Little Chickenhawk Runs Away
November 6, 2009
Tom Tancredo can’t stand up to Markos Moulitsas and storms off set. Poor little guy.
10 Out of 10 Reputable Economists Agree
November 6, 2009
Just further evidence that if the teabaggers around our country screaming and hollering about out of control spending really cared about deficits they would be FOR passing health care reform.
In an open letter, some of the nations top economists write:
Successful health care reform is vital to the nation’s fiscal and economic future. The legislation the House will vote on in the coming days will guarantee security of coverage, limit the costs of care, create incentives for improved quality of care, and set us on the path towards sustainable economic growth. In short, the House health reform legislation takes the steps necessary to promote our economic health.
Specifically, the bill:
* Reduces the deficit by over $100 billion in the first 10 years, and continues to reduce the deficit in subsequent years, as judged by the Congressional Budget Office.
* Takes initial steps to “bend the cost curve,” and thus might lead to even larger cost savings than official estimates suggest.
* Covers nearly all American citizens and legal residents.We urge House passage of the legislation, which provides a historic opportunity to realize the long-delayed goal of significant health care reform.
Signed,
Dr. Henry J. Aaron, The Brookings Institution
Dr. Mike Chernew, Harvard University Medical School
Dr. David Cutler, Harvard University
Dr. Judy Feder, Georgetown University, Center for American Progress Action Fund
Dr. Dana Goldman, University of Southern California
Dr. Jonathan Gruber, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Dr. Len Nichols, The New America Foundation
Dr. Alice Rivlin, The Brookings Institution
Dr. Meredith Rosenthal, Harvard University School of Public Health
Dr. Jonathan Skinner, Dartmouth College
Dr. Katherine Swartz, Harvard University School of Public Health
The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office has already reported that the Democratic plan would reduce the Federal Deficit while the recently released G.O.P. plan would actually add to it.
Any conservatives or teabaggers who say that current Democratic proposals for health care reform would add to the deficit are either liars, misinformed or tragically confused.
The 11/3 Project
November 6, 2009
Jon Stewart does a tone-perfect Glenn Beck send up. Since Glenn Beck’s existence serves no other useful purpose in this world, he might as well be good for comedy.What makes this segment so brilliant is how little the satire varies from its target. The “logic” of Stewart’s monologues and the fragility of the connections he makes are no more ridiculous than Beck’s and rely on the same false positives and flimsy associations as Beck’s own. A very enjoyable spoof of Beck’s inanity and insanity.
It’s Almost Cute
November 6, 2009
This just makes me chuckle.
On top of displaying a lack of understanding of civics, taxes or even manners, tuns out Conservatives can’t count either.
From Thinkprogress.org:
After the 9/12 march on Washington, conservatives falsely claimed that over a million people attended, when in reality the closest thing to an official count — numbers given by the Washington DC Fire Department to ABCNews.com — placed the crowd at “approximately 60,000 to 70,000 people.” Though today’s anti-health care reform rally has been much more sparsely attended, that hasn’t stopped conservatives from inflating the numbers again. On G. Gordon Liddy’s radio show today, producer Franklin Raff, who was on the ground at the rally, told guest host Joseph Farah that the crowd is “just as big or bigger than” the 9/12 rally, which Raff estimated “at about a million.”
Capitol Hill police told NBC’s Luke Russert that the crowd was about 4,000.
Rep. Akin Gets His Moment in the Sun
November 5, 2009
In one of those rare moments of seemingly divine providence which almost seem like a bit of justice in response to an outlandish statement, Rep. Todd Akin messes up the Pledge of Allegiance after making the absurd claim that doing so “drives liberals crazy.”
Rep. Akins led the Pledge during terrorist Representative Michelle “wait til you see how crazy I am tomorrow” Bachmann’s “scare your congressperson into voting against you” march on Capitol Hill this Thursday.
At the march, thousands of confused Americans showed up to fight against their own best interests at the behest of a few congresspeople doing their best to keep Insurance lobbyists happy.
Is the Huffington Post the New Drudge Report?
November 5, 2009
Today the Huffington Post ran the headline “Chris Dodd’s New Legislation Would Strip Power From Fed, FDIC” with the accompanying quote taken from the article:
Huffington Post's Editorial Team misleads its audience
WASHINGTON — A key Senate lawmaker is readying legislation that would dramatically redraw how the financial system is regulated, setting the chamber on a collision course with both the House of Representatives and the Obama administration, which have championed markedly different approaches.
The bill, which is being readied by Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.), would strip almost all bank-supervision powers from the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., according to people familiar with the matter.
When one follows the link and reads the actual Wall Street Journal article, one becomes privy to an entirely different story. Rather than stripping regulatory oversight from the Government, the Senate Banking Committee’s bill would assign strong oversight powers to a new body.
The bill, which is being readied by Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.), would strip almost all bank-supervision powers from the Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., according to people familiar with the matter. In their place, the bill would create a new agency in charge of supervising all banks and bank-holding companies, even the country’s largest and most complex institutions.
Mr. Dodd’s proposal also would create a powerful council of regulators, overseen by an independent White House appointee, charged with monitoring risks to the financial system.
Notice at what point the Huffington Post editorial team chooses to cut off its quote. Not at the end of a paragraph but instead at a point that paints Senator Dodd in an unfair light to its liberal audience, and audience that largely favors strong regulations.
While it isn’t clear what agenda the Huffington Post is pushing, the Huffington Post is run by media-savvy people who know that many people don’t read whole articles and only have time for headlines. Additionally, the fact that the Huffington Post chooses to quote a particularly misleading section of the article indicates a desire to drive the narrative on their part.
You just can’t get good honest news anymore.
Bob Cesca Nails Obama
November 5, 2009
Bob Cesca is one of the best political writers around, and I have yet to see him get one wrong.
As the far left and the far right increasingly pin their own pre-conceived worldviews, desires and even paranoia on our President, Bob Cesca does a good job at dissecting the truth of the change that we have seen in the year since we elected Barack Obama.
Bob Cesca: Hope, Change and The Long Road: One Year Later
Some choice bits…
Concerning the lunacy coming out of the Right Wing:
Of course the wingnut right — the Beck-Limbaugh-Palin Industrial Complex — has a significant head start. Plus, they’re immovable. Nothing this president does, short of resignation, will ever be greeted positively and everything will be pegged as a Nazi-Communist-Nixon-Carter-Terrorist usurping of American exceptionalism. However, on the left, there’s a growing discontentment that’s rapidly metastasizing into a similarly virulent and unchangeable anger. It not only threatens to fracture the president’s progressive base, but it could also force the president to retreat to the middle.
Concerning that change:
I’m not going to do the whole list, [of accomplishments thus far] but the tent pole items include setting a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, opening up federal funds for embryonic stem cell research, equal pay for women, ending torture, passing a major economic stimulus bill, which has helped to boost economic growth and yank the Dow back from the cliffs of insanity, and it looks like we’re going to have a fairly solid health care reform bill with a public insurance option sometime this year (unless Harry Reid fumbles it). Last week alone, the president signed historic new hate crimes legislation protecting the LGBT community, killed the useless F-22 program, ended funding for ineffectual abstinence-only education, and was able to ballyhoo the first quarter of economic growth since 2007. Plus, per the president’s orders, the Senate finally voted to allow the Guantanamo inmates to be moved onto U.S. soil for imprisonment and trial.
What the FOX?
November 5, 2009
DailyKos picks up on a Media Matters article and makes a good point regarding some astounding Fox News spin.
Fox Puts Their Spin On Things
By BarbinMD:
Really? Yesterday in Virginia and New Jersey, voters overwhelmingly said that their vote had nothing to do with the President or his policies, while at the same time Nancy Pelosi picked up two more House votes for health care reform. Yet according to Fixed News, Democrats winning the only two congressional races on the ballot yesterday is good news for Republicans and should send a message to Democrats.
Sounds suspiciously like GOP spin, doesn’t it?
Today’s Fox News Lie of the Day 11-04-09
November 5, 2009
From one of many to choose from, as always. This time reported on by the Christian Science Monitor:
What the Fox?
FOX News botched it this morning when a morning news host reported that President Obama watched an HBO documentary about his campaign last night.
Glenn Beck Drives the Right Even Further Off the Cliff
November 3, 2009
Some tasty bits of Beck lunacy:
Ten years ago, I could have shouted every single day about Osama bin Laden and his wacky crazy threats to kill Americans in New York and nobody would have been willing to stand in line two hours while some security officer made grandma take her shoes off. No one would have done it. But don’t you see. While the government is still not willing to do these things, today America is different. America has changed. Washington, we’re not going to let you get away with it anymore. Look, fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Conservatives are awake. 9/12ers are willing to do the hard things. We know what this means! We’re taking time out of our busy lives, taking time away from their families, they’re attending town hall meetings. Do you think they want to do that? They are calling their representatives. How many times do we have to be yelled at by your people in Washington? They are reading 2,000-page healthcare bills on the weekend. The 9/12ers are willing to stand in line and take our shoes off before the plane actually hits the tower.
And some more tasty lunacy from Rep. Virginia Foxx.
Everywhere I go in my district, people tell me they are frightened. … I share that fear, and I believe they should be fearful. And I believe the greatest fear that we all should have to our freedom comes from this room — this very room — and what may happen later this week in terms of a tax increase bill masquerading as a health care bill. I believe we have more to fear from the potential of that bill passing than we do from any terrorist right now in any country.
Where are the sensible representatives of the G.O.P.? Are there even any?
