Month: October 2011
Snuff Pix are the Porn of Revolutionary Politics
Really, there isn’t much of a distinction left between porn and snuff, between selling sex and selling death, between the world’s desire to see a dead person dragged through the street by a hooting mob and the media’s desire to give us what we want no matter what it is.
— Susannah Breslin, writing in Forbes.
Ohio Republican Governor Rescinded Regulation That Would Have Prevented Slaughter of Dozens of Exotic Animals
Headline of the day:
Order that Kasich rejected would have barred man from having exotic animals
Mukingum County farm owner had animal-cruelty conviction from six years ago
Weigel:
The story is true: [Ohio’s Democratic] Gov. Ted Strickland had signed an executive order restricting animal ownership to people without certain blemishes on their records. Gov. John Kasich, the Republican who beat him, judged this to be an overreach, so he scrapped it. The Columbus Dispatch finds that the issue, once ignored, stayed ignored:
Bill Damschroder, chief legal counsel for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources… said legislation was not in place that empowered the agency to do the things required by Strickland’s order. In addition, it allocated no resources to do the statewide enforcement job.
This is, in microcosm, the reality of the world Republicans yearn for — a world unfettered by government regulation in which, for example, convicted animal abusers are free to keep dozens of wild animals in captivity. After all, what business does the government have telling a felon convicted animal cruelty that he is unfit to keep wild animals?
Rapture Redux Today
Today is the day, supposedly, that the Rapture is supposed to occur. Either that or the Rev. Harold Camping will be wrong for the third time. Camping predicted the biblical Judgment Day for May 21, 2011.
When it failed to materialize (or immaterialize, as the case may be), Camping proceeded to have a stroke and then offered Oct. 21, 2011, as the true day when Jesus will return to establish his kingdom on earth and all the true believers will float up to heaven, leaving cars and buses driverless on the interstate and pots boiling on stoves, etc.
OK, if Camping got it wrong twice before the stroke and if he’s wrong again today, can we please stop paying any attention whatsoever to him from now until the End of Time?
We went to work anyway because as pagans we’ll still need to pay the bills once the earth is rid of those pesky Christians. But don’t worry, Christians, we’ll feed the dogs and cats and goldfish you leave behind and we’ll clean up the messes you make as you ascend to the heights.
Have fun sitting on the right hand of God for all eternity! Really, we mean it!
Finding Our Way Back
It’s hard not to think of this picture, which on Facebook is associated with the #OccupyWallStreet movement, when you hear the Republican candidates (except, she grudgingly admits, Rick Perry) debate immigration policy.
America hasn’t wanted your huddled masses yearning to breathe free for a long time, and we SURE don’t want your poor.
But we used to — and maybe someday we will again.
Senate Republicans Block Jobs Bill Meant to Prevent Layoffs of Teachers, Fireman and Police
“For the second time in two weeks,” [Pres. Obama wrote last night], “every single Republican in the United States Senate has chosen to obstruct a bill that would create jobs and get our economy going again. That’s unacceptable.”
Republicans were joined by three Democratic senators in refusing to pass the president’s request for $35 billion in immediate support to communities where teachers, police, and firefighters are facing layoffs because of tight local finances.
The president demanded in his response, “Those Americans deserve an explanation as to why they don’t deserve those jobs – and every American deserves an explanation as to why Republicans refuse to step up to the plate and do what’s necessary to create jobs and grow the economy right now.”
Days After Saying ‘No Longer Is [Economic] Policy Going to Be Dictated by K Street,’ Perry Seeks K Street Approval of His Economic Plan
1.During the Republican Party presidential debate in Las Vegas Wednesday night, Rick Perry said this about how economic policy will be crafted when he is elected president:
No longer is a policy going to be dictated by K Street… It’s going to come from main street!
2.The next morning, this item, sourced to an anonymous Perry campaign operative, appeared in the Washington Post:
Texas Gov. Rick Perry will travel to Washington on Friday for a series of economic and foreign policy meetings with dozens of lobbyists, trade association executives and conservative leaders, according to a source with knowledge of Perry’s schedule.
Dictator on Ice
It was a U.S. hellfire missle, shot from afar
That blew up the convoy carrying General Muammar.
Yes, it was our drone
That sent him home,
And now we’ll hear from Muammar no more.
