I have to chuckle about the rather incoherent response to Elena Kagan’s recent nomination to the Supreme Court. First off I will admit that I have some trepidation regarding such an unknown quantity replacing one of the few committed liberal voices in our judiciary. However the particular strain of criticism I am referring to seems to boarder on the fucking idiotic. For example I give you this labored talking point from a concerned citizen featured today in the Letters to the Editor section of my local newspaper, the Seattle Times:

“What could Supreme Court Nominee Elena Kagan possibly know about ordinary people? She was educated at an elite high school, an elite college, an elite law school and Oxford University, with two federal court clerkships and teaching posts at elite law schools.
The rest of her work life was spent in elite jobs in Washington, D.C. She has no reason to know anything about ordinary people — unless of course, when President Obama says ordinary, he means those with a career path like Kagan’s, which is far from ordinary.”

Now this statement might have some meaning if the other people on the court were just plain ordinary folks.
But since all the Supremes (except Stevens) come from a similar elite background, the word elite is rendered utterly meaningless. I would hope the letter writer isn’t just being mindlessly partisan here, hopefully they wrote similar letters back when Kagan’s fellow elitists Samuel Alito (Yale), and John Roberts (Harvard) were being nominated, but I’m guessing not…

Let’s face it America, you don’t get nominated to the high court if you spend your time doing average American things like getting sloppy drunk in the infield at Talladaga. My question is this, does the average American really want somebody just like them being on the nation’s highest court? If so I must say that is the kind of thinking that bad ideas are made of…

The writer seems to imply that only someone with an average education and background should be nominated. That the President should pick someone who understands firsthand the plight of *real* America. If that is the case, we would end up with someone just like me. I went to decidedly un-elite public schools, including a (gasp) public university. I have worked as a dishwasher, a pizza delivery boy, a picture framer, a retail manager, and I was a bartender for several years before finding work in the science field.

I’m not sure how much more mundane my career track could be, but I’m guessing it may fit this douche-bag’s person’s criteria for being non-elitist. I am not a lawyer, but since fancy law degrees tend to make you less-than-ordinary, that really shouldn’t be a consideration. More importantly, I do have actual real-world legal experience. Now I haven’t done anything impressive like argue before the Supreme Court, but as is common among the plain folk, I did defend myself (successfully I might add) in a disorderly conduct case a few years back. I believe that experience should suffice…

What exactly am I saying? I am saying that Doug Disney is the perfect ever-so-slightly-below-average candidate for the Supreme Court. I completely meet the letter writer’s implied criteria for serving on the nation’s highest court. A person who is commonplace, pedestrian, humdrum, average, mediocre, middling, unexceptional, unremarkable, undistinguished. I am that run-of-the-mill, dime-a-dozen, no-great-shakes candidate that the American people cry out for. After all we wouldn’t want someone who had distinguished themselves in any way, we want the ordinary…

Just how pointless is Facebook? Why I’m glad you asked. Since I have a Facebook page, I can tell you from experience that it is incredibly pointless. It even allows a group that prays for the death of our current president to exist unimpeded. FB says it doesn’t violate any of their user policies, and I suppose it doesn’t violate anything other than good taste and decorum. Of course the lovely religious folk who populate the page claim it is merely a good-natured ribbing of a man they have political disagreements with. No sir, it is certainly not vile hate-speech or a thinly-veiled death threat – it’s satire.

Here is their *joke*,
“DEAR LORD, THIS YEAR YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE ACTOR, PATRICK SWAYZIE.(SIC) YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE ACTRESS, FARAH FAWCETT. YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE SINGER, MICHAEL JACKSON. I JUST WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW, MY FAVORITE PRESIDENT IS BARACK OBAMA. AMEN.”

In honor of the fortieth anniversary of Earth Day I thought I should point out that a second bipartisan inquiry into the so-called climate-gate non-scandal has been released with (as I’ve come to expect) virtually no media coverage – surprise, surprise, surprise…

This inquiry, similar to the first, noted that, “the focus on CRU and Professor Phil Jones, Director of CRU, in particular, has largely been misplaced,” and that Dr. Jones’s actions were “in line with common practice in the climate science community,” and the CRU’s “analyses have been repeated and the conclusions have been verified.”

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Can anyone tell me exactly what the fuck is wrong with the state of Arizona? There are at least twenty-two rational people there. But not enough to stop the Arizona state legislature from passing a law that, “Would require U.S. presidential candidates who want to appear on the ballot in Arizona to submit documents proving they meet the constitutional requirements to be president.”

In other words, Arizona is well on its way to becoming the first official birther state. Mesa Republican Representative Cecil Ash stated that, “He has no reason to doubt Obama’s citizenship but supports the measure because it could help end doubt.” Really? End the doubt, eh? He is apparently unaware that only the truly insane believe that shit in the first place. I know that there is some doubt lingering out there in Wingnuttia. I also know that this grim fairy tale is being deliberately propagated by people who know it to be untrue. But they have a political agenda and won’t let a little thing like the truth get in the way of delegitimizing the nation’s first black President.

Sadly this is the codification of the idiotic birther movement. Before the election the anti-Obama propaganda centered around his faith. He was either a secret Muslim, or he attended a anti-American/Black nationalist Christian church. They’re not sure which, but that didn’t matter. Being perceived as different is all that matters. Or it was his political leanings, he was either a fascist, or a committed communist. Maybe a Euro-style socialist, possibly an America destroying nihilist. But most likely he’s a monarchist who plans on declaring himself president-for-life African-style, sometime before the next election.

Coherence in your message doesn’t matter if your intended audience is incoherent. It doesn’t even matter if the political or religious views are diametrically opposed. Americans are equally ignorant about religion and political science. That allows the propagandists to choose any two (or more) views and cobble them together to better achieve that otherness effect. None of that other crap stuck, so they had to up the ante. What could do that most effectively? Make Obama the ultimate foreign usurping other, by calling his U.S. citizenship into question.

Is it too late to add Arizona to Glenn Beck’s plan for a Texas-sized Wingnut summer camp?

I’ll start by saying that Tina Fey is hilarious, but she is no where near as comical as her source material. For example I give you the latest inane diatribe from that nitwit of the north Caribou Barbie. Instead of her standard Facebook follies, this skit was performed at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference. Although I must say that it puzzles me why any conservative would pay good money to hear the equivalent of some nut-job ranting away while waving a sign that reads The end is nigh, when they could just go to any street corner in America (Thank Saint Ronnie for emptying the mental hospitals) and hear virtually the same thing for free. That just doesn’t seem fiscally responsible to me, but I digress…

Bible Spice continuously demonstrates her lack of even a ninth-graders understanding of basic history and science, she seems to think the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is driven by simple zoning disputes. This time however the half-term half-wit displayed her ignorance of science as well as her new found celebutard status by going on a bizarre tangent on the subject of energy. It started as more of the same thinly veiled sexual innuendo about getting drilled here and now, you betcha, also, too. But went far afield when she referred to the recently debunked climate-gate non-scandal as “Gore-gate”. Stating with a stunning amount of contrived authority that conservatives were justified being skeptical of the science, which she refers to yet again as, “snake-oil”.

I find the Snowbilly grifter’s interpretation of reality to be very strange indeed. So let’s set the record straight for all the reality challenged people out there. I’ll start with former Vice President Al Gore. Al didn’t have a single thing whatsoever to do with the so-called climate-gate non-scandal. For fuck’s sake it didn’t even happen in the States, it was a British University that was involved. It is just fucking idiotic to blame that on Al Gore. It was a deliberate and pathetically lame attempt by Mooseilini to inject every wingnut’s favorite whipping boy into the conversation. More of the same pathetic *attack the messenger* style of politics that we’ve come to expect from our conservative friends. When you don’t want to discuss an issue on its merits, quickly bring up Chappaquiddick or William Jefferson, or whatever the Democratic scandal du jour happens to be…

Next is the climate-gate story itself, I told you Faux news would neglect to report that story. For the poorly informed I have news, there was no scandal and the science is sound. But since Sarah clearly doesn’t read, and only watches Faux news shows in which she appears, she most likely missed that report. The only “snake-oil” here is what Sarah is trying to sell to the tragically gullible audiences of idiot America.

There has been no person in my memory who so personifies the current trend in celebrity, that being someone who is famous for no discernible reason. She has indeed become the perfect reality television star. I just wish she had took a shot at blowing Bret Michaels, or better yet joined The Bad Girls Club. Anything other than her vainglorious attempt at the Vice Presidency. America would be a better place if that nails on chalkboard voice of hers was only heard when some neck-tattooed Jersey girl dragged her around the pool by her bumpit…

I have written about the environmentally disastrous practice of mountaintop removal before, But I didn’t know that Massey Energy, a major player in that horrible practice, also ran traditional underground coal mines. It figures that a company that believes leveling Appalachia is a viable way of encouraging economic development would have the same callous disregard for its underground operations. The recent tragedy in West Virginia has now brought the scope of crimes (both human and environmental) committed by Massey CEO and all around douche-bag Don Blankenship into the national spotlight.

This man is a caricature, a veritable Snidely Whiplash of dirty energy and profit margins over people and our shared environment. He is also the High Lord of the Flat Earth society a.k.a. the Climate Change science denial crowd. He uses his position in the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to actively work against any changes necessary to mitigate carbon pollution and save humanity from the worst effects of anthropogenic climate change. After all what does he care, he’s very wealthy now, and he’ll be dead before the worst of the impending shit-storm occurs. As my older brother often opines, “Why should I care about what happens to my great-grandchildren? I won’t know them.”

As you may know there are distinct levels of Climate Change denial. The most prominent in the media are the people who acknowledge that it is occurring, but do so only because it’s totally irrational to completely dismiss the overwhelming amount of evidence that it is indeed occurring. They are the, ‘Yes it’s happening, but it is a natural phenomenon’ group. Then there are the people who say, ‘Yes humans are causing it, but there is nothing we can do about it lest we destroy the economy and lots of people will starve and die.’ As a corollary to that belief, there are the people who say, ‘Okay we can do something about it, but that will hurt the bottom line of important industries like coal and oil, and send us back to the stone age.’

Dirty Don doesn’t fit into any of these groups, he is firmly in the ‘Climate Change is a massive hoax and grand conspiracy‘ crowd. He believes the conspiracy is being perpetrated by a shadowy cabal of greedy scientists out to make a buck off the government, and those damn dirty librul elitist hippies who want to teach your kids to worship nature and to hate (not necessarily in this order) America, free-market capitalism, Mom, apple pie, the flag, the troops, and especially our Lord and savior Jesus Christ who taught us that coal will save your soul…

Anthropogenic climate change is not an April Fool’s joke. I know it’s a day early, but I hope that lying asshat George Will and the rest of the idiot flat-earthers in the climate change denial crowd feel foolish. That might be the case if they were capable of exhibiting human emotions like shame. But since we know they’ll never admit to being wrong, or ever acknowledge that they deliberately ginned-up the faux *climategate* controversy for purely political purposes. All of us in the reality based community should take this opportunity to point at these fucktwit liars and laugh derisively…

There was truly no there, there…Phil Jones the director of the Climate Research Unit of East Anglia University was exonerated by an inquiry conducted by the British House of Commons. End of story. The science stands. There was no dishonesty found on the part of the researchers, and all the analyses are “consistent and verifiable”. Here is a direct quote from the report: “Even if the data that CRU used were not publicly available—which they mostly are—or the methods not published—which they have been—its published results would still be credible: the results from CRU agree with those drawn from other international data sets; in other words, the analyses have been repeated and the conclusions have been verified.”

Science wins again! Will you even see this story on Faux News? I found the story buried on page ten of my morning paper. When searching the intertubes, I found the story in only a few obscure places, mostly on climate science related sites. Even on the supposedly loony liberal sites like the Huffington Post, the headline was way down on the page and read, ‘Climategate Probe Largely Clears Scientists’ Largely clears? Did we read the same report? You would think the verification of the science and the exoneration of the scientists involved would garner as many headlines as the non-existent scandal did before the Copenhagen climate conference…

Some friendless whack-job living in the apartment above his parents garage threatens House Minority Whip Eric Cantor in a rambling anti-Semitic Youtube video, and rightly gets his crazy ass arrested. Normally such an arrest would be a good thing, but one wonders why he wasn’t arrested much earlier. After all the guy had posted over two thousand similar videos threatening most of the known universe. Including, but not limited to, virtually every Republican and Democratic politician in existence (including the President). What’s wrong with the Fed’s? They should have raided his folks garage immediately after he threatened the life of that adorable pig from the movie Babe…

Yet despite the plethora of video threats, somehow he is arrested only after a video of him threatening Cantor is discovered. Or shall we say – unearthed, most likely by Cantor’s own staff. Cantor lost whatever remaining credibility he had when he claimed a random shooting was directed at his office. Although I am speculating here, I believe it’s clear that he directed his staff to find something – anything to pin an extremist label on liberals. However, from even a cursory viewing of video posted by this deeply disturbed individual, it is painfully obvious that he is neither liberal nor conservative. He is quite simply a fucking nut-job with a god complex crying out for attention…

This incident, like the faux shooting story, is just another transparent attempt by Cantor to create false equivalence between the left and the current actions of the wingnut base of the Republican party. I’m sorry but it is no longer 1969, who are the Left’s armed lunatic fringe? Please point out which Leftist group threatens politicians and plots to overthrow the federal government? Friends of the Earth? PETA? Code Pink? Despite what you hear in the media, such a fringe is virtually non-existent. The year is 2010, and in 2010 it is the Right that uses threats of violence, intimidation, and vandalism to achieve their political goals…

So here is the question of the day. Who is more likely to act on their threats? The obviously insane Norman Leboon, or the Hutaree militia whack-jobs?

The Health Care bill was signed into law today. Sadly it is not the single-payer system I had hoped for, and it leaves the parasitic private health insurance system intact. That leaves me wondering why some conservatives believe it will lead to the end of civilization as we know it. Which is strange because for years now we’ve been told by conservatives that some wacky death-cult with a few thousand followers would be responsible for the destruction of Western civilization.

Times obviously have changed. According to some, the real agent of our demise has now emerged. That being evil godless socialism cleverly disguised as insurance reform. Which we know from watching Glenn Beck will lead directly to political purges, mass executions, farm collectivization, and FEMA-run gulags…

I especially wonder about the admission by House Minority leader John Boner Boehner (R) Tropical Tan. Who stated, “We have failed to listen to America.”  “And we have failed to reflect the will of our constituents.” “And when we fail to reflect that will – we fail ourselves and we fail our country.” I find it truly ironic that he would actually admit that his party has failed to listen to the vast majority of Americans who voted for exactly this kind of change just a short time ago. What? You say that wasn’t an admission of his party’s failure, that his statement was directed at the majority in Congress? Not fucking likely, that narrative, while popular in the media, has no bearing on reality…

I have to give John some credit, acknowledging that his party has a problem is the first step. I don’t think the Republicans are capable of a fearless moral inventory, as that requires morals. But I do know that Representative Boner (dammit, sorry) Boehner likes lists almost as much as crocodile tears, tanning beds and a couple of Rob Roy’s with lunch, so maybe he’ll skip ahead and make a list of all the people the Republican party has harmed and start making amends…

So the Health Care bill might pass this week, and I have a couple of questions about these scrot-lovin’ moran teabaggers and their blissful ignorance of pop culture references. It seems to me that the only thing these folks know how to do on the internets is forward xenophobic e-mails. Sadly, most probably have to ask their grand kids how to use the googles in order to find freerepublic. You would think their grand kids might tell them about the Urban Dictionary after grandma said she was leaving for DC to teabag the liberals with her buddy Glenn Beck…

Judging by the home-made signs found at their rallies, my first question is, are all these racist wingnuts semi-literate?

My second question is, do these people have jobs? Or is someone paying them to protest stuff they’ll eventually end up benefiting from?

Sorry, I thought I was done. But I also want to know why these folks are on teevee all the time with their angry pickets and unintentionally ironic signs? They couldn’t be more than a tiny fraction of the population, yet they are so prominently featured one might believe the opposite was true? And finally, how can an adult become more unhinged than a petulant fourteen-year-old banned from the xbox?

Okay, maybe one more question. How many of these folks protesting evil socialist entitlements that will destroy America are currently collecting social security/medicare and/or medicaid/unemployment benefits?

I nearly forgot, I also have a question for the “stunning” Steve King of Iowa. What in the fuck does the phrase “nationalizing our liberty” even mean? That makes about as much sense as Iowa voters thinking you would be a good representative…