When Rand Paul starting facing heat on his Gitmo stance from the far right-wing last year, his backtracking from his previous stances was immediate, continuing with his fancy Super Bowl ad on Sunday.
Rand Paul also decided that it would be politically advantageous to stop ripping Mitch McConnell at every opportunity as an example of what's wrong with the Republican Party, and start kissing his ass.
Now Rand Paul is facing heat in Eastern Kentucky for his previous attacks on our Pork friendly hypocrite-conservative representatives, particularly Hal Rogers. In fact, this lead to him being "not welcome" to the Pulaski County Republican dinner last week.
The question going forward: will Rand Paul once again make a calculated political "adjustment", or will he stand true to his principles and keep speaking out about all pork-barrel spending, no matter who is receiving it?
What say you, Paulbots?
Also, why has no one in the media asked Rand Paul if he applauds Obama's recent call to cut billions in federal subsidies to private companies? Mitch and Rogers and Chandler all denounced it, but I haven't heard Paul say one peep about these big government handouts being cut. Does Rand Paul favor this?
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Rand's next flip?
It's Satire!!!
God Bless you, Stephen Colbert, you magnificent bastard! While the mean librul-Commie media was busy calling Palin a giant hypocrite, true conservatives like Colbert had the guts to stand up for her keen eye for humor.
| The Colbert Report | Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Sarah Palin Uses a Hand-O-Prompter | ||||
| ||||
Anybody with Blackberries having trouble with B&P?
I hear that Blackberry users are having trouble with the site lately. That true for anybody else? And if so, how the hell does one solve such a problem? Inquiring minds want to know.
Share on FacebookQuit ruining our fun, Kim Geveden
It's been five days since Rasmussen's new poll came out showing Dan Mongiardo down by double figures to both Rand Paul and Trey Grayson, with pretty lame favorables, to boot.
And still, not a word from campaign spokesperson Kim Geveden.
One of the joys of the past year has been ole Kimbal's hilarious spin of bad news (his poor December numbers were because of snow), so he needs to get his statement/spin/excuse out there pronto and quit denying us all The Funny already...
UPDATE: perhaps they're running an internal poll as we speak?
Quick Hits: Yay! Snow Day! Edition
I've heard so many sirens today. I hope everyone is safe & sound!
- I'm a Steelers fan, but I'm thrilled that the Saints won. And have I ever told you just how much I love that Scott Fujita?
- Convicted murderer Scott Roeder may face federal charges in the assassination of Dr. George Tiller. Investigators are looking into violations of the FACE Act, as well as if Roeder had any accomplices in the murder.
- Some would-be kidnappers request U.S. government assistance while they are jailed.
- Some legislators want to keep Kentuckians poor.
- Fucking David Boswell is at it again.
- How is this for awesome? Reality-based education! Kentucky ranks 5th in poverty nationwide, 22nd in teen pregnancy rates, and is among the highest in cervical cancer deaths.
- Anyone got any recs for a new camera? Mine bit the dust shortly after the New Year, and this pretty snowfall has me thinking about getting a new one.
You thought YOUR grade school experience was boring!
Well now, today's Kentucky children may have to spend an hour a day on bible study:
"Three Democratic state senators are pushing a proposal to give public schools the option of teaching the Bible as an elective social studies course.Mercifully, Kentucky is at least not at the forefront on this particular fundamentalist nutty-fest:
The class would “teach students knowledge of biblical content, characters, poetry and narratives that are prerequisites to understanding contemporary society and culture,” said Democratic Sen. David Boswell of Owensboro."
According to the Bible Literacy Project, more than 350 public schools in 43 states have implemented courses on the Bible this school year. More than 50 are in Texas.Yeah. Share on Facebook
In 2007, Texas lawmakers passed a law requiring public high schools to teach Bible literacy beginning this year. The law did not call for specific guidelines from the state education department and left many educators confused.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Pot o' Gold in CentrePointe!
Lexington's civic hero is opening up his Fancy Unicorn Park to the city on St. Patrick's Day!
Call it the luck of the Irish. The festival portion of the 2010 Alltech-Lexington St. Patrick's Parade and Festival will take place in the very center of Lexington - CentrePointe, that is; the pasture-like city block in the middle of downtown Lexington that is the would-be site of a high rise by that name.Yes, as you can see, the second piece of great news here is that failed businessman Dudley Webb will make the active construction site available during the Horsey Games. Cause we all KNOW that CentrePointe will be in the construction phase at that point. Mmm hmm.
"The Irish ask, they receive," chuckled CentrePointe developer Dudley Webb. "It's still our intent to make it available during the (World Equestrian) Games," he said. "Basically we've been sitting on it until then. But since it's a joint venture with the city, that made it somewhat different from some private enterprise coming in and asking."
I wonder how much the city had to pay Dudley? Oh, he prolly let us use it for free, since he's such a kind, giving man. Share on Facebook
Crosstab fun from the Rasmussen poll
A further look at last week's Rasumussen poll on the US Senate race in KY that was good for Paul and Grayson, improved for Conway, and god awful for Dan Mongiardo.
Total favorable/unfavorable (Jan #'s)
Paul- 54/26 (57/25)
Grayson- 61/18 (57/21)
Conway- 47/32 (46/36)
Mongiardo- 45/43 (44/44)
Not much movement outside of margin of error, though Grayson did go +7 while Paul went -4.
The Gender gap is huge, as men love Republicans and women love Conway (women split on Lt. Dan). Mongiardo loses men 30%, while Conway loses by mid 20's. Among women, Conway wins by 7 and 11, while Mongiardo is even.
fav/unfav among men (women)
Grayson- 69/17 (54/20)
Paul- 67/25 (45/25)
Conway- 46/41 (46/25)
Mongiardo- 41/49 (48/37)
Nothing particularly noteworthy among age groups, besides the fact that the candidate with the highest total unfavorables among 18-29 is Rand Paul. (0% found Lt. Dan "very favorable")
In primary news, here's how each fare among their own party...
Grayson- 72/10
Paul- 67/17
Conway- 61/21
Mongiardo- 66/23
... and independents
Grayson- 69/10
Paul- 68/19
Conway- 41/27
Mongiardo- 28/53 (yikes!)
Here they are among liberals, conservatives and moderates
Grayson- 44/26 , 70/12 , 54/26
Paul- 33/34 , 67/16 , 46/36
Conway- 61/5, 34/46, 65/24
Mongiardo- 72/8 , 28/59 , 58/38
SUSA has been quiet, they need to rock out another one soon...
Newberry already starting his whisper campaign against Jim Gray?
I just got word that Jim Newberry's pollster Peter Hart ran a phone survey this weekend in Lexington.
Fair enough. But one of the questions asked whether they thought Jim Gray has "personal issues" that would prevent him from becoming mayor.
Remember, Jim Newberry is the same man who outed Ernesto Scorsone when he ran against him in 1998, along with favoring the return of sodomy laws, which he said he didn't regret as late as 2006.
Looks like Newberry is going down this road again. I wonder how his gay campaign workers feel about this...
Rand Paul thinks the UN will take our guns
Oh, it's true. Among the legislation he will support from his recent mailer:
H.R. 1146, which would end our membership in the United Nations, protecting us from their attempts to tax our guns or disarm us entirely.I'm sure that's just the kind of insane delusional paranoia that will help in the Republican primary. Though I'm not sure about this:
How many supposed pro-gun politicians voted for the Patriot Act, which gives the government the right to search your home without a warrant, when you’re not home, leave listening devices, and use any and all information to prosecute you on any charge, regardless of their original reason for the search?Who dat Libertarian? Share on Facebook
Sunday, February 7, 2010
A bottomless well of stupid
Well, there's the speech, of course, but the real magic happened when Sarah Palin got her pre-scripted question about what her top 3 issues are.
That's a REEEEEALLY hard question, so she of course did what any Real American would do:
As truly awesome as that is, I think the fact that she scrapped her third one and went with...
"It would be wise of us to seek some divine intervention in this country so that we can be safe and secure and prosperous again."... is my favorite part.
UPDATE: oh, and there's the Bailout hypocrisy, of course:
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Fun with Fake Polls
BREAKING! Some dude named Bill Johnson has overtaken Rand Paul in the polls! Check out some dude named Bill Johnson's press release:
JOHNSON OVERTAKES PAUL IN THE POLLSI suppose it's not even worth explaining to everyone why these are completely made up numbers and hilariously awful. But it appears that "Persistence Consulting" has a short but impressive history of pulling fake numbers directly out of their ass.
ELKTON — The Bill Johnson for U.S. Senate campaign received the following poll results. Shamrock Polling conducted the statewide poll for an undisclosed client. Questions regarding the poll can be directed to Persistence Consulting (persistenceconsulting@gmail.com). The Johnson for U.S. Senate campaign did not pay for or participate in this poll. The results are consistent with internal polling done by the campaign.
We asked 1,257 likely republican voters the following questions:
“Who are you planning on voting for US Senate in the republican primary on May 18th?”
Trey Grayson 27%
Bill Johnson 23%
Rand Paul 21%
Undecided 29%
We then asked are you strongly, moderately, or leaning towards your candidate?
Rand Paul 7% 27% 66%
Bill Johnson 72% 21% 7%
Trey Grayson 52% 14% 34%
Margin of Error 4.5%
Of course, you shouldn't believe those lies, because as Alan Keyes goes, so goes Kentucky. Share on Facebook
Friday, February 5, 2010
How dare I call the Teabaggers racist
The opening night speaker at the Tea Party convention suggested a return to a "literacy test" to protect America from presidents like Obama -- a segregation-era method employed by southern US states to keep blacks from voting.UPDATE: Further proof truth about Teabaggers from the comments: Tancredo voted for the bailout. Snort. Share on Facebook
In his speech Thursday to attendees, former Republican congressman Tom Tancredo invoked the loaded pre-civil rights era buzzword, saying that President Barack Obama was elected because "we do not have a civics, literacy test before people can vote in this country."
Friends of Rand Paul
Check out Rand's good friend Alex Jones talk with his pops about the Underwear Bomber Conspiracy, and... other things. You'll want to stick around for the end, trust me.
Calm Down, People
How in G-d's name did we come to a place politically that Firedoglake and Hot Air were on the same page?
(By the way, that's not wistful liberal "sigh Obama is letting us down" talk-- that's two barrels of GFY for the firebaggers and teabaggers both.)
Since both arguments are accepting the same premise (people are leaving the workforce in record numbers, and that's why the rate fell) and asking their audience to look beyond the most easily understood data point, I feel like it's not out of line to do some boring economic bullet points.
1) It's important to note that BLS takes in a whole mess of data, and then publishes it; there's no making sure it all syncs up, because, well, data doesn't work that way. Case in point: the number most frequently cited by the ZOMGFAIL crowd today was that another 200,000 jobs were lost last month. And indeed that's the case...if you ask the employers. But BLS doesn't just ask the employers-- it asks households, as well, and over 540,000 Americans reported that they had found work (right side, third item). Not stopped looking-- found.
2) Job losses are becoming less widespread; BLS uses something called the diffusion index to measure how widespread job losses (or gains) are; 50 is the median, and the further away from it on a scale of 100, the more diverse those losses (or gains) are. In January, the diffusion index was 46.8; in January, it was 41.3. Industries adding workers are still being drowned out by those that are shedding them...but not by as much as they once were.
3) Average hours worked (a precursor to hiring) increased, the number of temporary workers increased, and the number of people working part-time for economic reasons decreased. And the broadest measure of unemployment (the U6, which includes some but not all discouraged workers) fell from 17.3 to 16.5.
Look, the stimulus clearly needed to be bigger. The President, and the House and Senate leadership, have real responsibility for just how bad things have gotten, because the bill was 2/3 of the size it needed to be, and half of what we got was lost to tax cuts, which are great if you're working...and don't make any difference if you're not. But you can't argue that things aren't getting better. And this will be true next month, too, when unemployment regresses to the mean.
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