Here's today's installment of the Mark Sanford saga:
COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford said Tuesday that he "crossed lines" with a handful of women other than his mistress — but never had sex with them. The governor said he "never crossed the ultimate line" with anyone but Maria Belen Chapur, the Argentine at the center of a scandal that has derailed his once-promising political career.
"This was a whole lot more than a simple affair, this was a love story," Sanford said. "A forbidden one, a tragic one, but a love story at the end of the day."
This creep's wife and four sons are getting their hearts ripped up every time this fool opens his big, stupid mouth. This guy has not an atom of decency, good sense, circumspection, or dignity. He is an utter jerk, an exhibitionist, and a louse.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Sooner or later economists catch up to reality
We know that we're in a depression--the Great Depression of the 21st century--but until know conventional economists have doubted this; they're still calling this catastrophe a "recession."
But now, a pair of economists have studied the data and--surprise! surprise!--they've found that the dreadful economic performance of the last two years tracks the dreadful economic performance of the first years of the Great Depression that began in October, 1929. Yikes!
The conclusion of these guys: This is a Depression-sized event. The contemporary data are as bad or worse than comparable data from the 1930s. Shouldn't somebody in government be aware of this study and try to plan accordingly?
Read the Financial Times article here
But now, a pair of economists have studied the data and--surprise! surprise!--they've found that the dreadful economic performance of the last two years tracks the dreadful economic performance of the first years of the Great Depression that began in October, 1929. Yikes!
The conclusion of these guys: This is a Depression-sized event. The contemporary data are as bad or worse than comparable data from the 1930s. Shouldn't somebody in government be aware of this study and try to plan accordingly?
Read the Financial Times article here
Friday, June 12, 2009
A short shelf life
Carrie Prajean is back in the news again--briefly. A month ago she had a tussle with pageant officials who wanted to fire her for failure to live up to her contractual obligations as Miss California. Donald Trump, the owner of the pageant, decided to let retain her position. Now a month later, pageant officials say that Miss Prajean is still failing to fulfill her obligations, so they've fired her with The Donald's approval.
But Miss Prajean is blaming gays for her troubles, specifically the sour reaction to her now infamous "opposite marriage" statement. This is a novel approach to employment: don't show up for work and blame gay people if you're fired. Whatever happens, don't accept personal responsibility for your personal behavior; it's always somebody else's fault.
In truth Miss Prajean's fifteen minutes of fame expired a month ago; nobody's much interested in her now. She tried to maneuver a bit of celebrity into a career on the religious right; her irked employers got enough of her antics and told her to get lost. But the pleasures and rewards of victimhood beckon. Miss Prajean says that she's writing a book that will tell all--especially her sufferings and pain and tears. Do you suppose that she'll have a chapter about her silicon boobs?
Read it here
But Miss Prajean is blaming gays for her troubles, specifically the sour reaction to her now infamous "opposite marriage" statement. This is a novel approach to employment: don't show up for work and blame gay people if you're fired. Whatever happens, don't accept personal responsibility for your personal behavior; it's always somebody else's fault.
In truth Miss Prajean's fifteen minutes of fame expired a month ago; nobody's much interested in her now. She tried to maneuver a bit of celebrity into a career on the religious right; her irked employers got enough of her antics and told her to get lost. But the pleasures and rewards of victimhood beckon. Miss Prajean says that she's writing a book that will tell all--especially her sufferings and pain and tears. Do you suppose that she'll have a chapter about her silicon boobs?
Read it here
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Who's smoking what?
If you read the generic press, you may be cheered by recent announcements from journalists (who could not possibly know) that the recession seems to be "bottoming out" and signs of "recovery" are sprouting all over the place and unfolding themselves to the warm rays of the summer sun.
Yet...the jobs data get worse by the day. According to new financial data, Americans lost 1.3 trillion dollars (that's $1,300,000,000,000) of their personal wealth in just the first quarter of this year. (Add that 1.3 trillion to the trillions lost in the two years of the current depression and then consider that people are yakking about a recovery in consumer spending! What are these people smoking?)
On the other hand, less credulous folks like journalist Dave Lindorff tell us from both personal experience and a sound understanding of the real data that we're anything but bottoming out, that things are falling apart at an accelerated rate, and that Mr. Obama's "recovery" is as fake as his rhetoric. Inflation, once thought impossible in a depression, is now rapidly rising. Oil prices are shooting up, so is gold, and have you been to a grocery store lately? The trillions of dollars in government bonds that Mr. Obama is trying to peddle to the world are not selling; investors (a.k.a. "chumps") want higher interest. Soon the Federal Reserve will have to comply to prevent a California-style governmental bankruptcy. When interest rates start taking off, there won't be any stopping them and that's the end of the American economy.
But fantasy/hope springs eternal. The generic press, still in love with Mr. Obama, still gets misty-eyed at his crooning. They're still describing him as "eloquent" even though they know for a fact that Mr. Obama does not write the speeches he delivers. And they're still describing the worsening depression as recovery. Ain't blind love grand?
Curmudgeons, on the other hand, will read Dave Lindorff's latest column below and profit from it.
The Wheels are Coming Off
Yet...the jobs data get worse by the day. According to new financial data, Americans lost 1.3 trillion dollars (that's $1,300,000,000,000) of their personal wealth in just the first quarter of this year. (Add that 1.3 trillion to the trillions lost in the two years of the current depression and then consider that people are yakking about a recovery in consumer spending! What are these people smoking?)
On the other hand, less credulous folks like journalist Dave Lindorff tell us from both personal experience and a sound understanding of the real data that we're anything but bottoming out, that things are falling apart at an accelerated rate, and that Mr. Obama's "recovery" is as fake as his rhetoric. Inflation, once thought impossible in a depression, is now rapidly rising. Oil prices are shooting up, so is gold, and have you been to a grocery store lately? The trillions of dollars in government bonds that Mr. Obama is trying to peddle to the world are not selling; investors (a.k.a. "chumps") want higher interest. Soon the Federal Reserve will have to comply to prevent a California-style governmental bankruptcy. When interest rates start taking off, there won't be any stopping them and that's the end of the American economy.
But fantasy/hope springs eternal. The generic press, still in love with Mr. Obama, still gets misty-eyed at his crooning. They're still describing him as "eloquent" even though they know for a fact that Mr. Obama does not write the speeches he delivers. And they're still describing the worsening depression as recovery. Ain't blind love grand?
Curmudgeons, on the other hand, will read Dave Lindorff's latest column below and profit from it.
The Wheels are Coming Off
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Another powerful column from Chris Hedges
Here is another powerful article from one of the few morally serious journalists left in America, the indispensable Chris Hedges.
Read Chris Hedges here
Read Chris Hedges here
More stupidity from the religious right
A cursory scan of various religious right web sites reveals an interesting rhetorical change among the wackos. The phrase "secular humanist" is out; the term "post-modernist" is in.
What on earth possesses these dimwits? Apparently "post-modernist" means to them something like "denies moral absolutes." However, since that's what they accused those naughty "secular humanists" of doing, why the vocabulary change? Post-modernism is really an academic fashion, now largely spent and falling on hard times, that is associated with French pseudo-philosopher Jacques Derrida. I'm pretty sure that your average right-wing pew potato has never read Derrida and wouldn't understand Derrida even if he did read him, so what could "post-modernist" possibly mean to such folk? It's just more incoherent babble from a decadent, dying political movement that itself is now largely spent and falling on hard times. Seen in that light, maybe the word change is appropriate after all!
What on earth possesses these dimwits? Apparently "post-modernist" means to them something like "denies moral absolutes." However, since that's what they accused those naughty "secular humanists" of doing, why the vocabulary change? Post-modernism is really an academic fashion, now largely spent and falling on hard times, that is associated with French pseudo-philosopher Jacques Derrida. I'm pretty sure that your average right-wing pew potato has never read Derrida and wouldn't understand Derrida even if he did read him, so what could "post-modernist" possibly mean to such folk? It's just more incoherent babble from a decadent, dying political movement that itself is now largely spent and falling on hard times. Seen in that light, maybe the word change is appropriate after all!
Gay march of the penguins
Remember how the religious right tried to make the movie "March of the Penguins" into a celebration of heterosexual "family values" and thus by implication denigrate gays and their families?
It seems now that gay penguins in a German zoo are picking up the pieces of a failed heterosexual penguin pair and doing a much better job a making a family. That's the story of many gay families which adopt children abandoned by their heterosexual parents and rear them into happy, successful adults. But don't hold your breath waiting to hear a celebration of these penguins on the next "Focus on the Family" broadcast because Dr. Dobson and his zombies believe that if they keep pretending that happy gay families don't exist, then nobody will ever realize that they in fact do exist.
Read about the penguins here
It seems now that gay penguins in a German zoo are picking up the pieces of a failed heterosexual penguin pair and doing a much better job a making a family. That's the story of many gay families which adopt children abandoned by their heterosexual parents and rear them into happy, successful adults. But don't hold your breath waiting to hear a celebration of these penguins on the next "Focus on the Family" broadcast because Dr. Dobson and his zombies believe that if they keep pretending that happy gay families don't exist, then nobody will ever realize that they in fact do exist.
Read about the penguins here
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
Number 6!
Finally, New Hampshire has become the 6th state to legalize gay marriage. Both houses of the state legislature approved the religious protection language required by the governor, who promptly signed the marriage bill that had been approved almost two weeks ago.
Equality before the law takes another step forward. Which state will be number 7?
Read about the victory here
Equality before the law takes another step forward. Which state will be number 7?
Read about the victory here
Monday, June 1, 2009
Hooray for Nevada
The Nevada state legislature, perhaps taking a cue from the Vermont state legislature, has overridden Governor Jim Gibbons' veto of the recently passed domestic partners bill. Gay couples will now have legal recognition and protection in Nevada.
A few posts back, I noted that Gov. Gibbons and his mistresses were avid defenders of traditional marriage. In fact, Mr. Gibbons likes traditional marriage so much that he's had two of them--divorcing his first traditionally married wife so that he could have a traditional marriage with his second wife, whom he is now divorcing as well. I suppose that Mr. Gibbons will have a traditional third marriage fairly soon after he dumps his traditionally married second wife. Will the governor select Mrs. Gibbons Number 3 from his large assortment of former and current mistresses and paramours, or will he go traditional wife hunting somewhere else? Mr. Gibbons finds himself in the company of other loud-mouthed Republican "defenders" of traditional marriage including Rush Limbaugh (with traditionally married wife number 4), Newt Gingrich (with traditionally married wife number 3), and Bob Barr (principal author of the federal "Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 and with traditionally married wife number 3).
Now in fairness, I must concede that Bob Barr has disavowed his Republican party membership and morphed into a kind of semi-Libertarian; he has also renounced his own DOMA legislation and called for its revocation (read it here). Nonetheless, in his previous political incarnation as a Republican Mr. Barr's mouth was loudly proclaiming his fidelity to traditional marriage while the rest of him was proving that he cared not a fig about it. I suspect he would still be loudly defending DOMA had he not been voted out of office as a Georgia congressman. The point, of course, is that Mr. Barr's devotion to traditional marriage was purely rhetorical and had nothing to do with his personal life.
In any event, the victory in Nevada is tremendous news and a great step forward toward genuine equality before the law. The victories just keep rolling in!
Read about the Nevada victory here
A few posts back, I noted that Gov. Gibbons and his mistresses were avid defenders of traditional marriage. In fact, Mr. Gibbons likes traditional marriage so much that he's had two of them--divorcing his first traditionally married wife so that he could have a traditional marriage with his second wife, whom he is now divorcing as well. I suppose that Mr. Gibbons will have a traditional third marriage fairly soon after he dumps his traditionally married second wife. Will the governor select Mrs. Gibbons Number 3 from his large assortment of former and current mistresses and paramours, or will he go traditional wife hunting somewhere else? Mr. Gibbons finds himself in the company of other loud-mouthed Republican "defenders" of traditional marriage including Rush Limbaugh (with traditionally married wife number 4), Newt Gingrich (with traditionally married wife number 3), and Bob Barr (principal author of the federal "Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 and with traditionally married wife number 3).
Now in fairness, I must concede that Bob Barr has disavowed his Republican party membership and morphed into a kind of semi-Libertarian; he has also renounced his own DOMA legislation and called for its revocation (read it here). Nonetheless, in his previous political incarnation as a Republican Mr. Barr's mouth was loudly proclaiming his fidelity to traditional marriage while the rest of him was proving that he cared not a fig about it. I suspect he would still be loudly defending DOMA had he not been voted out of office as a Georgia congressman. The point, of course, is that Mr. Barr's devotion to traditional marriage was purely rhetorical and had nothing to do with his personal life.
In any event, the victory in Nevada is tremendous news and a great step forward toward genuine equality before the law. The victories just keep rolling in!
Read about the Nevada victory here