Author: Blue Texan

Here’s the Quitter’s new employer, Fox News, makin’ stuff up about the Teabaggers.

The Tea Party Express has toured state after state trying to kick up a debate about constitutional rights and cast doubt on the legality of the recently passed health care overhaul, all with an eye toward the 2010 elections.

But while organizers have held the tour as a way to stay front-and-center as a political force, the rallies have also attracted the kinds of mistruths, exaggerations and conspiracy theories that make Tea Party leaders cringe. Though the movement is still trying to shore up its credentials as a grassroots power that’s here to stay, the so-called “fringe” and its accompanying antics continue to give critics fodder.

Just who are these “fringe” Teabaggers?

Bigots!

“Obama, to me, is a socialist. He’s a Muslim and all he wants to do is bankrupt us and run us into the ground,” Ken Schwalbach of Escanaba, Mich., said at a rally on Friday.

Birthers!

Other Tea Party members continue to question the president’s citizenship — a sign reading “Show Us Your Birth Certificate” popped up at a recent rally in Traverse City, Mich.

“What’s more disturbing is that he’s not answering them,” Tea Party member and conservative blogger Andrea Shay King said of the questions over Obama’s birthplace.

Conspiracy nuts!

Ron Moore of Petoskey, Mich., said he stood firm in his belief that the Democrats’ goal was to implement “death panels” to decide who receives medical care and who does not.

“They’ve already started,” he said.

Will the Quitter call Fox out on the air for smearing her beloved Teabaggery like this? Will she demand Fox corrects the record?

I’m going to go with no.

At the Southern Strategy Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans, the Frothy Mixture offered up a favorite wingnut talking point.

“We let America down. I say that conservatism didn’t fail America. Conservatives failed conservatism,” he said.

See, here’s where I’m confused. Just how did Bush Republicans fail conservatism?

Gigantic tax cuts for the rich, check. Gutting regulations, check. Huge increases in defense spending? Check. Bombing/invading countries? Check. Right-wing ideologues appointed to the Supreme Court? Double check. Declaring war on science? Check. Erosion of the middle class? Check. Giving Big Oil and Wall Street everything they want? Check. Rewarding polluters? Check. Weakening gun laws? Check. Demonizing teh gays and brown people? Check and check. Etc., etc., etc.

Sure, the size of government grew under Bush/Cheney. As it did under St. Reagan of California, Poppy, Ford, Nixon and Ike. Are they all conservative failures too?

Unless “conservatism” is now a one-issue ideology, it’s undoubtedly the case that conservatives like Bush and Cheney served conservatism very loyally.

Meaning, they royally screwed the country.

Are all Teabaggers racists? Of course not. Are some? Undoubtedly.

Now that the obvious is out of the way, there seems to be an awful lot of Teabaggers who have serious issues with race.

“The tea party is not just about politics and size of government. The data suggests it may also be about race,”said Christopher Parker, a UW assistant professor of political science who directed the survey.

It found that those who are racially resentful, who believe the U.S. government has done too much to support blacks, are 36 percent more likely to support the tea party than those who are not.

Indeed, strong support for the tea party movement results in a 45 percent decline in support for health care reform compared with those who oppose the tea party. “While it’s clear that the tea party in one sense is about limited government, it’s also clear from the data that people who want limited government don’t want certain services for certain kinds of people. Those services include health care,”Parker said.

Not surprising.

As noted previously, the Teabaggers want government services, as long as they benefit them. It’s not about the size of government — it’s about being pissed  that “those people” are taking their money away from them.

Lee Atwater knew what he was talking about.

(h/t AZ Matt)

What an ass.

Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) on Tuesday vowed to block all future spending bills in the Senate that aren’t fully “paid for” with cuts to other spending programs.

Coburn and other Republicans are already blocking a $9 billion bill to extend jobless benefits for 30 days that isn’t offset with other spending cuts. That impasse halted benefits to 200,000 unemployed people this week.

[…]

Coburn told The Hill he’s disappointed with press coverage of his position, saying the media should focus on the fact that Democrats adopted a requirement that spending bills be paid for, yet frequently disregard the rule.

“That’s what the story ought to be,” he said. “If you’re going to spend new money, pay for it. And they haven’t paid for a thing … As soon as I decided to do this, I knew the press would be against this. That’s just a fact of life in Washington. We have a biased press.”

Wah! The press isn’t applauding my partisan hypocritical grandstanding.

by Fibonacci Blue

The Quitter teamed with up Michele Bachmann yesterday in Minnesota yesterday and drew a crowd of 10,000 Teabaggers. Chris Bowers thinks that means the Quitter is going to be the GOP’s nominee if she wants it, but I don’t think she does. Too much work.

We might just find out tomorrow, when she speaks at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference.

Anyway, back to the Quitter-Bachmann rally…

The rally was a lively assault on Democrats in Congress and the White House. The emcee, talk radio host Chris Baker, drew cheers and laughter when he said the party in power in Washington is a “lying, thieving . . . bunch of commies.”

…

Many in the audience wore buttons with side-by-side images of Palin and Bachmann. One man’s a sweatshirt had an image of Mount Rushmore and the words “Right Wing Extremist: Guess I’m in Good Company.”

…

Betty Soban, an admiring constituent of Bachmann’s, said: “My family left Germany because of Hitler and socialized medicine. I see it happening here.” Important to her, she said, are “freedom of ownership. Freedom of our guns. Freedom of having babies.“

It’s Palin’s party, for sure.

‘Bout time, guys.

The US military is reviewing a video of a controversial helicopter attack on a group of people in Iraq in 2007, officials say.

The review comes after footage of the attack was published online by the website WikiLeaks, gaining 4.1 million YouTube viewings.

There are, however, no plans to reopen an investigation into the case, a US Central Command spokesman says.

So we know how the review is going to go, don’t we?

The interwebs are buzzing today with the news that GOP Gov. Robert McDonnell of Virginia has declared April “Treason in Defense of Slavery” month.

But what’s not getting enough attention is the fact that the group that convinced McDonnell to sign the declaration are a bunch of neo-Confederates.

This year’s proclamation was requested by the Sons of Confederate Veterans. A representative of the group said it has known since it interviewed McDonnell when he was running for attorney general in 2005 that he was likely to respond differently than Warner or Kaine.

“We’ve known for quite some time we had a good opportunity should he ascend the governorship,” said Brandon Dorsey of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

The Southern Poverty Law Center has a dossier on the SCV.

Although the 31,400-member SCV has always billed itself as a “non-political” and “non-racial” heritage organization devoted merely to preserving the legacy of Confederate soldiers, SCV leaders have long been tied to segregation and white supremacy.

See more on the group here.

But you’ve got to see this quote from an article in the May/June, 2008 edition of the SCV’s newsletter, The Southern Mercury.

It is very clear to me that if Barack Obama should be elected President, he would be extremely anti-white and would demand reparations for slavery and press hard for affirmative action to the degree that it would hurt young whites who were seeking jobs or admission to College and Graduate Schools. Even if he were elected, I would think he would be a one term President and the Congressional Republicans with a “corporal’s guard’ of Democrats would stop most of the radical and unjust laws he would propose. However, I believe that his rhetoric and anti-white legislative proposals would stir up racial riots. If he were running for re-election, these riots would turn into an extremely violent nature that would seriously damage race relations in America, and leave entire sections of some of our cities in ruins.

Real nice people you’re keeping company with, Bob.

Great hire, Most Trusted Name in News.

Q Robert, on the Census, Erick Erickson, a commentator for CNN, a couple of days ago, he said he was not going to fill out his Census form, and if a Census worker came to the door, he said he would “pull out my wife’s shotgun and see how that little twerp likes being scared at the door.” So my question is, do those remarks concern the White House? And are there any –

MR. GIBBS: It should concern CNN — probably first and foremost. Probably concerns his wife as well.

They must be so proud.

Pictured: Erick Erickson reacts to Obama's new nuclear policy

SURRENDER!!!!11!!1!!!

President Obama said Monday that he was revamping American nuclear strategy to substantially narrow the conditions under which the United States would use nuclear weapons.

Well, this oughta be fun.

Powertools sees yet another Munich.

The problem is that our enemies understand symbolism and maybe take it too seriously. To them, today’s announcement is another sign that our government has gone soft, and one more inducement to undertake aggressive action against the United States.

Erick Erickson wonders,

How many Americans are going to die because of the Obama administration’s incompetent handling of our national security?

(ed. note: Hopefully fewer than under George W. Bush, Erick!)

Noted tough guy and decorated keyboard warrior Dan Riehl spits,

We can’t get this weakling out of the WH fast enough.

Atlas Juggs predicts our looming national date rape.

Obama says to our enemies, bring it on, we won’t fight ya — leaving us bare naked vulnerable like a virgin slipped a Rohypnol on her first date with a Chicagoland gangsta.

And Roger L. Simon asks exactly the same rhetorical questions he always asks.

What are we to make of this and the man who is adopting this policy? Does he hate us? Does he hate this country?

Speaking of America-haters: St. Reagan of California wanted to abolish nuclear weapons.

Have a nice day, morans.

And it’s not just that he’s used that sham of a nickname for years. He just did last week.

At a campaign really for McCain on March 26th, Palin asked Arizona voters to “send the maverick back to the United States Senate” as McCain looked on. She told the crowd that McCain’s “maverick” status hasn’t won him friends from the “Washington D.C. elite machine.”

One reason McCain may be shedding the “maverick” label is that it doesn’t play well with Republican primary voters. McCain is facing a primary challenge from former congressman J.D. Hayworth, who has deemed McCain less than a true conservative.

Really brings the choice of Palin into focus, doesn’t it?

There’s not many surprises in the new Gallup poll about the Tea Party.

The poll found that, surprise!, 70% of Teabaggers are conservatives, which means the 43% of the movement’s so-called “independents” are white men voters who pull the lever for the GOP, but don’t want to call themselves Republicans after George W. Bush’s pooch-screwing and with the cast of clowns currently running the party.

What’s interesting, however, is that only 37% of Americans view Teabaggery favorably.

Translation: the Teabaggers are really unpopular.

By comparison, President Obama’s favorability number is nearly 20 points higher at 55% — while Russia and China come in at 47% and 42% respectively.

The good news for the Teabaggers is they are still slightly more popular than Saudi Arabia (35%) and the Quitter (36.8%).

Steve Benen highlights yet another example of KEEP YOUR GUBMINT HANDS OFF MY GUBMINT WELFARE syndrome.

But for one important detail, Stephen Fincher could be a perfect “tea party” candidate: a gospel-singing cotton farmer from this tiny hamlet in western Tennessee, seeking to right the listing ship of Washington with a commitment to lower taxes and smaller government.

The detail? Fincher accepts roughly $200,000 in farm subsidies each year.

That’s right, just like Michele Bachmann. And really, this is perfectly consistent with the way most Teabaggers think.

Fincher says he wants to “fight government encroachment in our lives” and opposes “any attempt to increase government intervention in our health care” and thinks that the solution to all our problems is “the free market.”

But that $200 grand he gets every year from the gubmint? He’ll keep that, thanks very much.

And the rubes are lapping it up.

“He is for the Constitution,” said Lucy Overstreet, an organizer with the Jackson Madison County TEA Party who is supporting Fincher. “He is for getting the budget balanced. He does not want this health care. He is right in line with the views we are holding true to.”

Nance, of the Gibson County Patriots, said, “I don’t see the agricultural subsidy thing as an issue at all…”

Notes Benen,

For the right-wing crowd, subsidies for 32 million Americans with no health insurance is outrageous, but subsidies for conservative farmers is not an issue “at all.”

Of course not. IOKIYAR.

Speaking of Blanche Lincoln…

Bill Halter’s campaign announced today that they raised over $2 million in a month, having started his campaign at the beginning of March. Blanche Lincoln’s campaign announced today that they raised over $1 million in the quarter.

Some have used this information to say that Bill Halter’s campaign has doubled Blanche Lincoln’s campaign in raising cash. However, this doesn’t take into account that Halter only has been raising money since he announced in early March. This means that on a per month basis, Bill Halter’s campaign actually made $2,000,000/month and Blanche Lincoln’s made $333,333/month. Therefore, Bill Halter’s campaign actually raised cash six times as fast as Blanche Lincoln’s campaign… and he did it averaging around $30/donation. Now, we are working with initial estimates, but the difference is clear.

Go Halter!

You know what to do.

The Bushies disregarded the law? I’m shocked, shocked.

A federal judge has rejected the Bush administration’s justification for warrantless wiretapping of suspected terrorists and ruled that federal agents had eavesdropped illegally on a U.S.-based Islamic charity.

The ruling Wednesday by Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker of San Francisco focused on the surveillance of a single organization, the Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation – the only plaintiff in dozens of wiretapping lawsuits around the nation that had evidence its calls were intercepted.

But Walker’s reasoning struck at the heart of the program President George W. Bush authorized after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, allowing agents to intercept phone calls and e-mails between Americans and suspected foreign terrorists without a warrant.

When Bush acknowledged the surveillance in December 2005, he claimed the power to override a 1978 law, passed in response to revelations of wiretapping of political dissidents, that required the government to obtain advance court approval for each act of eavesdropping.

Walker said Wednesday that Bush lacked that authority.

Last week, after crazies like Jim DeMint, Pete Hoekstra and Michele Bachmann started the REPEALgasm, a group of slightly less crazy Republicans, including John Cornyn, Jon Kyl and Newt Gingrich, began to backpedal.

Now, Lamar Smith (R-TX), who himself signed on to the REPEALgasm, admits it’s all just kabuki.

…while we want to repeal it – we are going to have to wait for some changes that face any congress before we have the votes to do that. The second way that we want to improve or replace the health care scheme that just passed is to try to challenge it in court. My own feeling is we only have a 50-50 chance at best of succeeding in that. The current make up of the supreme court is likely to rule in a very close vote – it may be 5 to 4 against us – that the health care bill is constitutional – but its worth trying.

The current makeup of the Court, for those keeping track at home, includes 6 Republican appointees. So Smith is essentially conceding that a successful legal challenge of health reform is just a wingnut pipe dream to rile up the rubes.

It’s easy to see why Republicans like Smith are backing off. They know that if they make 2010 all about REPEAL, they won’t be able to deliver. And that means lots of angry Teabaggers (is there any other kind?) running a third party presidential candidate in 2012 — if that already isn’t inevitable.

Eugene Robinson has a great column about this today.

The episode highlights the obvious: For decades now, the most serious threat of domestic terrorism has come from the growing ranks of paranoid, anti-government hate groups that draw their inspiration, vocabulary and anger from the far right.

It is disingenuous for mainstream purveyors of incendiary far-right rhetoric to dismiss groups such as the Hutaree by saying that there are “crazies on both sides.” This simply is not true.

Nope. Read the whole thing.

Pictured: a non-Muslim Caucasian, and therefore, not a terrorist,

CNN:

Nine suspected members of a militia group were charged Monday with seditious conspiracy and related charges in an alleged plot to kill a Michigan law enforcement officer and then attack other officers at his funeral, federal prosecutors said.

A federal grand jury in Detroit, Michigan, indicted six Michigan residents, two Ohioans and an Indianan on charges of seditious conspiracy, attempted use of weapons of mass destruction, teaching the use of explosive materials and possessing a firearm during a crime of violence, U.S. Attorney Barbara L. McQuade and Andrew Arena, FBI special agent in charge, announced.

Those are some serious charges. Attempted use of WMD. Seditious conspiracy.

America’s vigilant Anti-Terror Warriors on the right will certainly be relieved and grateful that the FBI nabbed these guys, right?

Nope.

Glenn Reynolds smells a politically-motivated conspiracy.

THE TIMING APPEARS CONVENIENT: FBI stages domestic raids.

So does American Power.

Hey, is the administration taking after Christian militias to get in good with CAIR and the neo-communist left?

Dan Riehl finds something about the terrorists to praise.

Just three days ago, members of the group were assisting LE in a rescue search. Must be some really evil people there, what?

Classical Values sees nothing illegal going on.

Last time I looked, wanting to start a civil war (insane as it is) was not a crime.

You can hear echoes of “black helicopters” and “Ruby Ridge” and “Waco” in Confederate Yankee’s lament.

I question the wisdom of using such heavy forces (including armored vehicles and helicopters according to witness reports), when light, fast and quiet raids would have been at least as effective. More than the timing, I question the leadership.

And Roy Edroso flagged this reader’s comment at NRO.

We have to take a stand against creeping totalitarianism. I’ll take the risk that the regime will somehow get the NRO donation list and use it to round up the freedom-loving counterrevolutionaries.

Compare these reactions with the comments at Free Republic and you’ll find absolutely no discernible differences.

They’re all Freepers now.

Dave Neiwert has more.

Pictured: Teabaggers or hippies, either at yesterday's "Conservative Woodstock" or the one in 1969

Yesterday’s Tea Party event in Harry Reid’s hometown, headlined by the likes of the Quitter and Joe the Plumber, was billed as a “Conservative Woodstock” and was apparently supposed to be this huge gathering of Teabaggery.

Now, the actual Woodstock drew 400,000 people in 1969. Yesterday’s wingnut version, erm, came up a little short.

About 7,000 people streamed into tiny Searchlight, a former mining town 60 miles south of Las Vegas, bringing with them American flags and “Don’t Tread on Me” signs.

The 1969 Woodstock was attended by people mostly in their late teens and early 20s. Wingnut Woodstock?

While the audience, which thinned out rapidly after Palin’s appearance, was largely white and middle-aged, [Teabagger Ryan] Gill said there are no official efforts to market the movement to a more broad-based demographic, which might make it more politically powerful.

“We don’t split people into groups,” Gill said. “We reach out to people by talking to them about America’s ideals. We don’t see how that appeals to you differently if you’re black or young.“

The original Woodstock was a defining moment for a new progressive generation of Americans. The Wingnut Woodstock?

Dan Weinland, a 59-year-old visiting California, drove with his nephew from Santa Clarita because “it’s time to overthrow the socialist regime.”

At the ballot box, he clarified, but added, “If they come for me, I’m clinging to my guns, my God and my Bible and my country.”

Finally, the 1969 Woodstock showcased the music of Jimi and Janis and Joan and Jefferson Airplane. The Wingnut Woodstock — Victoria Jackson.

[Joe the Plumber] Wurzelbacher urged the crowd to get politically active, while [Victoria] Jackson performed a song that described Obama as “a communist dictator who is taking us to hell.“