Hypocrisy Watch category archive

Perhaps you’ve heard of the Bundy affair. If not, TPM has a nice little summary.

The short version is that a rancher stole from the government–that is, you and me–for almost two decades by grazing his cattle on public property, while ignoring repeated requests, followed by court orders for payment. When the government started to confiscate his cattle that were illegally on public property, the rancher went all John Wayne and threated a range war. Wingnuts grabbed up their AK-47s and rushed to fill his army. At last report, the government has backed down from aggressive enforcement to avoid bloodshed, though I suspect it’s not over yet.

Bob Cesca cuts to the hypocrisy (emphasis added):

This wasn’t about freedom or government overreach. This was about a rancher who’s clearly leeching off the system, and then who subsequently got all pissy-pants when, after repeatedly ignoring numerous civil attempts at collection, gathered a posse of local hooples to fight the power: armed neo-Confederate cosplayers, Ron Paul cultists, weekend warriors and Alex Jones chemtrail-busters who literally formed a line of battle and foolishly advanced upon the government corral.

(snip)

All we hear every day from the far-right is about how food stamp and welfare recipients are unfairly sucking from the government tit . . . . And yet there they were, lined up with horses, guns and cowboy drag, marching toward armed BLM rangers in the name of defending an actual freeloader who’s bilked American taxpayers out of millions.

Afterthought:

“Cowboy drag.” That pretty much sums it up.

Frederick Fuller is fed up with Hobby Lobby and its dupes and fellow travelers (emphasis added):

O’Brien went on to say, “The idea that a corporation has a conscience is for many of us completely ridiculous. It’s granting power to business owners with extremist religious beliefs.”

The bottom line is that religion has no place in issues of this sort. Religion is, as it has been for time immemorial, an excuse to break the law, kill people, conquer people and land, and refuse to help people in need. For all its fundamental Christian ideals, Hobby Lobby and the others involved conveniently play the religion card but forget that their Messiah turned no one away for any reason. They’re not Christ-like; they are capitalist opportunists hiding behind religion for their own gain.

Religion of any flavor is menacing when used by people to harm others or to shield themselves from public censure.

Thoreau has a thought.

Just follow the link.

Many years ago, an old black man said about my then State Senator, “He calls himself a lawyer . . . .”

It was an onion statement.

It had many layers, but underneath them all was a truth. The person in question was neither a good lawyer, nor a good State Senator.*

The statement can be equally true for someone who calls himself a pastor.

Sadly, in the universe of those who “call themselves” something or other they are not, there are many more who call themselves “pastors” than who call themselves “lawyers.”

Wrap yourself in God and get away with anything.

At least in this world.

__________________

*His wife was my boss on one of my summer jobs when I was a college student. She was a much better boss than he was either a State Senator or a lawyer.

Scofflaws caught on camera.

I promised myself that I was not going to spend more than one post on Duck Dynasty, but this is too good (and too true) to pass up.

Warning: Language, every bit of which is deserved.

The Inky notes that the Stars and Bars seems to be gaining popularity in Yankeeland. A nugget:

Charlie Hauber, owner of the Flag & Sign Place in Broomall, Delaware County, said he keeps Confederate flags in stock because of their historical relevance. Other flag stores refuse to sell them.

“I’ve had truckers come to me and say, ‘I can’t buy these things anywhere,’ ” Hauber said. “Places just stopped selling them.”

Hauber said that he doesn’t support slavery, but that the Civil War was also about states’ rights.

This question was not asked (or, at least, not mentioned in the story):

States’ rights to do just what, exactly?

One more time, when someone says, “states rights,” ask that question.

Then please let me know what happens.

Drape the Stars and Bars over it and thereby hide the obvious.

My ancestors wore the grey, and even I can understand that it was all about theft of labor (play the video if you want to get it).

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, wrap up theft of labor in misty grey-colored memories, add grits, and it becomes “Southern culture.”

I’ll stop now, before the profanity.

Politeness in the “happiest place on earth.”

A Walt Disney World park guest found a loaded gun in the seat of a ride at the Animal Kingdom that had fallen out of a man’s back pocket on Sunday.

A grandmother handed a Cobra .380-caliber semiautomatic pistol about noon to a park attendant, who immediately contacted security and the Orange County Sheriff’s Office.

The gun nut in question was quoted as saying the gun fell out of his pocket.

If there were an intelligence test for gunutt–oh, never mind.

Gina Barreca has some suggestions for candidates who walk the Appalachian Trail or twit on Twitter or both.

No. 1. If the first things springing up in a word association game at the mention of your name are “disgraced,” “dishonored” and “lies like a rug” only to be swiftly followed by “Forgiven by his wildly humiliated spouse who once seemed smart but now looks like she’s auditioning for ‘Sister Wives,'” you should lower your sense of self-esteem the way people lower the blinds.

The women at Swarthmore are fed up.

Hope Brinn says administrators were dismissive after a male student showed up in her room when she was unclothed and refused to leave, and Mia Ferguson says she was an assault victim. The two 19-year-old sophomores organized 20 other students and alums to complain to federal authorities that Swarthmore is violating the 1990 Clery Act that requires full reporting of campus crimes, including sexual assaults.

(snip)

About the only thing everyone agrees on is that underreporting sexual assaults and harassment is a national problem, not just a Swarthmore problem. On the same day as the Swarthmore complaint, 37 students and alums from Occidental College – the Southern California campus President Obama once attended – also lodged a Clery Act complaint, following complaints at a half-dozen other schools, including University of North Carolina and Amherst College.

Colleges don’t want the embarrassment of being in the news, unless it’s a victory on the athletic field.

After all, it’s not a cover-up when it’s “protecting the reputation of the institution,” now, is it?

The Old Boys Club protects not only Old Boys, but also young boys.

After all, young boys grow up to be Old Boys.

Wild oats and all that (harrumph), eh what?

Aside:

I wasn’t always cynical. Once I pinned a towel around my neck and pretended I was Superman.

Then I turned 11.

At the University of North Carolina, which seems to have relocated to Steubenville.

Attorney Clay Turner sent a letter Monday to Chancellor Holden Thorp, advising the school that his client, Landen Gambill, filed the complaint with the Office for Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of Education. The letter also asks Thorp to dismiss charges filed in honor court against Gambill.

The decision to pursue the honor court violations against Gambill are in retaliation for her participation in a Title IX complaint filed against the university and for her public criticisms of the way the school treats sexual violence survivors, he wrote.

Although she has not publicly identified the man she alleges raped her, Gambill is accused of violating the honor code by creating an environment that’s intimidating for him. A university hearings board earlier cleared him of sexual assault charges but found him guilty of harassing her. He faces no criminal charges.

The Booman has more.

Let no sin go unrewarded.

Retired Los Angeles Cardinal Roger Mahoney is soon off to Rome to vote on a successor to St. Peter, even though Mahoney was recently stripped of public duties by his successor after documents revealed he helped cover up scores of clerical sex abuse cases in the 1980s.

Archbishop Jose Gomez, who did the stripping, nonetheless is asking the faithful to pray for Cardinal Mahoney. Gomez is confident that his predecessor’s experience will serve “well” as cardinals work “to discern the will of the Holy Spirit” and elect a new pope.

Ireland’s Cardinal Sean Brady will be joining Mahoney in Rome. Two years ago, it was revealed that Brady swore to secrecy in 1975 two boys who were repeatedly abused by a monk and serial pedophile.

More at the link.

There’s a certain Zuckerboardian schadenfreude here.

A picture that (Facebook’s Mark–ed.) Zuckerberg’s sister posted on her personal Facebook profile was seen by a marketing director, who then posted the picture to Twitter and her more than 40,000 followers Wednesday.

That didn’t sit well with Zuckerberg’s sister, Randi, who tweeted at Callie Schweitzer that the picture was meant for friends only and that posting the private picture on Twitter was “way uncool.” Schweitzer replied by saying the picture popped up on her Facebook news feed.

Later on in the story, she is quoted as saying that it is rude to repost other persons’ stuff without their permission

You know, the way Facebook did (maybe still does) with your pictures in their ads.

(Other users were quoted as saying that the problem is that Facebook’s privacy policies, well, just zuck.)

Tagg Romney notoriously said that, when President Obama called out his Daddy’s lies in Tuesday’s debate, he wanted to rush the stage and–well–tag the President one.

In the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Tony Norman wonders why Tagg didn’t declare a desire to tag Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, or any other of Mitt the Flip’s opponents who have remarked on Mitt’s malignantly militant mendacity.

Gee.

Whatever could it have been?

I just can’t imagine how Mr. Obama could have made Mr. Tagg so uppityset.

A nugget from Mr. Norman (emphasis added).

And let’s address the elephant in the room: Tagg Romney was in no hurry to rush the stage when primary opponents this year and in 2008 questioned Mitt Romney’s integrity. He wouldn’t have had to worry about the Secret Service intervening when Gov. Rick Perry was mocking his father. Why didn’t he take a swing at the Texas governor? Because Mr. Perry would have stomped him silly and then stomped his dad for good measure.

When former House Speaker Newt Gingrich explicitly called Mitt Romney a liar, somehow Tagg Romney kept his composure. Former Sen. Rick Santorum insisted that Gov. Romney was the worst possible nominee the GOP could run against Barack Obama. Tagg smiled through Mr. Santorum’s withering assessment and kept his violent thoughts to himself. There were no goofy threats giggled into radio microphones back then, despite ample opportunities.

The fact that Tagg Romney could vent to his fantasies about taking a swing at the first black president is a testament to his broad-mindedness in a way. He’s another Republican who “doesn’t see color.” All Tagg Romney sees is someone taking a shot at his dad, and it makes him mad now in a way that didn’t make him quite as mad before.

It is all around us. We have only to look.

Via Contradict Me.

From the website:

Meet Matthew Fogg, a former U.S. Marshal whose??? exploits led him to be nicknamed “Batman.” When he noticed that all of his team’s drug raids were in black areas, he suggested doing the same in the suburbs. His boss didn’t shine to that idea.

Notice how the professional religionists always seem to be going for the gold?

God works in mysterious ways, it’s said, but his path to state lawmakers in Sacramento has taken a particularly odd route – through a North Carolina courtroom.

A bitter split three years ago in an evangelical group providing Bible studies at California’s Capitol has sparked an East Coast lawsuit. Two groups – Capitol Ministries and Capitol Commission – are rivals for the chance to bring Christian teachings to legislators at capitols nationwide.

Each nonprofit group blames the other for backstabbing and deceit in the effort to touch lawmakers’ hearts through ministries funded by millions of dollars from Christians and sympathetic churches, foundations and businesses.

The story makes Hamlet, minus the swordplay of course, seem like an episode of the Flintstones.

Roman Catholic parishioners were told their priest had to leave his church in 1992 because he had Lyme disease, even though his removal actually came after an altar boy’s fondling complaint, a witness testified Monday.

Mary Mignogno, who knew about the boy’s complaint, didn’t know what to say to her children when she heard the lie from the pulpit.

Nothing to add. Nothing needs adding.