Obama: Lost With Chicago, But Won With Oslo

Now Come The Sneers And The Jeers

It's 6:00AM EST and the announcement has hit AP fifteen minutes ago: President Barack Obama has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for "his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples," [as well as his] outreach to the Muslim world and attempts to curb nuclear proliferation. (AP)

So guess who won't be able to stomach their breakfasts: Hannity, Beck, Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Coulter, Perkins, Ingraham, Dobbs, Malkin and just about every other rightwing pundit.

Their laptops will also suffer from the furious typing (and the awful grammar) of their emails to friends, associates and Townhall.com. Won't it be fun to watch them cover the news with sour faces? Will they insult the Nobel committee as a group of dunderheads? Will they proffer the possibility of a "conspiracy?" Will they hint at some kind of political bribery? Or will they just dismiss the prize as a meaningless symbol of milquetoast diplomacy? After all, they rode on the winds of Bush's hardlined cowboy diplomacy: pre-emptive strikes, torture, and laughable last minute attempts at securing a "legacy." They saw history's greatest diplomatic dimwit act tough and folksy. He had diplomats putting their best foot forward - landing in cow patties in lustrous and sophisticated Crawford, Texas.

The rightwing pundits must say SOMETHING derogatory about this event. They're MANDATED to deride the President.

The sneering face of Greta Van Sustern will be frozen and placed atop the FOX News headlines for days, weeks maybe. Ann Coulter will be repeating the name "Hussein" until she has to have her jaw wired shut (again!). And Glenn Beck will make a bizarre connection from Alfred Nobel to Chairman Mao.

It's now 6:46 AM EST. I'm in San Francisco. I'm going to bed.



Let the circus begin begin without me. I've seen it before.

"Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world's attention and given its people hope for a better future," the committee said. "His diplomacy is founded in the concept that those who are to lead the world must do so on the basis of values and attitudes that are shared by the majority of the world's population."

Townhall.com and the Militia Movement: The Guns Are Free, But What About The Bullets?

Town Hall's Advertising Expertise

I've let this post simmer for about 48 hours because I wanted to gather more facts. I've read other articles before on "The Millionaire Patriot" Dr. Ignatius Piazza, but the above popped into my email and I decided to investigate it:

Can you believe this hypocrisy? Premiere Radio Network, makes a fortune off millions of listeners who believe the hosts they are listening to don't just "talk the talk" of conservative values but also "walk the walk" and yet when I place the word "Gun" in an ad with a proven track record of delivering over 3,000 courses and guns to responsible American citizens across this country, Premiere Radio Network refuses it!

That's incredible! Do Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck know about this blasphemy?

OK, so maybe the brouhaha has not been covered much by the MSM, but the fact remains that a gun training promotion was denied by a network that is a subsidiary of Clearchannel which has a close corporate "relationship" with Rupert Murdoch-owned FOX News. Rush Limbaugh, Laura Schlessinger, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Michael Savage and practically every microphone-slinging, right-wing air wave pundit owe's his substantial income to Clearchannel. And what about those pundits who include "screeding?"* Townhall.com (Townhall Daily) carries the likes of Ann Coulter(geist), Michelle Malkin, John Stossel, Chuck Norris, and Bill O'Reilly (who was awarded the "Courageous Broadcaster of the year" award at the Values Voter Summit).

It's an irony (not lost by "Dr." Piazza, to be sure) that Premiere Radio Network seems to bite the hand that feeds it. Is it so afraid of a liberal backlash? I doubt it. It seems to be some mid-level executive's lame attempt to present Premiere as a peaceful, non-violent advertising venue. But the more interesting thing about this affair is how Townhall.com has handled it: relaying "Dr." Piazza's message through its email list of subscribers. Almost secretly: you'll have a hard time finding the rant in Townhall's Oct. 4th issue. Is Townhall afraid of backlash as well? I'm not so sure. Publishing right-wing writings is its bread and butter. Then again, becoming involved in a gun control law suit could be a bit prickly, even to Townhall's tough hide.

Firearms Training Institute is definitely "militia lite": training programs cost from $1200 to $50,000 (lifetime memnbership). Taking cost into consideration, the "gift" of a gun is more like finding the plastic toy inside a box of Cracker Jack. However, Piazza has stepped up his promotion by offering to train teachers and pupils where crimes with firearms have been perpetrated.

wikipedia:

In 2007, University of Utah lifted the ban on students carrying concealed weapons. In support of this, Piazza announced that a free 5-day course on carrying and using a concealed handgun would be offered to every student there.

Then there's Piazza's own persona: he's been allied with Scientology, has been sued more than several times and made undisclosed settlements.

Check out some recommendations of Front Sight Firearms Training Institute by teenagers HERE. They're about as silly as you can get.

One former Front Site customer:

"I was flipping through the channels one evening and happened to catch a news segment about a place out in Nevada that was offering a free one day Uzi submachine gun class. I thought that sounded like a lot of fun."

Q: After you've finished a course on shooting with an Uzi, how do you put your knowledge to good use? A: Move to Alaska and show Sarah Palin what you can do to a moose.

And, of course, the high priest of right wing net media, Joseph Farah, endorses Piazza's promotion:

*My own word for writing in a thoroughly biased and bombastic style. Sort of like "bloviating" for writers.

Why I Am Allergic To Glenn Beck

“Only in America can you make that much money crying.”
(And From Having Vick's Vaporub applied under your eyes!)

Glenn Beck has spawned a new wave of pejoratives as well as bon mots. Some of them are worth repeating.

"High Priest of the paranoid style."

"Glenn Beck and reality do not mix well."

"Simply put: Glenn Beck is a modern day demagogue who spews lies and misinformation, fosters racism, hate and fear and whips all of this into a witches brew of anger that is divisive, destructive and pollutes healthy discourse and clouds the future of this country."

"If they’re giving Glenn Beck the key to the city, they should change the locks."

"...as inchoate and paranoid as that hawked by Father Coughlin during the Great Depression and George Wallace in the late 1960s."

Comparing Glenn Beck to Rachel Maddow is like comparing Bozo the Clown to Einstein.

Perfidiously obnoxious and superficial.

Truth-challenged.

Then there are those comments which are banal, but succinct:

Whiny douchebag.

Please keep in mind that some of the above comments were from own his home town!

Groups have demonstrated on the streets and in city council meetings over the conservative commentator's visit. Petitions have been collected calling on the cancellation of the visit. A small business owner put up a sign that says: "Glenn Beck & Hatred not welcome here." And the leader of a nearby city has offered the key to his city to Jon Stewart in sort of a mayoral rebuttal.

Of course, we all have our reasons for hating Glenn Beck and I have mine: I've come to the realization that I don't REALLY hate Glenn Beck. It's just that I've grown to be allergic to him.

This isn't silly, so please hear me out:

Hatred is man's dumbest, most unreasonable emotion. Hatred is without accomplishment. Hatred is useless. Hatred is totally against human survival.

Hatred is stupid.

And hatred is fostered by stupid people who want to gain control (or the gratuitous adulation) of other stupid people. Hatred through stupidity only begets ... more stupidity. And that's the point at which I get a rash... of hatred. And for that I am guilty and very stupid.

Just as I would go into anaphylactic shock if given penicillin, whenever I come in contact with Glenn Beck, I suffer an immediate reaction of hatred and, thence, stupidity. It's something I may have to live with the rest of my life. This, of course, drives a kind of stupidity phobia in me (yes, there is such a phobia). It's kind of circular when you think of it: Glenn Beck's stupidity/hatred makes me stupid/hate him. Does that make sense? We've experienced the opposite to be true: so many stupid Americans have a phobia against intelligence. They were the ones who voted for George W. Bush TWICE. And make no mistake about it: those same Americans have a fear of President Obama's intelligence.A President who is lampooned in the media as an idiot is preferable to a President who is mistrusted because his policies might be right.


So whenever I write disparagingly or condescendingly about Beck, I'm reacting to my allergy.*

I broke out in a rash of hatred when I read this, for instance:

In 2007, forest fires raged out of control in Southern California, "leaving one person dead, four firefighters wounded, and forcing about 1,500 people from their homes",(The New York Times). Here's what Glenn Beck had to say about the event:

"I think there is a handful of people who hate America. Unfortunately for them, a lot of them are losing their homes in a forest fire today."

Even Republicans are developing the rash: watch as Senator Lindsey Graham (R - SC) skewers Beck and right-wing media in general:


I never thought I'd compliment a Republican, but Lindsey Graham does seem to have a saner side than most.

I wonder what he thinks of teabaggers.


The latest on YouTube is Glenn Beck applying Vicks Vaporub under his eyes to make them tear. It was for a photo shoot. Now, only a true idiot would have allowed that video to be taken, much less published. Beck's too stupid to care about credibility. He'll now have to counter the video with genuine crying or he'll have to admit to deceit and laugh at the people who thought we was REALLY CRYING. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

*This also applies to Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Michael Savage, Fred Phelps, Tony Perkins, everyone who attended the Values Voter Summit, Sarah Palin, Lou Dobbs, Michelle Malkin, Michele Bachmann, Joe Wilson, Dick Cheney, Rick Warren and all Christofascists.

The Rift Of Rifqa Bary! Or Is It Elian Gonzales? Or Terry Schiavo? Or Carrie Prejean?

Who Cares?

What is it about Christofascists attaching themselves to cause celebres? Is it some form of rare addiction, leading Christian Right zealots to mainline celebrities du jour? A long time ago (or so it seems) it was Terry Schiavo. Then it was Elian Gonzales. Then it was stem cells, those tiny beings nobody knew about until Christofascists said they were the very origins of life. Recently, (or so it seems) it was Carrie Prejean.

Now it's Fathima Rifqa Bary. This may seem like harping on old news, but to Christian Right proselytes across the country, their newly-persecuted Fathima is still a star to hitch their futures and fortunes on.

"..use Rifqa to be an Esther."

On September 24th, the Christian Right bellowed a battle cry against America's perceived "Islamization." The National Day of Prayer Task Force headed by Lou Engle (The Call), Shirley Dobson (wife of Focus on the Family's James Dobson), Tony Perkins, (Family Research Council) gathered for a prayer rally and conference call to counteract a Muslim pray-in at the nation's capitol. Their big and wonderous "surprise guest" was Rifqa Bary, who, bouncing back and forth from humility to hysterics, told them about her love for Jesus and the intent of Muslims to put her to death as an "honor killing." (listen to it below).

On Sept. 4th, From Atlas Shrugs:

It's official: The Fathima Rifqa Bary Trust has been established.

From The New American:

Honor killing is that Muslim practice of killing women because they misbehave. They might not want to wear the hijab, or Muslim headscarf. Perhaps they are “too” Western. Maybe a woman is dating the wrong boy. She could be a rape victim. Whatever the case, husbands, fathers, and brothers, sometimes assisted by women in the family, routinely kill wives, daughters, and sisters.

(ed. note: The New American is the magazine of the John Birch Society)

Sept. 25th - From The Washington Times

Five ex-Muslims who founded a group called Former Muslims United put out a public appeal Thursday to the U.S. government for protection, saying the lives of thousands of "apostates from Islam" are in peril.

Speaking at a Capitol Hill press conference, the Granada Hills, Calif., group cited the case of Fathima Rifqa Bary, a 17-year-old from Ohio who converted to Christianity four years ago. She fled to Florida this past summer in fears that her parents would murder her for "honor" reasons. Her father, the girl said in a court filing, had already threatened to kill her.

So much for futures hanging on Rifqa's star, so how about fortunes?

Enter the couple who "lured" her away to Orlando, FL (as Rifqa's father, Mohamed Bary states): Pastor Blake Lorenz and his wife Beverly. They corresponded with Rifqa on Facebook for weeks before she took flight from home. Their church was called Global Revolution Church. They have since dismantled the old church name and direction, but you can still view their website HERE. (With its broken links and meatless prose, it looks to be a ministry that needs a little more attention, publicity, and donation$). Florida juvenile and court authorities have since then placed Rifqa in foster care, until a custody ruling in October. The Lorenzes have not yet explained why they have chosen to reorganize.

Blake Lorenz:

"These are the last days; these are the end times," he said, "and this conflict between Islam and Christianity is going to grow greater. This conflict between good and evil is going to grow greater."

From Right Wing Watch (Sept. 1)

If Rifqa's claims are indeed false, that raises the question of whether she may have been prodded by her new friends at Global Revolution Church to make the death-threat accusations, and whether she was somehow lured to Orlando by the Lorenzes via the Internet.

Mat Staver [sic], the Lorenzes' lawyer and longtime friend, said there is "no solid basis for the complaint" filed against them.

Perhaps you remember the name Mat Stavor from other articles: he's the Dean of Liberty University School of Law, the man who put together a "brief" list of wrongs about the Health Care Reform Bill (128 - all debunked) and the good friend of not only the Lorenzes, but of Rick Joyner of "I met Jesus and some saints" fame. Read HERE and HERE.

Sept. 14, The Orlando Sentinel:

The Ohio teen had planned locations thousands of miles away from her home -- known as "fire drills" -- where she could seek refuge. Orlando was her "primary planned sanctuary," and that's exactly where Rifqa ended up in July.

Those were among the details of a Florida Department of Law Enforcement report that said investigators found no credible reports of threats toward the 17-year-old runaway.

Of course, the FDL report has been attacked by the right-wing media. But just look at the dates: even after the FDL report came out, and even after press had speculated that Rifqa would be returned to her family, Rifqa's story of abuse, "courage in her flight," and love of Jesus Christ have been spotlighted and expanded. But for who's benefit? Rifqa's?

The Ohio teen had planned locations thousands of miles away from her home -- known as "fire drills" -- where she could seek refuge. Orlando was her "primary planned sanctuary," and that's exactly where Rifqa ended up in July. Those were among the details of a Florida Department of Law Enforcement report that said investigators found no credible reports of threats toward the 17-year-old runaway.

(and later, on Sept. 25th) A Muslim girl who gave her heart to Jesus and then ran away to Christian evangelists in Orlando is not just any Christian. She is driven to save souls and prays that God will make her a prophet.

That's according to writings she left behind when she fled.

Update (Orlando Sentinel)

The Department of Children and Families is trying to figure out who arranged for Fathima Rifqa Bary to join-in on a conference call with "thousands" of people and on which the 17-year-old delivered her testimony and a frenzied prayer.

It's amazing how Christofascists (aka, the Christian Right) can cling to something so flimsy as a youthful but deluded zealot, a girl who swore she was a Christian since she was 13, who swore that her parents (who knew of her conversion for at least a year) would murder her, who planned her "escape" well in advance, and who hopes to become a "prophet" for Christ.

Aren't these the same people who spirited away a young gay man named Bryce Faulkner to be "cured" by bogus "ex-gay" (reparative) therapy? As always with Christofascists, their actions are deeply rooted in hypocrisy. Faulkner has not been heard from in three months.

So to Christofascists who are always coming up with standard-bearers for their part in the culture war, I have to say:

You have your Rifqa Bary, but we have Bryce Faulkner.
Check. Your move.

Dear God! It's Finally Happened: The Dueling Prayer Groups Converge on Washington!

"Muslims should march on the White House. We are going to the White House so that Islam will be victorious, Allah willing, and the White House will become into a Muslim house."

From Right Wing Watch:

"...a major Christian leader of the Emergent Church called for forty days of fasting and prayer in the same Ramadan period with the goal that the church will better understand our Muslim friends. We advocate for understanding, but we must have spiritual discernment as to the spiritual dark powers that are being invoked into our nation.

Strange: the pejorative "Emergent Church" used in the same sentence with "Muslim friends." In other words: "Let those damn liberal 'churches' play footsie with heathen Muslims, we gotta protect our country from becoming a bunch of rag-headed terrorists!"

I really shouldn't call this reaction a "duel" since, as all good Christians should, they are preemptively praying (remember the "cowboy diplomacy" of GWB?) so that they might get a foothold in praying to the same God.

Therefore we are calling Christians all over America to join Lou Engle, Shirley Dobson, Tony Perkins, David Barton, and many other major leaders in America to a national conference call to pray for America. Please join us on Thursday, September 24th from 7:30PM to 9:00PM Eastern Time for possibly one of the greatest moments in American history.

Nah. The greatest moment in American history was when Washington, DC attempted to celebrate the nation's centennial by having one hundred orchestras of one hundred musicians each to play The Blue Danube. While the main conductor (on a VERY tall podium) didn't become deaf, the disjointed cacophony left many people wondering: "why?"

Perkins called the Muslim gathering "a wake-up call for the church" and a warning that if Christians do not "fill the void that's in this nation with the truth, it will be filled with something else."

Going After Christofascist Clowns: Frank Schaeffer and The Scariest Video EVER!

We should all be horrified at the above poll results and the video below. Look at them and ask how many people have been harmed (emotionally and physically) because a full 21% are in doubt, not because they' profess to be birthers, tenthers, Carrie Prejeaners, but because something, anything must be used to gather support for their warped worldviews. They are miscreants and malcontents who will believe anything and anyone.

And while only one in the video seems to be a rabid Bible-thumper, the scene will give you a very good picture of a mentality gone fanatic. Gone wild. Gone insane. It was, of course, Glenn Beck's 9-12 Teabagger March on Washington. This series of interviews was posted a little over 48 hours ago (which, in internet time is actually a millenium.) It has been viewed over 600,000 times - about 475,000 more people than were actually there. Of course, Glenn Beck said that it was definitely 1.7 million. Granted, the DC Police always underestimate in cases like these, but Beck's source is a little shaky: a university (which he can't seem to remember the name of) calculated the density of the bodies per square foot from a video. And who gave the idea to the University? Supposedly, Michelle Malkin! (hey, check with TYT).

So why is it so frightening?

When Jay Leno conducted on-the-street questions/surveys, ("Jay Walking") I was so shocked that his easy questions confounded walking, talking, functioning adults. Surely, these were "zombies"!

No, but I was close: they were future teabaggers.

And today's teabaggers vote, protest any change in Health Care, carry signs that display Obama as Hitler and chant slogans wishing he were dead. These teabaggers don't know history, they haven't read the Health Care Bill, and it looks as if they don't even know why they are there. Except, of course, that they are protesting against someone or something. Their causes are diverse. But they hate diversity.

The 80s were supposedly the "Me!" decade. Our next decade looks like it may become the "Us vs Them" decade.

Which brings us to the "Obama is the Anti-Christ" ideology.

When the son of a vastly popular Fundamentalist and Theologian, turns about and fires volleys at today's Christofascists for being "insane" there just might be a ring of truth to it.

Frank Schaeffer on Rachel Maddow's program:

[W]hen my late father -- Religious Right leader Francis Schaeffer -- denounced America and even called for the violent overthrow of the US government, he was invited to lunch with presidents Ford, Reagan and Bush, Sr."

Wikipedia:

Schaeffer has written: "In the mid 1980s I left the Religious Right, after I realized just how very anti-American they are, (the theme I explore in my book Crazy For God)." He added that he was a Republican until 2000, working for Senator John McCain in that year's primaries, but that after the 2000 election he re-registered as an independent.

Frank Schaeffer:

Can Christianity be rescued from Christians? And that’s an open question. And when you see a bunch of people going around thinking that our President is the anti-Christ you have to draw one of two conclusions. Either these are racists looking for any excuse to level the next accusation or they’re beyond crazy. And I think beyond crazy is a better explanation and that evangelical subculture has rotted the brain of the United States of America.

The angry people in the below video would all seem to be part of that rotted brain. They're loud, because they think louder is better. Crude because they think of themselves as true-blue American "diamonds in the rough." Clueless because they let others think for them. Others like Glenn Beck.

They think Glenn Beck is smart.

Sorry, Beck and Savage, San Francisco Prefers More Imperial Clowns

We like our clowns to have class.

150 years ago, a man in San Francisco declared himself to be Emperor of the United States and "Protector of Mexico." And San Francisco, (then as now), welcomed him not with a straight-jacket, but with open arms.

From The San Francisco Chronicle:

On Sept. 17, 1859, the San Francisco Bulletin published a notice on an inside page announcing that Joshua Norton, formerly a prominent San Francisco businessman, had proclaimed himself Norton I, "Emperor of these United States." He had acted, he said, "at the peremptory request of a large majority of the citizens."

Yes, San Francisco and much of the surrounding Bay Area is like that. But the fact that the clown prince of hatemongers, Michael Savage, got dumped from his "flagship" station, KNEW 910FM (located in Oakland, CA) shows that the San Francisco Bay Area can stomach only so much of an uncouth mouth running off at one of its radio stations. Because the only thing the residents of the Golden Gate can't tolerate is...intolerance.

And so it is with Glenn Beck. To date, Beck's show has lost 50 advertisers. His "halo" has slipped. His ratings, however, are up.

Huh?

From Marketwatch.com:

For advertisers, "the halo of the show means you are connected with supporting that point of view," said John Greening, a Northwestern University professor of marketing who spent 28 years in the advertising business. "It is not about awareness but about association."

So corporations can't afford to be associated with Beck, but the "closeted" clowns of intolerance have increased. Just as the number of hate groups in this country have increased. Hmmm.

I know, I know, that's a loose correlation, but it's a correlation all the same. Beck is also being compared to the late Senator Joe McCarthy. The Media Matters video below makes a fine connection. The only difference between the two men is that McCarthy seemed, at times, to be somewhat intelligent. He played on people's fears as much as Beck, but he was careful to twist "facts" instead of twisting gullible viewers' brains.

Wikipedia:

[Isobel Field wrote that Norton]:... "was a gentle and kindly man, and fortunately found himself in the friendliest and most sentimental city in the world, the idea being 'let him be emperor if he wants to.' San Francisco played the game with him."

And San Francisco knew he had class. One proclamation:

Whoever after due and proper warning shall be heard to utter the abominable word "Frisco", which has no linguistic or other warrant, shall be deemed guilty of a High Misdemeanor, and shall pay into the Imperial Treasury as penalty the sum of twenty-five dollars.

Michael Savage has called the City "Frisco." I'll bet Glenn Beck has too.

From GlennBeck.com:

I mean, they don't support the ROTC, they go against everything that our country stands for. They are constantly trying to turn us into a socialist state. Why don't you just become your own country, San Francisco? I mean it.

It's just a matter of time. Beck, I think you should pay the twenty-five dollars up front and avoid the bureaucratic hassle.