Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
Remember when John Ensign paying off his mistress was the lead story for six straight days?
And Weiner is offering increasingly bizarre and unconvincing responses to the media.
On the Sixth Day of WeinerGate, My True Love Gave to MePost + Comments (136)
You’ll all remember that Mitch Daniels quietly signed draconian legislation limiting access to certain health care providers for certain women, despite his national (and, turns out, completely phony) public call for a “truce” on social issues.
The timing was amusing for those of us out here in the cheap seats, because Mitch signed the law right about the time national media informed us he was a wonky and rational conservative simply seeking solutions to tough problems, because that’s what he told them he was and he’s an honorable guy. What happens in Indiana stays in Indiana, apparently.
Federal officials said Wednesday that the new Indiana law cutting Medicaid funding to Planned Parenthood violates Medicaid rules — a determination that could cost the state millions and possibly even billions of dollars.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services informed state officials by letter that it was denying Indiana’s new Medicaid plan because states can’t pick and choose where recipients receive health-care services.
It’s amazing to me that conservatives are shutting down access to the few affordable clinics that exist in a country where millions of people are already going without access to medical care. That’s just crazy. Commonsense conservatism in action.
Fake moderate Mitch Daniels loses a roundPost + Comments (64)
You don’t see many music videos about marital sexual dysfunction, but here’s one that’s borderline NSFW (via). Open thread for the masses.
This isn’t getting a lot of press attention, but for the first time in its 57-year life, Garrison Dam’s spillway is being opened during flood season in North Dakota. There will be unprecedented flooding downstream. Other dams on the Missouri (such as Oahe) are also releasing water because they are full of rain and snow runoff. Tens of thousands of people won’t be flooded, mainly because there isn’t that much housing in low-lying areas and because of heroic efforts shoring up flood dikes.
I grew up in this area. As a child, I was told that the reason we didn’t have floods was because of those huge dams (Garrison is the fifth largest earthen dam in the world). That’s not true anymore.
The story of how Andrew Viveros became the prom queen of a Miami high school is about Andrew’s courage, and about the support of important adults in Andrew’s life:
Last year, school officials suggested Andrew not dress as a female in class and to “tone it down,” she said.
“This year we got a new principal and she’s very supportive of me,” Andrew said, even encouraging her to run for prom queen. “She said “Stay in the running. Don’t back down for anything.’”
Before the big night, Andrew’s father, Oscar Viveros, bought her a gown, shoes and makeup.
“My parents support me. They always have,” said Andrew, the oldest of four siblings.
“I’ve always loved him unconditionally,” said Oscar Viveros, who still uses male pronouns when talking about Andrew. “I’ve told my other kids, they have to support him. He thinks he’s a girl in a man’s body. In school, he hears this and that, but I’ve made sure in our house he’s free to act and do whatever makes him comfortable.”
Viveros, 46, a supervisor at a private garbage-collection company in Fort Lauderdale, said his co-workers aren’t as tolerant.
“I’ve got guys at work who say, ‘Oh, you didn’t beat him up?’’’ Viveros said. “I love him too much.”
As has been aptly demonstrated by every poster and almost every commenter on this blog, the Ryan plan is a political fuckup of the first order, with 58% opposition from a fairly unengaged electorate. But Republicans can’t back down — in this respect, they’re like the habitually philandering, verbally abusive, binge-drinking husband who wants to keep his long-suffering wife from heading out the door. Deep down, they know that they deserve the heartbreak that’s coming, but they’re desperately casting around for a way to keep the little woman in the kitchen where she belongs.
Enter the debt ceiling. Yesterday’s vote was telegraphed to the markets as a joke, but, like the philandering husband cleaning his guns on the kitchen table, it’s a preview of coming attractions. Republicans showed Democrats that they have a united caucus, and that half of the House Democrats will vote the way that Fox News scares them into voting.
So what will happen next is pretty dreary and predictable. Republicans will attach some kind of Medicare “reform” to the debt ceiling bill. They’ll pass it at the last possible minute, probably a week after Tim Geithner is hospitalized for nervous exhaustion, and a day or two after Paul Krugman is put under mental hygiene arrest. It will be carefully calibrated to be the worst thing that the Senate can pass and Obama can sign. And, just in the same way that the wife always goes back to her jackass husband for the sake of the kids, Obama will then sign it, for the sake of the country.
Once this grand bipartisan consensus is achieved, Republicans will call the bill that they passed the “Ryan plan”, tell their base that they won, and argue that the fuss over the original, real Ryan plan was just histrionics from the lieberal media. Their claims will be accompanied by a hosannah chorus from the usual DC media suspects, who will hail its bracing realism and shared sacrifice. By this time next year, the plan to replace Medicare with vouchers will be firmly ensconced in the memory hole, and the Bachmann/Cain ticket will be blaming Obama for the double-dip recession.
From commentor Patrick II:
Bingo is my mom’s dog. Mom is eighty eight now and we had been looking for a companion dog for awhile. My cousin Pam found Bingo sleeping in a snowdrift, and brought him home. Pam already had three dogs – so she called Mom and asked her to give this dog a try for a week and see how she liked him. The week has been two years now, and Bingo has become a best friend to a very nice lady.
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Bingo is a mutt – the vet said he is half lhasa apso and half springer spaniel. I am not sure how the vet could tell, but to me he looks like Benji on stilts. The vet also said Bingo had been living wild for at least several months and had probably existed mostly on mice.
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Bingo doesn’t have to catch mice to survive anymore. He spends most of his time now listening to mom discuss the latest gossip, guarding the front yard against various interlopers — particularly the neighbor’s cat — , sleeping on the easy chair, playing fetch, and entertaining the grandkids when they come to visit. He is very bright and quickly learned the few tricks (sit, shake) that my niece taught him.