GET OVER HEREEEEEEEEE

God PLEASE let this be an actual preview of an actual movie. DAMN!

YES WE CAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Enough said

The Magnificent

I have seen most of President Obama's speeches if not live then on youtube, but I have to say that his speech today to the House Democratic caucus was the best I have ever seen from him. That's not hyperbole, its a fact and he made all the arguments that I would have made if given the chance to speak to the caucus. For me, that's huge because it means he was truly speaking for all of us today. No matter where you are on the political spectrum, no matter how many of Pres Obama's speeches you have seen before, no matter what you think about health care reform, please do yourself a favor and watch this video. You'll be glad you did.

More Of This Please!

Only the next time can we put this ad out BEFORE the Republicans put theirs out? Damn I'm tired of playing defense...

Melting Faces

Rachel Maddow has been on Bart Stupak's ass like a pitbull on a steak and now that she is asking questions that may well lead to trouble with the IRS if not the ethics committee in Congress, you gotta wonder if Stupak is regretting trying to kill health care reform with his one man jihad on a womans reproductive choices.

Whether he has regret or not it doesn't appear that Rachel will be letting up one bit on him any time soon.

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Byrd Still Has Some Bite

Check out this excerpt from a letter to the editor sent by Democratic Senator Robert Byrd, he of 90+ years of age.

With all due respect, the Daily Mail's hyperbole about "imposing government control," acts of "disrespect to the American people" and "corruption" of Senate procedures resembles more the barkings from the nether regions of Glennbeckistan than the "sober and second thought" of one of West Virginia's oldest and most respected daily newspapers.

If only some of his younger collegues showed such chutzpah!

AWESOME SAAAUUUUCCCEEEE

Don'tcha just love how Anthony Weiner doesn't give a damn about Congressional decorum?

He's That Dude!

President Obama just spent a little time kicking Republicans, politely, in their teeth for the whole world to see on TV. That shit was FRAWESOME! And as SOON as its up on youtube or another site, I will embed it here. I wish it would have been done in primetime because it was much more enjoyable than the State of the Union address which was by itself pretty good. Make sure to pass it around so everybody can see!

Update: Here you go, its long but well worth it!

Update II: Evidently the CSPAN embed isn't working. Ill try to find a youtube version.

Update III: MSNBC to the rescue!

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He Knocked That Shit Outta The Park!!!!!

President Obama was full of WIN tonight and he put both Republicans AND Democrats on notice. Its time to get shit done!

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A Miracle In the MIddle Of The Chaos In Haiti

It makes my heart smile when we see stories like this one to counterbalance all of the doom and gloom and loss from the people down in Haiti. It reminds us all that even in immense tragedies there can still be miracles.

CNN Take Notes

I saw that CNN had Erick Erickson of Red State on in the last few weeks as their representative for a right wing point of view. But they never, not even once, brought up any of the over the top, racist and culturally insensitve things he said on his blog. You would have thought he was a perfectly average guy just having a difference of opinion on substantive issues. Thankfully he was stupid enough to go on the Colbert Report last night. Needless to say he was finally challenged over some of the things he has said. It continues to amaze me that we have to wait for late night comedy shows to actually ask the tough questions of political operators. But I guess something is better than nothing.

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Erick Erickson
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Economy

How To Attack Right Wingers Over Climate Change

The next major initiative on the agenda as far as I can tell after health care reform is climate change legislation. Now it is apparent that in order to be a right winger or a right wing candidate for public office and win the hearts and minds of the idiotic base of the Republican Party, you basically have to reject science and deny climate change. You also have to play up the bullshit non scandal email scandal dubbed "Climategate" that recently went down. But I want to focus on where the origin of this denialism comes from, and how progressive Democrats can attack right wing candidates without offending a certain segment of the population and still making them look like fools.

You see when you listen very closely to politicians who claim the climate change denialism mantle there is one central place where they are coming from in their opposition to any notion that global warming comes from man made sources. And that place is evangelical Christianity. Well rather a perverted version of evangelical Christianity whereby humans can not possibly do anything to affect the fate of the earth because everything is in God's hands. Now most regular Christians do not see the world this way. Yes we believe that Jesus will return one day to bring us all to heaven and yes I understand that lots of people think that is crazy talk. But there isn't anything anywhere in the Bible about human beings not being able to hasten the second coming of Christ. So that is the first principle to know but its actually the death blow best held onto until the end of the argument with a right wing climate change denialist.


The best way to engage them initially however is to go on the attack right away. Don't get caught trying to defend accepted science as it doesn't need defending and any effort to do so will only serve to make you look defensive. What you want to do right away is establish the aforementioned "why" this particular politician doesn't believe in climate change. If they won't come out and say it right away then you should pointedly ask them if it has to do with their religious beliefs. That will put them on the defensive and they will absolutely feel the need to over play their own religious faith and pimp their Jesus cred and pretty much try to hang you with it. You should allow this without interruption and just allow them to ramble on for a bit and then continue with your deconstruction.

Once you have made them admit that their denialism is grounded in their faith and the belief that God is in control then its time to hit them with the killer hypotheticals. Now not all hypotheticals and analogies are equal and some are better for right wingers than others, so let me offer a few up for you to use.

Oil Spills

There is a certain former governor of a certan northern state that just so happened to have been impacted by a major oil spill by Exxon. Well that was one of many oil spills but the one that made the most noise. And so the question when dealing with that person or another person who hails from a coastal state is this:

If you believe that human beings can not affect our environment because God is in control, then do you also believe that if there is an oil spill somewhere off the coast of your state that it should not be cleaned up? If the idea is that God will fix climate change or global warming then why not take the same tact when it comes to something like an oil spill?

Nuclear Waste

If you happen to be dealing with a politician who lives in an area where there is a nuclear plant somewhere nearby then your question should be phrased thusly:

Are you willing to open up your area/county/city/state to nuclear waste dumping so we can expand our nuclear capabilities? If not, why not? Surely you can't be worried about the damage to the environment. Won't God take care of that just like climate change?

Hunting/Endangered Species
If the politician denying climate change hails from a state with a lot of hunting and or is a big NRA person then you can hit them this way:

How do you feel about hunting seasons? Why exactly should we have hunting seasons? Why can't Americans go and kill whatever animals they want to kill whenever they want to? Surely there won't be any impact to their numbers. I mean we aren't powerful enough to make a have a major effect on our environment are we?

This would also be a good time to ask them about endangered species, specifically one endangered species in particular:

As you know one of our great American symbols, the bald eagle, has been on and off the endangered species list in years past. Are you in favor of allowing people to go hunting for bald eagles? If not, why not? Why should sportsmen be deprived the opportunity to bag something as beautiful as a bald eagle? Surely it can't be because of their numbers. Remember, you said human beings aren't powerful enough to affect our environment, so according to you no matter how many bald eagles are killed won't God just create more of them?

I would almost pay someone to use that line of attack just to see the right wing politician damn near burst a blood vessel with anger. You know how much they love linking a bald eagle to FREEDOM!!! My advice would be to be careful though because some of them might want to fight you over this line of attack lol

Now, obviously those statements could still backfire at least initially because they will come off as condescending toward's their faith. I say WILL instead of MIGHT because the proper way to deliver those lines are as condescending as possible. You want to piss them off and challenge them on their faith and get the on the defensive. You ESPECIALLY want them to attack you and your faith once you go there with them. Because then its time to pull out the death blow.

When instead of addressing your hypothetical analogies, which most of them won't, they instead pound their chest about their faith and then wag their fingers at you to accuse you of not having any, then its time to calmly and respectfully ask them to quote anywhere in the Bible where it says man can not affect the environment. Then ask them to quote anywhere in the Bible where it says man can not hasten the end of the earth. Remember, calmly and patiently.

Once they are done fuming and yelling and screaming you just calmly state that there is no where in the Bible where you will find such passages. And that the politician's stance on climate change is blatantly at odds with whichever hypothetical analogy you used previously. Then you bring it home by saying something to the effect that "We all agree that when" (earlier hypothetical) "happens then we should" earlier hypothetical "to make sure that our impact doesn't have terrible consequences to our environment, well addressing climate change is no different. If it makes sense to clean up an oil spill/be careful with nuclear waste/impose hunting seasons/prohibit hunting of animals on the endangered species list then it should be obvious to all that we should also address our impact on climate change. Just like there have been permanent reprecussions from oil spills/chernobyl/eradication of whole species of animals because we waited too long to act to protect the environment from man made harm, the same will be the case if we continue to put off addressing the effects of climate change which are now staring us in the face"

Now you don't want to get too preachy about it, but you do want to make those points. And here is how you bring it home. You profess your own faith, and you say that as you see it there is nothing contradictory about being a good Christian and also believing in climate change. On the one hand you have seen (insert beautiful scenes in nature that you have personally experienced, the more the better) which are evidence of God's amazing abilities. But on the other hand seeing those things give you even more determination to make sure that we do not ruin what God has provided for us. It is your solemn duty to as a Christian and as an American that we do not squander our God given natural resources, one of them being our climate which makes our world liveable.

What you have just done, in an understated manner, is basically accuse your right wing opponent of not being a good Christian because they don't care about the environment, but hey let the audience figure that part out.

Well, that is my political advice for the end of the year. Hopefully someone will see it somewhere and put it to good use. Or not.

Merry Christmas everyone, hope you have a great holiday season!

Taking Time Out To Salute Greg Sargent

I really enjoy Greg Sargent's Plum Line blog and even though I don't comment there as much anymore, I still check all of his posts out every day. The last few days I have been trying to avoid political commentary since Joe Lieberman successfully made all of Senate leadership and the Obama White House his bitch, but I was still compelled to read his posts because they are usually so informative.

Well today he has a post up that should be used as a bludgeon against all of the conventional wisdom promoting, concern trolling, Villager assholes who like to try to throw the netroots and the left under the bus without ever addressing their specific concerns.

It would really be nice if certain Beltway journalists could get it into their heads that the Senate bill’s critics on the left have actual substantive differences with the bill’s proponents, and are not motivated solely by “ideology,” whatever the hell that means.

Ronald Brownstein, for one, is actually trying to claim that Howard Dean opposes the bill because he’s a “wine track” Democrat who doesn’t lack insurance and hence has the luxury to indulge in ideological struggles.

Brownstein writes that Dean and the “digital left” are able to “casually dismiss” the bill because “they operate in an environment where so few people need to worry about access to insurance.” He adds that for these critics, the debate is “largely an abstraction” and merely a crusade to “crush Republicans and ideologically cleanse the Democrats.”

Brownstein doesn’t meaningfully respond to any of Dean’s substantive policy objections to the bill. If he did, he could no longer claim Dean’s critique is purely “ideological.”

Brownstein isn't likely to forget that ass kicking any time soon, nor should he. All I can hope is that Sargent hasn't burned any bridges that hinder his work going forward. It is so damn ironic that the better you do your job as a journalist the harder it is for you to advance in the Beltway. Better to just set up strawman and copy down Republican talking points and then find yourself a featured op-ed columnist.

Coburn and Vitter Are The Wile E Coyotes Of The Senate

If you are like me, you grew up on Loony Tunes cartoons. Some of my favorite episodes featured Wile E Coyote plotting against the Road Runner. This guy would get ACME packages every day with some new scheme to do great bodily harm to the Road Runner but then, without fail, the great scheme would end up, literally at times, blowing up in his face.

Well GOP Senators Tom Coburn and David Vitter thought they had this great idea of how to really stick it to the Democrats in the Senate. Like their wingnut Republican base, they were SURE the Democrats weren't really serious about the public option and that they would never in a gazillion years agree to be placed on the public option themselves. Mind you this is the kind of crap you could hear on right wing radio or read on right wing blogs all day every day, which should have been the first clue that it was a misguided belief.

But since these cats just KNEW this to be the case they figured the would put all those lefty librul Senators on the spot and put forth an amendment to the health care reform bill where by if the bill passes, every Senator has to be enrolled in the public option. I am sure they were behind closed doors just a skinning and a grinning and slapping each other on the back over how clever they were. There was just one problem. The Democrats actually liked their amendment.

Not only did they like the amendment, they actually wanted to become cosponsors. Evidently it had never occured to them that this could happen and so they didn't know what to do. They hid out for days and didn't take any phone calls from their colleagues on the other side of the aisle. But unfortunately they couldn't prevent Democrats from cosponsoring the amendment once it came to the floor.

You can just picture Coburn and Vitter opening up tiny umbrellas as freshman Democratic Senator Al Franken to the floor to become a co sponsor of their amendment and thus bringing down that big boulder meant for the Democrats right down on their heads.

HOT DAMN!!!

Man, if you just missed Susan Rice and Rachel Maddow going at it over Afghanistan then you missed perhaps the best debate over Afghanistan that has happened thus far. There was no yelling and no hyperbole but both of them brought the awesome sauce. I'll have it up as soon as its available.

I have to say, for the first time ever, I think somebody got the better of Maddow. Rice had an answer basically for every question and in the end I think Rachel herself damn near tapped out because she had nowhere else to take the interview.

Update: The video as promised.

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I honestly think that Ambassador Rice had Rachel so perplexed that she felt the need to ask her to stay just to try to pin her down again. She did in fact stay, but it didn't in fact work.

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Honestly I am still on the fence over the escalation in Afghanistan, but Susan Rice made a stronger case than anybody else I have heard. And don't get me wrong, Rachel asked all the right questions, questions that you won't hear many other officials or Congress persons asked, but Rice was just incredibly prepared to answer them all. Kudos to both of them for having such a civil yet sharp debate on a very complex issue.

Did A Light Bulb Come On?

My head is about to explode. After a week where we saw Harry Reid put forth a health care reform bill with a public option in it, then make a video urging people to contact their members of Congress to lobby for keeping the public option, now comes news that last night he guilted Republican Senators into dropping their hold on Surgeon General nominee Regina Benjamin and she was confirmed by a voice vote.

Now the truth of course is that with this H1N1 outbreat she should have been confirmed weeks if not months ago. But still man where the hell has THIS Harry Reid been and what will it take to keep him around?!

He is about to mess around and have me phone banking for him and ish if he keeps this up!!!

More, More , More

You know I meant to link to this Matt Taibbi post over the weekend where he characterized Congressman Alan Grayson as "going werewolf" on him but I never got around to it. Well it seems damned appropriate now as Grayson keeps raising the bar on punching Republicans in the mouth. Tonight he went on The Rachel Maddow Show and continued the onslaught.



It was also great that Rachel reminded everyone of the kind of wild and disrespectful shit that Republicans have said on the floor of the House during this health care reform fight. Congressman Grayson is absolutely right that what we need right now are Democrats with guts. I would hope that more Democrats now start showing the kind of spine that he is showing and take the damn gloves off when dealing with the GOP going forward.

Eff Your Apology!

George Stephanopolous had the nerve to post this video (which I fully endorse) of Congressman Alan Grayson hitting the Republicans on the floor of the House over their lack of a real health care reform plan, and then asking if the GOP deserves an apology.




Mind you, I don't remember George asking Sarah Palin or Chuck Grassley for an apology when they pulled that death panel crap out of their ass. Nor Virginia Foxx or Michele Bachmann for the numerous baseless attacks they have launched from the floor of the House. But let me quote from the Republican Bible.

"Isn't he just expressing his right to free speech? Why is the GOP trying to muzzle him? Our founding fathers gave us the freedom to speak our mind and Congressman Grayson should be allowed to do so. Why it is unamerican to suggest otherwise and it is the GOP who should apologize for demanding an apology!!!"

See also, Joe Wilson.

Its stuff like this that shows why George Stephanopolous is a loser. Just a few weeks back he had all but overtaken Meet the Press in Tee Vee ratings. In response to this he books Michele Malkin, Liz Cheney, and John McCain in the weeks since. Needless to say David Gregory is no longer concerned. But hey George you just keep on try to play the role of "centrist" and keep on being 2nd place your whole life.

My Takeaway From President Obama's Speech To The Joint Session Of Congress

I want to reiterate from last night how much I enjoyed President Obama's speech. I don't know if it was quote unquote "perfect" but if it wasn't it was pretty damned close. I am going to go through what I felt like were the most important parts of the speech and when the full video comes available I will post it.

Public Option:

I think the most highly anticipated part of the speech was about the public option. Liberals and progressives, myself included, were anxious after a week of unnamed sources spinning GOPolitico to see just where President Obama would come out on this issue or if he would even talk about it at all. Here is what I felt was the most important statement he made about the public option last night.

But I will not back down on the basic principle that if Americans can't find affordable coverage, we will provide you with a choice.

Most of the rest of what he said about a public option was just repeating things he had already said, but this statement was probably as close to a drawing of a line in the sand as we are going to get from President Obama, and honestly I am good with that. It puts some closure on the subject in that he is saying there is not going to be a way to get this bill passed without at least something that looks like a public option. And he didn't say anything about trying to put a trigger in it either. Republicans don't even want the weaksauce Co Op proposals because their health insurance masters won't allow them to vote for any competition anyway. The same really goes for ConservaDems too. So it wasn't a guarantee of a public option but it was pretty close of a guarantee of something at least resembling one.

The Call Outs:

I thought President Obama did a great job last night of not only fact checking the opponents of health care reform, but also putting them on the defensive. For some time many of us have felt like the response to these liars and fear mongers has been mishandled. Not only wasn't the White House and establishment Democrats prepared beforehand with their own fact checkers at the ready for the inevitable shit storm that came with the health care reform fight, it also appeared that they underestimated at times just how many people would believe some of this bullshit and overestimated the job the media itself would do to quell those concerns. Well Obama last night took the gloves off and took his time calling out not just the special interests but also the media for covering it without factchecking and on elected officials for starting and repeating some of the cannards. Then he took his time and went through the most popular bits of misinformation and not only rebutted them, he also called them what they are,lies. Let me repeat, he used that dreaded L word, LIES. All I can say is about damned time.

The Shout Outs:

President Obama also took out the time to point out and commend all of the men who came before him and tried to implement health care reform. He gave John Dingell and his dad a lot of love. He talked up Teddy Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson. And of course he ended with Teddy Kennedy. Reading from the letter that Kennedy had delivered to him only after his death was probably most powerful and poignant moment of the night, and if anything should rally the Democrats it should be the text of that letter.

"What we face," he wrote, "is above all a moral issue; at stake are not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country."

Talk about putting it all in perspective. This is INDEED a moral issue. Some how I don't think Jesus would leave his people to the mercy, or lack there of, of the free market. Just sayin.

The Master Strokes:

Republicans were put on the spot and probably taken a bit off guard by two caveats that President Obama inserted into the health care reform bill last night.

For those individuals and small businesses who still cannot afford the lower-priced insurance available in the exchange, we will provide tax credits, the size of which will be based on your need. And all insurance companies that want access to this new marketplace will have to abide by the consumer protections I already mentioned. This exchange will take effect in four years, which will give us time to do it right. In the meantime, for those Americans who can't get insurance today because they have pre-existing medical conditions, we will immediately offer low-cost coverage that will protect you against financial ruin if you become seriously ill. This was a good idea when Senator John McCain proposed it in the campaign, it's a good idea now, and we should embrace it.

What President Obama didn't say last night of course was that this was pretty much going to be a centerpiece of John McCain's play whereas now its just going to be a bridge to a public option. Still by incorporating part of the Republicans' candidate for President from last year Obama once again burnished his bipartisan cred.

Finally, many in this chamber - particularly on the Republican side of the aisle - have long insisted that reforming our medical malpractice laws can help bring down the cost of health care. I don't believe malpractice reform is a silver bullet, but I have talked to enough doctors to know that defensive medicine may be contributing to unnecessary costs. So I am proposing that we move forward on a range of ideas about how to put patient safety first and let doctors focus on practicing medicine. I know that the Bush Administration considered authorizing demonstration projects in individual states to test these issues. It's a good idea, and I am directing my Secretary of Health and Human Services to move forward on this initiative today.

*POP*

That is the sound of the GOP bubble bursting. Just about the only headway they have made in terms of convincing people that they really had a plan for health care reform is with this bogus notion that tort reform will help bring down costs. Its bullshit and has been tried in 5 states so far with no discernable effect. Still President Obama destroys them by incorporating a Bush administration proposal into his own to "study" the effect it will have on teh state level. You could tell that the Republican response by Congressman Charles Boustany to the speech was all set to push hard for tort reform and when that was taken away there wasn't much left. I think the response took less than 10 minutes and the majority of that time was spent with Boustany repeating the same lies that President Obama had just rebutted even further delegitimizing his party.

Personal Touch:

I thought President Obama did a great job of relating the problem to the overwhelming majority of Americans who already have health insurance and think they are safe and don't get why reform is so important.

But the problem that plagues the health care system is not just a problem of the uninsured. Those who do have insurance have never had less security and stability than they do today. More and more Americans worry that if you move, lose your job, or change your job, you'll lose your health insurance too. More and more Americans pay their premiums, only to discover that their insurance company has dropped their coverage when they get sick, or won't pay the full cost of care. It happens every day.

One man from Illinois lost his coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because his insurer found that he hadn't reported gallstones that he didn't even know about. They delayed his treatment, and he died because of it. Another woman from Texas was about to get a double mastectomy when her insurance company canceled her policy because she forgot to declare a case of acne. By the time she had her insurance reinstated, her breast cancer more than doubled in size. That is heart-breaking, it is wrong, and no one should be treated that way in the United States of America.

He also obliterated the "greatest health care system in the world" talking point.

Our collective failure to meet this challenge - year after year, decade after decade - has led us to a breaking point. Everyone understands the extraordinary hardships that are placed on the uninsured, who live every day just one accident or illness away from bankruptcy. These are not primarily people on welfare. These are middle-class Americans. Some can't get insurance on the job. Others are self-employed, and can't afford it, since buying insurance on your own costs you three times as much as the coverage you get from your employer. Many other Americans who are willing and able to pay are still denied insurance due to previous illnesses or conditions that insurance companies decide are too risky or expensive to cover.

We are the only advanced democracy on Earth - the only wealthy nation - that allows such hardships for millions of its people. There are now more than thirty million American citizens who cannot get coverage. In just a two year period, one in every three Americans goes without health care coverage at some point. And every day, 14,000 Americans lose their coverage. In other words, it can happen to anyone.

snip

Then there's the problem of rising costs. We spend one-and-a-half times more per person on health care than any other country, but we aren't any healthier for it. This is one of the reasons that insurance premiums have gone up three times faster than wages. It's why so many employers - especially small businesses - are forcing their employees to pay more for insurance, or are dropping their coverage entirely. It's why so many aspiring entrepreneurs cannot afford to open a business in the first place, and why American businesses that compete internationally - like our automakers - are at a huge disadvantage. And it's why those of us with health insurance are also paying a hidden and growing tax for those without it - about $1000 per year that pays for somebody else's emergency room and charitable care.

Finally, our health care system is placing an unsustainable burden on taxpayers. When health care costs grow at the rate they have, it puts greater pressure on programs like Medicare and Medicaid. If we do nothing to slow these skyrocketing costs, we will eventually be spending more on Medicare and Medicaid than every other government program combined. Put simply, our health care problem is our deficit problem. Nothing else even comes close.

I think any rational truly undecided person watching this speech would at least understand exactly why reform needs to happen now. He framed it perfectly.

Playing Themselves:

I already touched on the weaksauce response response speech from Boustany, but what probably harmed the GOP more than anything else last night was Congressman Joe Wilson yelling out and calling President Obama a liar when he said no illegal aliens would be covered by this plan. The problem with him doing that are legion. First of all no matter what has been happening at townhalls around the country, nobody wants to be associated with elected assholes who would yell out during such a dignified event. Second of all if there was one provision in the bill that has the least amount of gray area its the issue of illegal aliens being covered. There is specific language in the bills moving through Congress right now barring the practice and every single fact check has come back with a false for that cannard. And Wilson's outburst will only serve to make more people go and look it up and realize the Republicans aren't at all serious.


End Game:

Now the truth as we all know is that when it comes to votes our problem is as much about ConservaDems as it is about Republicans or even more so. But the problem has been that the Republicans, by throwing out all of these fearmongering cannards have been providing cover for ConservaDems by confusing the public so much that public opinion has been genuinely mixed on important issues. By wiping away all the bullshti that has been flung around by the GOP, President Obama is helping to move public opinion back in the right direction and thus put more pressure on the ConservaDems. If the left keeps up the fight and doesn't preemptively cave, you can expect the ConservaDems to start falling like Dominoes. They aren't really brave, they just usually are better at bluffing. We just have to hold our water for once and let them turn their cards over.

Great speech, now its time for us to get it done, just like he said.

Update: Video as promised.

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#STFUMACHINE In Action!

If you twitter you know what hashtags are. For those who don't know, on twitter when you are talking about a particular subject and you want people who aren't following you or just people who are also talking about the same subject to be able to find your tweet you signify it with a hashtag. A hashtag can pretty much be anything you want it to be as long as it begins with a "#".

Well Lawrence O'Donnell does such a good job of pushing back on right wing ideologues on MSNBC that a bunch of us created the #STFUMACHINE hashtag for when we want to talk about a new clip where he PWNS some hapless wingnut. Today, as the guest host for "Hardball", he took it to a whole new level interviewing Republican Congressman John Culberson of Texas. Not only did he call him out for hypocrisy in the debate on health care reform, he also flat out called him a liar several times, something that you hardly EVER see on cable news no matter how bad a guest is full of shit.

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I'm kinda hoping that they end up giving him the 10pm time slot. Olberman, Maddow and then LOD would be one helluva lineup!