Needlenose

Bad enough that we are plagued with the traditional reactionary yahoos that could be found south of the Mason-Dixon line, but the movement back to the stone age appears to be spreading.  New Hampshire just overwhelmingly passed a law to allow parents to any part of a school curriculum – and force the school to provide alternatives.  So much for traditional Yankee common sense and pragmatism!

Reminds me of a recent Beavis and Butthead episode, where the two boys encounter Fundees protesting the teaching of evolution in school.  The lead Fundee explains that the theory of evolution is too complicated, can’t be understood – and something you can’t understand shouldn’t be taught.  The two young idiots of course expand this notion to pretty much every subject in the curriculum.  Assuming that they live in New Hampshire (increasingly plausible), all they need now is to have Beavis’ slut mom complain about all the subjects…and legally the New Hampshire schools would have to provide them with dumbed-down alternatives to real education!

No child left behind?  Of course, just watch the dullards in NH exploit ‘social promotion’ – Reactionary style!!

It’s sad and somewhat horrifying to see US poverty hit it’s highest point in 50 years…you can watch the chickens of the Reactionary misleadership coming home to roost.  On the other hand, to get a different perspective, Americans make up half of the world’s top 1% in income.  More specifically:

 ”…people at the world’s true middle — as defined by median income — live on just $1,225 a year. (And, yes, Milanovic’s numbers are adjusted to account for different costs of living across the globe.)

In the grand scheme of things, even the poorest 5% of Americans are better off financially than two thirds of the entire world. “

Don’t assume that I’m pitching a trite “be grateful for what you have’ homily.  Rather, consider how much farther we Americans have to fall.  The Rich and their Reactionary tools won’t be satisfied until they’ve reduced our earnings down to the world median.

Yelling at spitting at an 8-year old because she dresses immodestly – that’s just pitiful.  What’s worse is that we help fund these bozos.  Amazing that their country-mates put up with them – in a country surrounded by hostile nations with compulsory military service, these loons are exempt – presumably so they have more free time to scare the bemoishe out of little school kids who aren’t sufficiently holy.

Not surprising really, when you consider the little acts of terror in the ‘price tag’ campaign on the part of their ‘settler’ brethren (not that this is ‘news,’ price tag terror has been brewing for a few years now).  Fortunately, other than the official government randomly raining death and terror on the folks in Gaza when the Hezbollah become too uppity, the colonials haven’t been caught plotting anything as evil as the bombing of Arab schoolgirls for sometime – let’s hope their Reactionary government wakes up to the clear and present danger these various loons represent.

Back in ’03 I believed that all parties in the recently fractured Iraq would want to keep us around, the newly empowered Shi’ites in the ‘Coalition Government’ for protection, and the coalition of the Evil-Doers (former Baathists and jihadis) to have easy access to Americans to kill.  I posited that it wouldn’t take much for the latter to keep U.S. troops mired in the Quicksand of Iraq through acts of terror or sabotage.

Obama’s decision to close up shop in Iraq is already being sorely tested by the recent Coalition of the Evil-Doer’s massive terror attack, and of course is already being second-guessed by our home-grown warmongering reactionaries.  Of course if it were up to them, we would still be fighting in Vietnam.

Given that an overwhelming majority of Americans are pretty tired of hearing about a war that was only supposed to last a couple of weeks is now almost 9 years old, and that most of them probably don’t really care how many Iraqis die, the Coalition of the Evil-Doers will need to bump up the game and threaten the oil supply to keep around the American piñata – or in the words of Frank Herbert: “The Spice must flow!”

…by striking down ridiculous Confederate attempts to suppress the minority vote.  And the Reactionaries in the House are gonna need any vote they can steal, given how pissed off the people are at them right now….

*Update 12-24-11 – Worse than Jim Crow!!!

Back in ’03, there was discussion among the proto-Tea Bagger Libertarians about moving to some state like Montana or Wyoming and make it a Libertarian Utopia by using electoral clout to remake the state in Ayn Rand’s image.  Well here we are in 2011, and it looks like Libertopia may have already arrived – firemen in Tennessee refusing to save a burning house unless they get paid.  They don’t want to stop at taking us back to the 1890s, they want to go back to ancient Rome!

The first Roman fire brigade of which we have any substantial history was created by Marcus Licinius Crassus. Marcus Licinius Crassus was born into a wealthy Roman family around the year 115 BC, and acquired an enormous fortune through (in the words of Plutarch) “fire and rapine.” One of his most lucrative schemes took advantage of the fact that Rome had no fire department. Crassus filled this void by creating his own brigade—500 men strong—which rushed to burning buildings at the first cry of alarm. Upon arriving at the scene, however, the fire fighters did nothing while their employer bargained over the price of their services with the distressed property owner. If Crassus could not negotiate a satisfactory price, his men simply let the structure burn to the ground, after which he offered to purchase it for a fraction of its value.

 

*Update 12/7/11* Looks like Tennessee isn’t a true Libertopia, but rather just another Crony Capitalist state.

Just when you thought the Reactionaries hadn’t seen a tax cut they didn’t like, turns out they only like tax cuts that benefit the wealthy!  Although they were willing to shut down government and destroy the U.S. credit rating to keep the 1%’s taxes low, when it comes to Obama’s proposed cut to the payroll tax, something that would benefit workers…well, the Reactionaries aren’t so keen on that.  Turns out they have ‘conditions.’

Fucking hypocrites.

…and bring back miscegenation laws!!  Don’t believe ‘em when they say they dislike Obama for his politics and not his race – the Reactionaries won’t stop at sending racist photo-shopped pictures of Obama, they won’t be happy until they restore Jim Crow laws.

Tip of the ‘Nose to Film Critic Buddy

Fox News viewers are less informed than people who don’t watch any news:

“people who watch Fox News are 18-points less likely to know that Egyptians overthrew their government” and “6-points less likely to know that Syrians have not yet overthrown their government” compared to those who watch no news”…”the results show us that there is something about watching Fox News that leads people to do worse on these questions than those who don’t watch any news at all.”"

That’s being charitable.  ”that something” is known as stupidity.

Tip of the ‘Nose to Film Critic Buddy

About a week ago some self-proclaimed ‘moderate’ (I suspect he was really a Tea Bagger in disguise) called me an ‘extremist’ and an ‘alarmist’ when I joked that the GOP was on a mission to roll back all significant labor, consumer protection and other legislation of the last 100 years in the rush to turn us into a 3rd world cleptocracy.  I guess he doesn’t actually listen to what his leaders are saying.  Check out today’s latest- Newt Gingrich wants to put the children of America to work!  Interesting thought, although with roughly 1 out of 5 adults out of work, not sure what he’d have the kids do…sell True Grit?  They can’t deliver newspapers anymore, that industry is dying.

I wonder if Gingrich and Senator Mike Lee get their radical agenda from reading Needlenose snark…