Jon Stewart just blasted Ford on Daily Show

UPDATE: Crooks and Liars now has the video.

It was good. And only exacerbates the problem for Ford. When you're starting to be made fun of on the nightly comedy shows, you're in serious trouble. Read the rest of this post...

NBC: Pentagon may be spying on American citizens

I want an investigation of this, now. Read the rest of this post...

Open thread

Long dinner. What's up? Read the rest of this post...

He's baaack

Read the rest of this post...

Dan Savage's weekly column savages Ford

Dan's column is in big free weeklies across the country. Hopefully Ford will resolve this soon, before the damage is too deep to undo.

As only Dan can write it:

Straight Rights Update: After alleged secret meetings with the right-wing American Family Association (AFA), Ford Motor Company agreed to pull its advertising from gay publications and cease sponsoring gay events in order to avoid a threatened boycott. What does this have to do with straight rights? The AFA fucks intimidating Ford on the gay issue are the same fucks intimidating retailers like Target into denying women access to morning-after pills. They're the same assholes trying to stop the feds from approving a vaccine for two strains of HPV. (The HPV vaccine—already tested and 100 percent effective—could save thousands of women's lives every year.) When the AFA successfully attacks gay rights, it only emboldens its attacks on straight rights. So gay or straight, the AFA is your enemy.

What can you do? Call Ford dealers in your area and let them know that you won't be buying a Ford after this. (A list of Ford dealers broken down by state can be found on Americablog: americablog.blogspot.com.) And while you've got 'em on the phone, ask them what Ford is so afraid of. The AFA's boycott of Disney was called off after nine years because it wasn't working. When the AFA threatened Kraft, the execs at Kraft told the haters from the AFA to go fuck themselves. But what did Ford do when the AFA threatened them? The "Built Ford Tough" boys collapsed into a puddle. "Ford Puff" needs to hear from people who won't buy cars from companies that cave in to right-wing hatemongers. And when your local Ford dealer tells you that he didn't make this decision, tell him he had better yell at Ford HQ and get this decision reversed. Microsoft caved to right-wing Christian bullies and then reversed itself. Ford can too.

Read the rest of this post...

The Christofascists are freaking out over Brokeback Mountain

It seems the hate that dare not speak its name just couldn't shut up any longer about the hit movie "Brokeback Mountain" which opens at even more theaters across America this Friday.

Perhaps my favorite bit of pseudo-science from the extremist groups:

Baehr said gay films usually do poorly at the box office. This film may do slightly better, he said, because of the box-office draw of the stars — Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger.

" 'Kinsey,' a movie about sexologist Alfred Kinsey, got only $8 million at the box office, which was pathetic. The average homosexual movie averages only 600,000 dollars," Baehr said. "To put that in context for people, at six dollars a ticket, that's a hundred thousand people. In a country of 295 million people, it doesn't even register."

Putting aside the question of how Kinsey is a "gay movie," click on this Google link and just see how "badly" Brokeback is doing in the review (hint: It's a blockbuster).

As for the pseudo-science about "gay movies" only earning $600k at the box office, Brokeback has already earned nearly that much IN ONLY FIVE THEATERS:

Focus Features’ “Brokeback Mountain” debuted in five theaters and grossed an estimated $544,549. Helmed by Ang Lee, the drama about a love affair between two ranch hands in Wyoming averaged an impressive $108,910 per theater

When in doubt in fundie land, lie lie lie. Read the rest of this post...

Bush support undermines Santorum's re-election

Bush and Ricky really deserve each other. This couldn't happen to a better couple:

U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum's support of President Bush hurts his chances for re-election next year, Pennsylvania voters said by a 2-1 margin in a poll released Tuesday.

More than one-third of all Republicans surveyed in the Quinnipiac University poll also said Santorum's re-election prospects aren't helped by his support of the president.

The poll showed Democratic state Treasurer Robert P. Casey Jr. leading the two-term Republican incumbent by 50 percent to 38 percent in the 2006 Senate race, compared to a 52-to-34 percent lead in Quinnipiac's October poll. Voters also said they disapprove of Bush's job performance, 59 percent to 38 percent.

Read the rest of this post...

Open thread

I really need to get my 8 foot inflatable Grinch on the balcony later today, hopefully I won't freeze. Read the rest of this post...

Henry Ford unveils new line of anti-Semitic autos

So sayeth "Our Dumb Century: The Onion Presents 100 Years of Headlines from America's Finest News Source":

Read the rest of this post...

Zogby Poll: Bush approval rating drops again to 38%

Wow, these numbers are bad. Even the evangelicals hate him.

President Bush’s job approval rating languishes under 40%, despite an upturn in the economy and a public relations onslaught defending the role of the U.S. military in rebuilding Iraq, a new telephone poll by Zogby International shows.

Just 38% of Americans said they approve of the job the President is doing, down from 41% in a national Zogby America survey conducted last month....

Mr. Bush won re-election last year with solid support among those who live in “red” states, but 55% who live there now said he was doing only a fair or poor job. Just 31% of those living in a politically “blue” state approved of his performance in this latest survey....

He carries a 42% approval rating among married respondents, and among Catholics – another key demographic group supporting Mr. Bush last year – just 34% now approve of his leadership. Among the investor class, 43% give him a positive job rating.

“Perhaps most ominous for the President is that only 52% of self-described born-again Protestants give him a positive job performance rating,” said John Zogby, President and CEO of Zogby International.

Read the rest of this post...

Does Ford agree with the AFA that...

Let's look at some choice quotes from the extremist American Family Association (AFA) and its publications and see just how comfortable Ford Motor Company is with the hateful ideology its new buddy is pushing (note: AgapePress is the AFA's online "news" service):

Does a "Jewish upbringing" lead to a life of crime?

In the March issue of American Family Association Journal, a publication of Donald E. Wildmon's right-wing evangelical activist group, the American Family Association (AFA), author Randall Murphree suggested that a Jewish upbringing leads to hatred of Christians, and by extension, a criminal lifestyle.

Were gays the real evil behind the Holocaust?

Scott Lively, California chapter director of the AFA, is co-author of a book titled, The Pink Swastika: Homosexuality and the Nazi Party, in which he claims that “homosexuals [are] the true inventors of Nazism and the guiding force behind many Nazi atrocities.” Lively makes explicit links between his claims about the Nazi party and the modern gay equal rights movement, claiming that “From the ashes of Nazi Germany, the homo-fascist phoenix has arisen again, this time in the United States.”

Is Europe "infested" with Muslims who breed "faster than we do"?

"The problem we have with Europe is that [it] is infested with the Muslim population. The reason why is because they multiply at a much faster rate than we do," she says. "When we Christians get married, we have two, three, maybe four children -- after they're born, we start thinking about what college we're going to send them to, what education we're going to give them. The Muslims, on the other hand, are allowed to marry up to four wives at a time," she says, noting that terrorist Osama bin Laden had 27 children.

Is AIDS a "gay plague"?

Some time ago, you see, Thacker called AIDS "the gay plague," which everyone knows but no one will admit, particularly homosexuals and their friends in the Bush Administration.

Are gays responsible for the "end of times"?

The president of one pro-family group feels the battle in Massachusetts over legalizing homosexual marriage is a clear example of the struggle between good and evil as the end times approach.

Are Muslim-Americans trying to "take over our cities"?

Muslim newcomers are engaging in what area realtors call "block busting." In other words, he says, "They came in, paid outrageously high prices for some of our homes that you wouldn't give $20,000 for, paying 60 and 70 thousand, which then entrenched a number of [Muslim families] on every block." Golen believes this is part of a "concerted effort" on the part of Muslims to use their financial power take over the city, and he says, "they're doing a heck of a job because nobody's standing up to them."

Are gays "deviants"?

"...an immoral, deviant lifestyle."

Are gays a "public health" threat?

As a family physician, I’ve seen first-hand the devastation that homosexuality brings into the lives of patients that have chosen to live this way.... To promote homosexuality and even consider the sanctioning of it through “marriage” is irresponsible and is a danger to the public health of the entire country, spiritually and physically.

Do Jews control Hollywood?

The AFA Journal has long served as a platform for anti-Semitic theories and innuendo. For instance, Wildmon warned of Jewish control over popular culture, an old anti-Semitic canard, in a January 1989 article, "What Hollywood Believes and Wants." "The television elite are highly secular," Wildmon wrote. "The majority (59 percent) in the Jewish faith." In a separate article in the same issue, titled "Anti-Semitism Called a Serious Problem," Wildmon, a longtime opponent of gay rights, pointedly remarked that "Jews favor homosexual rights more than other Americans."

Are gays diseased perverts who die early? - I'm not even going to quote this crap from AFA, read it for yourself and then tell me how Ford Motor Company met with these bigots. Read the rest of this post...

Open thread

Feels like a slow news day. Yes, no, maybe? Read the rest of this post...

Senator George Allen (R-VA) goes soft on hate crimes to appease bigoted extremist groups

What a pig.

Phone: (202) 224-4024

And just FYI, there already is a federal hate crimes law on the books, this hate crimes amendment in question would simply add gender, disability and sexual orientation to the law that already covers race, religion and national origin. So tell them to spare us the argument about how hate crimes laws are per se evil when the existing law already covers the very people bitching about it. Perhaps they want to repeal their own protections? If there's going to be a law on the books, shouldn't it cover everybody? Or should we keep special rights for religious bigots? Read the rest of this post...

FYI My PO Box got accidentally shut down, it's back now with a new address

Anyone who sent contributions or other correspondence to my PO Box, it accidentally got shut down and the mail bounced. It's open again, but I'm going to start using a DIFFERENT PO Box, so please resend to the new address (though the old address will still be forwarded for a bit). The new address is:

JOHN ARAVOSIS
PO Box 21336
Washington, DC 20009

I'm sorry about that. Read the rest of this post...

L.A. Crips Gang Founder Executed in Calif.

From AP:

Convicted killer Stanley Tookie Williams, the Crips gang co-founder whose case stirred a national debate about capital punishment versus the possibility of redemption, was executed early Tuesday....

The case became the state's highest-profile execution in decades. Hollywood stars and capital punishment foes argued that Williams' sentence should be commuted to life in prison because he had made amends by writing children's books about the dangers of gangs and violence.

Read the rest of this post...

Bush: I am not the Bubble Boy

I'm not clueless, really I'm not:

U.S. President George W. Bush said on Monday that he does not live "in a bubble" and that he is well aware of what is going on outside the White House, rejecting critics' claims that he is out of touch with public opinion.

"I don't feel in a bubble," Bush said in an interview on "NBC Nightly News."

"I feel like I'm getting really good advice from very capable people, and that people from all walks of life have informed me and informed those who advise me. And I feel very comfortable that I'm very aware of what's going on," Bush said.

If you have to say you are very aware of what's going on, you probably aren't.

But, Bush is doing interviews. He even answered some questions from the audience yesterday. Wow. Watch the MSM gush over those "major" developments. Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Tell me about it. Read the rest of this post...

Poll: 58% of Americans do not believe Bush has a clear plan for Iraq

So much for all of the latest PR spin on the war. Fifty nine percent disapproved of the way Bush is handling the war, slightly improved from November. Since he tried for the millionth time to connect Iraq's current situation with the US founding fathers, maybe he should try once again to draw comparisons between post-WWII Germany and Iraq since we probably missed that story when they tried so many times before. Read the rest of this post...

1000 days in Iraq, by the numbers

Uh huh, shock and awe. Read the rest of this post...

Open thread

I'm off to bed Read the rest of this post...

I know Republicans lie, but this is ridiculous

From the New Jersey GOP Web site:



No, Forrester lost by a whopping ten points to Senator Corzine, over a month ago.

(Big hat tip to Kevin for finding this little gem.) Read the rest of this post...