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Gingrich Tells Gay to Support Obama

Scott Arnold, an adjunct professor of writing at William Penn University in Iowa, wanted to know how Newt Gingrich would represent him as president, so he went to one of Gingrich’s campaign events at the Smokey Row coffee house in Oskaloosa. Arnold says he had an open mind, but Gingrich’s response surprised him.

Gingrich told him to support Obama, that he didn’t want his support.

Gingrich recently said in Iowa “I believe that marriage is between a man and woman. It has been for all of recorded history and I think this is a temporary aberration that will dissipate. I think that it is just fundamentally goes against everything we know.” In a letter to The Family Leader this month he said he supported a constitutional amendment that would deny marriage rights to same-sex couples.

After three marriages and admitting adultery, you would think that Gingrich would just shut up about marriage. You know, “let he who is without sin” and all that.

Ironically, Gingrich has a half sister who is a married lesbian and a LGBT rights activist.

UPDATE: Meanwhile, the military seems to be adjusting just fine to the repeal of don’t-ask-don’t-tell. I wish I could say the same thing about the Republican party.

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All He Wants for Christmas…


© derf

Please Santa, make it so!

UPDATE: Matt Damon slams Obama, says “One Term President With Some Balls Would Have Been Better”.

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Naughty or Nice?


© Mike Stanfill

Can you be both naughty and nice?

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Late Night Political Humor

“Rick Perry said there were eight supreme court justices instead of nine. But, in his defense, he did know there were only three judges on ‘Dancing With the Stars.'” – Jay Leno

“Perry also said the Obama administration sent $500 million to the ‘country of Solyndra.’ If an energy company was a country, don’t you think we would’ve invaded it by now?” – Jay Leno

“Rick Perry was interviewed in a library, and they placed special books that were kind of mean: “Runnin’ Texas for Dummies,” “Supreme Court for Dummies,” “Dumb & Dumber for Dummies.” – Jay Leno

“Newt Gingrich released a statement promising he would not cheat on his wife. Even better, he said he wouldn’t cheat on his next wife either, or the one after that.” – Conan O’Brien

“Mitt Romney says if he is president he will create 11 million new jobs. Sure, they’ll all be in China, but a job is a job, ladies and gentlemen.” – David Letterman

“Michele Bachmann is picking running mates. That’s like the Colts picking out Super Bowl rings.” – David Letterman

“Donald trump announced this morning that he will not serve as moderator at the GOP debate that was scheduled for Dec. 27. He said he had to cancel the debate because he may want to run as an independent candidate — and because only two of the GOP candidates decided to show up.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“This guy is something. He’s committed to the debate, he’s not committed; he’s running, he’s not running; he’s in, he’s out. What does he think this is, one of his marriages?” – Jimmy Kimmel

“An Alabama anti-gay politician has been leading a secret life as a sperm donor for lesbian couples. This is a classic case of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. But he was making money hand over fist.” – Jay Leno

“Iran is now in possession of an American drone. When I heard that I thought, ‘Oh, my god, they captured Joe Biden?'” – Jay Leno

“Yesterday, someone threw a pair of shoes at Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Iran has captured the shoes and is studying their technology.” – Conan O’Brien

“Pope Benedict announced he’s going to visit Mexico sometime next year. He will bring with him a message of hope for all the Mexican people. And then he will come to Los Angeles and give the same message to even more Mexican people.” – Jay Leno

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The War on Christmas Cartoons


© Ruben Bolling

Merry Christmas from Political Irony!

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Late Night Political Humor

“Rick Perry doesn’t have an Achilles heel. He has an Achilles head.” – Daily Show correspondent John Oliver

“It was so cold in Texas that death row inmates are cutting in line just to get the electric chair.” – Jay Leno

“Mitt Romney tried to make a $10,000 bet with Rick Perry during a presidential debate. Well, who says the Republicans are rich snobs out of touch with the common man?” – Jay Leno

“Many voters feel that Mitt Romney is out of touch with real Americans after he tried to make a bet with Rick Perry for $10,000. When asked to comment, Mitt said, ‘I’m sorry, but that’s all I had in my pocket at the time.'” – Conan O’Brien

“Ron Paul looks like one of your old relatives. The guy that keeps sending you the blank emails.” – David Letterman

“Iran announced it will not return the American spy drone it recently captured. Yeah, they’re also refusing to return the Limp Bizkit album they borrowed 10 years ago.” – Conan O’Brien

“A lot of packages this time of year get lost. That’s awful. You’re promised something great. You wait and wait and wait. But nothing good ever comes. It’s like voting for Obama.” – Craig Ferguson

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The Year In Crazy, Part 1


© Tom Tomorrow

What can I say? Tom Tomorrow reminds us of the truly important events that defined 2011 as one of the craziest years ever.

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Let He Who Is Without Sin, Download The First File

Everyone downloads copyrighted files. Everyone.

A new website tracks what files have been downloaded using bittorrent by you (or any other user, by IP address). Just click on the link, and it will tell you if you (or someone at the same IP address) has been naughty.

Now the hypocritical part. The same data has been used to determine that major media companies are pretty much all guilty of downloading copyrighted materials, including Universal, Sony, and Fox. Even Homeland Security, the US department whose job includes seizing domain names to crack down on online piracy. Yup, they are downloading files illegally.

I guess this means that if SOPA passes, it will shut down the websites of all the major media companies and of Homeland Security?

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Late Night Political Humor

“More good news for Newt Gingrich. Earlier today, he was endorsed by the voices in Glenn Beck’s head.” – David Letterman

“You know the difference between God and Newt Gingrich? God doesn’t think he’s Newt Gingrich.” – Jay Leno

“Newt has a holiday book out. ‘The Newt Before Christmas.'” – David Letterman

“Only two candidates have agreed to attend Donald Trump’s Iowa debate. So Trump’s either going to cancel or round out the field with Meat Loaf, Omarosa and Gary Busey.” – Jay Leno

“Illinois is the only state where the present governor rides around in a car whose license plate was made by a previous governor.” – David Letterman

“A global study released just today found that happiness does not increase with the rate of economic growth. To which President Obama said, ‘See? That’s what I’ve been trying to tell people.'” – Jay Leno

“President Obama said he is ‘very concerned’ about the European debt crisis. While Joe Biden said he is quote ‘very concerned’ about the drop in Nickelodeon’s ratings.” – Jimmy Fallon

“President Obama celebrated Hanukkah at the White House last night. He lit the menorah, and then Vice President Joe Biden came in sang happy birthday, and blew out all of the candles.” –Jay Leno

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Too Stupid

I am often distressed by the level of discourse in this country, especially the willingness to some people (especially politicians) to dismiss scientific results and expert opinions. Especially when they do this to push an agenda.

But this is reaching new heights, as internet expert Cory Doctorow reports in BoingBoing:

If you followed my tweets from the markup session for SOPA in the House of Representatives, you know how frustrating it was to watch: you had these lawmakers blithely dismissing the security concerns of the likes of Vint Cerf, saying things like, “I’m no technology nerd, but I don’t believe it.” In other words: “I’m a perfect ignoramus, but I find it convenient to disregard the world’s foremost experts.” Another congressman from Florida kept saying things like “No one can explain to me how this bill harms political debate or academic freedom.”

I haven’t said much about SOPA in this blog, mainly because I was hoping that it was so broad and so damaging to free speech that it either wouldn’t be enacted or would instantly be found unconstitutional. But given the ridiculous amount of power organizations like the RIAA and MPAA exert over Congress, I guess it should be no surprise that politicians are trying to pull a fast one and sneak in approval of this horrible law. And given that out current Supreme Court thinks that corporations are people with important free speech rights, systemic censorship of the Internet might just become a reality.

Would rights-holding monopolies abuse the powers given to them by SOPA? Well, they already are abusing those powers, even though ironically they haven’t yet been given them. Friday, Universal Music Group lawyers asserted that they have the right to have YouTube remove any video they don’t like, even if UMG owns no rights to it.

That’s what SOPA does — gives big corporations the right to censor almost anything on the Internet, often with no recourse or judicial review for the person censored. If the idea of corporations controlling what you can say or write bothers you, write to your Congresscritters and express your displeasure.

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Why Do They Call It a “Straw” Poll?


© Keith Knight

Because they are totally tubular?

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Late Night Political Humor

“Here’s what you and your minions don’t understand, [Bill] O’Reilly. Your hell doesn’t scare me. I make my living watching Fox News eight hours a day. I’m already in hell.” – Jon Stewart

“The White House held its annual Hanukkah celebration. It was a traditional Jewish ceremony, except for the part where it was hosted by a black man from Hawaii.” – Conan O’Brien

“Vice President Joe Biden just mailed his family Christmas card which is signed with his dog Champ’s paw print. The weird thing is, Biden actually does that with all his important documents.” – Jimmy Fallon

“Rod Blagojevich, former governor of Illinois, stood under some mistletoe earlier today and kissed 14 years goodbye.” – David Letterman

“While speaking to a prominent group of Jewish Republicans, Newt Gingrich promised to support Israel, not give in to the Palestinians, and even promised his next wife would be Jewish.” – Jay Leno

“Perry gave three reasons for declining the Iowa debate later this month. First, he needs to concentrate on campaigning. Second, there are already two other debates scheduled for that week. And he forgot the third one.” – Jimmy Kimmel

“I’m not sure Rick Perry got it. Like when they asked him what he’d do about the West Bank, he said he’d bring back free checking.” – Jay Leno

“According to CNBC, a number of Americans are moving overseas looking for job opportunities. Now people over there will know what it feels like to lose their American jobs to foreigners.” – Jay Leno

“According to a recent report by CBS sports, the average Major League baseball player now makes just over $3 million a year. Or as the Yankees like to call them, ‘the 99 percenters.'” – Jay Leno

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Artificial Scarcity

The term “artificial scarcity” generally refers to a tactic where the supply of something is restricted so that prices go up (or remain high). Examples of this are diamonds (which are relatively plentiful and can be manufactured artificially at low cost), and health care (in the US the AMA keeps the number of doctors low so that their incomes can stay high, rather than just letting supply and demand set costs).

But this is the first time I’ve seen someone use abundance to drive up prices. Ausgrid, one of the largest providers of electricity in Australia, has notified government regulators that prices will have to rise. Why? Because rooftop solar panels have become so popular in Australia that there is too much electricity!

Remember when promoters promised that nuclear power would produce so much electricity that it would be “too cheap to meter“? Well, if solar power is producing too much electricity, it does make you wonder if we currently actually do have an artificial scarcity of energy in the world to keep energy companies (including oil and power) to keep prices artificially high.

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RIP Christopher Hitchens

Christopher Hitchens died yesterday after a fight with cancer, which he himself blamed on his own bad habits of smoking and drinking.

What I will remember most about Hitchens are his scathing zingers, thrown equally across the political spectrum. For example:

On Sarah Palin: “She’s got no charisma of any kind [but] I can imagine her being mildly useful to a low-rank porn director.” — The Leonard Lopate Show, June 2010

On Barack Obama: “The political rhetoric of Obamaism, alas, is even more bloviating at times than Camelot was.” — Slate, 2009

On Hypocrites in general: “Nothing optional—from homosexuality to adultery—is ever made punishable unless those who do the prohibiting (and exact the fierce punishment) have a repressed desire to participate.” — from his book “God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything”, 2007

On George W Bush: “[George W. Bush] is lucky to be governor of Texas. He is unusually incurious, abnormally unintelligent, amazingly inarticulate, fantastically uncultured, extraordinarily uneducated, and apparently quite proud of all these things.” — Hardball with Chris Matthews, 2000

On Progressives: “One of the many problems with the American left, and indeed of the American left, has been its image and self-image as something rather too solemn, mirthless, herbivorous, dull, monochrome, righteous, and boring.” — Frontpagemag.com, 2004

On the Media: “Only the aspirants for president are fool enough to believe what they read in the newspapers.” — C-SPAN, March 1988

and perhaps most famously:

On Jerry Falwell: “If [Falwell] had been given an enema, he could have been buried in a matchbox.” — CSPAN, April 2009

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Don’t Do This

Jon Stewart has a serious talk with Republican primary voters:

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