Don’t Steel This Idea! Or Steal it Either

Okay, so I was thinking yesterday. This is not unusual with me, I usually do. Remember that episode of Star Trek where the machine sucked out your thoughts? And with nothing to think about the poor soul in the machine did not reach the state of Nirvana in perfect communion with God, but rather died from lack of anything to do?  You remember right?

See, this really produced a conflict with me. I understand that perfect meditation requires an “emptying of the mind” yet, Star Trek in Daggers of the Mind informs me that it can cause death. So, I have always decided to err on the side of keeping my mind active rather than tempt God to just say, “nothing going on in there” and pull the plug.

Which then raises the second quandary for me. I know a ton of people with “nothing going on in there” and they seem to still VOTE and worse yet, LEGISLATE.

So I have no idea which is true.

So I was thinking, as I said.

And I got this perfect idea. Well, to be honest, it wasn’t exactly my idea, but I don’t know who Theor27 is so it might as well be my idea, since anybody who goes by the screen name Theor27 probably doesn’t have the connections I have to promote this idea properly, and anyway Theor27 just sorta mentioned it, and didn’t flesh it out like I have, and that has to count for something, right? I mean I respect  work product and all that, but I’m pretty sure if you sort through my massive subconscious, you would find this idea there, and that’s pretty close to be an original idea” don’t you think? Do you have any idea how many recipes I see that are exact, I mean down to every word that don’t mention that they got the idea from somebody else, but rather pass it off as their own. Doesn’t everybody start off their brownie recipe with “best darn brownies this side of Saturn”?

So given that good old Theor27 probably will never know, I’m claiming this idea in full as my own. Since I fleshed it out, as I said.

So, I’m thinking along the lines of a Sim city interface, or perhaps a board game. Or perhaps something more along the “miniature” railroad thing. You know what I mean surely. The old guy down the block whose entire basement is a little town with a railroad that runs all around, with miniature trees and overpasses and, even a lake? THAT guy? Or the lady who every Christmas turns her spare bedroom into a village with cotton ball “snow” and a post office, and carolers and little painted houses with little tiny lights inside? You know, THAT lady?

So this will be called: Tea Party Town. And you can make it up as you like. You see?

I’m just letting my mind flow here guys.

You could have like a “lake of fire” and a big old hand that you could automate to let go of little liberal action figures and drop them into it. It would be God (the hand that is) dropping the bad bad liberals into the lake of eternal damnation for all the things they want to do, like be communists or fascists (since tea baggers generally don’t know the difference) or being for “choice” or for Obamacare, or for wanting to “redistribute the wealth”. You know, whatever dumb thing teabaggers dream up for killin’ and condemning for all time anybody not like them.

There could be a big museum and out front Jesus could be sitting atop a big old Brontosaurus teaching the flock.

How cool would that be? All the people could be wearing little tri-corner hats with little teabags hanging from them.

Everybody would be white of course.

Except for the grounds keepers, and the maids, and the bus drivers.

 

 

 

 

So, that takes care of some of the bigger plans for our Tea Party village.

But no such place would be really “home” if it didn’t have some actual Tea Party homes.

So you could, you know, fashion the decor as it suits your version of Tea Party heaven.

Of course you should have Sarah greeting all the visitors to the neighborhood.

I mean she fits in here so well doncha think?

I big ol’ happy smile on her perky face.

Welcoming all you nice tea party friends, and makin’ sure as you drive by that you are the right complexion.

Pick up a bible as you enter, so you’ll be sure to know how to act now!

As you enter, don’t forget to notice how nice everything is, all the same. Nobody here likes to be “different” because God doesn’t like different. It says so, somewhere in the Good Book.  Or is certainly implied if you get my drift.

But for sure, in your village of Tea Baggerdom, don’t forget the most important place of all.

Or not.

It really depends.

Some tea baggers don’t cotton to no formalized church you know. They found that it in the bible too. Anybody can just read “God’s word”. Long as it’s the King James Version that is. The rest are just Satanic verse, to pun.

Don’t listen to no word of men, they say. God said it, ‘nuf said.

Or not.

If you are one of them churched teabaggers, then you probably should have one of these:

The Mega Church solves all your problems, and meets all your needs. From indoctrinating the lit’lins into proper creationist, flatlander, young earthiness, to making sure that your will suitably leaves all your money to the church, it’s one for all and all for one.

Common phrases you will hear are:

• Love the sinner, hate the sin.
• God hates sinners.
• God helps those who help themselves.
• If they don’t work, they don’t eat.
• Are you born again?
• Have you confessed Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior?
• Handups not handouts!
• Fornication is a sin, but God forgives!
• Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve!

Don’t forget this important place.

You will be spending a lot of time here, looking, touching, nay caressing the fine barrels of these beautiful killers.

There is no more important Amendment to the constitution (how it wasn’t listed as the first ARTICLE of the constitution beats me, than the 2nd?

SECOND?

You see, this constitution is all F**ked up isn’t it?

I mean I’m sure the Founding Fathers meant:

ARTICLE I: We are a Christian nation!

ARTICLE II: God wants us to use guns to enforce that!

All the rest is mere filler.

 

A little humor in your Tea Party village is always good.

For she is NOT A WITCH.

She said so.

Witches cannot lie. That is a lie.

That’s a whole ‘nother Star Trek show.

I don’t want to go there.

Christine O’Donnell made my head hurt.

Does this mean that somebody has beat me to the punch?

All this work?

And somebody has already got a Sim’s Tea Park?

I am crestfallen.

Nay I am deeply chagrined.

Nay, I am pissed.

This was MY IDEA.

I was gonna make a billion bucks off this. Hasbro on speed dial. Gates wanted it as a Microsoft Windows standard game. I just know it.

Sigh………..

I suppose you expect me to do something productive now?

And I had the decor all picked out in my Hawaiian beach house. I did. Really. No I did.

 

And the Nominee for STUPID is. . . .The GOP

Oh my head hurts. I mean seriously people, the list of nominees for MOST STUPID is the most widely contested race of all.

Shall we poll the Internet denizens?

Here are some of the nominees. Feel free to add any you can think of. The winner will receive a dead fish wrapped in the NYTimes, delivered by a pony express rider wearing a Dior gown of sparkling crystals.

1. Proving that he can’t read, Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin says he will sign a new bill requiring an ultrasound of any pregnant woman seeking an abortion. Having learned nothing from what happened in Virginia when Governor McDonnell also planned to sign the same sort of thing, Walker announces that “I don’t have any problem with ultrasound”. No I guess HE doesn’t. But perhaps if it were required that all men who decide to treat women like children and tell them what to do with their own bodies, should undergo a lobotomy, he might, just might, change his tune. But then again, maybe not.

2. Arizona House Representative, Trent Franks resurrected the old “rape victims block the pregnancy” argument of Todd Akin, stating the “incidence of pregnancy following rape is very low.”  This was in support of a bill introduced by Franks making abortion illegal after 20 weeks. Democrats had introduced an amendment making an exception for rape and incest. It appears that Republican man are raised to believe that they are doctors by osmosis. It’s a male thing.

3. So utterly against any immigration bill are some Republicans that they don’t even want to debate the issue. The reasons are obvious. The final bill may well pass the Senate, and then it’s on the House where Boehner will wring his hands and insist that he’s only there to help the House speak it’s will. The likes of Steve King and Louis Gohmert and Steve Stockton, will provide the show there. For now this group joins in a team effort to win the golden smelly carp award: Sens. John Barrasso (Wyo.), John Boozman (Ark.), Mike Crapo (Idaho), Ted Cruz (Tex.), Mike Enzi (Wyo.), Charles E. Grassley (Iowa), James Inhofe (Okla.), Mark Kirk (Ill.), Mike Lee (Utah), James Risch (Idaho), Pat Roberts (Kan.), Tim Scott (S.C.), Jeff Sessions (Ala.), Richard Shelby (Ala.) and David Vitter (La.). A finer band of brothers in stupid cannot be found.

4. Virginia Lieutenant Governor nominee, E. W. Jackson wrote a book, and published it. It is called The Ten Commandments to an Extraordinary Life. Trouble is, he misspelled Commandments to Comandments in the title. Then he said that yoga would lead to satanic possession.

5. Jim Bridenstine (R-OK) is somebody you probably never heard of. I suspect you can continue to not hear of him. He took to the floor last week in the House and ranted on about how the President was “a vengeful liar who lacks the moral compass” to lead the nation. He likened himself to Patrick Henry. He thinks he did a good job. Trouble is, I guess he forgets that the polls suggests he may be the one without a moral compass. It’s improper to cast such vitriol on the House floor. But alas it’s nothing new for the crazy crew. And by the by, all his reasoning was based on factual untruths. ALL of them. So I guess he’s intellectually impaired on top of being a flagrant abuser of the mouth.

6. Darrell Issa claimed through selected editing of testimony, that the order to select “conservative” applications for tax-exempt status came “from Washington”. He promised that the full transcripts would be released shortly. Of course the full transcripts said just about the opposite. The person who has owned up to the screening methodology, describes himself as a Conservative Republican and says he doesn’t believe there was any political motivation in the process, but merely a method to extract those applications that would undoubtedly necessitate deeper analysis. Issa now claims that release of the full transcripts would be “dangerous and irresponsible.” He now claims it is Cummings who is the problem.

7. Now I admit, this is not a Republican. But well, we have loved Carl Levin for many years. But we are pretty darn happy he’s decided to retire. He voted to keep the decision-making on rape charges in the hands of command. It was wrong. He sided with the military men. It was wrong. This kind of thing makes no sense on any level. It doesn’t promote cohesion in the ranks. It promotes distrust. Shame on him. And on Clare McCaskill who also voted this way.

So that’s my line up for today.

As I said, please add your favorites.

It’s hard to miss a week without Gohmert being on the list I know.

But he’ll be back in the top ten. He won’t let us down.

So.

Vote.

Vote often.

 

Related articles

• The GOP’s cleansing of its ‘stupid’ wing will never work (deathandtaxesmag.com)
• Ted Cruz and Mike Lee outshine Rand Paul on immigration (powerlineblog.com)
• Sen. Ellis shouts down Dems during ultrasound bill vote, breaks gavel base (host.madison.com)
• At hearing for ATF nominee, more Republican obstruction (afjjusticewatch.blogspot.com)
• GOP wunderkind drives Wisconsin into the ground (dailykos.com)
• MEMO: New GOP Assault on Women’s Health Care is Akin-Like (democrats.org)
• Non-Todd Akin GOP congressman: ‘The incidence of rape resulting in pregnancy are very low’ (dailykos.com)
• GOP Sen. Candidate Bashes ‘Moron’ Trent Franks For Rape Remarks: ‘Stupid Has No Specific Affiliation’ (mediaite.com)

 

God, I Can’t Get the Stench of Ick Off Me!

I mean seriously. Suddenly Geraldo Rivera is making sense? I’m in the same camp as Ms. Lindsey? This can only mean one thing.

I’ve been transported once again in my sleep by aliens to a far, far distance universe. I wanna come home!

It all started innocently enough.

You know me, speak first, think later. It’s been a lifelong methodology for me. Being nimble of mind, I usually can wriggle myself into some sort of explanatory pose without looking the complete fool. (Some would say–my no-named detractors, all noted I might add for an inability to add 2 + 2 and get 4 regularly, where was I? Oh yes, my detractors might claim I’m a complete fool all the time, but of course they are wrong).

Anyway.

Yesterday, in view of the revelations of one Glenn Greenwald and the Guardian, I was pretty down on the President. I’m not, and never have been a Patriot Act fan, neither liking the term patriot, which seems always used by those who really aren’t,  nor liking the flag-waving exceptionalism it tends to signify. Therefore hearing that the Obama Administration has continued a policy of sorting through my telephone calls gave me reason to lament his policy, all the while suggesting that the GOP in general would have a tough time railing against something they wrote (the Patriot Act) and passed on several times already under President Bushy. I also noted that of course faux news groups like Fox would forget all that history, and condemn their favorite whipping boy with nary a dropped beat.

So, then I actually learned what this is all about.

And I’m not nearly so upset as I was, since facts have a weird ability to actually turn wild speculative gut reactions into calm reasoned understanding of truth.

Okay, so let’s review. Under Bush, the government started this data mining process of collecting phone records. It began the process in around 2002, and without authorization from the FISA court which had been started in 1978. They were proceeding without court authority. This monitoring was done to foreign persons and American citizens.

Sometime around 2006, FISA was brought into the mix and the program continued to the present albeit with FISA oversight procedures in place. Congress regularly is called upon to renew the government’s ability to proceed, and so far it has. In fact Senator Diane Feinstein indicated that the issue of data mining of phone records has been debated by her committee, the Senate Intelligence Committee, no fewer than twelve times.  Ultra conservative Senator Lindsey Graham also suggested that he was not at all troubled by the “revelations” announced and that he found there was “nothing to worry about.”  Ditto Republican Mike Rogers, chair of the House Intelligence Committee.

Of course, the fact that it started under Bush is not some imprimatur upon the practice to be sure. In fact it might be close to the opposite. But it behooves us to look at what the practice actually entails before we condemn it as government overreach, no matter how legal it may be–and no one suggests it was illegal.

What goes on here is called metadata  mining.

Metadata, essentially, is data about data. Data mining programs use computer algorithms to search large collections of data for patterns.

Still sound like gobbledygook? It works something like this. Billions of phone calls are made daily. The numbers are gathered along with length of conversation. It’s essentially dumped into a data base. In other words, one computer downloads its billions of numbers into another computer. There it sits. When a terrorist suspect comes under scrutiny, his specific number is plugged into the database and “hits” are looked for. The computer has the ability (which no human could do) to see patterns in the calls this person X makes. For instance. X is in Istanbul. He is a “known” terrorist. He places a calls Yemen, Colorado, and Miami. The numbers in Yemen make calls to New Jersey and Miami and Charleston. The number from Colorado makes calls to New Jersey and Charleston.  Charleston called Colorado. A pattern is established.

At this point, (with perhaps other surveillance information)  as I understand it, the government goes to the FISA court and requests a warrant to subpoena the actual names of those persons in the pattern. And with further investigation it may lead to actually looking at the actual conversations or lead to wiretaps.

Similar things are done with the Internet, now a preferred means of communication between terrorist cells.

So nobody is reading your e-mails. Nobody is listening to your calls, or noting that you called Cousin Dotty last month. It’s just numbers and no human is even looking at the metadata at all, since it is meaningless anyway.

Geraldo Rivera suggests that this leak of the program, is directly related to the anger of the journalistic community at the subpoenaing journalist phone records in an attempt to uncover leaks by government employees. It’s a “in your face” sort of response.

The Rivera claims are in fact real. Terrorists do learn from our leaks and move to new ways of doing business. It is thought that it is this reason that caused the Obama Administration to move into the Internet data mining arena. At least Nicolle Wallace, former communication chief for Bush suggested this on Morning Joe this morning.

So, in all, I’m a lot less upset now than I was.

But of course I now find myself in a quandary. I recall that I was supportive of the leaking of the Pentagon Papers back in the Nixon years, and I have been similarly supportive of Bradley Manning and his leaking of information about the wars in the Middle East. But I find myself rather supportive of the government’s attempts to stop leaks from those who may in fact be more interested in harming a president than they are about the “immorality” of that which they leak about. (I’m of course reading that in).

So I am conflicted. I don’t think that the Pentagon papers situation or the Manning leaks compromised “security”, but rather reflected our government’s being deeply involved with corruption without those countries. Perhaps my memory is faulty. Here I see real attempts to undermine THIS government as a political ploy to gain advantage for a party or group within a party. Predictably Rand Paul is screeching that 1984 has arrived. Paul of course would be happiest without any government at all, and his squawking has to be held in that context. It should be noted that Paul introduced an amendment last year to ban this stuff when it was PASSED once again in December.

So are my positions irreconcilable or not?

Hopefully some of you can assist me, for a mind divided cannot stand. (Unless you’re a fundamentalist, and then all bets are off).

So help me out here guys.

For an excellent timetable of the Patriot Act/FISA/NSA database, see What you Should Know about the Government Massive Domestic Surveillance Program.

 

Related articles

• Senator Franken Calls for FISA Court Opinions to be Made Public When Possible (politicususa.com)
• Patriot Act at the center of the storm (cnn.com)
• Intelligence chief blasts NSA document leaks (cnsnews.com)
• guardian tecnologia: Fisa chief judge defends integrity of court over Verizon records collection (guardian.co.uk)
• ‘Fox and Friends’ suddenly against wiretapping they supported under Bush (rawstory.com)
• What You Should Know About The Government’s Massive Domestic Surveillance Program (kstreet607.com)

There’s a Scandal Alright–Just Not Where You Think

I’ve long wondered at the seeming inability of the GOP to remember that we actually keep records of  “that stuff”. They continue to forget that. I give a pass to the typical TeaPotter who is so ill-informed that they are left with nothing but misspelled phrases that they either paint on cardboard signs or attempt to regurgitate from memory. They can’t be expected to actually, you know, KNOW history.

As you know doubt know, the GOP has been looking for a way for five long years now to bury this president. All of their schemes have come to naught for quite obvious reasons, but even when we thought things might, just might, return to some semblance of normalcy after their debacle of 2012, well, sadly they learned nothing.

Some of their own kind (Pat Toomey)  even admit, that their membership so hates this man that they will vote NO on legislation as publicly supported as universal background checks. So of course we expected that rottweiler of a thug, Darrell Issa to continue his determination to find SOMETHING that can bring down this administration.

Benghazi was their choice, aided and abetted by one John S. McCain, who had a personal vendetta and was more than willing to rattle the sabre of “coverup” at least as it pertained to Susan Rice, a woman we can now categorically say was unfairly maligned and mistreated by Johnny and his misogynist guy pal, Ms. Lindsey.

Let me just say this simply. The Benghazi “scandal” is nothing more than a witch hunt. And history explains it all to us.

Darrell “my brother did it” Issa is chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. That is, innocent as it sounds, a very powerful committee, and one Issa has used since 2010 when he assumed chairmanship, to conduct endless hearings into the Obama administration, hoping to find ANYTHING that can be used to harass and drive from office the Negro in the White House.

It is also the only committee that is allowed to issue subpoenas under the chairman’s signature only. However, this has seldom been the practice. Normally, given that grave power, the Chairman has sought the agreement of a full committee vote before so proceeding. This has been  the case except for only two occasions in modern times. Hint: this is where the history gets important.

The most notable occasion when the Chairman took sole control over subpoenas was under the chairmanship of Dan Burton, (R-IN). Mr. Burton had a serious case of the ass against one William J. Clinton. Like Darrell, Dan fairly lit up the committee with his constant and outlandish claims of wrongdoing.

This resulted in a scandal of course–Mr. Burton spend years, over 1,000 subpoenas, and 7 million bucks of taxpayer money, trying to prove that there was scandal to be found in the fund-raising practices of the Democratic Campaign organization. Copies of audio tapes from a “witness” were released. Later it was determined that the tapes had been severely “edited” to appear quite different from their original content. Burton fired committee staff man David Bossie, the supposed “editor”.

However, the scandal went further, and finally, there were calls for Burton to step down himself. He never did of course.

Well, here we go again.

Mr. Issa decided that Burton’s sole possessor of the subpoena was a good thing,  and re-instituted the practice again. This brought a rather lengthy and well-reasoned letter from Elijah Cummings, ranking minority leader on the committee, and a man with a memory. He pointed out that unilateral usage of the power of subpoena had gotten the GOP into serious trouble once before, and it was better to return to the normal and regular practice of bipartisan issuance of these orders.

Of course, Mr. Issa declined rational behavior and has as we all know run a one-man-show of Obama attack. And the expected result has occurred.

For weeks the GOP has harped that the Obama White House was engaged in a cover-up regarding Benghazi. That cover-up has never been spelled out well, but it seems to have revolved around the White House changing the talking points (which implicated Rice somehow), to protect the State Department (and Hillary Clinton) from being accused of malfeasance.

This claim was bolstered by information from e-mails circulated between the  parties involved. We were told this by the GOP. Jonathan Karl broke the story for ABC, claiming as the GOP had alleged, that State Department officials had participated in changing the talking points, along with the White House. Karl implied that he had seen the emails himself and “quoted” from them.

When the true emails were brought forth, they told a different story–one that indicated that neither the White House nor the State Department had played a part in the versions discussed and finally issued by the CIA for distribution (i.e. to Susan Rice).  Now of course Karl claims he never actually saw any e-mails but his “source” shared “notes” with him of what he/she read.

The fair meaning  of what Karl claimed and the actual truth leave little doubt that there was a deliberate attempt to portray the White House and State Department in a bad light and to provide proof that they had acted politically with the intent to deceive. Since the e-mails were the subject of subpoenas, the likely “source” is undoubtedly someone on Issa’s committee.

It is ironic in the end that all this Benghazi “scandal” has been in part to dirty the White House, but also to begin the long process of discrediting Mrs. Clinton. While nobody is all that surprised by the GOP’s doing that, it must be remembered that when all efforts were directed toward destroying the President, the GOP actually held Mrs. Clinton up as the “ray of sunshine” in the otherwise dismal Obama landscape.

Now that the President seems invincible to their machinations, Clinton, the new threat, became the new target.

It’s all so predictable.

And that is what needs be investigated it seems–why are my tax monies being used to manufacture scandals for Republican political gain?

Riddle me that Batman.

Related articles

• Benghazi Backfires on Republicans as Democrats Eviscerate Issa and the GOP (politicususa.com)
• Will a GOP aide be fired over Benghazi email changes? (salon.com)
• CBS News: Republicans Changed Benghazi Emails (themoderatevoice.com)
• CBS: Republicans were source of inaccurate Benghazi emails (dailykos.com)
• Why the GOP may regret its Obama scandal obsession (tv.msnbc.com)
• Benghazi Backfires on Republicans as Democrats Eviscerate Issa and the GOP (easyjjgrand3.newsvine.com)

The Running of the Bulls. . .hit

Okay, get your outrage ready followed by your thinking caps. It, to pare a Bette Davis phrase, “is going to be a bumpy ride.”

Let’s get rid of the outrage first.

1. It’s bad to target identifiable public groups of people for special scrutiny unless they are promoting pedophilia or making Adolph Hitler’s birthday a national holiday.
2. A man as smart as President Obama is, is surely very good at getting elected and surely very bad at managing his Administration–at least he has a lot of really incompetent people working for him that aren’t doing him any favors.
3. Anything that gives Tea Potters the ability to dance in the street in glee is just wrong on so many levels–mostly because they dress like idiots who missed the bus to the Super Bowl tailgate party.
4. Fourth, Jon Stewart already said it better than you could anyway with this:

“Well, congratulations, President Barack Obama, Conspiracy theorists who generally can survive in anaerobic environments have just had an algae bloom dropped on their fucking heads, thus removing the last arrow in your pro-governance quiver: skepticism about your opponents.”

TeaPotters should of course get somebody to explain to them what he said meant.

Okay, outrage over.

Now, let’s examine the facts, which are still fairly small in number, which allows me the joyous whimsy of speculating all over the place about both what might have happened and why. Given that I’m reputed worldwide to be a fairly decent prognosticator (if you don’t count the times I was wrong), I’m sure you will find my analysis spot on as they say or don’t say. You choose. (We are not getting into the DOJ “new” scandal today, so relax, you won’t go into brain overheating).

Okay, let’s begin.

This goes back, in my humble opinion, and with a tiny bit of help from the ever bubbly Contrarian, to *drum roll* Citizens United. That amazingly short-sighted, ill-thought-out, and all around stupid decision opened the floodgates as you no doubt recall to all kinds of bad things. Corporations could give unlimited amounts of money to elect those persons who would support their cause that the only good dollar is one in the pocket of a rich person, for only they know what to do with it.

Okay, okay, so it also allowed all sorts of other “groups” to also gather and spend tons of dough to influence the minds of mostly mind-numbingly stupid voters.

With me so far?

So a lot, and I do mean a lot, of folks figured out that they wanted to get in on the action.

In the world of the IRS is a thing called a 501 (c) 4. This is a tax-exempt status, not quite as pure as a 501 (c)3 status. It allows you to collect money and not pay taxes on it, but the donor can’t claim it as a tax-exempt donation. The status is reserved for groups who operate “for the promotion of the public welfare.”

See the truck? See the truck drive through the gigantic hole in the wall?

What the hell is public welfare?

Well, I knew you would ask that.

The ACLU is considered to do so. But so is the NRA.

See the more rigorous status, the 501 (c) 3 status requires that you stay the hell out of politics in any way shape or form. The 501 (c) 4 status is a bit more lenient. It allows one to lobby for legislation and also to engage in political activities as “long as their primary activity is the promotion of social welfare.” The mack truck as you can see is still driving right on through.

So a whole bunch of organizations pop up, all claiming they are for the public welfare, when in reality they are really about promoting candidates and issues. Enter the TeaPotters and various other right-wing groups.  To be fair, and we aim for fair,  there are (although to lesser number) plenty of left-wing organizations who also are trying to do the same thing.

Now Cincinnati is the office that apparently is the hub of the IRS operation to approve or deny applications for this status. One can assume that following Citizens United in 2010, there was a general flood of applications as everybody including grandma wanted to get in on the action. (I’m told something like 60,000 would not be far off the mark) The status is valuable since, some of the money is tax exempt which allows more of it be used as the organization desires, whether it be to “public welfare” or quite frankly in some case to allow for bigger salaries to those who run the things. Hint: you can make a good living by setting up and running one.  Also donor lists are not required to be publicized.

What to do with this flood of applications which may well have driven the wait time up many additional months?

I figure that some mid-level bureaucrats, who were told in no uncertain terms to clear the backlog, and “no you were not getting any more workers” because the GOP just says NO!, dreamed up this computer program to sort through applications and flag those that would in all cases require further scrutiny–i.e., were they actually doing “public welfare” or only a front for a political agenda. (It’s fairly hard to argue that any Tea party group or any Occupy Wall street group could be anything but political.) The program used words like tea party, phrases like government not working, taxes, and so forth.

As I understand it, of the numbers of kicked out applications (requiring further scrutiny and action) 25% involved right-wing organizations. The rest involved either left-wing or other groups who did not meet the criteria, being not fraternal organizations of chickadee lovers, chocolate addicts anonymous, or things of similar ilk.

At some point, higher-ups learned of the practice. Discussions were had, and all seemed convinced that it was not aimed at “enemies” so much, as to simply weed out by computer rather than by hand, those applications that would require more time. The normal applications could thus be passed through within a reasonable time.

Of course, it became known up the chain of command what was going on. But apparently this raised no red flag (as it should have) as it was discussed and explained to them.

This is born out by the fact that during this entire episode, one Doug Shulman was head of the IRS. Now Mr. Shulman was appointed and began his leadership of the IRS in March of 2008, having been appointed by George W. Bush. He completed his term in November of 2012. He testified that there was no such thing going on in the IRS, as late as March of 2012. While it is still unknown whether he was aware of the practice, it is now thought that he probably did.

This suggests to me, that he did not consider it aimed at suppressing right-wing groups so much as helping to alleviate the backlog and limited to pulling out those applications that would otherwise require additional scrutiny anyway. It appears that the agency’s interests had turned to increasing revenue since the early 2000′s, and it was felt that as much as 1.2 billions were being lost to tax exempt groups in the 2012 election alone. Clearly some of this, if not most of it, should not be tax exempt under the current laws.

Shulman is and has never been a politico. His entire career has been spent in the business arena. That suggests that while his political affiliation is unknown,  he probably supports business interests and it seems unlikely to me that he would deliberately turn a blind eye to some deliberate effort to damage conservative groups, which typically favor business interests. Thus we can take him at this word I think that there was not attempt to “target” conservative groups per se.

This suggests that the real problem here is not one of an “enemies list” so much as what you get when you try so hard to depoliticize an organization that none within it have the political nose to see a HUGE problem for what was probably created as a benign process to speed up the process for legitimate applications while leaving more problematical ones for later.

In other words, any political junkie would have seen this immediately as “DANGER, DANGER WILL ROBINSON!”,  but they were not so seen by your average apolitical bureaucrat.

So that’s my initial take on it.

Of course weigh in.

Related articles

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• IRS nonprofit division overloaded, understaffed (publicintegrity.org)
• The Monday Long Read: Why the IRS scrutiny of conservative groups is less nefarious – and more necessary – than you think (americangladiators.wordpress.com)
• The IRS Shoots Itself in the Foot, Then Reloads (motherjones.com)
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The Benghazi Hustle

Here we go again. Everybody hold tight because this merry-go-round is speeding around the curve and headed for–well just about anything that the GOP imagination can dream up.

In a valiant attempt to turn a mole hill into a mountain, Republican Tea Snorters are busy twisting and feigning shock and awe at the shameful and deliberate attempt by the Obama Administration to get “brave Americans” murdered by, well, you know, their true friends.

If one reads the headlines of the extreme-stream media, here is what you will find:

“Benghazi Witness: First Time in my Career that a Diplomat Has more balls than somebody in the Military.”

“Benghazi revelations today could obliterate Obama’s Credibility and Sink Hillary’s 2016 ambitions.”

“Issa seeks more whistle blowers after dramatic Benghazi hearing.”

“Two key witnesses refuse to testify at Benghazi hearing.”

“Benghazi Makes Watergate look like kindergarten: The End of Obama”

“Hillary perjured herself on Benghazi?”

“Benghazi Whistleblower: You Should have Seen what Clinton Tried to do to us that night.”

And on and on it goes.

Here’s what I think we know at this point.

1. A YouTube video riled up Muslims around the world and demonstrations were being held in a variety of places, Egypt among them.
2. A demonstration occurred at Benghazi, that was violent.
3. Ambassador Stevens was fairly well known to favor less security rather than more in an attempt to be open to the residents of the country.
4. Republicans had steadfastly refused State Department requests for more money to beef up security around the world.
5. The Ambassador and three others were killed in the first attack.
6. Air support could not have reached the outpost for hours, a minimum of 5-7 according to the military.
7. There was no basis for suspecting a second attack.
8. There were no deaths or serious injuries sustained in the second attack.
9. A team of FOUR, a military security forces was located at Tripoli but they were concerned about security there, and even John Bolton admitted that they were unable to determine whether the four men should leave that facility for Benghazi when the deaths had already occurred and there was no reason to suspect a second attack.
10. Senator Tom Corker from Tennessee, sat on the Senate hearings on Benghazi and said that he read all the material and thought he knew what happened and was satisfied.
11. The President termed the attack a “terrorist attack” the day following the attack.
12. That Susan Rice delivered the cautionary remarks that we were unsure what happened based on material supplied her by others in the State Department or other agencies.
13. That Al Qaeda is not an organization so much as an idea, and many Islamic groups claim “affiliation” without benefit of any actual connection. To this day, we don’t know I don’t think who this group consisted of.
14. There was no reason to believe that naming it other than a terrorist attack was some how beneficial to the White House in the midst of an election. Most presidents, following some catastrophe or other see their polling improve as people tend to “rally round” the Administration. If the President had war mongered the event, the GOP would have been arguing just the opposite–that he was making it much worse than it was in order to gain sympathy.

The bottom line to me here is simply. The Benghazi outpost was under-secured. Certainly the GOP bears SOME responsibility for that fact as do congressional Democrats who agreed that they didn’t need additional funds. There was apparently not good plans in place for an emergency like this. There should have been.

Beyond that, it was a sad tragedy. But let us remember. Americans are dying around the world every day. They are dying in service to the country, and as employees of corporations doing business in dangerous places. These four were doing their jobs. They perhaps did not receive the full support they should have, but such is life in dangerous occupations. I don’t mean to minimize it, but it should not be overstated either.

The GOP tried to make this into some scandal during the fall of 2012 to hurt the chances of the President to be re-elected, and enhance their candidates chances. That didn’t happen. Now they see polling that suggests that Hillary Clinton, if the nominee will beat any Republican so far put forth, easily and soundly.

Is it hard to see why this is happening now? Of course not. This is just an attempt to dirty up Clinton and force her to not run.

That’s my take on it.

And what is yours?

Republicans are united in their insanity that this will lead to impeachment.

Do you?

Related articles

• Republicans continue to press for answers on Benghazi (nbcpolitics.nbcnews.com)
• Yet Another Benghazi Nothingburger Today (motherjones.com)

If You Talk From Your Ass, I Guess You Talk From Three Sides of Your Mouth

Half the civilized world has now reacted to the bilge that comes out of the anal region of Wayne La PEE PEE Pierre, so I won’t bore you with more.

Except this.

Part of me secretly snickers at how the NRA, along with all the Right-wing elites, (read Fox, corporate interests, and GOP politicos), play their audiences for a fool. I mean to the rest of normally functioning America, you are always saying, “how can people be so stupid to not get it?”

Get what?

Oh, get that the Right-wing elites get the little people, mostly working class but definitely middle class wannabes, to do their bidding. They do this by such blatant lying and cursing of the truth, that, well, it only works if you are burdened with a lack of grey matter with which to discern reality.

I mean, face it, smart people are not listening to Fox, only those who are (how can we say this delicately?) intellectually challenged respond to that crap. It’s really a combination of lack of intellectual acuity and lack of interest in well, thinking, that motivates the average working Joe to “just let Fox do it”–the thinking that is.

How else can you explain Wayne’s rant at the NRA conference and the illogical crap he spewed to ears who can hear, but alas cannot decipher the message?

Wayne says, (not wanting to exploit a tragedy of course), that the poor people of Boston “cowered” behind their locked doors, wishing for all they were worth that they had guns with which to protect themselves against the monster bombers roaming the streets.

Now such a statement defies intelligence. Boston has no laws against the ownership of firearms. Everybody in Boston prior to the bombing there, has all the firearms they wanted. Nobody was cowering without defense unless they were of a mind that ownership of firearms was not a thing for them.

Now Wayne is not stupid. Insane, maybe, but not stupid. He knew that. He knew nobody in Boston was wishing they had guns. If they had wished such a thing, they would have bought one, or many. But Wayne is talking to stupid Teapotters out there. And frankly one can’t assume they don’t know this. For Teapotters think that background checks = national registry = confiscation of guns=abandonment of the 2nd Amendment=last step before communism=end of the world. They truly do believe that. They believe it because Fox and Wayne have told them so.

And as one listened to the endless parade of new civil war mongering that passed as “speeches” at the NRA convention, one cannot help but understand that these people really truly don’t know any better. I’m not sure that one of their survivalist “stores” isn’t designing the Teapotter uniform even as we speak, in anticipation of the coming militia call-up ordered by Wayne and his band of boobs.

Which is all kind of amusing since Kelly Ayotte is scrambling to make herself “understood”. See, she really does support background checks. Really, really, really. It was just the mainstream media and it’s awful use of “tapes of her answers” that got everybody all confused. Or her explanation that background checks would impose burdens on gun sellers that was unfair, that got taken out of context–the context being the word salad she wallowed in while trying to figure out what to say.

But Ayotte too is well aware that she is playing to a weak audience. She raises the NRA claim that those persons denied the right to buy weapons under the current NICS system aren’t prosecuted enough. That is a straw argument and Ayotte knows it, although she hopes her audience doesn’t. She calls all those rejected by NICS as “criminals”. They aren’t of course, they just don’t qualify for gun ownership. She bemoans that this is the problem with the system–police and prosecutors aren’t using their resources to prosecute a person who the system has successfully prevented from buying a gun. I mean wow, better they should get that year’s probation while the rampage of house break-ins continue from lack of police power. There are priorities and then there are priorities!

Meanwhile, Jeff Flake from Arizona has had a change of heart as well. Likening his popularity in Arizona to that of “pond scum”, Flack now alleges that the reason he opposed the legislation was that it made it a “commercial sale” if I emailed you and said I had a gun and would you like to buy it. Jeff is now sure that “that can be worked out” and he had happily join the majority and vote for background checks.

I rather think that his resemblance to pond scum had a lot more to do with his decision than did the flimsy made up email crap.

While the NRA continues it barrage of hate spewing and fear mongering, it seems that the tide is turning. Frankly nothing points that out more clearly than looking at who spoke at the NRA and who didn’t. Rick Santorum? The “don’t forget me,”  girl, Sarah? Glenn “I’m madder than any hatter” Beck? Surely you jest?

With a lineup like that, I mean does it say it all? Where were the Rubio’s? The Graham’s? The Ryan’s? The Cantor’s? Where were they? Oh, they quietly whispered, “gosh darn Wayne, you know my heart is with you, and I’ll work tirelessly behind-the-scenes, but I can’t AFFORD to publicly support you. You understand. Elections coming. Can’t rile up the folks now can we? *wink*wink*nudge*nudge. Just don’t ahh, mention that you invited me okay?”

Did I mention that we, the sane ones are NOT GOING AWAY this time?

Did I mention that?

You heard me? I don’t have to shout?

Good.

PS: I hear that some of these boobs are calling for an “armed march” on Washington on the 4th of July. Good luck with that.

Related articles

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• NRA kicks off annual meeting with talk of ‘culture war’; Scott Walker among speakers (host.madison.com)
• Hoyt Hilsman: The Political Suicide of Kelly Ayotte (huffingtonpost.com)
• NRA Celebrates Gun Control Defeat, Senators Face Backlash – Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
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