Tag Archives: Republican Crazy

Newt vs. Newt

Newt Gingrich gives the perfect example of what happens when you’re reflexively anti-Obama.

Earlier this month, former Speaker of the House and current presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich was hammering President Obama for not intervening in Libya. Asked, “what would you do about Libya?” Gingrich responded:

Exercise a no-fly zone this evening. … We don’t need to have the United Nations. All we have to say is that we think that slaughtering your own citizens is unacceptable and that we’re intervening.

On yesterday’s Today Show, he had a new position.

GINGRICH: The standard [Obama] has fallen back to of humanitarian intervention could apply to Sudan, to North Korea, to Zimbabwe, to Syria this week, to Yemen, to Bahrain. … The Arab League wanted us to do something. The minute we did something, the Arab League began criticizing us doing it. I think that two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is a lot. I think that the problems we have in Pakistan, Egypt — go around the region. We could get engaged by this standard in all sorts of places. I would not have intervened. I think there were a lot of other ways to affect Qaddafi. I think there are a lot of other allies in the region we could have worked with. I would not have used American and European forces.

Newt Gingrich has a really good shot at becoming the GOP presidential nominee. He benefits from a reputation as a supposed conservative intellectual and 90s nostalgia, despite being completely ridiculous. That says a lot about the weakness of the GOP field.

Newt keeps trying to clarify but his position is about as clear as mud.

Update on Sussex County GOP

It seems that the Ron Sams resignation is music to the ears of the teabaggers. But these folks aren’t done.

Last week, Cape School Board member and 9/12 “Patriot” Sandi Minard, published a letter calling Sams a liar concerning the need to move the February and March meetings of the Sussex GOP. Our friends at DP published Sams’ response.

But the Fatman has better advice for his fellow teabaggers. He’s advocating that those who oppose Sams form their own county GOP committee and elect their own slate of delegates and go to the convention demanding that they be seated.

Hey Curley, you’re not the Mississippi Freedom Democrats. They stood for equality! Your group is a bunch of disgruntled would-be domestic terrorists“patriots” following a 330-pound mental midget.

Sheriff Jeff Wants to Be Supercop

Today was the day that Sussex County Sheriff Jeff “Supercop” Christopher (Teabag-Sussex) made his initial presentation to the County Council. Prior to this morning’s meeting, Supercop had never spoken to the Council, although he has accused them in emails to the 9/12 “Patriots” of blocking his agenda.

I knew the day would start off well as I met Skippertee and Aoine for breakfast. Skipper, being from Newark, looked every bit the Sussex Countian, wearing his pants with a belt and suspenders and doffing a trucker’s cap. The meeting started with a recitation of the Lord’s Prayer (sorry, I don’t know this one) and then the Pledge of Allegiance.

When it came time to make his presentation, Supercop started by saying that his emails had been misunderstood. And then he launched into his spiel.

Sussex County sheriff’s deputies should have the training to act when they see crimes in progress, the newly elected sheriff argued Tuesday, raising the specter of gangs, illegal immigration, home invasions and robberies.

This sounded very familiar. Seems Supercop’s old boss, former Sussex Sheriff Bob Reed, raised the same spectre of gangs and illegals when he asked Council for permission to put lights on his department’s vehicles. Reed was denied.

Supercop denies he wants to create a countywide police force, yet everything he’s asking for, from upgraded guns, lights and striping on his cars, and law enforcement training, flies in the face of this. In fact, Councilmen Vance Phillips and George Cole called Supercop on this. Both told him to “be honest about what you want and stop dancing around the issue.” Supercop was taken aback by this statement from his fellow Republicans.

Supercop asked for 3 additional positions in his office, with one position specifically charged with crime prevention.

Christopher said he wants to partner with other law enforcement agencies to focus on crime prevention and outreach.

He said home invasions, thefts, crimes against the elderly, scams and fraud are all on the rise. “With more retirees moving here, this is going to be an epidemic if we don’t step in and take some sort of action,” he said.

The problem here is that none of the county’s police agencies want to partner with him. Supercop could not produce any supporting statement from any of Sussex County’s police chiefs or the Delaware State Patrol to support his position.

Even though he sent out a mass email to his cohort, only about 49 people were at the meeting, and many of them were county employees there to make presentations to the Council. Of the ten people who signed up to speak to Council, nine were teabaggers who supported Christopher (Supercop himself had to sign up to speak again in support of his position.

Leading the charge was St. Bodie Girl. Sans his white high heels (he had on a pair of sensible brown flats), Bodie shared a story about how at last night’s Sussex County GOP meeting, he and Chris Weeks had been appointed as Sergeant’s at Arms “in case something happened during the meeting.” And according to him, “someone approached the podium after the meeting. He looked drunk or brain dead. I was so glad that Sheriff Christopher was there in uniform and with his gun. We need a sheriff who looks like a sheriff.” Hmm, I wonder how St. Bodie Girl could determine either of these. And of course, he didn’t say what this person was doing that alarmed him and Weeks. And what does a sheriff actually look like? When I hear “sheriff” I think of Andy Taylor and Barney Fife. Bodie went on to tweak the Council for giving grants out to community groups and towns, saying it was “nice that you’re giving our money to private entities – why don’t you give it to the sheriff?” And being the constitutional scholar that he is (NOT!), he and another speaker cited Title 15 of the Delaware Constitution that states that sheriffs and chancellors are the supreme law enforcement people in each county. “Giving the sheriff what he wants would solve the problems in our state, nation and world. It will stop us from falling into the abyss.”

OMG. Not letting Supercop and his deputies patrol the county is going to cause the entire world to go to Hell in a handbasket. Sweet Jebus.

Supercop also claimed that by not making his deputies full law enforcement officers and sending them to the police academy, the County was opening itself up to liability lawsuits. As the final speaker pointed out, the Delaware Code and decisions by the Attorney General from 2000 specifically proscribe sheriff’s deputies from being law enforcement officers in the State.

Between the cries of “we the people” voted for this and “we know what the Constitution says,” reasonable voices could be heard. Councilman Cole asked one speaker if he knew how much it would cost to deploy a countywide law enforcement agency. Nope. Did the speaker know that the County funds 40 additional State Troopers to patrol the county? Nope.

A few people, including Supercop, complained about DSP response times, claiming that having deputies as law enforcement would speed up response times to crime scenes. “My deputies go into neighborhoods where DSP won’t go.” Again, he could offer no evidence. Cole shot down Supercop’s argument, stating that deputies would not be sitting around in any neighborhood waiting for something to happen. And of course, we heard from the Chicken Little brigade who claim that illegal aliens, gangs, and druggies are overrunning the county.

After the meeting, one of the “patriots” approached the final speaker (the only sane person who spoke) and challenged their take on Delaware Code. He told this person that “other states have sheriffs that are law enforcement.” Well, dear boy, this is Delaware, not Virginia, not Maryland. If you want that type of protection, move back to Fairfax County (which is where he was from). And lest we forget, here is how some Maryland sheriff’s deputies operate.

In the end, it was much ado about nothing. No great cry from “we the people,” supporting Supercop (he could only muster 9 supporters from the thousands of teabaggers in Sussex who got his email). And until he makes a budget presentation, Council won’t act on anything. My read on the council is that Supercop’s request will be denied.

Sussex County GOP Chair Resigns

Sussex County GOP Chair Ron Sams has resigned.

Sussex County Republican Chairman Ron Sams announced during a meeting of the party’s executive committee tonight he was resigning in May.

Elbert Collins, of Laurel, whose wife works on the election committee, was at the meeting where the announcement was made.

“Ron simply gave a speech, indicated that he has spent sometime in Alabama, out of the area for a while. Through that and the controversy that went on in his absence he decided that it was best that he step down and that he was going to convention,” Collins said.

His vice chair Bryan Shupe also announced that he was stepping down, but cited family issues, Collins said.

In February the executive committee passed a resolution asking Sams to resign.

Collins said no one seemed surprised with the announcement.

So it looks as though the pitchfork and torches crowd led by the Fatman have won. As Bette Davis once said “Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy night.”

This Is Not A Godwin’s Law Violation

It’s not a Godwin’s Law violation to compare someone to Hitler if they praise Hitler is it? A state senator in New Hampshire had an interesting conversation with a constituent advocating for mental health funding:

In light of this huge wave of cuts, Sharon Omand, a community health care center manager and resident of Stafford, New Hampshire, called her state senator Martin Harty (R) recently to request more funding for community mental health programs and for the homeless. Omand was shocked by Harty’s response. The state senator told her “the world is too populated” and that there are too many “defective people.” When Omand asked what should be done with these “defective people” that are mentally ill, Harty suggested sending them to Siberia, something that he said Hitler was “right” to do:

Barrington Republican Martin Harty told Sharon Omand, a Strafford resident who manages a community mental health program, that “the world is too populated” and there are “too many defective people,” according to an e-mail account of the conversation by Omand. […]

Harty confirmed to the Monitor that he made the comments to Omand. […]

Omand says Harty then stated, “I wish we had a Siberia so we could ship them all off to freeze to death and die and clean up the population.” Omand said Harty appeared to be serious. After Omand responded that his idea sounded like what Adolf Hitler did in World War II, Omand said Harty responded, “Hitler did something right, and I agree with (it).”

When the GOP Speaker of the House in New Hampshire was asked about these statements, he said this:

Harty has not apologized for making his comments. Republican State House Speaker William O’Brien said that “at Harty’s age [90 years old], he has earned the right to say what he thinks, but ‘he needs to appreciate that as a representative, he will be held to a higher standard.’”

It was actually Stalin that sent people to Siberia but the phrase “Hitler did something right and I agree with” is not a phrase that should be uttered by anyone, anywhere. It felt dirty just to type it.

As criticisms go, that’s weak. O’Brien thinks that when you’re 90 you’ve apparently earned the right to praise Hitler and advocate for eugenics, but you really shouldn’t. Just to remind you – the Holocaust Museum killer James Von Brunn was 88 when he took a weapon to the museum and killed a museum guard.

Metaphor Misfire: Rand Paul Edition

Senator Rand Paul, yesterday:

“I think there should be some self-examination from the administration on the idea that you favor a woman’s right to an abortion, but you don’t favor a woman or a man’s right to choose what kind of light bulb, what kind of dishwasher, what kind of washing machine…We have to flush the toilet 10 times before it works. I’ve been waiting for 20 years to talk about how bad these toilets are and this was a good excuse today.”

I’ve looked and looked and for the life of me I can’t find the law mandating a 24-hour waiting period before you can purchase a toilet. I also couldn’t find the law requiring a mandatory sonogram before using the toilet. Perhaps someone can point me in the right direction.

He added (in case you’re not skeeved out enough):

“We have to flush the toilet 10 times before it works,” Paul said. “I’ve been waiting for 20 years to talk about how bad these toilets are and this was a good excuse today.”

Dude, TMI. Perhaps he should change his diet?

Perhaps Huckabee Should Stop Talking?

Have you ever heard of the first rule of digging holes? The rule states that if you find yourself in a hole – stop digging. Mike Huckabee should study this rule. He’s been on a rampage of silliness lately. He talked about Obama’s childhood in Kenya (false), learning from his grandfather and father (false) to hate British colonialism (Huckabee is pro-British imperialism?). Then he clarified that he meant Indonesia (the Indonesian Mau Mau rebellion) but Obama is still anti-American. Now he has a new target:

In a radio appearance on Monday, Mike Huckabee attacked actress Natalie Portman for having a child “out of wedlock.” Huckabee said that it’s “troubling” to see people like “Natalie Portman or some other Hollywood starlet who boasts of, ‘Hey look, you know, we’re having children, we’re not married, but we’re having these children, and they’re doing just fine.'” Huckabee added that “it’s unfortunate that we glorify and glamorize the idea of out of children wedlock.”  

Huckabee’s remarks came in response to radio host Michael Medved, who discussed Portman’s Academy Awards speech last Sunday. During her speech, Portman thanked fiancé Benjamin Millepied, “who choreographed the film, and has now given me my most important role of my life.” Medved said that Millepied “didn’t give her the most wonderful gift, which would be a wedding ring! And it just seems to me that sending that kind of message is problematic.”

Yep, that little lady should get married and go back into the kitchen, the slut. Thanks, Mike Huckabee, for reminding everyone you’re just another theocratic culture warrior.

Paranoia, Delaware Style

I ran across this little item in yesterday’s News Journal:

Buried deep in an electronic newsletter issued Saturday by the conservative 9-12 Delaware Patriots was an item letting people know about an emergency preparedness workshop next month in Dover.

“Are you prepared to cope with empty stores within hours of the proclamation of a general emergency?” asked the item. It was nestled between a link to a blog on how ABC News wonders if “Obama is Creating State-Run Media” and dates for upcoming deadlines for those interested in running for school boards.

Little else was said other than, “this is going to be very informative, and with all the recent events unfolding, this is one workshop you don’t want to miss!”

If you are curious about preparing for an emergency, make sure to be at the March 19 workshop, which starts at noon at the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints at 237 Lebanon Road, slightly west of the intersection of Old Mill Road.

So, what do you think they’re selling? Gold coins? Survival seeds? Glenn Beck’s 100-yr plan? Perhaps we should all attend, since we’ve already heard that the Rapture is actually happening this May, we need to be prepared for all those John Galts to be raptured.

Really, I Have No Idea Why People Make Fun Of Libertarians

Ron Paul was a big hit at this year’s CPAC convention and he really brought the house down with his speech. He has, well, an interesting proposal.

A lot of Republicans running for president (or “maybe running for president”) these days are trying to reach out to the Libertarian wing of the party, whose fiscal views have come to dominate the tea party movement. But Paul made it clear how far the Mitt Romneys and Tim Pawlentys of the world will have to go before they really talk like a libertarian. Where they’re talking about small government and shrunken entitlements, Paul’s suggesting young people be allowed to walk away from the government entirely. His proposed deal works like this: you pay the government 10% of your income (presumably to protect your borders and such) and you promise you’ll never take advantage of a government service for the rest of your life.

Can we make sure that these opt-liters don’t use our roads, our sewers and our electrical grids? How would this work at all in practice? Would the opt-Lugers wear special badges or something so police know not to help them and ambulances can ignore them. I suppose they could go live in a cabin in Idaho or something.

Also, apparently conservatives have found their love of trains. The Atlas Shrugged, Part 1 of 3 (no I’m not kidding, supposedly there’s 3 movies total) was a big hit at CPAC.

I’m sure you’re all saving your money already to go see this.

How the World Sees Us

…at least via our right wingnut crazies.

This hit my mailbox ALOT over the past few days, and I cringed every time I saw it: Middle East unrest according to Glenn Beck and friends. The Guardian rounds up a the crazy, the stupid and the dangerous of the Wingnut-o-Sphere, and you should go over there to see it all. They’ve got audio and video clips as well as transcripts that they react to, this one on Glenn Beck’s (who thinks that Tunisia is our “Archduke Ferdinand moment”)new theory of the apocalypse:

To cut to the chase, a new caliphate will emerge in the Middle East and push further east until China, as Beck puts it, says “Knock it off guys” and takes over India, reaching some way into Pakistan. The caliphate will then push north, which is when it will absorb the UK:

What happens to the overwhelming radical population of the UK, of radical Islamicists. What happens? Do they just sit around on their hands or do they see an opportunity? When you take the Marxists and you combine them with the radical in Islam the whole world begins to implode

So there you have it, an “Archduke Ferdinand moment” which will split Europe, the Middle East and Asia into Chinese and radical Islamic zones. In the full Beck, he also introduces Bill Ayers (who Sarah Palin had in mind when she accused Barack Obama of “palling around with terrorists”), Hizbullah and Code Pink, a feminist antiwar group. But that’s enough for now.

Fox Noise seems to want to blame the ACA for the Egyptian uprising; Michael Savage repeats his bullshit about Obama being a part of radical Islam; Frank Gaffney claiming that the Muslim Brotherhood is already in the US government; and, of course, the chief idiot himself, Bill O’Reilly getting his OG conspiracies on by reaching back and dusting off the Domino Theory. Most appalling is this one, with a fake JFK voice calling for the impeachment of Obama:

It is appalling enough that these fools are making ALOT of money fearmongering and lying to their audiences without having the rest of the world judging us on the sheer prevalence of this kind of bullshit on our airwaves. The ironic thing is, that one of the persistent themes of these fraudsters is that somehow the world is losing respect for the US. If that it true, then these guys will need to answer for some of it.

Michelle Obama Is Trying To Kill You

Don’t be fooled by Michelle Obama’s benign-sounding “Get Moving” campaign. It’s not actually about childhood obesity and health. It’s a nefarious plot to kill you. Thanks to Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller for revealing this terrible truth.

WHEN THE ‘BLAME OBAMA FIRST’ CROWD GOES OVERBOARD…. Visitors to the Daily Caller’s website today were greeted with a remarkable headline: “First Lady’s Anti-Obesity Campaign Could Be Causing More Pedestrian Deaths.” The accompanying piece was entirely serious.

Pedestrian deaths increased sharply during the first half of 2010, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA). On Wednesday, the Executive Director of the GHSA accused the first lady’s obesity program of causing the deaths by encouraging people to exercise.

In an interview with the Washington Examiner, GHSA Executive Director Barbara Harsha said that while there are not yet definitive answers as to why there were more pedestrian deaths in 2010 than 2009, Obama’s “get moving” movement could be at least partially to blame.

“There’s an emphasis these days to getting fit, and I think people doing that are more exposed to risk [of getting hit by a vehicle],” Harsha told the Examiner. “Obviously, further study is needed.”

Harsha also said electronic devices such as cell phones and iPods
could have contributed to the higher death rate.

By the way, this “sharp increase” in pedestrian deaths is from 1,884 to 1,891. That’s a statistically insignificant increase of 0.4%.

Republicans’ Big Day

Yesterday was the new GOP House of Representatives big day. It was the first session of Congress and they were going to put their stamp on the 112th Congress. They started by reading a redacted version of the Constitution (the King George version had too many icky parts). Apparently this was so boring few even bothered to stay and listen to the whole thing. The only bit of excitement came when a birther interrupted the reading of Article II, Section I (the natural born citizen part). This charming birther shouted:

Except Obama! Except Obama! Help us Jesus!

Of course this birther keeps an interesting website.

Since we had an outbreak of birtherism, Weeper of the House John Boehner was asked about the subject in his first press conference. He said that he thinks that Obama was born in Hawai’i but can’t tell others what to think. Yes, facts are something to be believed or not depending on whether they’re convenient or not.

It only took a couple of hours before the GOP violated the Constitution. Two Congressman missed the swearing in, but voted anyway. This puts the GOP’s top priority “Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act” in jeopardy, since one of them voted illegally in the Rules Committee. Speaking of inconvenient facts, the CBO scored H.R. 2 “Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act” as costing $230 Billion over 10 years. Since this was an inconvenient fact, John Boehner said “the CBO is entitled to their opinion” and vowed to increase the deficit and kick sick kids off insurance anyway. Priorities, people.

Very special Congressman Louie Gohmert Steve King (corrected) participated in the Rules Committee debate about HCR repeal. He explained how the Commerce Clause doesn’t apply the Health Care Reform:

After Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) said that health insurance counts as interstate commerce and therefore falls under the Congress’s constitutional powers, King argued that there are people who never even use health care — and therefore a law requiring them to buy insurance is unconstitutional.

“There have always been and likely will always be, babies that were born, lived and died within the jurisdictions of the individual states,” he said, “who never cross a state line, access no health care and therefore do not impact interstate commerce. Therefore, to compel someone who fits that category to buy an insurance policy” does not fit under the interstate commerce clause.

“You find the baby that was not born in a hospital or with a midwife, who did not receive inoculations,” Polis said. “You find that baby and identify them and I’ll be happy to have that discussion.” “I hate to tell you but they show up in garbage cans around this country, sir,” he said.

That makes perfect sense.

So, as you can see the Republicans really got off on the right foot today and have set the tone for the battles to come.