Yawn. And cackles.

So, one of the two least classiest people in the country is endorsing the other. #shockedshocked

I did enjoy this bit of damning with faint praise, though:

“Over the years Palin has actually cultivated a number of relationships in Iowa,” said Craig Robinson, the former political director of the Republican Party of Iowa and publisher of the website The Iowa Republican. “There are the Tea Party activists who still think she’s great and a breath of fresh air, but she also did a good job of courting Republican donors in the state,” he added.

"Has actually."

"Who still."

"But."

And when it comes to slimeweasels wielding shivs?

“Palin’s brand among evangelicals is as gold as the faucets in Trump Tower,” said Ralph Reed ...

Eh, who knows. Maybe that was meant as a sincere compliment.

To the extent that we can say "sincere" with a straight face when discussing this bunch, I mean.

So glad I'm not paying attention to politics anymore.

Why did I even click that link?

The problem for the G.O.P. is that it’s centered where national security and immigration intersect ...

Actually, Ross, the problem is that you still think the Republican Party is "centered." On anything.

[Added] Also, that picture makes me think of one thing: "preznit give me turkee."

Only a politician could say this

Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin), speaking about the soon to be ex-Speaker of the House, John Boehner (R-Ohio):

... John’s decades of service have helped move our country forward ...

And here I thought gridlock meant being stuck, motionless.

Well, I suppose he did advance some interests, from time to time ...

(h/t: KK)

You always knew the Republicans could be summed up in a cartoon, right?

An excerpt from Brian McFadden's latest.

On the upside, he's now got more time to go on the down-low

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

(h/t: KK, via email and the FB)

Bad day for the snarkosphere

Looks like we won't have Liz Cheney to kick around anymore.

Good riddance.

[Added] TBogg is already in mourning.

[Added2] Yr Wonkettes, also.

Funding denialism, documented

From the Dec 2013 issue of the journal Climatic Change:

Institutionalizing delay: foundation funding and the creation of U.S. climate change counter-movement organizations

Robert J. Brulle

Abstract

This paper conducts an analysis of the financial resource mobilization of the organizations that make up the climate change counter-movement (CCCM) in the United States. Utilizing IRS data, total annual income is compiled for a sample of CCCM organizations (including advocacy organizations, think tanks, and trade associations). These data are coupled with IRS data on philanthropic foundation funding of these CCCM organizations contained in the Foundation Center’s data base. This results in a data sample that contains financial information for the time period 2003 to 2010 on the annual income of 91 CCCM organizations funded by 140 different foundations. An examination of these data shows that these 91 CCCM organizations have an annual income of just over 900million,withanannualaverageof64 million in identifiable foundation support. The overwhelming majority of the philanthropic support comes from conservative foundations. Additionally, there is evidence of a trend toward concealing the sources of CCCM funding through the use of donor directed philanthropies.

The journal is peer-reviewed, I believe.

The full paper, sadly, costs a lot of money to see, but there is a bunch of supplementary online material (PDF) available for free.

The Guardian has a good article about the paper. Here's how it begins.

Conservative groups may have spent up to $1bn a year on the effort to deny science and oppose action on climate change, according to the first extensive study into the anatomy of the anti-climate effort.

The anti-climate effort has been largely underwritten by conservative billionaires, often working through secretive funding networks. They have displaced corporations as the prime supporters of 91 think tanks, advocacy groups and industry associations which have worked to block action on climate change. Such financial support has hardened conservative opposition to climate policy, ultimately dooming any chances of action from Congress to cut greenhouse gas emissions that are warming the planet, the study found.

News of the unsurprising, and mighty discouraging news at that, but a shoutout to Prof. Brulle for making the effort to document the atrocities, and a vote of sympathy to him for the character assassination he will doubtless be suffering in the next few weeks.

(h/t: Wired UK, via Ars Technica)

Another measure of the GOP's increasing distance from reality

Compare and contrast this, from the NYT's Business section, ...

More than two dozen of the nation’s biggest corporations, including the five major oil companies, are planning their future growth on the expectation that the government will force them to pay a price for carbon pollution as a way to control global warming.

The development is a striking departure from conservative orthodoxy and a reflection of growing divisions between the Republican Party and its business supporters.

A new report by the environmental data company CDP has found that at least 29 companies, some with close ties to Republicans, including ExxonMobil, Walmart and American Electric Power, are incorporating a price on carbon into their long-term financial plans.

... with this ...

During the 2012 election, every Republican presidential candidate but one, Jon Huntsman, questioned or denied the science of climate change and rejected policies to deal with global warming.

Better sit down for this part:

But unlike the five big oil companies — ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Chevron, BP and Shell, all major contributors to the Republican party — Koch Industries, a conglomerate that has played a major role in pushing Republicans away from action on climate change, is ramping up an already-aggressive campaign against climate policy — specifically against any tax or price on carbon. Owned by the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, the company includes oil refiners and the paper-goods company Georgia-Pacific.

---

[Added] Oops. Earlier noted by Ocean.

Now, that's entertainment

And it's not just the headline.

Chinese “spy” caught with NASA laptop full of porn, not secrets

There's also the backstory.

Jiang, a former contractor at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, had recently been let go by his employer because of pressure from Republican congressman Frank Wolf of Virginia. Wolf had claimed Jiang and other Chinese engineers employed by NASA contractors were a security risk. And that day, it seemed so—Jiang had a NASA-owned laptop in his possession, and was on a plane back to China.

But it quickly became apparent that Jiang was at worst guilty of violating NASA policies. There was no evidence of any sensitive material on the laptop, and Jiang didn't have clearance to such projects at Langley as an employee of the National Institute of Aerospace. Instead, investigators found, the laptop was loaded with pornography and pirated movies. Since he had lost his job and his work visa was expiring, Jiang simply was going home—with a little entertainment.

A press release issued by Wolf after the arrest and copy of Jiang's arrest warrant have since disappeared off the congressman's website. In the release (cached by Google here), Wolf had said, "I am particularly concerned that (the) information (on Jiang's laptop) may pertain to the source code for high-tech imaging technology that Jiang has been working on with NASA. This information could have significant military applications for the Chinese Peoples Liberation Army."

Some?

The NYT sure does love that weasel word.

The piece itself is a little more honest, to be fair.

Play this. Loud.

It's about fourteen minutes long, and it deserves your attention.

(alt. video link)

As you probably already know, I am not a rabid anti-gun person. As you probably also know, I wonder why we can't have SOME small amount of common sense concerning who gets to own guns. The Second Amendment does speak of a "well-regulated militia," after all, as KK and others have noted.

I'd also say that I wish my president would be this plain-spoken and angry about a whole host of issues. Maybe this can be a start?

Well, there is always hope.

(h/t: Rebecca Schoenkopf)

Bad enough that he bankrolled the Swiftboaters and Willard Romney

Not to mention Tom Delay.

But this is just sad:

Late last year he [Bob J. Perry] gave $45,000 to George P. Bush, the 36-year-old nephew of former President George W. Bush who is now running for Texas Land Commissioner in his first bid for public office.

Ah, well. A fool and his money are recently departed.

A must-read from TNC

Ta-Nehisi Coates turns his gimlet eye on the "present darling of the right wing, Dr. Benjamin Carson" and the past decade's history of the GOP's ongoing search for their "Conservative Black Hope."

I've thought many of the same thoughts as he expresses, but even in my dreams, it would have taken me 7000 words, not 700, to say it even half as well.

In. Touch.

This bit from Roy's latest must be reblogged.

From the Update, wingnut line of the week department:

Second place winner: Tevi Troi at Real Clear Politics, in his brow-squeezer "Can Republicans Close the Pop Culture Gap?" --

A move towards hipness must come from the party leaders themselves...

Um. Well. So ...

Who let the dogs out?

(alt. video link)

Never forget.

Changing times

I have no opinion on Jennifer Carroll's recent tribulations (the range of my expertise on this matter being encompassed by the three latest Wonkette posts on her), least of all whether she was having an affair with another woman, but this sentence did kinda jump out at me:

Ms. Carroll, who has been married for 30 years, offended lesbians by saying, “Black women who look like me don’t have relationships like that.” She later apologized, but critics said it was a major stumble.

Never mind everything else there (particularly "critics said," about which I could go off on one of my usual rants); it struck me that the New York Times's saying offended lesbians in such a straightforward yet low-key way is different, in ways I have no precise words for, from what I might have read in those same pages, a decade, or two, or three, ago.

Sometimes signs of progress in ongoing struggles aren't brilliantly lit, but I think I like the subtle ones the best. Somehow, they seem the most real.

Anyway ...

You are now free to make fun of the Republican griftin' half-lieutenant-governor. Super Big Gulp jokes are go.

Hoosier Daddy?

Blog post title of the day, from Doug Masson:

SB 371 – Abortion Clinics Not Required to Have Particle Colliders . . . Yet

(h/t: some other Indiana politics blogger)

Line of the Day: 2013-02-13

O.K., at this point the conventions of punditry call for saying something to demonstrate my evenhandedness, something along the lines of “Democrats do it too.” But while Democrats, being human, often read evidence selectively and choose to believe things that make them comfortable, there really isn’t anything equivalent to Republicans’ active hostility to collecting evidence in the first place.

The truth is that America’s partisan divide runs much deeper than even pessimists are usually willing to admit; the parties aren’t just divided on values and policy views, they’re divided over epistemology. One side believes, at least in principle, in letting its policy views be shaped by facts; the other believes in suppressing the facts if they contradict its fixed beliefs.
    -- ibid

Emph. added.

At last, the headline matches the lede

The Ignorance Caucus

Last week Eric Cantor, the House majority leader, gave what his office told us would be a major policy speech.

Oh, you want more?

P.S. I'm going to give PK irony credit for opening his second paragraph with a To be sure ...

Both sides are just the same!!!1!

Or ... are they?

The More Republicans Know About Politics, the More They Believe Conspiracy Theories

Dems, on the other hand, are more gullible the less they know.

Enjoy.

---

(pic. source)

A note of hope

Here's something of an antidote to the previous post: Tim Egan's latest, "The Tomorrow Majority."