Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

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

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

Too little, too late, ftfnyt. fuck all the way off.

You cannot love your country only when you win.

75% of people clapping liked the show!

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

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

If rights aren’t universal, they are privilege, not rights.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

Welcome to day five of every-bit-as-bad-as-you-thought-it-would-be.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

Their shamelessness is their super power.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

Let me file that under fuck it.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

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Archives for 2009

Troubling, but not surprising

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This kind of thing really gives me the willies:

Lawrence Summers, the chairman of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, collected roughly $5.2 million in compensation from hedge fund D.E. Shaw over the past year and was paid more than $2.7 million in speaking fees from several troubled Wall Street firms and other organizations.

[….]

Summers, a leading architect of the administration’s economic policies and response to the global recession, appears to have collected the most income. Financial institutions including JP Morgan, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch paid Summers for speaking appearances in 2008. Fees ranged from $45,000 for a Nov. 12 Merrill Lynch appearance to $135,000 for an April 16 visit to Goldman Sachs, according to his disclosure form.

The Geithner-Summers plan to continue with TARP-buying (as opposed to nationalizing) is very popular with the firms that paid Summers all that money over the past year. Maybe it’s the right plan anyway. But these kinds of things sure look like de facto bribes to me.

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Tragic Shootings In New York State

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Obviously this could have some ordinary explanation (outside the obvious), so there is nothing gained by jumping to conclusions.

Gov. David Paterson says “12 or 13” people were killed in an attack on an immigration services center in Binghamton, N.Y.

A federal law enforcement official who spoke on condition of anonymity also says the shooter has been found dead in the building.

Officials and media reports have said as many as 41 hostages were taken.

The law enforcement official says the gunman entered the building through the front while firing. He had already blocked the back door with his car.

You have to wonder why a person would do something like that.

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Great political achievements

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Personally, I don’t care very much about Michelle Obama one way or the other, though she certainly seems like a nice person. But the punditocracy thinks that the popularity of the first lady is uber-important in general. Here’s Halperin two years ago:

In the twenty-year history of Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton(?) American politics, here are the five biggest stories respresenting the greatest political achievements, from greatest to less great:

1. George W. Bush’s fundraising, 1999-2000.

2. The large governor of a small Southern state (a/k/a “Bill Clinton”) defeating an incumbent Republican president, 1992.

3. George W. Bush’s consolidation of the Republican base, 1999-2004.

4. Bill Clinton’s surviving impeachment and thriving in his last two years in office, 1998-2000.

5. Laura Bush’s enduring popularity, 1999-present.

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This Really Honks Me Off

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I joked about this yesterday, but these people are clinical:

Gov. Sarah Palin and the head of the Alaska Republican Party said Thursday that Sen. Mark Begich should give his Senate seat up to a special election now that prosecutors have abandoned their case against Ted Stevens. “Alaskans deserve to have a fair election not tainted by some announcement that one of the candidates was convicted fairly of seven felonies, when in fact it wasn’t a fair conviction,” Palin said in a Thursday interview with the Daily News.

The governor said she does not want to “split hairs” on whether Begich should resign or not but agrees with the Republican Party’s call for a special election.

This isn’t about a new election, because they all know that will not happen. There is no law that can be invoked, there was no wrongdoing, the election was clean and fair. The only thing they are trying to do is to marginalize and de-legitimize Mark Begich. I sometimes wish these guys would man up and look at their Sore/Loserman t-shirts from 2000 and think for a minute.

BTW- someone could have a lot of fun looking at the multiple stances of Sarah Palin regarding Ted Stevens. I vaguely remember her maverick creds being polished for going against him while she took all the money he sent back then she ran away from him during the trial and now, of course, she will probably be erecting statues in his name. If I am wrong on that, fill me in, but I would love to see a timeline with her positions and public statements regarding Stevens.

*** Update ***

From the comments:

The guy she said should resign before the election ended up losing. Now she wants the guy who won to resign so that the guy she originally said should resign can get a fair election. What a maverick!

You betcha!

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Congratulations, Gay Iowans

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The gay marriage ban was overturned as unconstitutional. I’m sure Sullivan will have more, and this seems notable:

The Vermont House of Representatives passed a bill late on Thursday that would legalize gay marriage, but supporters failed to get enough votes to override a veto threat from the governor.

Lawmakers in the Democratic-led House voted 95-52 in support of the measure, which had already passed the state Senate by a 26-4 vote. Advocates were five votes short of the two-thirds majority needed to override a veto.

The bill, which faces a largely procedural vote on Friday before heading to the desk of Republican Governor Jim Douglas, would have made Vermont the third U.S. state, after Connecticut and Massachusetts, to allow gay and lesbian couples to marry.

It passed with overwhelming support in both houses, but Douglas is going to veto it so it is not a “distraction.” The Republicans are so hopeless they can’t even come up with believable bullshit anymore. And you wonder why this sort of thing is often decided in courtrooms.

Also, activist judges!

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Blagojevich Details

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Remember when the Blago scandal hit a couple month backs and there were some exceptionally limp efforts to try and tie Blago to Obama, when in all likelihood it was the Obama team who went to Fitzgerald after finding out he was shopping Obama’s former seat? Some more background:

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel was the target of attempted extortion by former Gov. Rod Blagojevich, according to a source and a federal indictment filed Thursday alleging a state grant for a Portage Park neighborhood school was used as bait for a fundraising demand.

Emanuel, a confidant to both Blagojevich and President Barack Obama, is described by prosecutors as “Congressman A,” an identity confirmed by a White House aide.

The former North Side congressman, picked by Obama in November as his top staff member, was allegedly the subject of extortion in 2006 after he inquired about a $2 million state grant to benefit a school in his district. Prosecutors say Blagojevich instructed a top aide to block the release of the money, even though it had been included in the state’s budget.

Blagojevich also allegedly told a high-ranking state official that Emanuel’s brother needed to host a fundraiser for him. The indictment does not say which of two brothers was mentioned, but the White House aide said it was Ari Emanuel, a high-powered Hollywood agent active in political fundraising.

This will be interesting to follow.

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