Political Theatre category archive

Via Raw Story.

Warning: In worse taste than usual.

It has nothing to do with Jeb “Oh God Please Not Another” Bush.

Via Balloon Juice, which has other stuff that is even more depressing than the prospect of yet another Bush.

Via Kos.

Via Job’s Anger.

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel’s Christian Schneider follows a thought as it journeys through Scott Walker’s mind.

. . . and it’s time to worry.

Via Raw Story.

Also, pigs, wings.

Jeez Louise.

Sex between lobbyists and government officials who are covered under North Carolina’s ethics laws does not constitute a gift that must be listed in disclosure reports, the State Ethics Commission said Friday.

“Consensual sexual relationships do not have monetary value and therefore are not reportable as gifts or ‘reportable expenditures made for lobbying,’” the formal advisory opinion says.

If consensual sexual relations “do not have monetary value,” why is prostitution illegal?

(Link fixed.)

At Asia Times, Alfred W McCoy identifies what he dubs “the real American exceptionalism.” A snippet:

Washington, more than any other power, created the modern international community of laws and treaties, yet it now reserves the right to defy those same laws with impunity. A sovereign ruler should, said Schmitt, discard laws in times of national emergency. So the United States, as the planet’s last superpower or, in Schmitt’s terms, its global sovereign, has in these years repeatedly ignored international law, following instead its own unwritten rules of the road for the exercise of world power.

Follow the link to find to what thinker McCoy attributes such arrogation of power. You will be taken aback.

CPAC twits.

The Gloomy Historian points that, oh, yes, it sure as heck can.

This is a must-read.

The Rude One explains why Bill O’Reilly will survive and thrive despite the current kerfuffle over his lies. Two snippets:

No one on the right cares about right-wing liars. They just don’t.

(snip)

Lies are the fuel that runs the outrage engine that gets the base amped up and ready to vote for idiots.

Follow the link for the full dose of rudeness.

Leonard Pitts, Jr., uncovers the foundations of Rudy Guiliani’s recent claim that President Obama doesn’t love America “like us.” He reveals what that “us” is thinking.

Most of them (the “us”–ed.) no longer say it with racial slurs, but they say it just the same. They say it with birther lies and innuendo of terrorist ties. They say it by saying “subhuman mongrel.” They say it by questioning Obama’s faith. They say it as Rudy Giuliani said it last week. They say it because they have neither the guts to say nor the self-awareness to understand what’s really bothering them:

How did this bleeping N-word become president of the United States?

Read the rest.

As you may have heard, Rudy Guiliani recently unleashed his inner racist and various reporters and commentators had the gall–the unmitigated gall–to notice.

Wingnuts cried “media bias.’

At the same time, Howard Dean suggested that Wisconsin governor and Koch Brothers sycophant Scott Walker, being a college drop-out, was not qualified to be president. Republicans freaked out, but Democrats made no charges of media bias.

Jonathan Bernstein attempts to understand the contrast. A snippet:

Both accusations were pretty much denounced by everyone; both sparked predictable partisan bashing and a few interesting reflections.

But liberals didn’t go crying about conservative media bias in the Dean-Walker case because they don’t see every news story as an example of prejudice against them. Conservatives do.

Via Kos.