The silver linings playbook?

You’re staring to see the formation of a midterm platform that Dems could run.

* Historic job growth
* Pandemic under control
* ISIS leader taken out
* Infrastructure bill taking effect
* The Encanto soundtrack

— Sam Stein (@samstein) February 4, 2022

Republican = Racist

Peace,

emaycee

 

The persistence of selective memory

The republican national convention--a veritable smorgasbord of blog posts...

Funny, don't you think, what with republicans screaming incessantly at their convention this week to lock up Hillary Clinton in jail on trumped up (so to speak) charges, how they forget their very own President, one George W. Bush, lied America into a war with Iraq that has thus far killed over 4000 Americans, bankrupted the country with its outlandish expense, and bankrupted us morally with its ill-advised torture campaign which in turn led to the inception of ISIS.  Bush the Lesser is most certainly guilty of war crimes--where's the party of law and order when it comes to very real crimes?

The hypocrisy is staggering.

Frankly, if it's good for the goose, it's most certainly good for the gander.

Peace,
emaycee

STFU

In the 2008 Presidential election, American voters resoundingly rejected John McCain as their choice for our next President.  The only states McCain carried were the ones that would vote for the banjo playing kid in the movie Deliverance as long as he had an "R" next to his name.

None of that, however, has stopped McCain--who never met an American soldier he didn't want to get killed in a useless war--from criticizing President Obama at every turn, for every decision he's ever made concerning foreign policy.  And he does this despite the fact that President Obama has proved right in virtually every one of them.

Seems now McCain has his panties in a twist because President Obama is using "grudging incrementalism" in the fight against ISIS.  Apparently increasing the number of troops to a little over 4000 is going to lead to end of America as we know it.

(Roll eyes here,)

No, it isn't.  ISIS is not the Nazi war machine from WWII, it's not the Soviet Union of old, it's not China as we know it today, and would probably have a real battle on its hands with the rugged army of Luxembourg.  Yes, they've committed several terrorist attacks which are tragic and should be fought at every turn, but ISIS is not going to takeover America, not going to change our way of life, and is not going to take all of our women and children into slavery.

It is little more than a pimple on America's butt.

Listen, you wouldn't mortgage your family's future for a pimple on your butt, and you certainly wouldn't risk your kids lives for it.  You'd wait out the discomfort and use a little preventive medicine  until it eventually goes away of its own volition.

And America should handle ISIS in the same way.

And the last thing we need is idiots like McCain screaming to spend more money and waste more American lives on a big nothing.

Peace,
emaycee

Those pesky kids

Paul Ryan this week criticized President Obama's executive actions on gun control, saying that his tears over twenty dead children were a distraction from what should be Obama's primary focus, ISIS.

Think about that for a second:  Ryan thinks that twenty six and seven year old kids being shot to death by a madman is a "distraction."

Leaving aside the fact that it's down right psychopathic, Ryan has once again proven that the republican party doesn't give a good goddamn about any American once they've exited the womb.

Peace,
emaycee

Moi?

She's talking about you and me:

Truth be told, I only made it about thirty seconds before the bullshit got too deep and I stopped watching, but that's one Dana Loesch, a talking headcase for Glenn Beck's The Blaze TV network.  Long story short:  I, emaycee, have blood on my hands for the San Bernardino shootings, not the NRA, because Wayne LaPierre is a white guy and because I let a Muslim woman into this country legally and because said Muslim woman never posted her jihadist intentions on social media, and don't forget I am godless, too, and to conclude, I, emaycee, am a "tragedy dry-humping whore."

For real?

And here all this time I thought I was just a fairly nice guy with a wife, and kids, and a mortgage, who just wanted a safer, saner, and more economically equitable America.

Peace,
emaycee

Can they handle the truth?

Well whaddayaknow--conservatives aren't all wrong.

Writing in the American Conservative Daniel Larison takes to task hawks (which, let's face it, means republicans--no Democrat who matters has hopped on their terrorist threat crazy train so far) for over inflating the threat that ISIS poses to America.  The plain truth of the matter is that Americans face no more danger from ISIS than they do from right wing extremists--and the idea that ISIS threatens either the United States as a country or our way of life is so ludicrous as to be laughable.

But after today's school closings in Los Angeles (which are looking more and more like a big nothing), how many of tonight's Presidential candidate debaters do you suppose won't use the moment for more fear mongering to drive campaign contributions and rile up their base instead of  having the courage to educate their voters that ISIS is no more than a pimple on America's butt?

My guess is it will be the number that ISIS's Arabic ancestors invented:  zero.

Peace,
emaycee

Who wants to die?

For the first time, a majority of Americans (53%) are in now favor of sending ground troops in to fight ISIS.

Just wondering how many, do you suppose, would still be in favor if it involved sending their own children into the quagmire that is now Syria?

My guess is most belong to the Dick Cheney school of military service:  fighting wars is best left to other people's children.

Peace,
emaycee

The good, the bad, and the ugly

A week after the Paris attacks:

The Good--President Obama.  While he's had a few missteps over the last nearly seven years, he hasn't had any this week.  First, for not knuckling under pressure to send ground troops into Syria, and reminding America that republicans are the only ones who think sending our soldiers into that quagmire is a good idea, and second, for bitch slapping republicans over their decidedly un-American calls to allow only Syrian Christians into America.  What wouldn't Jesus do, right?

The Bad--Virtually all republican Governors (unconstitutionally) rejecting the Syrian refugees.  Led by Indiana Governor Mike Pence, who this week told two relief agencies to send back two families that had already been approved to relocate in Indianapolis (and then got shown the real meaning of Christian charity by Democratic Gov. Malloy of Connecticut who welcomed one of the families to his state), republicans embarrassed themselves with their bigotry, intolerance, and ignorance.  Some surprise there...

The Ugly--The complete and utter lack of courage demonstrated by the republican party in the face of the terrorist attack in Paris.  Republicans are absolutely wetting their pants over allowing a few thousand refugees into America, and yet France, who lost 150 of its people in a terrorist attack just a week ago, is agreeing to take in more than 30,000 Syrian refugees.  What we Democrats have known for quite some time is coming to fore:  the party that's "tough on defense" really isn't so tough after all.  Fucking wimps, the lot of them.

Peace,
emaycee

I can't hear you!

For all their bluster (and that's what it is--republicans are little more than fucking fraidy cats who want anybody but themselves to do the dirty and dangerous work) about Friday's attacks in Paris, here are four things they won't tell the American people:

• Republicans will demonize the Syrian refugees and call for walls! border security! but the murderous cretins who carried out these attacks are exactly what the refugees are trying to escape.
• You can forget those crockofshit tears republicans are shedding for the French--the right absolutely despises France and its people.
• There will be more Americans killed in the next five days by guns than were killed in the Paris attacks--and unlike Paris, the American deaths will continue ad infinitum.
• Most importantly, this whole mess is republicans fault.  From the Bush administration's having its head up its ass on 9/11, to their piss poor operation of the war in Afghanistan, to the ill-advised and ill-conceived Iraq War, to their disastrous torture program,  republicans have done more to create utter chaos and stoke hatred than President Obama could in ten lifetimes.

And this has been your daily dose of reality.

Peace,
emaycee

What is it good for?

Rick Santorum thinks we should bomb Iran back to the 7th century.

Marco Rubio thinks hunger and homelessness are the least of our problems--they won't matter if for the, oh, second time in our 239 year history some idiots decide to try to blow something up in the United States.  Because starving and the brutal elements of nature never killed anyone.

Lindsay Graham is desperately trying to relight John McCain's pretty much permanently snuffed out torch which would call for war in the Antarctic if a penguin farted.

It's beginning to look like the republican strategy for foreign policy in 2016 will be war, war, and more war--there's nothing like calling for the killing of people in foreign lands to excite the GOP base.

And this should be the Democrats response:

Good God, y'all--didn't you bozos learn anything from Iraq and Afghanistan?

Peace,
emaycee

Are his fifteen minutes up?

What really bothers me about Scott Walker's claim that his handling of Labor Union protesters in Wisconsin prepares him for dealing with ISIS isn't the comparison of Union protesters to terrorists (let's face it, that's pretty par for the course for republicans these days) but rather the abject naivete inherent in that claim.

I mean, the last time I checked, terrorists couldn't be rounded up by sending out the local sheriff.  And terrorists don't care that you have a majority of the votes in the legislature.  They also don't accept laws they think are wrong and go on with their lives.  Most of all, democracy means nothing to them--when they fight back it's with violence.

Frankly, his ball-less bullying would go over about as well as Bush the Lesser's faux bravado.  They'd have a little chuckle and go back to killing.

Tick-tock, Governor, tick-tock.

Peace,
emaycee

Once again, we learn nothing from history

A new CBS poll shows that for the first time a majority of Americans (57%) favor sending ground troops to combar ISIS.  Against a group that while responsible for some despicably heinous acts against American citizens, hasn't come within, oh, 6000 miles of any kind of attack on American soil.

For fuck's sake, we still have in our collective rearview mirror the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the lives lost and permanetly disabled, and the disaster they both wreaked on the American economy, and how little difference either of them really made...and still a majority of Americans want to start another one?  For fucking what?

Someone needs to boot a lot of Americans in the ass and remind them of the futility of fighting other people's battles (see also, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan).

Peace,
emaycee

Obama and ISIS

While I agree with those on the left who believe the War on ISIS is not ours to fight, won't solve anything, and will probably make matters worse, I would be less surprised by the Chicago Cubs winning this year's World Series than I would be of an American President, whether republican or Democrat, taking any path other than that of the most aggression.

After 9/11/01, the free pass for Presidents for terrorism on American soil expired.  Any President--current and future--who has another attack on his watch, unless utterly tenacious in his quest to cross every "t" and dot every "i" in protecting American lives, can kiss his Presidency goodbye, both in terms of his or her agenda and how it will be judged historically.  Much worse will be the horror of more American lives lost and the finger pointing ensuing soon thereafter.

It'll also be lame duck for every meal for the opposition party.

Some may scream about political courage, or the fact that an attack by ISIS on American soil is unlikely, but no politician wants to go down in history like Neville Chamberlain after his role in the Munich Agreement.  Aggression will supersede appeasement forever, especially when it comes to even minimally taking chances with American lives.

I don't know if President Obama made the right call this week, but it can't be easy in these times to have the very lives (even minimally) of over three hundred million Americans in your hands.

And it had to weigh heavily on his decision.

Peace,
emaycee

You can lead a moron to water...

...but you can't make him think.

In fairness, I've never seen Duck Dynasty.  Truth be told, I hate reality shows--and even if my brain suddenly turned to mush, I'm certain the reality show I chose to watch wouldn't be about a bunch of redneck dunces from Louisiana.

Point being...Fox News decided to bring the ringleader of the Duck Dynasty clan, Phil Robertson, on to discuss the rise of radical Islam. Why Robertson was chosen, considering that there are, oh, probably several million people in America who understand and know more about foreign policy than he does, though, really isn't a mystery.  For Fox News, if you're so dumb you can't find your butt to wipe it after taking a dump, you're their (usually white) man.

Robertson's solution?  "...convert them or kill them."

This is the level of political discourse provided by republicans.  For fuck's sake, I'd prefer Fox News headed to the nearest local farm, chose the first steed they saw, and asked him to clomp his hooves yes or no for the answers to their questions.

At least the horse would have a 50% chance of being right--the usual Fox commentators have a zero chance.

Peace,
emaycee