Looks like somebody’s getting fed up, finally:
White House Spokesman Jay Carney said Thursday afternoon that President Barack Obama rejected an invitation from Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell to meet about cutting the deficit.
“What the senator invited the president to do was to hear Senate Republicans restate their maximalist position. We know what that position is,†Carney said.
Update: Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell is inviting President Barack Obama to the Capitol to hear first-hand why his proposed tax increases will not pass, The Associated Press is reporting.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-rejects-invitation-to-meet-with-senate-republicans-on-debt-ceiling-2011-6#ixzz1Qn22Fe00
That’s the thing with righties. They’ve been reciting the same dogma for decade after decade, yet they always assume no one else has heard it before.
Elsewhere: SEC rules in favor of Colbert. Seriously.
The mindless hysteria of right-wing sheep.
From the other blog — something inspirational — a hate crime victim is trying to save his assailant from execution.
I’d have loved it if Obama, when invited, said to the media, “Well, I’d quote the previous Vice President and his response to Senator Leahy, but I’m too much of a gentleman. I do echo the sentiments, though.”
And I love Colbert.
Here, he’s doing what EVERY major new organization should have done/be doing – and that is exposing the SEC contribution rules for the farce that they are. He’s saying things as a joke that can, and are, happening in reality.
And if they weren’t mindless hysterics, they probably wouldn’t be right wing sheep.
And good for the guy trying to save his attacker from the death penalty. Which part of God saying “Vengeance is mine” don’t the religious maniacs who are out for blood understand?
That’s the thing with righties. They’ve been reciting the same dogma for decade after decade, yet they always assume no one else has heard it before.
It’s not that they assume no one has heard it – they don’t care if you’ve heard it or not. It’s that they believe in it, the way most people believe in gravity or that the sun rises in the east. They emphatically believe you should too. They state their (mere) beliefs as though they are Universally Accepted Facts, so why can’t you get with the program? And so to those who, inconceivably, don’t seem to get it, they recite their religious beliefs because it’s all they know, and because this kind of bullying has worked very well for them to get their way. The bully absolutely doesn’t care what you think or know.
It’s like a well worn, often used, highly effective standard battle tactic – link arms, become a single force, march forward and repeat the dogma until the enemy crumbles before you. It’s worked pretty well at obliterating enemies (again, who cares what they know or think?) since Reagan.
In California, Jerry Brown managed to get a budget passed without the help of Republicans. He made a remark to the effect that they had a religious reluctance to entertain any ideas involving new revenues. Same deeply held religious beliefs as the national party.
If you’re not understanding, I’m not yelling loud enough.
Shorter McConnell: Tell that boy to get his black ass down here and do what I tell him.
OT, One Small Town in America Quietly Enjoys the Health Care We Dream of.
“His administration has been burying our kids and grandkids in new debt and offered no plan to rein in spending,” Boehner said yesterday. “The President has been AWOL from that debate.”
I just read yesterday that our episode in Iraq/ Afghanistan/Libya with end up at approximately 3.4 trillion dollars..give or take a few hundred billion, and that our kids will be paying that debt until 2050. Maybe we can put a few hundred million of that total in Obama’s lap for the Libya thing, but the majority of that wasted money is a result the “War President” and the goose stepping Congress that couldn’t think past their allegiance to their political party.
It galls me that Boehner can be so boldly obnoxious and oblivious to reality when he spews his tainted nonsense. There’s enough blame to go around for the condition of our economy, and anybody who has been paying a small degree of attention should know how effed up Boehner is. Unfortunately there are a lot of clueless people out here who just swallow every word and distortion that Boehner puts out. Boehner is Puke City!
About the “hate crime victim is trying to save his assailant from execution” story…
I’ve said a few times that though I’m generally liberal and often “further to the left than Maha,” I’m not a big believer that every issue is a “left/right” thing. To me, the death penalty is one of those issues. In many cases (where an especially brutal crime has been committed, and the individual can never be allowed out of prison) I’m often in favor of the death penalty.
It’s not a revenge thing for me, nor do I believe the death penalty is an effective deterrent to crime. Most criminals think they won’t get caught, so whether you dish out life sentences or the death penalty, it makes little or no difference to the number of horrible crimes committed.
So why do I support the death penalty at all? A few reasons. If that convicted criminal is so dangerous that he/she can never be let out of prison (that is to say, a life sentence), you might as well execute him/her. A violent lifer is a danger to other nonviolent prisoners, and guards. The horrors that go on within American prisons (rapes, beatings, murders) are reason enough to reconsider keeping these people alive, after society has determined that they are too violent to ever walk free again.
Then there is the question of being humane. Is it more humane to put someone in prison for life, as opposed to execution? If it was me, and I was given the choice of execution or spending the rest of my life behind bars, I’d just as soon be executed and get it over with. Prison lifers are like the “living dead” – society is through with them, and they are locked in cages forever until they die.
There is a big caveat – we can’t call ourselves civilized unless all executions are done humanely. The recent scandal surrounding the “three-drug cocktail” (where the first drug – a sedative – is conveniently forgotten resulting in a very painful death) is truly disgusting. It puts America in the league of countries that stone prisoners to death. Indeed, stoning might be less painful. Carrying out a swift and painless execution does not exactly require high technology. Veterinarians (who generally love animals) perform “executions” all the time, often with tears in their eyes, but they manage to do it humanely. How can it be botched so badly when it come to humans?
I think this is where my opinion diverges significantly from righties – I noticed on the rightie blogs absolute cheering when they learned that many executions are botched, resulting in horribly painful deaths. Comments like “good, serves ’em right” are almost the norm in wingnutland. They also seem to take great delight in these executions, sometimes even expressing a desire to be an executioner. I guess it’s their idea of a great time.
I know that someone will raise the issue of accidentally executing an innocent person. Yes, I’m sure it happens all the time. Indeed, I’m sure that a high percentage of prisoners in the USA are serving life sentences for crimes they didn’t commit, or crimes that never even occurred. Now, THAT is the real scandal. In my opinion, prosecutors who are found to have falsely prosecuted innocent individuals should be immediately fired from their jobs at a minimum. The fact is, there is currently no penalty when prosecutors knowingly put an innocent person behind bars. They can do it repeatedly, and their pensions are not even threatened. With perverse incentives to get as many convictions as possible (to show that one is “tough on crime”), it’s little wonder that America is now host to the world’s largest gulag.
For those who haven’t seen it, I recommend the movie “Pierrepoint.” It’s about Britain’s last executioner. Not a “pro” or “anti” death penalty movie – just shows what it’s like to be the one who has to do the dirty work. Albert Pierrepoint was himself very tormented by what he had to do:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0462477/
In the end, Pierrepoint allegedly became an opponent of capital punishment.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Pierrepoint#Views_on_capital_punishment
Candide —
As you say, we now have copious evidence that some people executed in the U.S. in recent decades very likely did not commit the crimes of which they were convicted. As long as the prisoner is still alive, there’s a chance he can get a retrial and get the conviction reversed, and be released from prison. It does happen.
The death penalty automatically triggers a long, drawn-out appeals process even if there is no question the original trial was fair and the prisoner rightfully convicted. Because of this, the death penalty costs taxpayers more money than life imprisonment. Exactly how much more is a point of contention, and pro-execution arguments say that’s easy to fix; just eliminate the appeals. And the appeals are more limited than they used to be. But a death sentence requires the state to be extraordinarily cautious, IMO, so some appeals are required.
The appeals process keeps the survivors of murder victims in a state of limbo for many years after the conviction. They are caught up in a continuing struggle over the sentence that drags on and on through hearings and court appearances, instead of getting on with their lives. There’s no evidence that the execution brings any real relief or closure for most victims’ families. Often they say later that they expected it to help them feel better, but it didn’t.
I also think use of the death penalty encourages people to think that retribution and cruelty to some people are righteous and justified, which (in my unsupported opinion) may actually cause a population to be more violent. If you compare violent crime rates among nations, there is a fairly strong positive correlation — with a few exceptions — between use of the death penalty and violent crime rates. Especially if you compare nations with similar levels of affluence and political stability, as a rule nations that actively use a death penalty (some nations still have it on the books but haven’t executed anybody in many years) tend to have higher rates of homicide, assault, and other violent crimes than those that do not. There are some outliers, notably Japan, but the correlation holds true more often than not.
In the end, Pierrepoint allegedly became an opponent of capital punishment.
See also Let Him Have It (1991 British drama), about 19-year-old Derek Bentley, one of the last people Pierrepoint executed. It may explain why he came to oppose the death penalty.