Category Archives: Politics

People Mostly Hate Obama Because He’s Obama

There are plenty of reasons to be unhappy with the tenure of President Obama.  The most vocal people tend not to bring up any of those valid reasons.  What do they do instead?  They make crap up.  It doesn’t matter how stupid the stuff they make up is.  It doesn’t matter how easily disprovable the stuff they make up is.  All that matters is that the sizable portion that dislikes Obama will believe it.

Take Tuesday’s State of the Union address.  President Obama claimed that he will use a series of Executive Orders to get things accomplished in areas where Congress wasn’t moving fast enough and he was legally able to use Executive Orders.  This is unprecedented!  Obama is a dictator!  Obama is killing democracy!  Tyranny!  Didn’t Hitler also issue Executive Orders?!

Here’s the thing.  Executive Orders are public knowledge.  There are places that keep track of these things.  Guess what it shows.   Go on, guess!  Yep, Obama has issued fewer Executive Orders per year than any other President since records have been kept (back to Herbert Hoover).  The general trend is that the number of Executive Orders per President has been going down quite fast.  In fact, the lowest number of Executive Orders per year have been ordered by the last five Presidents.

So yes, Obama is well outside the norm when it comes to amount of Executive Orders issued by a President.  But he is well below average, not above.  And what should be a story about how much restraint the Obama Administration has shown when it comes to Executive Orders is twisted into a story about how, once again, Obama is un-American and destroying our country.  But don’t worry, race has nothing to do with this.

Marriage Equality Is Pretty Much A Done Deal

In state after state, the barriers against same-sex marriage are falling.  Even in uber-religious bastions like Utah, equality is coming into fashion.  Gandhi was right.  First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

There is still a lot of noise coming from religious circles, but their fight is all but over and as the count goes from 17 to 18 to 19 states they will more and more marginalize themselves as the bigots that they are.  But let’s be honest here, this religious fight has nothing to do with the sanctity of marriage as they loudly claim.  If it were about marriage, there would be just as much outrage over the state of heterosexual marriage in the U.S.  But, no, sanctimonious religious people loves them some divorces.

No, if we are honest with each other, this fight is about one thing and one thing only: sex.  Good, old-fashioned butt-sex.  It is, after all, an abomination unto God according to their holiest of holy books.  That and shellfish.  God hates nothing more than butt-sex and shellfish.  And woe unto those who dare combine the two!  I’m looking at you, Japan!  Without marriage, they can tune out the whole idea that gay sex is happening all around them.  At this very moment.  Just on the other side of that wall right there.  With legal same-sex marriage, though, it becomes very hard to ignore.  Marriage, in their minds, legitimizes gay sex.

When people start quoting the stupider parts of the bible, it’s hard to refute them.  Obviously, telling them their book is dumb and full of contradictions and has just as much to say about morality as “A Prayer for Owen Meany” does isn’t going to work.  The truth is you’re not going to win this argument.  There is really only one option.  Walk away.  But not before a witty rejoinder.  So before walking away, look deep into their eyes and say as loudly as you feel comfortable with, “Oh yeah?  Well if God hates butt-sex so much, why did he give men prostates?”  Be sure to pause for a few seconds to bask in their discomfort.  Drop your microphone if you happen to be holding one.  Walk away.  Peace!

Looking For Jobs That Don’t Exist

Federal long-term unemployment benefits expired at the end of 2013 and Congress has yet to approve a bill extending those benefits.  Democrats just want to get it done while Republicans claim to want to get it done but they are insisting on cutting things that benefit poor people which is like saying “Here’s $5 for unemployment benefits and I’ll just take that $5 that I gave you for food in return. Now go and be not poor!”

A lot of Republicans are simply dead set on denying any extension of the unemployment benefits.  Their pushcart of thought seems to go like this: People on long-term unemployment are lazy and are just collecting unemployment because they can.  Taking away the long-term unemployment benefits will force them to get off their lazy asses and find a job and then they can empower themselves to be not poor.

There are a few things wrong with this, the most important of all being that people who are on unemployment are required to look for jobs are a prerequisite to continuing to get unemployment.  So they are looking for jobs.  The jobs just don’t exist.  Recently, a new Washington D.C. Wal-Mart posted openings for 600 jobs.  How many applications did they get?  23,000!  I’m sure those 22,400 people who no longer have unemployment will be even extra motivated to find the jobs that don’t exist.

Then there’s the myriad other problems that the long-term unemployed face like companies refusing to hire them because they’ve been unemployed so long and the mental health problems that go with being unemployed in a culture where you are defined by your job.  Not to mention Congress hasn’t done anything to actually help these people when there is a long list of things that could be done immediately.  Take massive, much needed, infrastructure spending for example.

But no, the only answer that Republicans can come up with to lift people out of hardship is to create more hardship for them.  Yeah, that’ll work.  So now, the unemployed are back to only receiving 26 weeks of unemployment benefits in an economy that takes them on average 35 weeks.  What could possibly go wrong?

Three-Fifths Of A Living Wage

I recently read that phrase on a blog post that I have since forgotten, but the phrase itself stayed with me.  That’s some really powerful imagery in a few words.

Obviously, living on minimum wage is not anything nearly as bad as slavery was, but the phrase isn’t meant to evoke the way minimum wage earners are treated physically but the way they are treated politically and socially and in that respect there is a lot of similarity.  Giving every person the ability to have a 40 hour work week which pays a living wage would go a long way towards equality.

I don’t have much else to add about the subject past what I’ve already written in my American Disdain for the Poor post.  The phrase just stuck with me so I thought I’d share.

Oh Noes! The Slippery Slope!

A Federal judge in Utah ruled recently that bigamy is totally legal and everyone can have as many wives or husbands as they want.  That’s been the talk all around the conservative twitterverse.  And, to be fair, some liberals, but guess which one is more santorum-y (look it up on Urban Dictionary).

There’s only one problem.  The judge didn’t rule any such thing.  The only thing that was struck down was a tiny provision of the anti-bigamy law that said co-habitation was also illegal.  So, basically, Jack Tripper is no longer breaking the law in Utah.  Yeah, that’s it.  If you are a married couple, you can now legally have someone else who is not your family live with you and not be breaking the law.  What that extra person is doing there is none of the government’s business.

There are all sorts of complaints, mostly from Christians, of the slippery slope being in full effect and this is the logical next step after gay marriage gets legalized.  It doesn’t matter to them that bigamy is actually still illegal.  Of course, they may not even realize that bigamy is still illegal because they don’t know how to read past crappy headlines.

If anyone you know ever uses the slippery slope argument, just laugh in their face.  If you have every used the slippery slope argument, you should stop immediately.  Why?  Because the slippery slope argument is horrible and reflects more on your own sloppy thinking than it does whatever argument you are actually trying to make.  You may be on the right side of an argument and still look like an idiot if you use the slippery slope argument.

Here is why you should laugh in the face of anyone who uses the slippery slope argument.  If you are unable to articulate how going from A to B can lead you to eventually going C, let alone all the way to Z, you should just stop there and try to articulate to the best of your abilities why going from A to B is good or bad.  If every argument that you can make about going from A to B is shot down, you should really consider changing your mind about that particular topic.

Corporations Are People, My Friend

That titular comment was made by the silver-spooned Mitt Romney during the run-up to his being trounced by Barack Obama in the 2012 Presidential race.  It, and many other silly comments like it, are a lot of the reason why he lost so handily.  Sadly, in this instance, he was kind of right.  The law of the United States is that any use of the words “person” or “whoever” in laws automatically includes corporations.

Much of the precedent has to do with the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.  I don’t mind laws protecting corporations from governmental interference.  A lot of the Fourteenth Amendment arguments make fairly good sense.  Where I draw the line is the Constitutional protections afforded corporations.  I don’t think it should be the Fourteenth Amendment that protects corporations.  I think it should be law.  What I find especially funny is the most vocal proponents of Constitutional protections for corporations tend to be the same people who also advocate Constitutional Originalism.  Corporations existed back in 1776.  It would have been really easy for the founders to include corporations in the Constitution if they thought it should be applied to them, but the Constitution doesn’t mention corporations.  Funny, that.  Of course, I also find Originalism to be an intellectually bankrupt idea and the personhood dichotomy is just one reason why.

We now have another attempt to expand corporate personhood coming up at the Supreme Court.  The case is Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby.  The issue is the Obamacare mandate that requires health insurance policies to cover birth control.  The argument is that the mandate violates Hobby Lobby’s right to religious expression under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA).  All because the owners of Hobby Lobby have a misguided bug up their ass about emergency contraception and how it works.  The RFRA was written in response to a Supreme Court decision that ruled the government is able to pass generally acceptable neutral regulatory laws that happened to curtail a person’s religious expression.  And since corporations are people, the RFRA also applies to corporations.

Think about that for a moment.  The argument is that a for-profit entity that only exists as a piece of paper filed in some clerk’s office can now have a religion and must be allowed to freely express that religion.  If this doesn’t show the perversity of corporate personhood, I don’t know what does.

Keep in mind, Hobby Lobby is not being forced to give emergency contraception to its employees, it is just required to provide insurance that makes it available as part of the insurance policy that they offer.  The moral decision to use emergency contraception rests squarely with the employee.  Hobby Lobby is no more culpable morally than they would be if someone stabbed another person with the crafting scissors they bought at Hobby Lobby.  They could easily just hire people who swear they won’t use emergency contraception.

The biggest issue is where does it stop?  Hobby Lobby’s argument is pretty narrow.  They are only against the emergency contraception birth control options.  The Catholic Church’s is not.  They are against ALL birth control.  Should the mandate not apply to companies run by Catholics?  What about those backwards religions that are against all medical care?  Should all of Obamacare not apply to them?  If Hobby Lobby is successful, the answer is almost assuredly yes.

This is one of those cases that is hard to predict given the current makeup of the Supreme Court.  Normally, I’d say this is an easy 9-0 victory for the Obama administration.  There’s no way that happens with this court.  I still think a fairly easy win is inevitable, though.  Your religious expression forbids you from using emergency contraception.  Your religious expression demands you proclaim the evils of emergency contraception.  Your religious expression gives you no rights to prevent others from making up their own minds.

You Get Free Birth Control! You Get Free Birth Control! Everybody Gets Free Birth Control!*

* If you happen to be female.

One of the more controversial provisions of Obamacare is that health insurance plans must cover birth control for women.  Why is it controversial?  Well, because it violates a company’s right to freedom of religion.  That is a silly concept in so many ways that it deserves its own post so I’ll leave it for later.

What I want to spread is some good news.  The birth control mandate took effect at the beginning of 2013.  Prior to 2013, only 15% of women with private insurance were getting free birth control pills.  By the spring of 2013, that number was up to 40%.  The numbers for the ring were even more impressive.  Prior to the mandate, 23% were getting the ring for free.  That jumped to 52% by spring.  This is amazing.

With millions more women currently signing up on the exchanges, that number is likely to skyrocket when the statistics for 2014 come out.  In many cases, these will be women who could not afford birth control previously and now will be able to.  I don’t think it’s going out on a limb to say that this expansion of birth control coverage will lead to a marked decrease in the abortion rate in the United States.  And that’s great news everyone can get behind!

Chris Farley Died Too Soon

If I were inclined to waste my life even more than I already do, I would have totally made this mashup:

[youtube http://youtu.be/RUY6lDja-DE]

Compare and contrast:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGEOolwE03M]

It is funny.  But it’s also sad.  We’ve seen Rob Ford’s story before and his ending is likely the same as Chris Farley’s if he doesn’t get any help soon.

Warmongers Are Weeping This Week

The big world news this week is a temporary nuclear non-proliferation deal between Iran and the world.  For six months, Iran agrees to halt its nuclear enrichment activities in exchange for a moderate lifting of crippling economic sanctions.  After the six months of compliance elapse and trust has been established, a longer agreement to curb Iran’s nuclear ambitions could come to fruition.

The whole thing almost didn’t happen because of France of all nations.  They issued a series of last minute demands that caused Iran to walk away from the negotiating table.  And if that weren’t weird enough, it also caused Republicans to praise France.  That’s got to be a first.  It’s hard to believe that Freedom Fries was only a decade ago.

This agreement obviously proves that Obama is an appeaser and we are falling right into the hands of the evil Iranians.  Or at least it does if you’re John “Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran” McCain.  After all, Iran is just six months from getting a nuclear bomb and they have been for over ten years.  Clearly, a deal to stop them from pursuing it that doesn’t involve pounding them back into the stone age can only end in failure.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also come out vociferously against the temporary agreement saying that it was an “historic mistake”.   I swear I can’t tell the difference between him and Dick Cheney these days.  All either of them does is sell visions of mushroom clouds dancing in childrens heads with zero evidence.  He also proclaimed the boilerplate “Israel will defend itself” blah blah blah.  Fear is so easy to sell.

That isn’t to say that skepticality isn’t called for.  Iran is not exactly the most trustworthy of governments to work with and they do sponsor terrorist groups with regularity.  And with so many players wanting so many different things, getting even a six month agreement is fairly low on the probability charts, let alone getting them all to come up with an agreement that extends past six month.  But if the six month agreement fails, we’ll just be six months later and Iran will still be just six months from getting a nuclear bomb.  This seems like a win-win agreement to me.

So Long, Filibuster, And Thanks For All The Fish

The big news today is that Senate Democrats voted to remove the filibuster for judicial and executive branch nominees.  Supreme Court nominees and laws are still subject to filibuster rules.

Good riddance, I say.  Ideally, the filibuster would be used sparingly and would require a “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” level oratory to prevent a nominee from coming up for a vote, but that has long not been the case.  So be done with it.  In its present form, it only serves to prevent the party in power from ruling effectively.  You may think the nominees are spawn from the pit of hell, but that’s the consequences of elections.  The nominees reflect the priorities of the ruling party to enforce the laws.  Your opportunity to do something about it was lost at the voting booth.  Now you can just write blog posts to complain about it.

In response, Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell (R-KY jelly) threatened to do away with the filibuster completely if he ever became Majority Leader again.  It is amazing to me how people ignore Mitch McConnell.  You want to know what Republicans are up to, just listen to Mitch.  Trust him when he says that’s what he’s going to do.  If you think the filibuster should stay for Supreme Court nominees or laws, do not vote Republican.

But now that judicial nominees are filibuster-proof, it’s time to change some other things.  There should be a law that limits the terms of judges.  This includes Supreme Court justices.  I would be perfectly fine with removing the filibuster of Supreme Court nominees if there were term limits imposed on them.  Maybe 10 years?  I’d even be ok with multiple terms.  It baffles me that one of the co-equal branches of government has no term limits.  Giving someone that much power for life is not good for democracy.  Filibusters are stupid, lifetime appointments are stupider.  Maybe removing the filibuster will get both parties to realize the real evil of lifetime judicial appointments and give impetus to act.