Video: What happens when you take a cat for a walk on a leash

On the bright side, the floor is now clean.

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Hacker takes down GoDaddy, and loads of innocent Web sites. Is it terrorism?

A hacker who was using a name suggesting that he was with the group Anonymous claims to have taken down Godaddy today, a site that millions of Web sites, including ours, uses to host our DNS records and nameservers and all other complicated technical things that let you find our site by typing in AMERICAblog.com. So when they took down Godaddy, they potentially took down access to millions of Web sites across the Internet - I know for a fact we were down for many users today.

I'm not entirely sure why innocent people across the Internet, who have defended Anonymous in the past, like me, now need to pay a financial cost for them shutting down our businesses.  Having said that, the hacker is now saying he did this on his own, it was not an "Anonymous" job.*

A friend writes on Facebook:

Supposedly Anonymous has taken down GoDaddy's servers today because they disagree with the company's stances on certain public policies. If true, Anonymous has also disrupted the operations of hundreds of thousands of small businesses (not Wall Street, they don't use GoDaddy's discount services) and small non-profit organizations. Way to go, geniuses! How is this not cyber-terrorism? They're destroying property and trying to instill fear into those who disagree with what they want in order to try to influence public policy ... and they're hurting millions of other innocent people at the same time. How are these guys not terrorists?

*Before anyone mentions how "Republican" Godaddy's owner is, it's still not clear that possibly millions of innocent Web sites, and businesses, should pay a price for that.  I started using them before I knew their owner's politics. To change to another service now, when I'm not even breaking even on the blog many months, would be a change I can't afford at the moment (their competitors charge more, and I'd also have to pay someone to move our dozens and dozens of domain names).  If the economy ever comes back, then we'll talk.

But in any case, should innocent Web sites, Web businesses, across the Net be held hostage to a grudge someone has against Godaddy? Read the rest of this post...

Romney to remove pre-existing condition protections for 1/3 US workforce, 89m Americans

I wrote earlier about how Mitt Romney had flip-flopped four times yesterday on whether he'd repeal all of the President's Health Care Reform law.  Romney is famous for not having a set position on anything, but rather reading the tea leaves on any particular day.  So it was somewhat surprising, even for the eminently flip-flopable Mitt Romney, to flip-flop four times yesterday on this one issue

To recap: First, yesterday morning Romney said that he wouldn't repeal health care reform's provisions that would stop insurance companies from turning you down based on pre-existing conditions.  (He also said that he wouldn't repeal the provisions that make insurance companies accept kids up until the age of 26 on their parents' plans.)

Then later in the day, Romney's staff said "no," he's for repealing all of it.

Then, yesterday evening, Romney's staff said "nuh uh," Romney will keep the pre-existing conditions party mostly.

Then, when folks actually looking at the exact words that Romney's staff used, they realized that Romney wasn't planning on doing anything that wasn't already in the law, and under Romney's proposal one-third of the American workforce, 89 million Americans, would lose the pre-existing condition protections they currently have under ObamaCare, as Romney so derisively calls it.

Mind you, that's in addition to the six million children who would lose health insurance under Romney's plan because they're currently on their parents' insurance.

So, grand total for the number of Americans hurt under Mitt Romney's health care reform repeal proposal, 95 million.

And counting.  I'll be hurt by Romney's repeal because ObamaCare is the only thing guaranteeing that I'll have insurance to cover my asthma drugs.  Currently, Blue Cross Blue Shield cuts me off every year because my asthma drugs cost "too much."  Under ObamaCare, annual limits on coverage would go away, and in principle I'd no longer have to go abroad every year to find cheaper versions of the same drugs.

So people like me will very much be hurt by Mitt Romney's proposed repeal of ObamaCare.  As will any parent who currently has child age 26 or younger on their health insurance.  As will anyone who ever changes jobs, loses their job, moves to another state, or decides to start consulting - suddenly all of you will be at risk of losing your health insurance all over again, thanks to Mitt Romney.


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The secret GOP meeting to destroy the economy in time for 2012

Yep, welcome back to me — I return in time to see Paul Krugman's tale of Republican destruction of American lives and futures for political gain. This is actually a two-parter.

■ One, The Professor calls the Republican Party on its Shermanesque March to the White House, burning everything in its path. A joyful return indeed (my usual emphatic and paragraphic intrusions):

Does anyone remember the American Jobs Act? A year ago President Obama proposed boosting the economy with a combination of tax cuts and spending increases, aimed in particular at sustaining state and local government employment. Independent analysts reacted favorably. For example, the consulting firm Macroeconomic Advisers estimated that the act would add 1.3 million jobs by the end of 2012. ...

But the bill went nowhere, of course, blocked by Republicans in Congress. And now, having prevented Mr. Obama from implementing any of his policies, those same Republicans are pointing to disappointing job numbers and declaring that the president’s policies have failed.

Think of it as a two-part strategy. First, obstruct any and all efforts to strengthen the economy, then exploit the economy’s weakness for political gain. If this strategy sounds cynical, that’s because it is. Yet it’s the G.O.P.’s best chance for victory in November.

What some call "cynical" others call something else. More on that below, but first this, from Krugman, in which he proves his point — that these aren't your daddy's policy differences:

[D]o Republicans really believe that government spending is bad for the economy? No.

Right now Mitt Romney has an advertising blitz under way in which he attacks Mr. Obama for possible cuts in defense spending — cuts, by the way, that were mandated by an agreement forced on the president by House Republicans last year. And why is Mr. Romney denouncing these cuts? Because, he says, they would cost jobs!

Krugman calls that "weaponized Keynesianism" — the belief that government only creates jobs when those jobs create happy pants for the testosterone crowd cheering soldiers onward. (Krugman has a slightly different definition.)

And there's this:

What about the argument ... that Mr. Obama should have fixed the economy long ago? ... The short answer is, you’ve got to be kidding.

I know you're being ironic, but no sir, no one's kidding. Read on.

■ Second, about that characterization. Krugman calls this "cynical." Last I heard, members of Congress have a sworn fiduciary obligation to protect the Constitution and benefit the people:

Fiduciary: a person to whom property or power is entrusted for the benefit of another.

Did I say "sworn"? Thought so. What about violating that oath and damaging the nation you're sworn to "benefit" — all for personal gain?

Some dare call that "treason" — including criminal defense attorney John Reed, as quoted in this great piece by Howie Klein at DownWithTyranny:

When Kansas Republican state Senator Jean Schodorf of Wichita watched a discussion of Draper's book and learned about the obstructionist meeting she decided to quit the Republican Party, which her family had been active in since the time of Abraham Lincoln.

She told John Celock of HuffPo that "When I heard that while people were suffering from the recession that Republican leaders were plotting to get even with the president, that was it."

People are waking up to this sociopathic behavior by the GOP leadership. And more than a few people recognize it as treason against the American people. Retired criminal defense attorney John Reed:

We know now, though, that the very same day the world welcomed the new President into office, a small group of powerful men, bent on his destruction, secretly met to design a plan to create economic and political chaos in America for the coming four years, solely for the purpose of regaining the House of Representatives in 2010, and the Presidency in 2012.

And now we have the first indications that American voters are starting to grasp what the Republicans had in mind and what they did.

Half the country is now aware of the GOP conspiracy to tank the economy and even if many Republican voters have grown immune to reality most independent voters now understand why the recovery has taken so long.

Read Howie's post for the rest. The details are stunning. This wasn't a virtual meeting; it happened, and Howie names the participants.

Some call them traitors. I could be persuaded to be one.

I'm reminded that a "crisis" is a turning point. We had one in 2000, when the American people blessed Bush v Gore with their silent approval.

Here we have another. Imagine if Romney wins, with as many people being aware of the Republican treachery as the article above says, and he wins by less than the number of disenfranchized voters in, let's say, Ohio or Pennsylvania.

At that point, I'd be with Mr. Franklin in his comment to a fellow American. It's one thing to be the thief; it's another to be the victim who hands stuff eagerly over. If you read the sign and bought it, the product is yours with my blessing.

GP

To follow or send links: @Gaius_Publius
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Remembering 9/10: How the GOP hated NYC until it was politically expedient to love it

On September 10, 2001 -- the day before we were attacked -- New York City was a long-reviled place in the hearts of Republicans, right along with Chicago, San Francisco and the District of Columbia.

While today we see Republican Southerners and Midwesterners oddly invested, and stomping mad, about things like lower Manhattan zoning issues ("they're going to build a mosque on scared ground!" -- even though it's not a mosque at all, and it's blocks away), on September 10, 2001 they largely dismissed the metropolis as a worthless sewer representing all that was wrong with America.

Perhaps Republican Vice President Dan Quayle -- the Sarah Palin of his time -- put it best in 1992, when Democrats chose New York City as the site of their convention:

"In so many ways, the liberal Democrats chose the perfect site for their convention," Vice President Dan Quayle said last month, homing in on the theme. "Almost as if they feel a strange compulsion to return to the scene of the crime."

Quayle's derision for New York City wasn't an aberration.  Fast forward to Braves pitcher John Rocker in 1999, only two years before September 11.

When Rocker gave voice to this "I Hate 'Queer with AIDS' New York" assessment, nearly 30,000 fans in Atlanta leapt to their feet in a rapturous standing ovation. He would later receive standing ovations in places like Toledo, Ohio where like minded fans would bring homemade signs reading "Rocker for President".

What exactly did Rocker say that struck a chord with so many? In a 1999 interview with Sports Illustrated, where the admitted steroid-user mocked Asian women and called a black teammate a monkey, Rocker was asked whether he'd consider playing for the Yankees or Mets:

"I'd retire first. It's the most hectic, nerve-racking city. Imagine having to take the 7 Train to the ballpark looking like you're riding through Beirut next to some kid with purple hair, next to some queer with AIDS, right next to some dude who just got out of jail for the fourth time, right next to some 20-year-old mom with four kids. It's depressing... The biggest thing I don't like about New York are the foreigners. You can walk an entire block in Times Square and not hear anybody speaking English. Asians and Koreans and Vietnamese and Indians and Russians and Spanish people and everything up there. How the hell did they get in this country?"

When George W. Bush visited New York before 9/11 he was asked if he enjoyed being in the city, and he simply gave a knowing smirk. Complimenting the multicultural mecca wouldn't have played well with the base that adored his Texas brush clearing swagger.

His father wasn't any better in 1992:

The Republicans are already well into their campaign to tar New York as proof of what went wrong with Democratic liberalism. Just last Friday, the Bush campaign sent a video news release to thousands of local television stations around the country explaining that delegates would not be seeing "the real New York," because the city has deployed thousands of police officers on overtime to create a sanitized shimmer.

But as we always hear, 9-11 changed everything. It was like the prior decades of disdain never happened, and we've all pretty much played along.  Suddenly Republicans loved New York City so much, they even decided to have their convention there in 2004.

Of course everything didn't really change, and some of those good old fashioned disses still bleed through, now that 9/11 has become less effective as a political cudgel for Republicans to wield -- so they're back to hating New York again.

While speaking in Las Vegas earlier this year, Newt Gingrich blasted "New York elites who live in highrises and ride the subway," and Rick Santorum said only people outside of New York and Los Angeles have values:

“I kept saying, you just stick with us, you go out and vote for your values and trust what you know, because you don’t live in New York City. You don’t live in Los Angeles. You live like most Americans in between those two cities, and you know the values you believe in.”

Obviously Republicans haven't evolved since jumping to their feet in denunciation of immigrants, foreign languages, "queers", or mass transit. And New York certainly hasn't become less of a decidedly blue international city.

I can't look inside one's heart, but I can observe actions and listen to words. When Republicans cheer and wave plastic flags for a tough-talking president standing on a smouldering debris pile, but yawn or grumble when those responsible are finally killed by a different president, I think it's fair to outright dismiss their proclaimed love for New York and its people, among other things.

Ideologues used the wound of a national tragedy as an excuse to rush in like an opportunistic infection and push their agenda. I'd bet money many teabaggers -- whether caterwauling about where the city's "mosques" are built, or in a blind rage over plans to include (shudder) ethnic faces on a 9/11 statue -- couldn't even identify Manhattan on a map.

9/11 was a moment where we all came together, but when hacks like Sarah Palin talk about "the real America," Fox News personalities actually seem to encourage terrorists to attack San Francisco, and the Republican nominee for president regularly disparages our third largest city, we see that for Republicans, September 10th is far more relevant, far more self-defining, than September 11th will ever be.

And that, I will never forget.

@EmperorAndoe Read the rest of this post...

GOPers now trying to destroy small business owner who bear-hugged Obama

Obama must be destroyed. So anyone who shows any sign of humanity vis-a-vis the President - like this Republican small businessman who gave Obama a bear hug yesterday when the President stopped in his pizza joint - must also be destroyed.

They're attacking his Yelp profile and voting down his business in order to convince people that it's not a reputable business, and ultimately hurt the small business owner financially.

All because he hugged the President of the United States.

Here's an example of what they're doing to him on Yelp, a site that's supposed to rate how well the man operates his business:

Well.. I'd eat there but after seeing the owner grab our leftist President I felt compelled to disrespect his establishment as much as the President disrespects our constitution. Shame on you Scott Van Duzer for thumbing your nose at all the small business owners this President has disrespected for the last four years. I guess you DIDN'T BUILD IT!

I hope you're prepared for many more Yelps like this!!! Maybe you weren't thinking, or maybe you are the only liberal pro Obama business owner, who knows.. but you won't get mine or anyone else's business for your treachery.

Let me recap.  Democrats boycott your business because you used the proceeds from your business to take away their civil rights, such as the Mormons did in financing Prop 8 or Chick-fil-A did in financing officially-designated hate groups.  Republicans boycott your business because you got excited to meet the President of the United States.

Greg from, where else, Arizona:

Talk about committing business suicide. After picking up Obama, your books are gonna be in the red pretty soon. Not too smart.

Another poster raised a good point:

These reviews demonstrate that the right-wingers DON'T support small businesses. They support small businesses that agree with their stinking POLITICS, which is the same thing as not supporting small businesses AT ALL.

Where are Romney and Ryan on the fact that their supporters are now trying to destroy a small businessman simply for being a patriotic American?

But this Yelp commenter said it:

Simply to balance out the idiots, like Mike A., who are reviewing a place because the owner was able to not hate someone that they did.

And isn't that what it's really all about? Democrats dislike you because you hate. Republicans dislike you because you don't hate.  And then they criticize us for being intolerant of their intolerance.

There's a reason the Republican party is perceived as bigoted, homophobic and intolerant.  As mean and uncaring.  As greedy, and for the rich.  Because it is. Read the rest of this post...

TSA retaliates against traveler who refuses drink test

So we're clear on this, the TSA is more about theater and towing the line, no matter how ridiculous it may be.

The new policy now is to smile and demand that passengers let their drinks be tested even after passing security -- in other words, while you're sitting at the gate with the drink you got post-security. Failure to allow the happy, smiling TSA to test -- or even showing annoyance at this new intrusion -- will result in retaliation as seen in this video from the Houston airport. The TSA will not tolerate attitude even if someone raises a valid concern.

So is the TSA now admitting that their security system for both passengers and food vendors behind security is lousy and unable to detect danger? With each month, the TSA pushes to new extremes without complaint from the political class.

While traveling through the US the other day, I watched an elderly grandmother being lifted out of her wheelchair and put into a porno-scanner in Charlotte. Maybe some of the lemmings find that reassuring, but I found it to be scary and pathetic. Read the rest of this post...

Romney flip-flops 4 times on health care reform in past 24 hours

The man believes in nothing.

Sunday morning on NBC, Mitt Romney said that while he wants to repeal Health Care Reform, he would leave the provisions in place that ban insurers from discriminating based on pre-existing conditions, and that require insurance companies to cover children up to the age of 26 on their parents' plans.

Hooray!  A moment of humanity from the ice princess!

Not so fast.  As soon as Mitt's conservative overlords got wind of it, Romney did a quick 180, and now is against helping people with pre-existing conditions, and with children aged 26 and under.

Let me be more precise.  Mitt Romney is now saying that if he's elected president he will take away health care from 6.6 million children that are now on their parents' health insurance plans, and he will once again let insurance companies turn away people with "pre-existing conditions" as benign as psoriasis, high cholesterol and asthma.

In reference to how Romney would deal with those with preexisting conditions and young adults who want to remain on their parents’ plans, a Romney aide responded that there had been no change in Romney’s position and that “in a competitive environment, the marketplace will make available plans that include coverage for what there is demand for. He was not proposing a federal mandate to require insurance plans to offer those particular features.”

Then, suddenly, last night the Romney campaign amended their amended statement in an effort to suggest that they would in fact preserve the non-discrimination language concerning pre-existing conditions.  Hurray!

But not so fast, a re-read of the new statement makes clear that in fact Romney won't be preserving the pre-existing conditions protections that are in Health Care Reform.  Romney simply wanted you to think he was going to preserve it, but he really isn't.

So now he's not simply spineless, he's also duplicitous.

When you're worth a minimum of a quarter of a billion dollars it's of little consequence to you that more than six million children will lose their health insurance because of your incessant pandering to the far right.

But just as serious, this is all the more evidence that Mitt Romney simply believes in nothing.  He will be whatever the highest bidder wants him to be.  And that doesn't bode well for the rest of us not worth a quarter of a billion dollars. Read the rest of this post...

China continues to deliver poor economic numbers

This year continues to be a rough year for China. The ghost towns are still there, demand for raw materials is sagging, the critical 8% growth rate is slipping and now exports are also slowing along with internal consumer demand.

Again, for almost any other economy many of the numbers would be impressive but in the case of China, the numbers are both disappointing as well as reason for concern. For years the economic growth has been the key to social stability so when the growth disappears, the future is much more in question. To date, China has refused to implement a second stimulus though as the numbers get worse, that may be necessary. It also may be too late.

What next?

Exports grew 2.7 percent year-on-year last month, below the 3 percent forecast in a Reuters poll, confirming President Hu Jintao's warning of the "grave challenges" posed by the world economy.

Data for imports was even worse, showing a fall of 2.6 percent on the year in August, compared with expectations for a 3.5 percent rise. The number will solidify market expectations for further stimulus and monetary easing to support growth as China heads towards a once-a-decade leadership change later this year.

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