Rick Perry, welfare queen.

And here I thought we were going to secede:

Texas Governor Rick Perry criticized the Obama administration on Thursday for not responding to a request for a disaster aid for the parched state, where wildfires have scorched nearly 2 million acres.

"You have to ask, 'Why are you taking care of Alabama and other states?' I know our letter didn't get lost in the mail," Perry, a Republican and frequent critic of the federal government, said after addressing a Texas emergency management conference.

Rick needs to remember that the Lord helps those who help themselves and relying on the federal government just breeds a culture of dependency.

Goin' Galt!

Looks like the producer of Atlas Shrugged is goin' Galt and denying us further use of his talents because the critics were so mean to him.

"Why should I put up all of that money if the critics are coming in like lemmings?" Aglialoro said. "I’ll make my money back and I'll make a profit, but do I wanna go and do two? Maybe I just wanna see my grandkids and go on strike."

All together now: nooooooooooooooooooooo. nooooooooooooooo. please don't.

The rantings of El Rushbo.

This makes absolutely no sense.

Right now, such a person on the conservative side has not surfaced. So here's Trump, and he's taking it to Obama. And admit it. That's what you've wanted for two and a half years. Admit another thing. To us, there's nothing superhuman about Barack Obama. All he is to us is a threat to our nation as we've always known it. All he is to us is somebody who is so wrong as to portend a genuine danger for the future of our kids and grandkids, whom we love, just as we love our country. And we want this disaster stopped, and 2012 is the first chance we're gonna have. But frankly I don't know a single Republican in the field who's able to stand up and say what I just said. Have you heard it? Have you heard anybody who would say it? Is there anybody in our field who would refer to Obama as a disaster? No. They're petrified.

So...Obama's not superhuman -- he's just capable of personally destroying the country as we know it and ruining our grandchildren's future. Okay.

The rest of the segment convinces me that the reason wingnuts are lining up behind a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, thrice divorced, hedonistic marginal Democrat is that they're just dying for someone to say the n-word out loud, and so far, he's coming the closest.

Plenty of good copies still available

Joseph Farah was all too happy to embarrass himself in the WaPo for the opportunity to pimp Jerome Corsi's (remember him?) new book entitled, I shit you not, Where's the Birth Certificate? It's on WND Press, of course.

It comes out in 3 weeks. Plenty of time left to snatch one up.

David Frum: Republicans are racists.

Are you listening, Putz?

How did this poisonous and not very subtly racist allegation get such a grip on our conservative movement and our Republican party?

I know there will be Republican writers and conservative publicists who will now deny that birtherism ever did get a grip. Sorry, that’s just wrong. Not only did Trump surge ahead in Republican polls by flaming racial fires – not only did conservative media outlets from Fox to Drudge to the Breitbart sites indulge the birthers – but so also did every Republican candidate who said, “I take the president at his word.” Birthers did not doubt the president’s “word.” They were doubting the official records of the state of Hawaii. It’s like answering a 9/11 conspiracist by saying, “I take the 9/11 families at their word that they lost their loved ones.”

Yet even now, the racialist aspect of the anti-Obama movement has not subsided.

After careful consideration, Glenn Reynolds declares Donald Trump the winner.

Only Putz could turn 70% of Republicans being exposed as idiots as a victory for Republicans.

Orly Taitz's head explodes

Orly will be holding a Birth Certificate press conference later today, and she has released a statement in advance:

"SO WHAT? HE'S STILL A NEE-GRAH!"

Then her head exploded.

Glenn Reynolds a big fan of race baiting.

You just knew a good ol' Southern Republican like Putz would love this:

“I heard he was a terrible student, terrible. How does a bad student go to Columbia and then to Harvard? . . . We don’t know a thing about this guy. There are a lot of questions that are unanswered about our president.”

It's easy to see how Obama got into Harvard. But how did Putz get into Yale?

The Invisible Hand gives "Atlas Shrugged" the finger.

Oh well.

After a middling performance during its opening weekend that was hyped in some quarters (i.e., The Hollywood Reporter), the per-screen average for this amateurish Ayn Rand adaptation (even Kyle could only muster 2.5 stars' worth of enthusiam for the movie, though he liked its message) plunged to an alarming $1,890 from $5,640 during its opening frame. Overall, the weekend's take was a scant $879,000 -- a whopping 48 percent drop despite adding 166 locations. Which certainly suggest they're running out of audience quick.

That means that at some locations, distributor Rocky Mountain Pictures will be writing checks to theaters to cover the difference between receipts and operating expenses. The only way they're likely to get the 1,000 screens the producers say they want next weekend is to rent them. And, as Kyle put it at his personal blog, "Whether the sequels get made is purely a matter of how much desire the producers have for losing money.''

Boss Barbour will not be running.

There goes the GOP's chance to capture that elusive Southern white vote.

Greg Mankiw: there is such a thing as a free lunch!

Heh.

However, no amount of free Chinese food would make me want to eat lunch with Greg Mankiw.

But it's liberals who wanna keep talking about Sarah Palin.

No one would care about The Quitter if devious liberals and the Obama administration didn't keep bringing her up.

NEW YORK SUN: Sarah Palin For The Fed?

(A reminder.)

What was that thing Jesus said about the rich man and the eye of the needle?

Could some Evangelical Christian out there explain to me how a thrice divorced, pro-choice, pro-gay rights, materialistic hedonist like the Reality Show Guy is now the fundie favorite?

Most of the "American Century" was totally unfair, says conservative.

The headline says it all.

Obama says it’s only ‘fair’ to raise taxes on the rich. He’s wrong.

The reality show guy's in.

According to Krauthammer.

"I was prepared for a gale of abuse, because I've been really tough on him, and he would have been within his rights to do it," Krauthammer told Fox News host Sean Hannity Thursday night. "Actually he was rather gracious and courteous. ... He wanted to make me see, in his view, he was a serious candidate and a serious man. [...]

"He handled that rather well," Krauthammer added. "I give him the credit for graciousness and restraint. But it convinced me that he's running, that it's not just a feint."

Krauthammer said the call didn't change his views "on the unseriousness of his candidacy. But as a person, I thought more highly of him... because of the gracious way and the calm and courteous way he discussed the issues."

Did he mention he was gracious?

Scott Adams: douche or really big douche?

I'm gonna go with really big.

The same thing is happening today with a Republican official who emailed some friends a humorous photo of President Obama’s face on a chimp and a punch line about his birth certificate. If your only context is what the Internet says about this story, you assume it’s a typical racist act by a Republican who is already guilty by association. But if I add the context that Googling “George Bush monkey” gives you over 3 million hits, and most of them are jokes where President Bush’s face is transposed on a monkey, you see what’s really going on. Democrats and advocates of civil rights are using the media to further an agenda at the expense of a woman who was probably so non-racist that the photo in question didn’t set off her alarms as being a career-ending risk.

Yes, if your only context is that you're from another planet and haven't been around the Western world for the past 500 years -- calling a white man a monkey and a black man a monkey are totally the same thing!

Also, don't you love the way Scott assumes the woman who sent the racist email is "probably non-racist"? How does he know that?

This is nothing new for the glibertarian Adams, whose writing style and political views are reminiscent of a cross between Glenn and Helen Reynolds.

Outrage du jour.

Just how is Wonkette "liberal"?

Mays and Obama.

As a Giants partisan, I think this is pretty awesome.

Guess Americans are unserious and cowardly.

Mmmm-mmmm, this is some tasty Schadenfreude.

I knew it would be bad, but not this bad: More than 80 percent of Americans oppose Ryan’s plan to privatize Medicare.

Hope you enjoyed that week of celebrating Ryan the Serious and branding yourself for 2012 with a plan that only 16% of the country supports, morons.

In which McMegan compares taxation to rape.

Can't anyone do something about this?

All you need to know.

Look who's dominating -- and who's been dominating -- The Anchor Baby's presidential straw poll.

Again, there's nothing scandalous or surprising about a clown like Trump doing well with these people.

How is Trump worse than Palin?

I'm quite puzzled by all the wingnut soul-searching and panic over Donald Trump's leading the GOP field. Is he any less of a ridiculous figure than Sarah Palin or Steve Forbes? Really?

Look, over half of Republican primary voters think Obama wasn't born in the U.S., and it was only a matter of time before someone exploited that. Tack on the fact that they can't get behind Willard because of RomneyCare and they've fallen out of love with The Quitter -- and this is not at all surprising.

Battlefield: Train - an Atlas Shrugged movie review

I watched it so you don't have to. Here is a brief excerpt from the full review.

Battlefield: Earth is still my favorite film in the "so unbelievably bad you have to see it to believe it" genre, and it shares many similarities with Atlas. Both are cynical efforts to extract money from the wallets of blindly devoted followers of a patently silly belief system / cult of personality. Battlefield: Earth was made with the confidence that Scientologists would pay to see it no matter how bad it was, and I am afraid that the same motives underlie the decision to rush this sloppy, amateurish version of Atlas Shrugged into theaters. It ends with the disappeared Ellis Wyatt announcing in voiceover that the has gone Galt, emphatically stating "DON'T try to find me…I am ON STRIKE!" which caused the theater to erupt in an impromptu round of applause. The small crowd of office managers and dentists and petty bureaucrats so enjoyed identifying with the great Producer for two hours before heading home and preparing for another big day of running Northeast Georgia's fourth largest supplier of plumbing fixtures or filling out forms in the Office of Administrative Technicalities at the (public) University. And the cynical bastards who made this sad excuse for a film knew that no matter how much it sucked, society's frustrated, impotent petit bourgeoisie – lawyers, secretaries, cubicle dwellers, engineers, and assorted other educated, angry white people – would gladly hand over the price of admission for that brief thrill of feeling like society would give two flying shits if any of them joined Mr. Wyatt "on strike."

Atlas Shrugged: Part I is as good as anyone could expect a film based on the fiction of Ayn Rand to be. Shit begets shit.

I went a little too easy it.

Hehindeedy!

Wingnuts: not big fans of the Progressive Era -- or anything that came after it.

Shorter Mary Matalin: This hundred "experiment" whereby business is regulated and the wealth of the producers is redistributed to the underclass has been a massive failure.

If Fox News had existed throughout history.

Heh.

Oh my.

(via)

Just like conservatism itself, only the True Believers love it.

So fitting.

With the wingers, it's always a small cadre of small impassioned crazies against the rest of humanity.

It's for The Donald to lose.

Wow.

Only 38% of Republican primary voters say they're willing to support a candidate for President next year who firmly rejects the birther theory and those folks want Mitt Romney to be their nominee for President next year. With the other 62% of Republicans- 23% of whom say they are only willing to vote for a birther and 39% of whom are not sure- Donald Trump is cleaning up. And as a result Trump's ridden the controversy about Barack Obama's place of birth to the highest level of support we've found for anyone in our national GOP polling so far in 2011.

As I said a while back, the man can read a poll.

Yeah, probably not the best go-to guy on the subject.

Enumerated concepts

Arizona continues its quest to become the Alabama of the Southwest (and ironically, Alabama is now the Arizona of the South) by passing a bill requiring presidential candidates to prove their natural born citizenship before being placed on the state's ballots.

I see no problem with this. Nothing wrong with a set of legal requirements applied equally to each candidate. You show a birth certificate (as Obama and Hawaii have repeatedly done) and that's the end of the story.

The names of candidates can be kept off the ballot if the secretary of state doesn't believe the candidates met the citizenship requirement.

Oh.

Shorter entire right-wing: WAH!

Proving, yet again, these people have absolutely zero self-awareness.

What a whiny little punk Paul Ryan is.

Heh:

All the while, Mr. Ryan sat in a front-row seat in the George Washington University auditorium Wednesday while Mr. Obama unveiled his plan to constrain growing levels of federal debt.

Mr. Ryan grew visibly annoyed during the speech, shaking his head in disgust. He feverishly took notes, and when Mr. Obama finished he stood up and bolted from the auditorium.

Wah! Obama won't let me eliminate Medicare to pay for my tax cuts! Wah!

And kudos to the POTUS for this line:

The fact is, their vision is less about reducing the deficit than it is about changing the basic social compact in America. As Ronald Reagan's own budget director said, there's nothing "serious" or "courageous" about this plan. There's nothing serious about a plan that claims to reduce the deficit by spending a trillion dollars on tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires. There's nothing courageous about asking for sacrifice from those who can least afford it and don't have any clout on Capitol Hill. And this is not a vision of the America I know.

Obama is shrill.

I don't think Greg Mankiw knows what "historically" means.

Liar, liar.

That is, the choice we face is between historically high taxes (the left's unspoken preference) and a fundamental rethinking of the social safety net (such as the plan proposed by Congressman Ryan).

Sadly, no.

Surely, Mankiw has seen this before, right?

Help me Obi-Wan, you're our only hope

We know that Thomas Friedman probably tapes his own picture over his wife's face when they have sex, and today's NYT column is further proof.

When I was in Cairo during the Egyptian uprising, I wanted to change hotels one day to be closer to the action and called the Marriott to see if it had any openings. The young-sounding Egyptian woman who spoke with me from the reservations department offered me a room and then asked: “Do you have a corporate rate?” I said, “I don’t know. I work for The New York Times.” There was a silence on the phone for a few moments, and then she said: “ Can I ask you something?” Sure. “Are we going to be O.K.? I’m worried.”

OK. A few things here.

1. This conversation didn't actually happen. Isn't it funny how TF always randomly quotes some person who sets up whatever point he wants to make perfectly?
2. Are you sure it wasn't a cabdriver, Tom?
3. Frightened brown people need big, important, rich white American journalist to comfort them in their times of need. Maybe in the next column an Egyptian waiter will ask him to be their president. He will humbly decline.
4. Thomas Friedman needs psychological help.

The Republican alternate universe.

Not only are evolution and global warming phony liberal conspiracies -- the Civil War wasn't fought over slavery.

Moe Lane even stupider than previously thought.

Dear Moe,

George W. Bush's second term ended in January 2009 -- not March 2007.

Glad I could help.

BT

Just a few...more...days...

Do you have your opening night tickets for this massive shitburger? I sure do!



If you want to see this in a theater it might be a good idea to do it soon. Something tells me that the objectivist Battlefield: Earth isn't going to be on the big screen very long.

More on Yglesias.

Aravosis noticed the same Yglesias post I did -- and writes a much longer response.

Matt's second paragraph is a point we often hear from Obama defenders, but also from Democratic party defenders, with regards to any issue on which the party falls short of its promises: But the other guy is worse.

While I understand the premise, I'm not sure I get the point. Yes, Republicans are, more often than not, worse than Democrats on most issues we care about. And yes, the Republican House is far worse than President Obama.

And?

Does that mean we shouldn't expect the President to keep his promises, or at least fight for them (early and often)? If politicians aren't held response for broken promises, then like Fluffy peeing on the floor, they'll just keep breaking 'em until a politician's promises mean nothing. And while you can certainly try to get out the vote, and the money, by telling voters that the Ds are still better than the Rs, I think the D's job is a lot harder when voters think you lied to them after one too many broken promises.

And, if our goal to is to do good, then why not do all the good we can before our political life is over? There's an assumption in Matt's second graf that we shouldn't expect the President to try for more, simply because the Republicans are less. Why is that? Perhaps he's implying that we hurt the President's re-election chances when we chastise him for falling short of his promises on the stimulus, HCR, or the current budget debates.

He concludes:

You often hear from the White House and their defenders excuses such as: If we only had 60 votes; if we only had the right 60 votes; if we only had control of the House; and my personal favorite, "he's not God, you know" (as if). When it comes down to it, this debate is really between those who think the President is weak, and those who think Barack Obama has incredible untapped strength.

Which one do you think encapsulates the politics of hope?

Indeed.

It's difficult to get into someone's head, but Obama seems temperamentally an incrementalist-pragmatist.

There's nothing wrong with that, but that's a) not what he campaigned on; and b) not what the country desperately needed at the end of the disastrous Bush/Cheney administration and three decades of Reaganism.

People who don't have jobs and who are losing their houses are not going to be moved by, "Well, we're moving at a slower-than-ideal pace but in the right direction."

WASF

Yup, pretty much fucked.

In which I agree with Glenn Reynolds.

This is actually a good idea.

SO OBAMA’S PEOPLE ARE TALKING TAX INCREASES AGAIN. Here’s my proposal: A 50% surtax on anything earned within five years after leaving the federal government, above whatever the federal salary was. Leave a $150K job at the White House, take a $1M job with Goldman, Sachs, pay a $425K surtax.

That would be great! Let's make it retroactive, too.

Dick Cheney and Haley Barbour would be paying a hell of a lot in back taxes, don't you think? I'm thinking Cheney leads the league in money earned after leaving the federal government. Never seemed to bother Putzy before. Still, I'm down.

But because it's Putz, though, he also added this buffoonery.

Some House Republican should add this to a bill and watch the Dems react.

1) A Republican proposing a tax increase? HAHAHAHA!
3) A Republican proposing a tax increase on rich people? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!
2) A Republican taxing away their future as an oil lobbyist? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! times infinity!

2nd Deep Thought of the Day

Criticizing Obama's liberal critics makes the country more liberal.

Discuss.

Deep Thought for Today

Criticizing Obama from the left makes the country more conservative.

Discuss.

Pretty much.

Yes, yes, yes (excerpted from a comment below).

To caricature liberal criticism as the works elitists whose politics are governed by a psychic need to pick on the guy in charge is the golden oldie of the right who love to say they are the ones who really care about the disadvantaged, kind of like prison guards being the ones who really look for the inmates. Forget any stats on who votes for what party and the like.

At least get what's being said right. Otherwise, go back to I'm rubber, you're glue with lots of cursing added. Obama's liberal critics aim at the failure to defend liberalism in the budget deal as was the case on the tax cut showdown in December. Liberals want economic security and equal opportunity. That agenda could be used to criticize the hostage taking Boehner and company pulled here. To say the Republicans forced us to choose between more cuts to the poor or shutting down the govt entirely. Don't celebrate the deal you made. It reinforces the right's point that the gov't needs to be cut and that the cuts all have to come for the have nots.

Another round of this budget is coming soon. Starting from the point of saying we must cut but we can't touch defense or taxes on the corporations and the wealthy reinforces conservatism. And if the ideas don't matter then at least get wise to the impact that these cuts have income equality and the day-to-day struggle to get by for those in whose name you speak.

Based on the way the White House has negotiated previously, I am not optimistic.

The Republicans control 1/2 of 1/3 of the governmentThe Democrats control the White House and Senate but the GOP Teabaggers got their way.

(Edited, but unchanged.)

Yglesias: the budget catastrophe is Obama's critics' fault.

This is what I'm talking about:

I hope people remember this year next time large Democratic majorities produce an inadequate stimulus bill, a not-good-enough health reform bill, a somewhat weak financial regulation bill, and fail to deliver on their promises for immigration and the environment. It’s easy in a time like that to get cynical and dismissive about the whole thing. But there’s actually a huge difference between moving forward at a slower-than-ideal pace and scrambling to reduce the pace at which you move backwards. Now we’re moving backwards.

Not according to Obama. He just said we're winning the future!

This response to Yglesias nails it:

I hope Democratic majorities remember that they lose elections when they fail to deliver results (or in the case of civil liberties and executive power, when they actually move backwards by ratifying the abuses of the prior administration.) The next time Democrats win majorities, I will encourage as many people as possible to make their continued support conditional on results.

We do not have a problem with Democrats not winning elections often enough, we have a problem with Democratic politicians not doing their job when they win. What we should do is organize a parallel set of progressive institutions that makes their support for Democratic politicians conditional on progressive outcomes.

Exactly.

Do you want Obama to fail?

If you disagree with the President, that's what this post seems to be saying.

Also noticeably absent from this rambling 10,000-word rant is any mention of the outright contempt the administration has expressed for it's liberal base, which, feelings aside, is politically idiotic.

If Obama wants me to be a cheerleader for him, he needs to give me something to cheer about.

Not sure why that's controversial.

UPDATE

A reader writes,

Nobody's asking you to be a cheerleader. But aside from thinking you're the base when you're not, maybe you could apply some historical perspective to some of the things Obama has done in addition to some demographic perspective about who the base is? Compared to the presidents of the last 50 years, not compared to this magical lollipop fairyland that only lives in your head. A lot of what you write sounds like a baseball blogger who's allegedly a fan of one team, but constantly berates its star player for only hitting .400. A truly progressive player would hit 1.000, you say! It's fucking horseshit.

I think it's very strange and unhelpful to start tribal pie fights about who the base of the Democratic Party is -- but...You're going to compare Obama to Lyndon Johnson? Seriously?

I'd say that's fucking horseshit.

In my view, despite having the largest Democratic majorities in the House and Senate in a generation, and despite following the least popular Republican president since Herbert Hoover -- Obama has taken all of that political capital and promptly governed as a moderate Republican on domestic issues. A competent moderate Republican, but a moderate Republican, nonetheless.

Unfortunately, he's also reaffirmed most of the neocon Bush/Cheney national security policies.

The stimulus was a moderate Republican bill. The health care bill was a moderate Republican bill. FigReg was a joke, I'm not even sure what that was. Find me a credible center-left economist who likes it.

Surging in Afghanistan? Extending the war into Pakistan and Yemen? Attacking Libya? Extending the Bush tax cuts for millionaires?

Sorry, that's not what I voted for. If you're happy with that, great. If you think that's batting .400, fine. Just don't tell me I have to think so, because I don't.

And this latest outrage -- agreeing to cut billions of dollars in programs for the people who need it most in a bad economy -- while celebrating it as a victory.

Yes, let's all get behind that! Best liberal president since Johnson! Go team!!!

On Wisconsin

No word yet on whether Robert Mugabe will be flown into Madison to certify the election results as free, fair, and legitimate.

Glenn Reynolds: why can't gas be cheap, like it was under Bush?

What an assclown.

For those who weren't born in 2009, you'll remember that Bush/Cheney presided over years of spiraling, record-high gas prices (this chart is particularly helpful).

I guess they were trying to sell Chevy Volts!

1990s playbook.

The GOP really is partying like its the 1990s.

Shorter wingnuts: the 19th century was awesome!

I was getting ready to write about Greenwald's righteous smackdown of Putz, but then got distracted by Ryan's brave courageous Most Awesome Budget Evah (I posted a counter-proposal at FDL today).

Anyway, the funniest wingnut response to Ryan's Randian fantasy budget thus far has to be Pam Geller's.

Now, when lefties like me joke that right-wingers want to repeal the twentieth century -- it's just an over-the-top joke. We're KIDDING.

But nope, it turns out they really do!

It's simply impossible to parody these people.

Securing your financial future

Intellectual Chernobyl has added a new site, "TownHall Finance", to help the detached, aged wingnut in your life plan for his or her financial future. It's full of helpful advice and bunker-dwelling insanity about returning America to the gold standard. I feel wealthier already.

The Republicans cunning plan to make America prosperous!

Screw over the elderly and poor, keep taxes low for the rich.

How freaking original.

BREAKING NEWS: AMERICANS KNOW DICK ABOUT FEDERAL BUDGET

Shocking, isn't it?

Who knew NPR was 5-10% of the federal budget.

Glenn Reynolds: I was totally wrong about Obama's foreign policy!

The gloating never ceases.

It's almost like Putz spent 2007-2008 insisting that Obama was going to increase defense spending, surge in Afghanistan, litter Pakistan with Predators and affirm the bi-partisan Pax Americana vision that's been in place since the Cold War.

Don't you have to be, um, right to gloat?

The Republican Party of Tennessee.

Not very big on science.

Nice people you're voting for, Putz!

Bachmannia!

How humiliating for Willard.

Nice party you've got there, GOP.