Mitt Romney to openly campaign on constitutional amendment against gay marriage

Okay, so if this is something you can do, if this sort of thing is actually politically viable, how’s about Obama openly campaign on a constitutional amendment mandating that gay marriages be legal nationwide?
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Mitt Romney to openly campaign on constitutional amendment against gay marriage
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The uniform groupthink of The Freethought Borg

Look! Look at how identical our opinions are on everything! This latest spate of opinionation on the SCA’s new hire pretty much proves that we’re all cookie-cutter and identical around these parts.

Stephanie:

When I say interesting, I mean in the sense that I’m highly ambivalent about it. On the one, obvious hand, Rogers is someone who has supported politicians and a party that have worked very hard to marginalize us. She has propped up the party of the religious right and apparently done it well. That does not endear her to me, to say the least.

On the other hand, she will be my lobbyist, not my new best friend or even nifty human being, and my lobbyist on specific issues where we do agree. It’s my understanding that Rogers is pro-choice, supports gay rights, and really is a strong proponent of secularism.

Beyond that, this is an opportunity to test whether there are any inroads to be made in dealing with Republicans on our issues. In fact, this is probably the best test that such a strategy could have. We’ve been saying forever that demanding our rights protects the rights of everyone. We’ll see whether Rogers can get that message where it is so very badly needed. I can think of longer paths to reach our goals, but few that would be steeper. But if it doesn’t work here, with Rogers on the job, I think we can safely say, “No, and this is why”, to anyone advocating a similar path in the future.

Physioproffe:

I have no idea what the fucke these fucken idiots at the Secular Coalition for America were thinking hiring this sleazy right-wing asshole as their new Executive Director. She has spent nearly her entire professional life carrying water for the worst of the right-wing slime that have relied on the theocratic jeezus freak impulses of our most ignorant and hateful pig-people citizens to gain political power and then used that political power to push more and more pig-people religious and racial hate into the political sphere, and oh yeah, fucked uppe every fucken thing they touched: the economy, civil rights, foreign policy, our national physical infrastructure, education, etc.

NO ROOM FOR NUANCE HERE FOLKS! If you’ve got an opinion different from the groupthink, it’ll be ground into uniformity in no time fast! See how both of these bloggers… use articles, and verbs, and adjectives. In English! Using the Latin alphabet!

The uniform groupthink of The Freethought Borg

Network climate change coverage dropped 80% from 2009-2011

Funny, I guess something must have happened to fix the planet so that we might “stay the course” while I wasn’t looking! Suddenly, despite the big “ClimateGate” manufactroversy which should theoretically have driven all sorts of crazy TV coverage, the networks have all but gone silent on the topic.

Since 2009, when the U.S. House of Representatives passed a climate bill and a major climate conference took place in Copenhagen, the amount of climate coverage on both the Sunday shows (Fox News Sunday, NBC’s Meet the Press, CBS’ Face the Nation, and ABC’s This Week) and the nightly news (NBC Nightly News, CBS Evening News, and ABC World News) has declined tremendously. This drop comes despite a series of newsworthy stories related to climate change in 2010 and 2011, including a debate over comprehensive climate and energy legislation in the U.S. Senate, a series of record-breaking extreme weather events, notable developments in climate science, the rise of so-called “climate skeptics” in the House of Representatives, and a deal struck at the most recent UN climate summit in Durban, South Africa.

Apparently Donald Trump got way more coverage. And yet, despite his best efforts, he’s very unlikely to cause economic and humanitarian calamity in the near future.

Worse yet, on those shows, 50% of the guests are politicians (two to one for the Republicans, naturally), 45% media personalities, and 5% “other” which I assume might include actual climate scientists. So almost everyone discussing anthropogenic global warming on the news, during what little coverage the topic gets, actually knows what the hell they’re talking about.

What I’ve learned from MediaMatters’ analysis, hosted on ThinkProgress, is that people no longer care about climate change, even though it’s definitely still happening, and it’s definitely humankind’s fault. Apparently the smokescreen machine put up by the fossil fuel industry and the Party of No Responsibility For Our Actions has succeeded in obfuscating the truth of the climate crisis. I can only hope the pendulum will swing again and people will realize that the longer we wait to take action, the more painful the switch off fossils will be.

Network climate change coverage dropped 80% from 2009-2011

CISPA marches onward with precious little fanfare or opposition

What happens when the government wants to fire a salvo in the copyright war that will, as a function of its broadside, accidentally break the foundation of the internet? Everyone gets upset, from the common folk to the mass media — because, see, everyone uses the internet. Thus, SOPA and PIPA died.

What happens when a whole lot of companies and a whole lot of House representatives want to push a bill that serves as another (more stealthy) salvo in that same copyright war, which indemnifies companies against being sued for any privacy violation that happens when the government demands personal information about customers without a warrant, allowing a completely legal totalitarian Big Brother state that extends far beyond the borders of the state in question? Apparently nothing — because, see, evidently nobody gives a shit about privacy.
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CISPA marches onward with precious little fanfare or opposition

Meet the new internet power grab, same as the old one.

Ladies and gentlemen, I cordially introduce you to the new Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA, sponsored by Mike Rogers (R-MI).

I suspect that in name and in deed, it will remind you a great deal of SOPA and PIPA, the two bills we barely defeated by shutting down half the internet in protest. Only, see, this one is actually WORSE. If you can even believe it.

So, say the government thought you were discussing a cybersecurity threat or IP theft — such as illegal file sharing somehow related to cybersecurity — on Facebook. The bill would not force Facebook to hand you over to the feds, yet CISPA does make it so that Facebook will be completely unrestricted (say, by your rights) to cooperate with Homeland Security to the fullest extent.

The so-called “cybersecurity bill” lets the US government into any online communication if it believes there is reason to suspect cyber crime, or a threat of intellectual property theft. The bill defines “cybersecurity systems” and “cyber threat information” as anything related to protecting networks from:

‘(A) efforts to degrade, disrupt, or destroy such system or network; or ‘(B) theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information.

“Cybersecurity” is not actually defined in the bill.

Emphasis mine. And if I could make it blink, I would.
Continue reading “Meet the new internet power grab, same as the old one.”

Meet the new internet power grab, same as the old one.

Rick Santorum goes ridiculously hyperbolic

Rick Santorum believes abortions should be outlawed — except, of course, the ones that save his wife’s life, as long as you don’t call it an abortion — and that rape babies are “gifts from God”. Before I saw this video, I thought, could this man be any more ridiculous? Turns out, yes, yes he certainly can.

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Rick Santorum goes ridiculously hyperbolic

Anti-woman Republican quotes, spoken by women

Sounds pretty different when women are saying these things, doesn’t it? Sounds more… wrong, somehow.

As though you could get any more wrong than a bunch of stodgy old men legislating or pontificating on how women’s rights need to be abrogated. And all while these rights are being destroyed systematically.

Yeah, when you piss off over half of the voting populace, you’ve got three courses of action: either stop trying to take away their rights, finish the job and also take away their right to vote, or simply accept defeat and withdraw your ideology from the marketplace of ideas. What’s it going to be, GOP?

Anti-woman Republican quotes, spoken by women

News flash: Rush keeps being Rush

As though this is any surprise. Despite his not-pology, despite his declaring that when he called Sandra Fluke a slut he was “being like the left”, he’s still on the attack — any woman who dares speak up about contraception is fair game to this man.

I seriously have no idea what it’ll take to finish this ass off once and for all.

News flash: Rush keeps being Rush

Karen Handel: Komen defunding Planned Parenthood was a premeditated attack

… by Planned Parenthood.

That’s right, we’re now in full-on Bizarro World. Also, something something shakedown. Blah blah.

Does this strike anyone else as projection? I mean seriously, what exactly did Planned Parenthood do to “premeditatively attack” Komen? This is like saying Greedo shot first!
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Karen Handel: Komen defunding Planned Parenthood was a premeditated attack