Will people save money this winter by yes we canning? The New Politics thread.

[Mike24]

yeah....well that proposal is whack anyways.  which is why I think giving Dion his walking papers is step #1.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Not necessarily, TSKS.  I know "states' rights" was Gingrich's hobbyhorse during the "Republican Revolution," but although conservatives still often purport to be all about limited/localized governance, they stopped emphasizing the role of the states specifically when blue states started doing thing like legalizing gay marriage, medicinal marijuana, euthanasia, etc.  So states' rights can swing both ways w/r/t to civil liberties.   

edit:  To the extent that "States' Rights!  Wooo!" is still used as a conservative rallying cry, you're right.  It's generally used in local races in the South^tm as a dog whistle for creepy old white Confederacy-fetish dudes. 

I see your first paragraph point, but yeah, I suppose being in the south and hearing that particular dog whistle on a regular basis all my life has blinded me to the potential progressive turnabout implications for state's rights. I can't wait to throw state's rights into the faces of any of my family members who bitch about gay marriage over Christmas.

Course, if my gay cousin who lives in Connecticut is there, he and his boyfriend might be engaged or even married by now, so I guess they might be uncomfortable going there, at least while he's around.

[girl]

How come you never visit your cousin in CT?

[jess]

Not necessarily, TSKS.  I know "states' rights" was Gingrich's hobbyhorse during the "Republican Revolution," but although conservatives still often purport to be all about limited/localized governance, they stopped emphasizing the role of the states specifically when blue states started doing thing like legalizing gay marriage, medicinal marijuana, euthanasia, etc.  So states' rights can swing both ways w/r/t to civil liberties.   

edit:  To the extent that "States' Rights!  Wooo!" is still used as a conservative rallying cry, you're right.  It's generally used in local races in the South^tm as a dog whistle for creepy old white Confederacy-fetish dudes. 

I see your first paragraph point, but yeah, I suppose being in the south and hearing that particular dog whistle on a regular basis all my life has blinded me to the potential progressive turnabout implications for state's rights. I can't wait to throw state's rights into the faces of any of my family members who bitch about gay marriage over Christmas.

Course, if my gay cousin who lives in Connecticut is there, he and his boyfriend might be engaged or even married by now, so I guess they might be uncomfortable going there, at least while he's around.

Yeah, living in MA, I'm pretty glad my state has whatever independence it does. Gay marriage, check. Marijuana possession punished by fines, not jail time (at least for less than 1 oz), check. Allowing Plan B to distributed by specially trained pharmacists to girls over 16 and under 18 without a prescription, check. Establishing buffer zones around the entrances to abortion clinics, check. Mandating health insurance, check... actually that one is kind of fucking things up, and jeopardizing the main providers of health care to the poor, but still, interesting idea.

I do think watching things like that happen in states like MA (or say euthanasia in OR and now WA) ends up being a sort of test case for the country. It won't convince everyone, but the more states that have gay marriage and do just fine with it, the more it will happen elsewhere. And essentially, because of states like MA, CT and formerly CA (which I bet will be back next election), you can have states like NY who sort of approve gay marriage by recognizing it when performed elsewhere, which is better than nothing. If we had to wait for the entire country to be on board first, I think it would take a lot longer to make any progress.

[Andrew_TSKS]

How come you never visit your cousin in CT?

We're not really that close. Note that I don't know if he's even gotten married yet. Don't get me wrong, I think he's an awesome guy, but from when he was about 13 until my grandfather's funeral, he didn't come to one single family function. I think he had figured out he was gay and was trying to avoid confrontation. The first Christmas after my grandfather died, he showed up with an obviously gay man in tow, and I was like "Ohhhh, so THAT's where Jeb has been all this time."

And yes, my cousin's name is Jeb, though it's actually his initials and not short for Jebediah (apparently only family members still call him Jeb--his boyfriend calls him John, which is always a bit weird to hear).

[dieblucasdie]

Also, it bears pointing out that the Republican Party choosing to de-emphasize states' rights over federal rights coincided suspiciously with, ya know, the GOP taking over all three branches of the federal government. 

It's funny how on November 5th, all these douchebags who had been advocating copious foreign wars, a federal gay marriage amendment, NCLB, expansion of executive power, etc were suddenly advocates of limited federal government.  Given that the GOP's last stronghold is now state legislatures and governorships in the South and West, I expect we'll see a return to "states' rights" rhetoric.

[hannah]

OK Bush is a war criminal but also he is a lying, shitty, creepy, awful dickweed. From the transcript of an interview with Charles Gibson:

Mr. Gibson: You’ve always said there’s no do-overs as President. If you had one?

Mr. Bush: I don’t know — the biggest regret of all the presidency has to have been the intelligence failure in Iraq. A lot of people put their reputations on the line and said the weapons of mass destruction is a reason to remove Saddam Hussein. It wasn’t just people in my administration; a lot of members in Congress, prior to my arrival in Washington D.C., during the debate on Iraq, a lot of leaders of nations around the world were all looking at the same intelligence. And, you know, that’s not a do-over, but I wish the intelligence had been different, I guess.

Mr. Gibson: If the intelligence had been right, would there have been an Iraq war?

Mr. Bush: Yes, because Saddam Hussein was unwilling to let the inspectors go in to determine whether or not the U.N. resolutions were being upheld. In other words, if he had had weapons of mass destruction, would there have been a war? Absolutely.

Mr. Gibson: No, if you had known he didn’t.

Mr. Bush: Oh, I see what you’re saying. You know, that’s an interesting question. That is a do-over that I can’t do. It’s hard for me to speculate.

I mean, this shouldn't incredible. But it is. In what respect, Charlie?

[FreddyKnuckles]

That was just a confusing question: if the intelligence had been right could either mean that there were weapons or that there weren't--though it does say a lot about our President that he immediately assumed the other. 

[hannah]

Fair enough, but Bush is the one who brings up the "intelligence failure." And it's pretty fucking fucked-up to say only, "I wish the intelligence had been different."

in short: obviously this is a minor point, but just something that still managed to startle me on this snowy Monday

[girl]

I don't understand how he's still claiming that we actually had bad intelligence. His little self-created world must be a very happy place.

[hannah]

HIS WORLDVIEW?
IN WHAT RESPECT CHARLIE
IN WHAT RESPECT CHARLIE
IN WHAT RESPECT CHARLIE
IN WHAT RESPECT CHARLIE
IN WHAT RESPECT CHARLIE
IN WHAT RESPECT CHARLIE

[dieblucasdie]

I'm not the first to say this, but it's amazing how much mileage Bush has gotten out of the "nobody could have predicted" thing.  Lots of people, including, ya know, Bush's own fucking State Department were skeptical about WMD evidence.  But anyone who opposed the war was painted as a childish hippie who couldn't cope with the realities of terrorism.  And now it's all "how could we have known!?1?!" 

If circa fall 2002 you went and read the top 4 liberal blogs, and the top 5 conservative blogs, both would've seemed to a lot of people to be two sides of the same coin; the bastions of hysterical conspiracy theorists.  "The WMD evidence is fabricated!  Bush will use the Patriot Act to spy on American citizens without warrants!  They're torturing people at Gitmo!"

Way to fulfill liberals' worst fantasies about what conservative governance is like, 43.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Kentucky state Office of Homeland Security requires prominent acknowledgement of God in all reports

Under state law, God is Kentucky's first line of defense against terrorism.

The 2006 law organizing the state Office of Homeland Security lists its initial duty as "stressing the dependence on Almighty God as being vital to the security of the Commonwealth."

Specifically, Homeland Security is ordered to publicize God's benevolent protection in its reports, and it must post a plaque at the entrance to the state Emergency Operations Center with an 88-word statement that begins, "The safety and security of the Commonwealth cannot be achieved apart from reliance upon Almighty God."

State Rep. Tom Riner, a Southern Baptist minister, tucked the God provision into Homeland Security legislation as a floor amendment that lawmakers overwhelmingly approved two years ago.

As amended, Homeland Security's religious duties now come before all else, including its distribution of millions of dollars in federal grants and its analysis of possible threats.

The time and energy spent crediting God are appropriate, said Riner, D-Louisville, in an interview this week.

"This is recognition that government alone cannot guarantee the perfect safety of the people of Kentucky," Riner said. "Government itself, apart from God, cannot close the security gap. The job is too big for government."

That's the first few paragraphs, but you should really follow the link and read the whole article, because it's equally hilarious throughout.

[FreddyKnuckles]

fucking democrats

[dieblucasdie]

?

[jess]

If you read the article, it was a democrat who did the God thing in KY, so I think FK was enjoying that it was one of our guys for once.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Yeah. The blue dogs are kind of annoying but I can't really be too mad at them because they are generally populist.

[dieblucasdie]

Al Franken has picked up 37 votes from 171 newly discovered suburban St. Paul ballots that were never counted -- apparently because of a machine problem. Going by the Franken camp's count, that means his deficit is down to 13, with 7% of ballots remaining in the recount.

(Note that this doesn't include contested ballots, and the Coleman campaign has contested an order of magnitude more ballots than the Franken campaign)

[davy]

I voted this morning, and tons of other people did too, and I even got canvassed for the first time, but it's just not lookin' good for Jim Martin.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Aw, fuck, man, that's not good news.

[davy]

It's Chambliss 59 to 41 with 84% reporting.

That margin is a fuck of a lot wider than it was on Nov. 4. Couldn't get the vote out a second time, I guess.

Damn it.

[ellaguru]

Probably unavoidable, though.

[Maaik]

Yeah, Chambliss has 57% with 97% reporting.  I mean, yeah, I saw that coming.  Still sucks.

[donblood]

It must have been name recognition - voters recognized that his name makes it sound like he's a plantation owner in a white hat chewing a cigar.

[Andrew_TSKS]

Hah, being from the part of Virginia where I grew up, "Saxby" is part of that category of weird names that I don't even notice anymore. I knew so many kids with weird names like that when I was growing up, it's ridiculous.