McCain Needs to Go Away

How much hate can one man hold against another? How bitter must a person be to look for any misguided excuse to fingerpoint and shake his fist in outrage despite making himself look like a complete loon in the process?

Arizona Senator and former 2008 losing Republican presidential candidate John McCain is still in stage two of the five stages of loss and grief: Anger. And since he doesn't have the balls to challenge the president directly, he'll hypocritically go after UN Ambassador Susan Rice for expressing CIA intelligence at the time almost verbatim in regards to the Benghazi embassy attack.

But no matter. McCain can keep tilting at windmills along with his personal Sancho Panza, Sen. Lindsey Graham, about the Benghazi attack and claim a coverup or incompetence in this instance, but defend then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice in her "mushroom cloud" assessment because that's what the intelligence assessment said at the time. Why is that explanation good enough for Condoleezza Rice when it then had a direct result of taking the country into war on false pretenses, but not good enough for Susan Rice who had no direct involvement with the State Department and whose statements were consistent with CIA intelligence at the time? Oh right, it's okay if you're a Republican.

John McCain needs to go away. His mind is muddled with anger and revenge, never getting over 2008's loss. If he were so interested in the actual information about what happened in the Libyan embassy attack and the intelligence leading up to Benghazi on September 11th, he should have attended the classified briefing for members of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, of which he is a member, instead of holding a photo op press conference demanding information that was being disseminated in said meeting simultaneously, and calling for another investigation, also known as another witch hunt.

 Reporters would do well to skip McCain's pressers from now on, else they'll risk missing actual news.

Paul Ryan Forgets Stimulus Requests

Seriously, dude?! Now you're just fucking with me.

Paul Ryan spent the last three years railing against the horrible, terrible, no good, very bad stimulus in front of the cameras and microphones, while asking for stimulus money behind the scenes to help his district create jobs and stimulate the economy. That's a goddamn fact.

And still, after being caught with his hand in the cookie jar, with video and audio proof and letters requesting stimulus funds with his fucking signature on them, he still tries to push the bullshit that it "did nothing to stimulate the economy." That the stimulus was a complete failure.

Unfuckingbelievable.

Rachel Maddow wipes up the studio floor with this punk, jackass. Must. See.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

(Cross-posted at ABLC)

Socialist Jon Stewart is Back!

After a two week hiatus, The Daily Show came back with guns blazing! Enjoy.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Tweet of the Day

And that, in a nutshell, illustrates the rank hypocrisy of the right wing pundits in today's Republican Party. Good for you to call it out, Meghan.

UPDATE: Louis C.K.was announced as host of the June 8 Radio and Television correspondents’ dinner – which is not the same as the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. He has since withdrawn from the event.

Silence Is Golden

Remember when the GOP and Republican talking heads went apeshit when the Obama administration decided to try Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, AKA "The Underwear Bomber" in federal civilian court? Remember when Senate Minority Leader Mitch "The Jowel" McConnell said President Obama was acting “as if [Abdulmutallab] had robbed a convenience store”?

There was a time when the circumstances surrounding Abdulmutallab’s arrest were part of a lengthy national debate about the best way to handle terrorism cases. There were letters, television appearances and press releases calling on the Obama administration to reverse its position and send Abdulmutallab into the military tribunal system due to perceived weaknesses in the civilian court system.

Now that he’s locked up for life, it’s pretty much radio silence. A search for press releases mentioning Abdulmutallab from members of Congress this week turns up just one, from Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), who said the sentence ‘demonstrations that our federal court system is fully capable of bringing terrorist to justice.”

Yeah, they trusted our judicial system so much, they insisted he be sent to a military tribunal. Why do Republicans hate America and its justice system?



*Note: I know Joe Lieberman also insisted on a military tribunal for Abdulmutallab too, but really, let's not delude ourselves for a second that he was ever really a Democrat or even an Independent.

In Follow-Up to the Newt Affair

POSTED BY JHW22

Ooops, I probably shouldn't have called it an affair. I might hurt Newt's feelings and make him go all nukuler on me.

But, anyway, here's this.





h/t Rick Parry on Facebook.

Recess Par-TAY!

This is what happens when Republican opposition is only for reasons of trying to cripple the government under the Obama administration, be it the Consumer Protections Bureau, or the National Labor Relations Board to establish a quorum, or an ever growing number of vacancies in the federal judicial system (101 and counting). So enough is enough.

President Obama touched off a fierce election-year confrontation with Congressional Republicans on Wednesday, defying their deep opposition to appoint Richard Cordray as director of a new consumer protection agency and fill three labor board vacancies.

Whine all you want, Republicans, but refusing to even meet to vet or discuss nominations for positions to make the gears of government run is a bullshit move, and you can just fuck off.

“I refuse to take ‘no’ for an answer,” Mr. Obama said, adding, “I am not going to stand by while a minority in the Senate puts party ideology ahead of the people we were elected to serve.”

Oh, and there's also this:

"Despite the inevitable conservative complaints that President Obama is engaged in some kind of massive overreach by recess appointing Richard Cordray as the nation’s chief consumer financial protection watchdog, the truth is that Obama has used his recess appointment power very sparingly. After today’s appointment, President Obama will have made a total of 29 recess appointments. By comparison, George W. Bush made 171 recess appointments; Bill Clinton made 139 recess appointments; George H.W. Bush made 77 recess appointments; and Ronald Reagan made 243. When you divide these numbers by the number of years each man spent in the White House, it reveals that Obama is far and away the least likely president to invoke this power."

So yeah, fuck off, hypocrites.

Just Say "Oops" and Get Out (The Romney/Osama Bin Laden Edition)

Via Political Wire:

"I do not concur in the words of Barack Obama in a plan to enter an ally of ours... I don't think those kinds of comments help in this effort to draw more friends to our effort."

-- Mitt Romney, quoted by Reuters in 2008, on the United States entering Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden.

"I think other presidents and other candidates like myself would do exactly the same thing."

-- Romney, in an interview on MSNBC earlier today, downplaying credit for Obama for ordering the raid in Pakistan that finally killed Osama bin Laden.

Quote of the Day

"It is unconscionable that in the face of mass unemployment, Republicans continue to foil measures to spur employment, including an extension of the payroll tax holiday. How can conservatives declare simultaneously that (1) it would be a terrible crime to raise taxes on the rich in the long term, and (2) it is an act of virtue to raise taxes on the middle class immediately? Has class warfare ever been so naked?"

~E.J. Dionne, Washington Post

And there you have it. Simply explained and easy for everyone to understand despite the bristling of GOP mouthpieces projecting that it is the Democrats who are waging class warfare because they'd like to tax the wealthiest of the 1% an extra point or two.

They Really Do Try, Don't They?

I never cease to be amazed at the unadulterated spin from conservative pundits and columnists who look for any opportunity to blame President Obama for pretty much anything. It's almost as if they think they're speaking to or writing for a Fox News audience with no worry about being called to account for the obvious disingenuousness they spew. Markets down? Obama's fault. Greece in financial disarray? ...Damn that Obama. Scrapping the balloons at the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade this year due to high winds? ...OBAMAAAAAA!

The latest example of this comes from Washington Post opinion columnist Michael Gerson. Mr. Gerson has absolutely no problem blaming the failed Supercommittee debacle on the President. Titled "Obama Let the Supercommittee Fail," Gerson blames indifference on the part of the President for a group of twelve grown adults (yes, I'll include the Republicans on the committee as "grown-up") not coming to an agreement with a looming $1.2 trillion in cuts across the board. But amazingly, Gerson believes, or would have his readers believe, that the "supercommittee failed primarily because President Obama gave a shrug."

So what if Republicans wouldn't budge on actual revenue increases in a balanced combination with spending cuts? So what if their ultimate $300 billion tax increase offer was connected to a basic repeal of the Affordable Care Act which took over a year to pass and a privatization of Medicare? The real problem was that "these were the ingredients for a deal. But only a president can mix them and apply the heat." Yep, Obama is the cook that stirs the pot and self-motivation for 12 of an elite 100 members of our political system is of no consequence. ...Damn Obama!

The disconnect is the fact that Gerson knows that Republicans would have never agreed to anything, as witnessed by the moving of the goalposts farther and farther to the right. Ezra Klein analyzes:

If by "at fault" we mean "unwilling to compromise," we can do better than listen to the self-serving remarks of the players. We can look hard at the movement in the actual plans...

The final Boehner [/Obama] plan envisioned tax reform that would generate $800 billion in new revenues and bring the top rate down to 35 percent. In the supercommittee, the highest Republicans ever got on taxes was the Toomey plan's $300 billion, with envisioned a top rate of 28 percent. So on taxes, it's fairly clear: The supercommittee Republicans were far to the right of Boehner.

On the Democratic side, Obama eventually insisted on somewhere near $1.2 trillion in tax reform or, if the revenues were to move lower, on much less in entitlement cuts. In the supercommittee, the Democrats offered a plan with less than a trillion dollars in tax reform -- and more entitlement reforms than Obama was willing to agree to.

Boehner had about $150 billion in Medicare beneficiary cuts in his opening bid in the negotiations with the president, and he went down from there. In the supercommittee, Baucus offered $200 billion in Medicare beneficiary cuts...

These steps toward compromise by the Democrats, who swallowed hard in a serious effort to get something done, were far more than anything Republicans offered. Does it surprise anyone that Republicans would take a step further to the right in an effort to sink any deal and let the usual Republican "Obama can't get anything done" talking points continue? This has been their strategy from the start. And Gerson knows this. But why point the blame at a deadlocked "supercommittee" when you can just blame the President?

I won't bore you with anymore detail in Gerson's column (you can read it for yourself to get the full frontal asshattery) except for one line. Gerson asserts that the President "is simply in over his head." This was the same accusation hurled at President Obama on the supposed failed stimulus to stop our economy from hurdling over a cliff. Sorry for the bad timing, Mike, but maybe you should read the latest CBO report:

The economy would have been in much worse shape without the 2009 stimulus — which increased employment in the third quarter of this year by as many as 3.3 million full-time jobs, according to a report by the Congressional Budget Office...

...The CBO figures released Tuesday estimate that the stimulus package raised the gross domestic product this past quarter by 0.3 percent-1.9 percent.

Yep, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act enacted by this "in over his head" President is still stimulating the economy a year after its "end." We now know the recession we found ourselves in was much deeper and dire than anyone had estimated and had the stimulus been even larger, we might be in even better shape today. But hey, why let facts get in the way of a good villain story, right Mr. Gerson?

Occupy Something

POSTED BY JHW22

A friend just posted a photo of troops in Afghanistan with a sign telling OWS protestors to quit bitchin'. I decided not to post that picture because I respect that the men chose to serve but disagree with them on their perspective and I don't want to add any animosity toward them personally when I rant. I don't want these particular men to be the ones I am speaking to because who I am really speaking to are all of the people who don't get some things about the OWS movement OR who are choosing to pretend it's something it isn't.

First of all, don't forget that some in the OWS movement are vets who came home to no jobs.

Also, I know a lot of people who go to the OWS protests on their days off or after work. I also know of some people who telecommute from the protests. So the idea that every supporter of OWS is jobless isn't completely accurate.

And finally, seems odd that Republicans have been "bitchin'" about the unemployment rate, so why is it when unemployed people take a stand on the lack of jobs because of failed economic policies, there's a flip on who should be bitchin' and who should shut up?

I have to admit that I am not a full supporter of OWS, nor am I against it. There are things I agree with and things I don't. As with any movement of frustrated people, some are saying things I applaud and some are saying things that piss me off. I can't get on board to the point of going down to one or following any of them on Twitter. But I do feel it's necessary to call bullshit on false memes about them. Really, the OWS people are taking a different approach to expressing the same frustrations many in the Tea Party expressed.

We're all pissed about a lot of the same things. The difference is the Tea Party half-assed their anger (being mad at the wrong things in most cases) and they half-assed their protests. Sure they made a big mess of the health care reform debates. But where were they during the last six months? Nowhere. They dropped the "mad at too much of anything that bugs us" ball and the OWS protestors picked it up and have run with it. They are mad a lot of the same things and people, but generally more for the right reasons and with far less undermining influences trying to take over.

So I find it amusing when the Republicans bitch and moan about the unemployment rate and want to say Obama and Geithner and Bernanke and Pelosi and anyone else they don't like is to blame for there being "no jobs" and then they turn around and tell protestors, protestors with more dedication than the Tea Party protestors, to get a job. Remember, Republicans, you keep telling us there are no jobs. You keep telling us Obama killed jobs, that he hasn't created any jobs. Yet, you want these OWS people to go get one?

Please.

Wee Wee'd Up

POSTED BY JHW22

Remember when then-candidate Obama said something at a fundraiser about some people clinging to guns and religion? And remember how everyone from the left and right faked outrage over the remark, despite knowing he had a point?

Well apparently, the Republican party doesn't like their fundraiser event speeches being taken out of context. Oh, you know what speech I'm talking about.

Some are shocked that people are misconstruing Perry's performance as drunken or bizarre. Some are defending him as having been very well received by the crowd. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram went so far as to write a piece with supporters practically whining about how really, really good the speech was. My favorite part of the editorial was the reference to Perry seeming almost Paul Lynde-like.

But it's just one more example of the GOP hypocrisy. They take a comment from a very poignant, focused speech and rip it out of context and avoid the truth to it, just to mock the speaker. But when several clips, out of context or not, are shown to make their candidate look completely mockable, then hell's bells, that's unfair!

President Obama's Weekly Address - October 8, 2011

Making Your Voice Heard on the American Jobs Act

More Like This, Please

President Obama: “We don’t believe in the kind of smallness that says it’s OK for a stage full of political leaders — one of whom could end up being the President of the United States — being silent when an American soldier is booed. We don’t believe in that. We don’t believe in standing silent when that happens. We don't believe in them being silent since. You want to be commander-in-chief? You can start by standing up for the men and women who wear the uniform of the United States, even when it’s not politically convenient."

President Obama's Weekly Address - October 1, 2011

Fighting for the American Jobs Act

Buffett Birthers?

Seriously?

The Hill reports big names in Congress are starting to say Buffett "needs to reveal his finances if his views on tax rates are going to serve as the basis for Obama administration policy."

NRSC chair John Cornyn (TX), who took the call to Twitter Thursday, explained to ABC News that knowing how Buffett makes his money could change the way people view the so-called "Buffett Rule" that President Obama is making a cornerstone of his call for increased taxes on the super-rich.

John Cornyn should pay attention because I believe this is exactly what Warren Buffett admitted to. He is taxed at a lower percentage on capital gains for really doing nothing but investing his money.

Here he is on Charlie Rose, WITH A COPY OF HIS TAX RETURNS!



Hey Buffett Birthers, just say "Oops" and get out! And now that we've seen that Mr. Buffett has made his tax returns public, I'd like to see the Koch brothers' returns, please.

Poor Rep. Flemming Eking Out An Existence at $774K Per Year.

Here's the perfect example of the GOP disconnect in the class warfare/tax fairness issue. Republican Louisiana Rep. John Flemming owns Subway shops and UPS storefronts. His income from those businesses is $6 million yearly. But he has the balls to whine that after expenses, he only takes home $600,000. After after home expenses, he only has $400,000 left to reinvest.



First of all, it's none of my business if Flemming's home expenses are $200,000. But whatever happened to tightening your belt at home during hard economic times? What happened to living within your means? Second, it doesn't seem like he's counting his $174,000 Congressman's salary in his take home total. Finally, Flemming claims to have 500 employees. At $5.4 million in expenses, he's paying far less than $10,800 per employee that his number equals divided by 500 employees.

So, John Flemming is a liar when it comes to job creation. But what's really galling is that what he sees at practically nothing, his $774,000 "take home pay" can hire 15-20 teachers, or police officers or firefighters.

And these are the politicians the Tea Party types defend? Pathetic.

Less White Flag, More Pit Bull

A regular reader of this blog, Nowhere Man, and I had a conversation about ScheduleGate way, way back, long ago when it was fresh in our memories a whole 48 hours ago. He made a cogent argument for the frustration we were feeling at the time, at the news of the White House switching the date of the anticipated job's speech. I asked Nowhere Man to email me in the form of a post and I'd include it in the blog.

I know this will stir up controversy, especially with my co-blogger Jennifer and others, who believe we should keep our sights focused on John Boehner and the obstructionist GOP instead of "blaming" President Obama, and rightly so. But in my opinion, the continuing pattern when it comes to the perception, the perception of the White House and Congressional Democrats backing down from a fight on a seemingly consistent basis can be a very damaging thing.

Whether the perception is true or not, we know that the combination of a right-wing echo chamber and a complicit mainstream media terrified at the thought of being labeled "liberal," can hurt. I've said it before: optics matter. All you have to do is think of John Kerry on a sailboard, Michael Dukakis wearing a helmet while riding in a tank, or the infamous Howard Dean yowl to know that optics matter. The general population likes the image of a strong leader. Whether they agree with him or not, they can at least say he's a person of convictions. But the constant backtrack is a turn off. Two words: Mitt Romney.

So yes, while he have to keep our eyes peeled and call out Republican hypocrisy at every turn, it would help tremendously if the President and the administration did as well.
___________________________


POSTED BY NOWHERE MAN

Let's go back in time and try to remember when the brand new President of the Unites States tried to pass the stimulus to a Democratically controlled Congress to stave off a hemorrhaging economy. Republican leadership led by John Boehner and Eric Cantor wanted tax cuts in the bill. President Obama, trying to show he can work with the Republicans, allowed them to fill it with tax cuts. The largest tax cuts in US history, $282 billion worth over two years. The result: not a single Republican voted for the stimulus.

Right then and there the new President, barely a month into his term, should've sent the Republicans a profound message: DON'T TAKE ME FOR A SUCKER. He should have told then Speaker Nancy Pelosi to write a new bill minus the tax cuts the Republicans wanted. But he decided not to fight and instead left the Recovery Act as it was. By doing so, he made his first big mistake and sent a very different message to the Republicans: I CAN BE ROLLED.

What the President has needed from the very beginning is an advisor with a pit bull attitude, the way former President Clinton had James Carville to call out what phonies and hypocrites the Republicans were, and to say President Obama was trying to be conciliatory but got stabbed in the back by the opposition instead.

In the battle over the Bush tax cuts, Obama gave speeches to his base renewing his campaign pledge to let them expire. The Republicans held unemployment insurance hostage. He caved again and explained, incredibly telling and stupid in my opinion, that the hostage was going to be injured. The hostage was ultimately us. But it reaffirmed to the GOP he can be rolled, and all you have to do is grab a hostage.

It's too bad he didn't have a pit bull standing in front of the DC, inside the beltway, media elite cameras, ripping the Republicans and saying they didn't have a soul for using the middle class and unemployed like so much used toilet paper so the rich could keep getting richer, especially at such a difficult time for so many people during the holiday season, questioning, "What kind of country are we?" or "What kind of country have we become?"

At the press conference announcing the continuation of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy that he was so against, he was asked by a reporter if he was worried that the Republicans would now use the debt ceiling as the next hostage. Obama explained despite prior evidence to the contrary, that he thought Boehner was an HONORABLE man! I'm sure there were plenty of eye rolls by the White House Press Corp when he said that.

In the debt ceiling debates he repeatedly vowed that there would be no budget cuts without new revenues. He again gave speeches to his base telling them to contact their representatives to support his debt ceiling plan, and that there would be no cuts without new revenues. There was so much email traffic from his supporters that several Congressional websites crashed. I actually thought, "Finally! He's drawing a line in the sand!" Well we all know that turned out to be just another rerun: spending cuts with no new revenue.

There was no pit bull going around saying the Republicans love their party more than their country and proving it by willing to let the country go bankrupt. There was no thought of explaining how the elderly, the disabled, our combat soldiers engaged in two wars, were all being held hostage yet again. And President Obama, refusing to challenge the Republicans and see if they had the balls to let the country go under, as usual raised the white flag.

And now ScheduleGate. When I first heard that they scheduled the speech on the same day as the Republican debate, I said, "Wow! He's starting the campaign with a bang! What a politically brilliant and bold in your face move declaring 'I'm ready to fight and no more Mr. Nice Guy!'" I was listening to liberal radio that afternoon when the news broke on Boehner's rejection and suggestion that the speech be moved to the following night, opposite the first game of the year for the NFL.

In response, the White House should have explained the timeline. They should have said Boehner had no problem with it until Rush Limbaugh had a problem with it. They should have explained that Boehner's excuses were faulty at best because they were using a parliamentary tactic to prevent the President from making any recess appointments, therefore they were technically in session. They should have release a statement like this:

"While Congress was enjoying its five week layoff, there were and still are millions of Americans who have been on permanent unpaid vacations struggling to get by. They've been waiting for this current session of Congress to start who, under the leadership of John Boehner, have yet to introduce a single jobs bill in the nine months since he's been Speaker. They continue to demonstrate their benign neglect of the unemployed by the unprecedented rejection of the President's request for a joint session of Congress to deliver his speech for a jobs plan. 

The President has decided instead to give the speech to those its aimed at - the unemployed. Therefore, President Obama will be addressing an auditorium full of unemployed Americans at the University of Maryland as scheduled, on September 7th. We are making our case directly to the American people while the Republican controlled House passes all the anti-Planned Parenthood bills it wants."

But who am I kidding? That would be a pit bull talking!

He Can Do No Right

Look, I know that if you're a Republican, to agree with anything that President Obama has to offer is a political risk. I know that everyone in the GOP has pretty much taken the Mitch McConnell tact of making President Obama a one-term president as its main and major goal, even at the risk of US economic collapse. I know that the Republican Party likes to tout itself as the party of national security. But these latest comments from Republican Senator John McCain and his personal Renfield, Senator Lindsey Graham are absolutely laughable.

"Americans can be proud of the role our country has played in helping to defeat Qaddafi," their statement reads, "but we regret that this success was so long in coming due to the failure of the United States to employ the full weight of our airpower."

This statement comes from the same two Senators that were part of a delegation that considered selling nonlethal defense equipment to Gaddafi's Libya (with a little McCain bow to boot in his meeting with Gaddafi).

McCain wanted the US's "full weight" of the military airpower, and yet his own members of Congress were losing their shit just a few weeks ago, stomping their feet with a House vote to admonish the President for continuing America's role in the NATO operation and claiming a violation of the War Powers Act, and threatened to cut off funding for the operation. Does that mean that McCain and Graham would have been fine with a unilateral US strike against Libya with the "full weight" of our airpower had it only taken 89 days?

The bottom line is that the Republican Party has lost their "strong on defense" moniker and they don't like it.

The Obama administration was successful in taking out the Somali pirates that captured Captain Richard Phillips and held him hostage, but immediately afterward came the email smear campaign that the President was hesitant in authorizing lethal force.

President Obama made capturing or killing Osama Bin Laden a top priority as soon as he was sworn into  office and said so during the campaign. This was something George W. "Wanted Dead Or Alive" Bush couldn't bother with just six months after 9/11. Yet again, right wingers went to the Internet and created another smear email to claim something about which they knew nothing.

And now, with a war in Afghanistan and in the process of a methodical withdrawal from Iraq, and the President deciding to honor the US's obligation to NATO and the UN in the Libya conflict, and here are the Republicans making sure to criticize the widest range possible just to confirm they cover everything, from acting without Congressional authority, or berating Obama for letting France and England take the lead in the action, to now McCain and Graham whining about not acting quickly enough and that it took six months to ouster a dictator who held power for 42 years. Even the Wall Street Journal editorial page is praising the efforts while criticizing the the naysaying GOP.

The fighting continues in Tripoli, and Moammar Gadhafi still hasn't been captured, but the triumph of the U.S.-backed Libyan rebels seems to be only a matter of time. Though you wouldn't know it from the reaction at the Council on Foreign Relations or among some GOP Presidential candidates, this is a victory for freedom and U.S. national interests.

A dictator with American blood on his hands is about to be overthrown by a popular revolt invoking democratic principles. Not a single American has died in the effort, and the victory would not have been possible without U.S. air power, intelligence and targeting as part of NATO. A long-oppressed people now has a chance to chart a freer future, a fact that is clear from the rejoicing in Benghazi.

What would we prefer: That Gadhafi stay in power?

...Yet some of the same people who said we shouldn't help the rebels now want the U.N. to send "boots on the ground," including U.S. troops. It's not clear that the Libyans want or even need such help, especially from Americans, which could complicate their own nascent attempts at self-government.

...President Obama was right yesterday to urge the rebels to pursue "reconciliation." But America's foreign policy elites have also so far misjudged the rebels, who have shown impressive persistence and coordination in maintaining a six-month military campaign.

...One disappointment is the reluctance among Republicans to praise the rebel success, perhaps for fear it will somehow help Mr. Obama.

...U.S. intervention has succeeded in preventing a bloodbath in Benghazi and soon in deposing a long-time U.S. enemy who could have re-emerged as a terrorist sponsor.

Michele Bachmann, who played the al Qaeda tune, now looks partisan to a fault.

...The U.S. military is stretched at the current moment and we can't take sides in every civil war. But the Libyan intervention shows that when the cause is just and the means are available, the U.S. can make a moral and strategic difference.

U.S. support for the rebels won't be lost on a Middle East still undergoing its own upheavals, not least on the people and governments of Syria and Iran. NATO showed it will finish a military task it started, and soon Gadhafi will take his place with Saddam in the ranks of Arab despots who will terrorize their people no more.

I believe everyone has forgotten (including Michael Steele and the Morning Joe pundits this morning) that the initial intervention is Libya was a humanitarian one, with NATO acting on the information that Gaddafi was about to unleash hell on his own people in Benghazi.

And yet, President Obama can do no right. He doesn't even read the right books on vacation. I suppose he would have gotten a reprieve on the reading list criticism if he'd included Ayn Rand's ATLAS SHRUGGED and Rick Perry's FED UP!, both also works of fiction, by the way.

Deadbeat Dad Wants Government Austerity

I keep wondering why Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Teabag Freakville) is getting so much face time on the cable news shows. He calls President Obama a liar and complains about his out of control spending, completely oblivious to the fact that all of the spending done by this administration thus far pales in comparison to he who shall not be named.

But now I realize why Joe Walsh thinks we should not raise the debt ceiling, default on our obligations and to hell with our economy. It's his own modus operandi.

U.S. Rep. Joe Walsh of McHenry owes more than $100,000 in child support and interest to his former wife, she alleges in a Cook County Circuit Court filing.

The dispute, set out in a court filing last December, remains unsettled. Walsh's ex-wife says he is $117,437 behind in payments.

I know that in the state of New York, you are automatically arrested for being in arrears in child support payments. And this fucking deadbeat douchebag dad is on the television machine crying nonstop about balanced budget amendments and fiscal responsibility?! Fuck you, Joe Walsh!

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