Garn, Maher says, was her fourth grade sunday school teacher, though their affair wouldn't begin for several years after that.
Let this be a lesson to everyone! If you are not going to have sex in a hot tub, don't not do it in Utah, or 25 years later you will be out of work.
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Climate change is the perfect example of what happens when every issue becomes politicized. The latest Gallop poll reveals the following discouraging graph..
The New Republic asks why the change in public perception.
So why the rise in skepticism? Was it those Climategate e-mails? All those news stories harping on a few small errors in the IPCC's report? Sure, it's possible that both episodes could've affected public opinion, even if neither was significant on the merits. Still, it's interesting to look at the crosstabs of the poll, as Josh Nelson does, and note that skepticism about global warming is almost exclusively on the rise among political conservatives. Two years ago, for instance, 50 percent of conservatives believed climate change was already happening—that's now down to 30 percent.
I'd guess it's just as likely that political dynamics are a big driver here, as opposed to, say, a handful of e-mails from East Anglia. After all, climate change has become increasingly identified as a Democratic cause—in no small part because it's one of Barack Obama's main agenda items. And, on the flip side, you have key Republicans like John McCain and Charlie Crist facing primary challenges and edging away from what was once a signature issue for them. Energy issues have become far more partisan of late, which could explain the sharp uptick in skepticism over the past year and a half.
There are two main observations to be drawn from this. One is, as noted above, that climate change is identified as a liberal cause. Republicans have been successful in poisoning the minds of their followers to the point where any issue which has a liberal or Democratic backing is perceived to be wrong and perverted by conservatives. No facts are necessary to back up their claims. Simply state a lie enough times and shout it out from the highest mountain and the sheep will follow. We've seen the same type of ploy being used in the health care debate.
The second observation to be made is that industry lobbyists (i.e. Exxon) have the necessary money and resources to skew any topic just enough to plant a seed of doubt in the minds of many. The tobacco industry did the same in the 70s when they downplayed the harm caused by nicotine. We see it in the power of the religious right who have lambasted science to the point where half the population discounts evolution.
Republican's mentor of propaganda, Nazi Joseph Goebbels said is so well.
"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State."
This technique has become the Republican trademark. It was used effectively during the Bush years to sell the Iraq invasion and it is equally effective now in their role as minority party.
A blistering editorial from Israel:
There is one reason for the crisis: Netanyahu's persistence in continuing construction in East Jerusalem, in placing Jews in Arab neighborhoods and evicting Palestinians from their homes in the city. This is not a matter of timing but substance. Despite repeated warnings and bitter experiences, he stokes the flames over the conflict's most sensitive issue and is bound to get himself in trouble. Netanyahu has made it clear by his actions that American support for Israel, especially essential now in light of the Iranian threat, is less important to him than the chance to put another few Jews in the Sheikh Jarrah or Ramat Shlomo neighborhoods.
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The Great Sperm Race
People dressed in all white literally act out the role of sperm in the race to become one with the egg, running through valleys, squeezing through spirals, battling Leukocytes and much more. The impressive undertaking was completed with helicopter-mounted cameras, world-renowned scientists, CGI and over-the-top reconstruction of the sperm's journey played out in real life by humans.
It airs tonight. More info here.
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Suck on this little factoid, wingnuts! That is, if it makes it into the sanctioned information purveyed by the corporate media, but Chávez' economic policies are working for the vast majority of Venezuelans. Want proof? Poverty in Venezuela fell from 70% in 1996 to 23% in 2009.
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Whose veterans' benefits would Jesus steal?
Sen. Don Betzold, DFL-Fridley, told City Pages' Matt Snyders on Thursday that Gov. Tim Pawlenty has diverted funds from the "Support Our Troops" license plate program to his Governor's Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, an office that works to connect religious organizations with state funds.
Betzold says that $30,000 from the license plate program was supposed to go to the Department of Military Affairs and the Department of Veterans Affairs, but instead paid for a position at the faith-based office which is part of the Pawlenty's office. The funds, writes Snyders, "by law, were supposed to go to the Department of Military Affairs and the Department of Veterans Affairs."
"The money helped pay for someone's salary in the governor's office who coordinates faith-based initiatives," Betzold told Snyders on Thursday. "When I bought my license plate, I was thinking I was helping veterans and servicemen. I certainly didn't think it was going to that."
But so what? He's the kind of handsome, sun-chapped prairie guy you'd like to have a beer with.
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We vote 40,000,000 times a week for our next American Idol yet 60% of us, on a good year, can't heave our Twinkie-distended rear ends off our couches every 24 months to drive down the street to vote for our choice of Congressman or Senator or President or on important referendums.
http://brilliantatbreakfast.blogspot.com/2010/03/and-justice-for-some.html
Meet Murray Hill, Inc., the first corporation to run for Congress in the United States.
It's a new day," Hill's ad says. "Until now, corporations influenced politics with high paid lobbyists and backroom deals. However, as much as corporate interests gave to politicians, we could never be absolutely sure they would do our bidding. But today, thanks to an enlightened Supreme Court, corporations now have all the rights the founding fathers meant for us. It's our democracy: we bought it, we paid for it and we're going to keep it."
Henry Kissinger will be released from the South Korean hospital tomorrow. It was only stomach flu.
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Times have changed: the backlash against the narrow-minded bigots who were offended by a photo in the Washington Post of two men kissing as they left a government office with their marriage license sparked outrage from the usual suspects and prompted about twenty people to drop their subscriptions. This sparked a backlash, and emails poured in supporting the editorial decision, with letters of support outnumbering letters of protest by ten-to-one.
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Foul language alert!
Because real Americans aren't intimidated
Of the many deep wounds the Smirky/Darth maladministration inflicted on the American body politic, one of the worst was the idea that Americans react to danger by hysterically freaking out at every mouse squeak, and fight our enemies by becoming more like them. The Rude Pundit explains.
