Monday Open Thread
Welcome to your Monday open thread. Time to spend another week talking about this bogus, unnecessary debt ceiling crisis. I promise this thread will be 100% debt crisis free (at least the part I contol).
I think the following statement by Bill O’Reilly tells you more about him than anything else.
Commenting on the Institute of Medicine’s recommendation that contraception should be considered a preventative service and co-pays for contraception should be eliminated, Bill O’Reilly claimed: “Many women who get pregnant are blasted out of their minds when they have sex. They’re not going to use birth control anyway.”
This tells me that O’Reilly doesn’t understand how birth control works. Also I don’t want to think about how O’Reilly’s children were conceived.
Do you remember the story early this year about Rep. David Wu and his very odd behavior? His problems are a lot worse than that now – he’s accused of a sexual assault.
A distraught young woman called U.S. Rep. David Wu’s Portland office this spring, accusing him of an unwanted sexual encounter, according to multiple sources.
When confronted, the Oregon Democrat acknowledged a sexual encounter to his senior aides but insisted it was consensual, the sources said.
The woman is the daughter of a longtime friend and campaign donor. She apparently did not contact police at the time.
This is a horrible story. Rep. Wu needs to resign. He needs to focus on his criminal case and his known mental health problems.
Follow-up: Rep. Wu now says he won’t seek re-election, but won’t resign. We will see how long this lasts.
Tags: Open Thread
Craig Ferguson:
I was worried after having been burn this year by “Sucker Punch” but “Captain America” is a hell of a good movie. I will not say anything about Tommy Lee Jones, because once people start talking about Tommy Lee Jones, everybody is going to be sick to death of hearing about Tommy Lee Jones. The movie even made the over-the-top villain make perfect sense in the universe of the film.
Drugs going off-patent:
I wonder how much of the runup in health care costs, which has corrupted our politics lately, was driven by the patents on these drugs and the Republican insistence on no drug price negotiation.
Look for a flood of new over-the-top drug commercials as pharma desperately tries to switch patients and doctors to new patented drugs instead.
Also, good news for health care costs, maybe:
“Look for a flood of new over-the-top drug commercials as pharma desperately tries to switch patients and doctors to new patented drugs instead.”
I find most drug commercials highly entertaining, but wonder how effective it is marketing to hypochondriacs, who then presumably badger their doctors into prescribing the drug. Sometimes it’s hard to determine exactly what they are supposed to treat. The amusing part is the disclaimers for potential side effects.
Why is John Carney saying that Democrats are “jockeying for partisan position?”
I mean, WTF!?
Has it ever been more clear that Republicans are fucking everything up for partisan advantage? It is their only card. “Fuck shit up” it is their motto and their mantra, and yet we have chicken shit Democrats in the Congress like Carney who have always lump Democrats in with Republics.
JESUS CHRIST JOHN! Get your shit together.
http://www.contentdelaware.org/?page_id=42
From Bernie Sanders’ website. Fed provided 16 trillion in secret loans to bailout banks and business’ both in America and abroad.
http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=9e2a4ea8-6e73-4be2-a753-62060dcbb3c3
The first top-to-bottom audit of the Federal Reserve uncovered eye-popping new details about how the U.S. provided a whopping $16 trillion in secret loans to bail out American and foreign banks and businesses during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
“As a result of this audit, we now know that the Federal Reserve provided more than $16 trillion in total financial assistance to some of the largest financial institutions and corporations in the United States and throughout the world,” said Sanders. “This is a clear case of socialism for the rich and rugged, you’re-on-your-own individualism for everyone else.”
When my daughter was much younger she and I were watching TV and a pharma ad came on, with upbeat music and a woman smiling and playing with some kids in a sunny field. My daughter had no idea what the commercial was for, or even that it was for a drug, but she asked me “Daddy, can we buy that??”
Good Lord.
What’s worse is that the interviewer got John Carney to talk out of both sides of his mouth in that 2 minute segment. So on the one hand we’ve got *both sides* jockeying for position and then on the other hand, he agrees with David Brooks that the Republicans are walking away from a decent deal.
You know you’re in trouble when the people supposedly on your side can’t keep track of the details.
At Carney’s DelTech workshop (with Concord Coalition) he repeated the innumeracy that the Social Security retirement age was set to 65 because that was the average lifespan back then.
Delaware is one of the bluest of blue states where it would be nearly impossible to defeat an incumbent Dem, and yet we are stuck with chicken shit Democratic politicians who live in sheer panic of being perceived as a Democrat.
This kind of Tom Carper bullshit from Carney makes me appreciate Chris Coons all the more.
If Cassandra thinks there’s a problem then I definitely have to go watch the video.
It does not simply betray Democrats to say “…the various parties are jockeying for political partisan position” and “all the different sides” have caused the problem.
It is an affront to the truth. Hearing this clip, you have to wonder if John Carney has a firm grip on reality.
It would be hard to imagine a less inspiring first term in Congress than John Carney’s. He makes Mike Castle look like Captain Courageous.
O’Reilly claimed: “Many women who get pregnant are blasted out of their minds when they have sex. ”
Or high on Christ, take your pick.
And thinking about the implications of the Carney clip, it would be worthwhile to ask him about the contours of the Boehner plan (supposedly) forthcoming. With Carper foolishly supporting a short term debt increase limit, it’s time to keep a close watch on his boy Carney here.
“It does not simply betray Democrats to say “…the various parties are jockeying for political partisan position” and “all the different sides” have caused the problem.
It is an affront to the truth.”
I heard Obama say the same thing today on a clip on TV. Perhaps it’s the talking point of the day.
I just called Carney’s office and left a message for his Communications Director, James Allen. Basically asking is Congressman Carney stood by his observation that Both sides are equally responsible for the impasse and are guilty of political posturing and if he agrees with the PResident6 that the solution should be long term – or favors John Boehner’s call for a short term solution.
Carney is in over his head. He is basically just repeating platitudes he has heard.
I think in this clip he is pushing the “it’s just partisan bickering” meme. I mean, look who he was talking to.
Here’s the thing that really irks me about what Carney did here — the leader of his Party is *already* triangulating to a faretheewell and here is John Carney trying to triangulate from that. It just ends up looking really craven AND you can see the real limits of that approach. It just made him look like he put his finger in the wind and said anything. Sheesh.
“Many women who get pregnant are blasted out of their minds when they have sex. They’re not going to use birth control anyway.”
Now we know how O’Reilly gets women. Makes sense. 🙂
This is too good not to share: David Anderson thinks the reason the House servers are crashing today is because people are logging on to watch live video of some Fair Tax hearings.
The phone lines are jammed too. I’m sure that’s all from people calling about the Fair Tax hearing too.
People, please call our Congressional delegation. I know they aren’t in the Suicide Caucus, but they are probably counting calls to/against.
John Carney (302) 428-1902, Chris Coons (302) 573-6345, Tom Carper (302) 573-6291
The short term plan isn’t just damaging to Obama and the DEM 2012 election, it will create the havoc of not doing anything.
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/07/25/278929/ratings-agency-source-boehner-plan-would-lead-to-downgrade/
Plus, Rasmussen conservapoll says 56% want a plan with both taxes and cuts and will vote out the bums who don’t cooperate.