Thursday, September 25, 2008

Another One for the Blogroll

My Two Cents. Worth the read. Found it via BlondeSense.

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

'Nother Quickie...

Two more for the blogroll....

Via Firestarter5, The Great Endarkenment.

And, via The Great Endarkenment, Politits.

Quickie Post

One of Watertiger's regular commenters at Dependable Renegade (Ifthethunderdontgetya) referred to Palin as "Bible Spice."

I spit coffee all over the place.

The commenter says he swiped it from Wonkette. No matter who coined it, it's perfect.

A Chilling Thought

Okay, I'll admit right up front that this could be something out of The Twilight Zone, but I think it's worth at least a little consideration.

george w. bush and his evangelical cronies would love to see one of their own take over the White House. That's okay, every politician wants to be followed by another of his or her stripe. The problem is that so many of bush's cohorts are Dominionists, advocating a theocratic government for the U.S. (Kos diarist Dogemperor has many, many postings on Dominionism)*. Among the Dominionists with ties to the current administration are John Ashcroft, Dominos Pizza founder Tom Monaghan (he's also establishing a fundamentalist "Christian" community around his openly-Dominionist Ave Maria "Law School"), former Michigan gubernatorial candidate and Amway heir Richard DeVos, Truett Cathy (head of the Chik-Fil-A restaurant chain) and the Paxton family (of Pax TV).

Dominionists also have ties to other fringe groups: Christian Identity, the Militia movement, Sovereign Citizens (the "Republic of Texas" crowd), even the Klan and skinhead groups. The only thing these groups have in common is a pathological hatred for what this country represented before bush stole the presidency (twice).

The Dominionists are smart enough to realize that, thus far, they do not have a snowflake's chance in hell of getting one of their Talibangelicals elected to the highest office in the land.

So what do they do?

"Submitted for your consideration," as Rod Serling used to say:

Have the GOP nominate for President a man in his 70s, with a history of cancer... a cancer that is quite often fatal. Even without the cancer, McSame would be the oldest incoming President in history. How could they make this happen? Easy. Promise the GOP the fundamentalist/evangelical vote, and threaten to withhold it --or even worse, nominate their own candidate. The GOP is so used to knuckling under to the mouth-breathin', Bible-thumpin', hooker-humpin', sister-marryin', rifle-rack-in-the-pickmup crowd that they'd do it without a second thought.

They get one of their own -- Sarah Palin -- nominated as VP for John McSame. Palin has well-known ties to the Dominionist movement, and has even told interviewers she believes Christ will return to Earth during her lifetime. The right-wing loonie fringe could also point out that a certain (I hope small) number of hard-core feminists would vote Rethuglican to "punish" the Democrats for not nominating Hillary Clinton.

McSame cashes out, either through cancer or just plain old age. And if it looks like he might survive either the full term or -- God help us -- two terms (how's that for a terrifying thought?), I wouldn't put it past them to whack him... with "plausible deniability", of course.

Voila... Palin the Dominionist is President.

Far-fetched? Sure. But so is a lot of the rest of the things that have happened the past eight years.

* If the link doesn't work, go to Daily Kos and search authors for "Dogemperor".

Gotta Love Brooks

I have to admit, David Brooks' column yesterday floored me. Discussing the bailout plan for the financial industry, he says:

It does not rely on any system of checks and balances, but on the wisdom and public spiritedness of those in charge [Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke]. It offers succor to the investment banks that contributed to this mess and will burn through large piles of public money. But in exchange, it promises to restore confidence. [...] The country ... will turn to the safe heads of the investment banks. [...] Government activism will provide support to corporations, banks and business and will be used to shore up the stable conditions they need to thrive. [...] We're entering an era of the educated establishment, in which government acts to create a stable -- and often oligarchic-- framework for capitalist endeavor.


The "wisdom and public spiritedness of those in charge"?!? "Succor to the investment banks that contributed to this mess"?!?

Where's the relief for the thousands of Americans who are in danger of losing their homes? Sure, a lot of them were suckered in by immoral, lying bastards from companies like Countrywide, and conned into taking out mortgages they couldn't possibly afford, but what about the little guy?

Oh, wait... under the current administration -- and most likely under the potential administration of McSame and the MILF -- the little guy doesn't count. Only the rich and powerful count and are worthy of salvation.

Amazing how activist governments are a Bad Thing... until you need one to bail out your richie-rich friends.

Badtux, by the way, has a very good explanation of the technical points of the bailout plan; unlike those promulgated by the economists (on either side), his is easy to understand.

On a semi-related matter, today's Portland Press Herald has an editorial saying it's time for the undecided voters to wake up and start thinking about who will be the next President. It seems to me that Brooks' column should show the little guy where his vote should go.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

What Are The Chances?

I was perusing the Detroit News this evening, catching up on the antics of my favorite disgraced ex-mayor and soon-to-be jailbird, Kwame Kilpatrick, when a story from Michigan State University caught my eye. It seems that Mike Robell – purely by chance – was assigned the same dorm room his father had lived in thirty years earlier. Mike’s father Rich Robell suspected it was the same room, and, according to the paper, “the same broken window latch offered some evidence.”

Yes, one could ask what the chances were that father and son would get the same dorm room by chance. But my question is a little more basic:

THIRTY YEARS and you still haven’t fixed the broken window latch?!?

Thursday, September 04, 2008

Kwame OUT

Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick pleaded guilty to two felony counts and will resign from office effective in two weeks. The plea stems from the "text-message" scandal, in which it became obvious that Kilpatrick and his then chief-of-staff Christine Beatty lied under oath about their sexual affair and the effect the affair had on Kilpatrick's firing of several police officers. The firings led to a (roughly) $9 million settlement by the city of Dteroit. The scandal has since expanded, and included recent revelations that Federal agencies tapping the phones of Kilpatrick's parents overheard arrangements of pay-offs for city contracts. Kilpatrick's mother is US Rep Cheeks-Kilpatrick.

Kilpatrick and Beatty were indicted in April on a total of twelve felony counts for perjury and obstruction of justice.

It was also announced that police chief Ella Bully-Cummings is resigning effective immediately, and Kilpatrick's counsel Sharon McPhail will be resigning soon.

Kilpatrick still has to deal with two additional felony counts involving his alleged assault on two poice officers attempting to serve a subpoena on one of his friends.