Cut it out!

So I have decided that people can no longer claim to be Tea Party members unless they have the balls to examine the budget and at the very least act like they have a plan for how to cut funds out of the federal budget. This is, after all, the very definition of the Tea Party movement. The answer of "I really don't want to give specific cuts" doesn't fly when your movement is based on less government spending.

Jim Rome Is Right... I Guess

There was a whiff of bullshit coming out of Jim Rome is Burning on Wednesday. Honestly, I have hesitated to comment on it because the overall conclusion (that John Wall should be the #1 pick) is something I agree with. Oh well, this blog was created as a medium for us to comment on shit so here goes:

Rome posed this question to ESPN columnist Jamele Hill:

"Has there ever been a more sure fire first pick than John Wall?"

The answer should have been an emphatic "HELL YES!!! Consider LeBron James ('03), Tim Duncan ('97), Shaquille O'Neal ('92), and many others! How 'bout Lew Alcindor in 1969? Any chance he was more 'sure fire' than John Wall?"

The answer Jemele Hill gave was a more wishy-washy answer of you're right but I like Evan Turner.

Rome responded with:

"Look... Evan Turner, I love the guy... but you got a point guard. A point guard that's just gonna kill guys for a decade and he's on top. I think you gotta take him."

Okay, so he seems to be arguing that point guards are at a premium and, hence, are highly sought after even at the very top of the draft. Dear reader, are you ready to see the list of point guards that have gone #1 in the Lottery era? I hope you have several minutes to absorb this list... okay here goes:

2008 - Derrick Rose (Chicago Bulls)

End of list. Did you take the time to really absorb it?

Okay, another way I want to look at it. Can we consider the best guards of the post-Earvin/Isiah era. Off the top of my head, I came up with these players:

John Stockton
Gary Payton
Steve Nash
Jason Kidd
Kevin Johnson
Chris Paul
Deron Williams
Mark Price

Do you know how many titles have been won by those eight elite point guards?

One. Gary Payton latched onto the 2006 Miami Heat at the end of his career (he averaged 7.7 ppg and 3.2 apg that season) and got himself a ring. The other seven are, at least thus far, titleless.

Nevertheless, as I pointed out at the beginning, I don't mean to denigrate John Wall's potential NBA impact. I believe I saw him in one game before reporting to my Furriners colleagues that John Wall was the real deal. Like Derrick Rose... but better. However, like Jemele Hill (and Jim Rome), I also really like Evan Turner. He is also the real deal and Philly will be getting themselves a future All Star as well.

* this prediction is moot if LeBron James signs with the Chicago Bulls.

I call Bullshit!

Senator Richard Shelby is against the financial reform bill because it will allow the government to collect any financial information it wants from any financial institution it wants. He makes this claim while having supported the USA PATRIOT Act which allows the government to collect any information it wants on any American citizen it wants.

Is there any more damming evidence that this Senator is bought and paid for by the private sector? He cares more about the rights of our countries private industries than its private citizens. Yes, you the voting public take a back seat to a capitalist entity.

Perhaps campaign finance reform should be next on the docket so we can shift the focus of government responsibility back towards the electorate.

It's the private sector stupid!

Can we stop focusing our anger at our government for the solutions they pass to fix what the private sector messed up in the first place? You may not like the bailouts, the big loans, or the government funded mortgage refinancing but our government did all of these things to save jobs and prevent a depression. Your house may be worth less now than two years ago but what value it does have can be directly attributed to the fixes offered by the government. We should harness all of this anger and focus it on the true culprits of the recession - big business. We need to stop defending the free market so much that it makes us blind to its failings. Over the last decade big business has proved time and again that it needs regulations to keep the public safe. Just ask your average Enron employee, who was planning on using the value of his Enron stocks to retire, about the merits of government involvement in business. Big business doesn't care about the common good; they care about the good of its common stock. Our government is our voice and attacking it only quiets your own interests.

Trickle Down

As noted here before, the rich in America pay a smaller portion of taxes than they should, holding 40% or so of the wealth while paying only 30% of the taxes. This leaves the middle class to make up the difference. The reason for this is the loopholes for the rich are many.

It is my understanding the overriding theme of economics that makes up the ideology held by the right is "The Trickle Down Theory". Part in parcel to this theory is lower taxes. I wanted to offer an olive branch from the left.

First we need to shift the general thinking slightly and understand that our taxes buy us services similar to any service we purchase from the private sector. Weather we get good value or not is debatable but the services provided are not. So if we look at the Federal Government as an employer, they are the largest employer in the US. In this economy everyone is looking to lower unemployment and create jobs and under both Republicans and Democrats the Federal government has been exceedingly good at this task. Their problem currently is the revenue to expense ratio. The free market would dictate that we either raise the cost for services or cut costs. Since the object is to create jobs we are left with increasing the costs since cutting costs typically requires cutting staff. This is where the trickle down comes in. To create jobs we need to put more money from the rich into the system. If we can get their tax rate to wealth ratio to an even 35% we would realize the fruits of "The Trickle Down Theory" and see the unemployment rate drop.

This plan would only affect the costs of public services for the top 1% leaving the rest of us with all of the services we have come to know and love at no additional costs.

I would also like to take another key strategy from the right, the preemptive strike, and say in advance - you're welcome; Mission Accomplished.

Primar(l)y Stupid

I am not a political scientist. I acknowledge that fact. Chris Matthews knows waaaaay more about politics than do I. However, I still can't get myself to agree with the Beltway wisdom about the meaning of last night's primary results.

For example, Andrea Mitchell was reporting on the (not yet called) defeat of Arlen Specter (she seemed almost broken up about it... what was up with that?) and saying he lost because the voters are "angry", "frustrated", "scared" and that there is just a tremendous anti-incumbent feeling in the country at the moment. Why do they not draw the obvious conclusion that voters in a Democratic primary want to vote a real Democrat? I supported Rep. Joe Sestak and am glad that Specter lost but I do not consider myself scared or particuarly angry. Frustrated? Yes, I will confirm that one. (I will be frustrated as long as Joe Lieberman is in the senate and chairs the Senate's Homeland Security Committee. That is bullshit!)

I do not consider that an indictment of my feelings towards Barack Obama (or Gov. Ed Rendell for that matter). Tellingly, Howard Fineman (an MSNBC political analyst) reported that he talked to his mother (a lifelong Democrat living in the Pittsburgh area), he asked her for whom she voted? Her answer was Joe Sestak because Arlen Specter had voted for the war in Iraq and the Bush tax cuts. YES!! Thank you, Mrs. Fineman! It's not because of disapproval of Barack Obama or the health care bill or any junk like that; it's that we want to vote for someone who is a TRUE Democrat rather than 80 year old guy who has served five terms and who switched parties only because he had no chance as a Republican.

To follow up on Mrs. Fineman's reasoning, I saw Republican wordsmith Frank Luntz on Hannity last night giving his analysis of the special election in the 12th district of Pennsylvania last night. He said:

Sean, what is happening is that Democrats have realized that to run with Barack Obama... is not going to get them elected even in an overwhelmingly Democratic state like Pennsylvania

That was his analysis of why Mark Critz ran as a conservative democrat (pro life, anti-cap & trade, anti-health care reform, etc). The problem, of course, is that it is a district election... it is completely irrelevant if Pennsylvania is an "overwhelmingly Democratic state" (which is debatable anyway given that this was the state that had twice elected Rick Santorum to the Senate). MSNBC reported that the Pennsylvania 12th was the only district in the nation that voted for John Kerry in 2004 and John McCain in 2008. Now why that is would be an interesting question for political scientists to drill down on. Regardless, even if John Murtha had held the seat for many years, it's hard to say a district that had voted for McCain over Obama could be described as overwhelmingly Democratic.

Mr. Luntz continues:

"You're seeing it in Arkansas, you're seeing it here across the country. There's a message from tonight's election; the American people are saying in three words 'Enough Is Enough'"

Okay, so one would think Mr. Luntz means that the voters have had enough of the 'Obama Big Government Agenda'. If that is what he means, then he is completely full of shit. Bill Halter ran to the left of Blanche Lincoln and was supported (and financed) by labor unions and progressive groups (such as MoveOn.org and Progressive Change Campaign Committee). So, in my unpaid opinion, democratic primary voters were voting for Halter precisely because Lincoln was standing in the way of the Obama agenda (her very public stance against the public option in the health reform debate left many progressives upset with her). I mean, if you're a progressive Democrat, check out this Lincoln ad. Does that make you want to vote for her?

If, on the other hand, Mr. Luntz was arguing that the electorate are saying that we are against those politicians catering to special interests (like Blanche Lincoln and the entire Republican party (Rand Paul trounced the candidate supported by the Republican establishment in KY)), then I won't disagree.

The run-off election in Arkansas will be June 8th. Donate to Bill Halter!

And I can't wait for 2012... Joe Lieberman is going down! (and it won't be because he's an incumbent... it's because he is a douchebag).

Furriners = Super Scouts?

On two occasions in the past six weeks or so, I have challenged NbaDraft.Net for their overrating of Patrick Patterson.

In light of yesterday's NBA Lottery, I thought I'd check out Chad Ford's updated mock draft (2.0) at espn.com. I was almost shocked at the vindication my scouting report is receiving from this source. As of today's update, Ford has Epke Udoh going #8 to the Clippers and Patrick Patterson going #22(!) to Portland. Suck on that, NbaDraft.net!

To expand on my thoughts just a bit:

I am a Wake Forest fan. I am a resident of the Detroit area... but Al-Farouq Aminu at #7 to the Pistons?!?! No, no, no. I'd rather have Greg Monroe (who Ford has going #9 to Utah). I see a very high bust factor on Aminu. Monroe doesn't have a tremendously high ceiling given his lack of elite athleticism but the bust factor seems low because of his size, skill, & intelligence combination.

NOTE: as of today's update at NBADraft.net, they still have Patterson at #8 (LAC) and have moved Udoh to #15 (MIL).

I Call Bullshit!

I Call Bullshit was a name we considered for this blog but did not choose. In hindsight, it seems to be a more apt name for what he do here at Furriners.

And never would that premise be more appropriate than for this post here (well, except maybe for this post).

So I was listening to 97.1 The Ticket (a popular(?) local sports radio channel here in the metro Detroit area) and the host Pat Caputo was discussing the Lions chances to show marked improvement over the next couple seasons and he said (something like):

I know they feel really good about Matthew Stafford. Is it 'Fool's Gold'? I don't know. I know I advocated for drafting him after he clearly separated himself from everyone else before the 2009 draft.

BULLSHIT! I was listening to the lead up to that draft. Caputo was on the radio machine every weekend saying the Lions should draft B.J. Raji! And in the event that he tries to rewrite history again in the years ahead, I am reporting now for posterity that Caputo spent every show this year saying the Lions should draft Eric Berry - not Ndamakong Suh (he was too small according to Caputo).

Pat Caputo must be a Republican... or a Brady Quinn supporter. Those people are delusional!

Deep Fried Pelican

I was recently perusing an article regarding Mary Landrieu's staunch support of off shore drilling and someone commented with:

Mary Landrieu would deep-fry the last Brown Pelican if it would bring her a buck.

I thought it quite funny, definitely sad, and most likely true.

In last nights Rachel Maddow Show, a clip was played where Mary Landrieu said:

"The record will show that from 1947 until 2009, 175,813 barrels have been spilled out of the 16 billion produced."

I guess I don't know the full context of what exactly she is talking about because unless she is referring to some very specific subset of drilling, that is entirely inaccurate.

The Christian Science Monitor posted a good article indicating that:

Q: How much oil is spilled into the ocean every year?

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, 1.3 million gallons (4.9 million liters) of petroleum are spilled into U.S. waters from vessels and pipelines in a typical year. A major oil spill could easily double that amount.

Between 1971 and 2000, the U.S. Coast Guard identified more than 250,000 oil spills in U.S. waters, according to a 2002 report from the U.S. Department of the Interior Minerals Management Service.

Approximately 1.7 billion gallons (6.4 billion liters) of oil were lost as a result of tanker incidents from 1970 to 2009, according to International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation Limited, which collects data on oil spills from tankers and other sources.

What?!? Sports Guy's Never Heard of John McCain?

I was reading a newly posted column at espn.com about the potential death of professional basketball in Cleveland due to the stink bomb that LeBron James unveiled in Tuesday nights game 5 home loss to Boston.

In the column, Sports Guy, for a reason that isn't exactly clear, wrote this paragraph unrelated to the rest of the column:

I know you're dying to hear my "Karate Kid" remake thoughts. Well, I'm in conflict here -- obviously, you can't remake iconic classics if they remain exceedingly watchable. On the other hand, I'm the same guy who once wrote that ALL movies can be remade as long as the remake has a different gender or race. I can support concepts like "Black Scarface," "Female Hoosiers," "Black Caddyshack" (which actually happened and was awful), "Female Rocky" and so on. So it would be hypocritical of me to say, "No, I can't support 'Black Karate Kid.'" I hate being pigeonholed by a previously established position. Damn it all. Back to the game.

You "hate being pigeonholed by a previously established position"? Then, CHANGE THE POSITION!! That's what John McCain does (see: immigration, Don't Ask Don't Tell, Pay-Go, etc)!!

And, by the way, here is where I must admit that it is what Barack Obama does too (see: off shore oil drilling, spending freeze, trying KSM in New York City, etc.)

It sucks that our nations internet sports columnists are more concerned with blatant hypocrisy than many of our political leaders. *sigh*

(By the way, look at that photo!! That has to count as Red State porn, no?!?! You throw in an image of Jesus and/or Dale Earnhardt, and you're looking at rednecks all over the south calling their doctors because of their four hour erections. Truly, truly disturbing.)

....and the Rich get Richer

In the news today it was announced that BP shareholders were suing the company because the value of their investment had plummeted due to the recent oil spill at Deepwater Horizon. Their claim is that BP didn’t spend enough of its money to promote safety and instead focused its efforts on increasing profit.

Let’s ignore for a moment that that increasing profit is the goal of almost every company and that the government is the public’s only advocate, to force companies to at least give a cursory thought towards the greater good. Let’s instead look at the implication of the shareholders claims. First we need to understand that if you hold enough stocks in BP to make it worth your time to sue for a drop in the price of the stocks, you are rich. They are not doing this for the benefit of the general public. Any money earned John Q. Stockholder is completely accidental. In an effort to sell their sad story to the public they will make the argument that they are looking out for the little guy but the truth is at least 90% of any money awarded in this lawsuit will benefit a select group of people. This means that these people (the rich) feel that even though investing in the stock market is a risky proposition they feel they should be immune to these risks. Any money they lost should be covered by the company that let them down. Of course BP would have no interest in actually losing any money from this lawsuit since they have exorbitant bonuses to pay, so they will pass any costs associated with it along to us the consumer. Any tea partier worth his salt will defend this action under the guise of free market however when it comes down to it you as a taxpayer have a finite amount of money to spend. Some of this is paid to the government for services like police, roads, firefighters and defense, in the form of taxes, while the bulk of the rest of this money will be spent on products and services provided by the free market. If your taxes came down you would have money to buy more products and services. Similarly if the costs of goods and services came down you would have more money to buy more goods and services. Since it is sacrilege in this country to question the free market we blame the government for our lack money and act like they are the only ones who have wasteful spending, when the reality is your money supports wasteful spending in both the public and private sectors. So the implication in this lawsuit is that we the American taxpayer should cover any loss the rich may incur from a gamble gone bad, much like the recent bank bailouts.

What’s really laughable about the lawsuit is the ignorance with which it is made. First the extra value these shareholders “lost” only exists because BP focused on profit instead of safety. The possibility of BP stocks reaching $62 earlier this year if they had spent the funds necessary to avoid this catastrophe is miniscule at best. This is a catch 22 argument. Second, if these guys hold enough stocks that it is worth suing over a drop of $13 per share they must have a significant holding in BP. That much money invested in a company buys you a voice. To claim after the fact that they did you wrong is sour grapes. You can’t act like you deserve these ill-gotten goods and then in the same breath claim that the company was acting improperly. The only reason your stock price was so high was because the company did exactly what you claim made the stock price fall. Finally, as a stockholder myself there has never been a time that I have been forced to own a stock I didn’t like. I don’t put money into ADM because I deplore them. It’s rather self serving to say BP was acting improperly and I was against what they did but I deserve the value of the stocks that were attained while this company did things I was against.

In the end what we need to understand is that the system is set up to benefit the rich and unless the middle class stops taking their side with claims like “it’s the rich that employee most of us” the gap between us and them will continue to grow.

Welcome to Arizona

Thanks to the new Arizona law, immigrants, illegal and legal, are leaving in droves. This will change the population of the state to over 90% white geriatrics. The head of the Native American Members Bastion League Association (NAMBLA) recently commented “it’s about time that Americans of European decent had a land of their own”.

NBADraft.Net Is Taunting Me

Some time ago, I predicted that Baylor PF Epke Udoh would be picked ahead of Kentucky PF Patrick Patterson in the 2010 NBA Draft.

Now, as of their May 6 update, nbadraft.net is projecting Patterson to go #8 to the Clippers with Udoh going #18 to Miami. I think that is nuts. Actually, in all honesty, I like Patterson... but he is a tweener who, in my opinion, doesn't have that one skill that will make him a useful NBA player. He actually reminds me of Ryan Humphrey, a 2002 first round pick who was essentially a bust (Humphrey was a better athlete, Patterson is probably slightly more skilled).

I can not say that I am entirely confident that Udoh will be in a rotation either. But at least he is an excellent shot-blocker and a surprisingly skilled passer and has better size than Patterson. So I'm here to say again... Udoh over Patterson.

Rush Limbaugh Right?

Last week it was noted on this blog that Rush Limbaugh implied that the cause of the explosion at the Deepwater Horizon could be terrorism. Well, this week Congress is holding hearings on the incident and the three main culprits are all expected to testify and take full responsibility for nothing. Instead, in the American tradition, they will all blame each other for the failings of the rig.

So how does this relate to Rush Limbaugh’s comments you ask? Well it seems to me that three of the worst terrorist groups in the world are at work here. The first being BP, representing the terrorist group of Big Oil. They routinely use their main source of income as a biological weapon to kill animal life the world over. The second being Transocean, representing the terrorist group of Big Business. Like most terrorist groups, they utilize illegal practices and exploit the needs of the American public. These ill-gotten gains are put right back into the group to fund future operations. Finally we have Haliburton, representing the terrorist group Government Corruption. They use the corporation as a front to bring down our Democracy from within. In a well designed ponzi scheme, they take money from the American taxpayer to pay off politicians and obtain government contracts on the cheap. Once awarded these contracts, they make sure that each operation fails in a way that exposes a flaw of our system and then they use the politicians they bought to spin the blame away from the terrorist in charge of the operation towards the en vogue enemy of the day.

I'm glad to see that Rush was finally out in front of a story and that his paranoia about everything is actually paying off. Let's see if he keeps up his good work and locates other terrorist groups at work here in the US.

Go Fondle Yourself

A couple other stories that have gotten on my radar this week:

Roger Waters Paid Street Artists To Deface Elliott Smith Memorial Mural

Fortunately, he apologized... otherwise... oh man, I would say something really sarcastic about Pink Floyd. That would show him. But I accept his apology for the vandalism. As for his admission that he doesn't know Elliott's music... that is his loss; I ain't gonna lie, this video messes me up.

As for the other story, Jay Leno is also not quite a Joe Lieberman level villian... but he is still a total douche.

I Need Jon Stewart's GFY Choir

I have a message for Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT): GO FUCK YOURSELF!!

Honestly, if you'd asked me what I thought of Joe Lieberman before his latest dumbass idea, I would have said something along the lines of "He can go fuck himself" so, honestly, not all that much has changed.

The dumbass idea in question is reported thusly:

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) is planning to introduce a bill that would allow the government to take away citizenship from Americans who join foreign terrorist organizations.

That would be bad enough given it's disregard for our rights under the Constitution. However, it's even worse if what I've heard reported is accurate. That paragraph uses the word "join"... other reporting has used the phrase affiliated with. And the power to decide who is affiliated with a terrorist organization would be given to The State Department. Conservatives can't possibly support this dumbass idea, right? I mean, talk about government overreach! I know I don't want the government deciding who is affiliated with a terrorist organization. For all I know, Jim DeMint (R-SC) will be elected president and his administration will declare all Muslim organizations as terrorist organizations.

President DeMint? Yikes! I think I may have just given myself years of nightmares!

Rachel Does Not Know Rush

If you're reading this blog, you probably think that Rush Limbaugh is a huge tool. (Actually, statistically speaking, if you're reading this blog, you're probably related to me because, truthfully, we're not yet competitive with The Huffington Post or DailyKos or even FireDogLake - despite their conspicuous lack of Derek Anderson coverage).

What you may not know is that Rush Limbaugh is worse than the worst. I was watching The Rachel Maddow Show last night and she did a segment on the lasting environmental damage expected in the gulf from last month's oil spill. She said this:

"Even the worst apologists for this disaster admit that once that delicate fecund land has been sludged, there's not much to say about the future of that land in any of our lifetimes."

She was, in part, basing that conclusion on these articles:

CBC News: Exxon Valdez Oil Still Found in Alaskan Ducks
and
AP: Gulf Spill Prompts Alaskans to Revisit Exxon Valdez Days

A sobering assessment from Dr. Maddow.

Or you could believe Rush Limbaugh who said this on April 29:

"The ocean will take care of this on it's own...it's natural...even places that have been devestated by oil slicks like, uh,... Prince William Sound. The place in pristine now."

We believe his assessment came from a joint report from Exxon, Palin, and HisOwnFatAss.

Wait!!! What Are We Talking About?!?

Recently, there has been reports in the press about a person doing something "amateurish", "incompetent", and "pitiful".

The thing that was shocking about it was not that there was an attempted bombing in Times Square but rather that these reports were NOT about Jimmy Clausen's performance at the Carolina Panther's Rookie Camp.

Sue Lowden presents solution to campaign finance reform

In an effort to keep up with Sarah Palin as a maverick who comes up with cutting edge ideas Sue Lowden today introduced her ideas on how to solve campaign finance reform.

Rush Limbaugh Gay?

So Rush Limbaugh came out today on his show and stated the following:

I want to get back to the timing of the blowing up, the explosion out there in the Gulf of Mexico of this oil rig. ... Now, lest we forget, ladies and gentlemen, the carbon tax bill, cap and trade, that was scheduled to be announced on Earth Day. I remember that. And then it was postponed for a couple of days later after Earth Day, and then of course immigration has now moved in front of it. But this bill, the cap-and-trade bill, was strongly criticized by hardcore environmentalist wackos because it supposedly allowed more offshore drilling and nuclear plants, nuclear plant investment. So, since they're sending SWAT teams down there, folks, since they're sending SWAT teams to inspect the other rigs, what better way to head off more oil drilling, nuclear plants, than by blowing up a rig? I'm just noting the timing here.

Keeping with the theme of things completely fabricated we give you the picture above showing Rush Limbaugh’s gay tendencies as he makes out with former American Idol contestant Adam Lambert. Other than this picture that we made up we have nothing that proves Rush Limbaugh is in fact gay but you have to admit this picture is rather incriminating.