As I noted a short time ago, Paul Mitchell whined about a Mississippi state law that he hadn’t read and insisted that he would not read. That’s an example of a wingnut deliberately cultivating his own ignorance, which is of course an extremely common occurrence. But that wasn’t enough ignorance for this good ol’ boy. Nope, now he’s decided to compound the lie by claiming that he never wrote about the law — while simultaneously admitting that he mentions the law in the very first paragraph of his earlier post.

Paul, the imbecile store called. They’re running out of you.

• I yearn for the good old days, when childbirth was dirty and dangerous. That’s what put us on the moon, after all.

‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard, and shamelessly pilfered from Sadly, No.

Further evidence of the astroturf nature of the “tea party” movement has come to light:

Tea Party activists from across the country have come to Washington for a three-week long “Take The Town Halls to Washington” rally, an effort to lobby undecided House Democrats to vote against health care reform. At a press conference for the event on Friday, the Daily Caller spotted signs and buttons clearly paid for by the Republican National Committee. Activists distributed “red-white-and-blue buttons and signs emblazoned with the words ‘Listen to Me!’” — an official RNC slogan — with disclaimers at the bottom of the signs reading “Paid for by the Republican National Committee”...

Someone explain to me, please, why anyone should listen to these paid shills.

I am definitely going to do what I can to spread the use of this phrase.

(hat tip: Crooks & Liars)

In for a penny, in for a pound, I always say. What more fitting way to greet Democrats sick health care reform proposal than with the eliminationist rhetoric it and the Democrats deserve.

And he justifies his hatemongering with the infantile but-Mommy-everyone-else-is-doing-it excuse.

I’ll make it plain once again: Dan Riehl and most of his fellow wingnuts have the moral intelligence of sewer rats.

• Before May 2003: 15 of 92 torture tapes erased or damaged
• Early 2003: Dunlavey’s paper trail “lost”
• Before August 2004: John Yoo and Patrick Philbin’s torture memo emails deleted
• June 2005: most copies of Philip Zelikow’s dissent to the May 2005 CAT memo destroyed
• November 8-9, 2005: 92 torture tapes destroyed
• July 2007 (probably): 10 documents from OLC SCIF disappear
• December 19, 2007: Fire breaks out in Cheney’s office
  

If none of this material is evidence of torture, why has it disappeared?

Isn’t It Time To Euthanize Reid’s Wife?

I’m not sure I quite understand this, given that cost is so important as a burden to taxpayers when it comes to health care. If Democrats want so badly to abort babies because of it, why are we bothering with someone who has a broken neck and back at 69? It sounds to me like she’s pretty well used up and has probably been living off the taxpayers for plenty of years to begin with. Aren’t we at least going to get a vote on it?

Sen. Reid’s daughter Lana Reid Barringer, 48, who was driving the mini-van, and his wife, Landra G. Reid, 69, a passenger, were both injured. Landra suffered a broken back and a broken neck in the crash; Barringer suffered minor injuries, Sen. Reid’s office said Thursday.

I realize her crook of a husband and his pals in Congress have excluded themselves from the mess they’re going to compel everyone else to join, but we’re still paying the bills, are we not? I don’t see that she’s worth it at this point, frankly. I can’t recall her ever doing anything for me.

Come on, Harry – do your civic duty. The nation’s broke and counting on you guy. Pull the plug and get back to work. And don’t bill us for a full day today, either. This is no time to be sloughing off. Air freight her home, you can bury her during recess on your own time and dime. Or are you going to bill us for that, too?

Reid has stayed at his wife’s bedside throughout the day Friday and returned to the Capitol in the late afternoon.

This should not surprise us, of course — Riehl the moral vacuum has already admitted that he allowed his gay brother to die alone. The amusing part is that Riehl then throws a tantrum when Media Matters reproduced his post without comment. The Whiny-Ass Titty Baby actually has the gall to complain that

They have no right to take exception to my post.

Really, fucktard? Who does somebody have to be, before you will permit them to take exception to your posts?

I do so hope that Dan Riehl is proud of becoming the standard-bearer for the self-absorbed morally empty wingnuts that are poisoning the political landscape of a once-great nation.

UPDATE 03/13/10 7:28 AM EST: As always, when a wingnut like Riehl gets called on his own moral vacuity, the protestations of innocence are loud and impassioned. Unfortunately, Riehl is too fucking stupid to hide his own death worship.

In the aftermath of his post in which he advocates killing Landra Reid, Riehl has been the target of considerable blowback, both in the blogosphere and via Twitter. In one tweet, Riehl makes this comment:

Use your head. I dont advocate killing anyone. Doh!

Dan Riehl is, of course, lying. He is on record as being in favor of extra-judicial executions of accused criminals:

They say the Constitution isn’t a suicide pact. Well, neither should be trumped up Constitutional Rights. Degenerates like Maurice Clemmons should be shot in the head and left for dead whenever they get caught.

Riehl may be idiot enough to think that he can sell the idea that he was speaking merely rhetorically when he demanded the death of Landra Reid. However, his own words make it clear that he really does want to see people he doesn’t like murdered.

In a blog post entitled Justice Obama? You Betcha!, Jeff Schreiber stated:

I, for one, would love to see Barack Obama on the Supreme Court. I just don’t think, ideological slant or otherwise, he really has a grasp of the law or of the Constitution, the document he believes to be “deeply flawed.”

Schreiber was challenged to provide the entire quote, rather than just two carefully selected words, and to present that quote in context. Of course, he responded promptly:

“I think it is a remarkable document … the original Constitution as well as the Civil War Amendments, but I think it is an imperfect document, and I think it is a document that reflects some deep flaws in American culture, the Colonial culture nascent at that time. And in that sense, I think we can say that the Constitution reflected an enormous blind spot in this culture that carries on until this day, and that the Framers had that same blind spot. I don’t think the two views are contradictory, to say that it was a remarkable political document that paved the way for where we are now, and to say that it also reflected the fundamental flaw of this country that continues to this day.”

Look at that quote. Just look at it and marvel at it. It is truly a shining exemplar of painstaking accuracy, as one can see by noting how very closely it matches Obama’s actual words (which can be heard at 45:26 in the original broadcast):

“I think it is a remarkable document, I think... the original Constitution, as well as — as well as the Civil War amendments, but I think it is an imperfect document, and I think it is a document that reflects some deep flaws in American culture — the colonial culture nascent at that time. African-Americans were not — first of all, they weren’t African-Americans. The Africans at the time were not considered as part of the polity that was of concern to the framers. I think that, as Richard said, it was a nagging problem in the same way that, these days, we might think of environmental issues or some other problem that, where you have to balance, you know, cost-benefits, as opposed to seeing it as a moral problem involving persons of moral worth. And, in that sense, I think we can say that the Constitution reflected a enormous blind spot in this culture that carries on until this day, and that the Framers had that same blind spot. I don’t think the two views are contradictory to say that it was a remarkable political document that paved the way for where we are now, and to say that it also reflected the fundamental flaw of this country that continues to this day.”

You see? You see how perfectly Jeff Schreiber reported Obama’s words? Is that not astonishing?

It is clear that everyone on the far right of the great American political debate owes Jeff Schreiber a huge debt of gratitude for setting the standards of honesty and character where he has.

Hey, it’s meat. How could I resist?

(hat tip: Meatpaper, which I am so subscribing to…)

• Lookie! I can write nearly 800 words criticizing a proposed state law! Why is that so astonishing? I haven’t read the bill, and I’m not going to read the bill! Yet I can blather on and on and on and on about a bill I know nothing about! Gawd DAMN I love being an ignorant assclown!

‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard, and shamelessly pilfered from Sadly, No.

(hat tip: Daily Kos)

March 3, 2010: 153 House Republicans vote to reject a bill that would prevent the use of dangerous forms of restraint and seclusion (including the use of drugs) to discipline schoolchildren.

The Republican party has now officially become the party that is in favor of anything that decent people would recoil from in horror. They are the party of moral incompetence.

Too bad those who contribute to the sewer that is Widdle Jeffie’s blog aren’t held to the same high standards. Some delusional asshat calling himself Rick Saunders posted a well-debunked lie:

For a great expose on the abuse of the reconciliation nuclear option by the Democrats, check out this great primer by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich…

Reconciliation is not the “nuclear option”. It never has been. The wingnut press and their blogger hangers-on are furiously pushing this mendacious meme, trying to conflate what was called the “nuclear option” (a tactic once threatened by Republicans) and the thirty-year-old reconciliation procedure, in order to smear Democrats as “hypocrites”. It’s total hogwash.

Media have misrepresented or ignored history of reconciliation

Fox News falsely conflates reconciliation with “nuclear option.” Throughout the health care reform debate, Fox News has repeatedly falsely described the reconciliation process as the “nuclear option.” Fox News also recently seized on a Breitbart-promoted video to falsely accuse Democrats of hypocrisy for considering using the reconciliation process to pass health care reform because they had previously opposed the “nuclear option.” But, in fact, the nuclear option referred to a Republican proposal to change Senate filibuster rules on judicial nominees and was not related to reconciliation.

Media have pushed GOP claims that reconciliation “strange,” “extraordinary,” “arcane,” “lightly used,” “unusual.” Reporting on the Democrats’ possible use of the reconciliation budget process to pass health care reform, media outlets have advanced the Republican criticism that reconciliation is “an end-run around the normal legislative process.”

Media have not challenged GOP criticisms of reconciliation process. Media Matters for America has documented a pattern of journalists uncritically quoting Republican senators criticizing the decision to use reconciliation, without noting that those same senators — including Alexander, Grassley, and Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Judd Gregg (R-NH), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), and Orrin Hatch (R-UT) — voted to allow the use of the budget reconciliation process to pass legislation during the Bush administration, including tax cuts.

I am certain that Widdle Jeffie Schreiber is ecstatic that Rick Saunders has taken on the challenge of posting lies like these to America’s Right. It must be a great comfort to Widdle Jeffie that he can keep his lily-white hands clean of the nasty business of perpetuating falsehoods like this.

And make no mistake, the insurance companies are in this for profit. No other motivation need apply. The runaway health care costs in this country are due primarily to the greed of the insurers [PDF]:

[T]he insurance industry’s actual medical costs have grown far more slowly than premiums. An analysis of data covering the period 2000 to 2008 shows that:

• Premiums for families enrolled in employer-sponsored health plans increased 97 percent, while premiums for individuals enrolled in
  employer-sponsored health plans climbed 90 percent.
• Private insurers’ payments to health care providers rose 72 percent.
• Medical inflation increased 39 percent.
• Family premiums grew more than three times faster than wages, nearly five times faster than general inflation and more than twice as fast as medical inflation.
• Profits and administrative costs consumed $716.4 billion of the premiums insurers collected, a sum nearly equal to the entire 10-year cost of health reform.

When you encounter a wingnut railing against health care reform ask them this: “Why are you so adamant that the insurance companies should be allowed to sate their greed by continuing to raise premiums?”

(hat tip: Firedoglake)

I’m still waiting for my global warming….

Well, Kat, you’re in luck. I can tell you where the global warming is. It’s all over the globe. you shit-ignorant jackass:

Last week, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released its monthly “State of the Climate Global Analysis” for January.

We see blowout warming in the satellite temperature record, which is so beloved of the anti-science crowd since they think — incorrectly — it doesn’t show warming.  Note that in UAH, we crushed the previous record.

Stick to spewing Bible quotes, Kat. You are at least minimally competent at that task. Leave the discussion of science to the grown-ups — you know, the folks who are aware of the realities of the world beyond your own crappy little back yard.