Monthly Archives: October 2009

loco

News Flash: Rod Adair is still an Idiot

Rod Adair gets caught driving like a madman –118MPH – and says, “I did what many thousands of New Mexicans do.” That’s a defense? He should be thrown out of the New Mexico Legislature for his crime and for setting such a horrible example of public behavior and personal responsibility. Rod Adair is an ass.

ABQJOURNAL NEWS/STATE: Senator Cited for Driving 118 Mph

"I did what many thousands of New Mexicans do," Adair said.

    When asked why he was going so fast, he said he did not want to go into details.

    Adair, a four-term senator who represents parts of Lincoln and Chaves counties, has faced a handful of speeding charges since 1999.

    Most recently, he was arrested in June 2006 in Roswell on a bench warrant for failing to pay a speeding ticket. He had been cited by State Police in April of that year for driving 85 mph in a 55-mph zone.

    Adair also pleaded no contest in 2004 for a speeding citation in Reserve, where he was nabbed for driving more than 35 mph above the speed limit.
    Three previous speeding citations — two in 1999 and one in 2002 — were dismissed. [mjh: Because he has clout. The worst assholes always have clout.]

ABQJOURNAL NEWS/STATE: Senator Cited for Driving 118 Mph

mjh’s blog — In Which Adair Makes an Ass of Himself (Sat 11/18/06 at 1:51 pm)

Most of us have come to expect arrogance from Republican leaders, as well as some disconnect from reality. Rod Adair seldom disappoints on both counts. In his latest column for the Journal, Adair explains that everything good is and always has been Republican and everything shifty and immoral is and always has been Democrat. [read on at the link]

mjh’s blog — In Which Adair Makes an Ass of Himself

NADA, The Atheist's Pulpit

There is no god

You may know the horrible, gruesome details of a recent rape in California. It’s time for every man and woman in the world to say, “never again.” Never again should any human being be so horribly treated by another.

The President of the United States needs to speak out. Never again. The Governor of California needs to speak out. Never again. Each and every one of us needs to speak out: Never again. We will not tolerate such brutality and inhumanity.

If the perpetrators are caught and fairly convicted, I support public flogging, physical castration, and death, in that order. Since some men fail to see women as human beings, those men forfeit their right to continue to live. Let it be known: Some things are unforgiveable.

NADA

This Week’s “Well, WTF?!”

Since Oct. 20, the Republican National Committee’s Facebook page has had a picture of President Obama with a caption reading “Miscegenation is a crime against American values. Repeal Loving v. Virginia.”

[mjh: That’s right: repeal the ruling that allowed an interracial couple to marry. Rather reminiscent of the judge down south who recently said he wouldn’t marry an interracial couple because it’s bad for the kids. Tell it to Obama, jackass.]

As Raw Story notes, the RNC finally took the photo down today, after readers at Democratic Underground first began discussing it on Sunday. While it’s likely that the RNC “wasn’t aware the racist photo was on their page and it wasn’t produced or posted by anyone at the RNC,” the group had attacked MoveOn.org for a similar incident in 2004. As Chris Harris at Media Matters Action Network notes, when “a web user posted a self-produced web video that compared President Bush to Hitler as part of a MoveOn.org video contest, the RNC acted as if the video had been produced by MoveOn itself.” According to the National Journal:

“This [Bush as Hitler] is the worst and most vile form of political hate speech,” Republican National Committee spokesman Ed Gillespie proclaimed. “MoveOn.org should apologize.”

Boyd did just that, expressing “deep regret” that the ads made it through MoveOn’s filtering process, and promising to scrutinize such material in the future. Pariser emphasized that MoveOn had not produced the ads, not aired them, not endorsed them in the voting, and had removed them from the Web site –adding that the RNC had put them on its Web site to score points. Still, the damage had been done.

Will the RNC now issue a public apology?

Think Progress » Will the RNC apologize for racist Facebook photo?

NADA

Poll: GOP Favorability Falters – Surprise?

Poll: GOP Favorability Falters – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com 

Latest CNN/ORC survey puts Republican approval at two-year low.

Dips to 36% for only the second time in a decade according to CNN/USA Today/Gallup Trends.

Poll: GOP Favorability Falters – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com

Details: CNN/ORC Poll on Party Favorability – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com 

From CNN:

Republicans: 36% favorable, 54% unfavorable

Democrats: 53% favorable, 41% unfavorable

Congress: 29% approve, 69% disapprove

Congressional Democrats: 38% approve, 59% disapprove

Congressional Republicans: 33% approve, 66% disapprove

Conducted Oct. 16-18, error margin +/- 3 points.

Details: CNN/ORC Poll on Party Favorability – The Page by Mark Halperin – TIME.com

Congress performs the worst in this poll.

NADA

When Buchanan Calls You an Idiot, You’ve Been Seriously Dissed (Bucky Knows His Nixon)

 Think Progress » Buchanan on GOP and Fox linking Obama to Nixon: ‘It is the most idiotic comparison I’ve ever seen.’

Taking cues from their communications shop over at Fox News, GOP Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Judd Gregg (R-NH) yesterday attacked the White House’s campaign against Fox’s unethical journalistic practices by comparing President Obama to President Nixon. “Let’s not start calling people out and compiling an enemies list,” Alexander said, touting his days as a junior staffer in the Nixon White House as credentials for his charge. Gregg said he was “fascinated” by Alexander’s criticism and wondered if Obama is “Nixon-fying” the White House. But yesterday on MSNBC, top Nixon aide Pat Buchanan dismissed out-of-hand any comparison of Obama to Nixon:

BUCHANAN: It is the most idiotic comparison I’ve ever seen. Barack Obama won 95 percent of Washington DC, he comes in with both houses Congress behind him, the media love him, the country loves him. Nixon came in with both houses of Congress against him, he probably got 8 percent of the vote in Washington DC, the media loathed him. … I don’t see any comparison between Obama and Nixon whatsoever. … [T]here’s no comparison. Barack Obama’s got enormous press support, he’s got problems with Fox News but for heaven’s sakes there is no comparison here.

Think Progress » Buchanan on GOP and Fox linking Obama to Nixon: ‘It is the most idiotic comparison I’ve ever seen.’

photos

Lucky Timing

American avocets

I go to Chaco Canyon every year (except for this one). In 2008, I also traveled to a couple of outliers west of Chaco. The road into Kin Bineola (“where the wind whirls,” Navajo) crosses a dirt dam. I had never seen any water on either side of that dam before, but on this trip in May, there was a small pond near the dam, well below the road. I saw something circle over the pond. I stopped on the dam to consider taking a picture. The two adult avocets were cute enough – and seemed out of place enough – to warrant a photo. I just got lucky that the babies flew in just as I clicked. I respect photographic skill, experience, and equipment, but lucky timing is the most valuable asset a photographer can’t buy. I never expected to photograph shorebirds in the desert.

www.flickr.com

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mjhinton's items tagged with chacocanyon More of mjhinton’s stuff tagged with chacocanyon

NADA

This Week’s WTF?!

You probably thought the “joke” about gunning-down liberal democrats was this week’s WTF?! But, no, we have a last-minute winner, from the drooling maw of the Big Mouth of the Republican Party (sorry, Lush, take another Oxy), Glenn Blech:

 Think Progress » Beck says ‘progressives’ are descended from ‘tyrants’ and ‘slave owners.’

On his Fox News show today, Glenn Beck said that “in the last couple of years” he’s been “trying to read a different Founding Father all the time,” offering that his latest interest is in Samuel Adams. According to Beck, Samuel Adams would have hated modern day progressives. “We call them progressives now, but back in Samuel Adams’ day, they used to call them tyrants,” said Beck. “A little later, I think they were also called slave owners.” Watch it:

It’s kind of odd that Beck deifies the Founding Fathers while attacking progressives as “slave owners,” considering that some of the most famous Founding Fathers owned slaves.

Think Progress » Beck says ‘progressives’ are descended from ‘tyrants’ and ‘slave owners.’

Think Progress declines to note that the tattered remnants of Conservatism resemble nothing so much as the end of the Confederacy (slave holders, if you’ve forgotten). I can’t wait until Blech finishes with the Founders and moves on to the Civil War. Was that war about progressive slave holders in the South? Wouldn’t that make the North the good guys? But wasn’t the War of Northern Aggression between an overbearing Federal government (Sam Adams says, “boo, hiss”) versus freedom-loving (for some) States’ Righters (or Tenthers, as they call themselves today)? Of course, as in the Republican party, the Confederacy consisted of rich people rallying poor people to their defense. The people who have everything use people who have nothing to fight people who want something for everyone. Who needs slaves anymore? Turns out, you have to feed slaves, but you don’t have to feed poor people – let them join the military.