A couple of my favorites

My favorite Sullivan post as of late:

He avoided a second Great Depression. The bank bailout, however noxious, worked. GM may soon be returning a profit to the government. Health insurance reform will stick and, with careful oversight, could begin to curtail runaway healthcare costs. Financial re-regulation just passed. Two new Supreme Court Justices are in place after failed attempts at culture war demagoguery. Crime - amazingly - has not jumped with the recession. America is no longer despised abroad the way it was; torture has been ended; relations with Russia have improved immensely; Iran's regime is more diplomatically and economically isolated than in its entire history; even the Greater Israel chorus has been challenged. Moreover, if the House goes Republican this fall, it renders a second Obama term as likely as Clinton's became (how many Independents would want to hand over the government to Palin and the current GOP in Congress?). On the economy, the employment outlook remains bleak - but not desperate if you look at the long run

Oh, and his approval ratings are at a shockingly low 45%!!!

My favorite picture as of late:

My favorite thought as of late:

Why do I work at a job I don't want just to buy the things I don't need?

My favorite Fox News statistic of the week:

Only 1.38% of Fox News viewers are black. Yay!

My favorite graph of the day:

My least favorite idea of the week:

Massachusetts awards all of his electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote?? Is Massachusetts the new DC? Taxation with representation.

Told you so . .

In my last post, I half-heartedly opined . . .

Conservatives go into a Bible-tent frenzy at the notion that the repeal of DOMA or equal rights for gay Americans will infringe upon their religious freedom. But not just any religious freedom, just Christianity freedom. Evidently the Constitution only meant to apply to Christ-lovers.

Evidently, I was right:

Paging Dr. Kevorkian

I am currently watching the Bachelorette with Jey right now. You know what is awesome? Getting to work at 7 AM, working all day without a lunch, going to school for 3 hours immediately after work, and then having to go through this bullshit. This chick has just slept with two other dudes within the last 48 hours, and is crying that one of her suitors left her for his hometown sweetheart. My strategy is to feed Jey enough red wine so that she falls asleep and I can watch the Miltary Channel. The Military Channel at 11 PM is awesome. They can't sell any commercials since there are like 7 people watching, and it is awesome. But until we do, lets get to some blogging.

Military Policy

I agree with Adam that we should cut defense. But I think the strategy we should ask is how do we defend ourselves and protect ourselves more efficiently. There are more aircraft carriers in San Diego Bay right now than any other single nation has in their fleet. We have troops in nations like Germany that do very little to protect us. Why should we subsidize Germany's national defenses?

One thing I do believe is that we should have some soldier's protecting certain resources around the globe that protect our national interests. I hate to say it, but I think we do have to be prepared to go to war for oil. I know, hear me out. We can't survive without it. We don't have enough to maintain. But Steven, we can move to renewable sources and move away from oil. Shut up hippie, we really can't. Oil is the most efficient thing we have right now to move around our cars, trucks, and planes, so we are stuck with it until we can find something better. So maybe a couple bases in the Middle East isn't a bad idea. If we didn't support Israel unconditionally and if we had better support from our allies, we could protect our interests with less. We would have less terrorism to deal with. If we didn't do stupid stuff like start never ending wars in places like Iraq, it would help us out to.

The modern Republican party refuses to make any cuts to defense, Medicare, and Social Security. They are not conservatives. They are idiots. We should make defense more efficient and less costly. (Note: Spray tanned "Tobacco" John Boner (Boehner) did suggest raising the retirement age for social security, one of the few good ideas I have heard from a Republican in a while. I will give credit where credit is due. I still won't forgive him for happily handing out checks from the Tobacco lobby on the House floor.)

Lebron James

I hate Lebron, and not just for murdering Cleveland and hijacking ESPN for a month. I hate him because I signed him to a contract in 2014 in Dynasty mode of NBA Live 2009 shortly before "The Decision" aired and his douchiness was revealed to the world. I then was forced to trade him for Dwight Howard. And I don't like Dwight Howard. So F you Lebron.

Stingrays

If there is one thing worse than Lebron, its Stingrays. 30 people were stung in one day by Stingrays in La Jolla Shores. Why do they hate America? I have some hypothesises (hypothesi?)
1. Revenge for Oil Spills
2. ESPN's airing of the Decision.
3. Megyn Kelly of Fox News
4. Frequent La Jolla Shores beachgoer Steven Moore's constant urination in their home,

A Few Posts in One

Eddie is in New Orleans, so I have some spare time to post a few thoughts that have been churning around in my head.

Outsourcing the Military.

Barney Frank and Ron Paul, an odd couple, wrote an article in the Huffington Post recently about the need to reduce military spending in an effort to reduce the deficit. They make extremely valid points - which may be the reason they are ignored by both parties. But my take on it is this: while sure it might reduce the deficit, wouldn't it also create jobs?? We have 15,000 troops in Japan! Newsflash: the war ended 65 years ago, Japan is a stable democracy. It's like a bad case of the babysitter that just won't leave!

We have installations in Germany, Korea, Japan, Bulgaria, Italy, Kyrgystan, Spain, Portugal, Turkey, Israel, Djibouti, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Cuba, Bahrain, the Phillipines and yes, even Greenland. Just imagine if we brought all of those troops home. Not only would we reduce the deficit, but we bring home their families, their discretionary income, their part-time jobs, their full-time jobs. Immediate job creation - immediate deficit reduction. I don't know what we would do if Greenland were attacked. Oh yeah, we still have over 5,000 nuclear warheads. Ready at a moment's notice. To destroy the world. Comforting.

Have you even read it??

Cliches are really only fun when you used as weapons of argument. Our family's favorite was brought to us by the eloquent Hannity: Why do you hate America? But the most recent is, "Have you even read _______? Have you?!!?"

It started with the Arizona legislation. Supporters of the bill hurled that verbal javelin at any ignorant, unpatriotic, freedom hater that dared criticize the bill or inquire as to its possible ramifications. "Have you even read the bill? (no pause) No, I didn't think so. You don't know what you're talking about."

It's transformed into the trump card in any political discussion. And the answer is, I haven't. That's not my job. It may be fun to read Lawrence v. Texas or watch Elena Kagan verbally discombobulate John Cornyn on television, but it's not what we do. We trust the media (and no, not just one source, but a combination of many) to read the raw data and report it to us. It's their job to read the raw data - the Supreme Court case, the legislation, the transcript of the confirmation hearing, the memo from 30 years ago.

I haven't read the Arizona bill. I haven't read the transcript regarding the Blank Panther farce. And you will not win an argument with that line . . . hater of America.

Prediction: Republicans will not take the House or the Senate in November.

Why? It seems in their effort to attract Tea Party followers and meld* themselves into one, Republicans have taken a genius play out of the Tea Party playbook: no new ideas. It's common knowledge that the extent of the Tea Party movement's policy positions are protest signs. Try this . . . google "Tea Party Policy Positions" and then try to find one. Please note the difference between a policy and a "talking point." A "talking point" is something like, cut taxes, secure the border, support the military, cut spending. Those are not policy positions. It's not even an article about a policy position. Hell, it's barely a fucking headline.

Conservatives love mentally masturbating to the thought that they are the party of ideas (Newt Gingrich?), but if I hear tort reform and selling insurance across state lines one more time as the solution to America's healthcare crisis, I might just refudiate* myself. If I hear that tax cuts will solve our deficit problem, either you don't know history or don't know how to read a graph or both. It's infuriating and it will not win you elections.

*Editor's Note: "meld" is a new word combining "melt" and "mold" that Sarah Palin inspired me to create.

Dichotomous Conclusory Thoughts.

• Conservatives go into a Bible-tent frenzy at the notion that the repeal of DOMA or equal rights for gay Americans will infringe upon their religious freedom. But not just any religious freedom, just Christianity freedom. Evidently the Constitution only meant to apply to Christ-lovers. Try to build a mosque in New York or Tennessee and no way, you can't do that! That must be one of those strict interpretations of the Constitution, huh?
• Conservatives want the government to be stripped down to its basic functions and spending dramatically curtailed. Yet, they still want the government to fix oil leaks. Doesn't that take money, expertise, resources, agencies, etc?
• Gays in the military would destroy the fabric of the military, harm unit cohesion, and distract from the life and death mission. But isn't the Republicans who argue that our men and women in uniform are the most professional in the world? Can these professional adults not handle the occasional gay in the workplace? Almost every business in America are professional enough to handle us. Then again, maybe capitalism is that advanced.