“The results are based on aggregated data from more than 88,000 Gallup Daily tracking interviews conducted in the first six months of 2014 — a time when the president averaged 43% job approval among all Americans. Gallup interviewed 552 Muslims and at least 1,700 respondents in every other religious group during this time.”
TPM — The Blaze, the conservative news site affiliated with Glenn Beck, flagged the comments made Monday by Richard Mack, identified as a former Arizona sheriff who had joined more than 1,000 other protesters alongside Cliven Bundy, who has been feuding with BLM over his use of federal land to graze his cattle.
“We were actually strategizing to put all the women up at the front,” Mack said in a Fox News clip pulled by The Blaze. “If they are going to start shooting, it’s going to be women that are going to be televised all across the world getting shot by these rogue federal officers.”
That sounds … familiar.
Wiki — After World War II, it was claimed by German SS general Gottlob Berger that there was a plan, proposed by the Luftwaffe and approved by Adolf Hitler, to set up special POW camps for captured airmen of the Royal Air Force and the United States Army Air Forces in large German cities, to act as human shields against their bombing raids.
One of the most famous uses of human shields occurred in Iraq in 1990, following the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait that precipitated the Gulf War of 1990-1991. Saddam Hussein’s government detained hundreds of citizens of Western countries who were in Iraq for use as human shields in an attempt to deter nations from participating in military operations against the country. A number of these hostages were filmed meeting Hussein, and kept with him to deter any targeted attacks, whilst others were held in or near military and industrial targets.
According to various accounts—including that of the American ambassador to the U.N., the Taliban used women and children from their own population as human shields against coalition forces in 2006, and 2007, and when the British attacked during August 2008 during the war in Afghanistan
Over the last couple of days, two very different Republicans have opened two completely different faults lines in conservative ideology. Video of Rand Paul lashing out at Iraq War profiteer Dick Cheney surfaced, and Jeb Bush made the case for viewing illegal immigrants as human beings. First Rand Paul: [Read more…]
The wingnut brigade has a big problem with public schools. Actually, their big money silent partners in crime have a problem: schools are generally supported in large part by property taxes and the 0.01% pay more, based on the value of their real estate holdings, than the typical middle-class homeowner pays on his or her tiny box or struggling single parents pay on their roach infested tenement. Ergo, any excuse to bash public ed and pick on teachers is eagerly taken up and, if it involves portraying teachers as cowards, so much the better. So, what to do about teachers who have saved little kids while crazy people prowl the halls with assault weapons blowing off tiny heads and snuffing out tiny lives?
RW Watch — On VCY America’s Crosstalk last week, Gun Owners of America executive director Larry Pratt agreed with a caller who said that unarmed teachers who protect students during school shootings aren’t heroes. “When you see these stories on the news about teachers, and they’re saying they’re heroes because they’re running and hiding and locking doors and everything, and that’s supposed to be a heroic act. I think it’s sheer terror,” the caller complained. “I’d rather they be a hero with a good shot,” Pratt agreed.
Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world, just not the adults who sacrifice their lives to save them, huh? Let’s meet a few of these non heroes:
Maryrose Kristopik — music teacher, Newtown: Mrs Kristopik said: ‘I did take the children into the closet and talked with them to keep them quiet. I told them that I loved them. I said there was a bad person in the school. I didn’t want to tell them anything past that.’ Mrs Kristopik said she was standing in front of the other door and holding the handle to keep the children out of harm’s way.
Victoria Soto –, 1st grade, Newtown: When she became aware there was a gunman in the school, she hid her first-graders in closets and cabinets, then told the shooter they were in the gym. He turned the gun on Soto, killing her, but none of her students were harmed.
Antionette Tuff, accountant, Ronald McNair school: The bookkeeper, an eight-year veteran of the DeKalb County school district, talked suspect Michael Brandon Hill into surrendering after a brief standoff with police Tuesday afternoon. Faced with an armed 20-year-old who told her he was off his medication for a mental disorder, Tuff shared stories of heartbreak from her own life to help calm him down — a recent divorce, a son with multiple disabilities.
Larry Pratt may be a total, shameless, amoral sociopath or he may just a garden variety asshole. He’s sure not the guy any respectable org should want in the judges booth rating heroes. But when it comes to panic, I suspect Mr. Pratt may have some very real, first person insight into the mind of a coward.
North Carolina health officials are warning residents to steer clear of the Dan River, where a pipe from a nearby power plant is dumping unsafe levels of arsenic. … Arsenic levels in the waste-water are 14 times those considered safe for human contact.“Because the Duke Power-Eden coal ash spill is located in North Carolina’s portion of the Dan River, a potential hazard exists immediately downstream of the release,” health officials said in a statement, recommending that people “avoid recreational contact with water and sediment in the Dan River in North Carolina downstream of the Duke Power-Eden spill site.”
It has been said that every great cause starts out as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually turns into a racket. See exhibit A: the right-wing infotainment complex. That transformation took decades to complete. But former Massachusetts Senator Scot Brown (R-sociopath) may have set a new land-speed record by renting his email list out to a quack MD in exchange for a piece of the action: [Read more…]
Senator Ted Cruz, (R – sociopath) may be a shameful opportunist but he wants you to know he is proud naturalized American. The kind that was born in another country and therefore probably ineligible to be President. Which clearly means “both sides” do it: [Read more…]
All ye good and true Americans, heed the command of Tony Perkins and his small government ideology — except when the government is in the bedroom enforcing modern-day Puritism. Hark, though the SCOTUS decision does not force states to recognize gay marriage, and Perkins tries to celebrate this crushing defeat divine victory, we still must pray what remains of the gay away — because nothing fails quite like prayer thus assuring Cleric Perkins an unending supply of outrage. Which he has quite the proven facility for turning into money: [Read more…]
Zombie candidate and eternal right-wing pundit Mike Huckabee knows a thing or two about Jesus. The former Arkansas governor doesn’t think his Lord and Savoir is perturbed by tax cuts for zillionaires, sweetheart contracts for war profiteers, or budget cuts for those struggling with the real world consequences of Huckabee’s fave policies. But when it comes to marriage equality, Huckabee knows Jesus is so emotionally invested in denying same sex couples equal rights he cannot divinely compose himself today. [Read more…]
Zombie invasion: one of many possible contingencies being planned for in Kansas shelter/theme park.
Preppers rejoice, the end times may be nigh. At least according to a colorful, eccentric survivalist-themed park owner deep in the heart of Kansas. Doesn’t matter how the end comes mind you, until that mystery resolves, he’s definitely on a spiritual mission: which includes translating the cash of the paranoid and curious into his own: [Read more…]