the state. (Maybe it has to do with the fact that in SC Republicans can vote for Dem primary candidates, or the state's easily-hacked, no-paper-trail touch screen voting equipment manufactured and installed by GOP-friendly companies.) This stinks of blatant election fraud and it would seem easy to prosecute the seamy GOP lowlife that is surely behind it.
Not only that, but SC Rep. Jim Clyburn's Democratic primary opponent, a shit-grinning 'bidnessman' named Gregory Brown, supposedly spent $70K to challenge incumbent Clyburn. Curiously, more than a third of that money was paid for 'marketing strategies' to a firm owned by Preston Grisham, who worked as a special assistant and campaign manager for Republican Rep. Joe "You Lie!" Wilson up until November of 2009, and was flacking for two SC Republican candidates at the same time he was being paid by Brown. Move along, nothing to see here, stop connecting those dots.
Perhaps this is to be expected in a state that spawned the late Lee Atwater and his nasty and devious approach to political campaigning, but certainly Eric Holder's DOJ can take action to charge those responsible for such obvious, and stupid, attempts at defrauding South Carolina voters – these were elections for federal office, after all.
Read more:
"Clyburn's Dem Challenger Denies He's A 'Plant' -- But Hired GOP Rep.'s Aide"
-- Christina Bellatoni and Justin Elliot, TPMMuckraker, June 11, 2010.
"Clyburn Alleges Conspiracy To Plant Candidates In Three Dem Primaries In S.C."
-- Christina Bellatoni, TPMMuckraker, June 10, 2010.
"The Alvin Greene Interviews; a TPMtv Original Video"
© RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
"I'm the Democratic Party nominee. I mean, I mean, the people have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina. The people of South Carolina have spoken. We have to be pro-South Carolina."
-- Alvin Greene, apparently accepting the Dem nomination for US Senate from South Carolina, as quoted by CommonDreams.org.
Did the South Carolina GOP really think they could sneak this poor hapless vet through without anyone noticing? Regardless of what the Bias-Belted Insider Punditocracy says, I think the SC GOP, including cynical rump-pimple Sen. Jim DeMint, are a lot more vulnerable than the Big Media Babblelonians realize. It's the only reason the GOP dirty tricksters would try a lame stunt like this – what with the aftermath of the Mark Sanford scandal and the Republican-run state cratering economically mired in record unemployment, they're getting desperate.
Sadly, 13-year military vetetran Greene resembles an advanced PTSD case in the way he speaks and acts. He may also have a drinking or drug problem that needs servicing. Such people are easy to hornswoggle for money into buffoonish charades such as this. If the SC Republicans abused a brain-damaged vet this way, they should be boiled in BP's Gulf oil. (They should anyway, but that's another story.)
It shouldn't be too hard to find out how an unemployed man who had declared himself indigent a couple of months ago came up with $10,400 to put his name on the ballot, didn't spend a dime for anything else in his 'campaign' (even his t-shirt reads 'Greene Family Reunion,' although he wears it as if it had something to do with his senate run), and somehow won against an experienced former judge and state legislator, Vic Rawls, who actually went out and campaigned across the state. (Maybe it has to do with the fact that in SC Republicans can vote for Dem primary candidates, or the state's easily-hacked, no-paper-trail touch screen voting equipment manufactured and installed by GOP-friendly companies.) This stinks of blatant election fraud and it would seem easy to prosecute the seamy GOP lowlife that is surely behind it.
Not only that, but SC Rep. Jim Clyburn's Democratic primary opponent, a shit-grinning 'bidnessman' named Gregory Brown, supposedly spent $70K to challenge incumbent Clyburn. Curiously, more than a third of that money was paid for 'marketing strategies' to a firm owned by Preston Grisham, who worked as a special assistant and campaign manager for Republican Rep. Joe "You Lie!" Wilson up until November of 2009, and was flacking for two SC Republican candidates at the same time he was being paid by Brown. Move along, nothing to see here, stop connecting those dots.
Perhaps this is to be expected in a state that spawned the late Lee Atwater and his nasty and devious approach to political campaigning, but certainly Eric Holder's DOJ can take action to charge those responsible for such obvious, and stupid, attempts at defrauding South Carolina voters – these were elections for federal office, after all.
Read more:
"Clyburn's Dem Challenger Denies He's A 'Plant' -- But Hired GOP Rep.'s Aide"
-- Christina Bellatoni and Justin Elliot, TPMMuckraker, June 11, 2010.
"Clyburn Alleges Conspiracy To Plant Candidates In Three Dem Primaries In S.C."
-- Christina Bellatoni, TPMMuckraker, June 10, 2010.
"The Alvin Greene Interviews; a TPMtv Original Video"
© RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Friday, June 11, 2010
Sharron 'Double R for Ridiculously Right-wing' Angle's Political Makeover
Left click on image to enlarge.Thursday, June 10, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Primary Post-Mortem Edition
"Dear Lord Jesus, I do not often speak with you and ask for things, but now, I really must insist that you help me win the election tomorrow because I deserve it and Paul Metzler doesn't, as you well know. … I'm asking that you go that one last mile and make sure to put me in office where I belong so that I may carry out your will on earth as it is in heaven. Amen."
-- Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon) from the film classic "Election" (1999).
A quick rundown of the five most prominent primaries last Tuesday:
The DOA GOP
California:
US Senate: Creepy Republican Carly Fiorina is such a dimwit that Dem Sen. Barbara Boxer shouldn't have much problem with her. All Barb has to do is run ads revealing that Carly's idea of improving the American economy is shipping 13,000 jobs overseas, her record as one of the 20 worst CEOs in the country when she ran Hewlett-Packard, her flip-flop on cap and trade, and that squirrelly flub she made when supporting McCain for president in 2008 by saying (truthfully) that neither John McCain nor Sarah Palin were qualified to run a US corporation. Meanwhile, word is Carly's gearing up ads to brand Boxer as a – gasp! – liberal Democrat, as if California voters didn't already know that. Ms. Fiorina can be counted on to make at least one thoroughly ridiculous, out-of-touch, mind-numbingly dumb statement at some time during the campaign – she can't help herself – and that will seal her fate. (She's already fired some opening shots in that direction by carping about Barbara Boxer's hairstyle as if she were in a high school catfight, and dumping on fellow CA Republican Meg Whitman for appearing on Sean Hannity's Fox News laugh-a-thon.) Prediction: Bet on Boxer by a KO.
"There is no job that is America's God-given right anymore. We have to compete for jobs as a nation."
-- Carly Fiorina in 2004, telling American workers they should work for less, except herself, of course – she got a $20 million pay-off for resigning from HP after reducing the worth of their stock by half.
Governor: Speaking of Ms. Whitman, here's what I know about eBay – three separate people I've met, unconnected to one another, have all had very bad experiences selling or buying items on eBay and will never use them again, and they were all enraged at the negligent treatment they received from the company in settling their complaints. That doesn't augur well for any business and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman was in charge when these events happened. Meg just spent a record $80+ million to seize the Republican nomination for governor in the Golden State, which seems like an egregious waste of money since she's bound to be the GOP sacrifice to Dem Jerry Brown. After years of the Republican Guffernator, whose poll numbers are now lower than Gray Davis' when he was recalled, it seems Kalifornyuns are plumb tuckered out from the big business-small government-low taxes hoohah that has been Ahnuld Schwarzenfluffer's theme song and that Whitman is now peddling. It's worked so well that CA is an economic basket case, suffocating in massive debt and cutting needed services. Time for a change from the regressive buncombe. Prediction: Easy victory for Brown.
"We can’t impede progress in the name of environmental action that yields little for the environment and even less for our people … and we should look at the environment as an economic opportunity."
-- Meg Whitman. Yes, what an 'economic opportunity' the Gulf of Mexico has become thanks to lax 'environmental action.'
(Side Note: What is it about these Republican women politicians? They all talk and act like none-too-bright Century 21 reps at a sales seminar. Could it be that all of the smart, accomplished women become Dems and the shiny-eyed Tracy Flicks go GOP? Certainly seems that way.)
Nevada:
US Senate: Okay, there's no denying Dem Sen. Harry Reid is a horse's ass, but he's at least a generally rational horse's ass, which cannot be said of his newly-minted Republican opponent and Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle.
Angle has hit all the Stations of the Cross in Wingnut Wackadelphia: She wants to get rid of Social Security, unemployment insurance and Medicare; advocated for more offshore oil drilling and further deregulation even after the BP Gulf disaster; drools to eliminate the EPA, the Dept. of Education, and get out of the U.N.; and she's even revisited the reactionary-fringe past by opining that booze be banned along with the fluoridation of water. Angle is now desperately trying to play down how many nuts are in her fruitcake, but Reid should have a field day letting her own dopey words drag her to defeat. As lame as Reid may be, Nevadans are sick of Republican shenanigans and corruption – Gov. Jim Gibbons and Sen. John Ensign come to mind, to name just two – and they don't need another glaring embarrassment like Angle in Washington, competing with Michele Bachmann for the Goofball of the Week prize. Prediction: Reid will coast to victory next November.
"We have oil reserves and petroleum reserves that we should tap into. And that's a policy that we really need to look at as a nation. How do we deregulate enough to invite our industries to come back into the United States and quit outsourcing their business?"
-- Sharron Angle on May 26, 2010, more than a month after the BP Gulf oil disaster began, as quoted by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line.
The DOA Dems
Arkansas:
US Senate: Your Tattlesnake called Bill Halter in the runoff by 5 points and was, obviously, wrong. Of course, I didn't count on most of the polling places in districts friendly to Halter being closed by election officials with ties to his opponent -- such as only 2 open out of 36 in Garland County -- so that may have affected the final tally. Be that as it may, sitting Blue Dog Dem Sen. Blanche Lincoln is headed for doom in November – her campaign and an anonymous senior idiot at the White House who sounds suspiciously like Rahm Emanuel managed to gratuitously insult unions sufficiently that they will sit out the Arkansas vote. With no massive GOTV ground game, few moderate Dems enthusiastic about her reelection, and unions and progressives turning their backs on her in droves, Blanche is fixing to be blanched by a boiling landslide. No great loss – the Democrats need to shed backstabbers like Lincoln.
"Voters must have faith in the electoral process for our democracy to succeed."
-- Sen. Blanche Lincoln, apparently unconcerned about the AR primary runoff chicanery.
South Carolina:
Governor: Unless the lurid charges of hetero extramarital affairs and a lesbian tryst with, say, Wanda Sykes, turn out to be true, Republican Nikki Haley will be the next governor of SC. Maybe by the election cycle after that, the white-bread troglodytes who inhabit much of the state will learn how to read a calendar and realize it's 2012 and not 1912. Still, a female governor of Sikh Indian ancestry, albeit one endorsed by McCain's half-term wonder-thinker from Wasilla, is a slight improvement over most of the testicled louts that usually hold civic office in the steaming heap just south of the Tar Heel State, which may soon be known as the Tar Ball State, depending on the strength of the Loop Current from the Gulf.
No quote from Nikki Haley except to say that she agrees with her predecessor and endorser Gov. Mark Sanford's neocon policies that have brought SC to the brink of ruin. Just guessing, but she probably doesn't agree with him in the realm of personal conduct or trail hiking in the Appalachians.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
-- Tracy Flick (Reese Witherspoon) from the film classic "Election" (1999).
A quick rundown of the five most prominent primaries last Tuesday:
The DOA GOP
California:
US Senate: Creepy Republican Carly Fiorina is such a dimwit that Dem Sen. Barbara Boxer shouldn't have much problem with her. All Barb has to do is run ads revealing that Carly's idea of improving the American economy is shipping 13,000 jobs overseas, her record as one of the 20 worst CEOs in the country when she ran Hewlett-Packard, her flip-flop on cap and trade, and that squirrelly flub she made when supporting McCain for president in 2008 by saying (truthfully) that neither John McCain nor Sarah Palin were qualified to run a US corporation. Meanwhile, word is Carly's gearing up ads to brand Boxer as a – gasp! – liberal Democrat, as if California voters didn't already know that. Ms. Fiorina can be counted on to make at least one thoroughly ridiculous, out-of-touch, mind-numbingly dumb statement at some time during the campaign – she can't help herself – and that will seal her fate. (She's already fired some opening shots in that direction by carping about Barbara Boxer's hairstyle as if she were in a high school catfight, and dumping on fellow CA Republican Meg Whitman for appearing on Sean Hannity's Fox News laugh-a-thon.) Prediction: Bet on Boxer by a KO.
"There is no job that is America's God-given right anymore. We have to compete for jobs as a nation."
-- Carly Fiorina in 2004, telling American workers they should work for less, except herself, of course – she got a $20 million pay-off for resigning from HP after reducing the worth of their stock by half.
Governor: Speaking of Ms. Whitman, here's what I know about eBay – three separate people I've met, unconnected to one another, have all had very bad experiences selling or buying items on eBay and will never use them again, and they were all enraged at the negligent treatment they received from the company in settling their complaints. That doesn't augur well for any business and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman was in charge when these events happened. Meg just spent a record $80+ million to seize the Republican nomination for governor in the Golden State, which seems like an egregious waste of money since she's bound to be the GOP sacrifice to Dem Jerry Brown. After years of the Republican Guffernator, whose poll numbers are now lower than Gray Davis' when he was recalled, it seems Kalifornyuns are plumb tuckered out from the big business-small government-low taxes hoohah that has been Ahnuld Schwarzenfluffer's theme song and that Whitman is now peddling. It's worked so well that CA is an economic basket case, suffocating in massive debt and cutting needed services. Time for a change from the regressive buncombe. Prediction: Easy victory for Brown.
"We can’t impede progress in the name of environmental action that yields little for the environment and even less for our people … and we should look at the environment as an economic opportunity."
-- Meg Whitman. Yes, what an 'economic opportunity' the Gulf of Mexico has become thanks to lax 'environmental action.'
(Side Note: What is it about these Republican women politicians? They all talk and act like none-too-bright Century 21 reps at a sales seminar. Could it be that all of the smart, accomplished women become Dems and the shiny-eyed Tracy Flicks go GOP? Certainly seems that way.)
Nevada:
US Senate: Okay, there's no denying Dem Sen. Harry Reid is a horse's ass, but he's at least a generally rational horse's ass, which cannot be said of his newly-minted Republican opponent and Tea Party favorite Sharron Angle.
Angle has hit all the Stations of the Cross in Wingnut Wackadelphia: She wants to get rid of Social Security, unemployment insurance and Medicare; advocated for more offshore oil drilling and further deregulation even after the BP Gulf disaster; drools to eliminate the EPA, the Dept. of Education, and get out of the U.N.; and she's even revisited the reactionary-fringe past by opining that booze be banned along with the fluoridation of water. Angle is now desperately trying to play down how many nuts are in her fruitcake, but Reid should have a field day letting her own dopey words drag her to defeat. As lame as Reid may be, Nevadans are sick of Republican shenanigans and corruption – Gov. Jim Gibbons and Sen. John Ensign come to mind, to name just two – and they don't need another glaring embarrassment like Angle in Washington, competing with Michele Bachmann for the Goofball of the Week prize. Prediction: Reid will coast to victory next November.
"We have oil reserves and petroleum reserves that we should tap into. And that's a policy that we really need to look at as a nation. How do we deregulate enough to invite our industries to come back into the United States and quit outsourcing their business?"
-- Sharron Angle on May 26, 2010, more than a month after the BP Gulf oil disaster began, as quoted by Greg Sargent at The Plum Line.
The DOA Dems
Arkansas:
US Senate: Your Tattlesnake called Bill Halter in the runoff by 5 points and was, obviously, wrong. Of course, I didn't count on most of the polling places in districts friendly to Halter being closed by election officials with ties to his opponent -- such as only 2 open out of 36 in Garland County -- so that may have affected the final tally. Be that as it may, sitting Blue Dog Dem Sen. Blanche Lincoln is headed for doom in November – her campaign and an anonymous senior idiot at the White House who sounds suspiciously like Rahm Emanuel managed to gratuitously insult unions sufficiently that they will sit out the Arkansas vote. With no massive GOTV ground game, few moderate Dems enthusiastic about her reelection, and unions and progressives turning their backs on her in droves, Blanche is fixing to be blanched by a boiling landslide. No great loss – the Democrats need to shed backstabbers like Lincoln.
"Voters must have faith in the electoral process for our democracy to succeed."
-- Sen. Blanche Lincoln, apparently unconcerned about the AR primary runoff chicanery.
South Carolina:
Governor: Unless the lurid charges of hetero extramarital affairs and a lesbian tryst with, say, Wanda Sykes, turn out to be true, Republican Nikki Haley will be the next governor of SC. Maybe by the election cycle after that, the white-bread troglodytes who inhabit much of the state will learn how to read a calendar and realize it's 2012 and not 1912. Still, a female governor of Sikh Indian ancestry, albeit one endorsed by McCain's half-term wonder-thinker from Wasilla, is a slight improvement over most of the testicled louts that usually hold civic office in the steaming heap just south of the Tar Heel State, which may soon be known as the Tar Ball State, depending on the strength of the Loop Current from the Gulf.
No quote from Nikki Haley except to say that she agrees with her predecessor and endorser Gov. Mark Sanford's neocon policies that have brought SC to the brink of ruin. Just guessing, but she probably doesn't agree with him in the realm of personal conduct or trail hiking in the Appalachians.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Tuesday, June 08, 2010
Saturday, June 05, 2010
Friday, June 04, 2010
Thursday, June 03, 2010
What a Difference Two Words Make
Al-Qaeda operatives attack several states in the southern US, causing the deaths of 11 Americans outright, poisoning many others, destroying fishing, tourism and other businesses for generations to come and costing America billions of dollars. CIA spy satellites immediately identify the Al-Qaeda home base that masterminded and launched the attack, and bipartisan voices are raised in Congress and throughout the land demanding the president call in air strikes to destroy the base and send in the Marines to kill off any terrorists left alive. With the world's support, President Obama acts that very day, ordering the military to bomb the Al-Qaeda base 'back to the Stone Age' and putting the Marines on alert. "I will not sit still," says President Obama in a speech to the nation, "While organizations that plot and profit from destructive acts and cause vast devastation to our nation exist and thrive. We will take every available course of action to put them out of business permanently."
Replace 'Al-Qaeda' with 'British Petroleum' and it makes all the difference, doesn't it?
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Replace 'Al-Qaeda' with 'British Petroleum' and it makes all the difference, doesn't it?
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
Wednesday, June 02, 2010
The Tattlesnake – The Bibi Tweak, the GOP Geek and the BP Leak Edition
-- Does Not Compute:
If you believe the official Israeli government story regarding their boarding of those humanitarian aid ships that were bound for Gaza, Israeli commandos, thought to be among the toughest, best trained and equipped military outfits in the world, can be easily disarmed, beaten and stabbed by out-of-shape amateurs wielding metal rods. Either the Israeli commando force has turned into vanilla pudding or Netanyahu's government is lying through its teeth regarding the events surrounding the deaths of at least nine aid workers aboard those ships. I'll leave it to you to decide which is more believable.
-- Old Soldiers (and Sailors) Never Lie, But They Do:
Republican Rep. Mark Kirk, who awarded himself a military citation, 'Intelligence Officer of the Year,' he never received and even boasted about it in Congress and in his official bio; and who also claimed on his website he was part of Bush's Iraq invasion when he wasn't, just lost the race for Barack Obama's US Senate seat in Illinois. Well, that's if his Dem opponent, Alexi Giannoulias has the nachos to run an ad showing Kirk blabbering on about the mythical citation and then citing the fact that Kirk just made it up, and pointing out as well that Kirk was really safely in Washington when he said he was serving in Iraq. The tagline: 'How can you trust Kirk to represent you honestly when he can't even honestly represent himself?' Sure, the same can be said about Democrat Richard Blumenthal in CT who inflated his military record to service in Vietnam, and you can bet the GOP will be milking that for all it's worth. (Side Note: Vets never forget where they served or what medals or citations they received, and they don't 'misspeak' when discussing them. Kirk's full of it when he says otherwise, and so is Blumenthal, for that matter. A pox on both of these cheesy military resume-bloaters!)
-- The World Turned Upside Down:
MSNBC reported this afternoon (6/2) that crude oil has hit the barrier shores of Mississippi and Alabama – you know, the 'safe areas' according the BP -- and west Florida is next. While BP CEO Tony Hayward continues making cringing pronouncements that would befit a ditzy Monty Python character – yes, Tony, those 11 people who were killed on your Deepwater Horizon rig would no doubt like their lives back, too, as well as the tens of thousands who depend on the Gulf for their livelihoods – watch for BP to declare bankruptcy soon and split up into several smaller companies. Bankruptcy means what's left of BP will only be paying for a fraction, if any, of the cost of the clean-up and, regardless of Eric Holder's tough prosecutor stance, there won't be any senior BP execs heading for jail. (Most of them are in the UK and the Brits likely won't extradite.) Uncle Sucker, that's you and me fellow taxpayer, will get stuck with most of the tab and the generations of suffering that comes with it. I only hope our redneck friends down in the Gulf states get the hint and stop electing corrupt Big Oil-funded boobs to office; I hope the rest of us get the message that it's time to get off the oil teat permanently and switch to renewable energy. Okay, and I want world peace and a flat belly by tomorrow, too.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
If you believe the official Israeli government story regarding their boarding of those humanitarian aid ships that were bound for Gaza, Israeli commandos, thought to be among the toughest, best trained and equipped military outfits in the world, can be easily disarmed, beaten and stabbed by out-of-shape amateurs wielding metal rods. Either the Israeli commando force has turned into vanilla pudding or Netanyahu's government is lying through its teeth regarding the events surrounding the deaths of at least nine aid workers aboard those ships. I'll leave it to you to decide which is more believable.
-- Old Soldiers (and Sailors) Never Lie, But They Do:
Republican Rep. Mark Kirk, who awarded himself a military citation, 'Intelligence Officer of the Year,' he never received and even boasted about it in Congress and in his official bio; and who also claimed on his website he was part of Bush's Iraq invasion when he wasn't, just lost the race for Barack Obama's US Senate seat in Illinois. Well, that's if his Dem opponent, Alexi Giannoulias has the nachos to run an ad showing Kirk blabbering on about the mythical citation and then citing the fact that Kirk just made it up, and pointing out as well that Kirk was really safely in Washington when he said he was serving in Iraq. The tagline: 'How can you trust Kirk to represent you honestly when he can't even honestly represent himself?' Sure, the same can be said about Democrat Richard Blumenthal in CT who inflated his military record to service in Vietnam, and you can bet the GOP will be milking that for all it's worth. (Side Note: Vets never forget where they served or what medals or citations they received, and they don't 'misspeak' when discussing them. Kirk's full of it when he says otherwise, and so is Blumenthal, for that matter. A pox on both of these cheesy military resume-bloaters!)
-- The World Turned Upside Down:
MSNBC reported this afternoon (6/2) that crude oil has hit the barrier shores of Mississippi and Alabama – you know, the 'safe areas' according the BP -- and west Florida is next. While BP CEO Tony Hayward continues making cringing pronouncements that would befit a ditzy Monty Python character – yes, Tony, those 11 people who were killed on your Deepwater Horizon rig would no doubt like their lives back, too, as well as the tens of thousands who depend on the Gulf for their livelihoods – watch for BP to declare bankruptcy soon and split up into several smaller companies. Bankruptcy means what's left of BP will only be paying for a fraction, if any, of the cost of the clean-up and, regardless of Eric Holder's tough prosecutor stance, there won't be any senior BP execs heading for jail. (Most of them are in the UK and the Brits likely won't extradite.) Uncle Sucker, that's you and me fellow taxpayer, will get stuck with most of the tab and the generations of suffering that comes with it. I only hope our redneck friends down in the Gulf states get the hint and stop electing corrupt Big Oil-funded boobs to office; I hope the rest of us get the message that it's time to get off the oil teat permanently and switch to renewable energy. Okay, and I want world peace and a flat belly by tomorrow, too.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
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