Archive for March, 2010
The Nazi Pope
I’ve been following this story for the last week or so, and was waiting for some kind of mitigating factors to pop up. Doesn’t seem there are any. Top Vatican officials — including the future Pope Benedict XVI — did not defrock a priest who molested as many as 200 deaf boys, even though several [...]
Ugly Americans (contd.)
The post-healthcare-reform ugliness continues: Two conservative Tea Party activists posted the address of the home (of Rep. Tom Perriello’s brother) on the Internet on Monday, mistakenly believing it was the home of the congressman. One of the activists urged others to “drop by” and “express their thanks” for Perriello’s vote in favor of health care [...]
Time For The Ugly Duckling?
I think it’s time to give the Republican Party a new mascot, and I vote for replacing the elephant by the duckling. Partly, that reflects how big a force I think they are going to be in our politics over the next few years (maybe even a few decades, if they decide to keep heading [...]
A Trickle, Not A Flood
For a while, troubled banks and automakers were shouting themselves hoarse arguing that their survival depended on continuing to pay humongous salaries to their top executives. If the mean, petty and thoroughly shortsighted Obama administration allowed Kenneth R. Feinberg, the special master for executive compensation at corporations receiving federal aid, to cut back compensation below [...]
Ghosts In The Gallery?
Randy Neugebauer is a Republican member of the House, whose enduring claim to fame for the foreseeable future is going to be how he shouted “Baby killer” at Bart “Stupid?” Stupak during Sunday night’s extended healthcare bill debate. What you may not see reported in the mainstream media, though, is how the price of Randy [...]
Go Ahead, Gramps, Make My Day!
Yes, I know that John McCain has been a few marbles short of a functioning brain for a while now. But this is pretty absurd even for a senile old Republican facing a primary challenge from the far right. He’s sent out a fundraising letter saying: I believe we must repeal this bill immediately. He [...]
In Praise of Steve Benen
Steve Benen is a friend of mine, so my re-broadcasting this shout-out may not mean very much. But I don’t know that he’s a friend of Andrew Sabl‘s. And he’s the guy who wrote it. Success has many parents (of both sexes), and in this case needed more than one Godfather. I won’t dissent from [...]
The Call Of History
Last night, President Obama said: Tonight, we answered the call of history as so many generations of Americans have before us. Nobody who has followed the heathcare reform debate could have heard that, and not immediately thought of Olympia Snowe‘s “But when history calls, history calls…” Obama’s remark served to remind everyone how dismally Snowe [...]
Stupakery?
At some point last night, after a Healthcare Reform celebration dinner that spanned three different establishments of fine dining, I got to reflecting on the Stupak charade. Boiled down to its essentials, here’s what Stupak did. He fabricated an issue entirely without merit, recruited a gang that couldn’t think straight, licked his pencil and wrote [...]
Heathcare Vote Timeline
We still don’t know what will happen, but there finally seems to be some kind of timeline as to when it will happen. Or not. Here is a rough estimate of the timing for Sunday’s votes: 2 p.m.: The House will debate for one hour the rules of debate for the reconciliation bill and the [...]