Mint MorMoney is a Fucking Twat

Jesus Christ, this guy is a complete fucking twat.

And before you get on my case for calling him a Fucking Twat (which he IS), watch the entire video. Anybody here employed over the last 40 years? Remember when life was good, you worked hard, the boss gave you a bonus at the end of the year? Remember what happened around, oh, say, 2000? When companies started outsourcing jobs, and it seemed like raises kept dropping, or being eliminated altogether? And every year you were told there would be no bonus, or a reduced bonus? And then they started implementing performance targets for bonuses, so that it didn't matter how hard YOU worked, if your team, your group, your department, and your DIVISION didn't make their targets, you, the lowly schlub, could just kiss that bonus goodbye?

That's when Bain Capital was making Mint MorMoney all those millions. That's how come he has $300 million or more in his bank account, and you're lucky if you can feed the kids something that DOESN'T have rice, beans, or Hamburger Helper in it.

Mint MorMoney (copyright Helen Blazes)is a complete and total fucking twat. And if you want him as President, if you stay home and fail to vote for Barack Obama, don't you let me hear you whine ONCE, NOT FUCKING ONCE, about how there are no jobs and millionaires got tax breaks but you're paying more than ever. Because if you can't see that that's what he has planned, then YOU'RE a fucking twat, too, and a very STUPID fucking twat, at that.

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Martin Luther King, Jr. and #OccupyWallStreet

The war in VietNam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality, we will find ourselves organizing clergy- and laymen-concerned committees for the next generation. We will be marching and attending rallies without end unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy.

In 1957 a sensitive American official overseas said that it seemed to him that our nation was on the wrong side of a world revolution. [...] With such activity in mind, the words of John F. Kennedy come back to haunt us. Five years ago he said, "Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."

Increasingly, by choice or by accident, this is the role our nation has taken — by refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the immense profits of overseas investment.

I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. When machines and computers, profits and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice that produces beggars needs re-structuring. A true revolution of values will soon look easily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa, and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries and say: "This is not just." It will look upon our alliance with the landed gentry of Latin America and say: "This is not just." The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: "This way of settling differences is not just." This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of people normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.

[...]

These are revolutionary times. All over the globe men are revolting against old systems of exploitation and oppression, and out of the wombs of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being born. The shirtless and barefoot people of the land are rising up as never before. "The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light." We in the West must support these revolutions. It is a sad fact that, because of comfort, complacency, a morbid fear of communism, and our proneness to adjust to injustice, the Western nations that initiated so much of the revolutionary spirit of the modern world have now become the arch-anti-revolutionaries.

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Don't Forget To Give Thanks!

OK, this has to be an act of genius:



Really. Thank Fuck you very much, teabaggage.

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The President Rocks The Audience

Live from the White House Correspondents' Dinner:



Contrasting this with Bush's last appearance, I can't help thinking how innately decent and fair our President is. Yes, he had fun tweaking a few people, but no one who didn't deserve it. Most important of all, he called for remembrance of our troops -- the Republicans pay a LOT of lip service to that, but they're the ones who keep cutting the VA budget and freezing the ordinary soldier's wage, and refusing to regulate the payday lenders who are driving our troops' families into foreclosure.

More touching was his call to remember those devastated by the storms that have struck the Southern states. Those red states are a hotbed of teabagger KrayZ. He didn't have to say word one about them. But, unlike Bush, who never mentioned Katrina after it happened except to complain that Kanye West dissed him, our President called for a show of kindness and help to those who hate and disrespect him with every breath.

Thank you, Mr. President. Here's looking forward to another five years with you at the helm.

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The S_Trump_et Whores On

We mean, of course, The Donald. Or should that read "whoreson"?

Today, our President, Barack Hussein Obama, released the long form of his birth certificate.

Ordinarily,this form is not available for viewing except to those having a personal interest in it — which is to say, the person whose birth it records or other immediate family members. Hawai'i's privacy laws also do not permit the State to release the original copy to anyone. The President requested a waiver of such laws in order to release this piece of paper.

No other President — nor even any nominee for the office — has ever been required to prove their citizenship. So let's be perfectly straightforward and clear about this whole brouhaha. Had President Obama been white, the question would never even have arisen. On what grounds do I assert this? These:

• John McCain was never asked to produce his documents, despite the fact that he was NOT born in the US;
  

  
  

• Birfers are trying to change state and Federal laws — and possibly even the Constitution — to take away the right to citizenship jus soli, i.e., by virtue of having been born on US soil. They are also trying to alter the right to citizenship jus sanguinis, i.e., by right of blood. Currently, the Constitution recognizes both conditions as conferring citizenship. "Birther bills" on the State level actually require potential nominees to have *both* parents born on US soil. The fact that this would exclude Mitt Romney (whose father was born in Mexico) and Donald Trump (whose mother was born in Scotland) hasn't yet penetrated their crania, I suppose.
  

  
  

• These are the same people who, when Arnold Schwartzenegger the foreign-born brainless Austrian bodybuilder was making his stab at power, were willing to amend the Constitution to allow him to run for President. Yet they're not willing to accept the mixed-race child of a white American mother as a "real American" without making him leap through hoops despite what their OWN FUCKING LAWS SAY.

I'm furious and disgusted with the media's complicity in all this. With their endless bullshit, their boob job coverage, their fertility stories, their Royal wedding coverage, their bullshit about the teabaggers who can barely get 300 people to show up for most events, their refusal to cover the 100,000 who marched in Wisconsin. I'm sick of it. So I found this video on Crooks&Liars, which I cannot recommend highly enough. Please to watch. And then please spread the word. Because he's absolutely correct, every word of it.

Contact NBC and let them know what you think. They really need to hear from people.

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Is It Just MEEEEEE?

Or are the protestors in WI drowning out the Witch of Wasilla?



Something like 6,500 people showed up in WI today. Why? Skanky Wailin'Failin'Bailin' Palin was giving a word-salad speech. AP (worthless corporate cocksucking shills that they are) claims that "hundreds" of te@b@gging Kochroaches showed up, and were met by "hundreds" of union supporters. But, if you look at this clip, it's pretty obvious that "hundreds" of teabaggers might have showed up but they were completely and totally outnumbered by THOUSANDS of union supporters. Who managed to shout Skanky's speech down. Go, WISCONSIN! Show us how DEMOCRACY'S DONE!

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Didn't I Tell You Guys

Like, a fucking year ago?

President Barack Hussein Obama proves prescient once again in a speech to Republicans a year ago:



The man thinks ahead. He looks ahead. He's not perfect by a long shot, and he's not my ideal candidate by a long shot. But he is, hands down, the most pragmatic President ever. His rhetoric is not overblown but precise, surgically precise.

I wonder if John Boehner is weeping into his whisky watching this, right now.

Details here.

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What The FUCK Is Happening To This Country?

Unbelievable. Glenn Blech has just attacked a volunteer debate moderator from the League of Women voters.

What is it with these people? Fucking everybody is fair game? What are these fuckers up to? Ever since the day our President was sworn into office, Glenn Blech, Flush Rimbowl, and Pox Noose have been attacking him, and those of us who support him, despite the fact that 65,182,692 of us voted for him.

If you didn't want to click the linky, these are the linked incidents:

• FL gunman shoots exchange students;
  
• List of far-right politicians inciting violence;
  
• Murder of the Holocaust Museum guard;
  
• Murder of Dr. George Tiller;
  
• "Dirty bomb" materials found in RWNJ's home;
  
• TN skinheads arrested for plot to murder President Obama;
  
• Assault on WA activist Christie Stordeur;
  
• Assault on KY activist Lauren Valle;
  
• Arrest of a Democratic voter at a session for Eric Cantor;
  
• Intimidation of elderly black voters in TX;
  
• Attempted voter intimidation by teabaggers in TX;
  
• Reports of teabagger targeting of minority voters for harrassment coming out of many states.

There's lots more, not covered here. In OH, a McDonald's franchisee sent his employees a flyer telling them that if the Republicans win, they can expect bonuses and raises. Otherwise, fugaddeboudit. And, face it folks. This 24/7 demonization of anyone who isn't a fucking rightwing nutjob has gone too far.

It's one thing to attack your political opponents. But when you start attacking the fucking majority of your fellow-Americans because they voted for a black man in the White House, you are going TOO goddamned fucking far. For eight years, y'all told us, "Suck it up. Your side lost. Deal. You're either for us or agin' us. America — love it or leave it."

When does it get to be your turn to fucking suck it up? Y'all lost TWO FUCKING YEARS AGO, and all we've heard since then is threats, abuse, and promises of violence. And Pox Noose is at the heart of it all, spreading a seething discontent by feeding the fantasies of the worst of the worst. All along, y'all have been able to claim that none of you instigated this violence, this assault on the Constitutional liberties of the people. But now, stuff like this starts happening all over the place right around the elections, and it becomes clear to the rest of us who aren't stark barking mad, as the denizens of the TeaParty (what party? They're not registered as a party) appear to be.

Srsly. I don't want people who look or think like these pignorant dorks in charge of the country. Do YOU?

Raw Story commenter Sue Wilson says:

It's time to realize that Glenn Beck has 14 million radio listeners compared to 2 million Fox viewers. Radio airwaves are publicly owned, and we the people can and must demand accountability from broadcasters. Early next year, I am launching a project to empower communities to challenge stations' licenses. Why? Read here: http://retwt.me/1PsNH How? http://retwt.me/1PkA I need your help. I need specific instances of inciting violence on the radio. Not hate speech, our lawyers say it has to be inciting violence. I need date, time, host name, station call letters, and most importantly - audio. You get me these, I will challenge the stations' license. We the People are Taking the Media Back!

Sounds like a wonderful idea. When do we start?

If you like what Sue Wilson has to say, you can follow her on Twitter at @sueblueswilson.

And get your ass out there bright and early tomorrow and FUCKING VOTE. Unless you really want pignorant acephalic swine making the laws that will affect you and your children for the next 4-10 years.

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Politics: Freedom of Speech Is Important

... ONLY if we're the ones practicing it.

Photo from Rick Kaempfer's fine blog

Is anybody surprised? Teabaggers are only pro-free speech when it's their free speech at stake.

Your free speech? Hey, fuck you very much. And fuck your free speech too. In fact, if we don't like what you're saying, we reserve the right to call your employer and make such a fuss that they fire you.

The Huffington Post is reporting that firing was the fate of the unfortunate D.C. Douglas, an actor who does voice-overs for Geico. Well, did. Thanks to his call to the FreeDUMBWorks astroturf pseudo-TP (that's Tea Party for those who had their minds someplace grubbier), Mr. Douglas has been fired by Geico.

Well, Geico, you could — and should — have handled this much better. I know I won't be doing business with you ever again if I can avoid it.

If you feel the same way about this ridiculous foofaraw, please feel free to call Freedom works (yeah, right, for whom?) toll-free at 1.888.564.6273.



Update: Mr. Douglas is requesting that people do NOT contact Geico, with whom he says he has an amicable relationship. Therefore, I am removing the contact information for them. Even if I still think they could have handled this better.

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Politics: Smearing Judge Sotomayor

ICHC

Well, well, well.

Guess who's been caught with his greasy little paws on the scales of Justice? That old-time favourite Trent Lott. Raw Story is reporting that Trent Lott is behind the effort to smear Judge Sonia Sotomayor as a racist.

According to the article, sometime in 2002, Trent Lott recruited C. Boyden Gray, a lawyer for Bush's daddy, to create an astroturf organization — you know, a fake grassroots movement, sort of like the Teabaggers, where a bunch of rich people throw money around to recruit dumbfucks to actually bring out the bodies to be photographed.

The organization's purpose was to promote or block judicial appointments, ensuring that the judiciary, like the Houses of Congress, would be ultimately controlled by a small group of people. Gee Dumbya's daddy helped the group with a fundraising party. Members included PermaPiggy Karl Rove and current Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour.

The organization — which had the big fracking balls to disingenuously name itself the Committee for Justice — has an aim: to ensure that the judiciary is filled to the brim with pro-business judges. We've spotlighted this Committee before. The CFJ is responsible for the confirmation of William S. Pryor as an appellate court judge. Read about William S. Pryor at Mother Jones. Read about the lengthy campaign to ensure that big business owns the courts. Be sure to take your medications first.

And then get off your ass and get informed. These motherfuckers are sadly mistaken if they think we'll be distracted by their bullshit one more time. This is the legacy of Ronald Reagan and those poisonous swine, the Bush family of war criminals. It's time, folks. Let's put an end to this.

Does anyone else find a rich vein of irony in Trent Lott designating Judge Sotomayor a racist? Anybody?

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Politics: Teh News Sucks

If you're reading the news today, you know that it seriously sucks hind end. We'll get around to our usual high-quality reportage and venomous snark after the doctor's appointment. In the meantime, some not-so-sucky-news:

Blogger hunter for justice announced recently that South Africa's President Mothlanthe has appointed an openly gay man to the nation's highest court.

Hunter notes parallels with other nations and that this is a historic first. Thanks, Hunter, so pleased to hear something positive!

Digg friend AMiller sends good news about Africa. According to PRI, wherefrom comes the article, a majority of those on the African continent are moving towards democracy, better economic situations and improved health. To think that that dreadful little wart, Bill Gates, is in large part responsible for this! I only wish the jerk made better software. Still. Give the devil his due. In a world as plagued as ours by random violence, widespread insanity, and acts of cruelty, every little bit of good news helps.

And finally, for those of you as really needs a picker-upper, here's something worth fighting about — broccoli!



At least Captain Pugwash, the adorable kitteh, seems to think so.

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Politics: As Ye Sow

So shall ye reap. As one Sheldon Adelson is finding out, even as we squeak.

Who, you might ask, is Sheldon Adelson. Well, according to the article linked above, he is a 74-year-old billionaire who was once up there with Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, the third richest man in the U.S. He was also a dedicated Likudnik hawk who, according to the writer, was very likely to

...capitalize on his ascent to the top of the Republican money elite to try to build opposition in America to any Middle East peace settlement calling for the division of Israel into two states, one Jewish, the other Palestinian.

The two-state solution, as it is popularly termed, has been historically favoured by the majority of people in the affected areas as well as the rest of the world. Apparently, billionaires don't have to respect the will of the people. Apparently.

Because, yaknow, instant karma IS gonna get you. Sooner or later that chair you kicked every time you got mad? It's gonna stub your toe and turn it all purple and maybe even break it. So it is with Mr. Adelson, who has made most of his money in such crime-free enterprises as gambling. Mr. Adelson's holdings in Golden Sands Corp. is what accounts for his phenomenal wealth. And now the company is looking at defaulting on approximately $9 BILLION dollars of debt. Those loans were arranged by such luminaries as Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs, and Citigroup, three of the stars in the recent bailout scandal.

La Casa de Los Gatos wonders if any of the taxpayer dollars involved in the bailout will go into Mr. Adelson's pockets? One hopes not. On the plus side, our new President is going to have a decisive say on the staffing of the bailout plan. We believe that he will not put up with any shenanigans.

And for those who are upset over our President's Chief-of-Staff pick, Rahm Emanuel? We're not wild about Emanuel either, but we'd like to draw your attention to a few things.

• Emanuel is an enormously talented person.
  
  
• Emanuel has worked in a boutique brokerage and knows a lot about finance at a very high level.
  
  
• Emanuel is a very efficient and skillful organizer.
  
  
• Emanuel is a pit bull.
  
  He does not take shit from anyone. He does not take "No" for an answer. He is not a person to mess with because he probably will break your legs off and beat you senseless with them if you try. He's the only Democrat we know off who had the big brass balls to openly confront Dick Cheney.
  
  
• A President must be above the fray.
  
  It is not statesmanlike for the President to take partisan positions. He is the President of the WHOLE nation, not any particular interest group.
  
  
• A President must be capable of making unpopular decisions without seeming to do so.
  
  Rahm Emanuel is a perfect Chief of Staff for President Obama. He will be the lightning rod to deflect popular wrath over unpopular decisions. He's not a quitter and he's not intimidated by anyone.

In this time of economic crisis, Emanuel will understand what goes on in negotiations and he will give good advice. He's shown himself to be capable of making hard decisions when necessary.

None of this makes us like him any better, but he's not the President. He's being hired to do a job, and we suspect he is going to do a helluva job.

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2008 Elections: Telling The Truth

Opie sez it:

See more Ron Howard videos at Funny or Die

And so does the Fonz.

Change is on its way! Get out there and VOTE!

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2008 Elections: Who ARE These People, Anyway?

Longtime friend Bob (who would henceforth like to be known as Boob, and no, we don't plan to ask why) sent the following tirade, as is his wont:

Do you know of a way to find the names of the actors who starred in the latest McCain/Pig rally? I mean the rally where the guy in his 50s stood up and hollered about Obama and Pelosi and "why are they ahead in the polls?" or something like that. Great job portraying an angry mensch.

My understanding is that the Secret Service travels with the nominees; candidates mixing with an actual angry crowd would not be tolerated. Der Secret Service obersturmbannfuhrer would demand, "Why did you allow the candidate to get within reach of people shouting in hate?"

Also, who's the black man who plaintively begged McCain to stop ACORN from voting fraud? He looked so sincere. Only the perfect camera angle on him betrayed that it was a setup.

Obama's campaign should stage a few events like this, and hire these two guys.

Hmmm. The man has an excellent point. (No, not the one on his head. That's just for show.) The SS (how appropriate) is surely not permitting angry loons into crowds as small as the ones Mc Cain't draws. Apart from which, having some paid actor launch into a tirade on camera serves a useful function. It scares the holy crap out of those of us who are afraid the country's gone to the dogs. Fnords! They're all around us!

Doesn't the sight of such loons on camera contribute to the general depression and misery that people are drowning in, that makes us all jumpy, robs our sleep, keeps us tense on a low level so that we're all taking more painkillers or psychoactive meds or drinking more booze or snapping at our loved ones? Did Robert Anton Wilson's grand loony conspiracy theories have any basis in fact? Are we all going nuts?

Don't know about you out there, but we at La Casa de Los Gatos have been tense and stressed out since the McNasty campaign took its nasty turn. The financial news is doing zilch to help our mood. So? What do you think? Paid actors?

In the event, Barack don't need no paid actors. The Republicans are running away from McNasty and Cruella as fast as they can.

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2008 Elections: Presidential Debates

From the ICHC Lolcattery

Well? Should they go on as scheduled?

Yahoo wants to know what you think. Go tell 'em.

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2008 Elections: Calling A Lie A Lie

Where have all the student protesters gone? Well, some of them are alive and kicking ass out at the University of Iowa, apparently.

Take a look at the article, and if you support their actions, consider writing to the following pillars of the mass media. FTA:

Note from Stephen Fox: I think these students (Megan Felt, Hannah Rounds, Laura Kacere, Marni Steadham, Robin Berman, Dan Rathjen, David Goodner, Justin Feinstein, Brooke Bachelder, Lara Elborno, Naomi Prager, and Anthony Carter) deserve our commendation for their Gandhian courage and their intelligence to do what they did.

This could be in the form of letters to the editor of

1. Daily Iowan, the University Paper (diopletters@gmail.com)

2. Iowa City Press Citizen (opinion@press-citizen.com)

3. Des Moines Register (letters@dmreg.com)

4. Cedar Rapids Gazette (news@gazettecommunications.com)

plus five more listed here. (this is a "Live Blue" list of Newspapers in Iowa)

Thank you, students! May many more join your ranks and call these vile liars out at every opportunity.

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2008 Elections: Protect Your Vote!

From ICHC, purveyors of fine lolcattery to all

While tootling around HuffPo this morning, we found this gem from commenter SMP:

Every Vote Counts

PROTECT YOUR VOTE AGAINST VOTER FRAUD

• Absentee Ballot Users
  
  Photocopy your ballot and send it receipt requested mail. The P. O. will send you a receipt with date and time of delivery.
  
  
• In-person Voting
  
  Before going to the polls, on a piece of paper, write your vote, sign, date, and last 4 digits of your SS#. Take this with you to the polls. After voting, ask one of the men and women at the tables to sign your vote paper. These people are documented poll workers and will verify your vote. Demand this...it is your right.

This year, we MUST protect our vote!!!!

spread the word!!!

Well, that sounds like a decent call to action, and one that will certainly assist us in repelling the vote-stealing attempts of the Rebarflicans. So. Do like the commenter sez, y'all. Spread it.

See ICHC for more!

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2008 Elections: Register to Vote!

Over on Digg, commenter Bitfreak posts voter registration deadlines for the states.

If you haven't registered yet, please check your date here and register to vote well in advance. Remember that Republicans have openly declared that they will contest votes so be sure to register in enough time to fight any possible disenfranchisement. Ask your family and friends (regardless of political affiliation) if they have also registered. Persuade them to register, offer them rides if needed, do whatever it takes. This election will decide your fate, the fate of your children and grandchildren, and, most important — the fate of the nation.

State Voter Registration Deadline

Alabama Fri, Oct. 24
Alaska Sun, Oct. 5 (postmark by, Oct. 4)
Arizona Mon, Oct. 6
Arkansas Mon, Oct. 6
California Mon, Oct. 20
Colorado Mon, Oct. 6
Connecticut Tues, Oct. 21
Delaware Sat, Oct. 11
District of Columbia Mon, Oct. 6
Florida Mon, Oct. 6
Georgia Mon, Oct. 6
Hawaii Mon, Oct. 6
Idaho Register at Polls
Illinois Tues, Oct. 7
Indiana Mon, Oct. 6
Iowa Fri, Oct. 24
Kansas Mon, Oct. 20
Kentucky Mon, Oct. 6
Louisiana Mon, Oct. 6
Maine Tue, Oct. 21
Maryland Tue, Oct. 14
Massachusetts Wed, Oct. 15
Michigan Mon, Oct. 6
Minnesota Same Day Registration at polling place
Mississippi Mon, Oct. 6
Missouri Wed, Oct. 8
Montana Mon, Oct. 6 (or same day at elections office)
Nebraska Fri, Oct. 24 (mail, Oct. 17)
Nevada Tue, Oct. 14
New Hampshire Same Day
New Jersey Tues, Oct. 14
New Mexico Tues, Oct. 7
New York Fri, Oct. 10
North Carolina Fri, Oct. 10
North Dakota
Ohio Mon, Oct. 6
Oklahoma Fri, Oct. 10
Oregon Tue, Oct. 14
Pennsylvania Mon, Oct. 6
Rhode Island Sat, Oct. 4
South Carolina Sat, Oct. 4
South Dakota Mon, Oct. 20
Tennessee Mon, Oct. 6
Texas Mon, Oct. 6
Utah Oct. 6 or in person Tue, Oct. 28
Vermont Wed, Oct. 29
Virginia Mon, Oct. 6
Washington Mon, Oct. 4 ( Oct. 20 in person)
West Virginia Wed, Oct. 15
Wisconsin Wed, Oct. 15 (or Election Day at polling place)
Wyoming Can register at polls

Vote as if your life depended on it — because it does!

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2008 Elections: Entertainment!

To continue on with Samantha Bee's brilliant political analysis of the VP pick, all Vagina-Americans should love this one. Hey, Penis-Americans too!

Sarah Palin, in four minutes:



Enjoy! The Political Cat is having a couple of sick days from some mysterious ailment, so many thanks to Ms. Manitoba and FoTPC for picking up the slack. FWIW, we'll probably live, we're just suffering from severe nausea, headache, exhaustion, and convulsions(?). In LOLcat, that equates to:

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The Police State: Something YOU Can Do

Photo by Sarah L. Voisin, copyright Washington Post

Previous posts on the raid available here and here.

A rally was held yesterday for Mayor Cheye Calvo of Berwyn Heights, Maryland, to offer him and his wife support after a county sherriff's SWAT team kicked in their front door and killed their two black Labs in a stupid, irresponsible, incompetent, botched "drug raid."

One hundred people turned up, apparently. It's clear that the Mayor is popular with the citizenry. The tiny town boasts only 3,000 residents. Commentor Diane had this to say:

should put fear in all of us. Cheye has always supported ethics and justice in government, in its leaders and in his own personal life as well as his public life. Trinity Tomsic, his wife is exactly the same. I shudder to think of what worse could have happened if Trinity’s mother had taken this package in at the time of its arrival. Perhaps we would be reading about, not just two gentle innocent dogs being shot as they barked or ran from the heavily protected SWAT team carrying assault rifles, but a tiny older woman being shot as she ran away in fear. Any small investigation would have yielded enough information to make most people think twice about this family being considered “person’s of interest.” Recently, in the DC area, this receiving of a package of drugs by innocent people has happened, been documented, and should have been noted by these enforcers of the law. Where is justice? Where is due process? Why are the police of any kind given carte blanche (a knocking not necessary) warrant to enter a home with no known connection to drugs or crime? Don’t tell me how dangerous their job is if this is how they conduct it. They create unnecessary danger by their hapless planning and violent responses. Can you only imagine the feeling of personal violation had this been your home or pets? Would you, could you ever feel the same? No. Their lives are altered forever. As Cheye Calvo said, “these were our children.” Consider this. I believe killing those dogs was the violent act of intimidation and very purposeful. The message was clear as implied violence always is; Mr. Calvo, we can kill your dogs and we can kill you just as easily if you don’t comply. It was a cowardly act!! I see no bravery, courage, responsible forethought or accountability here. The county sheriff said of course, his men must have felt they were in danger to have killed the dogs. How merciful that Trinity was not home to witness this. How absurd that several men in protective gear armed with assault weapons are afraid of a fleeing terrified pet. If they fear a fleeing dog, they are definitely in the wrong business. Cheye has always planned a career in government and politics. I hope and pray he doesn’t shrink from this now. We obviously need more ethical people with courage to stop this madness. On the other hand, one can only imagine the pain, shock and sorrow in his heart that could lead him to turn his back on this violent madness. We who know and love this family, my family, are incredulous. It proves no one is safe from this kind of hapless violence. I will be at that rally in my heart!!!

We agree. This is nothing but intimidation. Brutal, violent, unconstitutional and therefore illegal, intimidation.

Commentor Susiefunk adds her two cents:

I hope the Mayor will sue the P.G.County Police and the Sheriff Department and have an individual suit against the deputy or deputies who shot the Labs for cruelty toward animals. The whole incident is a disgrace to P.G. County. I want to know if this same type of drug drop on a resident's porch has happened before(College Park) why was the idenity of the person who lived in the house taken into consideration? Or does this take too much effort on this law enforcement agency? To shoot a dog as it is running away is a real coward and bully!

Absolutely. One wonders why the police didn't bother to investigate more carefully. If there had been similar cases in the same area, shouldn't the police have known about it? Shouldn't they have used due diligence to uncover similar cases?

Commenter heckuvajob gives us the action item:

Sgt Mario Ellis can be reached at (240) 508-7638. I called to ask for the name of the shooter, and was told this guy is the department's spokesman. Several attempts to contact yielded only voicemail.

Give Sergeant Ellis' voicemail an earful, please. You might be speaking for a hundred others who are equally enraged but not able to contact the Sergeant for one reason or another. This is absolutely disgraceful. We've blogged about no-knock warrants before and how dangerous they are. And the police have yet to produce the warrant they claim to have based this illegal act on. Disgusting, disgraceful, and utterly shameful.

Our favourite penguin adds his two cents:

Wow, so they entered without a warrant too. How... fascist... of them.

Freedom(tm). For some definition of freedom that looks suspiciously like Soviet Russia or Nazi Germany. Sigh.

- Badtux the Free Penguin
(for some definition of "free" that doesn't look like the dictionary one at all).

Yup. Couldn't agree more. So, how does America look now in the eyes of those of her citizens who get their doors kicked in, their pets killed, or lose their own lives as Kathryn Johnston did? Does this look like the "land of the free and the home of the brave"? Does this look like the nation that was bequeathed by its founders to be a beacon of freedom? Badtux is right. It looks like Nazi Germany or Soviet Russia, a police state in which the police may violate any and all codes of decency, morality, humanity for any reason at any time without recourse for the citizenry.

And here's what really bunches our underroos. While this ridiculous sham of a police operation was going on, a certain Richard D. Davis and his companion Dena D. Riley, both of Missouri, are on trial for brutally torturing, raping, and murdering at least two women. Well, at least two whose repulsive deaths were videotaped, anyway. It so happens that Mr. Davis and Ms. Riley were questioned by the police, but not taken into custody at the time. Shortly after the questioning and before the police obtained a warrant for their arrest, the couple fled.

Mr. Davis, shortly before the torture-murders of the two known victims, had served an 18-year sentence for rape and sodomy. Yet, the police did not think they needed a "no-knock" warrant to apprehend him. A known criminal with an obvious proclivity for brutal crimes (it's not easy getting sentenced to 18 years for the crime of rape) gets a relatively polite questioning. And this from the police of the fine state of Missouri, who tased a teenager with a broken back nineteen fucking times for no reason that anyone can determine. But a law-abiding citizen like the Mayor of Berwyn Heights, with no known criminal record but rather a record of achievement and service to his community and his nation, gets his door kicked in, his pets shot before his eyes, and has the privilege of cleaning their bodies and blood off his floor afterwards and repairing his own front door. And the Prince George's County police have yet to show this warrant. So what's the deal, is Maryland trying to catch up with Missouri and Louisiana and Ohio in the "violation of human rights and civil rights" award department?

If you want to do something nice for Cheye Calvo and his wife, Trinity Tomsic, or for their poor dogs, send money to Chris Brittan-Powell, who organized the rally. Here's what he has to say:

Berwyn Heights police chief Patrick Murphy said he regretted that the sheriff's office and county police raided Calvo's home without Murphy's knowledge. Murphy has been vocal about his anger that his eight-person force was not informed of the raid in advance.

"I never imagined, when I set out to protect people from the crooks and the criminals, that I would have to protect them from my fellow police officers," Murphy told the crowd.

Brittan-Powell said that the rally's aim was not to condemn police but to show Calvo that residents were on his side and did not believe he deserved to have his home raided. Brittan-Powell said the group was taking donations to buy two trees to be planted at Calvo's home in memory of the dogs as well as to fund repairs to Calvo's front door.

Gads! The SWAT team, the county sherriff's department, and the county police department should have to pay for the repair of the door, plus a generous settlement for the emotional distress that resulted from their actions.

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