Two FOK News Channel posts for this date.
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Scott Walker: That Man Is An Idiot
Worst Persons of the Day
Special bonus YouTube (Keith interviewed at spring training, some time in March)
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Worst Persons Of The Day: March 1 2011
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The Bronze to Mike Huckabee of Fixed News. Well, the smooth-talking snake-oil salesman finally jumped the shark in an interview on a right-wing radio station in New York this morning. Insisting he wasn't a birther because if there were anything to birtherism the Clintons would've dug out the dirt in 2008, Huckabee promptly upped the birtherism ante by introducing his own twist to the paranoia:
President Obama, of course, spent part of his youth in Indonesia, not Kenya (off topic: if there were something to cover up, wouldn't that part have been covered up, too?) A spokesperson later said Huck merely slipped and meant Indonesia.
Regardless, the 'Kenya' reference suggests either a Huckabee dog whistle to the birthers he has heretofore shunned ("wait wait, Huckleby said that? Then denied it? They got to him!"), or a hack politician who couldn't avoid conflating the Glenn "Imperialism Is Good; Obama Is Anti-Imperialist" Beck drivel, with the Obama-Isn't-From-Here drivel.
—
The Runner-Up: Megyn Kelly of Fixed News. Lonesome Rhodes Beck, the morning morons, and Billo, and Hannity get the headlines, but Fox's afternoon news actress is as nasty a human being as they've got. Unfortunately for Mistress Megyn, she has gotten herself caught in a slam-dunk lie about Wisconsin. Fox's newest self-martyrdom is the claim that 'correspondent' Mike Tobin was assaulted by protesters in Madison.
Tobin tried to dial it down ("I got punched in the arm") but Kelly would have none of it. "It is an unwanted touching!," she bellows back at him. Unfortunately at the same link, LiveLeak happened to post video of the exact episode Kelly describes as battery and Tobin insists was a punch. The video shows: It was neither.
"She turned me into a newt!...(pause)...I got better!"
—
But our winner, John of Orange, Speaker Of The House, who, as the third month of his tenure begins, still hasn't produced any jobs, nor any meaningful legislation, nor any bipartisan compromise, nor anything that wouldn't get vaporized in the Senate or vetoed at the White House.
He has, however, produced this: a promise to introduce legislation to outlaw the FCC Fairness Doctrine!
What? There is no FCC Fairness Doctrine? There hasn't been an FCC Fairness Doctrine since 1987? There isn't one Democratic legislator or liberal commentator seriously pushing for an FCC Fairness Doctrine?
Never mind that! Stop acting rationally and calmly in a situation that calls for panic!
There isn't any Sharia Law in Tennessee either!
Speaker Boehner told the convention of the association of National Religious Broadcasters (that's a fun group) that the threat of a reinstated Fairness Doctrine is very real, and that there are those who want to "even expand" it. "Our new majority is committed to seeing that the government does not reinstate the fairness doctrine. Congressman (Greg) Walden (R-Oregon) has teamed up with another former broadcaster, Congressman Mike Pence of Indiana, to introduce legislation to help keep the airwaves free. I expect the House to act on this measure."
Boehner insists that The Fairness Doctrine (which next year will celebrate its 25th anniversary of being dead) is "a censorship scheme from the 1940′s mandating that competing viewpoints be offered on controversial topics."
You know: Fair and Balanced.
But never mind. There comes to mind the old story of the wild-eyed inventor who walks into the patent office in Washington with a complicated device straight out of the annals of Rube Goldberg. It has wires, and lights, and tubes, and fuzzy sparks jumping from anode to diode, and it hums – and occasionally blips or bleats. At its top, there is a small rotating dish that spins, sprinker-like, aiming what the man says is an invisible beam towards the sky. "This is my life's work," the wild-eyed inventor explains. "I'm going to sell these for ten million dollars apiece." The patent officer looks through the indecipherable blue prints and finally asks what it does. "I throw this switch here, and it immediately emits a sound that kills every wild elephant on the American Prairie." The patent officer pauses for a moment and stares at the wild-eyed inventor and finally says "But there aren't any wild elephants on the American Prairie." Whereupon the wild-eyed inventor smiles with broad satisfaction, folds his arms proudly across his chest and says "And we aim to keep it that way!"
John Boehner – Wild-Eyed Anti-American Prairie Elephant Inventor – today's Worst Person.
text only
The Bronze to Mike Huckabee of Fixed News. Well, the smooth-talking snake-oil salesman finally jumped the shark in an interview on a right-wing radio station in New York this morning. Insisting he wasn't a birther because if there were anything to birtherism the Clintons would've dug out the dirt in 2008, Huckabee promptly upped the birtherism ante by introducing his own twist to the paranoia:
If you think about it, his perspective as growing up in Kenya with a Kenyan father and grandfather, their view of the Mau Mau Revolution in Kenya is very different than ours because he probably grew up hearing that the British were a bunch of imperialists who persecuted his grandfather.
President Obama, of course, spent part of his youth in Indonesia, not Kenya (off topic: if there were something to cover up, wouldn't that part have been covered up, too?) A spokesperson later said Huck merely slipped and meant Indonesia.
Regardless, the 'Kenya' reference suggests either a Huckabee dog whistle to the birthers he has heretofore shunned ("wait wait, Huckleby said that? Then denied it? They got to him!"), or a hack politician who couldn't avoid conflating the Glenn "Imperialism Is Good; Obama Is Anti-Imperialist" Beck drivel, with the Obama-Isn't-From-Here drivel.
—
The Runner-Up: Megyn Kelly of Fixed News. Lonesome Rhodes Beck, the morning morons, and Billo, and Hannity get the headlines, but Fox's afternoon news actress is as nasty a human being as they've got. Unfortunately for Mistress Megyn, she has gotten herself caught in a slam-dunk lie about Wisconsin. Fox's newest self-martyrdom is the claim that 'correspondent' Mike Tobin was assaulted by protesters in Madison.
Tobin tried to dial it down ("I got punched in the arm") but Kelly would have none of it. "It is an unwanted touching!," she bellows back at him. Unfortunately at the same link, LiveLeak happened to post video of the exact episode Kelly describes as battery and Tobin insists was a punch. The video shows: It was neither.
"She turned me into a newt!...(pause)...I got better!"
—
But our winner, John of Orange, Speaker Of The House, who, as the third month of his tenure begins, still hasn't produced any jobs, nor any meaningful legislation, nor any bipartisan compromise, nor anything that wouldn't get vaporized in the Senate or vetoed at the White House.
He has, however, produced this: a promise to introduce legislation to outlaw the FCC Fairness Doctrine!
What? There is no FCC Fairness Doctrine? There hasn't been an FCC Fairness Doctrine since 1987? There isn't one Democratic legislator or liberal commentator seriously pushing for an FCC Fairness Doctrine?
Never mind that! Stop acting rationally and calmly in a situation that calls for panic!
There isn't any Sharia Law in Tennessee either!
Speaker Boehner told the convention of the association of National Religious Broadcasters (that's a fun group) that the threat of a reinstated Fairness Doctrine is very real, and that there are those who want to "even expand" it. "Our new majority is committed to seeing that the government does not reinstate the fairness doctrine. Congressman (Greg) Walden (R-Oregon) has teamed up with another former broadcaster, Congressman Mike Pence of Indiana, to introduce legislation to help keep the airwaves free. I expect the House to act on this measure."
Boehner insists that The Fairness Doctrine (which next year will celebrate its 25th anniversary of being dead) is "a censorship scheme from the 1940′s mandating that competing viewpoints be offered on controversial topics."
You know: Fair and Balanced.
But never mind. There comes to mind the old story of the wild-eyed inventor who walks into the patent office in Washington with a complicated device straight out of the annals of Rube Goldberg. It has wires, and lights, and tubes, and fuzzy sparks jumping from anode to diode, and it hums – and occasionally blips or bleats. At its top, there is a small rotating dish that spins, sprinker-like, aiming what the man says is an invisible beam towards the sky. "This is my life's work," the wild-eyed inventor explains. "I'm going to sell these for ten million dollars apiece." The patent officer looks through the indecipherable blue prints and finally asks what it does. "I throw this switch here, and it immediately emits a sound that kills every wild elephant on the American Prairie." The patent officer pauses for a moment and stares at the wild-eyed inventor and finally says "But there aren't any wild elephants on the American Prairie." Whereupon the wild-eyed inventor smiles with broad satisfaction, folds his arms proudly across his chest and says "And we aim to keep it that way!"
John Boehner – Wild-Eyed Anti-American Prairie Elephant Inventor – today's Worst Person.
Scott Walker: That Man Is An Idiot
Good grief, how many stupid people do we have in this country? And how come we keep electing them as Republican governors?
In a had-to-be-seen-to-be-believed budget speech this afternoon, Wisconsin's pet rock of a chief executive, Scott Walker, barely touched on the firestorm that has put his slightly cross-eyed, startled-looking mug on the national map. Absent were references to violating court orders to keep the Capitol open to protesters. No mention was made of unilateral decisions to bolt the Capitol windows shut. There wasn't a word in there about the no-holds-barred campaign to demonize the Unions as if they were al-Qaeda. Only in passing – by referencing those Democrats who interrupted the knee-capping of collective bargaining rights – did Walker even come close to mentioning the issue that his lit up the night sky of America's Dairyland.
In short, Walker's speech sounded about as in-touch and pertinent as one of Hosni Mubarak's. No; check that; Mubarak eventually got it. When it comes to tone-deaf speechifying (not, obviously, bloodshed), Walker is closer to Colonel Gadaffi.
Not only did Walker ignore the headline, but when he did flit gently into its neighborhood, he exploited the moment to actually try to slip by a 'Do-What-I-Say-Or-I'll-Shoot-This-School' threat as some kind of call to bipartisan responsibility:
So, if the 14 protesting Democratic state senators come back from Illinois and participate in the Kangaroo Court passage of the euphemistically titled "Budget Reform Bill," there will not be massive layoffs of teachers?
Well the Governor didn't exactly say that...
In the speech, Walker meandered from these two sentences – which are indeed consecutive – to initiatives for improving the third grade, which is evidently the level at which he believes most residents of Wisconsin now reside. Notice that in exchange for the Democrats dropping the logistical equivalent of the Republicans' Friend (The Filibuster) he does not forswear massive teacher layoffs. He promises only some future Utopian day when the classrooms will see "more money...ultimately."
So in one fell swoop, Walker is saying that if he doesn't get his way on his Koch Brothers Approved knee-capping of the unions, he will precipitate the firing of more Wisconsin teachers. And he will blame it on the Democrats. Unless they return from exotic Illinois and vote. In which case...he will precipitate the firing of more Wisconsin teachers anyway (I'm going to guess at what he left unsaid here; when it comes time to lay off the teachers, he will find some equally specious excuse to blame the Democrats for it).
But beyond this disturbingly see-through edition of "Heads I Win, Tails You Lose," in an excellent post in his blog at the Alt-Weekly in Madison, The Isthmus, Bill Leuders pointed out the new crap hidden behind Walker's regurgitation of his old crap. Though staring at a recall movement that is already counting the days until his first anniversary on the job makes him eligible, and polling showing that in a theoretical re-vote, enough Republicans would abandon him to get Tom Barrett elected, Walker is still beating the tub for the GOP agenda: More money for corporations, less money for...everybody else:
Leuders perceptively points out that Walker is now trying to cut it both ways. State funding for local school boards and local governments will be cut, and the state will merrily neuter every local government's ability to raise local property taxes to cover the shortfall – even if a municipality's residents agreed, as they so often do when local budgets are put to the vote and residents get to decide how much school they want for their kids. In other words, his agenda is to deliberately lower the quality of life for the average resident of his state, while denying that resident the opportunity to do anything about it.
Scott Walker wants you to not have your cake, and not eat it, too.
Good grief, how many stupid people do we have in this country? And how come we keep electing them as Republican governors?
In a had-to-be-seen-to-be-believed budget speech this afternoon, Wisconsin's pet rock of a chief executive, Scott Walker, barely touched on the firestorm that has put his slightly cross-eyed, startled-looking mug on the national map. Absent were references to violating court orders to keep the Capitol open to protesters. No mention was made of unilateral decisions to bolt the Capitol windows shut. There wasn't a word in there about the no-holds-barred campaign to demonize the Unions as if they were al-Qaeda. Only in passing – by referencing those Democrats who interrupted the knee-capping of collective bargaining rights – did Walker even come close to mentioning the issue that his lit up the night sky of America's Dairyland.
In short, Walker's speech sounded about as in-touch and pertinent as one of Hosni Mubarak's. No; check that; Mubarak eventually got it. When it comes to tone-deaf speechifying (not, obviously, bloodshed), Walker is closer to Colonel Gadaffi.
Not only did Walker ignore the headline, but when he did flit gently into its neighborhood, he exploited the moment to actually try to slip by a 'Do-What-I-Say-Or-I'll-Shoot-This-School' threat as some kind of call to bipartisan responsibility:
Again, this is why it is so vitally important for the Senate democrats to come back and do their jobs. If they do not, our schools face massive layoffs of teachers.
So, if the 14 protesting Democratic state senators come back from Illinois and participate in the Kangaroo Court passage of the euphemistically titled "Budget Reform Bill," there will not be massive layoffs of teachers?
Well the Governor didn't exactly say that...
However, if they do come back, overall savings for schools across the state will outweigh reductions, ultimately allowing schools to put more money in the classroom.
In the speech, Walker meandered from these two sentences – which are indeed consecutive – to initiatives for improving the third grade, which is evidently the level at which he believes most residents of Wisconsin now reside. Notice that in exchange for the Democrats dropping the logistical equivalent of the Republicans' Friend (The Filibuster) he does not forswear massive teacher layoffs. He promises only some future Utopian day when the classrooms will see "more money...ultimately."
So in one fell swoop, Walker is saying that if he doesn't get his way on his Koch Brothers Approved knee-capping of the unions, he will precipitate the firing of more Wisconsin teachers. And he will blame it on the Democrats. Unless they return from exotic Illinois and vote. In which case...he will precipitate the firing of more Wisconsin teachers anyway (I'm going to guess at what he left unsaid here; when it comes time to lay off the teachers, he will find some equally specious excuse to blame the Democrats for it).
But beyond this disturbingly see-through edition of "Heads I Win, Tails You Lose," in an excellent post in his blog at the Alt-Weekly in Madison, The Isthmus, Bill Leuders pointed out the new crap hidden behind Walker's regurgitation of his old crap. Though staring at a recall movement that is already counting the days until his first anniversary on the job makes him eligible, and polling showing that in a theoretical re-vote, enough Republicans would abandon him to get Tom Barrett elected, Walker is still beating the tub for the GOP agenda: More money for corporations, less money for...everybody else:
...by prosperity he meant delivering even more tax breaks to businesses. Walker said he would "eliminat[e] the capital gains tax for investors in Wisconsin companies" and "include tax relief for employers who hire more people to work in our state." Moreover, he'll "provide real tax relief for homeowners across the state by implementing property tax reform that locks in property tax levies at the local level."...yes, it does sound as though the governor may have just dropped another bomb and announced his intention to end the ability of local governments in Wisconsin to raise property taxes to meet needs in their communities. And with the governor saying he plans to cut state spending to local government by "just over" $1.25 billion, this might be flexibility local governments will want to have?
Leuders perceptively points out that Walker is now trying to cut it both ways. State funding for local school boards and local governments will be cut, and the state will merrily neuter every local government's ability to raise local property taxes to cover the shortfall – even if a municipality's residents agreed, as they so often do when local budgets are put to the vote and residents get to decide how much school they want for their kids. In other words, his agenda is to deliberately lower the quality of life for the average resident of his state, while denying that resident the opportunity to do anything about it.
Scott Walker wants you to not have your cake, and not eat it, too.
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