Category Archives: Hate Groups

Hot Air

A Stand Up Guy — Finally

At long last.

Prez Barack H.O. the other day finally — finally! — called out the idiotic climate change deniers in Congress and the Right Wing media. He was especially hard on the elected deniers who’ve tried to erect roadblocks before every gov’t attempt to stem the flow of crap into our air and water.

Of cerebral titans like Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio), who, while not overtly denying the science,  still play along with their partisan confreres who do, Obama said: “There are some who duck the question by saying, ‘Hey, I’m not a scientist.’ Let me translate that for you: what that means is, ‘I accept that man-made climate change is real, but if I admit it, I’ll be run out of town by a radical fringe that thinks climate science is a liberal plot.”

The Kenyan-born secret Muslim mole who has stolen the White House from its rightful heirs for all intents and purposes told a crowd of University of California-Irvine graduates Friday that climate change deniers are full of horseshit.

Obama/UC-Irvine

“I Must Say They’re Full Of Horseshit.”

What took you so long, Barry?

Oh right, you haven’t wanted to alienate these folks because you have to work with them. As if they’ll work with you whether you alienate them or not.

Anyway, Obama stood up for something for a change. Personal to the C-in-C: Keep it up.

A Cheesy Regulation

The interwebs this week have been buzzing with news that the federal Food and Drug Administration might want to ban the aging of cheese on wooden board, a practice that’s been going on since the first splotch of milk started going sour.

Cheesemaking

Cheese Aging On Wood Boards

Huzzah! The FDA has issued a clarification that says, in essense, Hey, don’t sweat it. The feds, it turns out, won’t be crushing artisanal cheesemakers with the heels of their jackboots by banning wood board aging after all.

I’m sure this apparent reversal has more to do with Open Carry cheesemakers advancing on Washington, DC than anything else.

Open Carry

… The Right Of The People To Age Monterey Jack…

Cinderella?

Back to presidents, the next one has taken some heat of late for her statement that she and her hubby Bill were “dead broke” when they left the White House in January, 2001.

Bill Clinton, of course, came from poverty but Hillary grew up in the very comfortable and privileged Chicago suburb of Park Ridge. As such, she has no idea what the term “dead broke” means.

Clintons

We’ve Got To Pay That Electric Bill

When Bill said “I feel your pain” back when he was running for prez the first time, you could believe him. Hillary, though, had better not say any such thing because she has no idea. This is not to say she can’t be an effective and powerful voice for the poor when — if? Naw, when — she takes the Oath of Office in Jan. 2017. Only that she’s never had to scrimp or save or eke for anything at any time in her life.

In this sense, her statement was as offensive as Ann Romney’s in 2012 when she bragged that she was a working woman because she’d raised kids at home. I wrote at the time that it’s doubtful she’d ever had to worry about scrubbing the toilet, mopping up a spilled gallon of milk, or cleaning up a splash of puke. If she did it would be because the help was off and the emergency household chore thing was sort of a lark.

Personal to Hill: Ixnay on telling the world about your financial struggles; you’ve got enough credibility problems already.

The States Of Hate

Thanks to Helen Harrell and Carol Fischer for pointing this out from the Southern Poverty Law Center:

SPLC Map

Go ahead and check the site for a more detailed look at this plotting but a quick glance shows how hate seems to be centered in a certain area of this holy land. The southeastern quarter of this nation is rife with people who so despise The Other that they’ve joined groups to do something about it.

Just a thought: Indiana seems a tad over-represented in relation to its size, doesn’t it?

 

The Pencil Today:

THE QUOTE

“Turn on to politics or politics will turn on you.” — Ralph Nader

JENNA WANTS MITT TO LICK BARACK

Retired porn star Jenna Jameson has endorsed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Don’t you love it?

“When you’re rich,” Jenna reasons, “you want a Republican in office.”

Family Values

To balance things out, the incomparable Ron Jeremy is behind the President. Poor Barack.

WHOSE SIDE ARE THEY ON?

If this doesn’t scare the bejesus out of you I don’t know what will.

In a piece on the radical right in America, al Jazeera claims that Republicans quashed a 2009 Department of Homeland Security report suggesting hate groups began to proliferate in the United States after the election of Barack Obama.

Not that the groups weren’t proliferating before that, mind you. Only that their rate of proliferation was bumped up dramatically by the presence of a brown man in the White House.

I’d say the GOP has some ‘splainin’ to do.

HATE IS ENOUGH

We still don’t understand the meaning of hatred in this country. ABC News ran this online headline yesterday:

Still No Motive?

Does the swastika have different meanings for different people even at this late date?

THE NEW MACHINE

Many years ago, even the most polarizing figures in this holy land were permitted to have nuanced and even seemingly self-contradictory viewpoints. They didn’t run in fear from the Thought Crime authorities within their political parties or the punditocracy.

For instance, one of the heroes of the hard-hat, blue-collar, bungalow-belt Silent Majority was Mayor Richard J. Daley of Chicago. He ran a highly disciplined political machine. He tolerated little in the way of dissent. He was a tough guy.

The Boss

He’d called for his police to shoot to kill arsonists and shoot to maim looters during race riots. He turned his police force loose on demonstrators during the 1968 Democratic Convention. By the early 1970s he ranked just below George Wallace, Spiro Agnew, and Jack Webb in the law and order pantheon.

Yet he was a staunch opponent of the Vietnam War and, even more surprisingly, guns. According to Rick Perlstein in “Nixonland,” Daley was in Washington, DC testifying before a congressional committee in the summer of 1972. “Take the guns away from every private citizen,” he said.

Can you imagine any darling of the right even suggesting private citizens should be limited to possessing several dozen assault rifles these days?

A NEW UNDERGROUND RAILROAD?

Author and journalist Achy Obejas (say it, AH-chee oh-BAY-hahss) spent a few years at Indiana University before she dropped out and went to work covering politics, GLBTQ issues, night life, and a host of other beats.

Obejas

Achy points out the latest lunatic pronouncement from a member of the holier-than-thou gang. It seems Bryan Fischer, one of the paid squealers for the American Family Association, has called for good, god-fearing citizens to save children being raised by same-sex couples.

Well, perhaps the word save isn’t quite right here. How about kidnap?

Achy’s got a horse in this race. Her wife, Megan, gave birth to a son last year. Achy swears she’s never been happier.

IN YEARS AHEAD, HE WOULD NOT BE TED

Here a sample of some graphic ad work a then-unknown artist named Theodore Geisel did back in the 1930s and 40s:

Recognize the style? Geisel later became Dr, Seuss.

See more at “25 Advertisements by Dr. Seuss Before He Was Dr. Seuss” on BuzzFeed.

Here’s how I waste my time. How about you? Share your fave sites with us via the comments section. Just type in the name of the site, not the url; we’ll find them. If we like them, we’ll include them — if not, we’ll ignore them.

I Love ChartsLife as seen through charts.

XKCD — “A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language.”

“What If?” From XKCD

SkepchickWomen scientists look at the world and the universe.

IndexedAll the answers in graph form, on index cards.

I Fucking Love ScienceA Facebook community of science geeks.

Present and CorrectFun, compelling, gorgeous and/or scary graphic designs and visual creations throughout the years and from all over the world.

Flip Flop Fly BallBaseball as seen through infographics, haikus, song lyrics, and other odd communications devices.

Mental FlossFacts.

Caps Off PleaseComics & fun.

SodaplayCreate your own models or play with other people’s models.

Eat Sleep DrawAn endless stream of artwork submitted by an endless stream of people.

Big ThinkTapping the brains of notable intellectuals for their opinions, predictions, and diagnoses.

The Daily PuppySo shoot me.

Electron Pencil event listings: Music, art, movies, lectures, parties, receptions, games, benefits, plays, meetings, fairs, conspiracies, rituals, etc.

Bear’s PlaceJazz Fables: Mr. Taylor and His Dirty Dixie Band; 5:30pm

Muddy Boots Cafe, Nashville — Americana Showcase; 6-8:30pm

Monroe County Public LibraryMonthly meeting, Bloomington Transportation Options for People; 6:30pm

◗ IU CinemaFilm: “To Rome with Love”; 7pm

Cafe DjangoJeff Isaac Trio; 8-10pm

The Comedy AtticTim Wilson; 8pm

Serendipity Martini BarTeam trivia; 8:30pm

Max’s PlaceWake the Dead; 9pm

The BluebirdApollo Quad; 9pm

The BishopHome Blitz, Bloody Mess, The Tsunamis; 9:30pm

Ongoing:

◗ Ivy Tech Waldron CenterExhibits:

  • “40 Years of Artists from Pygmalion’s”; through September 1st

◗ IU Art MuseumExhibits:

  • Qiao Xiaoguang, “Urban Landscape: A Selection of Papercuts” ; through August 12th
  • “A Tribute to William Zimmerman,” wildlife artist; through September 9th
  • Willi Baumeister, “Baumeister in Print”; through September 9th
  • Annibale and Agostino Carracci, “The Bolognese School”; through September 16th
  • “Contemporary Explorations: Paintings by Contemporary Native American Artists”; through October 14th
  • David Hockney, “New Acquisitions”; through October 21st
  • Utagawa Kuniyoshi, “Paragons of Filial Piety”; through fall semester 2012
  • Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Weston, & Harry Callahan, “Intimate Models: Photographs of Husbands, Wives, and Lovers”; through December 31st
  • “French Printmaking in the Seventeenth Century”; through December 31st

◗ IU SoFA Grunwald GalleryExhibits:

  • Coming — Media Life; August 24th through September 15th
  • Coming — Axe of Vengeance: Ghanaian Film Posters and Film Viewing Culture; August 24th through September 15th

◗ IU Kinsey Institute Gallery“Ephemeral Ink: Selections of Tattoo Art from the Kinsey Institute Collection”; through September 21st

◗ IU Lilly LibraryExhibit, “Translating the Canon: Building Special Collections in the 21st Century”; through September 1st

◗ IU Mathers Museum of World CulturesClosed for semester break, reopens Tuesday, August 21st

Monroe County History CenterPhoto exhibit, “Bloomington: Then and Now” by Bloomington Fading; through October 27th