Happy Hour Discurso

Today's opining on the public discourse.

I've been at the Grand Canyon all day, and I'm motherfucking exhausted. Apparently, however, stupid's well-rested and raring to go.

When the children cry, it's probably because of Jeff Sessions:

Yesterday, Sen. Pat Leahy (D-VT) held a hearing on the Uniting American Families Act, which would allow gay nationals to bring their foreign partners into the United States on the same basis as straight couples. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the only Republican who bothered to show up, grew impatient during the testimony of Shirley Tan; she faces deportation back to the Philippines, though her partner of 23 years and her children are American citizens. The New Republic reports that Sessions mocked Tan’s child for crying:

[O]ne of Tan’s children started crying within seconds of the start of her testimony. … For most people, the sight of a 12-year-old boy in tears at the prospect of his mother being deported halfway around the world would invoke some sympathy. Unmoved, however, was Alabama Republican Jeff Sessions, ranking minority member of the Committee and the only Republican to bother to attend the hearing. At the sight of the weeping boy, according to a Senate staffer who was at the hearing, Sessions leaned towards one of his aides and sighed, “Enough with the histrionics.”

That's sure some compassionate conservatism, that is.

The children might also be crying because Cons don't want them getting to school safely:

In April, President Obama and his cabinet identified $100 billion in easy-to-make cuts to the federal budget. His detractors scoffed, calling the cuts a very small drop in a very large bucket.

So, the president encouraged congressional Republicans to give the administration a hand. Obama vowed to take the GOP seriously if lawmakers could identify reasonable budget cuts, targeting wasteful and unnecessary spending.

Republican leaders have apparently finished their homework project, but I don't think the White House is going to like the results.

Responding to a challenge from President Barack Obama, House GOP leaders are offering up a roster of more than $23 billion in spending cuts over the next five years.

The proposed cuts, which were to be sent to the White House on Thursday, bear little resemblance to the dramatic proposals Republicans unfurled when they took over Congress 14 years ago.

Rather than proposing, for example, the elimination of the Education Department, as they have in the past, Republicans are suggesting killing a program that pays for building sidewalks, bike paths and crossing guards as part of the Safe Routes to Schools program. That would save $183 million a year.

For all the talk about "wasteful government spending" from GOP leaders, I actually thought the Republicans might come up with some half-credible ideas. If they combed through the budget, looking for some common-sense cuts, I figured they were bound to find a few spending measures that would prove hard to defend.

But they want to go after the Safe Routes to Schools program? Really? They think we're spending too much on making sure children get to school without getting hit by cars?

I guess the problem is that the children are no longer fetuses, and thus undeserving of special protection in the Cons' worldview. I can't wait to see them attempt to defend this one to parents.

For added hilarity, go check out Steve's followup, in which numbers are inspected, and it's discovered that the $23 billion in spending cuts mysteriously became $375 billion in the telling. Like a fish story, it turns out that certain claims were exaggerated. The final number: $5 billion in spending cuts.

I think they're in "throw me that fish I'm buying so I can tell my wife I caught it" territory, here.

Other news of the idiots includes Ari Fleischer, who should really just shut up rather than constantly proving himself a lackwit:

Today, former Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer told CBS that he disapproved of President Obama’s speech in Cairo about the U.S. relationship with Muslim communities around the world. His problem with the speech? It was too “balanced”:

Fleischer bluntly told [CBS's Mark] Knoller, “bottom line — the speech was balanced and that was what was wrong with it. American policy should not be balanced. It should side with those who fight terror.” [...]

I didn't catch Obama praising any terrorists, did you? I believe there's something wrong with poor Ari's brain - he seems to believe Obama wants to side with those who don't (yet) fight terror just because he refuses to throw gasoline on fires. Statecraft is completely lost on this fucktard.

Speaking of balanced, this should get a giggle out of you:

Hearing conservative Republicans whine about the "liberal media" is more tiresome than anything else. The accusations are obviously false; the evidence to the contrary is overwhelming; and the charges themselves are a reminder that the GOP's rhetorical and/or policy agenda hasn't progressed at all in many years.

And yet, the right isn't just clinging to this discredited idea, it's apparently launching some kind of congressional caucus to talk about it some more.

The GOP has been getting a lot of bad press recently, but Republicans in Congress are convinced that it's not because of their obstruction or lack of ideas. Rather, they say, it's all the media's fault.

As reported by Newsmax, House Republicans are set to form a new caucus devoted to fighting "liberal media bias." The group will be led by Texas Rep. Lamar Smith, who calls media bias "the greatest threat to our democracy today."

That's obviously silly hyperbole, but Smith seems to mean it. Without realizing the irony, the Texas Republican appeared on Fox News this morning to argue, "The greatest threat to America is a liberal media bias." Fox News' Bill Hemmer, equally oblivious, seemed to agree with the argument.

That's our Faux News: Fair(ly Oblivious) and (Un)balanced. Just like the vast majority of America's minority party.

And that's all she wrote, folks. I'll get the Grand Canyon pics up tomorrow. In the meantime, a little something to tide you over:

Wish you were here.