Get the Spin Built In

Checkout the way Reuters tells the story of the EPA's decision to delay permits for mountaintop mining in Appalachia:

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Mining companies accused the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday of ignoring America's need for affordable energy and hurting workers in a poor region of the country by delaying permits for proposed surface, or "mountaintop," mines in Appalachia.

You see that? It's a story about the criticism the EPA got for delaying the permits rather than a story about the delay. Thanks for the pre-spun news.

Writer Thinks Coup Will Solve "Obama Problem"

TPM has the full text of John L. Perry's column on Newsmax about how it's not unrealistic that a military coup would "resolve the Obama problem". Newsmax yanked the column.

UPDATE: Stories like this seem to be breaking everyday.

Enemy of Humanity?

A member of the House of Representatives has labeled the President an enemy of humanity. Trent Franks, serving his fourth term from the state of Arizona, lowers the bar even further.

Hugo Chavez Bans Family Guy

It's jump the shark week for the world's dictators. After the dictator olympics went down at the UN last week, it looked like Gaddafi was firmly in the lead with his 90 minute speech to the General Assembly.

So what does Hugo Chavez do to close the gap? He bans Family Guy for promoting the legalization of marijuana.

Did you hear that, American right wing? Hugo Chavez doesn't like weed and thinks it should be illegal! So, if we don't legalize it right away, we're communists.

You want to be responsible for that?

Bill Clinton Says 2010 Not So Bad for Democrats

I find it validating to hear my thoughts about the 2010 election come out of President Bill Clinton's mouth.

He says:

There's no way [the Republicans] can make it [as bad as '94]. Number one, the country is more diverse and more interested in positive action. Number two, they've seen this movie before, because they had eight years under President Bush when the Republicans finally had the whole government, and they know the results were bad. And--[laughing]--number three, the Democrats haven't taken on the gun lobby like I did, and they took 15 of our members out. So I don't think-- it'll be, whatever happens, it'll be manageable for the president.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/27/clinton-there-wont-be-a-r_n_301140.html

Nice reminder at the end there to the gun voters that Democrats don't dare challenge you, so don't fear voting Democrat.

Of course, Republicans will make some gains. But I think most of those gains will come at the expense of the Blue Dogs.

Of course, I want to reiterate, my overriding principle here is not the victory of Democrats. I'm still pretty deep in the whole defeat of the Republicans mindset.

By the way something, how's that new party to the left of the Democrats coming along?

Libyan Dictator Wants to Abolish Switzerland

During Libyan Dictator Muammar Qaddafi's rambling 90 minute address to the UN's General Assembly last week, the movie character come to life hit many high points, some points that even made sense, but did not even once mention his crusade against the existence of--no, not Israel--Switzerland. The Land of Switzers. Crazy old Ben Kenobi out in the desert wants Switzerland divided into three pieces--one each for France, Germany and Italy.

In July, Qaddafi broached the subject of Swiss elimination to the peeps at the G-8 Summit in Italy--right next door. He didn't screw around. He said, "[Switzerland] is a world mafia and not a state." Take that Switzerland, who Qaddafi's naked contempt for stems from the July 2008 arrest of Qaddafi's son, who's name is Hannibal, and his wife in Geneva for allegedly beating two of their servants at a local hotel. Qaddafi retaliated by instantly shutting down Swiss business interests in Libya. Libya also arrested two Swiss businessmen because, uh, Ugarte stole their papers and was hiding out with them at Rick's Cafe Americain in the somewhat nearby Casablanca, Morocco. Qaddafi also took $5 billion out of his Swiss bank accounts. Poker night at Muammar's next week!~ As you can imagine, the Swiss response was strong. Swiss President Hans-Rudolf Merz went to Libya in August to apologize for the arrest and to ask for the Swiss nationals--this was so unpopular in Switzerland Merz received repeated calls for his resignation.

The irony of all of this has not been lost on the Swiss. A Socialist parliamentarian who actually blogs about Qaddafi named Baptiste Hurni said, "It's a paradox that Qaddafi wants to dismantle Switzerland because, as he claims, it is not a homogeneous country, while Libya is divided by a desert into two regions that hate each other." Qaddafi went on to lobby for the reunification of Upper and Lower Uncton.

The latest edition of The Bugle podcast and Frogette at Ragebot and has more on the zany, yet momentous meeting of the UN General Assembly (especially for President Obama) where Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and moving target Hugo Chavez took second and third in the crazy dictator derby, respectively.

Birther-mercial Highlights

Finally, some high comedy. Via TPM here are highlights from an infomercial promoting the conspiracy theory that the President was born outside the United States. This program is only running in 11 mugwump towns, so luckily we have the highlights. Note to the person who made this montage: Thanks, but next time, please send the whole thing. It's just too good.

Former Teen Star Attacks Darwinism

Kirk Cameron is back in the news and he's bringing the pushy version of Christianity with him, despite all that stuff Jesus said about minding one's own business.

His target: Darwinism. Here's a quote:

Atheism has been on the rise for years now, and the Bible of the atheists is The Origin of Species. We have a situation in our country where young people are entering college with a belief in God and exiting with that faith being stripped and shredded. What we want to do is have student make an informed, educated decision before they chuck their faith.

"The Bible of the atheists is The Origin of Species"? Uh, no. There were plenty of atheists before Darwin. In fact, I'm starting to think this is about something else for Cameron. In this clip, He talks about how he used to be an atheist. He jumped into it because it made him feel like an intellectual to stick it to God.



So, for Cameron, making the decision to adopt atheism as his world view was based on nothing. But, we're supposed to believe that his turn to Jesus is a well informed choice and that he is now qualified to go around making sweeping statements about the evils of Darwinism. Like this one:

You can see where [Hitler] clearly takes Darwin's ideas to some of their logical conclusions and compares certain races of people to lower evolutionary life forms. If you take Darwin's theory and extend it to its logical end, it can be used to justify all number of very horrendous things.

Darwin's logical conclusion is not the Holocaust. Darwin described a slow process of natural selection played out over many generations. If the Nazis really were just trying to get to the logical end of Darwinism, which they weren't, they ruined the process by substituting their judgment for the judgment of nature. By definition, evolution can not be forced by will (not even will to power). As soon as it is forced, the selection is no longer natural and we are left with something other than evolution. Actually, that simple, elegant principle seems to point to a rational god more than just about anything else this atheist has seen or heard.

I'm Back, The End is Near

I'm back, what did I miss?

Let's see...

Ah! It looks like the Supreme Court of this country is on the verge of a disastrous decision that will take our frustrating, dysfunctional government that is unduly influenced by corporate interests and transform it into government explicitly of, by and for corporations.

The case is nominally about whether Citizens United, a nonprofit corporation, should have been allowed to air an anti-Hillary Clinton movie during last year's primary season. If it is ruled on broadly, the Court's decision could open the door for corporations, which are--incredibly--legally considered people, to spend unlimited amounts of money to support the candidates of their choice.

This is not just some hyperbolic prophetic warning from a well rested blogger. The New York Times editorial board warns, "There is a real danger that the case will expand corporations’ rights in ways that would undermine the election system." On Wednesday's Randi Rhodes Show, the very clear headed former Labor Secretary Robert Reich called the likely outcome of the case "the final nail in the coffin of our democracy". Stephen Colbert did two segments about it a couple weeks back (Crooks and Liars has the video, at the four minute mark Colbert starts defending the poor oppressed corporations).

According to Sierra Club director Carl Pope, Anthony Kennedy is planning to vote for the corperations. With Scalia and Thomas's votes certain, Pope thinks that Roberts is the swing vote.

Roberts is the swing vote?

Game over.