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My Favorite “Fool” posts

Sometimes my blog posts are just silly, sarcasm-filled rants, and I usually think they’re obvious enough that you can tell. Once in a while, however, someone writes to me, “Is this true?”

So here, for April Fool’s Day, are a few of my favorites:

Man in Dress Says Gay Marriage Will Harm his Non-Marriage : Taking marriage advice from the pope?  Sure!  Who’s better qualified?

Latin?  As in Latin America? :  Make a state motto in Latin?  Clearly the work of them damn ferners!blog-woodyallen-111811

Ted Cruz replaced by wacky inflatable tube:  Just as effective!

Nation’s bigots subject of hate-filled intolerance:  How dare we criticize bigots?  Aren’t we supposed to be tolerant?

South Carolina Joins the 21st Century;  Senator Graham has the Vapors :  And hits his head on the closet in which he lives.

How to Speak Republican:  Lessons to GOP politicians on how to take good news for America and make it sound bad.

Cruz Control:  Giddy over the government shutdown, Cruz plans other ways to destroy the country.

Tyrannical Obama tyrannically uses his tyrannical power to tyrannically force gays not to be discriminated against:  The clear sign of tyranny is giving more rights to people.

Hero of the Day:  Governor Rick Perry sure is a hero when it comes to photo ops.

Why won’t they vote for us? :  Republicans try to figure out why those sinful gays and illegal Mexicans don’t want to vote for them.

Editorial cartoon: Hiding bigotry

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Indiana’s “Religious Freedom” law is different

The outcry over Indiana’s new law allowing discrimination is valid. Arguments that “other states have similar laws” is not.

Many states have religious freedom laws, and they’re good laws. They prohibit the government from interfering with one’s religious practice, as provided for in the 1st Amendment.bigots For instance, such laws protect a Catholic school that only wants to hire Catholics to teach their classes. That makes sense, doesn’t it? It’s the same concept that says a church cannot be forced to perform a marriage they disagree with. These laws often apply to various non-profit charities and businesses where it makes a difference who gets treated and/or employed. Charities often have religious foundations, for instance.

Indiana’s law is different.  Indiana’s law explicitly allows for-profit businesses to have these same rights. Thus, Jim-Bob’s restaurant is allowed under this law to discriminate when it violates Jim-Bob’s personal religious views. “Sorry, my religion says no coloreds can sit at my lunch counter.” (This, of course, is exactly what we predicted would happen when the Supreme Court decided the terrible Hobby Lobby case, giving corporations a religion.)

This is unprecedented. Here in Pennsylvania, for instance, our “religious freedom” law specifically prohibits for-profit businesses from doing this.

If you want to open a business, you need to open it to everyone. Don’t give me that tired libertarian argument that the marketplace will solve this. It didn’t do that for a hundred years before civil rights laws were passed, and clearly it is not doing that now or else we wouldn’t even be discussing this. In some small communities, there may only be one store within close distance, so don’t go arguing that this is a minor inconvenience.

Bigotry has no place in our laws, and the government should be supporting the people who are being discriminated against, and not those who wish to discriminate.

Editorial cartoon: Freedumb

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Conservatives’ heads explode at the thought of making voting mandatory

If there’s one thing the GOP does not want, it’s everybody voting, because that way they’re sure to lose.  That’s why they spend so much time and money trying to keep people from voting and making up fake “voter fraud” arguments.obama vote

Obama’s recent comment that maybe mandated voting (like they have in other countries such as Australia) might be a good idea has produced the desired response from the right. It’s kind of fun to watch, really, as the outrage boils over. Andrea Tantaros on Fox argued against it, saying, “Do we really want everybody voting?”

Well, yes.  Isn’t that what democracy is about?

Let’s make it clear that there is no proposal or bill being discussed at the moment. Such a thing could take wildly different approaches, such as tax breaks for voters to small fines for those who do not. In places that have this, there is usually an option to vote for “none of the above” or otherwise case a blank ballot as a protest.

Conservatives scream that this violates liberty, because the government should only be forcing people to do things like having invasive unnecessary medical procedures before getting an abortion.

But there is a price to pay in a democracy. You are required to do jury duty, for instance. If there is a war, you can be required to serve in the military and die for your country. Why is requiring you to vote harsher than requiring you to die?

And think about the advantages. Politicans who win elections where 90% of the people actually do vote can clearly claim a mandate. Mandatory voting insures that the winner really does represent all the people and not just the few who find time and make the effort to get out and vote (usually the older and richer segments of our population).

Sometimes I just admire those Republicans who, when they’re not aware they are being recorded, admit that all this anti-voter movement has nothing to do with voter fraud and everything to do with keeping Democrats away from the polls. Because if there is one thing we have learned from past elections, it’s that Republicans will do everything in their power to win elections — except get the most votes.

Editorial cartoon: The Race

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Ted Cruz and the Constitution

Supporters say that they like Ted Cruz because he “supports the Constitution.”

What bullshit.ted-cruz

Ted believes states should decide civil rights issues such as gay marriage (which, of course, he opposes). Rights should not be voted on. That’s the same argument the segregationists gave and they were wrong too. For Cruz to claim the Constitution allows states to deny basic rights shows that he doesn’t understand the Constitution.

He also does not support the 1st Amendment, especially the Establishment Clause. He’s constantly bitching about how religion is under attack — you know, the whole fake War on Christmas crap — and there’s a reason he gave his announcement the other day at a college that teaches the world is only 6000 years old.  Cruz hates the Constitution, because it prevents him from forcing kids to be taught his church’s creationist story in public schools.

Cruz passed laws when in Texas having to do with immigration which Texas has no power to regulate, and has said that states have the right to do so despite the Supremacy Clause.  That’s hardly the reaction you’d get from someone who “respects the Constitution”. He proposed something called “interstate compacts” wherein states could get together and nullify federal laws they don’t like. You know, ’cause that worked so well for the confederates before.

As for rights of criminals, he was one of many who fought to take away the rights of American citizens who were suspected of terrorism, despite the Constitution’s guarantees. Sadly, he wasn’t alone there, but that hardly makes him a lover of the Constitution.

And you know that part of the Constitution that says the president signs treaties? Cruz supported the GOP Iran letter, so it’s clear that he has no respect for the Constitution’s separation of powers in these matters. (Of course, if it was a Democrat doing that to a Republican President, he’d be screaming “treason”).

Editorial Cartoon: CINO

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Tired of the Gun Control Shuffle

Whenever there was another mass shooting, I used to post about the “Gun Control Shuffle”:

1. Have a mass shooting.

2. Bury the dead and cry.

3. Politicians talk about the need for gun control so this never happens again.gun-deaths-us-other-countries-chart

4. Gun manufacturers, through their lobby group the NRA, warns that the government is out to take everyone’s guns.

5. Gun lovers buy lots of guns because they believe the NRA and the right-wing media.

6. Gun manufacturers’ income skyrockets.

7. Gun manufacturers use this money to bribe politicians through their lobby group, the NRA.

8. Despite overwhelming public support, no gun control passes.

9. Another mass shooting occurs.

Repeat every few months.

However, I found that instead of repeating the Shuffle post every few months, I was doing it every few weeks.  And lately, it seems like I would have to be doing it every few days.

Have you noticed?  Have you noticed how we’ve become so used to it that it hardly even makes the news? That everyone just says “Well, that’s it. There’s another shooting” and then walks away, as if there’s not a damn thing we can do about it?

I guess we as a society have decided that lives just aren’t as important to us as guns are; that there is no number of deaths that will make us do anything about the problem; that we just are giving up and letting the small percentage of gun nuts bully us all into letting them have their way.

 

Editorial cartoon: So much in common