Tag Archives: right-wing

The $1.3 billion ideological football

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So, saw a tweet by Sarah Palin someone had commented on in my timeline, talking about President Obama giving $1.3 billion to the Muslim Brotherhood even though Congress told him not to. It smelled like horsecrap from the get-go, but you know what?

It took me going through five or six Google search pages before I finally found one story nestled amongst all the angry repostings at conservative blogs and right-wing “news” sites that actually explained what really happened: It was military aid to Egypt, which we’ve been giving for years upon years upon years…and the only issue was that the Obama administration loosened some “democracy” restrictions so that the money could go where it was supposed to.

Nothing shady. Simply that, technically, Egypt wasn’t democratic enough to qualify. But the thing is, through multiple administration’s we’ve overlooked political and human rights abuses in Egypt (and Israel…and Saudi Arabia) because it would be political, diplomatic, military, security and stability suicide to do otherwise in the Middle East. You don’t start slapping your key allies in a tricky region like that.

But somehow, all that gets twisted into Obama giving a fat load of money to a Muslim group.

This makes me fear for the future of this country that people eat this stuff up and repeat it online without questioning it for even a moment and making an effort to find out what’s really going on.

Does the truth make this $1.3 billion wonderful news? No. There are still reasons to be concerned if it’s the right thing to do, but that’s on top of a lot of other damned-if-you-do/damned-if-you-don’t decisions we make worldwide to keep peace, keep the economy going and all that.

Point is that as bad as the left has been at times, I have never seen anything in my lifetime as batshit crazy as the right wing since Obama took office. It’s downright frightening how quickly they cling to obvious lies and reject obvious and verifiable truths. Not even gray areas. Things you can actually look up and see they aren’t true, but the right wing continues to insist they are, so loudly and for so long that they become seen as truth by a good chunk of America.

I mean, if Obama had cut $1.3 billion in military aid to Egypt saying that he can’t reward them since they’re moving too slowly on reforms, the Republicans and Tea Party and all the rest would be accusing him of trying to destabilize the Middle East, back away from a key ally and hurt American-based contractors who ultimately supply many of the items that military aid would end up buying.

I criticized George W. Bush for a lot of things, not the least of which was entangling us in a terrible, costly war using patently untrue reasons to justify it. I mostly criticized him for obvious conflicts of interest, like putting people on a committee meant to protect children from lead exposure who had been paid by industry for years to debunk research on lead’s health impact…or giving Iraq contracts to Halliburton, a company his vice president was intimately involved with…or taking long and frequent vacations to Texas during one of the most unsettled U.S. periods (in terms of peace and security) of my lifetime.

I’ve got my beefs with Obama, too. Difference is that for two presidential election cycles now, he’s clearly been the candidate with his head screwed on the tightest and the one who’s most likely to give somewhat of a crap about most Americans instead of solely kneeling to the very wealthy ones. So, while I think he’s done a lot of things wrong and I’m not sure he’s always responded as well as he could to crises, I’m going to mostly side with him.

And when I do criticize him, it will be based on truth, not lies and conspiracy theories…just like I have with any other president.

God Is Good. Well, Not *THAT* God…

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In the aftermath of the terrible killings in Oslo, Norway, there is a clear take-away message that I’m getting, and I’m so glad that right-wing pundits, conservative nutjobs and Tea Party members, among others, are brave enough to share this insight:

If a Muslim kills folks, it’s clearly terrorism, and also proof that Islam is an inherently violent religion that is obsessed with taking over the world and crushing the United States to dust.

If a Christian kills a bunch of folks, it’s simply a sign he was slightly too aggressive in expressing his understandable bigotry and/or he isn’t practicing his religion properly.

Thanks for clearing that up, folks. I feel so much better now.

Dueling Dissonance

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So, I’m having serious headaches from the cognitive dissonance created in meh wee brain thanks to both side of the ideological aisle.

On the one side, there are the conservatives, who inspired dissonance-related sufferings in my cerebrum when I heard one too many of them on NPR today indicate that the threat of climate change is some big myth and we should stop trying to control carbon levels in the air or protect endangered species and all of that. Where does the cognitive dissonance come in?

Well, a lot of these people will be happy to tell you God has everything in hand and we should stop worrying. After all, God promised not to destroy the Earth again and if the climate changes, it’s simply God’s will and we shouldn’t mess with it.

So, if we should keep our hands off because God has climate under control, why the hell does He need your help trying to derail same-sex marriages and homosexual rights? I mean, if you think He doesn’t need any help with the climate, surely you don’t think a bunch of gays and lesbians are going to pose Him any problems, right?

Therefore, while you’re ignoring our collapsing environment, do us all a favor and stay out of the affairs of consenting adults who happen to be the same sex.

Thanks.

The other half of my dissonance comes from the left…a group who’s been shoving legislated health down our throats for ages. Bad enough that Happy Meals are being banned in San Francisco but now the FDA is going to slap hideous disease-ridden photos on cigarette packs because the Nanny State mentality dictates that smokers still just don’t get it and therefore we’ll shock them into quitting.

First, aside from the fact that I want to see some diseased livers or graphic bloody drunk-driving related action shots on liquor bottles to balance that out…as well as photos of fat-clogged arteries and diseased hearts on potato chip bags…I want to know how my progressive brethren can possibly endure the following dissonant thought:

How can you rail on about how evil it is to flash photos of aborted fetuses in the faces of women seeking to terminate pregnancies, and be in FAVOR of flashing rotting body parts to adults who should be able to choose any damn legal vice they please?

So, on the left and the right: How about both of you get a grip and go back to minding your own damn business.

For Hate’s Sake

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If you haven’t heard about the Shirley Sherrod debacle, you might want to leave now, because I’m only going to give it a cursory overview before I get into the meat of this relatively short post (Miz Pink just went on a race thing the other day here, so why not me, too, eh?)

So, conservative asshole (or assholes), mess with video from a presentation that USDA official Shirley Sherrod made, in an attempt to make her look like a black racist who had perhaps been screwing over white farmers. Conservative dickhead Andrew “I don’t care if it’s true as long as it gets me hits” Briebart puts up the video. Fox News has a field day with it. Many others in the media, wanting to show they aren’t liberal elitists, jump all over Sherrod, too. The USDA reacts hastily and makes her quit.

In the span of a day, give or take, a woman is torn to pieces metaphorically. Then comes CNN with massive coverage showing that the tapes were doctored to make Sherrod look bad, when in fact white farmers and many other people have been quite happy with Sherrod’s work at the USDA.

Now, the head of the USDA is apologizing, and the White House is trying to make good and polish its image after what seems to be yet another attempt by the administration to show that it won’t play favorites with blacks, and will in fact throw them under the bus (as the saying goes).

Here’s what I’m not going to do:

Cuss out Andrew Briebart (he’s a dick and apparently cannot cease being so any more than Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck can. No one should have trusted anything that he touches, and the media should be ashamed for being led down the primrose path by him)

Blame Barack Obama (or anyone else in the White House. There is no reason to believe that Sherrod’s situation and firing would have gotten that high on the food chain. Obama and his core staff had bigger fish on the grill at that point with unemployment benefits and financial reform)

Here’s what I am going to do:

Shake my head, mutter and swear about how easily duped the mainstream media is these days.

Lament that people can get fired lickety-split these days over a controversy or rumors without anyone bothering to investigate whether there’s any basis to it all.

And finally, I’m going to ask, “Why?”

Why did someone think it was necessary to murder Sherrod’s reputation? Why paint her as evil and as some racist black woman in power? Why? Why doctor a video to target her?

Race. Hate.

That’s it. Someone was racist enough and hateful enough to try to ruin a black woman who apparently has done a  lot of good (much of that good for white farmers and white poor people), just because she was black and, probably, because it might help make our black president look worse.

It’s not enough to just blame black folks for crimes they don’t commit or play up isolated incidents in their past to make them look militant or extreme. It’s not enough to jail them for crimes at higher rates and deny them not only their freedom but take away their future right to vote when white folks go free for the same crimes routinely.

No, none of that is enough.

Now, it’s necessary just to flat-out make shit up about a black person just because. Not even someone who’s at the top in power. Just a key official in a certain region doing her job. But because she’s black, it’s OK to make her look like a villain. With outright lies. Doctored video. Out of context comments.

*sigh*

Of scarves and fidelity

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So, I’ve got a beef with the right wing and the left wing today, thanks to recent posts at The Field Negro and Raving Black Lunatic that have hipped me to some crazy stories in the news…well, online rants that have made the news, anyway.

First, we have right-wing pundit Michelle Malkin, who in her blog post Of Donuts and Dumb Celebrities tries to make the case that a scarf worn by Rachael Ray in a Dunkin Donuts commercial somehow legitimates and supports terrorism because is supposedly so obviously a keffiyeh. Given that it’s still pretty rare to find a die-hard conservative who is an atheist, I’ll work under the assumption that she’s Christian. And in putting forth this rant (which actually convinced Dunkin Donuts to pull the ad), she epitomizes one of the things that pisses me off about narrow-minded right-wing Christians, which is that they think you can reduce terror-loving religious extremists to something like a scarf. They are so frickin paranoid that we’re going to be overrun by swarthy Jesus-hating footsoldiers that they are concerned someone will see Rachael Ray in something keffiyeh-like and sympathize with terrorists.

Way to oversimplify religious extremism while completely ignoring your own.

But hey, I have a left-leaning Democrat in my sights too. Let it never be said I never have anything bad to say about the folks who are a bit closer to my political views. In this case, Sylvia Welsh, in a blog post titled The Shrinkage Factor, actually suggests that Barack Obama’s seemingly unassailable fidelity to his wife is some sign that perhaps he’s not tough enough to be president. That’s right, she actually tries to weave together a blog post that can somehow posit that by being faithful to his wife he’s too much of a nice guy (granted she makes a lot of other points in this blog as well, few of which make any damn sense). And in this we see the hypocrisy of someone whom I’m certain would be quick to decry a conservative Christian for cheating on his wife while espousing family values, but can also be among those who expect Obama to repudiate his pastor of 20 years and also knock him for not cheating on his wife. What Bizarro World suburb does this woman live in?

*Sigh* God save me from the idiots on the right of me and the idiots on the left of me…please.