My morning routine as a blogger is to get up, shower, dress, get coffee started immediately, plug my Kindle Fire in so it is fully charged, then start hunting links for the day's postings. Usually at that time, I group links that go together, save others for separate posts and begin my writing day.
More often than not my routine works perfectly for me.
Then there are days like today when as I start browsing political sites and headlines and I start thinking, "Okay, I am going to need to start Bloody Mary Sunday a day early," because what I am seeing is complete insanity running rampant and not just from what people are writing but the events of why they are writing about it.
Take Memeorandum for example. A site that lists what political stories are creating a buzz along the blogosphere and in the media, along with links to the articles and blog posts that are discussing those particular stories.
My first hint of what the day was going to be like comes from The Hill, who headlines with "Nazi Party gets a Washington lobbyist." I think, alright, good headline, makes me want to click the link to see what the real story is.Well, that isn't just a attention getting headline, have mercy, there really is a member of the American Nazi Party who has registered as a lobbyist in Washington.
Bowless has been involved in politics before. The ANP lobbyist was the presidential candidate in the 2008 race for an “other” party, according to Federal Election Commission records. US News and World Report reported the party was actually the National Socialist Movement.
Asked why he associates himself with the ANP rather than the National Socialist Movement, he said people in America do not understand what socialism is, while Nazism is well known.
“So [we] decided: Why don’t we just say what we are?” Bowles said.
“In the future, when we get people on the ballot, when people see the swastika on the ballot, they’ll know what they’re getting."
Bowles doesn’t think he’ll have a problem getting meetings on Capitol Hill, and said he’s not going to focus on racial issues or use “racial slurs,” but stick to facts. The first issue he said he’d like to tackle is making it easier for candidates from the ANP to run for office.
“One of my goals is to make it easier to get on the ballot. Trying to get on a ballot in some of these states [is difficult],” he said.
Yes, that is what Americans want, a person who worships a swastika to have easier access at the ballots to get elected to public office to represent American voters.
Moving right along...
First up at the moment on Memeorandum is a Washington Post piece, headlining "U.S. Secret Service agents recalled from Colombia."
Headline isn't weird you say? Try clicking the link and the new headline you see blaring is "U.S. Secret Service agents leave Colombia over prostitution inquiry."Edwin Donovan, an agency spokesman, said that an unspecified number of agents have been recalled and replaced with others, stressing that Obama’s security has not been compromised because of the change. Obama arrived in Cartagena on Friday afternoon for this weekend’s Summit of the Americas, a gathering of 33 of the hemisphere’s 35 leaders to discuss economic policy and trade.
Donovan declined to disclose details about the nature of the alleged misconduct. But Jon Adler, president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, said the accusations relate to at least one agent having involvement with prostitutes in Cartagena.
They go on to report up to a dozen agents have possibly been removed from the trip and that soliciting prostitution is considered inappropriate by the Secret Service. I would guess so, especially since the team's purpose is to guarantee Obama's safety, in advance to his actual trip. The article goes on to report a couple previous problems Obama has had with his Secret Service people.
Boys will be boys huh? If that was all, I would have categorized that as a slow news weekend's entertainment, not insanity, but the headlines and articles go on.
What do you get when a far right website and a far left website both agree on a hot button issue? Yeah, Twilight Zone, Outer limits or a touch of WTF, take your pick.
Topic: The indictment of George Zimmerman in the shooting of Trayvon Martin which sparked protests, public bounties put on Zimmerman's head and Wanted: Dead or Alive posters generated and passed out by the New Black Panthers.Liberal website TalkLeft says the affidavit of probable cause submitted for the arrest of George Zimmerman on second degree murder charges for the shooting death of Trayvon Martin receives a failing grade.
Affidavit = FAIL. That a judge signed off on this as establishing second degree murder which according to Florida jury instructions and case law requires the killing be done with "ill will, hatred, spite, or an evil intent" is perplexing, to say the least.But it seems the state has probably foreclosed a conviction on a federal hate crimes charge. With state investigators swearing under oath Zimmerman said "punks" instead of the alleged racial slur, even if others disagree, there's no way it will pass the proof beyond a reasonable doubt requirement for a hate crime conviction.
National Review, a conservative website agrees, and calls the affidavit "startlingly weak" and the writer who is a former chief economist at the U.S. Sentencing Commission, says he cannot recall an affidavit lacking "so much relevant information."
He also makes a couple more points:
Note some of the points that are missing. The prosecution doesn’t claim Zimmerman had racial animus against blacks. There was no “f***ing coons” on the police call. Some extremely relevant information from the police report is completely excluded: There is no mention of the grass and wetness found on the back of Zimmerman’s shirt, the gashes on the back of his head, the bloody nose, or the other witnesses who saw Martin on top of Zimmerman, beating him, before the shot was fired. There is not even an attempt to say that the police report was in error; instead the affidavit just disregards it.
Both seem to agree the prosecutor screwed up and the general consensus is if the charge doesn't intimidate Zimmerman into making a plea deal and this goes to trial, a jury is likely to acquit for lack of evidence to support second degree murder beyond a reasonable doubt.
The left and the right unite about something, slightly crazy.
The height of insanity though starts when I read a headline like the one over at The Hill which states "Report: Start of nuclear negotiations with Iran ‘constructive,’ diplomats say."Just using the words Iran, nuclear and constructive in the same sentence is insane, but when you add that with the last decade of so-called "constructive" talks with Iran that have always ended in more sanctions and their continuing on their merry way to obtaining a nuclear weapon which they have threatened "Death To Israel" and "Death To America" with, you really start to understand the level of insanity.
What is the definition of doing the same thing over and over and over again but expecting a different result? That is right, insanity.
At that point I decide that yes, indeed, it is time to make Bloody Mary Sunday a Bloody Mary Weekend and start on Saturday.
I haven't even begun to go through MSN News, Yahoo News and Google News yet. I am still over at Memeorandum.
So, I settle back in with my Bloody Mary (Cheers!) and continue to browse headlines and articles.
I see Washington Post wasted the time, energy and Internet space on a snarky piece about how the Fed should just print up enough worthless by that time money to provide 120,000,000 households with $10 million dollar loans and no one would have to work again!
Also, liberals and Democrats have doubled down in defense of Democratic strategist, advisor/consultant (whatever they are calling her today) Hilary Rosen, who decided it would be a good idea to attack Ann Romney for having the audacity to care about women's issues because she chose to be a stay-at-home mother who has suffered and survived cancer and still suffers from MS. In defense of her they have decided to go far beyond her original claim that Ann "never worked a day in her life" to now calling her things like cunt, bitch, whore and more.
Did you know that if Blacks breed with Whites it is the end of the African-American race? So says Louis Farrakhan, The Nation of Islam’s infamous leader.
If a Caucasian said the opposite and claimed that if Whites breed with Blacks it will be the "end of the White race," OMG, we would be seeing people scream about how racist that person was, how they want segregation again and a whole long list of why that person should be shunned, apologized for and so on and so forth.
That is the start of my Political Saturday Insanity For Bloggers and as a side note, those were just some of the top headlines, I didn't even bother listing the discussions surrounding those headlines.
Enjoy your Saturday reading while I go browse more political news.
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