1. Ben Carson finally earns universal ridicule.
You know you’ve crossed the line when Glenn Beck tells his audience that what you’ve said is “the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.” That, presumably, includes the voices in his head—not to impugn the voices in his head.
GOP presidential contender Ben Carson did it. He broke it. He pushed it too far. In his fevered brain, it might have sounded good to him; it sounded right. It sounded like a rational argument. He used the universally deplored atrocity of prison rape as part of his case that homosexuality is a choice.
"A lot of people who go into prison go into prison straight — and when they come out, they're gay,” Carson said on CNN Wednesday. “So, did something happen while they were in there? Ask yourself that question."
Stunned silence.
“Oh god,” said Joe Biden and the rest of the world.
Carson represents a particular kind of evil in the right-wing universe. His venality is cloaked in doctor’s scrubs and the intonations of a reasonable and well-educated man. His seemingly pleasant manner, twinkly eyes and soothing voice nevertheless has been the vehicle for some of the bat-sh*ttiest, and just plain sh*ttiest utterances of the past few years. Obamacare is worse than slavery. Same-sex marriage is like pedophilia. Black people are to blame for all their problems. People who believe in evolution are unethical. (Yes, a doctor, a supposed man of science said this.)
The Fox News darling tried to blame CNN, of course. They twisted his words, he whined. How, exactly? They were his words. He said them. On TV. He later gave up, and apologized-not-really, on Facebook. "I realized that my choice of language does not reflect fully my heart on gay issues." Later, he promised he’d stop talking about LGBT matters altogether. Sure he will.
Not really a "choice of language" issue, Ben. And we don’t even want to venture to guess what might be in your heart.
2. Kevin Swanson: If it's almost spring, they must be selling those lesbian cookies.
It turns out that prison is not the only thing that turns people gay. Cookies can do it too. A certain kind of peculiarly evil cookies. Full-on religious-right nutjob Kevin Swanson is again imploring people not to buy Girl Scout cookies. For if you do indulge in your hankering for a Thin Mint, or—heaven forfend—a Samoa, you will be helping to unleash the evil forces of lesbianism on the land.
Selling these cookies inexorably leads to lesbianism, because the Girl Scouts is a lesbian-promoting organization. It just is. How does it promote lesbianism? By accepting lesbians and bisexuals. That’s all it takes, a little acceptance. Swanson has made this hysterical argument for two years running now, and assured the listeners of his show “Generations Radio” this week that he is not about to back down on behalf of all those parents "who really care about their little girls" and don't want them "being lesbians at 24 years of age.” Oh, thank god someone is defending them.
Wait, he has listeners? Who the f*ck are these people?
3. Megyn Kelly stubbornly and utterly misses the point in Ferguson.
After an extensive federal investigation that uncovered profound racial bias on the part of the police in Ferguson, Missouri, Megyn Kelly remained primarily concerned with what happened to the white police officer who shot and killed Michael Brown.
Odd.
Poor Darren Wilson, who is neither dead nor under indictment for shooting an unarmed teenager. The court of public opinion was so mean to him. This injustice far outweighs the well-documented suffering of Ferguson’s black residents who have been putting up with racist policing resulting in injury, impoverishment, and imprisonment for years.
Kelly went after her guest, Democratic strategist Mark Hannah, when he said the protests might have been fueled by “perceptions” of a racist police force, perceptions that were more than borne out by the DOJ’s investigation.
Nope, Kelly countered. She’s sticking with the absurd notion that Al Sharpton is the one responsible for stirring up all the trouble.
No, Megyn, Al Sharpton did not ignite any tinderbox in Ferguson. The police did that. Residents there know full well what they’ve been enduring. And now, thanks to the DOJ investigation, the world knows it as well.
And on that pesky pattern of racially biased policing in Ferguson, Kelly remains perplexed. “That justifies this, Mark? What we saw, all these folks with their ‘hands up, don’t shoot,’ which did not happen!”
Didn't it?
But, yes. We’d say that taking to the streets and protesting these chronic abuses with that powerful gesture is more than justified.
4. Right-wing pundit has suggestion for officials who skipped the Netanyahu speech.
Perhaps you heard that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a controversial speech to Congress this week. Perhaps you didn’t and have been living under a rock. Although the war-mongering speech was nothing new—Netanyahu remains hopeful that his American friends will join him in opposing any possibility of peace with Iran or in the Middle East—the way in which it came about was novel. John “Kissy Face” Boehner invited the Israeli prime minister to speak. Netanyahu accepted completely dissing the White House in the process. Not done.
Some Democrats in Congress decided to support President Obama and boycott the speech. This too is novel. Democrats in Congress have often done their darndest to avoid any association with the twice-elected, increasingly popular President who managed to get millions of Americans health insurance.
But never mind about that.
Wingnut commentator WorldNetNews and radio host Andrea Shea King think the elected officials who skipped the speech should be punished. With death. Yeupp. That sounds reasonable.
“I would like to think that these guys could pay with their lives, hanging from a noose in front of the U.S. Capitol Building,” she told her listeners. “What they are doing is they are putting their own interests above that of America, and to me that is criminal.”
According to RightWingWatch, King specifically suggested hanging members of the Congressional Black Caucus, saying “their districts are all dumb clucks because these dumb clucks wouldn’t be electing these people if they knew better.”
“How do people like this get to represent us in Congress?” she asked. “Because there are stupid people out there in those congressional districts who are so ignorant it’s dangerous…. Stupid, stupid people."
Well, we agree at least on this. Stupid, stupid people—and the Koch brothers—are electing horrible representatives.
5. Fox Newsian is outraged that Obama mentioned immigrants when he commemorated Selma.
Idiotic white man Neil Cavuto knows all about the true meaning of Selma. And he’s not about to let some first black President “sully” the reputation of Selma—which Cavuto previously never gave a hoot about—by suggesting that immigrant rights are also a civil right, and worth reflecting about on the 50th anniversary of the March for voting rights.
“The notion that some young kid who was brought here when they were two or three years old might somehow be deported at the age of 20 or 25, even though they have grown up as Americans... is not true to the spirit of what Selma was about,” Obama said.
This outraged Cavuto. “Mr. President, Selma was about legal Americans being denied their rights, not illegal Americans thinking they were entitled to rights.”
“You’re sullying their sacrifice,” Cavuto lectured. “This isn’t about mixing up causes, this is mixed up.”
Shut up, Cavuto. Just shut up.
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