Pat Buchanan: Further Off The Deep End, Moving Goalposts, The Mittstorm Cometh IX: I(srael)nsurrection, Black and Jew, Scalia: Rocket Launchers For Everyone, and The Koch Sucking Stops Here.
Welcome to the Daily Sausage.
First off, we have a piece from Matt Taibbi on a recent piece from Pat Buchanan, titled “In the Long Run, is the GOP Dead?” in which Mr. Buchanan suggests that because he believes Democrats are promising three free meals a day to everyone that doesn’t look like Pat Buchanan, and because the GOP is giving them some tough love, that the GOP is doomed to failure.
There are a lot of reasons the GOP, as it exists today, is setting itself up for long term failure. The most rapidly growing demographic groups in the country are all pretty heavily Democratic. Now, in some cases it’s simply due to a lack of a reasonable second option. If the GOP softened it’s stance on drugs, crime, and illegal immigration, they could pull a ton of black and hispanic votes away from the Democrats and put states like California back in play.
The problem with that is that in order to do that, the GOP would have to jettison the Old White People that have been it’s base for fifty years, ever since LBJ kicked their collective asses out of the Democratic party. Ultimately, that’s what’s imperiling the GOP. The Democrats are going to kick their asses for thirty years unless they jettison the anchor the Tea Party has become.
Next up: Ed from Gin And Tacos talks about the stunning Florida welfare/unemployment drug testing scam/law, and how the whole thing was just a smokescreen for Rick Scott to grift some taxpayer cash.
I’ve been unemployed. It’s brutal. It’s soul crushing. And it’s next to impossible to look for work for eight hours a day, five days a week. If someone wants to job hunt for four to six hours a day then kick back and light up a fat one and watch some cartoons, who am I to judge?
Not only that, but this was such an egregious conflict of interest that it never should have been passed in the first place. Lo and behold, it cost the state significantly more than they ever saved on denying benefits to drug users.
And finally, Ed addresses the age old “We Did It For The Children” fallacy. Anytime something is “For The Kids”, “run. Run like your ass is on fire.”
And now, it’s everyone’s favorite and increasingly awkwardly named segment, The Mittstorm Cometh IX – I(srael)nsurrection
Mitt Romney, having clusterfucked his way across the UK, turned his sights to Israel this past weekend. After all, considering he managed to royally fuck up a glorified photo op in the UK, how badly could he do in Israel?
The answer, in case anyone had any doubt, is “quite a bit”.
First up, Mitt said outright, not even suggested or inferred, that the Israeli’s are culturally superior to the Palestinians, which is why they’re more economically successful. As previously mentioned, I drink the Manischevitz-flavored Kool-Aid, and even I know the Palestinian economy is artificially depressed because they’re surrounded by Israeli tanks.
Next up, Mitt lowered the threshold for US involvement in a strike on Iran, indicating that should Israel attack Iran, the US would back it up. This is really fucking stupid, because the ONLY way Israel could attack Iran is with US help, and Israel attacking Iran would almost assuredly kick off World War 3.
While we’re at it, Mitt praised Israel’s healthcare system, noting that “[Israel] spend[‘s] eight percent of GDP on healthcare. [Israel is] a pretty healthy nation.” Unfortunately for Mitt, Israel has a Universal Healthcare System, with an Individual Mandate. So tell me again how much you hate the PPACA, Mitt?
And finally, an interview from the Daily Beast with John McCain, which is basically John McCain shaking his fist at Mitt Romney and telling kids to get off his lawn.
Next up, keeping with our theme for the day, we have Black news, and Jewish news.
In Black News, former Florida Republican Party Chairman Jim Greer admitted that the Florida GOP was actively discriminating against black people in Florida. Greer may also be a pathological liar out to save his own ass, so we’ll take this one with a grain of salt.
In other Black News, an African American couple was barred from marrying in a predominantly white church in Mississippi. If I said “An African-American couple was barred from marrying in a predominantly white church”, where would you guess that church was? I’m willing to bet that Mississippi is in the top five, probably top three, and a strong contender for the overall Most Racist Place Ever Gold medal.
In Jew News, Nancy Pelosi argued that Republicans are exploiting Jewish voters over the issue of Israeli security. In a move that will surprise absolutely no one, Lone Jewish Republican Eric Cantor called it “patronizing and deeply insulting”, after which the Jewish community collectively facepalmed and let out an exasperated “Oy gevalt”.
Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia suggested that the Second Amendment allows people to own hand held rocket launchers, as that’s the interpretation you get when you only read the text of the Constitution, and not read for the meaning of the words. As the article suggests, the framers original idea of firearms consisted of slow loading, hard to aim muskets, not automatic rifles and grenade launchers.
Finally, a Koch Brothers-financed climate change study group, previously noted for their “skepticism” regarding climate change, has come out and said that climate change is real, happening, and is almost 100% caused by human activity. Worth noting that the Koch Brothers donate extensive amounts of money to organizations willing to further their climate change denialist agenda even though the vast majority of scientists agree that we’re at a tipping point in terms of global climate catastrophe, and if we don’t change our habits now we’re going to run the risk of permanent global climate change.
