Since Everyone's Talking About Kindle....

BREAKING COVER is available in that format. 

And I won't fuss at you for using the text to speech option, since I tend to agree with Neil Gaiman on this issue. 

Does the GOP Hate Farmers?

Again, Cafferty: 

JACK CAFFERTY, CNN ANCHOR: Wolf, the question this hour is, are earmarks a necessary evil or are they just plain evil?

S. in Michigan: "It depends on what ends up being called an earmark and who labels it as such. For the state or city getting the money, it is progress money or an investment. For others, it becomes pork, or an earmark, et cetera. For example, for Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, monitoring volcanoes is an earmark, but, for Alaskans, monitoring hurricanes may be earmarks. So, should we stop doing both?"

See, the people out there get it a lot better than the wingnuts and their media stooges think they do. John McCain, who like me has  apparently recently discovered Twitter, is Twittering like a madman with what he apparently thinks people will regard as "wasteful" items in the budget, such as: 

$650,000 for beaver management in North Carolina and Mississippi 

And 

How do you manage a beaver? 

(I'd take a swing at that last straight line, but Wonkette's Ana Marie Cox beat me to it). 

Apparently, Senator Straight Talk doesn't realize that the buck-toothed little bastards did a million bucks worth of damage to NC farms, timberland, and roads last year. Guess when you have eight houses, the problems of small farmers out in the sticks don't mean that much to you. 

In fact, a lot of the projects the born again budget hawks seem to be really exercised about are farm related. Over at Faux News, Hannity rails against  things like honeybee research and catfish genetics and "thanks to Tom Harkin, almost $2 million for swine odor and manure management. Because those pigs and their manure, they do smell pretty bad. We need to do something about that." 

Yeah, Sean, we kinda do, and if you'd ever get out of your comfy chair and get your smug, bloated  ass down to Eastern North Carolina or rural Iowa, you'd know why. You live in Duplin County, there ain't a damn thing funny about pig shit. 

 And as for honey bees,  as another Cafferty commenter pointed out: 

 $1.7 million for honeybee research. This seems silly at first glance. But when you recall that there appears to be something wiping out the honeybee population, and that these bees are necessary for crops, like apples, peaches, soybeans, pears, pumpkins, cucumbers, cherries, raspberries, blackberries, and strawberries, then it quickly starts looking like maybe we ought to be spending more money on this research.

It's true that Obama spoke the other night about cutting some farm subsidies. But as the Chicago Tribune points out: Obama's budget plan would eliminate direct payments for producers with high sales revenues. The subsidies are paid to farmers regardless of crop prices or crop yield.

On the other hand, invest any money on research aimed at  actually increasing yield or dealing with threats to actual crops, and it's "eamark! earmark! earmark!" 

Which raises the question: what does the GOP  have against farmers? 

It's kind of odd, given the farmer fetish the right wingers and their media stooges seem to have. After all, whenever they want to get the opinion of "real Americans" they always seem to find a farmer to interview. But I guess farmers are like the troops: the Right  loves them in the abstract, but for God's sake let's not spend any money on them. 

Congratulations, Kristy!!

We interrupt this blog's brutal repression of dissent to congratulate my good friend Kristy Kiernan on her Florida Book Award for the amazing* MATTERS OF FAITH:

"It received a bronze medal, and considering the other authors under consideration this year--including John Dufresne, Jeff Sharra, Brad Meltzer, Debra Dean, Tony D'Souza, & Bonnie Glover just to name a few-- I am truly honored."

Congratulations, Kristy!

*How amazing? I teared up at the end. That's pretty damn rare.

Good Question, Jack

From The Cafferty File: 

In the Republican response to President Obama’s speech last night, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal called the stimulus package “irresponsible”. He said it will grow government, increase taxes in the future and saddle future generations with debt.

“Who among us would ask our children for a loan, so we could spend money we do not have, on things we do not need? That is precisely what the Democrats in Congress just did,” said Jindal.

Interesting, after the last 8 years, it would seem that Republicans are hardly in a position to lecture anyone about fiscal responsibility. When President Bush took office in 2000, the national debt was about $5.7 trillion dollars, which after two wars and lots of other spending, is now approaching $11 trillion. President Bush ran up more debt for this country than all previous presidents combined.

Jindal acknowledged last night that in recent years, “our party got away from its principles.” No kidding.

Keep in mind, Jindal — who some see as a possible contender for his party’s presidential nominee in 2012 — is one of the Republican governors talking about rejecting stimulus funding for his state. Jindal says he plans to turn down $100 million because it would require his state to change its unemployment laws. I guess when you’re a wealthy state like Louisiana you don’t need no stinking stimulus money.

Here’s my question to you: Are the Republicans in any position to lecture President Obama on fiscal responsibility?

Obviously, Jack Cafferty is filled with nothing but hate and malice towards the poor innocent Republicans. How dare he try to silence Governor Jindal! Clearly, liberals are attempting to stifle dissent by the fiendish tactic of questioning the GOP. The liberals are the true fascists. 

John McCain Calls the Troops "Losers" (If You Use GOP Rules)

Remember when it was treasonous to say we were losing a war? Specifically, when Harry Reid said we were losing the war in Iraq, SC Senator Lindsey Graham went on Wolf Blitzer and charged that Reid called the troops "losers?" 

So I guess by GOP Rules, Honorable John McCain Who Was a POW just called U.S. troops "losers."

"When you aren't winning in this kind of war, you are losing. And, in Afghanistan today, we are not winning," McCain said in remarks delivered at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington-based think tank. 

I look forward to Senator Graham's scathung denunciation  of McCain's treason. Disgraceful. McCain used to be a POW, you know. 

Thoughts On the Obama Speech

What Obama was talking about last night was exactly what he ran on: alternative energy sources, health care reform, investment in education, tax cuts for working people, closing tax loopholes and tax cuts for people making over $250,000 a year.  He was always clear on this. Hell,  it was in nearly every ad he ran. 

The American people voted for it, and made Obama President by the largest margin in years. It was certainly a much larger margin than Dubbya could ever claim during the years when he governed as if he had a mandate. 

So the Republicans can bitch and moan and stomp their little feet all they want about what Obama said last night, but the fact is, they had your chance to try Governor Jindal's "America will pull out of this if the government just leaves everything alone" idea and it failed utterly.  The truly pathetic thing is that they just don't seem to get that it's the message the people rejected, not just the package it came in. They can trot out all the MILFs or all the minority spokesmen they can find, but it ain't the package, it's the product. 

 All the GOP really has left is saying "this won't work" and then doing everything in their power to make sure it doesn't.  Therefore, it's important to make sure that "everything in their power" doesn't add up to much.