I'm just tired of the lies and nonsense coming from the GOP, so this is my little contribution to combat the nonsense!
Don’t look now, but Glenn Beck has a new conspiracy theory, one that he has verified (in his head) and has determined to be true. According to this nut-job, Google is a “government propaganda” machine responsible for the uprising in Egypt and those in Iran in 2009.
But in order not put words in Beck’s mouth, let me pass the chalk over to the man worshiped by millions of followers in radio land and on Fox-We Make This Stuff Up-News!
Most would consider this good news, but those wishing for America’s destruction simply for political gains will not be happy over this. General Motors, the company that received $50 billion from tax payers in the form of a “bail-out,” has recovered to the point where they are now giving checks in the amount of $4,000 or more, to 45,000 hourly American workers through profit sharing.
The New York Times reports;
The checks will be worth “upwards of $4,000,” a G.M. spokeswoman, Sherrie Childers-Arb, said. That is more than double the company’s previous record of $1,775, paid in 2000.
About 3,000 G.M. workers at four plants in New York, Michigan and Indiana that were formerly part of the Delphi Corporation will receive about $3,000 each.
In all, G.M. will give at least $189 million of its profit back to plant workers.
If Republicans had their way, General Motors would have been a faint memory, causing hundreds of thousand to loose their jobs. Since receiving the bailout, GM has recovered, restructured its product and the company’s goals. Between January and September of 2010 GM saw profits of $4.2 billion.
Read the New York Time’s report here.
In a shocking twist, we find out that Michele Bachmann is just another opportunistic politician. Well, maybe not shocking, but after promising the Teaparty that she will promote “small government,” Bachmann voted ‘yes’ for a bill that represents one of the largest government intrusion into the lives of ordinary Americans – the Patriot Act.
She explains the reason for her vote on her Facebook page;
Today I voted for a temporary extension of three legal authorities in the Patriot Act. This vote was not for a full reauthorization of the Patriot Act. As a member of the House Intelligence Committee, I look forward to briefings and reports from our intelligence community that will help us develop longer term solutions as we protect our nation against international terrorism.
Well, this didn’t go over too well with her Facebook fans. Page after page of negative responses were posted in reference to Michele’s vote. Below is a small section from some angry fans:
The Republican Party would like Americans to believe they are all for deficit reduction. Of course, their position on the deficit and spending can easily be refuted by the free pass they gave the Bush Administration, who conducted business in Washington like they were playing with monopoly money. That said, the Teaparty was hatched to keep Obama in check, and the November midterm election saw much of their members elected to Congress.
They rode into Washington claiming to have a mandate from the Teaparty the –reduction of America’s deficit–and in keeping with this mandate, Republican leaders in the house began making the usual promises . One of those promises was a reduction of $100 billion, a feat easier said than done, and one that can only be accomplished through drastically slashing services that benefit many Americans. The Teaparty demanded these spending cuts, and the House Republicans are determined to please.
So what’s a Republicans to do?
Paul Krugman – a nobel price winner for Economics – wrote an article in then New York Times in which he explains the plight the Republican leaders face. As Krugman explains, Republicans will “sacrifice the future.”
Focus the cuts on programs whose benefits aren’t immediate; basically, eat America’s seed corn. There will be a huge price to pay, eventually — but for now, you can keep the base happy.
If you didn’t understand that logic, you might be puzzled by many items in the House G.O.P. proposal. Why cut a billion dollars from a highly successful program that provides supplemental nutrition to pregnant mothers, infants, and young children? Why cut $648 million from nuclear nonproliferation activities? (One terrorist nuke, assembled from stray ex-Soviet fissile material, can ruin your whole day.) Why cut $578 million from the I.R.S. enforcement budget? (Letting tax cheats run wild doesn’t exactly serve the cause of deficit reduction.)
Once you understand the imperatives Republicans face, however, it all makes sense. By slashing future-oriented programs, they can deliver the instant spending cuts Tea Partiers demand, without imposing too much immediate pain on voters. And as for the future costs — a population damaged by childhood malnutrition, an increased chance of terrorist attacks, a revenue system undermined by widespread tax evasion — well, tomorrow is another day.
Sacrificing America’s future just to win the next vote. But then again we are talking about the Republican party, and with them, it has always been party before country, regardless of what John McCain’s 2008 presidential slogan was!
Read Paul Krugman’s Article here.
More Republican foolishness. This time, the people in South Carolina are definitely not getting their money’s worth. The fool? State Sen. Lee Bright (R-Roebuck). His idea? Give South Carolina its own currency!
Senator Lee Bright is not so bright at all. He thinks he has his finger on the pulse of this economy and the United States dollar, and as far as he can tell, the dollar will be worthless because, “many widely recognized experts predict the inevitable destruction of the Federal Reserve System’s currency through hyperinflation in the foreseeable future.”
So Mr. Bright has introduced legislature in South Carolina, the purpose of which was to create a group of experts who will provide a study detailing the benefits and the best way of implementing the new currency. According to the legislation;
South Carolina can avoid or at least mitigate many of the economic, social, and political shocks to be expected to arise from hyperinflation, depression, or other economic calamity related to the breakdown of the Federal Reserve System only through the timely adoption of an alternative sound currency that the state’s government and citizens may employ without delay in the event of the destruction of the Federal Reserve System’s currency;
Director of South Carolina’s Democratic Caucus Phil Bailey calls the legislation a waste of time;
“It’s a waste of resources. I mean who’s paying for this study? Will they be paid in actual dollars or gold doubloons?”
Pay them in doubloons please!
More on this story here.
In the heat of the Health Care battle when all manner of accusations were made against President Obama and the Democrats implementation of Health Care reform, Senator Tom Coburn accurately said that FOX News were spreading false and misleading information insinuating that Americans will be jailed if they don’t purchase Health Insurance.
Bill O’Reilly, in his effort to prove Mr. Coburn wrong and restore Fox’s unknown reputation for truth-telling, brought the senator on his show, The O’Reilly Factor and did what he does best – lied- saying no one at FOX ever made the statement.
Of course, it’s all on tape…
We knew this all along. They call themselves a news channel, but what they broadcast are lies and willful misinformation. Now, a former employee of FOX NEWS is coming forward with information that the network just made stuff up in an attempt to destroy the Obama administration and the Democrats.
“It is their M.O. to undermine the administration and to undermine Democrats,” says the source. “They’re a propaganda outfit but they call themselves news.”
The employee spoke in an exclusive interview with Media Matters and confirmed what the rest of the world already knew.
“I don’t think people would believe it’s as concocted as it is; that stuff is just made up.
“They say one thing and do another. They insist on maintaining this charade, this façade, that they’re balanced or that they’re not right-wing extreme propagandist.”
“You have to work there for a while to understand the nods and the winks, and God help you if you don’t because sooner or later you’re going to get burned.”
The source continues;
“Like any news channel there’s lot of room for non-news content. The content that wasn’t ‘news,’ they didn’t care what we did with as long as it was amusing or quirky or entertaining; as along as it brought in eyeballs. But anything—anything–that was a news story you had to understand what the spin should be on it. If it was a big enough story it was explained to you in the morning [editorial] meeting. If it wasn’t explained, it was up to you to know the conservative take on it. There’s a conservative take on every story no matter what it is. So you either get told what it is or you better intuitively know what it is.”
Yes, FOXNEWS lies. Yes, they make stuff up and yes, they’re a propaganda machine for the right-wing. But their need to stoop this low is not the saddest part of the story. What’s really sad is their faithful followers who tune in night after night expecting news, and not able or willing to accept the fact that they aren’t getting it.
According to a recent study conducted by World Public Opinion, Fox has the most uninformed viewers among cable news networks. The poll basically found that watching Foxnews makes you stupid. But don’t tell that to their audience. These poor souls continue tuning in – night after lying night – to get their dose of dumbing-down. Some people you just can’t help!
More from the employee’s interview here.
Okay, so there really is a first for everything. Consider this our first and maybe not the last critique of this Administration.
What is going on with President Obama? The National Journal is reporting massive cuts to LIHEAP (Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program), a federally funded program geared towards helping the poorer among us to heat their homes during the cold winter months. The report states that this will be “the biggest domestic spending cut disclosed so far, and one that will likely generate the most heat from the president’s traditional political allies.”
This is obviously an effort by the administration to appease the Republican party, who have promised the Teaparty that they will impose massive cuts to domestic spending programs.
The decision has left some in the President’s own party scratching their heads. The report continues;
One White House friend, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said earlier today that a Republican proposal to cut home heating oil counted as an “extreme idea” that would “set the country backwards.” Schumer has not yet reacted to Obama’s proposed cut. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., declared: “The President’s reported proposal to drastically slash LIHEAP funds by more than half would have a severe impact on many of New Hampshire’s most vulnerable citizens and I strongly oppose it.” A spokesman for Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., declared similarly: “If these cuts are real, it would be a very disappointing development for millions of families still struggling through a harsh winter.”
In a letter to Obama, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., wrote, “We simply cannot afford to cut LIHEAP funding during one of the most brutal winters in history. Families across Massachusetts, and the country, depend on these monies to heat their homes and survive the season.”
The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, or LIHEAP, would see funding drop by about $2.5 billion from an authorized 2009 total of $5.1 billion. The proposed cut will not touch the program’s emergency reserve fund, about $590 million, which can be used during particularly harsh cold snaps or extended heat spells, three officials told National Journal
Read the rest of the report here.
John McCain, the 2008 Republican Presidential nominee has found himself on the wrong side of the political fence. He’s pissing off some conservatives for what is to me a very shocking reason…doing his job!;
The president has become more centrist, which makes him easier to work with, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Thursday.
Speaking with Bloomberg Television a day after a private meeting with President Obama, McCain said he could picture working with Obama on several issues going forward.
“I think there’s a number of issues we could work on together, and I think it’s pretty clear that the president has really pivoted to a much more centrist position, which I think makes it much more for us easier to work with him,” McCain said.
A United States Senator, simply saying that there may be a number of issues where he can work together with the President of The United States, has become a means for attack from the right. Doug Powers, a writer at Michelle Malkin’s blog says that McCain;
…often reminds me of a trout that just got hooked and is thrilled that the fisherman has agreed to meet him halfway.
John McCain hasn’t said yet what these issues would be, so why would this loony be mad?
It just shows that issues don’t matter with the GOP. All that matters to these people are congressmen and women who will consistently say no to everything this president offers – regardless of the issues, regardless of the policies, regardless of the positive outcome for the American people.
To those on the right, the branches of our government and the President of the United States will not work together if the president’s name happens to be Barack Obama.
Just a little over a month after an assassination attempt, where she was shot in the head, doctors at the TIRR Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston say congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords is recovering and her hard work at rehabilitation is “clearly paying off.”
“She is speaking more and more with each passing day, most recently asking for toast,” said spokesman C.J. Karamargin. “They are working with her on all kinds of language and speech exercises.”
Reuters reports:
Giffords — known to friends and relatives as “Gabby” — is eating three meals a day, her husband said.
“Gabby’s appetite is back and — even though it’s hospital food — she’s enjoying three meals a day,” NASA astronaut Mark Kelly said in a Facebook posting on Tuesday.
Kelly, a three-time space shuttle veteran, will command the shuttle Endeavour when it launches in April, NASA said last week.
“The doctors say she is recovering at lightning speed considering her injury, but they aren’t kidding when they say this is a marathon process,” Kelly said.
Doctors say Giffords’ full recovery could take months.
As an elected congressman or woman for that matter, one of your primary responsibilities to the people who vote you into power is to be honest. However, Republican congressman Steve King from Iowa went on “The Last Word” with Lawrence O’Donnell and claimed that he lies to his constituents to keep the peace.
Only in America can a congressman come on television, say he’s a Christian, profess to know the truth about an issue, then deliberately withholds this truth from his constituents for fear of pissing them off! The issue in this case is whether or not President Obama is a Christian or Muslim.
Ladies and gentlemen, please allow us to introduce to you the Lying, Christian, Republican Congressman from Iowa, Mr. Steve King.
Video…
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
A Republican congressman, Christopher Lee quit his job today. Seems the congressman had a nice camera phone, you know, the kind that was capable of taking pictures of the congressman as he posed in front a mirror half naked. And apparently its the kind of phone capable of sending said pictures directly online, as in this case, sharing them on Craigslist
We’re not sure what phone was used, but from the looks of the congressman’s reflection, he’s holding a red phone, probably a blackberry or something by AT&T. Whoever it is though, some phone company is in for some free advertising. Way to go congressman!
Oh, and for a little comic relief, here’s what the Congressman had to say before stepping down;
“The challenges we face in Western New York and across the country are too serious for me to allow this distraction to continue, and so I am announcing that I have resigned my seat in Congress effective immediately,” Lee said in a written statement. “I regret the harm that my actions have caused my family, my staff and my constituents. I deeply and sincerely apologize to them all. I have made profound mistakes and I promise to work as hard as I can to seek their forgiveness.”
Explaining to his wife why he posed and took these pictures, then uploaded them to the “Women Seeking Men” section of Craigslist is one thing. Explaining why he described himself as a “divorced” “lobbyist” and a “fit fun classy guy” is another. What I’m interested in however, is how he’s gonna react when she takes his little red phone away!
Now that’s gonna be the real story…
