Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

A consequence of cucumbers

How can republicans represent us when they don’t trust women?

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

Second rate reporter says what?

Let’s finish the job.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

After roe, women are no longer free.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

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John Jon Stewart just referred to Ben Bernanke as Hamid Karzai’s stunt double and then went on to make fun of the tea party morons (has it been explained to them that taxes are LOWER right now than they were during the Bush years thanks to tax cuts the Republicans voted against), Glenn Beck, and Lou Dobbs.

This TDS looks like a keeper.

Reader Interactions

71Comments

  2. 2.

    blahblah

    Slashdot recently posted a story about Harlan Ellison suing Paramount Television over some Star Trek episode from antiquity. Here’s a bit of quoted Ellison:

    "The arrogance, the pompous dismissive imperial manner of those who ‘have more important things to worry about,’ who’ll have their assistant get back to you, who don’t actually read or create, who merely ‘take’ meetings, and shuffle papers — much of which is paper money denied to those who actually did the manual labor of creating those dreams — they refuse even to notice…until you jam a Federal lawsuit in their eye. To hell with all that obfuscation and phony flag-waving: they got my money. Pay me and pay off all the other writers from whom you’ve made hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars..from OUR labors..just so you can float your fat asses in warm Bahamian waters."

    I don’t much give a shit about Star Trek, or even know who that Ellison is, but he does sum up in the quote just how badly fucked up the ass everyone who produces anything has had to endure over these years. The financial industry parasites took over and have bled their host so badly, it has become not just a nuisance but a matter of survival.

    They gorged and now the beast kicks. Kick hard, Beast.

  5. 5.

    D-Chance.

    They’ve got to be kidding…

    OK, I got it. If Obamamerica makes a few jokes in front of a group of "journalists", it’s tradition. Hell, it’s downright expected. If Obamamerica makes a few jokes in front of a few million Americans on a tv talk show, it "diminishes his presidency".

    Uh… right.

  7. 7.

    donovong

    I saw tonight’s show, and I am glad Stewart brought up the idiotic, stoopid, ignorant bullshit that is being floated over charging wounded military members’ personal health insurance if they are wounded. I love Obama, but whoever thought up this bullshit needs to be taken out behind the barn and have the shit beaten out of them – and then charge it to their fucking insurance.

    I have been hoping that this would tiurn out to be Snopes bait, but it ain’t happened yet. What a fucking crock.

  8. 8.

    Comrade Stuck

    (has it been explained to them that taxes are LOWER right now than they were during the Bush years thanks to tax cuts the Republicans voted against),

    Of course they’re bogus type tax cuts cause payroll tax isn’t really a tax even though it’s called a tax, but is really a fee for poor people who vote democratic that should be grateful for the privilege of taking up space otherwise reserved for God fearin’ and well scrubbed GOP voters. Demorats waived a fee is all. It were Left Wing lieberal media bias is all and nuttin’ to do with tax cut.

    Plus, since the GOP wouldn’t get credit cause the Obamunist stole their issue and left them cake to eat/

  9. 9.

    AhabTRuler

    Having actually witnessed more than one Gridiron (full dress-rehearsals, excellent buffet table!), I can authoritatively say that there is no dignity in watching a bunch of aging journo’s perform "funny" skits to music years (decades?) out of date.

  10. 10.

    gnomedad

    @Incertus:

    Do you think they’ve ever actually read any US history?

    History … that’s kinda like reality, right? They make their own history.

  11. 11.

    valdivia

    @D-Chance.:

    exactly, because the Gridiron dinner is for the special super club you know, and he has to worship at the feet of the Village. The rest of the country? They know nothing.

  13. 13.

    Comrade Stuck

    I so wish I could surround Glenn Beck & crush him in my iron grip of death.

    I’m guessing an ordinary Boo! would waste his pudgy ass.

  14. 14.

    AhabTRuler

    because the Gridiron dinner is for the special super club you know, and he has to worship at the feet of the Village.

    The Gridiron Club is neither as powerful nor as prestigious as you think. More like print journo dorks rule the Glee Club. The only reason anyone shows up is the open bar (just like in the real world).

  16. 16.

    YellowJournalism

    Do you really want to get any Glenn Beck on you?

    Yeah, and not even Febreeze can get rid of the smell.

  17. 17.

    Martin

    I so wish I could surround Glenn Beck & crush him in my iron grip of death.

    He’d start crying before you even got close.

  19. 19.

    TenguPhule

    Ben Bernanke as Hamid Karzai’s stunt double

    Is it a sad sign of the times that I’m not sure who that’s supposed to insult more?

  21. 21.

    LD50

    the tea party morons (has it been explained to them that taxes are LOWER right now than they were during the Bush years thanks to tax cuts the Republicans voted against)

    Only in America do people whose taxes are being *lowered* protest over the fact that people much richer than themselves are having their taxes raised.

    I guess there’s a certain kind of American who absolutely refuses to concede that they’ll never be rich, despite overwhelming evidence.

  22. 22.

    Incertus

    @donovong: I seem to remember someone from the administration on Press the Meat Sunday walking that idea back pretty firmly–don’t know why it’s still a story, frankly.

  23. 23.

    freelancer

    @Martin:

    He’d start crying before you even got close.

    What are you talking about? If the minute ends in an even number, Beck’s weeping.

  24. 24.

    burnspbesq

    So much for Canada’s vaunted commitment to human rights.

    Bush gave a speech in Calgary today and was not arrested and turned over to the International Criminal Court.

    What’s up with that, eh?

  27. 27.

    Comrade Jake

    @D-Chance.:

    The author of that piece lost me with:

    When I was writing speeches for President Bush #41

    I think we’re talking about the same set of folks who believed it was more important to wear a jacket in the oval office than to, you know, actually be competent. Stupid on eleven.

  29. 29.

    Comrade Jake

    I’m sure a few of you spotted Frum pointing out the piles of stupid that is Glenn Beck’s show recently. I think Sully quoted Frum on his site.

    Well, go and read the comments that follow the post. Full-bore nutjob.

  30. 30.

    mikefromtexas

    Soryy. Couldn’t get that link thingie to work. Check out studiodave.blogspot.com, bottom post.

  32. 32.

    handy

    @Comrade Jake:

    Wow, that’s a lot of nutjob, although the best comment was one of the few sane ones:

    It has just occurred to me that earlier today, somebody in this thread referred to Conservatism as being timeless. I think that whoever said this needs to realize he sounds more like a New Age Hippie when he says things like this than he does a serious person. Liberalism is, like, forever also.

    That’s pretty awesome.

  33. 33.

    JenJen

    Ugh… try living here in Cincinnati, which has apparently become Tea Party Central after getting the motherlode of 4,000 protesters at Sunday’s rally on Fountain Square. Our Lady Of Perpetual Outrage is all over it.

    (I’ll remind everyone that Obama won not only the city of Cincinnati, but also its county, Hamilton. It shocked just about everyone who has spent any time in Ohio; the political climate in southwestern Ohio is changing. Has changed.)

    Isn’t it clear to just about everyone that these Tea Parties are nothing more than anti-Obama protests, especially judging by the signage? It’s as if they really miss the Sarah Palin days, or something. What’s amusing to me is looking through some of the local blogs that have posted about it, and reading the comments from those who attended. Here are their basic tenets:

    1. The Tea Parties are apolitical and bipartisan. We were really mad at Bush, too! The whole time! Yes, all of our Republican congressional representatives are here, but that doesn’t make the Tea Parties political AT ALL. So stop saying that. There are tons of people there who voted for Obama and are now mad so SHUT UP!

    2. FDR made the Great Depression worse with the New Deal. Everybody knows this. Learn your history, libtards.

    3. The Tea Parties are about our taxes getting raised to pay for Obama’s Leninism. That’s Taxation Without Representation! Oh, wait… actually the Tea Parties are about the outrage of deficit spending, keep your disgusting LIEberal hands off my kid’s future! Oh, wait… the Tea Parties are about the bailouts. Oh, wait… the Tea Parties are about the Stimulus Package…

    4. Look out, Obamabots, because this isn’t going to end pretty. It’ll probably end with violence. (Not kidding… big theme on the blogs.)

  35. 35.

    Indylib

    @donovong:

    the idiotic, stoopid, ignorant bullshit that is being floated over charging wounded military members’ personal health insurance if they are wounded

    Go to Huffpo, ignore the headline and go to the comments. There are links there that will explain pretty well what Obama is trying to do.

    I’m not sure about how I feel about this myself. My husband will eventually end up in the VA, assuming the legislation reenstating non- combat-wounded vetrans are let back into the VA system under the Dems, so I’m pretty interested in this. Obama sounds pretty sane about it, but it better be well regulated because the potential for major abuse certainly exists.

  37. 37.

    Comrade Stuck

    Damn Indy lib (actually donovong), we must be on the same frequency tonight. You beat me to it though.:)

    Obama and the dems are NOT, let me repeat Not going to throw out ANY vets from VA. Ain’t gonna happen, though copay for non service connected vets with higher incomes may continue to go up some.

  38. 38.

    Martin

    And not just the wingnuts. There’s plenty of outrage at GOS over it as well.

    I think we need more things in society to be genuinely outraged at, because people keep getting loaded up on the fake shit instead.

  39. 39.

    Comrade Stuck

    @Martin:

    from the link to VA watchdog I had, it seems this dumbass idea was dreamed up by some young phenom budget wonks at OMB.

  40. 40.

    Mouse Tolliver

    @blahblah:

    I don’t much give a shit about Star Trek, or even know who that Ellison is, but he does sum up in the quote just how badly fucked up the ass everyone who produces anything has had to endure over these years.

    Speaking of writers… When the screenwriters went on strike because they weren’t getting paid for their work, Randian assholes like Michelle Malkin sneered and called them socialists.

    BTW, Marty McFly owes his existence to Harlan Ellison, because Ellison wrote the classic time-travel episode — "City on the Edge of Forever." The one where Kirk, Spock and McCoy go back in time and inadvertently alter history for the worse, which means William Shatner has to kill Joan Collins in order to prevent Hitler from winning WWII. It’s an obvious inspiration for the "Back to the Future" series.

    Actually, "City on the Edge of Forever" is one of Star Trek’s most storied, acclaimed, controversial, and relevant episodes. Even if you’re not a fan it’s worth a google search or two for the backstage drama and the stories political implications.

  43. 43.

    Comrade Stuck

    @Indylib:

    I suspect because it’s such a patently ludicrous suggestion that such an idea was even floated. From what little I’ve read about it, it seems when asked about it, Shinsecki gave a bone headed answer that it was under consideration, which is usually a boilerplate answer to things like this, but on something like this being radioactive politically, he should have said no, or not anything at all.

    Anyways, Patty Murray the VA committee chair gave the right answer which was it was DOA, not gonna happen.

  44. 44.

    Zuzu's Petals

    Until I saw tonight’s TDS, I had no idea that Glenn Beck actually Cried. On. TV.

    Unfarkinbelievable.

    On the other hand, I actually laughed out loud at the montage.

  45. 45.

    Martin

    Well, I don’t quite get what the problem is. They already bill for non-combat care, so there’s nothing new there. If they bill for direct combat related care, that’s a problem, but I’m not sure that’s what they are looking at.

    My guess is that insurance companies routinely deny coverage for vets for anything they can claim is remotely related to combat wounds and the VA is trying to recoup that. For example, my grandmother was wounded during WWII – a leg injury. She was a nurse on a troop ship that came under fire. Now 30 years later she gets arthritis in her legs. Is that combat related? Maybe, but who the hell can say? I imagine that any insurance company today would deny that claim under pre-existing condition.

    My suspicion is that insurance companies are largely getting a free ride on vets. I also suspect that if Obama did push for it, it’d be used to direct the broader health care legislation coming. If insurers are resisting reimbursing the VA under a new policy, then there is no way in hell that they could be trusted to cover the rest of us as part of a national healthcare plan.

    I don’t think it’s going to happen either, unless it’s a test for something broader.

  46. 46.

    Warren Terra

    An actual quote from Dubya himself in Calgary yesterday, speaking about the book he plans to "write":

    I’m going to put people in my place, so when the history of this administration is written at least there’s an authoritarian voice saying exactly what happened

    Now leaving aside the odd phrase "put people in my place", and the absurdity of the whole prospect given his administration’s notorious secrecy, that "authoritarian voice" Freudian slip was a bit of a doozy.

  47. 47.

    Svlad Jelly

    "…has it been explained to them that taxes are LOWER right now than they were during the Bush years thanks to tax cuts the Republicans voted against…"

    Which technically means that they voted for raising taxes, of course.

  48. 48.

    Blue Raven

    Beck’s "Believe in something, even if it’s wrong" has got to be the best unintentional demonstration of the wingnut mindset I’ve seen in a while.

    BTW, John? The people you need to kick as far as your feed goes appears to be Yahoo. I use my Yahoo page to track this place, and they haven’t successfully scraped your site in nearly 24 hours.

  50. 50.

    Krista

    Okay, something’s just gone wonky with the blog. The most recent posts have disappeared, along with the most recent comments. Gremlins? Or has RedState finally hired some competent programmers who decided to have a little fun on the side?

  52. 52.

    Ash Can

    …OK, wait a second. Did a bunch of comments just get wiped here, or am I just caffeine-deficient this morning?

    ETA: (deep breath) Whew. Not just me. Still need more coffee, though…

  54. 54.

    JL

    Such a sad post on Chuck’s son. Parenting involves lots of love, structure, and crossed fingers.

  55. 55.

    Krista

    Okay, so it’s not just me, then. Yeah, all of today has disappeared. Maybe John has discovered the secret of time travel, and we’re actually back in yesterday! (Checks date.) Nope, the blog is just fucked, that’s all.

  57. 57.

    Grumpy Code Monkey

    @blahblah:

    Don’t take everything Ellison says at face value. He’s a damn good writer, but he’s also a raging, narcissistic asshole. Yes, Roddenberry took Ellison’s original script for "City on the Edge of Forever" and pretty much rewrote it completely. Yes, Ellison got dicked around a bit over it. However, Ellison’s outrage is largely show; he’d been writing for television well before Star Trek, and he was far from naive about how producers treated writers.

    And Glenn Beck needs someone to commit him, stat. Dude’s reached the point to being a danger to himself and others.

  58. 58.

    Krista

    @Rick Taylor — that blows. I learned that lesson the hard way a few times. Now if I write any long or particularly pithy post, I always ctl-C it before hitting submit. So if it gets eaten, I can always slap it into Notepad or something and save it for later.

  60. 60.

    AhabTRuler

    that "authoritarian voice" Freudian slip was a bit of a doozy.

    Ehhhh…not so much. You would have to presume that Bush was aware of the difference between "authoritative," and "authoritarian." Given the difficulty that he has had with various roots, suffixes, and prefixes, I would have to go with the theory that he is just a thicky.

  61. 61.

    Michael

    And Glenn Beck needs someone to commit him, stat. Dude’s reached the point to being a danger to himself and others.

    If you turn off the sound while he talks, it becomes even more obvious that he’s completely deranged, just by his expressions and body language.

  62. 62.

    AhabTRuler

    First, they came for Balloon Juice’s comments, and I said nothing because, well, they took the comments. How can I comment if the comments keep disappearing. Soon it will be entire threads…oh my God, someone divided by zero!

  63. 63.

    Xenos

    I thought I was losing it…

    Maybe my long-winded comment on AIG just put the blog to sleep. That happens to me sometimes.

  65. 65.

    TR

    I’m looking forward to Beck’s inevitable on-air meltdown.

    Will it be a true psychotic meltdown like Howard Beale in "Network"? Or an exposure as a con man like Lonesome Rhodes in "A Face in the Crowd"?

    My money’s on the Beale meltdown. You can’t fake that kind of crazy.

  66. 66.

    Wile E. Quixote

    "I don’t think ‘teabag the White House’ means what you think it means…I could see a rusty trombone in the Washington Monument, maybe going down to the National Archives and giving it a Dirty Sanchez…I love that our audience tonight is perversion literate."

    I love that Stewart mocked himself and got in a shot at Tucker Carlson. Sure Tucker’s down, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t stop kicking him every chance we get. And the Glenn Beck mockery, frigging brilliant, but the John Oliver piece "…I’ve seen people pissing up against the walls of buildings in anger!"

  67. 67.

    Michael

    Speaking of crazy stupid, Andy Martin has come up with a site for a "Birther Conference". Apparently Andy (who is dead assed broke, as I recall) has found somebody stupid enough to pony up for a room at the Capitol Hilton to serve as ‘nutcase headquarters".

    http://www.pr-inside.com/washington-dc-obama-birth-certificate-r1124769.htm

    Andy Martin: The American People want answers. Why is Obama concealing his original birth certificate? Why won’t he make his college records available to researchers for scholarly review? The National Conference promises a "big surprise" on April 4th. The first national meeting on Barack Obama’s missing college records and original birth certificate will convene in the nation’s capital April 3-4. The Conference releases a proposed agenda and registration forms.

    Andy is almost a parody all by himself, and it would be really funny if the "big surprise" was a bunch of guys with white coats and straightjackets ready to haul away all the attendees.

  68. 68.

    YellowJournalism

    Will it be a true psychotic meltdown like Howard Beale in "Network"? Or an exposure as a con man like Lonesome Rhodes in "A Face in the Crowd"?

    No, it will be more along the lines of Steve Carrell in "Bruce Almighty".

  69. 69.

    Blue Raven

    Old thread, I know, but one point about the rewrite on "City"… Ellison’s script as written would’ve destroyed Trek. McCoy was a drug addict, Kirk went insane, and nevermind the stuff the crew was guilty of. Elements of that worked out great later on Babylon 5, but in 1968, nobody would’ve swallowed that whole. And that little ego machine wants a cut? Tracy Ullman couldn’t get squat from Klasky/Csupo for The Simpsons and she had a better case.

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