Happy Hour Discurso

Today's opining on the public discourse.

You know, Cons have been throwing a sustained tantrum since January 20th, 2009 (they started screaming and pounding their fists before that, but let's just simplify a bit).  Sometimes, they raise the volume, maybe start throwing things and creating more of a ruckus because the screaming and fist-pounding just isn't getting them the negative attention they crave.  They're behaving like spoiled rotten brats, which is why they get 0 respect here in the cantina.

The respect meter just dropped into the negative numbers:

Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chair Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) intends to move on its climate change bill on Tuesday. The legislation, championed by Boxer and Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), has drawn some support from Republicans, and would clear the committee easily -- Dems enjoy a 12-7 majority on the panel.

So, to scuttle the legislation, committee Republicans have decided not to show up on Tuesday.

Republicans on the Senate Environment and Public Works committee will boycott the mark-up of the Kerry-Boxer climate bill if Chairwoman Barbara Boxer tries to take it up next week.
The seven Republican members on the committee met on the Senate floor last night and unanimously agreed to a boycott, according to Republican aides.

Boxer doesn't need their votes, but she does need at least two of the seven to actually be in the room and establish a quorum. The boycott will make that impossible, at least for now.

The Politico report added that the boycott is "being led by the two most moderate Republican members on the committee: Sens. George Voinovich of Ohio, and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee." That seems a little hard to believe -- Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), the ranking Republican on the committee, began orchestrating the boycott a week ago.

You know, there is a very simple solution to all this yelling, screaming, fist-pounding, breath-holding bullshit from these raging infants: quit.  Just quit.  If you Cons don't want to do your fucking jobs, fucking quit.  Go hike the Appalachian Trail (if you're not already doing so).  Get the fuck out of D.C.  Let the adults take care of business, because you fuckwits are obviously incapable of it.  If you're an attention whore, do what Tom Delay did and get yourselves on a reality show.  Perform stunts.  Play pretend grassroots protesters with the Teabaggers.  Whatever you want.  Just get the fuck out of government so that this country can get on with its business.

Moving on, then.  I'd say we need a jolly good laugh, and lo and behold, here comes Pat Robinson raring to provide one:

Yesterday on the Christian Broadcasting Network, televangelist Pat Robertson aired a segment slamming President Obama for signing the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act into law. Extending hate crimes protection to the gay and transgendered community, Robertson argued, was a targeted attack on homophobic Christians like himself. Robertson said the new law is the latest example of a “noose” tightening around “the necks of Christians.” Later in the segment, he implied Democrats in Congress were “opposed to many of the fundamental Christian beliefs”:

PAT ROBERTSON: The noose has tightened around the necks of Christians to keep them from speaking out on certain moral issues. And it all was embodied in something called the Hate crimes bill that President Obama said was a major victory for America. I’m not sure if America was the beneficiary. [...] We have voted into office a group of people who are opposed to many of the fundamental Christian beliefs of our nation.

Nononono, Pat.  They're opposed to the fundamentalist Christian beliefs of our nation's frothing fucktards.  There's an important difference, there, which you're a little too frothing fundie to appreciate.  And, my dear dumbshit, the only way "the noose has tightened around the necks of Christians" with this legislation is if, instead of merely speaking out about your abhorrent viewpoints, you decide to back that up with murder, assault, or some other act that's not merely speech, but violence.  You can continue spewing all the poison you want, noose-free.

And no, Pat, allowing saner people to tell you what a disgusting piece of shit you are is not a noose, either.  That's free speech, that is.  You really must see a therapist about this noose fetish of yours.

Aren't they precious when they're being all paranoid and hyperbolic over nothing?

Speaking of getting all het up over nothing, check out Liz Cheney foaming at the mouth:

President Obama paid his respects to fallen U.S. soldiers yesterday at Dover Air Force, as flag-draped coffins returned home from Afghanistan. Even some of the president's conservative detractors were willing to show some decency -- National Review's Peter Hegseth, for example, called it "a classy move." A blog called Right Wing Nut House added, "[T]he emotion that animated [Obama's] face during this solemn, heart rending ceremony showed that he understands his responsibilities."

Some right-wing voices were far less gracious.

Liz Cheney called out President Obama for his early-morning trip to honor fallen soldiers arriving at Dover Air Force Base yesterday, suggesting President Bush honored America's heroes with a bit more class than his successor.

Cheney, on Fox News Radio's John Gibson Show yesterday: "I think that what President Bush used to do is do it without the cameras. And I don't understand sort of showing up with the White House Press Pool with photographers and asking family members if you can take pictures. That's really hard for me to get my head around.... It was a surprising way for the president to choose to do this."

Actually, what's surprising is how pathetic Liz Cheney's sense of decency has become.

President Bush didn't used to "do it without the cameras"; President Bush didn't used to do it at all. After seven years of the war in Afghanistan, Bush didn't greet returning caskets once. He didn't even want journalists to take photographs of the events, fearing that the images may turn public opinion against the war.

What's more, President Obama didn't "show up with the White House Press Pool." The trip was not announced in advance -- the White House wasn't seeking publicity -- and only a "small contingent" of journalists were allowed to attend. In fact, "most of the event was closed to media."

I guess when you've been lying so much for so long, it just becomes a habit.

I'd take her to the woodshed further, but our own dear Thinking Brain Dog has performed that task admirably.

We began with an outrage, and we shall end with an outrage.  It is past bloody time to kick Joe Lieberman right the fuck out of the Dem caucus:

After joining with Republicans this week in a promise to filibuster health reform if a public option is included, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) tells ABC News that he plans on campaigning for some GOP candidates in the 2010 elections:

I probably will support some Republican candidates for Congress or Senate in the elections in 2010. I’m going to call them as I see them.
There’s a hard core of partisan, passionate, hardcore Republicans. There’s a hard core of partisan Democrats on the other side. And in between is the larger group, which is people who really want to see the right thing done, or want something good done for this country and them — and that means, sometimes, the better choice is somebody who’s not a Democrat.

Lieberman also said it remains an “open question” whether he will seek the Democratic nomination when he runs for re-election in 2012.

I don't care what pheromones he's spraying himself with.  I don't care how powerful his man-musk is.  I could give two shits how lovestruck Reid et al are over him.  He wants to go play with Cons, he can go play with Cons - but he can't stay in the Dem caucus while he does it.

Looks like the only one who appreciates that fact is Sen. Tom Harkin:

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) doesn't have a whole lot to gain from siding with Republicans against health care reform. Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), however, offered some subtle speculation this week about something Lieberman still has to lose.

"[Lieberman] still wants to be a part of the Democratic Party although he is a registered independent," Harkin said. "He wants to caucus with us and, of course, he enjoys his chairmanship of the [Homeland Security] committee because of the indulgence of the Democratic Caucus. So, I'm sure all of those things will cross his mind before the final vote."

To be sure, this is hardly an explicit threat. But it is an instance in which a powerful Democratic senator raised the specter of connecting Lieberman's vote on reform and his role as a committee chairman and caucus member.

A little something for Lieberman to have "cross his mind."

They need to see if Harkin has some sort of Lieberman antibody, and develop a vaccine.