Bush Shoring Up Legacy

Finish already!

WASHINGTON — The Labor Department is racing to complete a new rule, strenuously opposed by President-elect Barack Obama, that would make it much harder for the government to regulate toxic substances and hazardous chemicals to which workers are exposed on the job.

The rule, which has strong support from business groups, says that in assessing the risk from a particular substance, federal agencies should gather and analyze “industry-by-industry evidence” of employees’ exposure to it during their working lives. The proposal would, in many cases, add a step to the lengthy process of developing standards to protect workers’ health.

Public health officials and labor unions said the rule would delay needed protections for workers, resulting in additional deaths and illnesses.

Lots of damage coming in the last <60 days.

The Labor Department rule is among many that federal agencies are poised to issue before Mr. Bush turns over the White House to Mr. Obama.

One rule would allow coal companies to dump rock and dirt from mountaintop mining operations into nearby streams and valleys. Another, issued last week by the Health and Human Services Department, gives states sweeping authority to charge higher co-payments for doctor’s visits, hospital care and prescription drugs provided to low-income people under Medicaid. The department is working on another rule to protect health care workers who refuse to perform abortions or other procedures on religious or moral grounds.

Auto-Pilot

Yglesias:

Presumably the reason the top executives at a giant financial services firm get paid such extravagant salaries is that it’s their job to be prepared for the stuff that “nobody” is prepared for. If the idea is just that you make money while the market goes up, and then when the market goes down the government steps in to rescue you, probably a lot of people could do the job. And if a lot of people could do the job, there’s no need for compensation packages to run into the tens of millions of dollars.

[...]

I don’t, personally, believe that there’s anyone like that out there. So nobody should be blamed for failing to live up to that hype. But people can be blamed for participating in the hype and profiting from it.

New Wingnut Scapegoat: Space Travel

Digesting my Tofurky, I found myself in the presence of one Michael Bresciani, complaining about stuff:

While everyone from Barack Obama to John Doe is decrying genocide in Darfur, Americans are still killing the unborn at the rate of 4000 per day. In fact more people die at the hands of abortion clinic doctors in one week than in the entire 8 year long Iraq war.

Where fetus=people and people≠Iraqis.

Should I mention that the soldiers in Iraq at least had a choice?

Feel free.

We debate teachers pay but don't spend too much time asking why our kids have the highest suicide rate in the world and the lowest academic averages. More than fifty thousand children disappear each year and over 800,000 people are sold into slavery yearly around the world and many of them right here in America. Millions of Americans use dangerous addictive drugs and recreational drugs and have created the largest demand for such substances in the entire world. Why don't they just do positive things instead or go plant a tree?

Turning the eyes away from the horrific in America is not much different than ignoring the smoke bellowing out of the Nazi prison camp cremation ovens. You can put the thought out of the mind but the stench still assaults the nostrils. No amount of positive thinking or celebrating a new president makes us any less culpable.

While the "why don't they do positive things?" gambit's pretty sweet, this Abortion-to-Nazism flow is fairly run of the mill stuff for Alan Keyes' RenewAmerica crew. However, the reason his article caught my eye comes near the end, when he lists why we fail.

I have watched as America has replaced the knowledge of God with just about everything they can conger up; evolutionary doctrine, secularism, political correctness, sexual revolutions, Hollywood claptrap, perversions, visions of space travel to the stars just to name a few. What we have as a result of all this is a nation that thinks it can plant a tree, talk to its enemies, do a little positive thing everyday and all will just be fine.

Well, spank my spacesuit! That's a new one for me.

And I like the flip-flop on the value of planting trees.

to write a song, you just have to sit down and do it

From an interview with Nick Cave at CHARTattack:

Has it gotten easier or harder to write after so many years?
It just depends. It doesn't get harder. It doesn't get easier, either. The process is to just sit down and write the songs. There's no other process.

Truth of the matter is that to write a song, you just have to sit down and do it. They don't magically appear. I don't wake up after a lost weekend and find out I've written an album. I just sit down and write the stuff. Always have. I assume most people have to do that. I don't know what other musicians do. But I don't see how anybody else does it.

Feds Say

BREAKING NEWS!

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Federal authorities have received a "plausible but unsubstantiated" report that al Qaeda may have discussed targeting transit systems in or around New York City, the Department of Homeland Security said.


Al Qaeda suicide bombers could target New York City subways, federal security officials say.

"These discussions reportedly involved the use of suicide bombers or explosives" on subway or passenger rail trains, according to a joint DHS and FBI statement issued Tuesday.

"We have no specific details to confirm that this plot has developed beyond aspirational planning, but we are issuing this warning out of concern that such an attack could possibly be conducted during the forthcoming holiday season," the statement said.

To which I say: NO SHIT SHERLOCK.

Isn't this why we've had our bags checked for 7 years upon entering the subway? Isn't this why there are machine guns all around the city now?

Was anyone over the last 7 years not operating under the assumption that there was "aspirational planning" for an attack on crowded places like subways?

Sounds like this is just regular ass-covering.

However, [CNN senior international correspondent Nic Robertson ] said, it also would be possible for al Qaeda deliberately to plant false information.

"They would love to sort of create fear when they're not actually capable of creating a strike. ... I've seen it myself, in Afghanistan."

You don't say? Sown fear? Has anyone seen a climate of fear created any closer than Afghanistan?

Least Likely

Ta-Nehisi, in an article addressing concerns on the left over Obama appointments, lays out what really matters to him.

Look, it all comes down to this. I believed Obama was the candidate least likely to fly over an American city in the midst of destruction, and appear days later only to tell his point-man he'd done a great job. The most important thing for me is for the leadership of this country to throw off anti-intellectualism and get down to business. I won't ever know the most intricate details of government policy, and smite me should I ever write like I do. But as a voter, and I guess as a blogger, I knew I wanted someone in the White House who would be able to process all of those details--I wanted someone who was an intellectual, who had a supple mind, and saw no contrast between being a thinking man, and loving Monday Night Football. It's small, but it's what I wanted. And it's why, so far, I'm not terribly disappointed. When it comes down to it, man, I just wanted shit to work again.

This is also extra true:

Man, when Joe Leiberman says "bipartisan" I feel like someone is cursing at me.

razer

Great stuff by a "Russian artist by the nickname razer" over at concept ships.

Wingnut Understanding

John Cole summarizes:

Wingnut- “Homosexuals are filthy sodomites who should not have access to marriage.”

Evil gay person- “Nonsense. I demand the same rights as you and will fight for them.”

Wingnut- “Why won’t you respect my right to free speech?”

And there you have the wingnut understanding of the Constitution.

Dweeb

Eric Dondero of the goofy Libertarian Republican is a veteran of the Gulf War, so I guess he thinks that makes these words not seem crazy:

Free Health Care is nice, but what most Vets really want is Booze and Broads
Sure, give Vets the health care, and the GI Bill, though I must admit, the psychological counseling for many is a bit on the wimpy side.

But beyond that, give Veterans tickets to the Jets games, and the Washington Redskins. Treat 'em to a private reception with the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleading squad.

You wanna help Veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan? Buy them a bunch of free meals and beer at their local Hooters.

And if you're a young hot female, take a Vet out for a few drinks at the local Tavern or Disco. Tell that non-serving grad student dweeb boyfriend of yours to stay home cause you've got a little "something to do for your country" tonight.

But most of all, just thank them for the VICTORY in Iraq and Afghanistan. Don't thank the Vets for "their service," no thank them for VICTORY over our enemies abroad. Acknowledge that they won, and won bigtime. Give them a big slap on the back and tell them as loud as can be heard in a crowded airport, "You guys kicked some 'f'ing A-rab ass."

It's not politically correct. But it's what most Vets want.

Update: Eric showed up to verbally spar with us in the comments.

Mam

This is my favorite of Shaq's first week of using twitter.

Smear

As the Minnesota recount is tightening, Erick Erickson at RedState is losing his shit, claiming:

It's like Robert Mugabe is in charge or something.

Victim

This kind of shit from Peter Kirsanow at NRO is what we mean by poisoning the discourse:

Jonah, the better dictionaries are in the process of updating the definition of racist to reflect contemporary usage:

Racist—n.,adj. 1. Any person who performs any act, holds any belief or makes any statement that negatively reflects upon or adversely affects Barack Obama or his policies, positions, interests, conduct, associates, or holiness. 2. Any act, belief or statement that negatively reflects upon or adversely affects Barack Obama or his policies, positions, interests, conduct, associates, or holiness. Synonyms: conservative; Republican; red state; rural; churchgoer; gun owner.

Yes, Peter, that's what racism is.

All they have is denial, blindness, divisiveness, pearl-clutching.

Why Should We Believe Them Now?

DarkSyde dissects and debunks the rightwing talking point (a "zombie lie") that "In the 70s, all the scientists were predicting a new ice age, so why should we listen to them now?":

For a few years, back in the 70s, the Ice Age claims took on a life of their own and echoed around in a subset of pop culture. Eventually reality and observation caught up to and killed it. It lay mostly dormant for thirty years until, a few years ago, the old story was lovingly exhumed by industry and right-wing PR hacks, and jolted dramatically back to life. It lives today only as a zombie lie in the heads of doubters, near impossible to kill, no matter how many times it's put down.

Particular Nasal Stress

Are you brave enough to venture into the dark caverns of the mind of Victor Davis Hanson? As illustrated in a piece he calls "Ten Random, Politically Incorrect Thoughts?"

Let us peek in at #6:

Something has happened to the generic American male accent. Maybe it is urbanization; perhaps it is now an affectation to sound precise and caring with a patina of intellectual authority; perhaps it is the fashion culture of the metrosexual; maybe it is the influence of the gay community in arts and popular culture. Maybe the ubiquitous new intonation comes from the scarcity of salty old jobs in construction, farming, or fishing. But increasingly to meet a young American male about 25 is to hear a particular nasal stress, a much higher tone than one heard 40 years ago, and, to be frank, to listen to a precious voice often nearly indistinguishable from the female. How indeed could one make Westerns these days, when there simply is not anyone left who sounds like John Wayne, Richard Boone, Robert Duvall, or Gary Cooper much less a Struther Martin, Jack Palance, L.Q. Jones, or Ben Johnson?

Be bold!

People Would Like It

I learn the truths of the world from digby:

[Republican Senators] have to block health care reform because people will like it. And if government produces, the entire GOP worldview is lost.

Good Luck With That

The party leaders.

Fake America

Fucking Michael Goldfarb talks about the Palin/turkey thing:

Another Palin Rorschach test. Watch the video and see if you're from real America or fake America. As a real American, it's clear to me that these turkeys had it coming, and, personally, I admire a woman who can keep her wits about her even in the face of such horrific violence. In retrospect, they might have slaughtered animals during the Couric interview just to keep things on an even keel.

Favorite and Least Favorite

Gabe from Penny Arcade what he likes and doesn't like about the new Xbox Dashboard:

So I grabbed the new Xbox dashboard last night. My least favorite new feature is the one were it locks up my box when I try and look at my friends list. Then I have to restart and it freezes again. Then I do that about seven more times before I throw my controller and play WOW. I liked how in the old Dashboard I could use it without it breaking my Xbox. Maybe that's just me.

I'm considering a 360 this xmas season, so I have to start paying attention to these Very Important Things.

Ship of Fools

The Economist is not amused:

The Republicans lost the battle of ideas even more comprehensively than they lost the battle for educated votes, marching into the election armed with nothing more than slogans. Energy? Just drill, baby, drill. Global warming? Crack a joke about Ozone Al. Immigration? Send the bums home. Torture and Guantánamo? Wear a T-shirt saying you would rather be water-boarding. Ha ha. During the primary debates, three out of ten Republican candidates admitted that they did not believe in evolution.

Body Language

Incredibly telling video clip - what the world thinks of GWB, and what Bush thinks of himself.

Not much.