September 26, 2013

today our hr dept. sent out a notice

Saying the ACA requires everyone to have health insurance and an explanation of how to get help if you cant afford it. Ted Cruz can shit and piss himself in public while reading children's books until Jesus returns. But guess what? This is real. We did it!

September 25, 2013

forget the issue itself. ted cruz spent 21 hours railing against something

presumably pissing and shitting in a diaper only to turn around and vote for that something. That is crazy with a capital K. That isnt Rand Paul my ideas are crazy. That is crazy crazy. I have a theory he is actually some Greenwich Village performance artist painting his masterpiece.

September 22, 2013

The GOP's existential threat: Texas Democrats fired up and organizing on a level like never before

I just got back from a tri- county meeting where we signed up activists where we haven't had precinct chairs in 20 years. We are getting our data together and our asses in gear. As Paul Begala said texas is not a red state. It is a non voting state. We are changing that precinct by precinct. And when Texas Turns blue you will not see a Republican president for a generation.

Viva Wendy

September 20, 2013

town fights white supremacy takover

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/north-dakota-town-combats-white-supremacist-takeover-with-legal-defense-fund

September 19, 2013

The new iPhone

Once again some will stand in line longer than the rest of us to pay significantly more for a gadget than anyone ever will.

Why?

September 18, 2013

UN Data Points to Assad's Forces

The inspectors, instructed to investigate the attack but not to assign blame, nonetheless listed the precise compass directions of flight for two rocket strikes that appeared to lead back toward the government’s elite redoubt in Damascus, Mount Qasioun, which overlooks and protects neighborhoods and Mr. Assad’s presidential palace and where his Republican Guard and the army’s powerful Fourth Division are entrenched.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2013/09/18/world/middleeast/un-data-on-gas-attack-points-to-assads-top-forces.html?from=homepage

September 8, 2013

The New Yorker: Crossing the Line

Early in 1987, Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi President, decided to clear out scores of Kurdish villages, in order to undermine separatist rebels. He asked Ali Hassan al-Majid, a general and a first cousin, to lead the project. In tape recordings later produced by Iraqi prosecutors, Majid told Baath Party colleagues that the novelty and the terror of chemical weapons would “threaten” the Kurds and “motivate them to surrender.” On April 16th of that year, Iraq became the first nation ever to drop gas bombs on its own citizens; the gassing campaign lasted two years and killed thousands of people. “I will kill them all with chemical weapons!” Majid told his colleagues. “Who is going to say anything? The international community? Fuck them! The international community and those who listen to them!”...

...International laws and informal warnings of retaliation are designed to dissuade dictators and terrorists from using weapons of mass destruction under any circumstances. A failure to enforce such norms in Syria would likely lower the threshold for chemical use in this and future wars. Obama’s deliberateness about military action in Syria is understandable. The consequences of intervention may be difficult to control; the Syrian opposition is fractured and influenced by jihadi fighters. As Iraq has shown, the public requires transparency, accountability, and democratic deliberation when war crimes become a basis for more war.

In Iraq, starting in 2006, Chemical Ali went on trial for mass murder and other crimes against humanity. The proceedings were undeniably flawed. Yet they put Majid’s murderous arrogance on full display to his countrymen, and guaranteed that the record of his guilt can never be obscured. He was hanged in 2010. The prospect of even such rough justice for Syria’s chemical bombers looks elusive. Yet Obama’s original instincts were sound. There are red lines even in a war as devoid of clarity as Syria’s. The best available evidence is that on August 21st Bashar al-Assad’s forces crossed to the other side. ?

http://www.newyorker.com/talk/comment/2013/09/09/130909taco_talk_coll

September 8, 2013

For those saying Obama would be a war criminal for attacking Syria and should be impeached

and maybe even sent to the Hague, have you actually watched what it is that has him advocating military action against the Assad regime? You want to see a war crime? This is a war crime. This the torture-murder of children. Whether you support military action or have your doubts (like me) or out right oppose it, you need to put this into context. Calling Obama a war criminal when he wants (whether or not you agree with his tactics) to stop THIS, I mean come on we can disagree about what he wants to do but war crimes are what he is trying to stop.

Warning, graphic link to CNN.com:

http://www.cnn.com/video/data/2.0/video/politics/2013/09/07/nr-vo-tapper-classified-congress-syria.cnn.html

September 8, 2013

Crazy Right Wing Crazy Motherfucker Charles Krauthammer twists Gen. Dempsey's Words

The White House’s top military officer can tell you his objective in Syria just fine

"My colleague Charles Krauthammer believes it’s not worth intervening in Syria unless we actually intend to weaken Assad’s regime and help the rebels win. That’s a reasonable argument, though it does raise the question, “What if the rebels actually win?” No one who’s read C.J. Chivers’s horrifying report from the front lines can feel very comfortable with that prospect, either."

I, Arely Staircase, agree. I am not advocating US intervention for that reason (though I thin k the administration is making a much better case now and should they decide to hit Assad with some cruise missiles, I hope they get the bastard himself. But here is the interesting point on the Krauthammer bullshit..

"For better or worse, the administration does have an articulated goal in Syria: Punish Assad’s use of chemical weapons with strikes that will deter future tyrants from following his example. At times, the administration also argues that those strikes — which will focus on Assad’s military infrastructure — will degrade Assad’s capabilities just enough to push him toward the negotiating table. That might be too little, or too muddled, of a mission for Krauthammer. I think the kind of calibration that requires merits quite a bit of skepticism. But being skeptical of the articulated mission is different than there being no articulated mission. Dempsey is perfectly clear on what’s been asked of him."

So, good bullshit call on the bullshitter Krauthammer and his bullshit.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/09/06/the-white-houses-top-military-officer-can-tell-you-his-objective-in-syria-just-fine/

September 8, 2013

Holy Crap, I step away from DU for a week and

wow. The people who never liked Obama have cranked it up to a full blown shit fit of hate. He and Kerry are liars and the only debate is how early it should have been obvious to everyone. Calls for impeachment and just fucking outright insanity. I will say the "he has lost my trust" postings from people who have been dumping on him since 08 are kind of amusing.

But my God. What a fucking loony bin.