Archive for February 18th, 2009
February 18th, 2009
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The New York Post, a part of Rupert Murdoch’s conservative media empire (which also includes Fox News and the Wall Street Journal), is the target of widespread OUTRAGE over this cartoon by staffer Sean Delonas.
Some people say the cartoon is racist and personifies President Obama as a chimpanzee. What do you think?
More reaction HERE and HERE and HERE.
Over HERE, we have an item about a right-wing Web site that says the cartoon is no big deal and compares it to left-wing depictions of George W. Bush as a chimp.
The difference, of course, is that this chimp has been shot dead by police officers who identify it as the author of the stimulus bill.
February 18th, 2009
 
Republican Sen. Kit Bond of Missouri  is in the running for the Hypocrite of the Year award for cheerfully informing his constituents of the jobs for his state in a bill he had previously said “doesn’t stimulate jobs.”
But Bond has lots of competition for the award, as we see HERE.
POSTSCRIPT: But there’s a handful of Republican governors who say they might NOT ACCEPT some or perhaps any of the money for their states in the stimulus bill.
Such gestures would not be hypocritical, but the constituents of these governors might consider them stupid.
(”Governor, you’re a man of principle for saying no thanks to jobs we needed. Now, can we bring our families over to your mansion for dinner?”)
February 18th, 2009
“I Want Some Tarp”:
February 18th, 2009
 
I’ve been telling you here for months that there’s no truth to all the scaremongering from Fox News and right-wing radio blabbers about President Obama reinstating the Fairness Doctrine.
Obama said last spring that he was against the idea, and now the White House has REITERATEDÂ his opposition.
Of course, this won’t pacify the hard-core nut cases — the kind who still think Obama’s a Muslim or not a native-born American — but it ought to give the quasi-sentient extremists at least a little peace of mind.
February 18th, 2009
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There are six bars for each presidential administration, extending from the poorest folks on the left to the richest on the right. The percentages are adjusted for inflation.
It looks like everyone fared best under Clinton.
It’s all explained HERE.
February 18th, 2009
 
(NOTICE:Â SEE THE UPDATE AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS POST.)Â
This Europhobia thing among American right-wingers seems inexplicable to me.
Granted, the brand of football they play over there (see photo) is boring compared to ours. Hell, it’s boring compared to watching paint dry.  But we also have soccer over here (if only so that our suburban moms can complain about having to drive their kids to and from the practices and matches). So, that can’t be the reason for conservatives’ disdain of Europe.
Nor can it be culture. C’mon. I mean, Europe is the birthplace of Western civilization, which most American righties with half a brain ordinarily extol at every turn.
So why the loathing of most things continental?
Is it that Europe tends more toward secularism these days? No, that can’t be the only reason.
Socialism? Yeah, that’s a big part of it, I suppose. But there’s something more basic, more primal about the right’s hatred of the other side of the pond.
Oh, well. Conservatives probably don’t agree among themselves on why they despise Europe. After all, they’ve never been very good at explaining their peeves.
Meanwhile, THIS kind of phenomenon evidences itself all over the place.
UPDATE: As Gilda Radner’s Emily Latella would say: Never mind!
Prompted by a snarky comment from Mike Carroll, one of our regulars here at Applesauce, I’ve re-read the Hendrik Hertzberg piece to which I linked in this post, and I’ve done further reading on the subject of Europhobia — and I hereby retract much of what I wrote here.
On some days, I’m a little more sloppy or inattentive than I am on others. Today is an example of the former, at least with regard to this post.
Sorry.
UPDATE II: It’s not my day. I even screwed up my retraction.
In my first update, I referred to a piece by Henrick Hertzberg. But my link to it in my main post was indirect. I actually linked to an item by Matt Yglesias at Think Progress. It was Matt who linked to Hertzberg’s article in The New Yorker.
February 18th, 2009
 
Poor Roland Burris. He hardly got his bags unpacked at his new Washington digs before the fates (read: his own witlessness) doomed his unlikely Senate career.
HERE’s a collection of calls for his resignation — or at least for authorities to measure his neck for a political/criminal noose.
UPDATE: Dick Durbin has THROWN Burris off the bus, if not under it.
February 18th, 2009
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In no particular order of importance:
1. Why is everything on CNN “Breaking News” (even when the story is hours old)?
2. When will the business world recognize that “branding” consultants are running a scam?
3. If God knows everything, why do your prayers usually include explanations?
4. If doctors can give you morphine for almost anything that’s painful, why can’t they give marijuana to terminal cancer patients?
5. How did Winston Churchill live to be 90 despite his drinking like a lush, eating like a pig and smoking like a chimney?
6. Why do I somehow feel sorry for Roland Burris?
7. If the world economy has lost trillions of dollars in recent months, where did it go?
8. Why do they overload my electronic stuff with bells and whistles I don’t want?
9. Why are Southern white folks generally more enthusiastic about NASCAR than the rest of us?
10. Why don’t we just give up on guessing about what happens after death, when nobody — I mean nobody — can say for sure?
I eagerly await your answers to these troubling questions.
