Archive for June, 2010

This site is awesome. It puts actual quotes from various Tea Party and right-wing types into Jesus’ mouth. It shows just how lost many of these people are. Seeing Jesus say, “We’ve already donated to Haiti, it’s called US income tax” is just weird. Because you have to know that is the opposite of what the J man would have said.

There are a lot of pages (they say a lot of crazy things), but scroll through some of them. The fun part is that if you click on the quotes they link to a page revealing who actually said it. It’s a fun guessing game.

Enjoy Christians saying summer school lunches for the poor are a bad thing (Limbaugh said they should dumpster dive).

Adam Feser

Sharron Angle, Dr’s homegirl, opposes abortions, even in cases of rape and incest (Judging by her words I would have to assume also if it childbirth would kill the mother). She cites the old, “God has a plan” argument as her reasoning.

Each person’s belief is their belief, but she would use her belief to force a rape victim’s hand.

Also, if everything that happens is part of God’s plan, does it not stand to reason that abortion is a part of God’s plan? Just a thought.

Enjoy Reid’s saving grace.

Adam Feser

Here are the 2010 Statewide Elections in South Dakota. Everything is set after both parties had their conventions over the weekend. I am predicting a republican sweep of all these races. The US House race and the Secretary of State race will be the toughest. Ben Nesselhuf is a good candidate. Adam, I am curious on your thoughts.

Click on each of the links for more information on the candidates.

Governor:
Scott Heidepriem-D
Dennis Daugaard-R

US House:
Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin-D
Kristi Noem-R
B. Thomas Marking-I

Attorney General
Marty Jackley-R
Ron Volesky-D (Dude go away. You can’t win anything)

Secretary of State:
Jason Gant-R
Ben Nesselhuf-D

State Auditor:
Steve Barnett-R
Julie Bartling-D

State Treasurer:
Rich Sattgast-R
Tom Katus-D

Public Utilities Commission:
Dustin ‘Dusty’ Johnson-R
Doyle Karpen(who)-D

School and Public Lands Commissioner
Jarrod Johnson-R
Bob Pelle-D

Kentucky candidate for the Senate Rand Paul has had some problems recently. First he was in trouble for stating that businesses should be able to discriminate based on race. Recently he has advocated an underground electronic fence on the border. He has pretty much ignored requests to define just what the electronic underground border fence will do or how it will function. Now there is some controversy over his occupation.

Rand Paul claims to be a Board-certified ophthalmologist. The idea of being certified by a Board is meant to provide comfort to patients because their physicians have proved to a group of their peers that they are qualified to practice. What’s strange about Paul’s claim is that he is not certified by the American Board of Ophthalmology. He is, however certified by the National Board of Ophthalmology. If you’re wondering if the difference between the two, it is quite vast. The American Board of Ophthalmology, which has not certified him, is the actual board. The National Board of Ophthalmology, which has certified Paul, is created by Rand Paul. He is the president and director. I believe his wife and father-in-law hold other positions. The office is a PO Box. It is a shell so Rand can call himself “Board-certified.”

This is obviously intentionally misleading patients and the American public. I think it is especially troubling from the perspective of the patient. I hear Board-certified and I feel confident that I am going to get solid care. Misusing that phrase to mislead people seems like it should almost have legal ramifications. If I had been cared for by this guy under the assumption that he was ABO certified, I would be irate.

Perhaps I will declare myself a Board-certified ophthalmologist. Stephen Colbert did just that:

Enjoy the excuse for this one.

Adam Feser

Republicans and Ben Nelson have blocked an extension of benefits for over a million people who have lost their jobs. Because, you know, screw them, I guess?

This, and other actions, has some wondering whether the GOP wants things to get worse so that they have a better November. Things are turning around, but if they do they might not win as many elections. This is pretty cynical, but this has been their strategy the whole time. Regardless of what Obama and Democrats propose, say no. I wouldn’t have guessed blocking help for the unemployed would be a part of this strategy, but here we are.

I wish Democrats would have made Republicans filibuster.

Enjoy Ghana’s demise.

Adam Feser

This weekend is the South Dakota Republican Convention. I will be attending it starting Friday evening with the Governor’s Dinner with Dennis Daugaard, Mike Rounds, John Thune and Kristi Noem . Saturday we will be voting on the three on three races to see who will be on the ballot for the republicans. Those three Races are: Secretary of State, State Auditor and State Treasurer.
Republican Candidates for Secretary of State are
Teresa Bray from Pierre
Jason Gant from Sioux Falls
Tom Deadrick of Platte

Republican Candidates for State Auditor are:
Steve Barnett from Aberdeen
Pat Miller from Ft. Pierre
Tim Rounds from Pierre

Republican Canididates for State Treasurer are:
Rich Sattgast of Pierre
Mike Mehlhaff, Sr. of Pierre

I have a convention vote and I will most likely be voting for Steve Barnett, Jason Gant and Rich Sattgast. I will post the results Saturday after the convention concluded. If I am correct, the democrats have their convention in Sioux Falls this week.

In other things, a new poll has been released by Rassmussen Sen. Reid from Nevada is down 8 points to his opponent…could be a tough year for the incumbant, regardless of which party you are from

Glenn Beck hates the World Cup a lot, likely because the rest of the world hates it. Beck also draws some giant analogy with almost no thought put into it about how the World Cup represents Barack Obama’s policies. (If he means Barack Obama’s policies unite the world, I guess he sees that as a bad thing?) Beck also thinks America will reject the World Cup no matter how much it is forced down our throats. This facts, once again, have no impact on Beck’s ravings. World Cup coverage is breaking records with numbers of viewers. He also must really hate Rupert Murdoch for shoving soccer down our throats, what with Fox Soccer Channel and all. And those damned corporations advertising soccer apparently have been socialists all along.

Dan Gainor believes it must be a socialist plot because soccer is for the poor. He also claims our sporting events don’t devolve into riots. (Hmm, within the last week L.A. rioters burned a cab, Artest and team fighting the crowd, Michigan St. riots, the ten here, and on and on. Is he kidding?) He also claims soccer is being sold in America due to the “browning” of America. Seriously.

Some say soccer is being promoted by the left because they are uncomfortable with American exceptionalism (or something?). Gary Schmitt says soccer must be unAmerican because of some drivel about excellence prevailing in American sports and not in soccer (which is absolute garbage).

Others wonder why it’s being forced on us when we aren’t getting any better, though we’ve clearly improved a great deal and continue to do so. Look at the amount of youths that play soccer. It is growing.

I’m not the biggest soccer fan in the world, and for a good deal of time I would always say I hated soccer. Weird, right, since I’m a left-wing nutjob. But I hated it because I thought it was boring, not because of some strange conspiracy, or because it was scary and different. I’m really giving watching it a shot and I find that even the games not involving America are interesting. The score might be 1-0 but there are no shortage of near goals, great shots, great saves, or great crosses. And I realize it was hypocritical of me because I love a 1-0 baseball game and a 3-0 football game for many of the same reasons. The more America learns about the game the more it can appreciate and enjoy it, which is what is happening.

But back to the left-wing conspiracy garbage. These people are simply afraid of what is different. If something they don’t understand comes along, it must be dangerous. If the rest of the world (including allies and enemies) loves it, it must be horrible. Poor countries play it, it must be for poor people. Brown countries play it, it must be for brown people. The crap spewing from these peoples’ mouths is truly insane, and it makes me even happier to be enjoying the World Cup. I hope it’s a huge success and soccer continues to grow, just to make these crotchety old dudes uncomfortable. I can just picture the, “I hate change!” and “New things scare me!” cries emanating from various conservative news sources.

Enjoy the World Cup.

Adam Feser

As I have said before, Obama has continued several of Bush’s policies regarding the War on Terror. He has continued ignoring human rights in his policies, which is the opposite of what he promised. This has been the area in which I am most disappointed in Obama. Jon is less than amused as well.

Enjoy people calling him soft on terror.

Adam Feser

Republican Candidate for Governor Dennis Daugaard has tapped former Rep. Matt Michels, R-Yankton, as his running mate.

At first I wasn’t sure about his selection but after thinking about it I am sure this was a good choice. I thought Chris Nelson would have been a good choice but this guy comes with out baggage. As I learn more about him, I am sure I will come to understand his choice.

Check out what American News Blogger Bob Mercer had to say about the selection

Canadian and Syrian citizen Maher Arar was in the U.S. on his way home from a vacation in 2003. The U.S. was acting on bad intelligence given to them by Canada. Arar was treated harshly while in U.S. custody, lied to about what would happen to him, his attorney was lied to, and he was eventually transferred to Syria, which he pleaded against because he believed he would be tortured.

Turns out he was right. For ten months he suffered (read bottom of link for details, many of the links from Glenn Greenwald’s article) in horrible conditions and was tortured.

After ten months, the Syrians finally figured out he had no connection to terrorism and returned him to Canada. Canada had a government commission review the case and found both the Canadian and American governments were clearly in the wrong. Canada’s Prime Minister personally and publicly apologized and Arar received about $9 million for what he endured. Though a few lawmakers have apologized, America’s government has not.

I bring this up because Arar’s suit against the U.S. government has died. The Supreme Court has refused to hear his appeal of a lower court’s decision that he has no grounds to sue. Extraordinary rendition, woo, I guess.

Both the Bush and Obama administrations have argued they cannot be held accountable for our actions because of state secrets, or some such garbage. It is no secret that this innocent man was detained, sent to Syria, and tortured.

So the message here is that the United States government can just snag whoever they want, have them tortured for months, and there are no consequences for their actions and no remedy for the victims. When you make a decision to do horrible things like this, the least you could do is commit to at least trying to make things right when you f up so bad.

Imagine you are not at all involved in terrorism, are detained, lied to, sent to Syria, tortured for months, probably think you’re going to die, nearly do from being malnourished and mistreated, finally return home, have public knowledge that you have done no wrong, then the government that did this to you accepts no responsibility and takes no action, doesn’t even apologize. Actually imagine that. Absolutely ridiculous.

So many people talk about accountability for actions in this country. It’s often used as a way to justify cutting social programs. But when it comes to torturing an innocent dude, all that accountability talk goes out the window.

What’s ever going to stop things like this from happening if there are never consequences?

Enjoy you rights, which only apply when it’s convenient.

Adam Feser