The Democrat Thread

[Rex Kickass]

Sadly, over one out of four gay Americans will vote for a Republican President this year, even though the frontrunners are all but saying don't even bother.

 

http://blog.sfgate.com/nov05election/2011/...man-vote-obama/

 

Republican Presidential contender Newt Gingrich had one message for a gay Iowa man: Don’t bother with me, vote Obama.

 

Or so says a professor who met Gingrich at the Smokey Row coffee house in Iowa, according to the Des Moines Register.

 

“I asked him if he’s elected, how does he plan to engage gay Americans. How are we to support him? And he told me to support Obama,” Scott Arnold, an associate professor of writing at William Penn University told the paper.

 

“When you ask somebody a question and you expect them to support all Americans and have everyone’s general interest,” Arnold continued. “It’s a little bit frustrating and disheartening when you’re told to support the other side. That he doesn’t’ need your support.”

 

Gingrich has said he supports a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and that same-sex marriage “is a temporary aberration that will dissipate.”

[lostfan]

No idea where else to put this, but Bradley Manning's password was TWink1492. lollerskates

[StrangeSox]

Lower classes quicker to show compassion in the face of suffering

 

Emotional differences between the rich and poor, as depicted in such Charles Dickens classics as “A Christmas Carol” and “A Tale of Two Cities,” may have a scientific basis. Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, have found that people in the lower socio-economic classes are more physiologically attuned to suffering, and quicker to express compassion than their more affluent counterparts.

 

By comparison, the UC Berkeley study found that individuals in the upper middle and upper classes were less able to detect and respond to the distress signals of others. Overall, the results indicate that socio-economic status correlates with the level of empathy and compassion that people show in the face of emotionally charged situations.

 

“It’s not that the upper classes are coldhearted,” said UC Berkeley social psychologist Jennifer Stellar, lead author of the study published online on Dec. 12 in the journal, Emotion. “They may just not be as adept at recognizing the cues and signals of suffering because they haven’t had to deal with as many obstacles in their lives.”

[Rex Kickass]

Over one out of four gay people still vote Republican.

 

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/20...m+Daily+News%29

 

A bill to end health insurance coverage for domestic partners of government workers in Michigan was signed into law today by GOP governor Rick Snyder.

The legislation was introduced by GOP state representative Dave Agema and pushed by Republican attorney general Bill Schuette. With Snyder's signature, the bill becomes law and ends health insurance coverage for unmarried partners of government workers.

“Governor Snyder’s support for this bill is appalling," Emily Dievendorf, director of policy for Equality Michigan, said in a statement. "Today, the governor told unmarried public employees that they can no longer care for their partners or children. He has put hardworking gay and lesbian couples and their children into harm’s way by eliminating important health care coverage. He has spent the last two years talking about creating a welcoming state with a attractive business climate, and this bill flies in the face of those goals."

[farmteam]

Over one out of four gay people still vote Republican.

 

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/20...m+Daily+News%29

 

But not in Minnesota!

 

http://blogs.citypages.com/blotter/2011/12...el_brodkorb.php

[Balta1701]

There's a fair amount of political drama in these paragraphs.

Dennis Kucinich, the left-wing Democratic Congressman from Ohio, and two-time candidate for president, has announced that he will run against fellow incumbent Democrat Marcy Kaptur after they were drawn into a new district — setting up the biggest challenge of Kucinich’s political career since his brief and tumultuous term as Mayor of Cleveland in the 1970’s.

 

Kucinich announced on Twitter Wednesday that he has filed to run in the 9th District, which will pit him against Kaptur, who has already been gearing up for the race.

 

The two were drawn into a gerrymandered district that stretches from east to west around Lake Erie, all the way from the Democratic stronghold of Cleveland (Kucinich’s base) to the Democratic stronghold of Toledo (Kaptur territory). And for what it is worth, the new district does in fact contain a bit more of Kaptur’s territory, than it does from Kucinich.

 

For a time, Kucinich even considered parachuting across the country, all the way into Washington state, which is gaining a seat — but polling of the state found that the state’s voters were not big on the idea (if they had even heard of him at all).

 

And just in case the race for this deep-blue district wasn’t wacky enough already, the winner of the Democratic primary could quite possibly face a general election against Republican nominee…Joe “The Plumber” Wurzelbacher!

[Balta1701]

There's a fair amount of political drama in these paragraphs.

Dennis Kucinich, the left-wing Democratic Congressman from Ohio, and two-time candidate for president, has announced that he will run against fellow incumbent Democrat Marcy Kaptur after they were drawn into a new district — setting up the biggest challenge of Kucinich’s political career since his brief and tumultuous term as Mayor of Cleveland in the 1970’s.

 

Kucinich announced on Twitter Wednesday that he has filed to run in the 9th District, which will pit him against Kaptur, who has already been gearing up for the race.

 

The two were drawn into a gerrymandered district that stretches from east to west around Lake Erie, all the way from the Democratic stronghold of Cleveland (Kucinich’s base) to the Democratic stronghold of Toledo (Kaptur territory). And for what it is worth, the new district does in fact contain a bit more of Kaptur’s territory, than it does from Kucinich.

 

For a time, Kucinich even considered parachuting across the country, all the way into Washington state, which is gaining a seat — but polling of the state found that the state’s voters were not big on the idea (if they had even heard of him at all).

 

And just in case the race for this deep-blue district wasn’t wacky enough already, the winner of the Democratic primary could quite possibly face a general election against Republican nominee…Joe “The Plumber” Wurzelbacher!

[Balta1701]

I must say, it is definitely nice to see one candidate get called out over what should be the absolutely ridiculous proposition that states should be able to ban contraception.

[Balta1701]

The governor of Washington State, Christine Gregoire, will introduce a bill that will legalize gay marriage if passed.

[StrangeSox]

This is a pretty bizarre GOP bill from New Hampshire

 

New Hampshire Republicans are taking textual originalism to a whole new level: three lawmakers have proposed a bill that requires that all legislation find its origin not in the U.S. constitution, but an English document crafted in 1215.

 

When the legislature reconvenes this month, Republicans want their colleagues to justify many new bills with a direct quote from the 800-year-old Magna Carta:

Edited January 5, 2012 by StrangeSox

[mr_genius]

Did you guys know that Al Gore has a 'news' network? I didn't. But I guess Keith Olbermann works there and is causing trouble.

 

 

[BigSqwert]

Did you guys know that Al Gore has a 'news' network? I didn't. But I guess Keith Olbermann works there and is causing trouble.

No I didn't know that but I do know that he has been involved with Current TV for many years, an entertainment network on basic cable which happens to have a one hour political opinion show hosted by Keith Olbermann.

[mr_genius]

No I didn't know that but I do know that he has been involved with Current TV for many years, an entertainment network on basic cable which happens to have a one hour political opinion show hosted by Keith Olbermann.

 

that's the network i'm talking about. the NY Times said it was a news network like MSNBC and the Goracle is totally involved

Edited January 6, 2012 by mr_genius

[Balta1701]

White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley (yes that one) has resigned.

[southsider2k5]

White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley (yes that one) has resigned.

 

Well after they stripped him of a lot of his duties, it was pretty inevitable.

[kapkomet]

Well after they stripped him of a lot of his duties, it was pretty inevitable.

 

 

From one Wall Street insider, to another Wall Street insider, to another Wall Street insider. Damn, Obama hates some Wall Street. Bad enough to keep hiring them as COS. Yet, we're all told that Wall Street and bankers suck and they run his White House. Oh the irony.

[StrangeSox]

From one Wall Street insider, to another Wall Street insider, to another Wall Street insider. Damn, Obama hates some Wall Street. Bad enough to keep hiring them as COS. Yet, we're all told that Wall Street and bankers suck and they run his White House. Oh the irony.

 

This is a great attack on the "MARXIST OBAMA HATES BUSINESS AND MURDERS JOBS!" rhetoric and goes right with the leftist "CORPORATIST OBAMA IS A CENTER-RIGHT SHILL!" Which is kinda surprising coming from kap.

 

But it's pretty much correct.

[kapkomet]

This is a great attack on the "MARXIST OBAMA HATES BUSINESS AND MURDERS JOBS!" rhetoric and goes right with the leftist "CORPORATIST OBAMA IS A CENTER-RIGHT SHILL!" Which is kinda surprising coming from kap.

 

But it's pretty much correct.

 

 

[southsider2k5]

From one Wall Street insider, to another Wall Street insider, to another Wall Street insider. Damn, Obama hates some Wall Street. Bad enough to keep hiring them as COS. Yet, we're all told that Wall Street and bankers suck and they run his White House. Oh the irony.

 

That was all about paying back his debt to the Daley's. Now he doesn't need them anymore.

[NorthSideSox72]

I don't normally post videos, and certainly not inherently partisan ones, but this Daily Show clip about the GOP debates cracked my s*** up. I particularly like the bologna bits...

 

[SOXOBAMA]

Did you guys know that Al Gore has a 'news' network? I didn't. But I guess Keith Olbermann works there and is causing trouble.

 

Keith has been at war with Current Tv lately..

[StrangeSox]

American History

 

America was founded by people who were escaping oppression and yearning to be free. Upon arrival in the New World they established religious freedom, except for those people who weren’t religious enough, or were suspected of witchcraft, or were Catholic, or who adhered to some silly pagan faith like those practiced by the Indians whom the colonists encountered. The colonists then set about building a new nation in which all men were created equal, as long as those men weren’t women, or something other than European, or poor. Along the way, mistakes were made (haven’t you ever made a mistake?), and sadly, Native Americans died in large numbers because they didn’t have resistance to the diseases brought over from Europe, or the bullets we occasionally were forced to fire at them when they weren’t willing to let us live on their land, or when they didn’t show sufficient appreciation for the nice spot we had made for them in Oklahoma.

Also, Africans were brought to America and held in bondage as slaves, which was wrong. But most were treated reasonably well by their masters because you can’t get much work out of a slave if you kill him or chop off his arms or his foot like John Amos in that movie, Roots. And remember, slavery has existed everywhere, and back then everyone believed in slavery — well, except the slaves or the abolitionists — so, ya know, you can’t judge that period by today’s moral standards. It’s not like the human brain was capable of supporting liberty and freedom as far back as 200 years ago! So stop living in the past. At some point we have to move on. Mistakes were made. Haven’t you ever made a mistake?

 

And yes, after slavery, we had a new racist system known as segregation, but that too was ultimately defeated because Americans stood up and said “no” in the civil rights movement, after hearing Martin Luther King Jr. tell them about his “dream.” So even though mistakes were made, the system was corrected. I bet you’ve made mistakes. And I bet you didn’t correct them as quickly as America.

 

Also, we have never started a war with anyone. We have only acted in self-defense or in defense of our immediate interests. Mistakes have been made, (and haven’t we all made mistakes?), but our intentions are good and we are always defending ourselves.

 

This was true with the Indians whom we had to kill to keep them from scalping us when we would try and take their land.

 

And it was true with Mexico, when they tried to keep us from annexing part of their country known as Texas, which we had to annex, because some of our slaveholders had gone there and declared the area independent of Mexico, and we had to defend those slaveholders because Mexico was led by a corrupt dictator, and because they might have tried to retake the territory that our slaveholders had taken from them, and that would have been unfair, because the slaveholders had only been able to enjoy it for like a year.

 

And it was true when we intervened to support the overthrow of the government of Hawaii in 1893, after the Queen decided not to abide by the previous Constitution stripping most non-whites of the right to vote, which some American businessmen (also known as “job-creators”) had previously forced upon the nation. Although some mistakes were made (like you’ve never made a mistake), we had to defend our interests. We needed pineapples and nice beaches. I mean, have you ever actually been to Panama City, or Rockaway?

 

And it was self-defense that motivated us in the Philippines at the turn of the 20th century, when we had to kill around a million men, women and children just to make sure that we would have control of that country, rather than the Spanish imperialists who had been in control of it before. We were liberating the Filipinos from those awful Spanish who were trying to control them, so that we could show them the proper way to run a country. Mistakes were made, but we did it for their own good. I bet when you’ve made mistakes it wasn’t for someone else’s good, it was all for you, you, you. Because you’re selfish, unlike America.

 

And it was self-defense that propelled us forward in Nicaragua in the 1920s, when we sent Marines there to capture a horrible, evil terrorist who had the support of the citizenry, but only because they didn’t understand that he was a horrible, evil terrorist. After we invaded their country, Nicaraguans began shooting at us, so we had to shoot back. I mean, that’s self-defense. What would you have done? Let them shoot you? That was one mistake America was not going to make, that’s for sure.

 

And when we went to war in Southeast Asia, it was all about self-defense too. We had to protect the South Vietnamese from the communist leader in the north, and so we bombed them. No, not the north. We bombed the south. So they would realize what a bad guy that communist in the north was. But some people are hard-headed and don’t learn the lessons we’re trying to teach them in a timely manner. So we kept at it for a decade, bombing Laos and Cambodia too, because they were also insufficiently scared of the communists, and if they became communists, pretty soon, we’d have all been speaking Vietnamese, or Chinese, or Lao, or something else Oriental, because it’s like dominoes. If one falls they all fall. And yes, mistakes were made in the war, and we ended up losing, but that’s because we didn’t bomb them enough, because hippies wouldn’t let us. So we lost, and Vietnam went communist. And yes, we’re still speaking English but that’s not because the domino theory was wrong, it’s just because English is better.

 

And Iraq in 1991 and again in 2003? Both self-defense! In 1991 we had to attack them because they invaded Kuwait and might have taken Kuwait’s oil, which we need to drive our cars and stuff. And in 2003, we had to invade because Saddam Hussein might have had the ingredients to make weapons of mass destruction, since we and our companies had sold him the ingredients, and then he might use them like that time he used them against Iran, or the Kurds. Only this time, we’d actually give a s***, because he might sell them to al-Qaeda, and then they might use them on us the next time they fly planes into some of our buildings, because even though Saddam and al-Qaeda hated each other, you can’t really trust Muslims, because Mohammed commanded them to kill us all, like on 9/11.

 

Oh yeah, and speaking of that: 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11. Did we mention 9/11?

 

In other words, we’ve had our problems and mistakes have been made, but we’re still the greatest nation that ever existed and ever will exist. God bless America.

[Balta1701]

I'd like to point out...the New York Times public editor actually wrote this. And treated it as if it were an open question.

I’m looking for reader input on whether and when New York Times news reporters should challenge “facts” that are asserted by newsmakers they write about.

 

This is not something from the Onion.

[StrangeSox]

yes, always.

 

bmags, isn't this something covered in JOUR 101?

[Princess Dye]

Anybody catch the name of that woman John Oliver interviewed tonight? Who the hell was that