I could spend all day unpacking this Obama statement, but I’ll try to stick to my usual terse self.
Part of the reason that we have had a faith outreach in our campaigns is precisely because I don’t think the LGBT community or the Democratic Party is served by being hermetically sealed from the faith community and not in dialogue with a substantial portion of the electorate, even though we may disagree with them.
Aside from the adoption of right wing frames, this kind of statement is incredibly insulting to both the LGBT community who are apparently "hermetically sealed from the faith community" and to the "faith community" which is apparently defined as nothing more than a bunch of anti-gay bigots. Not to mention the Democratic Party, which apparently includes no actual religious people.
Obama gets smaller and smaller every day doesn’t he? Of course, this statement wasn’t directed at the gay community, but at the so-called ‘faith’ based voters. You know…the ones who keep insisting that the United States is a Christian Nation. No. It’s a nation where everyone, Christians included, have freedom of worship. And that’s precisely because the government isn’t supposed to take sides in matters of faith. Which is just what the religious right wants it to. So the only freedom of worship Americans will have, is the freedom to be a right wing Christian.
I guess Obama thinks he can woo enough of these away from the republican ranks that it won’t matter how many gay voters he slaps. He did it there again, speaking to the religious right, in the terms it understands. If we’re talking about people of faith, as opposed to the people who wear the label "People Of FAITH" on their sleeves along with "I’M A GODLY PERSON BOW DOWN BEFORE ME YOU HELLBOUND HEATHEN YOU", then of course a good many, if not most gay people are also people of faith. Never mind how often and how loudly the religious right bellyaches that homosexuals are anti-Christian. When I was working the Weekly Community Events board at the Gay and Lesbian Information Bureau BBS (GLIB), about half of all the notices, and there were tons of notices, were for gay accepting, gay friendly, religious worship services. Every, and I want to emphasize that, Every denomination was represented. There were Catholics. There were Baptists. There were Quakers. There were various Mennonite sects. There were Mormons. There were Unitarians. There were notices from various gay friendly Synagogues. In addition to a host of non-Judeo-Christian faith services listed. Don’t tell me that gay people are not a living part of that all embracing rainbow colored body that compasses people of faith.
And don’t tell me that Obama doesn’t know this. When he adopts a right wing frame for the issue of religious faith in America, he knows exactly what he’s doing. And I don’t believe for a second that his taking on an ex-gay gospel singer was an accident either. My hunch is Obama thought he could dog whistle to black homophobic conservatives. It didn’t work and now he has to take a stand and he’s Still dog whistling to them.
[Update…] from the New York Times report on the concert…
COLUMBIA, S.C. — At Barack Obama’s gospel concert here last night, more than 2,000 black evangelicals were singing, waving their hands and cramming the aisles _ most enthusiastically when Donnie McClurkin, the superstar black gospel singer, decried the criticism he has generated because of his views that homosexuality is a choice.
…
He approached the subject gingerly at first. Then, just when the concert had seemed to reach its pitch and about to end, Mr. McClurkin returned to it with a full-blown plea: “Don’t call me a bigot or anti-gay when I have suffered the same feelings,” he cried.
“God delivered me from homosexuality,” he added. He then told the audience to believe the Bible over the blogs: “God is the only way.” The crowd sang and clapped along in full support.
And the gay white minister Obama invited to the concert after the controversy errupted…? Ah…yes…
The Obama campaign had appeared to be caught off guard by the reaction to inviting Mr. McClurkin in the first place, and it may have been surprised tonight by the degree to which the singer focused on himself. The other speakers and singers had avoided referencing the controversy. Even an openly gay minister whom Mr. Obama had invited after the fact to try to appease his gay and lesbian critics spoke so early that few people heard him.
CNN said the white gay preacher, Rev. Andy Sidden, gave a short prayer at the beginning of the concert when the auditorium was less then half full, and then he left. I wonder if his prayers were answered.
Elections Must Be Coming Up…I See The Republicans Are Dusting Off Their Gay Menace Fliers
Via Pam’s House Blend… What does a vulnerable republican politician do when a gay challenger threatens to unseat him…? Why…make him look like he’s a predatory homosexual child molester of course…
In the neighboring state to the north, the District 39 race in Virginia is getting ugly, thanks to Republican State Senator James J. "Jay" O’Brien Jr. In a desperate bid to pander to the wingnut vote, he decided that sending out a flyer that says, among other things, that his Democratic opponent
"George Barker wants to take time away from core academic subjects like math, science, and reading to teach children to accept the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender Lifestyle (GLBT)."
It’s no surprise that this flyer (PDF) was paid for by the Republican Party of Virginia.
What would have surprised me is if the republicans hadn’t stooped to it. This is the party that simply cannot win elections without the bigot vote.
It’s clear that the right wing is ratcheting up the homo-hate as Barker has received the endorsement of the Washington Post.
Republican Sen. James J. "Jay" O’Brien Jr. is an affable incumbent, but his scant command of policy and legislative issues has failed to impress. His Democratic rival, George L. Barker, a health-care planner, would make a far more able, detail-oriented and effective senator in this district straddling the Fairfax-Prince William line.
Barker also has strong support from educators (I’m sure O’Brien feels they are part of the Homosexual Agenda anyway).
More from the heinous mailer — he certainly telegraphs his priorities:
George Barker went on to say that he would vote for legislation that would teach Virginia students about the "GLBT" lifestyle during school hours — regardless of their family’s own beliefs. Barker also said he would "guarantee" his support for "GLBT" clubs in public schools.
…George Barker worked very hard in terms of opposing the marriage amendment, and be strongly in favor of gay rights, be [sic] he shouldn’t impose his values on elementary school children.
A question for O’Brien – I suppose that kids in your state don’t need to know about tolerance and families that are different, you know — like that of little Samuel Cheney, a resident of Virginia and son of loyal Republican Mary Cheney.
Here’s what the republican party is sending to voters in Virginia, to make sure they get the message that the homo running against their boy wants to molest their children…
They’re not calling the gay candidate a child molester outright, but look at the imagery in that flier and tell me that they’re not fear mongering a gay man and child sexual abuse there, right there, with that close up image of the back of that small boy and that shirt collar pulled down the back of his neck, right up in the reader’s face.
It’s despicable. But that’s how republicans win elections these days. From the gutter. Problem is, that’s also how they govern. The party that thinks the only way it can win elections is fear mongering, also seems to think it can eavesdrop on Americans at will, without all that rule of law stuff getting in the way. The party that thinks the only way it can win elections is to appeal to the lowest prejudices within us, also seems to think that it can govern just fine thank-you, in complete secrecy and without any accountability. The party that thinks the only way it can win elections is to call gay men child molesters, seems to think George Bush unilaterally drag the country into whatever war he likes, and shovel your kids into it. You get the government you vote for. You vote your fears, you get a government that makes sure you have lots to be afraid of.
I realize I’m going to be spending more on gasoline now that I own a car that runs on premium, and what is more get’s almost ten miles per gallon less. But…geeze…
LONDON: Concern that Turkey may attack Kurdish militants in Iraq and disrupt petroleum shipments pushed crude oil to a record price Tuesday, nudging $88 a barrel and extending a rally that has added $8 in a week.
Crude oil for November delivery rose as much as $1.84, or 2.1 percent, to $87.97 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the highest level since the futures were introduced in 1983.
In early London trade, the contract was at $87.45.
Oil is closing in on the inflation-adjusted high of $90.46 seen in 1980, the year after the Iranian revolution and at the start of the Iran-Iraq war. Prices this year have averaged $67.
The latest surge in oil prices came after Turkey talked over the weekend of invading northern Iraq to pursue rebel fighters from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.
You want to get people’s attention here in America? Instead of issuing terrorist threat alerts on a color scale, they should issue them on a cost of a gallon of gas scale. The Homeland Security Administration rose the terrorist threat level to $4 a gallon today…
Brown County GOP Chairman Donald Fleischman has resigned his post, says a spokesperson, after being accused of enticement and fondling of an underage boy, reports the Green Bay Press-Gazette Saturday.
Fleischman, 37, is free after posting a $20,000 bond on September 28. "My client is innocent of the charges," says attorney Jeff Jazgar, who "declined to discuss specifics."
"Our plan is to get some witnesses to testify and present enough information to dismiss the case."
The boy was found by police in Fleischman’s home on two occasions in late 2006 while being sought as a runaway from Ethan House, a home for at-risk youth. Now 17, he says he stayed with Fleischman at his house and a cabin, where he was provided with alcohol and cannabis, and regularly fondled.
On November 19, 2006, according to a September 7th complaint obtained from the WisPolitics Courtwatch Blog, the boy in question was found hiding in a bedroom closet, and a pipe was found in the house, which tested positive for THC. Shortly after, on December 8, 2006, Fleischman said he was trying to convince the boy, discovered again in the home, to turn himself in as a runaway.
Fleischman faces two counts of child enticement, two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a child, and one count of exposing himself to a child. He returns to court on October 29.
It’s been like a week doesn’t go by that some GOP operative or religious right nutcase turns up in the middle of some kind of sex scandal. And they’re lecturing us on sexual conduct?
Anyway, let’s see how the NYTimes does in fielding their latest gibberish.
when Democrats enlisted 12-year-old Graeme Frost, who along with a younger sister relied on the program for treatment of severe brain injuries suffered in a car crash, to give the response to Mr. Bush’s weekly radio address on Sept. 29, Republican opponents quickly accused them of exploiting the boy to score political points.
Then, they wasted little time in going after him to score their own.
In recent days, Graeme and his family have been attacked by conservative bloggers and other critics of the Democrats’ plan to expand the insurance program, known as S-chip. They scrutinized the family’s income and assets — even alleged the counters in their kitchen to be granite — and declared that the Frosts did not seem needy enough for government benefits.
OK. So they accused the kid’s family of fraud, essentially. How does the NYTimes do in fact-checking the asses of the right blogosphere?
The critics accused Graeme’s father, Halsey, a self-employed woodworker, of choosing not to provide insurance for his family of six, even though he owned his own business. They pointed out that Graeme attends an expensive private school. And they asserted that the family’s home had undergone extensive remodeling, and that its market value could exceed $400,000.
One critic, in an e-mail message to Graeme’s mother, Bonnie, warned: “Lie down with dogs, and expect to get fleas.” As it turns out, the Frosts say, Graeme attends the private school on scholarship. The business that the critics said Mr. Frost owned was dissolved in 1999. The family’s home, in the modest Butchers Hill neighborhood of Baltimore, was bought for $55,000 in 1990 and is now worth about $260,000, according to public records. And, for the record, the Frosts say, their kitchen counters are concrete.
Certainly the Frosts are not destitute. They also own a commercial property, valued at about $160,000, that provides rental income. Mr. Frost works intermittently in woodworking and as a welder, while Mrs. Frost has a part-time job at a firm that provides services to publishers of medical journals. Her job does not provide health coverage.
Under the Maryland child health program, a family of six must earn less than $55,220 a year for children to qualify. The program does not require applicants to list their assets, which do not affect eligibility.
In a telephone interview, the Frosts said they had recently been rejected by three private insurance companies because of pre-existing medical conditions. “We stood up in the first place because S-chip really helped our family and we wanted to help other families,” Mrs. Frost said.
That’s a pretty thorough refutation of every single accusation the wingnuts could come up with against the family. So, good. I myself would add that there never really was any reason to take their frenzied posts seriously in the first place: the crap about the private school, and their real estate assets supposedly affecting how much they could pay for health insurance, were obviously absurd from the start. There never was any need to "investigate" these claims: common sense should have said, "irrelevant."
In other words, if, as the NYT has it,
But what on the surface appears to be yet another partisan feud, all the nastier because a child is at the center of it, actually cuts to the most substantive debate around S-chip. Democrats say it is crucially needed to help the working poor — Medicaid already helps the impoverished — but many Republicans say it now helps too many people with the means to help themselves.
… It’s pretty clear that yes, the Frosts are a good example of the kind of people the program would help, and it’s also pretty clear that the reason the wingnuts went after them and their kitchen counters (!) was that their example is in fact a very persuasive one.
Most Americans know perfectly damn well just how messed up our heathcare system is, and they want relief from the constant stress this mess imposes upon them, and they’d really think it is kind of neat that you might not have to lose your home because your kids get in a serious car wreck. What are their "arguments," anyway? That it’s too costly? When money is shamelessly being flushed away by this administration on all sorts of harebrained schemes, most notably the wildly unpopular Iraq debacle, how’s that one going to fly? That it could lead to eeek socialism booga booga? When people might think to themselves, "is this constant worry over healthcare, which causes me to make constant sacrifices and affects even so basic a question as what do I want to do with my life and what kind of a family do I want to have, actually what American liberty is supposed to be all about? Constant fear?"
You can see why they decided to fling slime on the Frosts’ kitchen counters instead.
Reading the article, this all seems to me pretty clear, though naturally I’d like it spelled out more firmly.
But the real news in the article is this:
Republicans on Capitol Hill, who were gearing up to use Graeme as evidence that Democrats have overexpanded the health program to include families wealthy enough to afford private insurance, have backed off.
An aide to Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, expressed relief that his office had not issued a press release criticizing the Frosts.
And that is good news. If the GOP party leaders are backing off, then the media very likely won’t feel the need to plaster the Frosts all over the damn place over essentially nothing. And that is a Good Thing.
The progressive blogs started fighting back at once on this, and it looks like it made a difference. Now the noise from the right wing sewer isn’t going unchallenged by the time it percolates up to the corporate news rooms. This is good. This is very good. The radical right has spent decades building this noise machine. But it’s starting to look like other voices are finally, Finally, making themselves heard in the echo chamber.
But there’s more to this story then the simple fact that the right is lying about the Frosts. This little smear campaign illustrates perfectly how the radical right has been looking America in the eye and lying about itself, about its purpose, its values, its motives, for decades. Juan Cole (soon to be an ex-republican) sums it all up pretty well here…
I was talking to Tim via AOL IM, and I decided it was probably worthwhile to bring this up for everyone. One of the things that is so surprising (for me, at least) about the whole Graeme Frost episode is that rather than make their case against this program with their vicious assault against this family, they Malkin/Freeper/Limbaugh brigade are doing just the opposite. Rather than expose this family as a bunch of frauds and lazy slackers and welfare queens, they are making the family’s case.
If you look through this family’s dossier, it appears they are doing everything Republicans say they should be doing- hell, their story is almost what you would consider a checklist for good, red-blooded American Republican voters: they own their own business, they pay their taxes, they are still in a committed relationship and are raising their kids, they eschewed public education and are doing what they have to do to get them into Private schools, they are part of the American dream of home ownership that Republicans have been pointing to in the past two administrations as proof of the health of the economy, and so on.
In short, they are a white, lower-middle-class, committed family, who is doing EVERYTHING the GOP Kultur Kops would have you believe people should be doing. They aren’t gay. They aren’t divorced. They didn’t abort their children. They aren’t drug addicts or welfare queens. They are property owners, entrepeneurs, taxpayers, and hard-working Americans. I bet nine times out of ten in past elections, if you handed this resume to a pollster, they would think you were discussing the prototypical Republican voter. Hell, the only thing missing from this equation is membership to a church and an irrational fear of Muslims and you HAVE the prototypical Bush voter.
They are, however, not without fault. They are unable to afford insurance through normal means (and now that they have pre-existing conditions, probably couldn’t get traditional insurance anyway), and managed to get several of their family members injured in a traumatic accident. And, it appears, those are the big blind spots for compassionate conservatism. That, and the real big sin- allowing themselves to advocate for a policy that the Decider was going to veto. Here it is, so you can see their grievous sin that requires they be destroyed:
“Hi, my name is Graeme Frost. I’m 12 years old and I live in Baltimore, Maryland. Most kids my age probably haven’t heard of CHIP, the Children’s Health Insurance Program. But I know all about it, because if it weren’t for CHIP, I might not be here today.
“CHIP is a law the government made to help families like mine afford healthcare for their kids. Three years ago, my family was in a really bad car accident. My younger sister Gemma and I were both hurt. I was in a coma for a week and couldn’t eat or stand up or even talk at first. My sister was even worse. I was in the hospital for five-and-a-half months and I needed a big surgery. For a long time after that, I had to go to physical therapy after school to get stronger. But even though I was hurt badly, I was really lucky. My sister and I both were.
“My parents work really hard and always make sure my sister and I have everything we need, but the hospital bills were huge. We got the help we needed because we had health insurance for us through the CHIP program.
“But there are millions of kids out there who don’t have CHIP, and they wouldn’t get the care that my sister and I did if they got hurt. Their parents might have to sell their cars or their houses, or they might not be able to pay for hospital bills at all.
“Now I’m back to school. One of my vocal chords is paralyzed so I don’t talk the same way I used to. And I can’t walk or run as fast as I did. The doctors say I can’t play football any more, but I might still be able to be a coach. I’m just happy to be back with my friends.
“I don’t know why President Bush wants to stop kids who really need help from getting CHIP. All I know is I have some really good doctors. They took great care of me when I was sick, and I’m glad I could see them because of the Children’s Health Program.
“I just hope the President will listen to my story and help other kids to be as lucky as me. This is Graeme Frost, and this has been the Weekly Democratic Radio address. Thanks for listening.”
Pretty strong stuff. I can see why this rabid dog needs to be put down with the full force of the wingnutosphere. And it just goes downhill from there. We learn from our intrepid “reporters” on the right that $45,000 is now rich, which is news to me and everyone else who remember mocking Democrats when they tried to claim $100k combined income was considered rich. You righties do remember that, don’t you?
I think the property was valued at around $225,000. I dunno, I have no sympathy for them. Looks like they have more than enough money for luxuries they won’t sacrifice, yet they expect everyone else to sacrifice for them. My family had to sell our house because we couldn’t afford to keep it, have one used minivan and a clunker my husband uses to get back and forth to work, and until this past weekend we didn’t have a television because it was a luxury we couldn’t justify spending on. No private schools for my 3 kids- can’t even afford daycare. Yet we manage to afford health insurance, keep our rental home comfy, and have food on the table. I’m content with what I have and certainly don’t want anyone else paying for what I can afford, after cutting out the luxuries.
15 years ago, when my then-wife and I discovered we were going to have a child – I had a job with no health insurance.
I changed jobs – period. I was stupid and willing to go without insurance for myself – but with my child there was no way I was going to risk it.
These parents have the same opportunity.
They chose not to find jobs that offered health insurance – and they chose to spend their money elsewhere.
Then, when tragedy strikes, they’re held up as models of “what’s wrong with this country”.
Sorry – but they should be held up as models of “What’s wrong with many Americans”.
My bad- they don’t have any advice other than “SUCKS TO BE YOU” or “SELL YOUR HOUSE” or “GET ANOTHER JOB.” Because, as we all know, the hallmark of responsibility is making your children homeless so they can maybe get healthcare. Nobody even pointed to the numerous charities that we conservatives are supposed to expect to fill the gap so the government doesn’t have to pay for things. Instead, it was taunts, catcalls, contempt, and jealousy (because these folks are in SUCH an enviable situation).
I simply can not believe this is what the Republican party has become. I just can’t. It just makes me sick to think all those years of supporting this party, and this is what it has become. Even if you don’t like the S-Chip expansion, it is hard to deny what Republicans are- a bunch of bitter, nasty, petty, snarling, sneering, vicious thugs, peering through people’s windows so they can make fun of their misfortune.
I’m registering Independent tomorrow.
For the record, I was raised in a family of Rockefeller republicans. I registered republican at age 18, as soon as 18 year olds were given the vote back in the early 70s. I switched to democrat in the 1990s, because I got tired of gay folks like myself being used as baseball bats against democrats. I figured if the party regarded me as the ultimate weapon against democrats, I might as well be one. Mr. Cole…your gay and lesbian neighbors have known what a bunch of bitter, nasty, petty, snarling, vicious thugs, peering through people’s windows, the republican grassroots are for a long, long time now. Reagan delivered them into power. Bush taught them that to the victor belong the spoils.
Nonetheless, progressive types persist in deluding themselves that there are vast masses of the "needy" out there that only the government can rescue. An editorial in Canada’s biggest-selling newspaper today states:
A total of 905,000 people visited food banks across the Greater Toronto Area in the past year.
The population of Toronto is about two-and-a-half million. Is the Star suggesting one in three citizens of one of the wealthiest municipalities on earth depends on "food banks"? Or is it the same one thousand people getting three square meals a day there? Or ten thousand people swinging by a couple of times a week? And, in that case, how many of them actually "depend" on food banks? Only the Star knows. But the idea that 905,000 Torontonians need food aid is innumerate bunk.
(emphasis added)
Now, I don’t know anything about the Star article in question, but anyone who’s not a wingnut engaged in "fact-checking" can plainly see that the "Greater Toronto Area" would have a larger population than "Toronto." Since wingnut research is done entirely with The Google, let’s consult the oracle:
The Greater Toronto Area (widely abbreviated as the GTA) is the most populous metropolitan area in Canada. The GTA is a provincial planning area with a population of 5,555,912 at the 2006 Canadian Census.[1]
5.6 million vs 2.5 million. OK, the actual figure is only 220% higher than Steyn’s.
These little slights-of-hand aren’t clumsy or accidental.
Sorry, no sale. The Democrats chose to outsource their airtime to a Seventh Grader. If a political party is desperate enough to send a boy to do a man’s job, then the boy is fair game.
So says Mark Steyn of the National Review. Firedoglake has more…
Why are all these high traffic wingnut blogs (and far right Fox News) attacking this 12 year old boy and his family? This may well be the lamest excuse I have ever heard in my life for attacking two children who were severely injured in a car accident and their parents who couldn’t afford health insurance for them. I mean honestly, this propaganda fishing expedition disguised as “questions” doesn’t pass the smell test, and Malkin and her cronies know it:
Asking questions and subjecting political anecdotes to scrutiny are what journalists should be doing.
First of all, you weren’t scrutinizing, you were harassing the family at their place of business and their home, and then you kept on harassing them and egged your readers to do the same. Your gin up a phony distraction from your bad press because ”the GOP doesn’t care about poor children“ conservative bloggers and pundits decided that the ends justifies the means in cleaning up after George Bush’s latest mess — even if it meant sacrificing the daily lives of a couple of injured children in the fray. Secondly, you weren’t even close to following the code of ethics that professional journalists require in this situation to “minimize harm,” so you can call yourself the ethically-challenged political hacks that you are and be done with it.
None of you political hatchet cronies give a rat’s ass about minimizing harm for these children, one of whom suffered a severe brain injury in the car accident and can’t possibly fight back against this crass, thoughtless tactic. And on top of that, you are liars.
Which really says it all about how much they believe themselves in their own ideology. A political movement that claims to have access to certain truths about morality and governance that so-called "leftists" and "socialists" are trying to suppress has to resort to lies to get it’s point across? So where’s all this Truth you guys claim you have over progressives? No. No. They lie, starting with their declared moral and political values, because if they told the truth, that all they really believe in is Might Makes Right, and the absolute rule of the rich and powerful, they’d never get anywhere. They’re scum. Or as Digby says…
This is so loathesome I am literally sick to my stomach. These kids were hurt in a car accident. Their parents could not afford health insurance — and sure as hell couldn’t get it now with a severely handicapped daughter. And these shrieking wingnut jackasses are harassing their family for publicly supporting the program that allowed the kids to get health care. A program, by the way, which a large number of these Republicans support as well.
They went after Michael J. Fox. They went after a wounded Iraq war veteran. Now they are going after handicapped kids. There is obviously no limit to how low these people will go.
It has come to this: Democrats give a twelve year old boy airtime on their weekly address to relate his story about what happened to him and his family when she was in an automobile accident, and they couldn’t afford to pay the bills without the kind of federal help that President Nice Job Brownie just vetoed, and the Bush republican grassroots immediately begin Swift-Boating his family.
Whiskey Fire has some good notes on the obscenity Here. The gutter is bitching about the fact that they own a 3000 square foot rowhouse in Baltimore, that their father owns his own cabinet making business, that the kids are going to a private school with a 20,000 a year tuition. No part of that family’s life is now escaping the smear machine’s attention…right down to the kitchen counter tops…
The current market value of their improved 3,040 SF home at 104 S Collington Ave is unknown but 113 S COLLINGTON AVE, also an end unit, sold for $485,000 this past March and it was only 2,060 SF. A photo taken in the family’s kitchen shows what appears to be a recent remodeling job with granite counter tops and glass front cabinets.
Yeah, and the current market value of my little 1500 sq foot Baltimore rowhouse is about $240,000 but just six years ago I was able to buy it for $89,900, because that was what it’s market value was then. One reason the housing market is still so hot here in Baltimore is that prices in the surrounding suburbs, and Washington D.C., are simply insane. So people of modest means are buying up Baltimore rowhouses in the neighborhoods are that are still fairly safe. One Whiskey Fire commenter puts it thusly:
Let me get this straight. This guy’s a cabinet maker, and these geniuses are leering about how nice his cabinets are?
Given that those people basically live in downtown Baltimore, I’d be willing to bet that they bought a a rundown house in a gentrifying neighborhood on the cheap so that Mr. Frost, who is good with his hands, can fix the place up and they can turn the house around for a profit. His business, which is a couple of blocks away in downtown Baltimore, basically comes from all the people fixing up all the old brownstones in the area.
In the meantime, he has to send his kids to school and the public schools in Baltimore don’t really seem like the ideal option. So he looks around, and finds that he can send them to a private school using their assistance program.
But given that $45000 dollars, while a decent living all things considered, isn’t a whole hell of a lot of money, especially when there are six mouths to feed, after everything’s said and done with he just can’t make things work with health insurance (when it comes down to it, after the mortgage, food, clothes and all the rest of the expenses of raising a family, even another $600 is no small potatos).
Then the children get into a catasrophic accident, the family is suddenly looking at medical bills it can’t pay. They are in such bad straits that the school is doing fundraisers for them. This government program helps them; makes their lives better in a fundamental way.
And these jokers are pissed off about it.
Amazing.
I have a next door neighbor who is doing just that on his rowhouse. He’s a building contractor of some sort, and he redid his own kitchen and it is just fabulous. But you’d expect it to be, or you wouldn’t be wanting him to do your kitchen too. And I have another neighbor who is by no means wealthy, and trying hard to keep his own kids in the Friends school here in Baltimore, rather then public school. The public schools here in the city, thanks in large measure to republican scorched earth attacks on racial equality, cities, and public education, are teetering on the verge of collapse.
So this self employed father does his best to provide for his family, and give his kids a decent education, on $45,000 a year, and his kids are nearly killed in an automobile accident and that family suddenly finds themselves looking into an almost bottomless pit of medical expenses…and the gutter puppies at Powerline and The Free Republic, and professor InstaJackass, think there’s something suspicious about this? No. No. Absolutely not. They know goddamn well there’s nothing wrong with this family’s story. Nothing factually wrong that is. But it was very politically incorrect, and for that the family must not only suffer, it must be publicly run through the wringer as an example to others who might be considering speaking out.
For the Bush base, the Party is the only truth, the only religion, the only morality. When the right wing talks about virtue and morality, what they’re talking about is fealty to the party. Nothing else. That’s how you can run a propaganda steamroller over a twelve year old boy’s family, because she dared to ask the nation to look, really look, at what happened to them.
[Update…] Graeme Frost is a boy, not a girl, as I’d originally written. Obviously I didn’t listen to the radio address that started all this. Sorry guy…
Daily KOS has some facts the Freepers don’t want you to know…
Graeme has a scholarship to a private school. The school costs $15K a year, but the family only pays $500 a year.
His sister Gemma attends another private school to help her with the brain injuries that occurred due to her accident. The school costs $23,000 a year, but the state pays the entire cost.
They bought their “lavish house” sixteen years ago for $55,000 at a time when the neighborhood was less than safe.
Last year, the Frost’s made $45,000 combined. Over the past few years they have made no more than $50,000 combined.
The state of Maryland has found them eligible to participate in the CHIP program.
So Graeme’s sister is actually in a private school because she’s still struggling with injuries from the automobile accident. And their Baltimore rowhouse was bought for considerably less then what it’s worth now…a fact which would only be surprising to someone who didn’t know that housing prices have risen dramatically in the past few years. But see what the Freepers did. They took the current value of the house and related it as though that represented the income level of the owners. They took the cost of tuition at the schools the kids are going to, and related it as though they’d just proven that was what the family was actually paying. They even put photos of the family kitchen under the microscope.
Michelle Malkin, who once posted the names and home phone numbers of University of California students who had organized a protest against military recruiters on campus, is now stalking the family of Graeme Frost. And surely she’s not the only wingnut that wants to get this family somehow, some way, for speaking out, for putting human faces on the American health care crisis. They say that this family is not deserving of support, because it is not destitute. But that something like an automobile accident can drive an essentially middle-class, small business family into destitution is emblematic of Exactly what’s wrong with our health care system. The political movement that waves "family values" as a banner has now officially made American families another enemy in the kulturkampf. The political movement that enshrined free market capitalism as a moral standard more righteous then the Sermon On The Mount has now officially declared small businessmen are the enemy. We are all on the front line now. We are all targets. But of course, we always were.
[Update II…] You gotta love the comments the gutter is leaving on progressive blogs on this. The suggestion being floated now is that the Frost family should have sold their house to pay for their children’s medical expenses. They bought the house for 55 grand and now its worth almost half a million and so the kook pews are saying that means the family is rich and they’re just milking the system like a bunch of liberal welfare junkies. I’ve seen one of them suggest the family sell the house and rent a 1 thousand square foot apartment to make ends meet.
Let’s deconstruct this. The family of six, whose father is a self employed cabinet maker, is making somewhat less then 50 grand a year. The house is 3 thousand square feet, which is good for a family of six. I once rented a 750k sq foot apartment and that rent was costing me by the time I moved out in 2001 800 dollars a month. And that was a One Bedroom apartment. The two bedrooms, which were 1200 sq feet, rented for over a thousand a month. Rents in Baltimore have skyrocketed as the value of homes have skyrocketed, and I doubt you could find a decent 1k sq foot apartment in Baltimore for less then the mortgage this family is currently paying on their house. And it would be at most two bedrooms, which isn’t enough for a family of six.
So in other words, to pay the medical bills incurred because their children were in an automobile accident, and still stay right with the kook pews, this middle class working family should sell the house that’s big enough to raise four kids in, and which they can afford the mortgage on, and move everyone into a one bedroom apartment that will cost them more to rent, and which they’ll never own, and which is too small to raise a family of four children in.
Actually, this is Exactly what would have happened to this family were it not for the Maryland CHIP program. They would have lost their home, and been forced into a downward spiral that so many working poor are. Their living expenses would have gone up, even as their standard of living went down. I never realized how much my own family had been nickeled and dimed to death until I bought my house, and saw all the tax and economic breaks I was suddenly getting.
And the Bush republicans think this is the Right policy. They really think that pushing middle class families into poverty by medical bills is better then having a national health care system that would keep them, and their children out of poverty.
The next time a Bush republican utters the words "Family Values" in your presence, laugh in their face. Oh, and do the same whenever you hear them start yapping about the virtues of small business.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 — The Senate approved a resolution on Thursday denouncing the liberal antiwar group MoveOn.org over an advertisement that questioned the credibility of Gen. David H. Petraeus, the American commander in Iraq.
MoveOn.org, with 3.2 million members, has become a powerful force in Democratic politics and the advertisement it paid for, which appeared in The New York Times, has come under sharp attack from Congressional Republicans and others as unpatriotic and impugning the integrity of General Petraeus.
Damn those dastardly democrats! Impugning the integrity of a war veteran! Is there no low they won’t sink too!!!
Like…oh…this for instance…?
At a White House news conference, President Bush called the advertisement disgusting and said it was an attack not only on General Petraeus but also on the entire American military.
I got your disgusting right here Junior…
You want a civil debate on the issues? Fuck Off! pls? kthxbye…
The “values voters” seem (so far) to be obsessed about homosexuality. And the candidates that showed up to pander are playing right along. They all weighed in on how to oppose “the homosexual agenda” with only Ron Paul hedging his anti-gay attitudes in terms of libertarianism.
Libertarianism…did you say…?
Every single candidate present would veto ENDA, would support a federal marriage amendment, and would support healthcare policies that would reward a “moral” lifestyle.
Emphasis mine. Ron is the kind of libertarian who would have (and probably did as far as I know) joined in the celebrations over the supreme court decision in Hardwick v. Bowers back in 1986, which upheld the sodomy laws. It was a "state’s rights" thing see. Now of course, it’s Let’s Let The Federal Government Define What Is And What Is Not A Family.
State’s Rights. Libertarianism.
[Update…] In the comments to that post, Ron Paul’s supporters note that Paul is apparently "on the record" as being against FMA. However, that seems not to have been a record Paul was willing to share with the Values Voters. Apparently he weaseled his way around the question.
See…this is the thing I noticed even back in the 1970s about many libertarians. You can appeal to a lot of people by saying the government should get the hell out of (insert what government does that you despise most here), so long as you mute the part about wanting to dismantle (insert what government does that you really like here). And almost without exception those libertarians who did that, turned out to be mostly right wing conservatives, wrapping themselves in libertarian language, trying to convince liberals that government is more a source of all our troubles, then a means to any good end. They’ve been singing that tune since…oh…back around when the feds started desegregating the public schools…
I won’t deny that there are libertarians who would be perfectly willing to get up on that Values Voter stage, look that audience right in the eye, and tell them if they want the government to leave them alone, it has to leave their neighbors alone too. They’d be tossing those votes away of course, but they’d say it. Paul apparently, couldn’t bring himself that day to stand on…you know…principle. There’s probably a reason for that.
The Pentagon is investigating how a B52 bomber was mistakenly armed with six nuclear warheads last week and allowed to fly 1,500 miles across America before anyone noticed the weapons were missing.
Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can’t imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?
His final point was to observe that someone on the inside obviously leaked the info that the planes were carrying nukes. A B-52 landing at Barksdale is a non-event. A B-52 landing with nukes. That is something else.
Now maybe there is an innocent explanation for this? I can’t think of one. What is certain is that the pilots of this plane did not just make a last minute decision to strap on some nukes and take them for a joy ride…
Ya Think…? And in the comments at TPM Cafe’…
A mistake? To fly with any ordinance requires sign-offs from ground crew, chain of authority, etc. And nukes are far and beyond other ordinance.
The claim they accidentally forgot to remove the warheads and didn’t notice, after it was leaked they were moved, not plausible. It’s not like nuclear warheads are disassembled on the runway and left beside the fuel trucks. Removal of a warhead is going to set gears into motion, any number of which are sure to notice they don’t have the warheads.
Presuming these were nukes as alleged and this info was leaked, either by a whistle blower or a deliberate propagandist sending a message to someone, the probability of movement by mistake is close to zero.
…
The official story is that the missiles were decommissioned ACMs. Why they were mounted under the wings instead of being transported inside a cargo plane with the warheads removed is an interesting question. Pretty hard to believe it was all just an accident.
This could be saber rattling. But consider the man holding the saber.
…I would have been unable to resist saying that Republicans have shown no sign of believing in "the right to keep your own money" or in limited government or in a "strong defense". Allowing rich people and corporations to make use of (and often ruin) public services without paying for them is not giving you "the right to keep your own money"; in fact, it’s making you pay for the things they get more use from. Limiting the power of government to protect your Constitutional rights is not "limited government"; neither is allowing a president the power to summarily deprive individuals of those rights "limited government". Bankrupting the Treasury in order to give the DoD money it doesn’t need (and doesn’t spend wisely) while you go blow up other countries that posed no threat to the US is not "a strong defense".
Conservatives have always supported intrusive government, they have always endangered Americans by aggravating other countries, and they have always been very happy to collect taxes from ordinary working people and use that tax money to fatten the Malefactors of Great Wealth while depriving the rest of us of our freedoms. Those same people conned a number of libertarian-minded young people in the ’70s and ’80s into believing that conservatism was liberalism and vice-versa because a few intolerant lefties went overboard in their objections to morally reprehensible expressions of racism and sexism. I would have thought these kids would have grown up by now and realized that they’re still paying taxes but under the Republicans they’re getting less for them – and that’s before the bill for all that "strong defense" comes due. How dumb they have to be to think it makes sense to be both Republican and gay after all this just doesn’t bear thinking about.
I was one of those who were conned…right up until Reagan gave me a clear understanding of what kind of government we were likely to end up with when market forces become the moral standard and the rule of law bows to the rule of money. But I think the final nail in my libertarian phase’s coffin was the reaction of many of my ersatz fellow libertarians to the supreme court decision in Hardwick v. Bowers, that upheld the sodomy laws. I heard a lot of applause for the court standing up for state’s rights, while at the same time paying lip service to the proposition that individuals should be free to have whatever sex they wanted to, as long as it was mutually consensual. How, I asked them, don’t sodomy laws violate the fundamental libertarian principles of individual freedom and freedom of association? To which I got the standard "state’s rights" reply.
Me: But…sodomy laws are wrong…they’re evil…
They: The federal government has no business telling the states what laws they can pass.
Me: But…you Do agree that state don’t have the right to trample on the individual’s liberty…?
They: The federal government has no business telling the states what laws they can pass.
Me: But…states don’t have any more right to abridge the freedoms of the people then the federal government does…
They: The federal government has no business telling the states what laws they can pass.
…and so on. That was when I realized that a lot of libertarians were merely right wing conservatives cloaking themselves in libertarian rhetoric about individual freedom when it suited them. I’ve watched them play that game ever since. And amazingly, as President Nice Job Brownie has proven, they can rip the rights guarantees right out of our constitution, eliminate the right to a trial by a jury of our peers, eliminate access even to the courts, spy on Americans and laugh at the need to get a warrant, lie the country into war, assert that the government has the right to determine what is, and what is not a family, declare same sex couples to be legally strangers before the law with no recourse to marriage or even civil unions, and wave our tax dollars in our faces before stuffing them into their cronies pockets…and those gen-X knuckleheads who bought into it during the Reagan years will still insist that republicans and conservatives are for individual rights and democrats and liberals hate freedom and are for big government.
We’re The Moral Values Party…The Party Is The Moral Value…
Glen Greenwald has a good post up about the somewhat different reactions from the kook pews to Larry Craig’s first outing, verses his second…
The reaction to the Larry Craig story provides one of the most vivid illustrations yet of how the right-wing movement works. Last October, just weeks before the midterm election, gay activist Mike Rogers reported that the married, GOP "family values" Senator repeatedly had sex with anonymous men in public bathrooms. His report was based on "extensive research," including interviews with several men whom Craig solicited for bathroom sex.
As Rogers argued at the time, the story was relevant — just as the Vitter prostitute story was — in light of Craig’s frequent political exploitation of issues of sexual morality and his opposition to virtually every gay rights bill. Rogers’ story, as a factual matter, seemed relatively credible, both because of his history of accurate outings and because there is no discernible reason why, if he were intent on fabricating, he would single out someone as obscure as Larry Craig, who was not even up for re-election.
Nonetheless, it is hard to overstate the intense fury that this pre-election report triggered from the Right — not at Senator Craig for engaging in this behavior, but at Rogers for reporting it.
The "Then" and "Now" examples Greenwald gives make it sickeningly clear that the problem for the Party Of Moral Values was the election, and not Craig’s behavior.
Last year, in excoriating Mike Rogers for reporting about Craig’s bathroom sex, Dean Barnett said:
I’m sorry if this topic causes embarrassment to Larry Craig and his family, but I assume by now they’ve figured out that politics in 2006 is a thoroughly rotten business. . . .
THE FIRST LEFT WING PATHOLOGY "OUTED" by the Craig story is the relentless meanness that characterizes modern day liberalism. . . .BUT MOST DAMNING OF THE LEFT is the casual assumption of group-think that this exercise demonstrates. The logic is that if you’re gay, you must therefore support gay marriage. What’s more, you must support everything that someone like Glenn Greenwald supports. To do otherwise evidences self-hatred and a betrayal of the cause.
But today, Barnett — based on reports of the exact same behavior from Craig — demanded that Craig resign from the Senate and said this:
AS TO THE SERIOUS QUESTION OF whether or not Senator Craig should resign, that one’s a no-brainer for someone like me who thought David Vitter should have stepped down. To lead millions of people, one needs at least a modicum of moral stature. Both politicians forfeited that stature when they engaged in their off-campus hijinks . . . .
Vitter falls into the same category. You can’t preen as a moralist and then seek out the services of a prostitute. If Vitter (or Craig or Clinton) had positioned themselves as libertarian libertines, then their private diddlings would have been none of our concern. But all three made a habit of saluting good old All-American family values. How a ranking public office-holder can be so thoroughly revealed as a hypocrite and still cling to his position is beyond me.
I would honestly pay money to watch someone try to reconcile those two positions. Last October, Barnett depicted Rogers as an "odious presence" for violating Craig’s privacy based on purely private behavior that was none of anyone’s business. Today, the same Barnett demands that Craig resign from the Senate, and invokes exactly the rationale which Rogers and other "outers" use to justify these disclosures ("How a ranking public office-holder can be so thoroughly revealed as a hypocrite and still cling to his position is beyond me").
Finally, and rather hilariously, Barnett defends Hewitt’s demand that Craig resign but Vitter need not as follows: "Where one draws the line on such matters is arbitrary, so I don’t think anyone’s being hypocritical if they say Vitter can stay and Craig must go."
Apparently, what matters is to have moral standards, even if they are completely incoherent, arbitrary and applied solely to suit one’s personal biases and political interests [Vitter’s resignation would be for heterosexual encounters and would lead to appointment of a Democratic replacement (hence Hewitt opposes it), while Craig’s resignation would be for gay sex and would lead to a GOP replacement (hence Hewitt favors it)]. It might be totally "arbitrary," says Barnett, but at least it is a moral standard.
Right. As Garrison Keillor said after the 2000 "election" of President Nice Job Brownie, they’re republicans first, and Americans second. What benefits The Party is morally right, because it benefits The Party. That’s the standard. Everything else from God to Abortion to Same Sex Marriage is just a hook to get the rubes into the voting booths. They don’t give a good goddamn about any of that. They just want power.
Roll Call is reporting that Sen. Larry Craig, an Idaho Republican, was arrested earlier this summer in a men’s room at the Minneapolis airport by an undercover officer investigating complaints about sexual activity. The Capitol Hill newspaper says it obtained the arrest report.
…
According to the incident report, Sgt. Dave Karsnia was working as a plainclothes officer on June 11 investigating civilian complaints regarding sexual activity in the men’s public restroom in which Craig was arrested.
Airport police previously had made numerous arrests in the men’s restroom of the Northstar Crossing in the Lindbergh Terminal in connection with sexual activity.
Karsnia entered the bathroom at noon that day and about 13 minutes after taking a seat in a stall, he stated he could see “an older white male with grey hair standing outside my stall.”
The man, who lingered in front of the stall for two minutes, was later identified as Craig.
“I could see Craig look through the crack in the door from his position. Craig would look down at his hands, ‘fidget’ with his fingers, and then look through the crack into my stall again. Craig would repeat this cycle for about two minutes,” the report states.
Craig then entered the stall next to Karsnia’s and placed his roller bag against the front of the stall door.
“My experience has shown that individuals engaging in lewd conduct use their bags to block the view from the front of their stall,” Karsnia stated in his report. “From my seated position, I could observe the shoes and ankles of Craig seated to the left of me.”
Craig was wearing dress pants with black dress shoes.
“At 1216 hours, Craig tapped his right foot. I recognized this as a signal used by persons wishing to engage in lewd conduct. Craig tapped his toes several times and moves his foot closer to my foot.
I moved my foot up and down slowly. While this was occurring, the male in the stall to my right was still present. I could hear several unknown persons in the restroom that appeared to use the restroom for its intended use. The presence of others did not seem to deter Craig as he moved his right foot so that it touched the side of my left foot which was within my stall area,” the report states.
Craig then proceeded to swipe his hand under the stall divider several times, and Karsnia noted in his report that “I could … see Craig had a gold ring on his ring finger as his hand was on my side of the stall divider.”
Karsnia then held his police identification down by the floor so that Craig could see it. “With my left hand near the floor, I pointed towards the exit. Craig responded, ‘No!’ I again pointed towards the exit. Craig exited the stall with his roller bags without flushing the toilet. … Craig said he would not go. I told Craig that he was under arrest, he had to go, and that I didn’t want to make a scene. Craig then left the restroom.”
In a recorded interview after his arrest, Craig “either disagreed with me or ‘didn’t recall’ the events as they happened,” the report states.
Craig stated “that he has a wide stance when going to the bathroom and that his foot may have touched mine,” the report states. Craig also told the arresting officer that he reached down with his right hand to pick up a piece of paper that was on the floor.
“It should be noted that there was not a piece of paper on the bathroom floor, nor did Craig pick up a piece of paper,” the arresting officer said in the report.
* Voted YES on constitutional ban of same-sex marriage. (Jun 2006)
* Voted NO on adding sexual orientation to definition of hate crimes. (Jun 2002)
* Voted NO on expanding hate crimes to include sexual orientation. (Jun 2000)
* Voted YES on prohibiting same-sex marriage. (Sep 1996)
* Voted NO on prohibiting job discrimination by sexual orientation. (Sep 1996)
I could … see Craig had a gold ring on his ring finger as his hand was on my side of the stall divider.” If there’s one image you can take away from the George Bush years, one defining moment that sums up perfectly the condition of the right wing gutter, the moral compass of the William Bennett’s, James Dobsons, Jerry Falwells and Charles Krauthammers of the American right…here it is: the hand of a senator who voted for the federal marriage amendment, furtively moving under a toilet stall wall, the gold wedding band on his ring finger glinting in the pale florescent light as he tries to proposition the vice cop in the stall next to his. You could write volumes about the degeneracy of the American right wing, and not capture it as utterly, as elegantly, as that one profoundly sickening image does. It is perfect.
Marriage is a sacred thing the right insists…and so it is. For couples in love the wedding band is a symbol of one of this life’s most perfect joys. But to the right it is no more then a cheap status symbol…like owning a Bentley, or having white skin. Something to denote privilege, status, rank. Certainly nothing to do with love and desire, trust and devotion. Whether Larry Craig is a homosexual, or a heterosexual man with some pretty major sexual issues, it makes no difference. When he consigned the sex lives of his gay neighbors to the toilet, he consigned his own sex life there too. Love keeps no balance sheet, acknowledges no rank, bows to no prejudice. The one who doesn’t know this, has either never loved, or never loved anyone more then they loved rank and status. The ring knew where it belonged.
Where Six Years Of GOP Rule Has Brought America To The Brink Of
The most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government and I’m here to help. -Ronald Reagan
Oh…Ya Think, Ron….?
A government plan to use members of the clergy to quell dissent and objections to government orders during a time of national emergency has been revealed by a Shreveport, La., television station.
Sandy Davis, director of the Caddo-Bossier Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, said there are several advantages, but primarily, “these clergy would already be known in the neighborhoods in which they’re helping to diffuse that situation.”
So government orders to abandon homes, turn over guns, leave livestock behind, or whatever would come to the minds of various officials during an “emergency,” would be easier for people to accept, the report indicated.
The report said one of the biggest tools the clergy members would use would be the Bible itself, specifically Romans 13, where Tuberville said the Bible states “the government’s established by the Lord, you know. And, that’s what we believe in the Christian faith. That’s what’s stated in the Scripture.”
Civil rights advocates have raised questions about the idea of using clergy in such a fashion, noting the balance clergy would have to maintain when asked to do what the government wants under color of their status as a religious leader.
A blogger for the Christian education site, Chalcedon noted that the training has been going on in secret for over a year already.
In case you’re wondering, Chalcedon is the Christian Reconstructionist organization founded by RJ Rushdoony himself. These folks believe in imposing biblical, as in Old Testament, law on the United States.
The grim irony here is that the above is taken from the right wing kook site, World Net Daily. Gosh…even the wingers are starting to get scared of the republicans now. Well folks…You Fucking Asked For It…! When they come with the local preacher to take your guns away from you, just hand them over quietly. After all, you voted for them, and then you looked the other way while they got busy shredding the Constitution because you always thought that it was only the darkies and the dirty hippies and the faggots and weirdos who had anything to worry and you couldn’t wait to see them all get what was coming to them.
So, yes, I am a supporter of gay marriage and undoubtedly will remain so, since it is consistent with my values of long duration. And, yes, I will continue to agitate for it in my writing and elsewhere. But in return I call on my friends on the Left –- straight or gay -– to help defend that real source of liberalism the Enlightenment, because if we lose and fall under religious law, there not only will be no gay marriage, there will be no women’s rights, no freedom of the press, no basic human rights, not even – as in the case of Iran – any music.
Every now and then, it is worth noting that substantial portions of the right-wing political movement in the United States — the Pajamas Media/ right-wing-blogosphere / Fox News / Michelle Malkin / Rush Limbaugh listener strain — actually believe that Islamists are going to take over the U.S. and impose sharia law on all of us. And then we will have to be Muslims and “our women” will be forced into burkas and there will be no more music or gay bars or churches or blogs. This is an actual fear that they have — not a theoretical fear but one that is pressing, urgent, at the forefront of their worldview.
To which, Tom Tomorrow points out that the agenda of our own homebrew religious extremists doesn’t look too terribly different. Simon, he of the Moses Wine detective novels, is doing his level best to throw his country to the wolves over here, to save it from the wolves over there. And thanks to the likes of him, and all the other Roger Simons of America, now they’ve got their hands firmly around our democracy’s throat. Far out Moses…
Here’s the KSLA News 12 video, via YouTube. All together now…My country ’tis, of thee….
Hey Roger…don’t worry…it’s okay as long as it’s a Christian sharia law…
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Let me get this straight. This guy’s a cabinet maker, and these geniuses are leering about how nice his cabinets are?
Given that those people basically live in downtown Baltimore, I’d be willing to bet that they bought a a rundown house in a gentrifying neighborhood on the cheap so that Mr. Frost, who is good with his hands, can fix the place up and they can turn the house around for a profit. His business, which is a couple of blocks away in downtown Baltimore, basically comes from all the people fixing up all the old brownstones in the area.
In the meantime, he has to send his kids to school and the public schools in Baltimore don’t really seem like the ideal option. So he looks around, and finds that he can send them to a private school using their assistance program.
But given that $45000 dollars, while a decent living all things considered, isn’t a whole hell of a lot of money, especially when there are six mouths to feed, after everything’s said and done with he just can’t make things work with health insurance (when it comes down to it, after the mortgage, food, clothes and all the rest of the expenses of raising a family, even another $600 is no small potatos).
Then the children get into a catasrophic accident, the family is suddenly looking at medical bills it can’t pay. They are in such bad straits that the school is doing fundraisers for them. This government program helps them; makes their lives better in a fundamental way.
And these jokers are pissed off about it.
Amazing.