Suffer The Little Children

Because guns don't kill people.  Lack of access to mental health services don't kill people.  America's fascination and worship of violence doesn't kill people.  No, it is the lack of school-sponsored prayer that kills people.

The response to the Newtown shooting, in which 26 people were killed on school property, 20 of them children, was as predictable as it was infuriating:

You know the question’s gonna come up, where was God?” he said. “I thought God cared about the little children, God protected the little children. Where was God when all this went down? And here’s the bottom line: God is not gonna go where he’s not wanted.

Now we have spent, since 1962, this, we’re 50 years into this now, we have spent 50 years telling God to get lost. Telling God, we do not want you in our schools, we don’t want to pray to you in our schools, we don’t want to pray to you before football games, we don’t want to pray to you at graduation, we don’t want anyone talking about you in a graduation speech.

We’ve kicked God out of our public school system. And I think God would say to us, "Hey I’ll be glad to protect your children, but you’ve gotta invite me back into your world first. I’m not gonna go where I’m not wanted. I am a gentleman."

And then, Mike Huckabee weighs in:

Between The Rock and a Cold, Hard Place: Religious Discussion in America

My grandmother liked to say "my Father's house has many rooms." John 14:2

Yes, I know, some people say "mansions" and argue that John meant different physical churches, not different faiths.  But that's not what my Grandmother meant.

Why Won't He Marry Me?-Blame Feminism

Is the modern man pissed off at the modern woman, and reacting by becoming a bunch of slackers?  Author Suzanne Venker thinks so:

True North: Objectivity Is Not a Fad

Alec Baldwin: But in your profession, in the political professional class, the punditocracy, whatever you want to call it, now we have a whole network which is very, very tilted in one direction. Did you see that coming?

George Will: You have two – you have two whole networks. Well, look, 30 years ago – CNN was founded in '81, I think – 30 years ago at the dinner hour in this country, 80 percent of all television sets in use were turned to Cronkite, Chancellor, and Peter Jennings. Today we have this cornucopia of news sources. People define journalism on their own terms, get it on their own time.

I was told by an activist in South Carolina during the primary this year that a survey showed that 72 percent of all Republican primary voters in South Carolina get all, not most, all of their news from Fox News. When a Republican candidate buys an ad on Fox News, he's not broadcasting, he's narrowcasting right into Republican voters. 

Now, in a way, this too is a reversion. When the party system developed in the 1790s and early 1800s, American newspapers were largely factional papers. Some of them were paid by the parties.  So we may look back upon the, some would say the pretense of objective journalism or nonpartisan journalism as an episode, a parenthesis in our national history. [Emphasis Mine.]

- Here's the Thing Podcast, September 24, 2012

There are things I like about George Will.  He's an interesting, smart guy.  He often has a different take on political situations than the Republican party line.  And I like smart people who aren't afraid to show their smarts - so in the same way that I have an appreciation for Justice Scalia, I have an appreciation for George Will.  But this statement he made - in a generally good podcast episode - made me seriously upset.

I'll try to explain why.

3 and 1/2 Reasons Republicans Should Be Glad They Lost

Okay, my Republican Friends: enough with the predictions of gloom and doom.  What Would Reagan Do, people?  Reagan wouldn't talk about the country being awful these days, and he wouldn't despair.  Let's try to find the bright side here, folks.  And there really is one.  Three and a half, even.

Seriously, Grover.

1. The Game of Tax-Raising Chicken Can End.  A.K.A. Grover K. Norquist: will you please go now?


Grover Norquist (founder of Americans for Tax Reform or ATR) has been holding the Republican Party hostage for years now.  He's bullied almost all Republicans running for any national office to sign his no-raising-taxes-ever pledge.


And then he puts together a highly-biased yearly rating based on his own estimation of what votes should count as "raising taxes" and which should not.  He threatens legislators with rating given votes in his yearly tally.  And he has been very successful in keeping Rs in his line...

Come Sail Away: Our Top 3 Take-Aways from the 2012 Election

So there has been over 24 hours of sobbing, crowing, whining, gloating, and finger-pointing.  And that was just on Facebook.  Now that we have a bit of distance from the emotion of the night, what are our top take-aways from the election?  We will each give you our top 3.



Emily:

1. Women Matter -

3 Reasons Why Romney Will Lose The Election

I had to.

Mandi depressed me yesterday, largely because of her astute analysis in culling out the most likely reasons that Obama would lose.

But the debate last night reinforced for me the many ways I think Romney is a weak candidate (even though it's possible he is still the strongest candidate the Republicans had this year).  And yes, I've already talked about 3 reasons why Romney DESERVES to lose, and 3 ways he is worse than W.  But those are different questions.

You Didn't Build That!

My two favorites of the memes...

So, the right-wing has gone into a frenzy over remarks by Obama that seemed to me at least, perfectly unremarkable.  He said, to wit:

That's Not Funny

Yep.  Hours after reading it.  Still mad.

The Decision...

So it’s day one after The Decision.  And the political fallout has yet to be seen.  When I first heard about the Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision to uphold the Affordable Care Act (aka the health care act, or Obamacare), I’ll admit that my first reaction was one of giddiness and glee.  I totally thrust my fist into the air, and with the kind of satisfaction that can only come from a mixture of relief and schadenfraude, I thought to myself, 'na na na nah boo boo, stick your head in doo doo', which, I’ll freely acknowledge, was not the most mature reaction I could have had.

Rhetoric 101: "Die Pinko Scum!"

Background: Rep. Allen West (R-FL), has said that there are between 71 and 80 current U.S. Representatives who are members of the Communist Party.  They are all Democrats.  He has not named names.  Here's the Maddow Blog piece about this.

Here's the video of Rep. West:

...And The Conversation: 

[Ed. Note: Don't worry, you'll get used to this format.  This is going to be like sitting near Mandi and me (Emily) in the coffee shop, eavesdropping on our conversations.  One time we had a guy give up all pretense of actually using his computer because we are so fascinating.  But see here, no guilt!  We clearly WANT you to listen.]

Emily:  So, Mand, do you think the Republicans had Rep. West level this charge because he's black, or do you think he believes it?

Mandi:  Does Allen West believe that s***?  Republicans have been calling Democrats communists for a very long time.  Do they believe that s***?  My guess is, no, they do not believe that s***, and neither does he.  I'm not sure if being black gives you more cover for being publicly crazy, but apparently being a Republican gives you all kinds of cover for being publicly crazy.  It's like we hold Republicans to a lower standard of reasonableness than "normal" people.  Silly things like facts are of no object. "Some people believe that man went to the moon in 1969.  Other people believe that the moon is made of green cheese.  The truth is probably somewhere in the middle."  Well, no, it isn't, and it's time we stopped treating it like it is.

Emily:  Yeah, there is a definite callousness to the way Fox-Era Republicans treat the truth.  It's like they believe everything is relative, or at least malleable, if they need it to be.  Because I know that nobody who actually studied government could honestly conflate "communism" - which is about socialist ideas + totalitarianism - with even the most liberal of American Democrats (who at most liberal right now still believe in free trade and a whole bunch of capitalism - and no totalitarianism).  And it's even crazier to do that right now, when American Democrats have been chasing Republicans in their sprint to the right for about 30-or-so years.

So, this is a strategy.

I think being a black Republican gives West a bit of cover for saying things like this, because it's not just crazy, it's completely implausible and insulting to Democrats.  But I think white, male reporters are less likely to confront a black politician on that than a white one, for fear of seeming racist.  Like, do you think Michael Steele got called on his crazy all the time, or do you think he sometimes/to some extent got a pass?  Alan Keyes just gets ignored.