Uppity Wisconsin

It seems like everywhere you look these days, someone’s trying to spread...The Fear.

All around us...in every town...on every corner...a massive Army Of Fear is standing by, according to the Messengers, ready at a moment’s notice to obey the dictates of some unappointed Czar or another.

Just ask Glenn Beck: concentration camps for the white people, jackbooted stormtroopers ready to snatch the guns from your cold dead fingers...Socialist Government-Controlled Healthcare That Threatens Your Not Socialist Medicare...it’s all coming, my friends—and unless we organize, as a community, to return to the values of the Founding Fathers, The Government, meaning that awful Obama and Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and George Soros and all the other Evil Community Organizers, will win.

There’s no government, we’re told, like no government.

You know who would find all of this fear of self-government just entirely bizarre?

The Founding Fathers.

In today’s conversation we’ll consider the fundamentals of American patriotism, we’ll ask one of those Founding Fathers how he saw the role of Government—and we’ll toss in a few words from Abraham Lincoln, just for good measure.

LANGUAGE WARNING: Today’s story is uncharacteristically blunt, and from this moment forward we will be using lots of inappropriate language in making our points.

Gentle Reader, you have been officially...warned.

With that in mind, if you take offense when confronted with language strong enough to knock a fuckin’ buzzard off a shitwagon, please stop reading now.

It is by now fairly well known that Rahm Emanuel, President Obama’s White House Chief of Staff, had a bit of a blow-up with liberals who were ready to start running ads against “blue dog” Democrats who were working very hard to shut down the health care reform effort.

Now we’re not gonna get in the middle of that argument today; instead, since we’re finally getting a chance to talk, I figured me and Rahm could get a few other things out of the way that have been on everyone’s mind for the past year or so.

As expected, the Supreme Court just ruled 5-4 against key provisions of campaign finance, opening the floodgates of corporate and union money just in time for the 2010 elections.  Look forward to a level of bogus flirting with the truth at a level that you've never seen before.

I'm considering throwing my TV out in the snow.

Update - News from The Sconz and NYT

Update - Sunlight Foundation Weighs in:

Update - Feingold Statement:

"It is important to note that the decision does not affect McCain-Feingold’s soft money ban, which will continue to prevent corporate contributions to the political parties from corrupting the political process.  But this decision was a terrible mistake.  Presented with a relatively narrow legal issue, the Supreme Court chose to roll back laws that have limited the role of corporate money in federal elections since Teddy Roosevelt was president.  Ignoring important principles of judicial restraint and respect for precedent, the Court has given corporate money a breathtaking new role in federal campaigns. Just six years ago, the Court said that the prohibition on corporations and unions dipping into their treasuries to influence campaigns was ‘firmly embedded in our law.’  Yet this Court has just upended that prohibition, and a century's worth of campaign finance law designed to stem corruption in government.  The American people will pay dearly for this decision when, more than ever, their voices are drowned out by corporate spending in our federal elections. In the coming weeks, I will work with my colleagues to pass legislation restoring as many of the critical restraints on corporate control of our elections as possible.

As a result of a recent event involving an aircraft and underpants Representative Peter King (R-Not From Iowa), the senior Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, has again come forth to bring his expertise on questions of international terrorism to the national debate.

King, a Congressman who represents a district that straddles New York’s Long Island (NY-3), previously served as the Comptroller of Nassau County and a member of Hempstead, New York’s Town Council, which wouldn’t seem to be the kind of résumé that would give you much credibility in this arena—but Mr. King is a special case.

You see, Mr. King knows a great deal about terrorism...from the inside...because for many years the personal cause that drove his life was to be an active and public supporter of a terrorist group.

And that’s why, today, we’ll be connecting the dots between Congressman King and the Irish Republican Army.

Sigh-

I noticed this the other day, when I was wondering why the heck I had an increase in Nigerian 419 spam - and took a look and saw that some of it had been forwarded from the Democratic Party mail servers. 

Seems the democrats.org web site has an invite page that lets you send emails through the site to invite people to the web site.  You can put anything in the email you want.  They even make it easy to take addresses out of your address book.  No Captcha, no spam control, no nuttin'.  A spammer's paradise, just write a little script to exploit it. I haven't seen anybody do this for years - just not good net citizenship.  Anyway, it's been noticed.  Hasn't been fixed as of this afternoon, but it's been noticed.  I keep trying to become one of them high-paid Democratic consultants, so maybe spam alleviation is my in.  You'd kind of think they'd know better.

WASHINGTON (FNS) – In a startling development related to the recent disruptions of town hall meetings, FNS is now able to confirm that the Obama Administration, with the assistance of Unilever Group and Queen Beatrix, both of the Netherlands, PepsiCo, Skull And Bones, and the Bilderberg Group, is unleashing a secret plot to dispatch fleets of unmarked aircraft and helicopters to prevent teabag protesters from having access to teabags.

The goal of the plot: to disrupt protesters’ plans to save America from the destruction of our health care system.

FNS reporters have been following a trail of information that includes airport noise abatement records, classified documents, and the testimony of insiders, some of whom are now willing to be publicly identified.

We’ll begin our story by reporting on three events that occurred the evening of Friday, August 8th.

It has been quite some time, Gentle Reader, since we addressed the issue of political robot design, but recent events have forced us to return to the subject once again.

As you undoubtedly are aware, three high profile ‘bots from Robotican™ Labs have recently experienced major failures. It was originally thought that the problems were isolated to the Robotican™.1 Congressional Series of Devices...but it is now known that the failures also extend to the .2 Gubernatorial Series as well.

In today’s story we will examine what is known about these failures, how they may impact other devices in Political Service, and what solutions might be available to address these issues.

New Hampshire just joined the list of states allowing gay marriage, after a quick trip through the legislature and a world-record-breaking signing by the governor. 

And yet, Wisconsin has somehow lost its progressive way on this issue.  2006 was the sad year in which Wisconsin legalized discrimination, both legally and morally.  It's time to fix this. Let's try again.  Let's keep trying until we get it right.