A Mountain of Dumb, ctd.

 Wow.  Somehow she managed to raise (lower?) the bar with this one: 

"Gulf disaster needs divine intervention as man's efforts have been futile. Gulf lawmakers designate today Day of Prayer for solution/miracle" 
~Sarah Palin via Twitter

I get high with a little help...

I'd like to welcome a new voice to the Scared Center family, Eric Giordano.   Eric brings a centrist perspective, Poli-Sci edumacation and a desire to rant to the table which really means someone who knows what they're talking about will be helping me out in this space.  Eric shares in my loathing of the Tea Party movement and also thinks Sarah Palin is the anti-christ.  In other words he's awesome.

The good thing about this is it will free me up to write more about my two favorite things:  boobs and golf.   It's a Win/Win when you think about it.

(note: Eric is not the hot Asian in the picture above, which is a god damned shame.  That's Jarah Mariano.   Jarah probably thinks Drill Baby Drill has little to do with oil prospecting which is totally fine in most circumstances, just not on this blog)

US Open Final Thoughts

After the insanity that was Moving Day at the US Open on Pebble Beach, Sunday's cool-down should have come as no surprise.  There was no way anyone was going to match the dual-66 magic that Tiger and Johnson posted Saturday, especially on a US Open Final Round setup.

So the winning number?  Even Par.  Not -3, not -6.  E.  Just the way the USGA drew it up.  Graeme McDowell's victory required an "unflappable" final round score of 3-over 74.   So if you wanted to see low scores and eagles abound - or a  replay of Tiger's unreal second on 18 - you came to the wrong place.   Pebble was playing lightning fast and hammering away at mistakes.  It's casualties were three of the biggest names in the sport, Tiger, Phil and Ernie, and the bomber who had a seemingly commanding three-shot lead in the final group.

The Notables:

Gotta Give Biden Props for This

Fool me eight times?!

Jon Stewart tears up the last eight administrations' empty promises to get the US off of oil dependence.   Call me a pinko if you will but this guy is pretty much the only one talking politics in the media with the slightest shred of integrity.    There, I said it. 

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
An Energy-Independent Future
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

US Open Day 1

Golf's Second Major Championship is the only thing that can dull the pain of the Celtics horrible loss last night.  The Masters and US Open are by far my favorite tournaments and the obsession is practically unhealthy.  Nothing quite compares to the drama those two tournaments consistently give us and yesterday's opening round was no exception.   Let's breakdown some highlights and lowlights.

Another Moronic Phil Shot - Mickelson was trapped behind the two cyprus trees on the 18th fairway and instead of taking his medicine and laying up - which every other player on tour would have done - he tried to hit a retarded draw around the trees and over the water.  Didn't work out.   No shit it didn't work out!   People ask me all the time why I don't like Loveable Loser Phil.   This shot was exhibit A.

De Jonge What?  Micheel Who? - Two of the three 18 hole leaders are relatively unknown, which is unfortunate for poor Sean Micheel who only won the '03 PGA Championship "It's amazing how quickly people forget you." he said after the round.

Hoffman's 18 -  This was just heart-breaking.   After the amateur's second shot was slightly boxed out by the cyprus trees on 18, he tried to bend a low cut only to clip a branch and have it ricochet into the ocean.  Two-in-Three-out.   He yanked his fourth left and into the water again.   Four-in-Five-out.  Six into the right greenside bunker.  Seven stayed in.   Eight popped out to 10 feet and he saved himself a dreaded ten by nailing the putt.   Poor guy was even par on the tee box and dropped 70 spots on the leaderboard by the time he tossed his ball into the Pacific. 

Moore's 17 - This was just baffling.   First he pulls out a fairway metal on the 208 yard par 3 - way too much club - and pushed it right....  all the way over the 18th tee box.   From here he got some miraculous relief from the tee box sign, popped his come backer into the left greenside bunker and somehow got up and down for one of the wackiest bogey's you'll ever see on tour. 

Paul Casey's Grindin' - This guy kicks ass.  Not because he's a big name, because he's not.   Not because he makes it rain with wins on tour; he doesn't.   No, I like him because Yoda the Golf Instructor used Casey's swing  for my comparison video (compare these mirror-image swings after the jump!)   Casey was strong early with birdies on 3 and 5 but then started struggling to hit greens.  But boy did he make up for it with the flat stick.   He finished the round with 24 putts on the late-day poana greens to put him in a tie for the lead with what's-their-names. 

Stay tuned for Round 2 action!

Phew! Stimulus Saves A World At Play

Okay look, if you rake in $1.3B in annual revenue, you don't need another $54M from the taxpayers, mmmkay?

The Mohegan tribe, which owns the Mohegan Suncasino in Uncasville, Conn., has been awarded a $54 million loan from federal stimulus funds.

The tribe runs the sprawling Mohegan Sun casino, halfway between New York City and Boston, which earned more than $1.3 billion in gross revenues in 2009. Each tribe member receives a cut of the profits, a number a tribal official said was "less than $30,000" per capita per year. The stimulus money is a loan from a U.S. Department of Agriculture rural development program that is meant to help communities of less than 20,000 people that have been "unable to obtain other credit at reasonable rates and terms and are unable to finance the proposed project from their own resources."

Not that I really expect any less from Leiberman and Dodd, but... cmon guys!  At a time when every excessive dollar spent by the government is heavily scrutinized, they should know better than to pull this kind of crap.

HCR Savings begin seeping into public consciousness

Yglesias passes on a great tidbit:

Everyone knows that health care costs are a major component of the federal budget, but they also have important implications for state budgets, so Mainers will likely be interested to learn that the Affordable Care Act signed into law earlier this year will save their state money.
Mal Leary of the Bangor Daily News explains:

A state analysis of the impact of the new federal health reform law indicates it will cost Maine in the near term, but will save the state tens of millions of dollars a year after it is fully implemented in 2014.

This is the type of news that is sure to bubble up over the next 6, 12, 24 months that spells complete doom for all the HCR naysayers and Palin '12 grand-standers. 

Sully on the Tea Party

In a fantastic two part post, Sully reiterates his confusion with the Tea Party ideology, or lack thereof.   Specifically his confusion with the movement's curious anti-government veil covering what amounts to a pro-government face. 

The Bush-Cheney presidency was, in some respects, the perfect pseudo-conservative administration. They waged war based on loathing of the experts (damned knowledgeable elites!); they slashed taxes and boosted spending for their constituencies, while pretending to be fiscally responsible; they tore up the most ancient taboos - against torture - with a bravado that will one day seem obscene; and they left the country in far worse shape than they found it.

Throughout all this, the Tea Partiers supported them. So how do they manage the cognitive dissonance that two failed wars, a financial collapse and a debt crisis have brought? How do they deal with the fact that their beloved president was manifestly the most incompetent and disastrous in modern times? They blame it on the next guy.

Yes, they are doing all they can to avoid facing the fact that they did all of this ... to themselves. And sometimes, the truly, deeply humiliated can only carry on through blind rage.

Fatty Labs Body-Boarding on Snow

Oh how I love Labs and their quirky made-up little games.

Watch the vid, bitches

Porn, Sword, Stun Gun, Cliff Fall? Check!

If there's a better lead paragraph from a news story, I've yet to read it. 

A porn actor, who was accused of killing a coworker with a sword, died after falling off a cliff in California on Saturday when police used a stun gun to subdue him.

A Mountain of Dumb

Really, is there any other way to describe this fucking bimbo?

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is using the Gulf Coast oil spill to promote the issue of drilling in the Alaskan Wildlife National Refuge – the 20-million protected acres where untapped oil and gas reserves have long served as a lightning rod of controversy.

"Extreme Greenies: see now why we push 'drill,baby,drill' of known reserves & promising finds in safe onshore places like ANWR? Now do you get it?" the former Republican vice presidential nominee wrote Tuesday evening on her Twitter account.

Chait on Gerson's EC

Good stuff.   Chait busts up two vacuum-chamber rattles about Health Care Reform.

First, that Obama and the left hid the cost of HCR in the "doc fix"

This isn't part of the "overall cost of the entitlement." It's part of the cost of running Medicare. The cost exists irrespective of the Affordable Care Act. The paper savings from lower physician reimbursements were not used to cover insurance subsidies in the bill. If health care reform had died, Congress would still be passing a doc fix. Gerson's charge is utterly, unambiguously false.

Then that HCR is an entitlement for the un-needy

Focus on Gerson's claim that the Affordable Care Act benefits citizens who are not "vulnerable." By what possible standard is this true? The primary beneficiaries are people who can't afford to buy health insurance! They're vulnerable to getting sick and suffering terrible pain, bankruptcy, or even death either because they or a family member has a preexisting condition, or because their employer doesn't offer health insurance and they're priced out of the dysfunctional individual market. That's not "vulnerable"?

Gaza Flotilla

My first reaction to the IDF attack on the Palestinian aide vessel was annoyance mixed with utter despair and concern.  Just another insult on the way to the inevitable breakout of WWIII that Israel seems to welcome.  As I've been perusing left and right blogosphere though I'm left more confused than anything.    I think Chait breaks it down the best (after ample prodding by Sullivan, of course.

First, is the underlying blockade of Gaza humanely constructed? No it is not:

Israel prevents Gazans from importing, among other things, cilantro, sage, jam, chocolate, French fries, dried fruit, fabrics, notebooks, empty flowerpots and toys, none of which are particularly useful in building Kassam rockets. It’s why Israel bans virtually all exports from Gaza, a policy that has helped to destroy the Strip’s agriculture, contributed to the closing of some 95 percent of its factories, and left more 80 percent of its population dependent on food aid. It’s why Gaza’s fishermen are not allowed to travel more than three miles from the coast, which dramatically reduces their catch. And it’s why Israel prevents Gazan students from studying in the West Bank, a policy recently denounced by 10 winners of the prestigious Israel Prize. There’s a name for all this: collective punishment.

Second, given that the blockade was in place, was Israel militarily justified in responding as it did? Yes, it was:

We have no sympathy for the motives of the participants in the flotilla -- a motley collection that included European sympathizers with the Palestinian cause, Israeli Arab leaders and Turkish Islamic activists. Israel says that some of the organizers have ties to Hamas and al-Qaeda. What's plain is that the group's nominal purpose, delivering "humanitarian" supplies to Gaza, was secondary to the aim of provoking a confrontation. The flotilla turned down an Israeli offer to unload the six boats and deliver the goods to Gaza by truck; it ignored repeated warnings that it would not be allowed to reach Gaza. Its spokesmen said they would insist on "breaking Israel's siege," as one of them put it.

Third, given that Israel had a right to stop the ship and reply to the lethal force used against its soldiers, was it wise to respond as it did? No, it was not:

Better information was needed. The commandos didn't know they were going to face an angry mob armed with knives and bats. Different equipment was needed: The raiders apparently didn't have enough nonlethal weapons on hand. A more creative approach was needed: Maybe a way to stop the ship without having to board it. But these are all just technical details of an operation gone sour.

This level-headed perspective is why I like reading Chait.  The Blockade is inhumane; the Israeli's had a right to deter the ship from breaking the blockade; the Israeli's used excessive force.   In the end it seems the Flotilla's main goal of bringing political attention to the Gaza blockade was wildly successful in that it put Israel's inhumane blockade in the forefront of world news.  The whole ordeal also gave us a glimpse into the future of Western border security, should the right ever get their wish to turn the US into a isolated giant.    Excessive force?   Sure!  As long as we protect our borders!!

But I digress.  Where I'm most disappointed in all this is Obama's response, which to me was like the equivalent of a soccer mom threatening to pull the minivan over.  Now now kids, mommy's trying to concentrate here. When nine civilians are murdered on an aide vessel by your supposed ally, you should come right out and denounce the damn action.  Plain and simple. Stop being a pussy about it and put your foot down, Mr. President.