Green Eagle

Remember Richard Mack, the lunatic former Sheriff who joined Cliven Bundy and was the one who came up with the idea of putting all the women and children down front so they would be killed first? Well, here are the top two items from Mr. Mack's website today: "Decisions from Sheriff Mack's lawsuit against the Clinton administration being used to block Obamacare   On December 9, 2013 Newsmax.com reported that South Carolina is very close to passing HB 3101, which nullifies Obamacare for SC citizens and businesses. If the bill passes, South Carolina will be the first state to take this courageous and very appropriate stand against this most destructive and abusive and yes, unconstitutional statute!" "Family members and other supporters start a GoFundMe campaign for Richard & Dawn Mack   In November of 2014, Richard Mack's wife Dawn was hospitalized with serious medical issues. Then, in early January of 2015, Richard suffered a heart attack that re...

Here's a report on the annual survey of world elections by Harvard University and the University of Sydney, which pretty much reports what anyone could have predicted.  I should mention at the outset that this article is from Brad Friedman, who has chronicled the degeneration of the American electoral system for as long as I can remember, and who is, accordingly, totally marginalized by the mainstream press: "U.S. 'Electoral Integrity' Ranked 45th Among 107 Nations, 'Worst of Established Democracies'... [C]ontests in the United States scored the worst performance among any long-established democracy. Hence the 2012 Presidential elections was ranked 42nd worldwide, while the 2014 mid-term Congressional races was ranked 45th, similar to Colombia and Bulgaria. One reason is that experts expressed growing concern over US electoral laws and processes of voter registration, both areas of heated partisan debate." Columbia or Bulgaria.  I don't think I a...

I don't love the country that slaughtered two million civilians in a war of aggression against Vietnam, and four decades later still refuses to face up to the largest mass murder since the Nazis. I don't love the country that invaded an innocent country in the Middle East, killing another half million civilians and creating murderous chaos, based on lies and racial hatred. I don't love the country that has made a handful of rich sociopaths more powerful than all of the rest of us. I don't love the country that will let millions go without health care in order to increase the income of a for-profit medical system. I don't love the country where, apparently any white police officer can kill any black guy without consequences (and in more and more Republican States, any white guy at all.) I don't love the country that tortures. I don't love the country that is deliberately letting the entire world descend into ecological disaster in order to enhance...

And let's just start out with the most incoherent attack on Obama I've seen lately: John Ransom, Town Hall:  "While ISIS conducts a pogrom in the Middle East on groups like Jews and Christians with whom it disagrees, the Obama administration has transferred their domestic political pogrom on jobs to the black hooded terrorist army." Huh?  I guess he is trying to say that Obama is somehow like ISIS, because he is conducting a "pogrom" on jobs.  The statistics on this vicious pogrom can be seen in this chart: or this one: Mr. Ransom somehow forgot to mention that Obama's pogrom on jobs has actually generated over 11 million jobs.  Just an accident, I guess. Cortney O'Brien, Town Hall:  "Ethics Go Out the Door as Clinton Foundation Accepts Foreign Funds" No real scandal?  Then let's make up a fake one:  The Clinton Foundation is a charity.  None of the money goes to the Clintons themselves, or to Hillary's campaign. ...

I want to point you toward a wonderful article in the New York Daily News today, responding to Rudy Giuliani's recent piggish remark about Obama not "loving" the United States.  The article is by Wayne Barrett, and is entitled "What Rudy Giuliani knows about love — a response to his 'doesn't love America' critique of Obama."  It is a discussion of Giuliani's behavior in his three marriages, and pretty well makes it clear that Rudy Giuliani never loved a thing in his life except himself, and does not have a clue what the word "love" means. I'll just add that, personally speaking, whatever I feel for my country has very little to do with what I feel for my wife or my kids, or for that matter my Corgi dog. So I would never describe it as "love." Once again, Republicans are just trying to force Obama into some humiliating linguistic concession, the same way that they insist he use exactly the words they want when he talks...

They are all bad guys: "Beirut (AFP) - Ten children were among at least 48 people killed in a Syrian village this week when regime forces executed six families of rebel fighters, a monitoring group said on Saturday." So, we are supposed to support a savage dictator because he is just slightly less barbaric than ISIS?  Who, exactly, do we expect to bring a decent way of life to the people of Syria and Iraq, and now Yemen and Libya too?  Are we expected to feel bad that another savage, terrorist monster, Moammar Khadafy was overthrown, because the people of his country don't have the decency to come together and build a peaceful country, preferring to slaughter each other en masse over meaningless religious disputes? Of course, the Republicans' answer to this is to savagely attack Obama for not fixing the unfixable, when we all know that if they were in charge, not only would they do no better, but their hunger for violent intervention would make things far wors...

From an article in the International Business Times today: "Islamic extremist planned to 'make Yellowstone supervolcano erupt' in US terror plot" Well, that's nice.  I wonder how he proposed to do that.  He finally decided to try to blow up a train in Canada instead.  Sort of a pretty weak second choice to something that has the potential to wipe out a third of the population of the United States.  Anyway, he didn't blow up the train either.  He got caught.  I hope the Canadians have the sense to never let this idiotic jerk out of jail again,

Because it seems like no one on earth dares speak the truth about what is going on with the recent ruling by U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen, to stop enforcement of Obama's actions on immigration.  The Republicans engaged in the time honored but malign practice of "judge-shopping," finding a G. W. Bush appointed Judge who hates both immigrants and Obama to make this decision, which is so manifestly without merit that it is inevitably going to be overturned. But, you see, that is fine with Republicans, because here is the reason that this whole charade is taking place:  As we all can see, the Republicans have painted themselves into a really ugly corner over the House's refusal to refund the Department of Homeland Security without kicking Obama in the teeth over his immigration actions.  Unfortunately, the Senate Republicans don't have the votes to pass the House version of the DHS funding bill, and the House Republicans won't budge an inch.  That means that...

So, for about a year now, we've heard the Republicans howling to the moon because Obama doesn't use the word "terrorist."  Of course, he has used the word over and over again, but that is an issue for another day.  Now, Obama has been using the term consistently.  So, are the Republicans thanking him for adopting their linguistic demands? “There’s a set of words, it’s almost as if they’re given a card — a do-not-speak card,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R.-Texas) said last week at the conservative Center for Security Policy think thank. “The words ‘radical Islamic terrorism’ do not come out of the president’s mouth." So now, you see, Obama has to say "radical Islamic terrorism" or else he is going to be subject to the same savage attacks.  And if he says that, they'll add another demand that he spout out their jingoistic code words.  And on it will go, because you know that he can never win.  If the time comes that they have exhausted every single English w...

Yes, there is absolutely no depth to which they will not sink.   Here's a story covered by Fox 5 in San Diego: "(News anchor Kathleen) Bade's report discussed how the office of San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis’ has declined to prosecute a person of interest in a rape case, the Raw Story blog reported. The sexual assault case involved students at San Diego State University." And here's a screen capture from the story as it appeared on the air: Anything about this guy look familiar?  Oh well, it was just a little mixup, I'm sure. The station broadcast no correction, and has refused to apologize.  A spokesman had this to say"  “They really don’t do that when it’s a small thing like that.” Calling the President of the United States a rapist, in a TV news show.  Just a small thing.  Well, I guess compared to calling him a Muslim terrorist or the Antichrist, it is.

Charles C. Johnson, on Twitter: "Why don't we know Sasha Obama's middle name?" The scandal that will bring Obama down!  From a series of Twitter comments in which Johnson insists that Sasha's real father is Jesse Jackson.

And here it is, just to remind you: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed." I had never thought of this before, but it just occurred to me that the bill protects the right to "keep and bear arms."  It says nothing at all about owning them.  I would say that, under a literal interpretation of the second amendment, there is nothing to prevent the government from banning the private ownership of weapons. Well, what do you think?  I mean, that's what they said, right?  Original intent and the Founding Fathers and all that...how do you think right wingers would respond to that argument?

As usual with left leaning blogs, by just not being cynical enough. Here's a quote from a Daily Kos post about Michael Cannon, one of the Cato Institute (i.e. Koch brothers paid) people who came up with the Obamacare challenge, and who is responsible for getting the Supreme Court to vote his way: "Cannon's job is convincing five Supreme Court justices of his idea that there will be cheaper health insurance when they "get rid of those subsidies and mandates so that the law is not making health insurance so expensive for the majority of these folks in healthcare.gov anymore." Well, that is not Cannon's job at all.  It is only to give the five corrupt corporate tools on the court cover to decide the way their masters want them to.  And that is a much lower bar than actually trying to convince them of the totally ludicrous possibility that the Republicans will come up with an adequate replacement for Obamacare.

I have to say, I've had real trouble with this edition of Wingnut Wrapup.  I just haven't found the jackass behavior of right wingers to be that funny lately, and if I reduce this to nothing but rants about how vicious these guys are, it won't be much fun to read, let alone write.  Anyway, as Mario would say, here we go: Jeff Jacoby, Town Hall:  "No, 2014 Wasn't the "Warmest Year In History" Fie on those damned "scientists" with their "facts."  The average real American patriot knows better!  It sonwed in Boston!  In January! Star Parker, Town Hall:  "Freedom is Best Way to Help Low-Income Students" Freedom!!!  As opposed to adequate funding for public schools, which does nothing at all.  Freedom will teach them everything they need to know.  How?  Who the hell knows...which just proves how poor our educational system is, I guess. John Ransom, Town Hall:  "Liberals Were Wrong and We Were Right—Again" ...

I want to urgently encourage you to look at this collection of photos of the now-demolished Kowloon Walled City.  It is a view of the future that the Republican party has in store for the 99.99% of Americans who cannot self-finance political campaigns.  Here are a couple of examples: I am not kidding here.  These things are not sets from Blade Runner or some other dystopian movie about the future.  It is a place where over a million people once lived, and it is exactly the sort of environment which sociopathic billionaires like the Koch brothers think is a suitable home for the rest of us. I have said for a long time that one of two fates await the workers of this country: either they bring the incomes of foreign workers closer to their own, or they are going to see their lives descend into the plight of foreign workers.  Well, here are some great pictures of what that looks like.  Please take a look and decide if this is a good enough life for y...

And we're only 15 years in.  This is the story that the Republican party is going to be telling in the next few years, and as you might expect, the Republican king of fantasy, Senator Ted Cruz, is out front telling it: "Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) suggested on Sunday that Democrats will lose the 2016 presidential race because they are the party of the “top 1 percent,” and that Republicans are the party of “hard working” people." For those of us who are even minimally in touch with reality, this is so preposterous that it's hard to think that even Ted Cruz could say it with a straight face.  But remember, the point of this claim is not really to convince people, it is just to make the voters in the middle see this as a "he said-she said" debate, in which no one can be clearly identified as telling the truth.  It's a strategy they have refined to a fine art, most recently practiced by the "new" Mitt Romney, who had decided to run on the claim that...

In case you haven't seen this photo yet, before you look below, take a guess who it is: Well, it's not an action adventure movie actor.  It's the King of Jordan, who announced today that Jordan is going to attack ISIS until it doesn't have a bomb or a bullet left.  Life imitates art, huh?

I'm sure many of you saw something about the recent study commissioned by the New York Attorney General's office, which tested dietary supplements from four major retailers of them- Wal-Mart, Target, Walgreens and General Nutrition Centers, and which found that eighty percent of them contained major adulterants, and many of them contained none of the promised ingredients at all. As many of my readers will know, I have a very keen interest in people who believe things that are false.  This dates from the late 1960's and one of the things I have followed since that time is the "health food" and "dietary supplement" business. I first want to say that the entire history of health food fads and dietary supplements in this country, from the mid-nineteenth century and people like the Kelloggs and Sylvester Graham, through Gaylord Hauser, the Rodales, and the aforementioned General Nutrition Centers, right down to the present, has featured consistent fraud...

I just know you are going to be as uplifted by this information as I was: "Cairo (AFP) - Al-Azhar, Sunni Islam's most prestigious centre of learning, expressed outrage at the Islamic State group for burning to death a captive Jordanian pilot, saying its militants deserve to be killed or crucified.   After a video was released showing the caged fighter pilot, Maaz al-Kassasbeh, dying engulfed in flames, the Cairo-based authority's head, Ahmed al-Tayib, expressed his "strong dismay at this cowardly act".   This "requires the punishment mentioned in the Koran for these corrupt oppressors who fight against God and his prophet: killing, crucifixion or chopping of the limbs." As we all come together to condemn those who attack all Muslims because of the acts of a few, I think it is so hopeful that we have moderate, educated Muslims clarifying that the behavior of ISIS is not acceptable.  Burning to death- NO!  Crucifixion or "chopping of the l...

It has been a matter of faith in those who took an interest in anti-vaccine lunacy, including, I must confess, myself, that this movement existed primarily among left-leaning people, providing a convenient counterbalance, in the eyes of the everybody-does-it crowd to the dozens of certifiably idiotic conspiracy theories and fantasies that are the very stuff of life of the right.  But lately a lot has been happening to challenge that notion, or at least suggest that there is a major change going on in who buys into this malicious fantasy. All of a sudden, we are seeing all sorts of right wing figures championing this cause,or at least insisting that not vaccinating children is a legitimate choice.   Rand Paul, for example, or Chris Christie, who is constantly touted as a rational Republican.   Fox News of course has jumped on the bandwagon. I guess this shouldn't be surprising, given that this paranoid conspiracy theory fits neatly into the anti-government and anti-...

The United Nations, an utterly impartial referee in diplomatic disputes, as we learn from this article at the Al Jazeera website: "The head of a UN inquiry into last summer's conflict between Israel and Gaza has said he will resign after Israeli allegations of bias due to consultancy work he did for the Palestine Liberation Organisation [PLO]...   (Canadian academic William)  Schabas was appointed last August by the head of the UN Human Rights Council to lead a three-member group looking into alleged war crimes during Israel's military offensive against Gaza.   Schabas' departure highlights the sensitivity of the UN investigation just weeks after prosecutors at the International Criminal Court in The Hague said they had started a preliminary inquiry into alleged atrocities in the Palestinian territories." It does, of course not " highlight the sensitivity of the UN investigation;" it highlights what a rigged farce it is.  After reading this, a...

Here's an interview with a doctor (!) that was on CNN, which I found in a post at Crooks and Liars, which pretty much spells out the real truth about parents who won't have their kids vaccinated.  The case he was discussing involved a girl with Leukemia, whose immune system was severely compromised, and who could easily be killed by a disease like measles: "An Arizona cardiologist told CNN in an interview that went online Monday that he doesn't care if his refusal to vaccinate his kids gives other children grave, preventable diseases.   “I’m not going to sacrifice the well-being of my child. My child is pure,” Dr. Jack Wolfson said in the interview. “It’s not my responsibility to be protecting their child.” "As far as I’m concerned, it’s very likely that her leukemia is from vaccinations in the first place," Wolfson said.   The CNN interviewer asked Wolfson repeatedly if he could live with himself if his unvaccinated child got other children, lik...