The Crowbar

Say what you will about Cheney, but the top left bloggers really REALLY hate him with a passion. They’ve recently devoted lots of webspace to their rage: HuffPo’s Borowitz spews out lame satire at Cheney, saying the Former VP is To Travel Around Country In Sound Truck. Groan. DailyKos’ David Swanson verbosely explains the Three Worst Reasons to Delay Putting Cheney in Prison. Like all morally confused liberals, Swanson is SO for “enforcing laws.” Of course, laws only apply to liberal causes, they can be skirted with “empathy” when laws cause “social injustice.” Aside from that, it’s doubtful that any laws were actually broken, and there will never be prosecutions b/c top Democrats would be dragged down, too.  The fringe leftists at Democratic Underground indulge in ancient Cheney-based fantasy claiming Cheney Confirms Iran-Contra Cover-Up; says Cheney:

“I went through the Iran-contra hearings and watched the way administration officials ran for cover and left the little guys out to dry. And I was bound and determined that wasn’t going to happen this time.”

Because he used the word “cover,” he has now admitted a “cover-up”? Oy. The ever-excitable Andrew Sullivan has another go at Cheney, implying that Cheney betrayed his oath of office by supporting harsh interrogation of deranged psychopaths bent on killing Americans. Says Sully, “Is Cheney’s ultimate defense is that he didn’t understand the oath he took?” Go ahead and believe that Sullivan, you’re already a lost cause. ThinkProgress works it over hard, trying to make Cheney look bad because he’d choose Rush Limbaugh over Colin Powell. Who in their right mind would choose Powell the Backstabber? Greg Sargent at Plumb Line gets himself all excited when he finds out White House To Declassify “Holy Grail” Torture Report That Could Undercut Cheney. The report supposedly says it’s “difficult to determine conclusively whether interrogations have provided information critical to interdicting specific imminent attacks.” Just because it’s difficult, doesn’t mean it’s impossible, duh. Another secret the White House will give to the terrorists for free. How quaint. Josh Marshall at TPM is so hot and bothered he decided to share a Dick Cheney Deep Thought, “Megalomania is a hard drug to kick.” Save it for twitter, Marshall.  Heather at Crooks and Liars thinks she really has something in taking advantage of Cheney and Limbaugh’s negative poll numbers. Take a look-see at Mary Matalin: Newt Gingrich, Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh Exemplify Conservatism. Heather seems to think that Republican policies have been rejected by a large portion of the electorate. Yep. That would be the self-identified “Democrats.” Brilliant like a stone light bulb. Hilzoy at Political Animal gets dramatically offended by Cheney and decries, “How Dare He?”

Dick Cheney forfeited the right to lecture anyone on their willingness to sacrifice American lives the day he decided to deceive us into an unnecessary war.

Please stop with your Superior Moral SuperForce, Hilzoy, you’re making the chickens nervous.

The Left Blogsphere  joined hands today to commit mass abuse of conservative Tea Party protesters. The left’s putrid hate rained down upon the Internet like sewage dumped from 1000 Hollywood-owned airplanes. Unable to contain the sludge within their minds, the left uniformly referred to the Tea Party Movement with the crude sexual reference “Tea Bagging,” showing just how immature and unprofessional they really are. More > Snark II | Snark III ***** Steve Benen attempted to discredit the Washington DC/White House Tea Party protest with the “if it’s not well planned it’s not legitimate” bit. Protesters threw a box of tea into the White House lawn and got in trouble with authorities. If this were a liberal protest and Bush was in the White House, you better believe Benen wouldn’t have this snark to offer:

So, these guys didn’t think it was important to come up with a rationale for the protests or to get permits for the protests … It’s hard not to get the impression that very little thought went into these far-right festivities.

We also know that not a lot of thought went into the civil rights movement at first, it started as slowly building emotion.  ***** We hear only muffled sounds from Josh Marshall at TalkingPointsMemo as he attempts to remove his foot from his mouth for calling this picture and the 28 subsequent pics of protests “Anti-Tax Porn:” ***** Everyone’s favorite fake conservative Andrew Sullivan featured a post from hard left Pandagon blogger Jesse Taylor. From “Unicorn Nuts…On Your Face,” a shrill upchuck of liberal malevolence:

This gets to the basic issue with the whole Tea Party movement.  It’s a group of fucknuts joining other groups of marginally related fucknuts to protest something or other, in a hugely fucknutty way.  The point of the Tea Party movement, besides the largest thrusting of testicles to America’s collective face since the Soviets launched Sputnik, is to protest…well, basically the entire functioning of the government with no alternative plan or goal whatsoever. 

LOL, what great prose and impeccable logic! Good to know what Sullivan considers to be “curt.” He thinks “the goal of the Tea Parties” is to “DOMINATE THE AGENDA,” whatever that means.  Stay tuned for more, folks…

I was not able to post yesterday, so I made up for it with the following roundup of the top 10 blogs.

Huffington Post > It’s obvious liberals are starting to feel threatened by the Tea Party Movement, they are devoting more webspace trying to kill it. Huffpo blogger Karl Frisch (also a Senior Fellow at Media Matters for America), tries desperately to discredit all of Fox News for allegedly cheer-leading the movement. Fox News isn’t, but their opinion show hosts are. You know, kinda like MSNBC and CNN opinion show hosts drooled over Obama, which Media Matters strangely didn’t cover. It’s a truly lame attempt, but I’m sure lots of hard left HuffPo readers will take it as fact.

Democratic Underground > Trouble for Obama from the suicidal dove faction. DU Poster AmyCamus reposted a story on Alternet by hard left Iraq Marine veteran Benjamin Lewis, who is likely to be court marshaled “for his intention to refuse reactivation.” Lewis is Against Obama’s Afghanistan, and after the usual peacenik screed he expresses his disappointment quite tellingly:

If it was not evident before, it should be apparent by now that Obama is not our savior.

You heard it here at The Crowbar nearly first, folks!

Daily Kos > Kossack Susan Gardner gives us all a preview of what’s to coming this Sunday 4/13 on Kos…

• A lame attack by Michael Lazzaro on the Tea Party Movement pretending that the left/ACORN is DEFINITELY NOT attempting to infiltrate the Movement, really.
• Dana Houle will attempt to discredit Glenn Beck by tying him to “manifestos of the violent radical right”  and saying he “traffics in violent conspiratorial rhetoric of the kind that inspired Timothy McVeigh”
• Gardner will pass on hard left propaganda by David Neiwert bashing talk radio and insulting talk radio listeners.

The Daily Dish | Andrew Sullivan > Sullivan spent the entire day dismissively bashing the Tea Party movement, calling it the “Tea Tantrum movement.” Sullivan puts on his “fiscal conservative” hat (conical with a red puffy ball on top) to give himself false authority to declare the movement “adolescent, unserious hysteria” and proof of the Republican “party’s fast-accelerating nervous breakdown.” Sullivan takes us on an unfantastic journey devoting 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 posts to deriding the movement. You see, the mistake the Tea Party Movement made is not consulting Sullivan and his clearly superior British intellect first – the man has a PhD in Government from Harvard, donchya know.

Talking Points Memo (TPM)  > Trouble in paradise, specifically Guantanamo Bay. Harsh reality may be setting for Obama. Seems Obama’s DOJ is stonewalling Gitmo case just like Bush. I guess sending the terrorists to Pennsylvania is no loger viable? In any case, the anger of the Liberalati is rising. Hard left Gitmo lawyer David Cynamon says:

What I have been hoping for, and am getting increasingly frustrated about, is to see that closing Guantanamo be matched with a change in policy at the Justice Department to actually try to get these cases heard to test the evidence and then to determine, if there’s no evidence, to release these people. That part I haven’t seen at all.

Think Progress > Lee Fang nostalgically engages in Bush Derangement Syndrome (BDS) by wishing that Bush would hate himself as much as Fang and other BDS sufferers do. In a promo video for Bush’s Presidential library, Bush fails to say that he lied and people died, that he traded blood for oil, that 9/11 was his inside job and that he personally used a weather satellite to aim Katrina at New Orleans because lots of black people live there.

The Conscience of a Liberal >Krugman  ties income inequality with “intense partisanship” in The financial factor  ”But what caused the fall and rise of inequality?… regulation and deregulation.” So Krugman is arguing for more regulation – you’re shocked, I know. The kicker is that he damages his own argument, “OK, correlation does not imply causation yada yada.” Meh.

Crooks and Liars > Nicole Belle writes an open letter to National Organization for Marriage, hoping to affect change by the sheer force of her condescending insults:

I find your stance akin to those bigots who protested for miscegenation…

…unless of course, your marriage is simply not as strong as mine and having others commit would suddenly inspire you or your spouse to up and leave.

…it might actually have more credibility if you could find an actual doctor to claim her job is somehow threatened, rather than using a really, really bad actor.

…you boneheads.

Yours in complete and utter scorn…

Aren’t top liberal bloggers fun people?

Wonkette > It’s correction time as Wonkete jumps to conclusions about a fake YouTube video of “the libidinous fartsack Silvio Berlusconi, who still lives with his mom, assaulting some poor woman who just wanted to write a goddamn parking ticket in peace.”  Isn’t that special. Then comes the correction:

Oh well shit our own former editor Alex Pareene debunked this dumb thing three years ago. Ha ha, fact-checking!

Do you think Wonkette will see how their hyperactive, venomous hatred made them assume the worst even after their own blogger debunked it three years ago? Fat chance. 

Glenn Greenwald > Greenwald spends another day taking on the “Obama DOJ’s inexcusable embrace of some of the most radical Bush/Cheney secrecy doctrines.” Uh-oh, sounds like MORE trouble in paradise. Wait, wait… isn’t criticizing the DOJ racist since Attorney General Eric Holder is the first black man to be appointed to the office? OH, that’s right – Greenwald is a liberal. Different standards, my bad – he’s not racist.

Political Animal | Steve Benen > Benen spends time patronizing Glenn Beck for his speaking style. Benen, unable to hold back his poisonous sneer, accuses Beck of actually being “insane,” “deranged,” and “crazy” and says, “might try to eat his shoes while arguing with mailboxes. Getting dressed and making it to a television studio every day would be difficult.” I’ve no doubt it’s Benen who needs therapy.

Josh Marshall of TalkingPointsMemo has a strange stress-relief exercise:

I’m nonetheless comforted by the fact that the Republicans running things in the House GOP caucus are still as clinically insane as in years past

Marshall then attempts to misunderstand basic economics:

We see today from their House GOP ‘budget’ that their new-found allegiance to fiscal discipline has them lowering the top marginal tax rate to 25% (it’s currently 35%, with the Bush tax cuts), which for anyone who knows anything about the federal budget would pretty much inevitably lead to gargantuan federal deficits and the Treasury exploding probably some time early in the next decade.

Marshall obviously doesn’t know much about the federal budget or economics (he doesn’t care, really). I don’t know much either, but I do have a VERY simple concept down. If you tax at a 0% rate, the government gets zero revenue If you tax at a 100% rate, the government gets zero revenue.  A sane government’s goal is to maximize revenue. Too little revenue and you may not have enough to pay for necessary government functions (defense, inter-infrastructure, law enforcement, etc.). Too much tax rate and you demotivate your population and cause the economy to shrink and revenues to fall. It’s called the Laffer Curve and liberal economists like James Tobin and Paul Krugman detest it with all their might because it destroys their worldview that states you can tax the rich into oblivion and it have no effect on everyone else. Whenever you see liberal bloggers gnash their teeth and scream about “supply-side” and “trickle-down” economics you’ll know they’re in some serious denial. Back to Josh Marshall:

If that weren’t enough. This is the scoring the House Republicans have provided, tracking Democratic budget policy and theirs over the next 70 years. As you can see, predicting ideological stances over as yet unborn Democratic members of Congress, the GOP scoring appears to have us on track for the government owning about 90% of the economy in the early-mid-22nd century, which if I remember is about the time period of the invention of the warp drive. So I don’t know if they’ve figured that in too.

Ummm, yeah. The Republicans are such fools to think about future generations if we continue on the same track. Let’s just ignore all the warning signs and trust The One! Who’s clinically insane?

Apparently devoid of any interesting arguments, Washington Monthly’s Steve Benen tries a little sleight-of-hand. Citing a TalkingPointsMemo video Benen says:

Sen. James Inhofe (R) believes snow in his home state of Oklahoma is compelling evidence that global warming isn’t real. Seriously.

Seriously, Benen is so full of it. The video shows Inhofe giving a limited time speech to the Senate and among the first things he says is “I won’t get into the science thing…” Then some seconds later Inhofe gives an anecdotal account of it snowing in Oklahoma.  THIS constitutes proof that Inhofe thinks that snow in Oklahoma is “compelling evidence that global warming isn’t real?” Hard-hitting journalism there, Benen. See for yourself: