Here’s an ad tying the GOP to Limbaugh

7 comments February 28th, 2009

President Obama’s weekly YouTube address

1 comment February 28th, 2009

The more Limbaugh, the better

11 comments February 28th, 2009

I’ve been telling you this for months: Progressives LOVE Rush Limbaugh more than the right-wingers do.

UPDATE: El Rushbo ATTACKED Newt Gingrich at a convention of wingnuts today.

And some other guy at the same gathering called certain other conservatives TRAITORS for having second-guessed John McCain’s choice of Sarah Palin as a running mate.

Looks like it’s all-out civil war among right-wingers.

Obama’s personal pronoun problem

5 comments February 27th, 2009

 

 Let’s admit from the get-go here that there ain’t none of us that don’t got difficulties with grammar from time to time.

 It’s just that some folks have more difficulties than others.

 Of course, in the final analysis, the most important thing in speaking or writing is to make oneself understandable — sometimes in more ways than one.

 For example, I would not have had as keen a sense of what Elvis was getting at if he had said, “You aren’t anything but a hound dog.”  Nor would it have sufficed for Mick Jagger to declare: “I cannot get any satisfaction.”

  Then, too, strict observance of certain grammatical rules can be cumbersome if carried to extremes. I, for one, am not going to tell you that ending sentences in prepositions is something up with which we should not put.

 Another thing to remember is that the English language and its rules of grammar are forever evolving, else we’d all be talking like Chaucer.  In many cases, yesterday’s errant usage is acceptable and commonplace today.

 Still, there’s something to be said for employing good grammar in certain situations.  Most of us neither expect nor want Margaret Thatcher to sound like Ma Kettle. We don’t want Brian Williams or Charles Gibson to come off as cast members of “Hee Haw.” We’re glad that the great speeches by Lincoln, FDR and Martin Luther King were grammatically solid.

 Good grammar also can be important in making social and career advancements.  If you sound like Gomer Pyle, you’re not going to go far as a public-relations specialist or enjoy great social mobility.

 All of this brings us to the subject at hand: President Obama’s occasional PROBLEM with the pronouns “I” and “me.” It’s no big thing, really, and it’s not a mistake that isn’t commonly made by countless otherwise articulate people.

 Nor are Obama’s grammatical lapses nearly as frequent or egregious as those of his immediate predecessor in the White House.

 But it’s good, I think, that the president is sometimes gently faulted for his grammar mistakes, as he is in the piece to which I linked.

 I don’t mind being corrected for bad grammar (if you find a problem herein, bring it on), and I love to correct those people who also annoy me on matters having nothing to do with grammar.

Latter-day Marie Antoinettes: Let them eat cake!

Add comment February 27th, 2009

 There’s GROWING ANGER among the jobless in the nine states whose governors are reluctant to accept new federal aid for the unemployed.

Reefer tax to save California?

7 comments February 27th, 2009

THIS GUY says marijuana is California’s biggest cash crop, so it might as well be legalized and taxed to save the state from fiscal ruin.

UPDATE: Now the attorney general of Arizona is TALKING ABOUT legalization of pot.

Joe the Plumber says he favors violence against some members of Congress

1 comment February 27th, 2009

 

  Joe Wurzelbacher, whom John McCain promoted last year as the model of common-man virtues, is waxing completely nutty these days with VISIONS of wreaking violence on those members of Congress who don’t live up to his standards of patriotism.

 What a great American!

Weird right-wing dreams of mushroom clouds

Add comment February 27th, 2009

 

 There’s something about the idea of nuclear attacks on certain Democratic Party strongholds that GREATLY AMUSES some of our friends on the political right.

 Haven’t I read somewhere that such fantasies are linked with bedwetting? Maybe not.

Whom do Americans trust on health-care reform?

Add comment February 27th, 2009

 POLL commissioned by Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.

 (Hat-tip to Daily Kos)

Obama’s biggest tax breaks aimed at incomes from $38k to $112k; biggest hike for $600k-plus

5 comments February 27th, 2009

Bloomberg is out today with an ANALYSIS that says President Obama’s spending and tax programs are aimed at the middle class and could pay long-term political dividends for Democrats.

BONUS: Bloomberg also has THIS PIECE this morning about the influence of the late Nobel laureate James Tobin on the Obama administration’s fiscal policies.

UPDATE: Conservative Charles Krauthammer has his own ANALYSIS of Obama’s plans and likens the president, at least in one sense, to Ronald Reagan.

UPDATE II: Sean Quinn EXAMINES media coverage of Obama’s budget proposals.

UPDATE III: WaPo’s Dan Balz (a friend and neighbor of mine when we were growing up in Freeport) also ANALYZES Obama’s budget.

UPDATE IV: Keith Olbermann and Robert Reich take a look at Obamanomics: