Today’s IOKIYAR

Wow seems like just this week the right wing was in a tizzy over Helen Thomas saying she thought the Jews should “get the hell out of Palestine.” Thomas paid for her insensitivity swiftly and severely: she lost her job, was dumped by her speakers’ bureau, and basically had her long, groundbreaking, 60+ year legacy in the media destroyed in a matter of days.

Anyhoo, with that little controversy fresh in everyone’s minds you’d naturally think the right wing would be offended by this blatant racism from Cato Institute scholar Michael Cannon:

Responding to a tragic story about a New Orleans area sheriff asking federal authorities to investigate reports that undocumented workers are involved in the oil spill clean up, Cannon tweeted that undocumented workers “are very absorbent.” View a screen shot below:

Yes, it was clearly meant as a joke which failed horribly. But beyond the blatant racism, it is especially insensitive when one considers the highly charged atmosphere Hispanics face right now, thanks to Arizona’s immigration law. But not to Dave Weigel of the Washington Post, who rallies to Cannon’s defense:

You have to put on blinders to miss the fact that Cannon is joking about what he sees as craziness in Louisiana.

Umm, really? So it’s a slam on those crazy Louisiana people? How do you figure? And if you DO figure, how do you figure that’s any better?

Look, I realize conservatives are missing whatever thread of DNA it is that includes a funny bone, which explains lame “comedians” like Dennis Miller and Victoria Jackson (in all fairness, I find Victoria Jackson hilarious, however that is because I am laughing at her, not with her). So a Cato Institute scholar Tweeting a joke which lands with a massive thud is as predictable as the sun rising in the east.

That fellow conservatives like Dave Weigel would rally to his defense is also, sadly, predictable. This is the same columnist who rushed to defend Rand Paul, not once but twice. Just as conservatives lack a sense of humor, they also seem to lack any sensitivity where issues of race and tolerance are concerned. And this, too, is no surprise, since so much of the conservative movement is an obvious backlash against "political correctness." It is, at its core, a movement born out of a desire to be intolerant and not be called an asshole.

Well, nice try Dave but no prize for you. This was obviously not a joke made at the expense of those “crazy Cajuns” or whatever you are trying to pretend here. It was a joke made at the expense of Hispanics who, I’m sorry to say, have received a good bit of this offensive stereotyping disguised as humor of late.

Check out the Ohio radio station which thought it would be soooo funny to have a contest where you can “spend a day hunting illegals” in Phoenix. Ha ha absofucking hilarious. Yeah those illegals, they put their lives at risk and break the law and all that just cuz, they’re funny that way, must be all the tequila and hot sun, ha ha. I mean, forget about the grinding poverty that forces people to leave their homes and families to come here in search of a better life in the first place. Forget the American economic policy so addicted to the crack pipe that is cheap labor that businesses happily ignore the law and provide jobs for these folks, sometimes even hire contractors to cross the border recruit this cheap labor. But hey, these immigrants are illegal and what part of illegal don’t we DFH’s understand? Yeah I get it.

You know, it just seems there’s no racist comment that could come from a conservative that won’t push the Dave Weigels of the country way out on a limb to defend them. It’s always, always, always OK if you are a Republican.

We Are the Government; So if Government Sucks...

I've read several posts in the past few weeks about the BP disaster and inevitably, they address the issue of blame. The catchall statement is that we are all guilty for BP's swath of environmental destruction because of our dependency on oil.

I understand the rejection of the mantle of guilt by those who have favored environmental policies and who have never supported deregulation of the oil drilling industry, but I have been disturbed by the trend to disavow any responsibility and blame it all on the failings of government. The litany goes something like this: the government has failed to promote the development of economically priced electric cars, or other environmentally sound vehicles; I would buy such a car if it were available at a reasonable price.

I have been intrigued for decades by this tendency to speak of government as if it were some autonomous beast, making decisions to control our existence. We are the government. We may not always get the people that we choose into office but nonetheless we are responsible for government. We decide how much we want to be involved and overall, we do a pretty sorry job of it. Voting is a precious right that more of us choose not to exercise in any given election than those of us who do. Campaigning is hard work and takes a massive number of volunteers, but most of us have never worked on a local or national campaign for any candidate. Every citizen has a right to lobby elected officials but most of us have never lobbied state or federal elected officials on any issue. However, we are far too willing to insist that big bad government is the source of all societal ills. The right insists that it is too much government that is the problem, and the left expresses that the government fails to take the lead in promoting the common good.

Are all of us guilty for the oil spill? I don't think so but do we share the responsibility? Oh yes. We share a collective responsibility for the common good; it is our refusal to step up to the plate and accept this responsibility that leaves us constantly bemoaning the failures of government. We can't fix anything because it's not our fault; it's the government's fault, " I drive a small car that gets good mileage so I'm not responsible for our over dependence on oil." Poppycock!
 
Our biggest failure is our inability to accept individual responsibility to do all that we possibly can to promote the common good. Who is responsible for fixing all of these problems if we sit on our collective asses denying responsibility for the arc of ills that bedevil us because we personally didn't vote for GWB or some other incompetent leader? It's not about what you didn't do, the question to ask yourself is what have I done, and what am I willing to do to improve this world that I share with the rest of creation?
 
Merely sitting back and shaking your head in disgust and dismay is not a solution. Announcing which candidates you didn't support is not a solution. Declaring that you personally recycle and drive a small car is not a solution. If you aren't actively and consistently taking steps to effect change, then you're useless and all of your disgust with the status quo is self-indulgent.
 
Get involved! Join organizations that advocate for change and become an activist. Know who your federal and state legislators are. Call, write, email and let them know what you support and what you are against. Collect signatures and send petitions from voters who agree with you. Make certain to be informed on all issues in elections and vote! Volunteer to pass out information, drive people to the polls, get the word out about the issues. Effecting change is hard work but nothing has ever been changed by declaring your lack of personal responsibility and bemoaning the inadequacies of government.
 
Government is only as good as we make it. So what have you done lately to contribute to the common good?

HELP BRITISH PETROLEUM IMPROVE ITS PUBLIC IMAGE

Understatement of the year: British Petroleum seems to have a public relations problem, and the website of logo design, LogoMyWay.com, is sponsoring a contest to help BP improve its corporate image. Here is a sampling of logos submitted thus far:

Is Greene a GOP plant?

S.C. politics are just flat weird. GOP politics stink like a convention of skunks.

How could an unemployed ex-marine (alleged) raise the $10,400 filing fee to run for the S.C. democratic Senate seat? Alvin Greene didn't campaign  but claims he "criss-crossed the state during his campaign—though he declined to specify any of the towns or places he visited or say how much money he spent while on the road."

"It wasn’t much, I mean, just, it was—it wasn’t much. Not much, I mean, it wasn’t much," he said, when asked how much of his own money he spent in the primary. Greene frequently spoke in rapid-fire, fragmentary sentences, repeating certain phrases or interrupting himself multiple times during the same sentence while he searched for the right words

He didn’t show up at the "South Carolina Democratic Party convention in April and didn't file any of the required paperwork for candidates with the state or Federal Election Commission."

James Clyborn (D-SC) House Majority Whip, called for an investigation into the circumstances that led to Alvin Greene winning the Democratic Senate primary.

"There were some real shenanigans going on in the South Carolina primary," Clyburn said during an appearance on the liberal Bill Press radio show. "I don't know if he was a Republican plant; he was someone's plant."

Greene certainly talks like a Republican and he may even act like one. He's facing a felony charge for allegedly showing obscene photos to a University of South Carolina student.

Welcome to Carolinagate.

As goes Arizona

I'd like to give notice. There must be someone, some registry I can add my name to as one who wishes to officially disassociate myself with the idiocy of America. Those who doubted that our experiment in including the rabble in government would fare any better than the French Revolution did would, if they could, be smiling to read Florida gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott's campaign rhetoric and would spit up in their coffins to read the comments on his website from people responding to his appeal to "stand with Rick Scott" in pushing for an unconstitutional immigration policy. The end should justify the means in Florida and not just in Arizona.

The United States Constitution, like the Bible and the Qur'an are mirrors in which we see our thoughts justified, venal and noble. I hear from people who insist that Arizona is doing what's necessary and if immigrants are second class citizens, required to wear yellow stars and carry papers at all times, it simply doesn't bother them. Of course if the Coast Guard hails and boards their yachts and fishing boats asking for papers; asking about weapons aboard and checking registration and proof of ownership? Why that's unconstitutional!

In fact the constitution demands that the US protect our states from "invasion" by gardeners, fruit pickers, dish washers and day laborers, says one Scott supporter. And of course, it's not racism, says another. It's simply our distaste for infractions of the law, you see. If we were being "invaded" by Canadians, we'd need to do the same thing although since nobody seems to bother tallying up the number of Canadians in the US illegally and fair skinned blue-eyed, people named McKenzie or Scott aren't being stopped in Home Depot parking lots for interrogation. I frankly don't think anyone gives a damn about immigration law or quotas or visas or green cards. I think it's about an ethnically pure America, just as it always has been.

No, I don't deny the need to control immigration. I don't deny that there is a problem with porous borders. I do deny that the problems need to be dealt with by taking away yet another bit of American freedom.

I don't notice much damn being given at all about US agents shooting a Mexican 14 year old on Mexican soil for throwing rocks either. Fox News of course assured us that it was all OK, since the kid was "known to authorities," although in Fox Fashion, no actually authorities were identified or quoted and more than likely weren't actually consulted. Why bother, why care? Something needs to be done and so anything can be done and let's just be done with it.

Will Florida join the Arizona Confederacy and force people with Spanish accents and other unspecified characteristics to stop and furnish papers or be arrested? Will we fire teachers with accents and punish schools that mention Cesar Chavez or that the Seminoles were hunted down like animals and killed and tortured or that an entire Florida town was murdered and no one was prosecuted for it or that (yes, it's true) our fair state tolerated de facto slavery until the 1940's?

If I'm looking at the future when I look at Arizona and listen to Rick Scott, if the near unanimous opinion of my peers is that we have a disaster in the Gulf because of "too much government regulation" I want no part of the insanity, the stupidity, the animal rage, the drooling masses yearning to bring back what my parents' generation and my generation fought to free us from.

Smoke coming out of my ears . . .

Life hasn't been great in this dumpy apartment complex I've been living in for three years but it's been tolerable and even peaceful considering the drug deals going down, a crazy neighbor who used to walk out of his apartment and fall flat in a drunken stupor, another guy who liked to stand outside my window and watch me work, and a new neighbor who runs around squawking like a mother hen and who hates Blacks, Hispanics and Southerners.

My apartment manager has always been decent, friendly and fair and square. Then she hired Brunhilde who lives here and who began her weekend job as assistant with gusto. A real matron of the prison farm school. Even when she's not on duty she's on duty. "That's against the rules." "You're not allowed to do that." She's about as popular as a bucket of road apples.

The manager has always been tolerant of my 14-year-old 110 pound lab mix getting lose or simply lying out in front of my apartment and rolling in the grass. Unfortunately I live right across from the office. Nobody has ever complained about Lucky or me or any other dog who isn't on a leash. That is, until Brunhilde stormed in.

The Brun hates animals and is petrified of them. So why didn't she move into a pet-free apartment complex you ask? Who in hell knows.

For three weeks I've watched her eyes bulge every time Lucky went within 50 yards of her. "It's against the rules." "It's for safety." "Hasn't anyone complained?" No. But I knew the day would come when Brun would turn the screws in my back. Today the apartment manager told me to put him on a leash. There's a couple of Pit Bulls here and a Chiguagua that are bigger threats than my 110 pound wuss. I'd be delighted if they did me the favor of putting teeth marks in her ass.

Yes, yes I know there are major tragedies that are far more severe and devastating than the one I'm facing. The Gulf Oil Spill exceeds any man made disaster this country has ever experienced. The destruction of the marine life, the birds, the wetlands, the beaches, the fishing industry and other industries that are dependant on the Gulf for survival and the entire way of life of the region is being destroyed day by day, minute by minute for thousands of miles.

And polls are showing that people are blaming the government for not acting fast enough. Translated, that means our black president. You see, it's much easier to cast blame than to look a little deeper and to consider the realities of the problem. This is a tragedy that should bring the nation together, not rip it apart with dumb, petty, spiteful, ignorant as-hell politics.

The idiots at FoxNews aren't the only media outlets criticizing the government. But their irresponsibility is driven by ignorance and downright mean spiritedness. The Main Stream Media doesn't even have a decent excuse for their know-nothing, superficial coverage . Reporters have become lazy, cowardly, and slaves to the corporations and they can't be bothered with research or looking below the surface.

Then there's the Texas State Board of Education which passed textbook guidelines that practically annihilates American history.

To the West is Arizona which has passed a law making it a state crime for an illegal immigrant to apply for a job or to solicit work publicly. But it's a-okay if an employer hires illegals. This is followed up with Ethnic Studies being banned in public schools. And Arizona Governor Jan Brewer hysterically claiming the state is under "terrorist attack."  Arizona state treasurer Dean Martin  has called for tent cities to house illegal immigrants, no doubt copying the idea from Maricopa County's notorious sheriff Joe Arpaio - and maybe because he might earn a few more votes in his run for governor.

Let's don't forget Republican Representative from South Carolina, Joe "you lie" Wilson or S.C. state senator Jake "raghead" Knotts, or his twin over in Mississippi Gov. Haley "Oil? What oil?" Barbour.

And then there's that adorable Sarah Palin, whose lies are only superseded by her ignorance of American history, the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, who doesn't read, who's an international whiz-kid because she can see Russia out her back window. I'm sure she'd fit right in as a Texas School Board member.

I can't finish without mentioning SCOTUS and it's rape of Miranda, its personalization of corporations and its ruling blocking Arizona from subsidizing state candidates facing privately funded foes.

So, between Brunhilde, the Neanderthals who are elected to uphold the laws of the land but don't, and the MSM which doesn't investigate but should, I have smoke coming out of my ears, I'm steaming and I'm swearing up a storm. In more succinct terms, I'm p****d as hell.

GUILT IS NOT WRITTEN ALL OVER MY FACE

Every news show I've watched the last few weeks has some well meaning person saying we're all guilty of the destruction of the Gulf of Mexico. I'm sorry. I'm not.


Strike that "I'm sorry" thing. I'm not sorry I'm not guilty. I didn't vote for Bush. I felt the proper liberal bewilderment when Sarah Palin kept on saying "drill baby, drill." I've asked that my taxes be raised so we can have a government that can afford to govern.



These people say anyone that uses oil is guilty. It sucks that electric cars like the Chevy Volt which hasn't even been for sale yet cost 40 grand. I don't have 40 grand and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay the finance charges on a 40 thousand dollar loan so my electric bill can skyrocket from having to plug the damn car in every night.
I have a Ford Fusion 4 cylinder non hybrid that gets 30 mpg on the highway and 23 in the city. That's the best I can do to fight BP.



I didn't tell BP to keep operating after problems with the leaking pipes started. I didn't kill the Kennedys or Martin Luther King or Abraham Lincoln. Hell. I have people that still won't speak to me in my hometown because I thought renaming a street in honor of Dr. King was a good idea. Okay. I plead guilty for feeling guilty that racism is still alive in our Country and I wanted to do what I could to stick it to some racists by renaming a street after a great American they hate.



It's too easy and for some reason people think it's profound or fair or some other nonsense to blame us all for bad things. Well I don't accept blame for things that aren't my fault. I can think of damn few problems that arose from liberal policies. Most of the problems we face now are from republican ideas like deregulation. Supply side, deficit building economics. Incoherent immigration policies. And I'm not sure if immigration is even a problem or just another bogeyman created by tea bagging types to get people to not pay attention to their really stupid ideas. Occupations of countries that are no threat, one of them never was a threat, that drain our treasury and worse, continue to rack up casualties among our brave Troops.



The signs and bumper stickers say "Don't blame me. I voted for Bush." And the republicans call themselves the party of personal responsibility.

SC's Slur-Slinging Crapfest

[With a respectful nod to HuffPost's Jason Linkins for the title inspiration.  Now, everybody knows what SC stands for.]

Apologizing for South Carolina has become a full-time job.

Jake Knotts

Given the infamy our leaders have slapped us upside the head with and the effect it will have on the state's economy, I feel lucky to be employed at all; since I began blogging in August, 2009, I've earned $7.20 and I have my stellar state of residence to thank for at least two bucks of that.  I call it my state of residence, rather than my home, because obviously I wasn't born in South Carolina.  I was born in North Carolina, where we look down on our sister state to the south for being a bunch of inbred, redneck, backwoods ignunts.  I, of course, just live there...the only little petunia in the onion patch.

Top Kill, Bottom Kill

As Jeff Foxworthy might say, "you might be a liberal if you've ever taken extra trash bags on a two-day canoe trip just so you could pack out other people's trash." I have just arrived home sun-burnt, exhausted, and mentally recharged from a nice float down the Buffalo River. I needed it after completing this video of a bipartisan discussion on the BP oil spill. Enjoy!

IF ALL THE ANIMALS CEASED TO EXIST, HUMAN BEINGS WOULD DIE OF A GREAT LONELINESS OF SPIRIT

If Chief Seattle were alive today to witness what we have done to our world, he would be shocked, heartbroken, and demoralized. When words fails, all we can do now is look upon our mighty works and despair: