The Romney campaign today announced a surprise pick for Vice President – Exxon Mobil Corporation. "This is a game changing decision, that will really energize the true Republican base: Koch Industries, Haliburton, Walmart, Bechtel, Fox and Shell BP," said a Romney spokesman. "It's also a breakthrough for minority rights, as it's the first time a Corporate American had appeared on the ballot. With subsidiaries in fifty eight countries and puppet regimes in six, Exxon Mobil brings to the ticket foreign policy experience focused on the only countries that matter – the ones with oil."
When questioned by reporters about the vetting process, the spokesman said that it had been completed in a record forty eight hours by Exxon Mobil staff. Asked about the possible conflict of interest, the spokesman revealed that Exxon had been vetted by the same Exxon public servants who wrote the Cheney administration's energy policy, so they were ideally qualified for vetting a Vice Presidential candidate.
Exxon Mobil is expected to self finance the campaign. "We would have paid for it anyway," said their CEO, "But now we get a place on the ticket, too. I know there are some racists out there who don't think that Corporate Americans are real Americans, or even real people, but this election will prove them wrong."
A spokesman for the Obama campaign said they were not commenting on the constitutionality of this announcement until they had seen Exxon Mobil's birth certificate.
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Cuz I'm pretty sure these assholes would make sure it was covered:
On Monday evening, Rep. David Dreier (R-CA) said that insurance companies should be allowed to discriminate against people with brain tumors during a House Rules Committee debate of the GOP's bill repealing the Affordable Care Act. The law, which Republicans will vote to eliminate on Wednesday, includes a provision prohibiting insurance companies from turning away sick people.
There really is no level too low for these fuckmeisters to stoop to. Also.
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Opaque Transparency - Shorter Willard: Nothing to see here, move along. Anyway, he's talking about his fortune hidden all over the world, let's listen in, shall we:
"I don't manage them. I don't even know where they are. That trustee follows all U.S. laws. All the taxes are paid, as appropriate. All of them have been reported to the government. There's nothing hidden there. If, for instance, you own shares in Renault or Fiat, you still have to disclose that in the United States," Romney said."
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Best news I've heard all day.
According to the report, "Americans' confidence in television news is at a new low by one percentage point, with 21% of adults expressing a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in it. This marks a decline from 27% last year and from 46% when Gallup started tracking confidence in television news in 1993." And, in case you're wondering, the results preceded the erroneous initial reports by cable-news networks CNN and Fox News regarding the U.S. Supreme Court's June 28 decision about the constitutionality of the U.S. healthcare law," so our opinions of TV news are probably even worse.
But good news for the teevee talking heads; their habit of false equivalency and a phony "balance" are finally paying off -- now everyone hates TV media equally. "Liberals and moderates lost so much confidence in television news this year -- 11 and 10 points, respectively -- that their views are now more akin to conservatives' views," the report tells us. In fact, liberals now hate TV news more than anyone. And the better educated you are, the more likely you are to recognize TV news as horseshit.
Here's a crazy idea -- fewer pundits arguing about bullshit, spin, and opinions and MORE VERIFIABLE FACTS.
Just a suggestion. (Gallup)
About that Team Romney pushback on being a tax cheat.
They're not receiving any help from establishment figures. Former RNC chair Haley Borbour called on Mitt Romney to release more taxes returns yesterday, and today Senator Lindsey Graham says he doesn't blame Mitt Romney for dodging taxes (but I thought Romney wasn't dodging taxes?) because "it's really American."
WASHINGTON — Mitt Romney shouldn't be criticized for using off-shore tax havens because "it's really American to avoid paying taxes, legally," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Tuesday. [...]
"As long as it was legal, I'm OK with it," Graham said. "I don't blame anybody for using the tax code to their advantage. I blame us for having it so complicated and confused. Pick a rate and make people pay it."
"It's a game we play," Graham said. "Every American tries to find the way to get the most deductions they can. I see nothing wrong with playing the game because we set it up to be a game."
It was legal!
I don't even know where my money is!
Everyone's doing it!
Say what you will about Democratic messaging on economic issues in the past, but right now Republican messaging is a damn disaster.
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The NRA. Defrauding taxpayers for fun and profit.
via ThinkProgress
Chicago, like many large cities around the country, sponsors a successful gun buyback program meant to incentivize owners of dangerous weapons to turn their guns into authorities. The program's no-questions-asked policy allows for anyone to drop off a gun — no matter the condition or circumstances surrounding how it was obtained — in exchange for prepaid Visa cards worth $100 per gun and $10 per BB gun or air gun. The program, called "Don't Kill a Dream, Save a Life," aims to reduce the number of dangerous weapons on the streets and in households.
But Guns Save Life exploited the "Don't Kill a Dream, Save a Life" initiative and used the program to help fund an NRA-sponsored summer shooting camp for young children by turning in a collection of old, rusted and broken guns and BB guns collected by members through the program in exchange for $6,240 in taxpayer money.
In case you don't follow – the NRA-sponsored Guns Save Life group ran a donation drive for old busted guns, traded the busted guns in for taxpayer money, then used the taxpayer money to buy new guns and put them in the hands of children at their private summer camp.
But, you know, they're just doing their part to save lives. I'm sure area police departments are thankful for their efforts.
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A judge determined that it's okay for a restaurant to kill its own customers.
New York's 2nd Avenue Deli will be allowed to continue selling its "Instant Heart Attack" sandwich thanks to a Manhattan judge who ruled against a copyright infringement claim by infamous Las Vegas illness-monger The Heart Attack Grill.
After the 2nd Ave Deli received a cease and desist from the Heart Attack Grill — once a Phoenix-based chain, but now a single establishment in the Sin City — over the questionably named sandwich which consists of half-a-pound of Corned Beef, Pastrami, Turkey or Salami between two large potato pancakes, the deli filed a lawsuit to settle the matter.
"We feel that we've been vindicated," owner Jeremy Lebewohl told the Daily News. "We're doing what we've always done, what we do best, selling sandwiches."
I hate to sound really, really evil, but if a customer eats a sandwich called the "Instant Heart Attack" and then has an actual heart attack, the customer deserves the heart attack, and the restaurant deserves to lose a paying customer. Also, both the customer and the restaurant are ridiculously huge idiots.
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So the Democrats write a Senate bill giving tax breaks to small businesses for hiring, figuring it's a cinch for Republican support. Ha ha ha ha! Charlie Brown, will you ever learn?
Senior Republicans suggested on Tuesday that they are likely to block the bill later this week on procedural grounds. They are demanding an open amendment process that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, according to staff, will not allow.
The likely failure of the measure, which is on President Obama's "checklist" of jobs bills, will leave Democrats accusing the GOP of blocking the measure to deny Obama a win. Republicans call the bill a naked political ploy and that Democrats have no real interest in passing the legislation. Debate on the bill looks likely to offer a warm-up for a fight over whether to extend the George W. Bush tax cuts that will gain steam with symbolic House and Senate votes on the matter as soon as next week.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said today that Senate Finance Committee ranking member Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, will offer an amendment that would extend all the Bush tax cuts for one year.
The Senate bill would give businesses a tax credit worth 10 percent of any amount by which they increase payrolls. By capping the credits at $500,000, the bill aims to primarily help small businesses. The measure would also extend for a year a 100 percent rate under which businesses claim bonus depreciation tax deductions on capital investments--a provision Republicans generally support.
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