THE CANCER OF LIES

When the right wants to deny healthcare for the vast majority of Americans they point out to the incredible cost asking how would we balance the budget? No mention (of course) of tax cuts for themselves which really helps imbalance the budget. But what they talk about is the high cost of lingering diseases, not mentioned by name but of course cancer is right up there with those. Interestingly, the American Cancer Society has just come out with figures (and so far they are not disputed) that cancer is only 5% of the healthcare in this country. Interesting, and while it’s been more expensive than it was decades ago, we shouldn’t consider the expense, we should consider the savings.

FRIDAY PHILOSOPHY

It’s not troubling that so many citizens are “aginers” against what the Government is doing. What’s troubling is they’re not aware of what the Government is doing. Example; the loans to the bank and bailouts, have already been paid back with a 20 billion dollar profit. If they know it and still don’t think it was a good idea great, but . . .

FOOD FIGHT, A TEACHING MOMENT

Whatever you think about the obesity problem in this country, I can’t imagine anyone would want it for themselves. A survey some years ago asked obese people this simple question: If you could be given a million dollars or be made a normal weight, which would you choose? Well over 95% just wanted to be a normal weight and live a normal life. So maybe we have to go to an abnormal diet, because it’s been shown that kids eating school lunches have a far higher rate of obesity than kids that don’t. This kid is going to be a lethargic kid, he’s going to be a less attentive kid, and he’s going to be a less educated kid. And when the Obama Administration said that this is the civil rights issue of this generation’s education, they are so right. High sodium, high fat foods are so wrong. Just food for thought when you hear about the educational food fight. We think if he were around, John Belucci from Animal House would agree.

LET’S START OUT WITH SOME DICK BLUMENTHAL SUGGESTIONS

Linda McMahon said no to healthcare for her employees, no to testing for steroids, no to safe working environment, she is the perfect person for the Party of NO. Second approach; you get people in their 50s & 60s saying “I hear from Linda McMahon they want outsiders, experience doesn’t count”. And then you have a surgeon, a fireman, a police chief, an airline pilot…you get people that are actually in those occupations supporting Richard Blumenthal and saying “we hear McMahon wants outsiders and not experience. Trust me, in a crunch you want my experience”.

“REPUBLICAN PROGRESSIVE” KEN MEHLMAN

We have a saying about Republicans and that is they often do become progressive, reasonable, open to change, aware of the world around them, that’s when they stop being Republicans. The latest example; Ken Mehlman, who was George Bush’s campaign manager in ‘04, you remember that campaign with all the anti-gay local agendas in swing states such as Ohio and Florida. Ok, Ken’s out of that now and he had a realization that it was time to let people know he was gay. All right, he said it has taken him “43 years to come to terms with this problem in my life”. But they always come to these terms after their Republican term. And now he is an advocate for gay marriage, now he’s an advocate for reason for discourse, and now he is against labeling and slander and fear because he’s no longer an active Republican. Gees, can these guys go back and talk to their former party members and say, if you’re going to get rational, why not have a legacy? Be rational when you are with the party, so later with the clearest of conscience you can party.

HIRE EDUCATION

Lately the GAO (Government Accounting Office) at the behest of the Obama administration is examining these for profit universities and the degrees of their degree. The fact is these online folks appear to be giving people a line. One example is; a basic massage course from a junior college goes for $500.00 and from these folks as much as $14,000.00. This is truly “hire education” as in they are being hired but how much education are people getting? A number of these as Stephen Colbert pointed out are owned by very reputable parent companies, for instance Goldman Sachs or as they are officially known to Fauxvians as Goldman Sacks and Plunders and now if you attempt to buy your education from those folks you’ll have plundered because (to repeat), these for profit universities online are giving you a line. Truly hire education

FOX NEWS, MOSQUING THE TRUTH?

Fox News and “Fox and Friends” are in a “fair and balanced” furor these days about the so called ground zero mosque. They’ve got some legitimate and grave concerns about the mosque’s main financial backer and his motives for doing so. They also have serious questions about his background indicating he financed a number of fundamentalist schools in Saudi Arabia. And, he is the same individual who offered millions to the 9/11 recovery fund that then Mayor Rudy Guiliani so vociferously refused. In fact, our friends at Fox will tell you just about everything you need to know about this man except…his…name. The public should know why. He is in fact a Saudi Arabian billionaire prince and by-the-by a good friend of George W. Bush, and his name is Alwaleed bin Talal. So is it reasonable to expect the Fox News folks (owned by Newscorp) to know his true identity? Probably, because they work for him. That’s right, Alwaleed bin Talal is the second largest shareholder in Newscorp behind Rupert Murdoch and this can no doubt be verified on their “fair and balanced” balance sheet. Imagine if this fundamentalist supporting Saudi prince were an owner of MSNBC, CNN, or even NBC, we would hear his name so often that even “Fox and Friends” would be able to spell it. As for right now, we would just like them to explain why they wont even say his name thereby mosquing the truth.

BEYOND THE PALE-IN JR

Bristol Palin has the challenges of being the daughter of a public figure and being a single mother. She is going to do a speaking tour on these challenges. Although, her challenges are going to be somewhat more evolved or modified, or have kind of a different ambience take your pick. She is going to be getting a minimum of $30,000.00 per speaking engagement so she is going to have to give an update on the challenges of a single mother who makes $30,000.00 per speech has to raise a child. That’s different and we are sure there will be no underlying political message on behalf of her mother. It will be a sincere discussion of the real struggles of the young single mother who’s like really, really raking it in. Hey, Kudos, when her mother said “does you love your freedom”? I guess this system in America here with speaking engagements and unlimited fees gives you a lot of it.

PLAGIARIZING IN ADVANCE

We’ve now done it to the best. For some time now, going back in to roughly 2008 we’ve talked about the followers of Glen Beck the equivalent of Rush Limbaugh’s ditto heads and these are the Becker heads. It seemed so perfect a label, we’ve received favorable commentary on it, but last week it turns out that in keeping with our custom of plagiarizing in advance we did it to the best. We did it to the esteemed Steven Colbert. Yes, that’s right. On May 13, 2010 the Colbert Report in a lengthy discussion of Glen Beck, the host mentioned, we have decided to call them Becker Heads. You should have told us Steven, we wouldn’t have been doing this since 08, we would never not give you credit, you are the esteemed one; you are the oracle of obliviousness and you are what every play on words or words on play affectionato hopes to be. So, we apologize to you the best, The Colbert Report, for having plagiarized in advance your term “Becker Heads”, but listen to him and listen to his followers. Congrats again, we hope you will accept our apology.

WE PLAGIARIZE IN ADVANCE, ON VIETNAM ERA SERVICE THIS TIME

We’d like to talk to Larry Pressler, he was a Republican Senator from South Dakota and he was in Vietnam from 1967 to 1968. He talks about the inherent unfairness of the draft (and it was unfair), and he talks about it every time one of the elite is mentioned in the media. CT AG Richard Blumenthal got five deferments and was in the Marine Reserves and Mr. Cheney got five deferments and was totally unapologetic, saying “I had more important things on my agenda”. Yes for every one of those folks, there was a “man instead” -a term we have used over the years in articles and on this website. Because there were draft quotas, and every town was required to send X amount of young men to that war in Asia and was going to fill their quota. Usually it was a poor person, often an African American, who went instead as Mr. Pressler, the former Republican Senator so rightly points out. For better or worse (and you can most certainly say more worse than better) you can say those were the politics and morays of the time. Oh, yes, John Ashcroft to our knowledge has the most Vietnam Era deferments; seven. Guess he knew his best security was staying in the homeland. So, let those who condemn Mr. Blumenthal, look at their own service or the service of relatives, spouses, friends, and let them look at their own voting record. Namely, if they voted for Mr. Cheney, and supported the appointment of Mr. Ashcroft, or personally had them or those who sent to Vietnam their man instead, then don’t say a word about Richard Blumenthal, because you are being as hypocritical now as you were then.

THE BARRON OF THE PLASTIC KINGDOM

John Shepherd-Barron was a Scotsman. In the 1960s he came up with the idea that he should be able to get his money even if the banks were closed and he created a machine which he could use a card to dispense money. Gee, you’re thinking; why didn’t he use an ATM? Because there weren’t any and that is what he invented. Yes, the crude form beginnings had some glitches, but it was refined and it is worth noting that in its original form a customer was not able to withdraw more than $14.00 in cash at a time. Now there is over 1.7 million ATMs around the world, you can draw great amounts of your own funds out, which seems only fair. We owe his wife one little debt of convenience; he suggested a six number pin and she said four would be fine and he went with that. We are a plastic kingdom and John Shepherd-Barron was the first Barron. He was born in India in 1925 to Scottish parents.

WE PLAGIARIZE IN ADVANCE, A G A I N

Several weeks ago we pointed out that Jay Leno due to his, well, lack of being funny was off of prime time and back to late night because he had gone GOP, so he was OPT. Several people had commented that they noticed that about Jay Leno. But this past weekend on Saturday Night Live News, when Tina Faye talked about her new “Sara Palin Network” and listed all sorts of unbelievable titles, she listed also the Jay Leno Show. This is an NBC parody on the NBC late night talk show host. People are starting to notice it. We have plagiarized them in advance, again.

THE LATEST LIZ FIZZ

Liz Cheney recently spoke at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference and she’s talking about how we treat the Afghanistan President Karzai, and that we don’t even refer to him as an ally. Of course, he did refer to the American troops as occupiers, and Liz said that she had worked on the Mid East and there was a saying in the Arab world that it is more dangerous to be America’s friend than to be America’s enemy. Of course this comes from when people like Liz Cheney did work in the Mid East. Also it should be pointed out that Afghanistan is not part of the Arab world but the facts never get in the way of the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, or of Liz Cheney, just another Liz Fizz. Karzai, it should also be pointed out has recently considered joining the Taliban, and yet Liz Cheney is in support of him. So, we have to wonder when the Republicans have asked, whose side is President Obama on? We have always said the more important question is who’s side are the Republican’s on? On the side of the man who says American Troops are occupiers and he considered joining the Taliban. Could you picture if a Democrat had said that? That actually would be news that would be on Faux News.

PARTISAN COURT IN SESSIONS

With Justice Stevens retiring, the possible nominees on the short list are Judge Diane Wood (US Court of Appeals7th circuit), Elana Kagan (Solicitor General), Judge Merrick Garland (US Court of Appeals - DC Circuit) and Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano. All these are mainstream, highly qualified possible justices. So, is bipartisanship still in sessions? Well, it is when you talk to Republican Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama. He is the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee and when asked by David Gregory about these people that Mr. Sessions well knows, would any of them be a non starter? He gave the classic shadow answer, “we have to look deeply into their background”. Among other things, we have to make sure they pass Clarence Thomas’ criteria for having a large enough porn collection, I guess. But with this answer you know it’s going to be a fight, there is no way to unite the un-unite-able because partisanship is in Sessions.

J.O.P. STAYS G.O.P.

Very much in the news (especially in the comic news) is the good ole boys night out to watch the good looking young girls night in at the voyeurs club in Los Angeles. All the pundits nationally made fun of the Republicans since this “non family values adventure” was to be charged to the RNC, well almost all. The exception was Jay Leno, to whom we shall henceforth refer by the moniker J.O.P. – “Jay’s Off Primetime”. And when you hear his latest round of jokes you can figure out why. Here is how he framed the blame involving the young right wing conservative’s foray into nude lesbian foreplay; he refers to the incident and then he concluded “now that’s something that the Republicans and Democrats can agree on”. Only Mr. Leno could gear up his humor in such a faux neutral way to have his punch line poke fun of Democrats for the Republicans night out, no make that blight out. That’s why he’s now JOP as in “Jay’s off primetime”. P.S. David Letterman was the man and got it right pointing out that any party who could do so well at tying up health care and other important matters in congress would certainly be comfortable watching women be tied up.