So, I know that when I got up this morning, I’d be typing “Right wing Panda x Hillary slash fiction“.
Open thread.
If Guns are Outlawed, Only Morons Who Are Outlaws Will Accidentally Shoot Each Other
Today is “Gun Appreciation Day.”  An event created by right winger with penis issues, and so called because “Insensitivity To First Graders Being Slaughtered Wholesale Day” doesn’t roll as glibly off the tongue.  It also gives the game away, but I digress.
At gun shows across the country, the hicks and goobers line up to look at and buy all sorts of guns, and more guns and still more guns instead of getting the roof fixed, buying a used truck less than eight years old, or saving up for Billy Bob’s and Jolene’s tuition at the junior college that might have allowed them to not work at Walmart as adults.
So today, on this day where we are supposed to be seeing examples of law-abiding, safety conscious gun owners engaging in the patriotic past time of purchasing mass killing implements just because they can, what do you suppose has been happening?  Wait for it…
The Only Thing That Stops a Bad Guy With a Gun
A 16-year-old was in critical condition Thursday night after a fellow student interrupted a first-period class at Taft Union High School southwest of Bakersfield, confronted him by name and fired a round from a 12-gauge shotgun into his upper body.
The assailant, also 16, tried to shoot a second student and missed before a science teacher was able to talk him down, apparently taking the shotgun as the other students fled from the classroom through a door.
Police officers arrived after the teacher had disarmed the assailant and took the teenager into custody. They seized the shotgun.
The teacher, Ryan Heber, was struck in the head by a pellet but was not seriously injured and refused treatment, authorities said.
“If it weren’t for this teacher and his quick response, we don’t know what would have happened,” Kern County Sheriff Donny Youngblood said.
Other reports I saw said that the kid had pockets full of shells so who knows how many lives Heber saved.
The Only Thing That Stops a Bad Guy With a GunPost + Comments (119)
Your Sunday Show Sideeye
Cory Booker versus Nooners on gun violence and Newtown:
The look Cory Booker gave Peggy Noonan when she blamed gun violence on video games. via @vote4will twitter.com/Jane_Roh/statuâŠ
— Andrew Kaczynski (@BuzzFeedAndrew) December 23, 2012
I may frame this. Oh, and Booker (who might actually know something about a city facing gun violence as Mayor of Newark) went on to snatch Nooners’ wig on live teevee.
“I don’t know if anybody here has seen somebody shot. I have,” Booker said during a round-table discussion on the show, hosted by George Stephanopoulos. “I don’t know if anybody here has had to put their hand in somebody’s chest and try to stop the bleeding so somebody doesn’t die. I have. And the what frustrates me about this debate is it’s a false debate. It’s a false debate.
“This is a convenient trick to try to divide our country more. Most of us in America, including gun owners, agree on things that would stop the kind of carnage that’s going on in cities all over America.”
“I’m tired of the political debates,” he added. “They’re not necessary. I’m tired of the ideological positions. We don’t even need to visit them. Let’s stick to the pragmatic center where all Americans believe the same thing and let’s pass legislation that would make America safer.”
That of course will never happen as long as Republicans have any sort of power in Congress.
Revision Of Labor
Gosh, I wish President Obama’s Chicago Machine thugs would quit rigging the economic numbers to make him look worse.
The U.S. economy grew at a 2.7 percent annual rate in the third quarter, the Bureau of Economic Analysis says. That’s a sharp upward revision in its estimate of gross domestic product growth from mid-summer into the fall. In its first look at the quarter’s GDP, the agency estimated growth at a 2 percent annual rate.
According to BEA, consumer spending, inventory investment, exports and federal spending all contributed to growth from July 1 through Sept. 30.
In the second quarter, GDP expanded at a 1.3 percent annual rate.
Also, jobless claims down to 393K. Darn that economy, actually growing. It’s like the guy knows what he’s doing with this whole “stewardship of the economy” thing.
I wonder where the economic numbers would be without the House GOP blocking all the big league economic boosters, ya know?
Either I’m doing something right, or John hasn’t figured out the FYWP password after I changed it.
Whichever one of those two options makes you feel better is the one you should run with.
Tomorrow marks one year that I’ve been on the front page here at Balloon-Juice. Since there’s some kind of festival going on that the majority of our readership will be involved with, I’m posting this here today. Special thanks to Anne Laurie who pitched the idea of giving me the keys to John, and to John himself for taking the chance. I hope that I haven’t embarrassed either of you too much. Thanks also to the other front pagers who make it look so easy. It’s due to their quality work that you have been saved from all sorts of crap I would have posted, but then I saw something one of them put up and said to myself “no way in hell I’m posting this piece of crap after reading that.”
Even more thanks to Kos, whose community allowed me to start to find my voice, with an admission price that I and so many others could afford. And to many of the front pagers over there, past and present who listened to what I had to say even as they frequently disagreed with me, and most especially to Armando, for plucking me from obscurity and posting something I wrote on the front page there and showing me that there were actually people who were interested in what I had say. Now, if I could only figure out why that is, I’d probably make a fortune.
And lastly, thank you all. Without the readers and commenters here on Balloon-Juice, I wouldn’t have a reason to do this. To the ones with whom I’ve had disagreements and even the ones who hate me, thank you as well. You’ve all had a hand in making me a better person, if not a better writer.
My Favorite Picture of The Night and a Few Of My Other Favorite Things
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The other wonderful things are the dismissals of the wingnuts Allen West and Michele Bachmann, and the rape apologists Mourdock and Akin.
UPDATE: Bachmann is now ahead by ~1300 votes with 86% reporting. I’m not a praying man, but I’ll make an exception.
And the most wonderful thing are the winger tears. If you think Political Observer’s melt-down in the last thread is fun to watch, you need to take a look at Victoria Jackson’s twitter, @vicjackshow
And since most of her ~4300 followers are people who point at her and laugh, a fact she doesn’t seem to get, it’s like watching children poke at this poor rabid worn out gopher with sticks to see what she’ll do. Good times, good times.
And last but certainly not the least among my favorite things, is the fact that Andrew Breitbart is still dead.
Oh, yeah, I’m drunk. Falling down, commode-hugging, epically fucking drunk! Thank God for spell check!
SG+Whothefuckknows?
My Favorite Picture of The Night and a Few Of My Other Favorite ThingsPost + Comments (59)