Yesterday, in his taped message to the nation, Obama gave the Republican party an opportunity for relevance:
Every program, every entitlement, every dollar. An opportunity to catalog all the spending Republicans and conservatives think is useless and bring it up for a hearing, and be part of the dialog and have a say in the budgeting priorities. He is giving you guys an opportunity to be relevant. Rahm Emanuel did it again on Sunday:
EMANUEL: And if you go through the process on kids’ health care, national service, as well as getting resources necessary for stabilizing the banks, every one of those votes has been bipartisan.
The challenge will be, will the Republicans come to the table with constructive ideas?
Then, today, President Obama went out and taunted you all and asked for only 100 million in cuts from each department. $100 million. You can sneeze and cut that from the smallest department out there.
So what are right-wing bloggers talking about today? Obama shaking Hugo Chavez’s hand and how waterboarding isn’t torture.
Fencedude
You forgot to close your center tags or something.
srv
John, your blogroll link to Ezra has reverted to his old blog.
Yukoner
I’m sure if you cut the waste and fraud (except in the military budget of course) and make further cuts to the top marginal income tax rate everything will be just peachy!
TenguPhule
But this would mean firing leftover Bush era political toadies.
Think of the poor wingnuts on six figure Welfare!
Also, Obama will taunt them a second time. Then come the flying cows.
TenguPhule
Question. Is this wanted as in “Looking for one to do the job” or wanted in the sense of “Please take down, dead or alive”?
Elie
— I have to think that they are just going through the motions anymore. They get further and further from any real relevance or seriousness and will continue to do so..
The Republicans are without leadership, without ideas, courage or just plain intelligence.
Joshua Norton
Of course, the purse lipped, stick-up-their-ass brigade has NO qualms about Bush holding hands and hugging the Saudi prince – that’s mucho macho, no?
Pearls, fainting couch, etc.
I wish these wealthy, pale male, wingnut assholes would just go play some golf, (with a little time off to run through daddy’s house grabbing shit and screaming “mine, mine” while the old man’s body cools upstairs) and just let the rest of us get the country cleaned up after their spectacular failures.
LD50
How long before BoB wanders in and mentions teleprompters?
Bad Horse's Filly
I almost threw my coffee at the tv this a.m. when Newt was on Today doing his thing. But it was expensive coffee and I really like the mug. Otherwise….
Cris
Ever since Atanarjuat started taking his meds, BOB has had to pick up the slack.
Xecky Gilchrist
The challenge will be, will the Republicans come to the table with constructive ideas?
No. SATSQ.
rob
O’Donell just gave the smack down to Buchanan on Hardball over Obama shaking hands and smiling with Chavez. Buchanan also kept harping on the speech the Pres. of Argentina gave blaming the white man for the worlds ills or something. He said our President just sat there during this speech against America and did nothing. Kinda reminded me of the whole Rev. Wright meme from a year ago. I think the Repubs have just given up. They have nothing.
The Grand Panjandrum
You forgot to mention that Obama’s now following down the path of Kennedy and Kruschev. Of course, Venezuela will have to stand in for the old USSR and Obama will have to invite Halle Berry to the White House for this thing to play itself out properly, because EVERYONE knows the Russians would never have put those missiles in Cuba if Jack hadn’t been so darned nice to Nikita.
Joshua Norton
Oh my. Donald Rumsfeld and Saddam Hussein, anyone?
Corner Stone
@Elie:
I’m still expecting a return to the whole “He’s not wearing a flag pin!” debacle. The whole handshake thing’s one-half step above that nonsense.
The just have nothing else and no way to get there if they did.
I can 100% absolutely guarantee you this though – they are all mofo praying, PRAYING, for an attack against the US by “terrists”. This is the only thing that could provide traction at this point.
Corner Stone
@Cris:
I don’t know who’s spoofing the A-man lately but I’ve found his recent posts to be spot on. Am now wondering if maybe I need to get back *on* meds….
Paul L.
CNN abusing Copyright/DMCA to get an embarrassing Clip pulled from YouTube.
Treasury department not letting the banks pay back TARP funds. So the Obama Administration still has a reason to tell them what to do.
Anniversary of Harry Reid declaring the War in Iraq lost.
Lefty paragon Janeane Garafalo on Olbermann and lying about snubbing Rush.
Gay paragon Perez Hilton comments on disagreeing with Miss California, Carrie Prejean in a tolerant progressive way.
Corner Stone
@The Grand Panjandrum:
This solution appeals to me.
Zandar
It doesn’t matter.
He could do everything the GOP wanted him to do, they would still say he is destroying America.
And roughly 35% of the country would agree with the GOP and go back to stockpiling ammo for the Rapture even if Obama kicked Bin Laden’s ass live on Oprah.
We don’t have an opposition party. We have a collective accretion of applied ignorance.
Tonal Crow
Alright Prez, I’ll take your $100 million and raise you $30 billion by zeroing out the War on
DrugsLiberty.Xecky Gilchrist
@Corner Stone: they are all mofo praying, PRAYING, for an attack against the US by “terrists”. This is the only thing that could provide traction at this point.
Yes they are, but that could massively backfire on them in lots of ways, especially if Obama does a better job handling it than Bush did with 9/11 – and really, how could he not, as long as he isn’t among the casualties in the attack?
Plus if they start openly calling for an attack on the U.S. and one happens, that would look really, really bad for them. Doubly so if it turns out to be another McVeigh far-rightie thing.
The Grand Panjandrum
@Corner Stone: Well we can eliminate you as being a nom de guerre for Michelle Obama.
But hey they aren’t completely out of ideas. And just when you thought he was gone.
GregB Formerly GSD
How soon before Joe the Plumber gets a job shilling Shamwow’s?
-G
Paddy
Rob @12- Ask and ye shall…
Video Rematch- Buchanan V O’Donnell On Chavez Handshake
The Populist
Yep, you forgot to point out that once they get over the elation it’s “mine, mine” they cry that they get hit with a “death” tax and that makes them angry, so angry.
Hehe, the estate tax (call it what it is liar righties) is not a problem. It seems only to be a problem for rich, spoiled a-holes who will still have more than they could ever spend.
Elie
Corner Stone —
You are right — a “Terrist” attack is their last hope and they probably pray day and night for that — might even make one up???
Naw…
The Populist
I heard he’s going to be the new spokesman for The Hair Club For Men and Viagra.
valdivia
I love it–Soviet Union, the Evil Empire is now the same as Venezuela. head. hits. desk.
I was listening to CNN where they called Chavez the arch-enemy of the US. Huh? When did he graduate to arch?
And on the Ortega thing—what was Obama supposed to do? Walk out? Yell at Ortega? I am no fan of Ortega but his historical representation of what the US did in Nicaragua was spot on. starting back with the invasion in the the 1910s and the support of Somoza and his family.
Edit–and yes we need an opposition party, these reps are really not up to it.
toujoursdan
Don’t forget the Nixon and Mao smile and handshake. You know Mao, that scary communist who killed tens of millions in the Cultural Revolution.
http://www.state.gov/cms_images/maonixon.jpg
kay
It’s just the difference between a campaign and governing.
Newt Gingrich thinks if he keeps talking about “appeasement”, Obama will lose Pennsylvania’s electoral votes next Tuesday.
Mary
@The Grand Panjandrum
Joe the Plumber is using a teleprompter, isn’t he?
Brachiator
@The Grand Panjandrum:
Bush would have had Cheney shoot Chavez in the face.
Because Obama is bi-racial, he would have to invite both Halle Berry and Scarlett Johannson. Via his Blackberry.
ksmiami
I think Obama is slowly twisting the knife in. I mean these guys were crazy under Clinton, but now they are just totally loony, like the black knight….
Just a Flesh Wound. I can bite you
N M
While the Republicans are being asshats at the moment, I think that it is just a matter of time. Bush ran the table with the Dems (9/11 helped) after his election for years. Christ he started two wars.
Republicans are dealing with defeat poorly but everyone does. Get back to me after the 2010 midterms, Dems are almost sure to lose some seats due to random chance scandal and the GOP will feel as if it has some mojo again.
JGabriel
@TenguPhule:
I think it’s probably ok to leave that one unclarified. I kind of like the purity of its ambiguity.
.
srv
@Paul L.:
So, the right gets their news from Entertainment Tonight now?
Since Garafalo is my paragon, could you tell me what show she is on? I’d like to learn more.
And oh, what was the surge for? Wasn’t it something about time for political reconciliation? My, that situation has sure changed.
tomjones
John, are you proposing that Republicans become complicit in Obama’s reign of economic fascism? Perish the thought! No, our manly Republicans will fight economic fascism on the beaches, in teh streets, to the last man! WOLVER–
Shhh. I think I just heard the jackbooted march of economic fascists outside my door.
Corner Stone
@The Grand Panjandrum:
I’m not M to the O but this is no proof. My goodness but who the hell could say no given the opportunity?
Except John H. or whoever it was who didn’t sleep with his hot naked tipsy roommate when he was younger and used that to crow over the rest of us primitive males. That guy could say no. The rest of us are all like, “Hellll yeeeeaaaahhh.”
ETA – If there’s a male or female here who says “No” to Halle Berry then I will post up my best Zell Miller and Challenge You To A Dual!
N M
@GregB Formerly GSD:
Naw, he’s already a scammer h/t Sully.
JL
@Bad Horse’s Filly: When Newt came on I switched to GMA and Jake Tapper gave an honest analysis. He said that during the book presentation Obama looked uncomfortable. He mentioned that Obama is not the type to be surprised. Jake also mentioned that the book was in spanish and that our President does not read Spanish. Since there was no story they moved on.
Rush Limbaugh will no longer consider Jake worthy.
Ejoiner
Yeah, Obama sucks!
A truly great president like Reagan would never have met and warmly embraced a man who was a real threat to the US with, you know, 10000 nuclear warheads aimed at our cities.
Cue copious pictures of Reagan and Gorbachev.
Or Ford and Brezhnev.
For the Republican outrage du jour to make sense they now have to begin forgetting the supposed greatest accomplishments of their greatest leader.
It’s Orwellian, I tell ya!
valdivia
@JL:
this surprises me since tapper had a headline this weekend on his blog about Obama being ‘punked’ I wanted to write that it was Tapper who was punked by Chavez since all he wanted was his camera moment with Obama. The american press does not know how to analyze the actions of politicians of other countries, they are Villagers.
Dennis-SGMM
Venezuela is an existential threat. With a GDP of $358bn and a military budget just over 1.2% of that GDP it’s only a matter of weeks before hordes of Venezuelan tanks roll into Los Angeles.
Corner Stone
@Brachiator:
“Ahhhlllllllllllll” (think of the noise Homer makes when in the presence of donuts)
valdivia
@Dennis-SGMM:
oh Dennis, don’t you know they already have sleeper cells here? (see Miami, FL even if those Venezuelans are the wealthy who hate Chavez, but no matter) They are already here!
The Grand Panjandrum
@Corner Stone: I could say no to her. AND I would really, really, really mean it. (If my wife were standing next to me.) But, hey, that’s how I roll.
Montysano (All Hail Marx & Lennon)
Janeane on Countdown last week. I thought Mark Levin was going to have a stroke over it.
Pat Buchanan needs to avoid Lawrence O’Donnell. Ouch.
lamh31
Actually, the talking point on the $100 million is that it is not a lot of money.
Here’s an exchange between Gibbs and CBS Chip Reid about the $100 million Obama wants cut from cabinet budget.
http://www.politico.com/politico44/wbarchive/whiteboard04202009.html
That “$600 toilet seat” line was brutal line.
JL
@valdivia: Since I switched from Today Show, I could have missed the part where Jake dissed the President. Joe in the morning lost me several weeks, so now I just surf.
valdivia
@JL:
could be or he was just being contrarian this am as is his wont.
sgwhiteinfla
Funny thing about $100 million
Last month during the debate over the Omnibus bill $100 million was a lot of money when talking about earmarks.
This month when President Obama asks each Cabinet member to cut $100 million from their budget it ain’t shit.
Gotta love it.
Corner Stone
@The Grand Panjandrum: You’ve lost all credibility here. All 3% of it you previously had.
Also.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuBnlNjZq24
Roger Moore
@Zandar:
No duh. If he were doing everything the Republicans wanted him to, he would be destroying America.
J. Michael Neal
The Republicans have taken to heart Karl Rove’s strategy of the permanent campaign. The problem is that the election they’re continuously campaigning for is the Republican primary.
JL
This is my favorite part of the Emanuel quote
Tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts!
Just Some Fuckhead
Republican response: lolwut??
Zifnab
@sgwhiteinfla: Obama isn’t getting run around by the nose, though. He’s got an agenda, and every Republican talking point gets jujitsued into serving that agenda. It’s so refreshing to have a savvy politician as leader of the Party again.
That said, if the GOP keeps digging its heels in and throwing screaming hissy fits, they will do some serious damage before they run themselves into full blown minority-hood come 2010. I’m really not interested in seeing exactly what a national temper tantrum can do to the nation.
Comrade Stuck
I think they are making a yeoman’s effort, for mental midgets.
Napoleon
@Brachiator:
Why, Halle is bi-racial, so I think he has it covered with just her.
Tonal Crow
@J. Michael Neal:
We have a winner!
binzinerator
And this is exactly why they will continue to focus on bullshit like handshakes. They dread having to identify to the nation what they think useless spending is, because they know most of the nation will reject their judgment. The nation already has. Worse, like a ship in dry dock, the scum- and crud-encrusted keel of the GOP will be exposed. The nation would learn — literally be able to put numbers to — what Republicans really value, and the people would see the gaping rupture between what the Republicans say they value and what they really value.
The whole submerged structure of Conservatism under the Republican party must remain hidden from sight. They absolutely cannot risk being exposed for the frauds, bigots, selfish resentful, mean, petty, vindictive, callous and small-minded people they truly are.
So of course they will continue with the bullshit and obfuscations and lies and distractions.
Bad Horse's Filly
@JL: Well then I blame Tapper, because I had GMA on but reflexively hit the remote to Today when he came on screen…thus suffering Newt on my screen. Just my luck, this one time he wasn’t a complete asshole.
smiley
I skimmed previous comments so forgive me if I missed it, but the president called for $100,000,000 over all the departments cumulatively, not 100,000,000 per department, at least according to WaPo.. Big difference. In fact, $100,000,000 is pretty paltry for the whole US budget. Please correct me if I’m wrong..
Zifnab
@binzinerator: But surely they can just highlight the $30 million dollar Pelosi marsh mouse, or the $8 billion high speed train from Disney Land to the Bunny Ranch (just 432 miles) outside Los Vegas.
I mean, these are easy things to axe, right? All those t-bones for young bucks and Cadillacs for welfare queens. We should cut them from the budget first and we’ll be on the road to recovery in no time.
Xecky Gilchrist
@binzinerator: So of course they will continue with the bullshit and obfuscations and lies and distractions.
Yes – isn’t it great? Obama certainly knows that, knows that they have no choice but to make fools of themselves, then he gets to say “you didn’t suggest any cuts, so here we are.” The Republicans look like fools again for not cutting the money when they had the chance – even if it’s a small amount by govt terms, they should be jumping at it if they actually care, right?
TenguPhule
Well yeah.
The only sides that won the Iraq War II were Iran and Sadr.
smiley
OT but I just heard a few minutes of the Michael Savage show on the radio. I hope the Secret Service (interesting name, btw) is monitoring him. The bad part is that they can’t monitor his audience – at least not easily.
Cris
@smiley: I believe you are correct.
Just Some Fuckhead
And the Bush family crime syndicate.
And White American Jesus, because He endorsed Danger Monkey, something I will never forgive Him for.
Tonal Crow
@TenguPhule:
I agree on Iran, but it’s not clear how much Sadr has won, though the various religious nuts (of which there are many in his movement) appear to have won much power to terrorize those whom they consider “immoral”. But the Kurds’ (effective) independence is far and away the best thing to come out of Bush’s Excellent Misadventure. Still, Bush never would have been able to sell America on a war for Kurdish independence (even had that been his motive — ha!) He had to lie about “WMDs” to sell it, and lie he did — like a rug.
TenguPhule
Only until the Iraqis who grew up in the hell of IW II manage to start tracking Bush clan members down.
TenguPhule
Not really.
Turkey to the North and the Iraq ‘government’ to the south leaves them trapped between the devil and the deep blue sea.
Once we’re out, I expect it to get very noisy in the neighborhood.
Martin
I have a counterproposal for Obama that would present an interesting debate before the voters. He should hand the public a spending cut commitment, which they can weigh in on, that matches Congress’ earmark budget. This year that was $47B or thereabouts.
It’d be interesting to see the chatter come out of that, both from Congress and from the usual suspects.
TenguPhule
He went from ‘minor cleric with famous dad’ to a major power broker in the country.
Bob’s his uncle now.
Blue Raven
@Paul L.:
After looking up this little brouhaha, I have to wonder what rock Prejean slithered out from under to have the infinite gall to tell a gay man to his face he’s a second-class citizen and she likes it that way on national TV. And if the right-wing blogs are flipping their shit over how Hilton replied in his own blog, they are so clearly not reading him, either. This is the man who tried to claim Castro was dead between posts with Photoshopped bathroom-wall quality insults aimed at the bimbo of the week.
Corner Stone
@Tonal Crow:
The fact that you even know who he is…
And if you have reason to know who Sadr is, then the fact that I know who you’re talking about…
Pwned.
Joshua Norton
It gets a little complicated when she tries to balance her personal bigotry, her parents religious and political wingnuttia and her deep down desire to win all at the same time. She’s probably just stumbling through thinking “hey, can we just get to the swim suit competition?”.
And I don’t even like Perez Hilton’s site. (for the longest time I thought he was Paris Hilton). But if it causes righties to pop a cork, then freakin’ A.
Martin
Gall? But Jesus likes it that way too! She’s just standing up for her rights!
(Their reading, not mine)
Tonal Crow
@TenguPhule:
And then back to being a minor cleric with a famous dad. The Sadrists lost their bid to block the US/Iraq status-of-forces agreement last December. I believe Sadr has 29 of 275 seats in Parliament, which puts him behind the DPAK (Kurdish) (53 seats), Iraqi Accord (44 seats), and Badr (36 seats). (Though I think he’s still part of the United Iraqi Alliance, which holds 130 seats when you count all the members). Also, I can’t say I’ve heard much from Sadr in months, nor really ever since he got routed in Basra.
Tonal Crow
@Corner Stone:
So that I know who Custer is means that he won something (other than a ticket to feed the worms)? Pwned.
TenguPhule
And then back to being a minor cleric with a famous dad. The Sadrists lost their bid to block the US/Iraq status-of-forces agreement last December. I believe Sadr has 29 of 275 seats in Parliament, which puts him behind the DPAK (Kurdish) (53 seats), Iraqi Accord (44 seats), and Badr (36 seats). (Though I think he’s still part of the United Iraqi Alliance, which holds 130 seats when you count all the members). Also, I can’t say I’ve heard much from Sadr in months, nor really ever since he got routed in Basra.
Parliament is a joke. His people and the Kurds have all the guns and most of the fighters. He’s been lying low for now, but that powerbase he built up hasn’t gone away.
Corner Stone
@Tonal Crow:
Ummm, no. You bring up Custer to somehow analogize Sadr?
Pathetic.
To add – We know plenty about *our* history. You equate this info to current events in Iraq? Double pathetic.
Tonal Crow
@TenguPhule:
I can’t disagree much.
I agree about Kurds and guns, but Sadr not so much anymore. For example, he didn’t try to use force when Parliament overruled his objections to the SoFA, and I don’t think that his earlier parliamentary “walkout” gained him anything. I also wonder how much control he really has over his apparatus. His movement (and control) looked pretty strong early on, but I think his defeats in Basra and Najaf really hurt him. Still, conditions change — especially in Iraq.
Mike in NC
I recall a major NORTHCOM anti-terrorism exercise a few years back, which involved a suitcase nuke being set off near Indianapolis. At one point everybody was expected to drop what they were doing to address a ballistic missile threat scenario coming from Venezuela. After a good laugh we ignored the whole stupid premise and went back to work.
Thrown his shoes? His BlackBerry?
Tonal Crow
@Corner Stone:
I bring up Custer for the very limited purpose of illustrating that (even widespread) public knowledge of a martial figure doesn’t mean that he’s successful.
Most Americans know sh*t about American history.
To try to spin my message into a general comparison between American history and recent Iraqi events is just a non-sequitur.
mcc
I was listening to CNN where they called Chavez the arch-enemy of the US. Huh? When did he graduate to arch?
As of at least May 2008 he’s still our fourth largest source of oil.
But no, somehow Venezuela supposed to be this great enemy of the United States, on par with Iran or the Taliban, something that it’s shocking that Obama would engage in negotiations without preconditions with or smile at him in a hallway.
I wonder how this is supposed to work. I imagine Uncle Sam walking over to Hugo Chavez, to pick up his oil drums and give him a big wad of dollars in return. But oh, Uncle Sam is very very angry when he does it!
Hugo Chavez is the best evidence we have of the idea that the way conservatives determine who should be the biggest enemy of the United States is directly based on who is easiest to push around.
Comrade Darkness
@TenguPhule, which would be too bad. I’ve thought that the best outcome of this whole thing would be if we took a few billion we wasted on the war and simply purchased the kurdish territories from turkey and handed them over to the kurds. Then at least there would be a single domino we could claim had fallen into friendly territory in the region.
Corner Stone
@Tonal Crow:
It’s not a comparison you pathetic fucking hack.
I’m not spinning anything. You mentioned Custer. He’s irrelevant here.
Custer was a commissioned officer of the US govt who, “was a murderer who fell in love with his own legend. And his troopers died for it.” According to Capt Algren. And I always believe Tom Cruise movies as authoritative.
Sadr just basically fucking runs the most men with the most guns in Iraq.
No comparison there. Irrelevant!
Tonal Crow
@Corner Stone: Forget your lithium today?
Cain
@Cris:
I’m really goddam sad about that. We need another troll to replace him.
cain
Corner Stone
@Tonal Crow: I’m really sorry that you have nothing more cogent to add.
Peace out.
binzinerator
@Xecky Gilchrist:
Yup. The goopers painted themselves into a corner and now Obama’s giving them the option of either tracking across the wet paint — and everyone will see what fucking dipshits and morons they were — or they can just huddle in their dry little corner of the old confederacy and make armpit fart noises and hop up and down demanding people take them seriously.
TenguPhule
Would never fly.Turkey’s national pride would never tolerate it.
Also, not so sure the Kurd’s wouldn’t try to expand their reach if they could.
TenguPhule
Just because the tiger hasn’t taken a bite out of you yet doesn’t mean it doesn’t have any teeth left.
We already killed most of the stupid people in Iraq. The ones that are left learned fast.