James O’Keefe has a new video out purporting to show that Welfare Recipients of Color are selling their “Obamaphones” to buy drugs. And the usual gullible twits who believe everything they see on Drudge are breathlessly passing this along. The Dumbest Man on the Internet thinks they are buying Louis Vuittons also.
It seems O’Keefe’s video doesn’t actually show anyone selling his phone to buy drugs, just some actor-recipients saying that’s what they’ll do, and a sales clerk saying, in effect, he doesn’t give a bleep what they do with the phones. Obviously the sales clerk is taking direction directly from the Oval Office. (/sarcasm)
But we’re not talking iPhones or Androids here. These appear to be bare-bones cell phones that just make phone calls and which come with less than $10 a month in calling time. No doubt they are locked to particular phone providers and accounts, so someone not registered to the account probably couldn’t use them without unlocking them. And the buyer would have to know how to do that, because the service providers aren’t doing it any more, I don’t think.
So the phones are hardly worth the price of a Louis Vuitton. They may not be worth the price of a luggage tag.
And the free cell phone program began during the Bush Administration, so logically they ought to be called “Dubya phones.” But neither Dubya nor the current POTUS was actually involved with setting up the program, which is not subsidized with tax dollars but by phone companies, which are also making money from this somehow. The video explains:
[Apologies; video has disappeared.]
See also Annenberg Fact Check and Gawker. People are paying a surcharge on their phone bills to help pay for the program, but the same surcharge also helps to subsidize phone service in rural areas. So some of the yahoos who might be complaining about the surcharge also are benefiting from it.
The bigger wonder, though, is how so many on the Right are so completely void of critical thinking skills that they don’t question how a cheapie phone would be worth enough money to buy drugs. They quote a clerk on the video saying to take the phone to a pawn shop to see what they are worth, but you don’t see O’Keefe actually doing that. My bet is that pawnbrokers won’t take them.
No, maha, I beg to differ – righties are NOT stupid.
They are far more than just stupid.
They are stupid AND ignorant.
And intolerant.
And lack compassion.
And lack any critical thinking skills.
And only laugh at something cruel. While the rest of us may guiltily laugh at a scene in a movie or on TV, where an old lady slips on a banana peel, and lands on her ass. Righties won’t laugh unless her poor ass is run-over by a city bus – which is, in their minds, a government hand-out to moochers who need rides, because they’re too lazy to walk, and too poor to own cars. And now, she won’t be able to collect any more SS! ‘CAUSE SHE’S DEAD!!! Oh, they’ll ROTFLTAO over that one!
They are followers, who imagine themselves to be great leaders.
They are scared little people, with delusions of grandeur, who think the government is out to get them. Hell, the WHOLE WORLD is out to get them!!
But most of all – THEY ARE DANGEROUS!!!!!
If it’s true that 27% of all people are unhinged Authoritarian followers, then realize that more than 1 in 4 drivers of cars on any road you’re on, wouldn’t think twice of running you over, or running into you, as long as they could get away with it, and you were worse off for the encounter than they are.
And they are SICK.
^ gulag, the word I use is “venal”. Stupid and venal. O’Keefe is Exhibit A.
O’Keefe needs to tighten up on his investigative reporting.. His subject matter is like so played out.. But the ‘Obamaphone” is kinda novel in adding a humorous twist. I’m surprised he didn’t highlight the advantages of Pimpdaddy keeping his hoes on an electronic leash at taxpayers expense.
Thanks, I like that word, too.
But what’s most amazing, is that after Reich Wing radio gathered steam and FOX “News” became mainstream, the stupid and ignorant people, are proud of their stupidity and ignorance.
They revel in it.
It used to be, really stupid and ignorant people kind of isolated themselves, because they knew, deep down, that they were stupid and ignorant. And they knew better than to open their mouths in public.
Now, not only do these people call into radio shows, they host them, they’re talking heads on FOX, and they run for political office – AND WIN!!!
Welcome to DumbF*ckistan!
Where every feckin’ eedjit thinks s/he’s a genius, and shouts down smart people, calling them idiots.
It really is a scary time to be alive.
I look at it as the failure of the intelligent people to keep the stupid in place. Because there always will be stupid. It’s happened before, William Butler Yeats wrote about it, in The Second Coming:
The best lack conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity. If you think it’s scary now, just wait till things really start falling apart.
“Righties Are Stupid”
Goes without saying. All a half-assed politician ever needed to get a righties vote was some phony slogan, city on the hill, thousand points, county first? The real danger is that more and more even “mainstream” righties live in a world fueled by email rumor and internet folk lore. Spend a few minutes at the Blaze you’ll be amazed at the dribble these knuckle-draggers get all in a twist about. The fact that CNN would title their story debunking the myth “The real story behind free Obama Phones” says it all.
I wonder how much of this is stupidity and how much of it is dishonesty.
Check out Darrell Issa’s Wikipedia page.. Seems he’s not only proficient at doing IRS investigations.. He’s pretty handy with a Slim Jim also. He’s been arrested more times than Clyde Barrow.
Actually, I believe the Lifeline phone program started under Saint Ronnie.
Lee — that was a land line phone service program that was sort of the grandfather of the current program. The free cell phone part started during the Bush Administration.
(Read with sarcasm set to “drip”)It really would be so much better just to keep the elderly and impoverished more isolated so they could die alone and not be found ill when the chances of saving them would probably be low, and we all know how much emergency room treatment costs. It is a savings opportunity at both ends! (Sarcasm tag, please.)
I was reminded of this article:
http://www.thebaffler.com/past/the_long_con/print