Is This A Joke?

The question is rhetorical.

Raw Replay: House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) told NBC’s Matt Lauer Tuesday that tax hikes were “off the table” in negotiations with Democrats over raising the debt ceiling.

In a speech to Wall Street Monday, the Speaker insisted on trillions in spending cuts in exchange for raising the nation’s borrowing limit.

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Look, we can argue whether spending cuts to crucial programs during the slow recovery of such a disastrous recession is a good idea or not, but don't try to pull the wool over our eyes with this "we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem" talking point mumbo jumbo. When corporations can get away with paying practically no taxes because of loopholes and the richest 1% of the country pays less in taxes on percentage than the entire middle class, then yes, there's a fucking revenue problem. So fix it.

"I'm a regular guy with a big job." You sure are, Johnny. And exposing your lack of leadership by not standing up to the Tea Party freshmen who are out for your head, shows you're way in over your head.

ADDING... While the Speaker claimed Republicans are addressing the debt...

FACT CHECK

Ryan Admitted Plan Added $8 Trillion to Debt . According to an initial analysis by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), they found that by the end of the 10 year budget window, public debt would actually be higher. CBO projected under current law the debt would balloon to 67 percent of GDP by 2022; “under Ryan’s plan, the CBO expects it to rise to 70 percent.” Ryan had to reassure conservatives “disappointed that his plan still adds $8 trillion in debt while failing to balance the budget for at least two decades.” [Congressional Budget Office, 4/5/11; The Atlantic, 4/6/11; The Hill, 4/5/11]

EDITORIAL: GOP Budget isn’t a “Serious Answer” to the Deficit Problem. “The deficit is a serious problem, but the Ryan plan is not a serious answer.” [New York Times Editorial, 4/6/11]

House Republicans Voted to End Medicare.  The Wall Street Journal wrote, “The plan would essentially end Medicare, which now pays most of the health-care bills for 48 million elderly and disabled Americans, as a program that directly pays those bills.” [H Con. Res. 34, Vote #277, 4/15/11; Wall Street Journal, 4/4/11]

President Obama - Today Show Interview

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There Goes The Neighborhood

Picture the really annoying family that lives on the block that ruins what would otherwise be a fun neighborhood to live in. You know the ones. Everyone has those types of neighbors driving down property values. They are the reason, "There goes the neighborhood" became a catchphrase. They have regular shouting matches in the driveway. They leave garbage in their backyard after a barbecue that attracts rodents which soon infest your own yard. They have the police pulling up to their house once every couple of weeks in the middle of the night to settle a domestic dispute. You don't want your children playing with their children for fear of them being a bad influence on your kids, be it disrespect... or drugs... or lice. Or scabies.

Meet the Palins. The Wasilla Hillbillies. There goes the neighborhood.

This past week, Late Night host David Letterman made a couple of crude jokes at the expense of the Palins. Specifically the joke in question was, "Sarah Palin went to a Yankees game yesterday. There was one awkward moment. During the 7th inning stretch, her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodgriguez."

In response, Todd Palin released a statement: “Any 'jokes' about raping my 14-year-old are despicable. Alaskans know it and I believe the rest of the world knows it, too.”

Raping my 14-year-old daughter? A bit over the top, eh Todd?

Letterman discussed the whole situation at length in what I view as a half-hearted apology. I say half-hearted because the Palins made the joke something which it wasn't, and although he called the jokes "ugly," Letterman wasn't so much apologizing as explaining the truth of the matter. 14-year-old Willow Palin was not the subject of the joke. Something the Palins seem to skirt around.



They could have taken the high road, accepted the apology and left it alone. But no, they decided to make this an issue that it wasn't about, while insinuating that Letterman can't be trusted with underage girls. It's pathetic. The Palins' continuation of this fiasco with their idiotic press releases and Sarah Palin's appearance on the Today Show further exemplifies the opportunists that they are.

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Enough of the feigned outrage. Anyone who has any sense of humor at all knows that this joke, although in poor taste, was not meant for Willow. Did everyone forget about Bristol Palin? Apparently her own mother, Sarah Palin did.

"I would say that you and anybody else are extremely naive to believe that very convenient excuse of David Letterman's the other day - it took a couple of days for him to think of that excuse that - uh, no he wasn't talking about my daughter who was there with me at the game, the 14-year-old, he was talking about some other daughter. Well I think it's a weak excuse."

Yes, Sarah, the "other daughter." Remember the one named Bristol that you exploited during your campaign? Bristol, your "other daughter" that actually did get "knocked up" and is now laughably pushed out into the spotlight as an advocate for ABSTINENCE?! Your "other daughter," Bristol, that you were forcing to marry off to Levi Johnston and trotted them out as Margaret Carlson said, "like the Charles and Diana of the Klondike" until you lost the election. Where's Levi now? Discarded. Conveniently out of the family portrait.

And not that it matters but guess what? Not everyone knows exactly who attended the Yankees game despite the fact that Sarah Palin thinks we await her every move with bated breath. When I heard the joke, it was obvious that the daughter inferred was Bristol, the knocked up abstinence advocate, and that the real butt of the joke was Alex Rodriguez.

Sarah and Todd Palin are the ones who interjected 14-year-old Willow into this faux controversy, not Letterman. Why? Because they can't stand being ignored. During the campaign they felt the national spotlight, and it was good, and now they need the national spotlight, even though under that bright light, every ugly deed and deceitful lie uttered is more easily revealed for all to see than when sitting in seclusion in Alaska.

Is this the future of the Republican Party? Sarah Palin in 2012, with her run-on sentence rants and her penchant for playing Hatfield/McCoy on the national stage? I'm guessing the Democratic National Committee is dreaming of it. I actually think that her act will get old and tired pretty fast and that she'll burn herself out by then. At least I hope so, because if I have to listen to her jibberish for three more years, I'm going to contemplate putting a bullet in my brain.

Cramer Just Won't Give Up

Jim Cramer spoke out against his Jon Stewart interview on the Today show.

I think it was a naive and misleading thing to attack the media. We weren’t behind this. CNBC, in particular, has been out front on this. … I think there are people who bear so much more responsibility [than the media] that it’s just wrong-headed: the politicians, the regulators, the SEC, the lenders, the investment banks. … It’s just a naive focus, it really is Meredith.

My question to Cramer is: why didn't you say any of this when you were on Stewart's show? By the way, during that interview, Jon Stewart did say that there were a few good journalists at CNBC and included David Faber, or don't you remember because of the drubbing you were in the midst of?

Cramer's comment of taking the "high road" when he said he would try to do better sticks in my craw when the following day on his show, he did this. So much for the high road OR actually trying to do better. Sorry, Jim. This defense was weak.

Jim Cramer Picked the Wrong Guy to Fuck With

The Jim Cramer evisceration continues. And Joe Scarborough gets into the act. Joe Scarborough!



I believe Thrusday night at 11pm on Comedy Central is going to be a Must-See-TV night, as Stewart's guest is going to be... Jim Cramer! I would also suggest to The Scar that should he happen to criticize a show, perhaps he should watch it first.

Jon Stewart Bitchslaps Jim Cramer - UPDATED

Stewart continued his rampage against CNBC, specifically Jim Cramer, who decided to write an article on how his advice was mischaracterized by The Daily Show. ...Bad move, Jim.

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

In Cramer We Trust

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UPDATE (2:18pm): Cramer fights back with an appearance on The Today Show, claiming he stuck his neck out when he told everyone to sell by October 2008. Well fuck, Jim, by October '08 even I knew that! I didn't need a talking head financial guru slapping red buttons like a maniac to tell me the market was tanking when it had been happening for a year. He also refers to himself as "the little guy." Poor multi-millionaire Jim Cramer.

Maybe you should just go on The Daily Show and hash it out. I'd like to see that.

Matt Lauer Calls Out Rick Santelli On His White House Threat Claim

Santelli: "Well, I'm not saying 'threatening'..."

Really? That's not what you said on G. Gordon Liddy's sorry excuse for a show.



Good for Matt Lauer to call out this moron. And Lauer didn't even mention the fact that the reason Robert Gibbs "called out" Santelli is because he was asked a question about Santelli's specific action!

Q On the foreclosure plan, aside from Rush Limbaugh and that cable rant on the floor of the Exchange, there really does appear to be some --

MR. GIBBS: Chuck's network? (Laughter.)

Q -- there really does appear to be some anger out there from people who just don't believe the President when he said that only people who acted responsibly are going to be helped here. How can you assure people that you're going to reward only people, only homeowners who acted responsibly?

Can this guy please fade back into obscurity now?

Why Ann Coulter Is Still Insane (Yet another chapter in a never ending series.)

Poor Matt Lauer. He's got to deal with crazy Ann Coulter after she was rescheduled on The Today Show. For the second straight day, the conservative crack ho battles with herself in trying to get a word in egdewise, interrupting herself in an attempt to predict when Lauer would interrupt her.

I think she may have had an issue when younger of constantly being interrupted, or constantly told to shut her cakehole at the dinner table, to the point of refusing to be interrupted and being paranoid about it in adulthood.

Matt Lauer, like most other interviewers trying to tackle the impossible, just gives up on attepting to have a real discourse or debate and just reads the questions from his cards without a care about the answer, hoping Harry Smith would run onto the set and stab him in the temple with the pen he was contemplating using on himself only yesterday.

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OOPS!

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. was just interviewed by Matt Lauer on the Today show. Here was their first exchange:

Lauer: First of all, how is your father... your father? Yes, how is your father doing?

RFK, Jr.: My uncle?

Lauer: (with a look of horror on his face) Yes! Yes! I'm sorry, your uncle. How is your uncle doing?

Matt Lauer: Tool of Epic Proportions.