When You Start Talking About Armed Rebellion You Need to Explain Who You're Going to Kill

Ignatius Piazza, via Playboy
 

An old friend, who worries that the armed and dangerous wingnuts are getting restless, forwarded this email with no comment. I can only take that to mean that he wanted me to post it here.

Former chiropractor Dr. Ignatius "Naish" Piazza, whose love for guns runs so deep one wonders if he's ever had sex with one, is perhaps most famous for his ongoing attempt to build a "Sun City for gun owners," called the Village of Front Site, named after his firearms training institute currently operating on the site near Pahrump, NV (shoot a submachine gun, then play some slots!).

Ignatius, who has apparently dabbled enough in Scientology to get "clear," has nonetheless sued at least two people who connected him to the cult. While he claims to be a Catholic, he admits to having attended Scientology "services" and that he has ""attended business management courses using the business management tools of L. Ron Hubbard."

I'm sure the new Pope would be fine with business courses run by a cult, as long as those courses teach you that being associated with a cult might be bad for business.

"Village" of Front Site, NV, via Handvapen Guiden

In the email my friend forwarded, Dr. Piazza noted that yesterday was the 238th anniversary of the American Revolution, and it seems he's itching for a new one. You can guess who the British are in this scenario.

Over the last 283 years, as the government we created “For the People and By the People” has grown into a massive, self-serving, liberty-stealing machine. I wonder what the government will do to trigger the NEXT shot heard round the world. 

Think it can't happen again? 

It will happen again.

Odd that I can't find any record of Dr. Ignatius being angry when GW Bush and Dick Cheney ignored warnings about 9-11 (which Dr. Ignatius did get upset about) and then used that tragedy to lie us into a $6 trillion war while torturing, assassinating, renditioning, indefinitely detaining, warrantlessly spying, and all the other "liberty stealing" things the Bush Junta got away with. Seems Dr. Piazza was just fine with those things, because apparently the only part of the constitution he cares about is the well regulated militias.

Ignatius, his arms wide, via another of his sites.

No, this wingnut is pissed about NY State's law that tries to keep guns out of the hands of people with psychological problems that professionals think might lead them to harm themselves or others (judging by Mr. Piazza's history of tightrope walking on the edge of reality, I can understand his worry). He embeds a Fox News video of the story of one man in NY about whom the government might have made a mistake.

One case of government in NY overreaching in their attempt to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill constitutes a federal government that "has grown into a massive, self-serving, liberty-stealing machine"? Really?

Apparently, this one case has such far reaching implications for Piazza that he's willing to start a war over it.

When 10% of the American population (31 million armed and trained Americans) collectively think that they have had enough and are willing to unite to remind our government officials that THEY SERVE US, not the other way around, we will once again enjoy the freedom our forefathers bled and died to win for us.

Unless you're black, of course, because the "forefathers" (except for John Jay) didn't give a damn about your freedom. In fact, his threat to the 90% of us who think keeping guns out of the hands of psychos is a good idea seems reminiscent of another armed rebellion against the duly elected Federal Government, where his armed compound amidst Pahrump's sand and tumbleweed is the new Fort Sumter.


White population of the US south in 1860: 5,447,220. Total US population 1860: 31,443,321.

White southerners were 17.32% of the US population, and they managed to start a Civil War. If these fuckers think they can do it with 10%, I say bring it. Watch how fast we kick your traitorous asses this time.

What Happens When Wingnuts Keep Talking

This 23 percenter is on the House Intelligence Committee!

Just wanted to quickly note that the more the wingnuts talk, the more people hear them, and the more people hear them, the less people think they're "in touch." In fact, it's gotten so bad that I'm worried people might stop listening to them, which is why I started this blog.

The really great thing about this self-reinforcing cycle of wingnut demise is that it has distilled the crazy down to the number that keeps popping up: 23%:

Q: Do you think the Republican Party is in touch with the concerns of most people in the United States today, or is it out of touch?

In touch: 23%   Out of touch: 70%

George W Bush's final approval rating when he left office was 22%. 23% of Americans are functionally illiterate. A 1999 Gallup poll reported that 23% of Americans heard a voice or seen a vision in response to prayer. In 2009, 23% of Americans thought Barack Obama was born outside the US. And, perhaps most miraculously, 23% of Americans (40% of white southerners) would side with the confederacy if the Civil War broke out today.

Given how often it shows up, it seems fair to say that 23% of Americans are batshit crazy. and yet they seem to control a much larger percentage of the leaders in our "democracy." Since I don't see much chance of changing the gerrymandered congressional districts, or the hypo-democratic US Senate, I guess we're just going to have to keep the wingnuts talking in order to convince a few more of the crazies to give up on the GOP.

George W Bush Is Worried about His Hamstrings

Reuters Image via The Telegraph

There is no wingnut on the face of the earth that we want to keep talking more than GW Bush, who's George W. Bush Presidential Center, Steve Benen notes, opens on May 1st, 10 years to the day after the "Mission Accomplished" moment. May the first is also May Day, which has pagan roots, but in this context is best remembered as International Workers Day, this year in honor of the millions of workers who lost their jobs in the Little Bush Depression. Irony abounds.

In 1958, Eisenhower, worried about the communist influence of May Day, decided to make May 1st "Law Day, U.S.A." It's the day we contemplate the importance of law in our society. You know, laws like anti-fraud statutes that the Bush administration ignored while letting Wall Street stamp crap paper AAA so they could sell it to their unsuspecting customers (your retirement fund) while they shorted it. Like laws against torture, war crimes, lying to congress, and other fun conventions that Ike thought were important.

"Laws are silent in times of war."--Cicero

All those pesky laws were "just a spring clean for the May queen" George Bush, who, to be fair, was simply following the if-the-President-does-it-it's-not-illegal Nixonian logic that's been screwing us for decades. In Bush's case, it led to justifications for hypothetical child testicle crushing. Talk about compassionate conservatism.

Reuters image via the WSJ

But we're here to let Bush do the talking, which he did in length to the Dallas Morning News.

"People ask me, ‘What about the economy?'" Bush said. "My answer is, 'Why don’t you go hire an economist? Or hire five economists and get 15 different opinions?'"

W with the defensive misdirect!

Bush's monthly job creation average in non-recession months was 68,000. When Obama's monthly total dropped to 80 some-odd thousand, the right wing went nuts.

That was the commie Ezra Klein being nice to the former President. Let's see what the nice folks at the conservative Wall Street Journal had to say about the George W Bush Memorial Crater Economy:

The current President Bush, once taking account how long he’s been in office, shows the worst track record for job creation since the government began keeping records.

Seems liberals and conservatives agree. We could ask 13 more economists about the Bush economy, which ended in the biggest recession since the Great Depression (bigger than the previous four recessions combined) and we'd get the same answer. Bush's final GDP, in 4Q2008, was negative 9%. We were shedding jobs at about 800,000 per month when Obama took over. No economist worth his weight in bullshit would try to make that disaster look good.

"My only point," Bush said, "is that when there’s an objective analysis of our fiscal record, people will say, 'Well, that’s different than I thought.'"

AP image via Maddow Blog

I hope that's not his only point, but even wingnut economists tend to frown on negative 9% GDP.

The great thing about the quote "Or hire five economists and get 15 different opinions?" is that it tells us that GW Bush is either bullshtiting, or he thinks economists all give three answers to every question. If that's the kind of economists he was listening to (Glenn Hubbard, et al) then that certainly explains the Little Bush Depression.

The quote is classic Bush, blaming the fact that Bushonomics didn't work on his economists, who apparently could never give him a good marketing strategy for explaining their systematic looting of trillions of dollars.

Wearing a light blue, open-collar shirt, Bush, 66, said repeatedly that he’s "comfortable" with both life and legacy. Among his most pressing concerns was whether his hamstrings were ready for a mountain bike ride later that day.

Bush "repeatedly" saying that he's comfortable is a tell that he's not comfortable, but he wants us to think he is. He wants us to think that his contemplative self portrait from the shower isn't guilty self reflection. He wants us to think that painting his feet in the bathtub isn't some kind of sign that he feels guilty for all the Iraq war veterans who lost their feet. His eagerness to assure us of his comfort is oddly reminiscent of how the God of the Bible seems really concerned that we might not believe in him.

I like to think that any human who lied his country into a $6 trillion dollar war that maimed and killed millions would have more pressing concerns than hamstrings. Either GW is bullshtiting us, or he really does worry about the persistent violence in Iraq. Maybe he does feel guilty about the millions of people whose lives were ruined by the war.

Or maybe he's just a sociopath.

"Much of my presidency was defined by things that you didn't necessarily want to have happen," he said.

I think I actually missed the guy.

He didn't necessarily want 9-11 to happen, but he didn't do much to stop it. In fact, he didn't listen to the people who were trying to warn him it would happen, having famously said to the CIA operative who gave him the daily briefing, on Aug 6, that Bin Laden was determined to strike inside the US: "You've covered your ass, now." He didn't necessarily want 9-11 to happen, but since the PNAC was saying we'd need a "new Pearl Harbor" to get involved in the middle east the way the neo-cons really wanted to, well, it was convenient.

GW Bush being greeted as a liberator, image via The Telegraph

And he didn't necessarily want a housing bubble that would ruin the world economy, but it's not like he did anything to stop it. He didn't necessarily want to ignore Afghanistan for most of a decade, or let Bin Laden get away from Tora Bora, or waste trillions rebuilding Iraq and making his war contractor friends rich, but, you know, he's comfortable with it.

He likewise reiterated his support for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, saying that he’s "confident the decisions were made the right way."

That's Bushian code for "we did exactly what we wanted to do and you guys can all suck it if you don''t like it."

"I’m comfortable with what I did," he said. "I’m comfortable with who I am."

I'm comfortable with letting him talk. After all, there's no better advertisement for voting for Democrats than this war mongering, veteran ignoring, economy destroying, upward redistributing hamstrung wingnut who, thank goodness, will probably keep talking until the day he dies, which, with any luck, will be a long time from now.

That's right, you just heard me wish GW Bush a long life. After all, if he died young, he wouldn't get to worry about his hamstrings, which must be torture.

Hate Group President Tony Perkins Wants Republicans to Stop Giving to the GOP and Give to Him Because He Really Hates The Gays

Hate Group Leader Tony Perkins, photo from CNN.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, whose past ties to white supremacists he still claims he knew nothing about, is not so evasively ashamed of his very public position that gay people are subhuman. In fact, he's so pissed the GOP isn't openly hating on the people who decided the 2012 Presidential election that he wants his fellow gay hating wingnuts to stop giving money to the GOP, and give it to him instead, so he can do their money justice by hating on people enough to get rated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

From The Hill:

Tony Perkins, in an email sent to his supporters, criticized the Republican National Committee over a report released last month that suggested the party should reconsider its messaging on same-sex marriage to appeal to younger voters.

"Until the RNC and the other national Republican organizations grow a backbone and start defending core principles, don’t send them a dime of your hard-earned money," Perkins said in the email, a copy of which was obtained by CNN.

"If you want to invest in the political process, and I encourage you to do so, give directly to candidates who reflect your values and organizations you trust — like FRC Action."

I'm tempted to send Perkins money just to encourage him to keep talking. Even the suggestion by Reince Priebus that maybe the GOP should keep on hating, but just not be so vocal and mean about it, is enough to set Perkins off into an intraparty equivalent of firing on Fort Sumter.

The uneasy alliance between Wall Street Whores and the Racist Christian Right, which has powered the GOP for decades, has never been more strained. The Wall Streeters have managed to rip off neo-confederate working class voters for decades without any populist retribution (they even managed to corporatize the supposedly populist tea party). But when the GOP, in its zeal to keep winning elections, realizes gay voters actually won the election for Obama, and that maybe they're going to have to be a little more accepting (eg, telling gay people they don't hate them, just their filthy lifestyles), that's a gay version of the Edmund Pettus Bridge too far.

Luckily, Tony's little hissy fit goes well beyond money. Yes, when Tony fires on Fort Sumter, he uses all his barrels, and he enlists his friends to fire too!

Thirteen social conservatives, representing various influential groups, wrote Priebus ahead of the RNC's quarterly meeting this week in Los Angeles to sternly rebuke the conclusions of a post-election report that advised Republican elected officials to adopt a softer tone toward social issues. 

"We respectfully warn GOP Leadership that an abandonment of its principles will necessarily result in the abandonment of our constituents to their support," concludes the letter, which was obtained by and independently verified by NBC News in advance of the meeting this week.

Tony Perkins appears before the Council of Conservative Citizens
Photo via Box Turtle Bulletin.

The election conscious members of the GOP still want to support their core principles of hating on people, they just want to be quiet and nicer about it. This, of course, isn't good enough for Tony. Unless you're out in front of the hate group with Tony, equating gay people with pedophiles, you're not supporting the GOP principles.

Since the GOP cannot afford to lose their hate group base, they're stuck with the very real possibility of a Huckabee or Santorum surge in the 2016 primaries [KTW will be betting on Huck if we get a new incarnation of Intrade in time] that will chase the Wall Street Whores out of the party* possibly for good, because even the most powerful Wall Streeters might not be able to control the kind of hate that these people could bring to the White House. And if there's one thing Wall Street hates, it's lack of control.


* Don't worry, money grubbers, there are plenty of Democrats willing to work The Street with you, which is why KTW supports the Daily Kos Motto "More and Better Democrats."

Rand Paul Bullshits Howard University Audience that Understands the History of US Civil Rights Much Better than He Does

Rand Paul Bullshitting at Howard U.
Image via Opposing Views.

Yesterday, the Great Steve Benen had the obligatory take down of Rand Paul, who gets my vote as Best New GOP Bullshitter.

The Republican senator told his Howard audience, "I've never wavered in my support for civil rights or the Civil Rights Act." He added, "I've never been against the Civil Rights Act, ever."

Steve says it's a lie, and he has the video to prove it. But to be more accurate, Paul doesn't care what's true or not. He's merely trying to convey a certain impression to whomever he's speaking at the time. In this case, at a traditionally black University, Paul doesn't want his audience to think that he ever thought that the Civil Rights Act should not have been passed. So, he just bullshits about it--says whatever he thinks makes him look best in that situation. Steve has the actual facts:

As a candidate for the U.S. Senate in 2010, Paul told the Louisville Courier-Journal he opposed the Civil Rights Act's ban on discrimination on the basis of race in "places of public accommodation" such as privately owned businesses that are open to the public. He said the same thing on NPR. 

When Paul appeared on "The Rachel Maddow Show," Rachel asked, as part of a discussion of the Civil Rights Act, "Do you think that a private business has the right to say we don't serve black people?" Paul replied, "Yes." 

It was consistent with his approach to federal civil rights law dating back to at least 2002. 

Now, in fairness, I should note that Paul, as a candidate in 2010, eventually reversed course and said the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was necessary and he would have voted for it. 

But notice again what he said at Howard: he's "never wavered" in his support for the Civil Rights Act and he's "never been against the Civil Rights Act, ever."

Rand Paul on the Rachel Maddow Show

Since what he said up until 2010 was anti-Civil Rights Act, I think he's bullshitting when he says he would have voted for it. But who knows? Maybe he really did change his mind. That's one of the biggest problems with being a bullshitter. No one can ever be sure what you really think.

Today Steve gets into the meat of Paul diving into one of my favorite wingnut latrine holes: that the Democrats are the racists. Like most Republicans who bring this up, Paul wants to stop history in 1964, when LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act that Paul opposed until it was inconvenient to do so. As anyone who wants to read about it knows, LBJ famously said that the Democrats would lose the south for a long time because of that. He was right. The racists in the Democratic party, known as the Dixiecrats, switched parties to vote for the slingers of a new style of Bullshit--The Southern Strategy.

Here's Steve summing it up nicely, because I've done it here before, and I'm sick of doing it:

The Democratic Party, in the first half of the 20th century, was home to two broad, competing constituencies -- southern whites with abhorrent views on race, and white progressives and African Americans in the north, who sought to advance the cause of civil rights. The party struggled with this conflict for years, before ultimately siding with an inclusive, liberal agenda. 

As the party shifted, the Democratic mainstream embraced its new role. Republicans, meanwhile, also changed. In the wake of Democratic President Lyndon Johnson signing the Civil Rights Act, the Republican Party welcomed the white supremacists who no longer felt comfortable in the Democratic Party. Indeed, in 1964, Republican presidential nominee Barry Goldwater boasted of his opposition to the Civil Rights Act, and made it part of his platform. 

It was right around this time when figures like Jesse Helms and Strom Thurmond made the transition -- leaving the progressive, diverse, tolerant Democratic Party for the GOP. 

In the years that followed, Democrats embraced their role as the party of inclusion and civil rights. Republicans, meanwhile, became the party of the "Southern Strategy," opposition to affirmative action, campaigns based on race-baiting, vote-caging, discriminatory voter-ID laws, and politicians like Helms and Thurmond. (A Republican congressman from Texas named Ron Paul also criticized Abraham Lincoln for waging the Civil War, while also opposing the Civil Rights Act.)

Ronald Reagan campaigning in Philadelphia MS.
Image credit.

Who knows if Rand Paul knows all this or not? Maybe he was stoned during his 20th Century American History Class. Maybe he didn't have to study history to become a self-accredited opthamologist. Maybe someone from Kentucky can get elected to the US Senate without knowing the history of the Civil Rights movement. But one sure as hell can't bullshit a Howard University audience on the subject, and the fact that he would even try tells me that he really doesn't give a damn about the truth, or black people, or anything else, really, except saying whatever he needs to say in order to become President.

And with that fact in mind, I'm really happy that this bullshitting wingnut apparently doesn't know how to shut up.

Rick Wiles Warns Obama about a Potential Infestation of Biblical (not just Ayn Randian) Parasites

Rick Wiles, Grifter

Right Wing Watch catches all the wingnut chatter that matters, like End Times Radio Grifter Rick Wiles' prolonged chat with Marvin Rosenthal of Zion’s Voice Ministry, who thinks President Obama is an unqualified, demon infested, Nimrod-like madman soon to be infested with parasites like King Herod.

First things first. Rosenthal has a problem with the qualifications of the Harvard educated constitutional lawyer, first black President of the Harvard Law review, Illinois State and US Senator who worked his way up to becoming the first black President of the US.

Wiles: Do you think that the current president, Mr. Barack Obama, is a pro-Islamic president? 

Rosenthal: Unfortunately I do. I guess I would take it farther than that. I am convinced from his childhood, where he was born, the family he was raised in, the mentors that he has had all the way on from childhood to the present have been preparing him for this day. If you want to talk about a man who was totally unqualified to become President of the United States, it is our present president. He had no credentials. It’s almost like having a guy perform heart surgery who never fixed a Band-Aid to a finger. He had no qualifications to be president and then to be re-elected.

I can't find a single case of Mr. Rosenthal suggesting that Sarah Palin had qualification problems, so I guess he figures her Witch Doctor could take care of any problems that arose from her inexperience. Rosenthal gets a bonus for sneaking in the little known probability that anyone born in Hawaii is automatically pro-Islam and unqualified to be President. But maybe he means Kenya.

Next, Mr. Rosenthal thinks the One World Government is possibly right around the corner (who knows, you'd better send him money so he can fight against it anyway!)...

I will tell you without fear of being found wrong, he is clearly under spiritual influence, not in the demise of this country but to diminish this country because he is pushing toward a one world government and a one world religion, which is exactly what Nimrod was doing back in the early chapters of Genesis. To establish a one world government and a one world religion he has to bring America down or we would never cooperate in a one world government, that is what his agenda really is and he’s moving it rapidly.

Nimrod! It's not every day you get to hear the name of that great grandson of an arc builder! Note the careful wording with "not in the demise of this country." Right. Obama is going to force a one world government and single religion (Satanism? Islam? Mormonism?) on us all, but that will only diminish us, not lead to our demise... Of course, Rosenthal can tell us this "without fear of being found wrong" because he can simply define "demise" as something as simple as, well, Obama probably thought about a One World Government once, and having a President who even thought such a thing for a split second demises our country. A little. Kinda.

Marvin Rosenthal, nut job

Way to go out on a limb with your prediction, there, Marvin. Guess I won't see you betting against me at the next incarnation of the Intrade prediction markets.

Wiles: I think he’s demon-possessed. 

Rosenthal: I would not find fault with that. I said he’s being influenced, under the control of—so if you say demon-possession I’m not saying I disagree.

Rosenthal's not saying he agrees Obama is possessed by demons, but he's not saying he disagrees. Maybe he thinks it's just Obama's clothes that are possessed.

Of course, this Nimrod keeps talking, but Rick Wiles manages to get his two cents in (it is his show, after all):

Wiles: He’s very frightening to me. I see him potentially as potentially the next in line after the long line of madmen from Stalin to Hitler, Mao Zedong; I think that is in him, that capacity to become a madman. He’s being restrained, I don’t know if he’ll ever be totally cut loose to do what is in his heart but I really believe he has the potential to be a madman who could bring great havoc in the world if he is allowed to carry out everything that he wants to do.

No, Godwin's Law has not been invoked, technically, because Obama is only double "potentially" (talk about hedging your bets!) a Hitler, Stalin, or Mao. Obama's inner madman is being restrained, which allows Wiles a convenient "out" to explain, 4 years from now, why Obama didn't become the totally horrible thing that he had the potential potential to be. I'm sure if you asked Mr. Wiles (who thinks God guided the hand of the make up artists on the History Channel's The Bible to reveal that Obama is really Satan) who was restraining History's Greatest Potential Monster, he'd tell you it's the Tea Party House of Representatives who God put there as a check on that pesky Satan.

The Wiles-Rosenthal bull session finally gets around to a full proof of Godwin's Law, which starts, as Godwin Law breakers almost always do, by making it clear that they are not saying Obama is Hitler, but...

Rosenthal: While I’m not saying, I want to make sure I’m clear, that he’s another Hitler, one of the things I would say is Adolf Hitler had the capacity to speak to multitudes of people and almost mesmerize them. I am seeing the same ability with our present president, he speaks to large portions of America and sometimes quite frankly I think when God was giving our brains some of them will say they thought it was trains and said I don’t want any because he mesmerizes great multitudes of America.

It’s almost to me, because he’s not that profound, he is not in my opinion that great a communicator although many people think it is, I think there is some kind of spiritual capability that is involved when he speaks to the multitudes and they listen spellbound. What amazes me is men from Harvard and Yale and Princeton, some of the leaders in the secular news media who are brilliant men and I know they are liberal and leftists but he goes way beyond that and they’re enamored by this guy, it’s almost like there are blindfolds over they eyes as to where he’s leading us, far beyond what most of them would like. 

Wiles: And they openly deify him. 

Rosenthal: Yes they do. It’s amazing and I think it is Satanic. 

Wiles: I do too. Mr. Obama never rebukes them for it. I’ve tried to warn him, Mr. Obama, letting your people deify you is going to get you in a lot of trouble. The last person that did that in the Bible got filled up with worms when he would not stop the people from deifying him. I think the guy is headed for a bad infestation of parasites.

Satan, image via The Political Cat

I'm not sure what the equivalent of Godwin's law is for the inevitable comparison to Satan (Church Lady's Law?), but these two manage to get there as fast as AM radio waves can bounce off the ionosphere. I could find no such terrible haste to label Dick "Deficits Don't Matter" Cheney, who's responsible for the $6 trillion Iraq war that killed and maimed millions, Satanic. But, you know, I'm such a nit picker.

The really interesting thing here is that this argument could be used to justify another nimrod dumbass President who's speaking abilities are a little less Reaganesque, and a lot more GW Bushian. So far, though, I can find no evidence that they support Palin for President. Maybe if they keep talking they'll convince Mike Huckabee to take on the Devil and his Golden Fiddle.

All Men Are Created Equal, Endowed by Their Creator--Stop Right There! I Gotta Know Right Now.

Ken Cuccinelli, Roanoke Free Press

TPMDC has the story of a Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli speech in 2009 where he was all up in that Natural Law.

“We are a natural law country and we have the greatest foundation in the history of the world. And the one sentence you all know, ‘we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, endowed by their Creator’ — and I’m gonna stop right there. That sentence, Dr. Martin Luther King called that our national creed. I think that is a great title for that sentence. It is the foundation in my view, it’s the vision statement for America. And the foundation of that foundation is endowed by their Creator. And if we disconnect from that, we don’t have a rational basis to defend the foundation that we’ve got.”

Cuccinelli is a smart guy. He got a  J.D. George Mason Law, and an M.A. in International Commerce and Policy from George Mason. I'm pretty sure he's had a few American History courses, and he probably did well. So when he talks about "all men created equal" and puts MLK in there, he knows damn well he's overlooking the fact that when those old, white, Deist slave owners* wrote that constitution, Martin Luther King would not  have been considered "equal."

So, right off the bat, he knows that our definition of natural law changes. Being a Virginia Republican, Cuccinelli is trapped hunting for votes from some pretty serious neo-confederates. But Virginia's a pretty purple state. So if he wants to be Governor, he's got to throw some double BS out there, where he makes himself not seem like a racist because he mentions MLK, but he hits that dog whistle for the good old boys, that whole "those other people aren't equal" thing. Just replace black people with gay people.

Gotta be hatin' on somebody.

Remember, Lee Atwater, one of the best southern strategists, noted that you had to speak in code. You had to get all abstract, because just coming right out and saying "nigger" like you could back in the day would backfire on you.

So, to get all abstract with this "natural law" thing, he conflates the Declaration of Independence with the Constitution. The Constitution has no mention of God. The constitutional concept of natural law comes mainly from the ninth amendment which suggests we naturally have more rights than any constitution could ever list. No doubt he was awake at George Mason. He would have learned this basic fact.

The anti-federalists, ironically, were the ones who wanted the Bill of Rights, as a way to limit federal power. And the very first amendment that those old, white, Deist slave owners wrote says that Ken Cuccinelli needs to rethink this whole idea of forcing what you think is "natural law" on the rest of us.

* To be fair, Michele Bachmann (still waiting for a really good quote, Congresswoman) was right, John Jay, a founding father, did fight tirelessly against slavery, so they weren't all slave owners.

Louie Gohmert's Slippery Slope to Forcing Churches to Hire Cross-Dressing, Satan-Worshiping, Animal Rapers

Louie Gohmert is a Congressman!
No, really!

According to Louis Gohmert, once you draw a line on the number of rounds a magazine can hold, nothing's stopping the government from forcing churches to hire cross-dressing, Satan-worshiping animal rapers.

No, really.

In fact, I had this discussion with some wonderful, caring Democrats earlier this week on the issue of, well, they said "surely you could agree to limit the number of rounds in a magazine, couldn't you? How would that be problematic?"

[...] 

And I pointed out, well, once you make it ten, then why would you draw the line at ten? What's wrong with nine? Or eleven? And the problem is once you draw that limit ; it's kind of like marriage when you say it's not a man and a woman any more, then why not have three men and one woman, or four women and one man, or why not somebody has a love for an animal?

71.7% of TX-1's voters sent Gohmert to Congress.

My favorite bit is "wonderful, caring, Democrats." This is Louie doing his best to speak nicely of the people he hates, the people he thinks are going to lead us all to forced bestiality. Maybe as he starts to flap his gums, some little recess of his brain tells him he should love the sinners, but as he gets his mouth warmed up, the connection with that part of his brain short circuits, the gate opens, and away they go.

And as his disjointed thoughts race down the home stretch, they inevitably latch on to "Obamacare" which, of course, is going to force people to abandon their religious beliefs.

No, really.

You need to educate yourselves on the issues. You need to understand that when there is a law being pushed, as it has for several years, that says that religious institutions should not be exempt from discrimination laws, that it is going to devastate the church, the synagogue, the places of worship that hire people because ultimately they're saying you have to hire whatever Satan-worshiper, whatever cross-dresser you think might be immoral, that's against your religious belief.  You are going to be forced to abandon your religious beliefs, and we've been seeing that with some of the requirements under Obamacare.

Your Church will be forced to hire this man! Via Wonkette.

It's hard to get a handle on just how nuts Louie Gohmert is, so it's best to use a comparison. KTW posted on Rep. Don Young's recent revival of Operation Wetback. Young's wingnutty enough to get his own post here, but even Young couldn't help but laugh at the lunacy that 71.7% of TX-1 voters thought was an accurate representation of their interests in congress (note, that this suggests some of those voters are actually crazier than Louie Gohmert).

During a meeting of the House Natural Resources committee Gohmert said that the warmth created as oil makes its way through the pipeline gets caribou ready for some hot and heavy behavior in the region. 

According to Gohmert: 

“So when they want to go on a date, they invite each other to head over to the pipeline. So my real concern now … if oil stops running through the pipeline … do we need a study to see how adversely the caribou would be affected if that warm oil ever quit flowing?” 

The Washington Post calls the representatives call for action a “faux concern” and it apparently led fellow GOP Rep. Don Young of Alaska stifling his own laughter while stating: 

“I’m not sure it’s warmth of the pipeline.”

The fact that Young said he's "not sure" tells you how crazy Don Young is, and yet even he couldn't deal with the east Texas hot sauce of hilarity that is Louie Gohmert.

So Many Wingnuts, So Little Time

At least anti-christ ranks at the bottom.

The results of Public Policy Polling's national conspiracy theory poll were posted yesterday, and never have the wingnuts said so much by answering yes, no, or maybe. While plenty of Democrats believed some crazy stuff, the trophy for believing the unbelievable goes to the Republicans in the poll.

At the top of the list, we have yet another point of reference that makes me miss Intrade.

37% of voters believe global warming is a hoax, 51% do not. Republicans say global warming is a hoax by a 58-25 margin, Democrats disagree 11-77, and Independents are more split at  41-51. 61% of Romney voters believe global warming is a hoax.

Fifty-eight percent of Republicans believe global warming is a hoax. This is astounding. They're not saying, oh, it's happening but it's natural, or it's the sun, or whatever. They're saying that a world-wide consensus of top scientists are conspiring to tell us something that is obviously happening is not, just so they can have the black helicopters come take their SUVs. Or something.

Intrade had a whole host of climate markets, from monthly, annual, and multi-annual global temperature anomalies, to last named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, to minimum arctic sea ice extent, and much more. The volume was pretty low in those markets, and it was often hard to find people to bet the conspiracy side of things, but a bet's a bet, and I was surprised at how few takers there are.

I was trying to round up more of these hoaxters to put their money where their conspiracy minded mouths are. Maybe if Intrade does manage to recover from their recent problems and return, I'll be able to coax some of these ignorant fools into putting a few bucks on their theory.

Keep talking, wingnut! Image credit. 

The wingnuttery continues!

13% of voters think Barack Obama is the anti-Christ, including 22% of Romney voters.

This is more proof of ThomasD's theory that fundamentalists have a problem with parables. That is, if you think there is any allegory in Revelations at all. Frankly, I think it's the ravings of a nut case who was just trying to scare ignorant people into becoming Christians. Pretty impressive ravings, though, considering that even in this modern age, 13% of Americans not only believe it, but think the President is one of the main characters in this never ending fairy tale.

And, finally, proof that although they tend to deny they supported the war now, or that the war was a good idea, or whatever, we find that, if asked in a poll where no one will know who they are, the Republican love for W hasn't really diminished at all. I'm guessing that a great many of the people who supported the $6.2 trillion Iraq war will go to their graves thinking they were right.

Voters are split 44%-45% on whether Bush intentionally misled about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. 72% of Democrats think Bush lied about WMDs, Independents agree 48-45, just 13% of Republicans think so.

Considering the other crazy shit that Republicans revealed about themselves in this poll, I'm surprised that 13% of Republicans think Bush lied us into Iraq. They must be RINOs.

Same Old Rusty Dog Whistles Dripping with Centuries Old Spit

GOP Rep Lou Barletta, via That's My Congress

Just days after GOP Rep. Don Young of the great white north kicked off the latest incarnation of Operation Wetback, Rep Lou Barletta, a GOP congressman from the Pennsylvania section of Upper Appalachia, might have accidentally stumbled into saying something stupid about immigration:

“Let’s not take on any more water on this sinking ship,” he said. “Let’s patch the holes. Then we’ll decide what do we do with all this water that’s here.”

I don't have any evidence that he accidentally said this, though. He might be getting his soggy talking points from the Great GOP Fax of the Universe, in which case this is the same old dog whistle they've been blowing for decades. It's the same dog whistle that got the first marijuana laws passed. It's the same dog whistle Eisenhower used to round 'em up and send 'em home. The odds may be good that this wingnut (with a distinctly immigrant sounding name) might have some kind of history of being anti-immigrant. Who knows? Probably best not to mention it.

Maybe the New York Times doesn't have access to Google. That would explain why the reporter of this latest story on the GOP's obsession with dampness couldn't find basic facts like Rep. Barletta's lack of basic facts.

When the law passed, Barletta told the Washington Post, "I will get rid of the illegal people. It's this simple: They must leave." On the day the city passed the measure, Barletta wore a bulletproof vest to illustrate his concern over crimes he said were being committed by undocumented immigrants. Statistics, however, showed that undocumented immigrants were hardly responsible for a crime wave in Hazelton: the city's data showed that of 8,575 felonies committed in the city between 2000 and 2007, 20 had been linked to undocumented immigrants. Later, forced to admit that he had no proof of an illegal immigrant-caused crime wave, or proof that illegal immigrants were crowding Hazleton's schools and hospitals, or even any idea how many illegal immigrants were in Hazelton, Barletta responded, "The people in my city don't need numbers."

Apparently the people in his congressional district don't need numbers, either, since they decided to send this Bullshitting Wingnut to congress. Or, maybe he's just a nice guy with something important to add to the conversation on immigration and race. I can't really decide which, so I guess I should be nice, and just say it's "a gaffe." Too bad some New York Times reporter doesn't go keep him talking; we might find out what he really thinks.