Cue The Clown Music

I just love watching Congressman Mike Pence's idiotic responses when confronted with even the most softball of pushback, this time from Carlos Watson. Its apparent that Watson could have and probably should have just called him a liar and been done with it. But he just corrected the record ever so gently and there goes Mike Pence's head bouncing like a pez dispenser.

Does anybody trust this guy?





*Accidentally embedded the wrong video. Apologies.

Here's Your Sign

Didn't President Obama talk about these kind of uninformed and misguided people yesterday during his townhall? Who knew he meant Republican leaders in Congress.



In other news, evidently Republican is a supporter of legalizing drugs because he seems to be smoking some kush.

Mike Pence PWNED On Stimulus Criticism

I guess the one small saving grace for Mike Pence is that even with all of his unfounded and irrational criticism of the stimulus bill, he didn't put us a ridiculous YouTube of him searching for jobs with a bloodhound.

From the Evansville Courier and Press of Indiana

INDIANAPOLIS — More than 2,400 people are now at work on federal stimulus-funded roadway projects in Indiana, according to a state report being released today.

Covering 83 projects and listing a total payroll of $2.8 million, the Indiana Department of Transportation report details only a small fraction of the hundreds of projects so far selected for funding using the $440 million the agency received under the American Relief and Recovery Act.

Economists say it's too early to tell whether the long-term value of President Barack Obama's economy-boosting effort will justify its $787 billion cost. But construction executives say stimulus-funded projects certainly have created jobs and spared layoffs within the industry.

"Things were slowing down, and the stimulus filled in the gap," said Tim Mahoney, an economics professor at the University of Southern Indiana.

"It has kept people employed that would be laid off."

It's tough to tell exactly how many new jobs are being created or old jobs are being saved by stimulus projects that range from repaving roads to laying new ones.

"On all these stimulus programs, the anticipation is greater than the reality in terms of getting the money spent and getting the jobs created," Mahoney said. "Just by the nature of a public works program, it just takes awhile to get geared up."

Nonetheless, INDOT has been among the quickest state transportation agencies in getting projects under way.

The nature of construction industry work already causes a great degree of fluctuation in employment numbers.

What's clear is that the stimulus projects have boosted an industry otherwise floundering in Indiana.

The work is badly needed. According to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports, Indiana's construction industry has lost nearly 24,000 jobs over the last two years.

"In general, it definitely puts our people to work," said Pete Bjorkman, the chief estimator for Evansville-based J.H. Rudolph.

"We've been struggling here just due to the recent economic woes we've been through."

Bjorkman said the company has a core group of workers that are among the first called to begin projects each year. The stimulus, he said, has allowed the company to rehire those core workers.

He said in the construction industry, a better measurement is how many hours are available for everyone from truck drivers to project managers.

"Our crews are going to be working more hours and more days because of this ...," he said. "It is creating more crew hours for our people that wouldn't have been there before."

Mahoney said it's early, but signs are beginning to point to slow progress, in part thanks to the stimulus package.

"I think the markets are starting to look and say 'OK, there are some of these projects that are starting to pay off,'" he said. "But the private sector is still coming back slowly. Public dollars mean an awful lot to that (construction) industry."

I wonder if Pence will go home during August break and tell these people that they are all failures and that they don't count.

Some how I doubt it.

(h/t Greg Sargent)

Every Once In A While...

This is what pisses me off about Chris Matthews. About once or twice a week he can lay the smackdown as he did today to Mike Pence like nobody's business. But then the rest of the time he is damn near a blithering idiot. I swear man every time I am close to totally writing him off he will pull an interview like this out of his ass. The way he exposed Congressman Pence as a fundamentalist bible thumping, anti-science, anti-progress, anti green energy, wingnutastic buffoon was just masterful. By the end of the interview you just knew that Pence was going to whup whomever booked him on that show's ass big time. Dammit Tweety can we get this out of you on more of a regular basis? Sheesh.

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Sometimes You Have To Remind These Fools

Elections have consequences.

Mike Pence Is A Supreme Parser

Someone please explain to me how if President Obama's economic policies fail, the country won't by extention fail. Seriously, I am willing to be convinced.

Scarborough Unintentionally PWNS House Republicans

That's what happens when you bring a fact checker on your show and you are used to repeating Republican talking points. Politifact's Bill Adair was more than happy to set the record straight for the whole cast of Morning Joe about the Republican bullshit talking point about the "Pelosi field mice" provision that was supposedly in the stimulus bill. To prove that it was true Scar had a video of Republican Mike Pence making the claim on a cable news show. If you want to hear something funny just fast forward to 4:00 when Adair announces that its false. You can hear those idiots gasping and Mika screaming "WHAT?!".

But it gets better because Scarborough goes on to give a long ass convoluted story from one of his "inside sources" about how it was really true but the Democrats just used a good cover specifically for Pelosi. It looked like it hurt his heart when Adair told him he was wrong again. Notice the music started play AS SOON as Adair shot him down the second time. I have a feeling we won't be seeing Bill Adair on Morning Joe again for quite awhile.

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P.S. How stupid does Mika sound at the end still saying that the provision shouldn't be in the bill? I am now convinced that she HAD to be adopted.

(h/t Benen)