The pill poppin', doctor shoppin', limp dicked, sex touristin', torture lovin', foreigner hatin', anal cyst havin', draft dodgin', confirmed(1) racist(2) Rush Limbaugh is homophobic.
And he is the de facto leader of the Republican party.
Enjoy being losers, assholes.
Showing posts with label rush limbaugh. Show all posts
Showing posts with label rush limbaugh. Show all posts
Monday, February 16, 2009
Friday, February 13, 2009
$650 billion.
That's how much it's going to cost you for Obama to learn his lesson about bipartisanship.
Assuming any kind of stimulus could help at this point, the stimulus bill appears to be a wasted opportunity. In the end, only about $150 billion would go towards infrastructure projects which would be the best use of stimulus funds. It isn't that the other $650 billion or so was absolutely wasteful--the vast majority of it will be spent on good things. However, with the concessions and tax cuts gained by the Republicans, who will still vote nay, I'm afraid we're left with a spending bill which, in addition to not doing nearly enough to make up for consumer spending in any meaningful way, will also do very little to make it easier to pay back the money.
So the question is, was there a real opportunity to pick up bipartisan support that Obama and the democrats completely flubbed, or was every concession in the process only doomed to weaken the stimulative effects of the bill?
This leads to an important question: if the Republicans had no intention on voting for the bill, no matter what it contained, what was the point in bringing them into the legislative process at all? What Gregg is saying is, and what Limbaugh has emphatically stated, is that the Republicans' only interest is that the Democratic agenda fails, regardless of its intention, or regardless to the interests of the American people.
For the sake of being charitable, allow me to posit that it would seem unfair to say that Republicans value partisan advantage over national interest. After all, would not partisan opposition to a party, whom you believe are not acting in the national interest, be in the national interest?
I would accept this theory, had I not considered their record of governance.
While enjoying a comfortable majority in Congress and the Supreme Court, and with control of the executive, Republicans should have balanced the budget, cut government spending, in particular, cut entitlement programs like social security and medicare, given states more latitude to adopt their own policies, increased individual freedom, repealed gun control legislation, and worked to outlaw gay marriage and abortion. In short, accomplish their agenda.
In fact, we see that Republicans have done none of these things. They do not seem to be interested in enacting their own agenda, let alone that of the opposition's.
Therefore, since they do not seem interested in advancing what they believe to advance the national interest, can we not conclude, then, that their entire philosophy is maintaining partisan advantage?
White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel conceded President Barack Obama and his team lost control of the message for selling their massive stimulus bill last week, fixating on bipartisanship while Republicans were savaging the legislation.
Assuming any kind of stimulus could help at this point, the stimulus bill appears to be a wasted opportunity. In the end, only about $150 billion would go towards infrastructure projects which would be the best use of stimulus funds. It isn't that the other $650 billion or so was absolutely wasteful--the vast majority of it will be spent on good things. However, with the concessions and tax cuts gained by the Republicans, who will still vote nay, I'm afraid we're left with a spending bill which, in addition to not doing nearly enough to make up for consumer spending in any meaningful way, will also do very little to make it easier to pay back the money.
So the question is, was there a real opportunity to pick up bipartisan support that Obama and the democrats completely flubbed, or was every concession in the process only doomed to weaken the stimulative effects of the bill?
Appearing on CNBC the day after he abruptly withdrew his nomination for Commerce Secretary, Sen. Judd Gregg made a rather blunt admission about the partisan intransigence that the Obama administration is forced to deal with.
From the transcript:
Carl Quintanilla: Well, Senator, since you were nominated it's become quite clear that the margin that the president is going to rely on in the Senate has come down to really three Senators."Sen. Gregg: I think it's always been that margin.
The point Sen. Gregg seems to be making, is that, no matter what, Obama was never going to get any of the 38 Republican votes he was seeking.
This leads to an important question: if the Republicans had no intention on voting for the bill, no matter what it contained, what was the point in bringing them into the legislative process at all? What Gregg is saying is, and what Limbaugh has emphatically stated, is that the Republicans' only interest is that the Democratic agenda fails, regardless of its intention, or regardless to the interests of the American people.
For the sake of being charitable, allow me to posit that it would seem unfair to say that Republicans value partisan advantage over national interest. After all, would not partisan opposition to a party, whom you believe are not acting in the national interest, be in the national interest?
I would accept this theory, had I not considered their record of governance.
While enjoying a comfortable majority in Congress and the Supreme Court, and with control of the executive, Republicans should have balanced the budget, cut government spending, in particular, cut entitlement programs like social security and medicare, given states more latitude to adopt their own policies, increased individual freedom, repealed gun control legislation, and worked to outlaw gay marriage and abortion. In short, accomplish their agenda.
In fact, we see that Republicans have done none of these things. They do not seem to be interested in enacting their own agenda, let alone that of the opposition's.
Therefore, since they do not seem interested in advancing what they believe to advance the national interest, can we not conclude, then, that their entire philosophy is maintaining partisan advantage?
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Hate.
Last year, a 58-year-old unemployed man named Jim Adkisson drove to the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee. In his small SUV was a guitar case.
He brought his guitar case into the church, and as worshippers were enjoying a children's musical performance, Adkisson retrieved his shotgun from the case, along with 76 shells. He managed to murder 2, and wound 6 others before he was tackled and detained until his arrest.
Yesterday, he was sentenced to life in prison.
His motive, according to his handwritten manifesto, was to kill liberals. The Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church is known for its tolerance of homosexuals and political refugees.
He wrote, “Liberals are a pest like termites, millions of them … the only way we can rid ourselves of this evil is kill them in the streets, kill them where they gather.”
If you read over his stated motive for what he explicitly says is a "hate crime," you will find a collection of right wing radio coded words and talking points. I've listened to enough AM radio, that I'm comfortable saying Adkisson parroted directly from Hannity, who has long called into question the "American-ness" of groups like MoveOn.org and Code Pink (whom he specifically mentions by name ad nauseum), two groups mentioned in Mr. Adkisson's manifesto. In fact, Hannity uses the phrase, "groups like Code Pink and MoveOn.org" like a blues guitarist uses riffs as turnarounds between progressions.
The irresponsibility of Mr. Limbaugh, Mr. Hannity, Mr. Savage, Mr. Levin et al. has forever changed the lives of those families in Knoxville. Having listened to these men peddle their poison for years, it is not unfair to lay this at talk radio's feet. The vieled and not so vield racism, sexism, homophobia and ideological hate these men spew into their microphones every night is far beyond the pale. The difficult part to understand is not why Mr. Adkisson's murderous hatred was screwed up by talk radio--what is surprising is that their listeners have so far show such restraint.
He brought his guitar case into the church, and as worshippers were enjoying a children's musical performance, Adkisson retrieved his shotgun from the case, along with 76 shells. He managed to murder 2, and wound 6 others before he was tackled and detained until his arrest.
Yesterday, he was sentenced to life in prison.
His motive, according to his handwritten manifesto, was to kill liberals. The Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church is known for its tolerance of homosexuals and political refugees.
He wrote, “Liberals are a pest like termites, millions of them … the only way we can rid ourselves of this evil is kill them in the streets, kill them where they gather.”
If you read over his stated motive for what he explicitly says is a "hate crime," you will find a collection of right wing radio coded words and talking points. I've listened to enough AM radio, that I'm comfortable saying Adkisson parroted directly from Hannity, who has long called into question the "American-ness" of groups like MoveOn.org and Code Pink (whom he specifically mentions by name ad nauseum), two groups mentioned in Mr. Adkisson's manifesto. In fact, Hannity uses the phrase, "groups like Code Pink and MoveOn.org" like a blues guitarist uses riffs as turnarounds between progressions.
The irresponsibility of Mr. Limbaugh, Mr. Hannity, Mr. Savage, Mr. Levin et al. has forever changed the lives of those families in Knoxville. Having listened to these men peddle their poison for years, it is not unfair to lay this at talk radio's feet. The vieled and not so vield racism, sexism, homophobia and ideological hate these men spew into their microphones every night is far beyond the pale. The difficult part to understand is not why Mr. Adkisson's murderous hatred was screwed up by talk radio--what is surprising is that their listeners have so far show such restraint.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Limbaugh.
So, President Obama met with GOP leadership last week in an attempt to get this new stimulus bill passed. In this meeting, it is reported he said,
Not one to take these things lightly, Rush responded:
Oh for fuck's sake. Nobody is blaming the markets for this mess, Mr. Limbaugh, you drug-addled piece of shit. Nice straw man. The blame rests on those in the government, Congress, previous administrations, etc, for opening the door to the kind of business behavior that is perfectly normal in a dysfunctional market.
Of course private institutions are going to maximize profits. They can do this by doing all sorts of things, the most egregious examples usually result in a feel-good movie about the little man fighting back, losing, and finding some token victory to cling to as the rain forest is cut down, chemicals continue to pollute, the neighborhood store closes down when a big box comes to town, or unsafe cars blow up their drivers, etc., etc.
Markets are doing what they do. There is nothing wrong with a company in a market trying to maximize profits. The market's function, in its entirety, is providing a way to buy and sell the products of capital and labor in the most efficient way possible. If they didn't, capitalism wouldn't work. To expect any more from it is both foolish and impossible.
This is the whole reason for government regulation. Left to its own devices, a market will eventually consume itself. With adroit regulation--rules of law governing market behavior, a market will not grow as rapidly, nor fall as low. Without it, you get market failure. Finding the right set of rules that continues to allow the market to operate to maximize profits in a sane, sustainable way that minimizes negative externalities is the government's job, as they are the only one who can impose rules on market behavior. Where the government fails to do its job, the market will inevitably fail in its wake.
"You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done,"Goddamn right you can't. Unnamed white house staff insisted that this was an effort to make a large point about bipartisanship. Which is probably right, but I'm happy if Obama manages to marginalize Limbaugh, who is an asshat. And not just because his racist remarks don't go over as well on national TV as they do on his radio show. I'm not making an argument that this is a personal thing with Obama, but I'm sure it has to feel pretty good to needle Limbaugh all he can to make his political case.
Not one to take these things lightly, Rush responded:
There are two things going on here. One prong of the Great Unifier's plan is to isolate elected Republicans from their voters and supporters by making the argument about me and not about his plan. He is hoping that these Republicans will also publicly denounce me and thus marginalize me. And who knows? Are ideological and philosophical ties enough to keep the GOP loyal to their voters? Meanwhile, the effort to foist all blame for this mess on the private sector continues unabated when most of the blame for this current debacle can be laid at the feet of the Congress and a couple of former presidents. And there is a strategic reason for this.
Oh for fuck's sake. Nobody is blaming the markets for this mess, Mr. Limbaugh, you drug-addled piece of shit. Nice straw man. The blame rests on those in the government, Congress, previous administrations, etc, for opening the door to the kind of business behavior that is perfectly normal in a dysfunctional market.
Of course private institutions are going to maximize profits. They can do this by doing all sorts of things, the most egregious examples usually result in a feel-good movie about the little man fighting back, losing, and finding some token victory to cling to as the rain forest is cut down, chemicals continue to pollute, the neighborhood store closes down when a big box comes to town, or unsafe cars blow up their drivers, etc., etc.
Markets are doing what they do. There is nothing wrong with a company in a market trying to maximize profits. The market's function, in its entirety, is providing a way to buy and sell the products of capital and labor in the most efficient way possible. If they didn't, capitalism wouldn't work. To expect any more from it is both foolish and impossible.
This is the whole reason for government regulation. Left to its own devices, a market will eventually consume itself. With adroit regulation--rules of law governing market behavior, a market will not grow as rapidly, nor fall as low. Without it, you get market failure. Finding the right set of rules that continues to allow the market to operate to maximize profits in a sane, sustainable way that minimizes negative externalities is the government's job, as they are the only one who can impose rules on market behavior. Where the government fails to do its job, the market will inevitably fail in its wake.
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