From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Hightower!
One of the great pleasures of stomping around Austin in 97-degree heat with the Netroots Nation hooligans back in 2008 was the chance to meet liberal activist, populist and rabble-rouser Jim Hightower, of whom Molly Ivins said: "If Will Rogers and Mother Jones had a baby, Jim Hightower would be that rambunctious child---mad as hell, with a sense of humor." Darn fine writer, too:
[F]rom Wall Street to Washington, we have too many five-watt bulbs sitting in 100-watt sockets. As a result of their dimness, America's uniting and constructive ethic of "We're all in this together" and "Together we can" is being supplanted by a shriveled, dispiriting ethic that exalts plutocratic selfishness and scorns the public interest as intrusive, wasteful, ideologically impure, and morally ruinous. They're pushing us toward a forbidding Kochian jungle in which there is no "we"---money rules, everyone's on their own, and such matters as justice, general welfare, tranquility, and posterity are none of society's damned business. …
While it can be disheartening to see the smallness of those in power, don't let it get you down, for they want us to become so disheartened that we give up. Better that we turn their failure into our inspiration for more agitation. After all, they're the ones who're wrong---wrong about the can-do power of the people they pretend to lead, wrong about the depth of this nation's historic commitment to egalitarianism and the common good, wrong about what they think they can get away with.
Our task is to confront them again and again, shoving back until we shove them out. Confront them in the coming election--demand from every candidate for every office why their idea of what Americans can do is so small. Confront them in the workplace, the media, the pocketbook, the schools, the shareholder meetings, the public forums, the streets... everywhere.
But nothing beats his signature line: "There's nothing in the middle of the road but yellow stripes and dead armadillos." Happy 69th birthday, sir. And many blessings on your Stetson.
P.S. Speaking of Netroots Nation, the organizers are now accepting ideas for panels at this year's convention in Providence (June 7-10). The process is outlined here. If you have questions, there's a live online webinar today starting at 2pmET/11amPT---click here to RSVP. Light refreshments will be held up to the camera for your enjoyment.
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, January 11, 2012
Note: "I'll be hoooome for Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. You can count on meeee…." I do so love this time of year.
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By the Numbers:
Days `til the Bluff Balloon Festival in Utah: 2
Days 'til the Chinese New Year (of the Dragon): 12
Starting price in the Rolls Royce "Year of the Dragon" collection: $1.6 million
Number of people in China who still live on less than $1 a day: 150 million
(Source: L.A. Times)
Percent of U.S. prisoners with a relative who's been incarcerated: 48%
Violent crimes in the U.S. per year: 1.2 million
(Source: Time)
Rank of Miami, Chicago and Atlanta among cities surveyed where residents rank themselves on a scale of 1-10 based on their looks: #1, #2, #3
(Source: LivingSocial survey via USA Today)
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Mid-week Rapture Index: 183 (including 3 plagues and 1 plastered new year's porcupine). Soul Protection Factor 8 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Cheers!
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CHEERS to that thingy next door I've already almost forgotten. The New Hampshire primary is now history, and perhaps the biggest story of the night is how the bottom fell out of Republican participation compared to 2008. For those who care, here's the breakdown:
Held nose and voted for Romney---20%
Closed eyes and voted for Romney---10%
Vomited first and then voted for Romney---8%
"Was promised a cookie if I voted for Romney"---10%
Voted for Romney but got no cookie---10%
Voted for "Pious Baloney" Romney---8%
Happily voted for Romney---4%
Voted to fire Romney---62%
None of the candidates bowed out. So now the next stop for the Anticlimax Express is South Carolina on January 24th, but not before three more debates take place. Because they're trying to kill my liver.
CHEERS to getting the green light. Y'know those TV ads of ours slamming Republicans for voting last year to end Medicare as we know it? Republicans have been crying foul over them because, of course, the truth is hurting 'em like hell. TV stations, however, aren't buying it and have been airing the ads:
“Our lawyers looked at the ad and concluded it’s within the bounds of robust public debate,” Jeff Barlett, the general manager of WMUR, tells me. “If [Rep.] Charlie Bass and his supporters disagree with this, they’re free to create their own ad and tell their side of the story.”
And their side of the story, of course, is: "Look over there! Shiny object!"
JEERS to Camp Sunshine. My, how time flies when your captors are flushing your Quran down the toilet in your cell. Today marks the tenth anniversary of the grand opening of the gulag at Gitmo. And, boy, do I feel safer:
[Lakhdar] Boumediene was not simply arrested and imprisoned for years despite no evidence that he was a terrorist, he was arrested while he was working as a humanitarian aide worker. For children. The man devoted his life to helping the youngest and most vulnerable victims of a terrible conflict, and we locked him up and tortured him.
To mark the tenth anniversary, all the inmates will get a double-hosedown and an extra hour of sleep deprivation.
CHEERS to the not-so-artful dodger. Happy 257th birthday to Alexander Hamilton. He was one of our country's youngest Founding Fathers, but he wasn't very good at avoiding controversy (adultery, skullduggery in the 1800 election) or ye olde musket ball. And here's something you can toss into this afternoon's pootie diary:
People today still name their tomcats after Alexander Hamilton in deference to his infamous many extramarital affairs. Martha Washington was the first as she named her large carousing tomcat 'Hamilton.'
Pay your respects here. Or you can just pull out a ten-spot and give it a pat.
CHEERS to the gaffe that keeps on gaffe'ing. In 2004, stiff and uninspiring Democratic presidential contender John Kerry said he "actually voted for the $87 billion before I voted against it," and it dogged him for months. Now, in 2012, stiff and uninspiring Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney ensured that he'll be similarly hounded when he said, "I like being able to fire people." A tweet from TPM shows you why this will dog him all the way through election day:
At an event in NH, as Romney held a baby, someone in the audience yelled, "Are you going to fire the baby?"
And check out how the DNC is running with it on the You Tubes. Now, to be fair, let's be mindful of context. As in, let's be mindful that context isn't in the Republicans' vocabulary when they're coming after us. So, in conclusion: Mitt Romney "likes being able to fire people." And America must know.
CHEERS to clearing the air....and the lungs. Forty-eight years ago today, in 1964, U.S. Surgeon General Luther Terry issued the first government report saying smoking may be hazardous to your health. (This came as quite a shock to some of tobacco's most fervent supporters, like doctors and Ronald Reagan.) The report had quite the impact:
The landmark Surgeon General's report on smoking and health stimulated a greatly increased concern about tobacco on the part of the American public and government policymakers and led to a broad-based anti-smoking campaign. ... The report was also responsible for the passage of the Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act of 1965, which, among other things, mandated the familiar Surgeon General's health warnings on cigarette packages.
Unfortunately the Surgeon General's warning reads like "blah blah blah" to the average smoker, so the FDA tried to add photos of smoking's consequences. Like, for instance, turning you into an increasingly powerless orange crybaby. A federal judge has since ruled against them. Too gruesome.
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Five years ago in C&J: January 11, 2007
CHEERS to the iPHONE!!!! It slices! It dices! It makes julienne fries at the touch of a button! Turn it upside down and it becomes an all-in-one tire inflator and grout remover! Place a pork roast in the chamber and then..."set it and forget it!!" But wait, there's more! Make deposits and withdrawals with the handy ATM feature! Twist on the rotor attachment and to turn it into your own personal CommuterCopter! Or add the exclusive Nipple 3.0 and feed your infant 100% pure breast milk for up to 10 minutes while playing the latest single from Beyonce! And somewhere on it I think there's a phone. How quaint.
JEERS to "His Most Important Speech Ever." Drawing from ideas apparently scribbled on the back of a napkin and stuffed into the Recyclotron 2007, President Bush---my notes say he looked "tired, ashen, nervous, tentative"---offered a New Way Forward in Iraq. It's exactly the same as the Old New Way Forward except he added one word: "Honest!" In fairness, the speech did immediately help to identify the thousands of insurgents who have infiltrated the Iraqi military and police force: al-Maliki just rounded up the ones doubled over in laughter.
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And just one more…
JEERS to pining for a whiter shade of pale. Maine's offshoot of the far-right Heritage Foundation, an outfit called the Maine Heritage Policy Center (motto: "Fresh Fudgy Numbers Crunched Daily"), hired a guy to work for them. Leif Parsell possessed the Center's conservative gift of seeing things in black and white, although not quite in the way they imagined:
On PolicyMic, a user-fed forum for news and pontificating, Parsell opined last month that "cultural diversity combines with our increasing racial and ethnic diversity to degrade society." On his own Facebook page, Parsell observed that he'd "rather have a country that had fallen behind India or China, than one that sold its soul to non-European immigrants and lost its culture." […] Parsell said, he's simply been saying that this country isn't doing enough to "Americanize" immigrants. At the same time, he said, we should stop letting so many newcomers into this country until those who already are here get to know their way around.
Isn’t that what MapQuest is for? Anyway, after claiming his words were taken out of context (of course), Parsell clarified his position to Portland Press Herald columnist Bill Nemitz:
"I like where I grew up. I like the town (Waldoboro) where I grew up in. I like the region that I grew up in and I'm not ashamed of the fact that Maine is, you know, 98 percent white, my town was 100 percent white, my high school was 100 percent white."
And thanks to his purity of thought, Parsell is now 100 percent shit-canned. But he probably would've left anyway. Thanks to him, the Maine Heritage Policy Center is now 100 percent red-faced. The horror.
Have a tolerable Wednesday. Oh, and evolution deniers: you lose again. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial:
"I like being able to fire Bill in Portland Maine."
---Mitt Romney
1/9/12
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