The Republic of T.

The “Tea Party To Businesses: ‘Stop Hiring!’” story has really taken off. Even Stephen Colbert has covered it.

I didn’t get to be on “The Colbert Show” myself, but I was on “The David Pakman Show” this afternoon to talk about the tea party’s “Stop hiring!” message. Watch the video below.

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I’m a longtime fan of NPR. I’ve even written them a check or two, during pledge drive seasons. However, after NPR’s craven instigation the firing of a producer over her support for Occupy DC, I’m starting to rethink that support. Maybe more liberals should do the same.

Freelance broadcaster Lisa Simeone was fired from public radio program Soundprint yesterday after NPR took issue with her role as a spokesperson for the Occupy DC protests, despite the fact that she is not officially employed by the organization.

Simeone’s conflict with NPR was first reported by Roll Call and eventually ended up on Fox News before she was officially fired, evoking another infamous NPR termination. “The whole thing, right down to the firing-by-phone-after-pickup-from-Fox, has echoes of the Juan Williams debacle,” wrote Politico’s Keach Hagey, “and is likely to worsen public radio’s political woes, even if Simeone was not

Soundprint isn’t actually produced by NPR and airs on affiliate WAMU in Washington, D.C., but WAMU news director Jim Asendio said that the station shares NPR’s code of ethics, which states that “NPR journalists may not engage in public relations work, paid or unpaid,” excepting “certain volunteer nonprofit, nonpartisan activities, such as participating in the work of a church, synagogue, or other institution of worship, or a charitable organization.”

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I’m filing this one under “Things I’d Do If I Won The Lottery.” It’s a long list. The only problem with it is that I never play the lottery, because “buying lottery tickets is an irrational act — the odds are hugely stacked against us.” So, I’ve never won the lottery, because I’ve never bought a ticket.

But if I were a progressive-with-loads-of-cash, I’d buy network of radio stations. If you are a progressive-with-loads-of-cash (or know someone who is), there’s a great opportunity to invest in another shot at resurrecting progressive radio.

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I think I’m beginning to get Michelle Bachmann, after the whole migraine story.

The Minnesota Republican frequently suffers from stress-induced medical episodes that she has characterized as severe headaches. These episodes, say witnesses, occur once a week on average and can “incapacitate” her for days at time. On at least three occasions, Bachmann has landed in the hospital as a result.

“She has terrible migraine headaches. And they put her out of commission for a day or more at a time. They come out of nowhere, and they’re unpredictable,” says an adviser to Bachmann who was involved in her 2010 congressional campaign. “They level her. They put her down. It’s actually sad. It’s very painful.”

Bachmann’s medical condition wouldn’t merit public attention, but for the fact she is running for president. Some close to Bachmann fear she won’t be equal to the stress of the campaign, much less the presidency itself.

No, it’s not what you think.

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Warning: Graphic images below the fold. NSFW. Strong trigger warning re: graphic depictions of violence, abuse, etc.

Here, we go again. Why does it seem, lately, that a significant portion of the country sounds a lot like our three-year-old every time he sees me looking at something I my iPhone: “Let me see! I wanna see!”

It doesn’t matter what there is to see, or whether it’s something we should see. I doesn’t matter if we know what we’re seeing. It doesn’t even matter whether it matters if we see it. There’s something to see, and we just gotta see it.

So of course, having learned that there are pictures of Osama bin Laden’s corpse, it’s become the hottest “must see” piece of GWOT “war porn.”

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“Honey, we’re on page two of the Washington Post.”

That’s what my husband said to me Saturday morning, when he and Dylan returned from their swimming class, as he left on the counter a page that had been ripped from the day’s newspaper, before turning around and taking Dylan outside to play with our neighbor’s two boys.

“Huh,” I said. It took a minute for it to register. Why on earth would we be in the Post? Then I picked up the paper and read the headline: “Slim majority back gay marriage, Post-ABC poll says.”

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I think Ezra got it about right, re: NPR’s decision to fire Juan Williams, following his “Muslim=Terrorist” remarks on Fox News. It may have been that NPR was looking for a reason to fire Williams, and he gave it to them. They, however, acted too drastically and too quickly. As Ezra said, if NPR wanted to fire Williams the best option would be to simply wait out his contract and quietly declined to renew. Maybe people would have questioned whether it was his remarks to O’Reilly that put him over the top, but NPR could have simply declined to comment. (Heck, they wouldn’t even have to tell Williams himself.)

And, no, I don’t buy Williams claim that NPR’s decision is a “chilling assault on free speech.” I say the same thing to Williams I said to Dr. Laura.

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Farewell, “Dr.” Laura. Alas, we knew you far too well.

Actually, there is just one thing before you go…

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I wasn’t able to follow this story much yesterday, and probably won’t today. (This post was hastily written yesterday, before I went back to my power-less home.) Apparently, the "Flint Serial Killer" has been caught.

A suspect in the killings of five people and the stabbings of 15 others in three states was arrested at the airport here as he tried to board a plane to Israel, the authorities said Thursday morning.

The suspect was identified as Elias Abuelazam, 33, and investigators said they believed he was responsible for a spree of attacks in Michigan, Ohio and Virginia that began in May. Mr. Abuelazam was arrested on Wednesday night and was being held on unrelated charges, the police in Leesburg, Va., said in a statement.

“While this is a key step in the investigation, there are still many issues that need to be addressed before we identify this individual as the person responsible for this horrific crime spree,” the police said.

Nearly all of the victims were black men, and the crimes may have been racial motivated, authorities said.

Arrested in Georgia? On his way to Israel?

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I’m assuming the blonde woman in the Prius, with a kid in the back seat, who stopped to ask me for directions Monday morning was safe. But, until they catch this guy I’m not telling anyone else where to go.

A Michigan prosecutor said Tuesday that stabbing attacks in his state that killed five people are linked to similar attacks in Virginia and Ohio.

So far, authorities have reported a total of 20 such attacks in the three states. Genesee County, Michigan, prosecutor David Leyton said on CNN’s "American Morning" that the victims’ description of the attacker and his car are similar.

"We think we have the same perpetrator," he said.

Leyton said police believe the man is responsible for three recent attacks in Leesburg, Virginia, the stabbing deaths of five people and injuries to 11 others in the Flint, Michigan, area and a stabbing Saturday that injured one man in Toledo, Ohio.

Fourteen of the 16 victims in Michigan were African-American, he said, but Flint is also a majority African-American community. In majority white Leesburg, Virginia, two victims were black and one was Hispanic.

Great. On top of the usual day to day stuff, I gotta look out for a serial killer who may be in the metro-D.C. area, and whose favorite victims are apparently people who look like me.

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I wonder what Lena Horne would say to Miss USA Rima Fakih.

Much has been written and will be written about Fakih’s pageant win. Not being a big fan of beauty pageants, I didn’t watch this one. So, my thoughts about it are pretty simple: Obviously, she met all the qualifications to participate in the competition, and lacking an ability to read the minds of the judges I can only assume she met and likely exceeded their standards for beauty and poise, and thus beat out her opponents. Leave her alone and let her enjoy her year-long reign.

On one hand it seems silly — given the unresolved fate of financial reform, the BP oil disaster, and any number of issues — that so much attention is being given to the outcome of the outcome of a beauty pageant. On the other hand, after while it made perfect sense to me. Because I thought of Lena Horne.

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Living and working in Washington, it’s not unusual to run in to famous people. No, not “movie star famous.” At least not most of the time. But people who hold important positions or people whose work and actions have made history, and made a difference in the lives of countless others.

Dr. Dorothy Height was one of those people  who fit all of the above criteria.

Legendary civil rights leader Dorothy Height died Tuesday morning, at age 98. She dedicated her life to empowering women and blacks, and led the National Council of Negro Women for four decades.

Height was born in Richmond, Va., and grew up near Pittsburgh. As a teenager, she won a scholarship to Barnard College in New York, only to find that the school had already admitted its quota of two blacks.

In 1963, as Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have A Dream” speech at the March on Washington, only one woman stood on the platform behind him: Dorothy Height. A lifelong champion of civil rights, Height organized a meeting the next day in which women in the movement could address racism and sexism.

Height had the ear of U.S. presidents from Eisenhower to Obama. President Obama paid homage to Height in a statement Tuesday, calling her a hero and “the godmother of the civil rights movement.”

I never formally met Dr. Height, but in my one experience with her she impressed me with the depth of her understanding, and I came away knowing a bit more about how she could work so tirelessly for so long.

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OK. This is truly getting tiresome. I know the media is making an attempt to be “fair and balanced” in writing about the threats of violence against Democratic lawmakers after the passage of health care reform. Plenty of people have already addressed this, but the media’s absurd, desperate reaching to find the equivalent of the extreme, violent, eliminationist rhetoric on the right is more than I can stand.

Case in point, even a reputable news organization like the Christian Science Monitor is susceptible to fear of being labeled part of the “liberal media.” It’s bad enough to start out framing an article with a title like, “Healthcare reform: America, the violent? How the political parties are complicit.”

Well, given that Thomas Jefferson was called the Antichrist by members of the Federalist Party, the pitched emotions at a major political crossroads perhaps aren’t so surprising — nor are threats against lawmakers.

Instead, this moment is a part of what the American political process is, say some political analysts: Every major shift in policy or political direction is a revolution in miniature, with both sides retreating toward the radical to rhetorically demonize the other.

The Republicans ratchet up the anger over the country’s changing direction. The Democrats play to fears by painting large swaths of Americans as radicals, racists, and rabble-rousers.

Horse-hockey.

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(Or “CPAC: Sideshow and Snake Oil, Pt. 2″)

The circus sideshow that was CPAC folded its tent and left Washington weeks ago. However, its apparent ringmaster and chief snake oil salesman still sweats, struts, and sobs across the “stage” of conservative media — that medicine show never stops rolling and never stops hawking its “solutions” to Americans who are in desperate need of something to ease their economic aches and pains, and heal their political maladies.

And like the medicine shows of old, Glenn Beck — and others like him — peddle magical “miracle cures” that either poison directly by filling the body politic with toxic bile, or indirectly by distracting us from actual solutions, and aren’t intended to “cure what ails us” so much as to make us think that we feel better even as the illness progresses. Case in point is Beck’s latest attack on the very idea of social justice.

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Update: The transcript is up.

The hubby and I are participating in a Washington Post online chat about marriage in D.C., a1 t 1 p.m. today.  Come join in!

open source video, online video platform, video streaming, video solutions

With the issuing of the first marriage licenses to same-sex couples Tuesday, the District follows five states — from Iowa to Massachusetts — in allowing gay couples to marry. Same-sex couples were first able to apply for licenses in the District last Wednesday but, like all couples, had to follow the city’s three-day waiting period before getting hitched.

Rick Imirowicz and Terrance Heath, who were married Tuesday, will be online Wednesday, March 10, at 1 p.m. ET to discuss the new law in the District and what it means to them and others in the GLBT community and the nation.

*Sigh*

Stuff like this gives me a headache Excedrin can’t begin to cure.

Oh no you didn’t, Chris. You didn’t forget he was black. Not for a second.

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Note: This is a somewhat extended version of a “Letter to the Editor” I emailed to Newsweek upon seeing their December 19th issue.

To the Editor:

I know what was meant by it, but I couldn’t help rolling my eyes when I read the subtitle of your December 19th issue: “People who matter, on what matters most.” Frankly, that struck me as precisely our problem in this country, on so many levels.

The very idea of “people who matter” inevitably comes paired with the idea that there are “people who don’t matter.” It’s the basis of what Robert Fuller calls “rankism” — which, instead of seeing the world in black and white, sees it populated with “somebodies and nobodies.” Fuller writes, “‘Somebodies’ are sought after, given preference, lionized. ‘Nobodies’ get insulted, dissed, exploited, ignored.”

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This is already being done by plenty of other people, but I can’t help myself. When a guy who just a month ago said “We need segregated buses,” takes umbrage at the notion that people think he’s a racist… Well, it’s just too hard to resist.

They are the ones with prejudice and bigotry coursing through their vanes [sic], through their hearts, and through their souls. They are consumed with jealousy and rage. They are all liberals–and make no mistake: That’s what this is about. It is about ideology. It isn’t about race. It’s about their being jealous and attempting to discredit me, and they’ve now sunk to the low of repeating fabricated quotes that they cannot source…. These people are scum.

Yeah. Sure, Rush.

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Dare I hope? I mean, I’ll never be on American Idol anyway. (Too old. Wrong voice type: baritone.) But the Washington Post is borrowing a page from the Idol handbook.

You’ve got an opinion, but do you have what it takes to be heard?

Here’s your chance to put your opinions to the test — and win the opportunity to write a weekly column and a launching pad for your opinionating career!

Start making your case.

Use the entry form to send us a short opinion essay (400 words or less) pegged to a topic in the news and an additional paragraph (100 words or less) on yourself and why you should win. Entries will be judged on the basis of style, intelligence and freshness of argument, but not on whether Post editors agree or disagree with your point of view. Entry deadline: Oct. 21, 2009 at 11:59 p.m. ET.

Then get ready for the great debate.

Beginning on or about Oct. 30, ten prospective pundits will get to compete for the title of America’s Next Great Pundit, facing off in challenges that test the skills a modern pundit must possess. They’ll have to write on deadline, hold their own on video and field questions from Post readers. (Contestants won’t have to quit their day jobs, but they should be prepared to put in about eight hours a week for three weeks.) After each round, a panel of Post personalities will offer kudos and catcalls, and reader votes will help to determine who gets another chance at a byline and who has to shut down their laptop.

Eyes on the prize.

The ultimate winner will get the opportunity to write a weekly column that may appear in the print and/or online editions of The Washington Post, paid at a rate of $200 per column, for a total of 13 weeks and $2,600. Our Opinions lineup includes a dozen Pulitzer Prize winners, regulars on the national political talk shows and some of the most influential players inside the Beltway. We’ll set our promising pundit on a path to become the next byline in demand, the talking head every show wants to book, the voice that helps the country figure out what’s really going on.

So what are you waiting for?

So, what am I waiting for?

Well, it’s actually too munch like Idol. After all, a popularity contest is pretty much assurance that the most mainstream “talent” wins.

And that means I’d have to make a decision. I’ve accepted that the kin of stuff I blog about and the way that I do it doesn’t lend itself to attracting a broad audience. Enter a contest and — assuming I make it past the first cut — I’d have to change that if I want to win.

And I’d want to win.

Why?

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Some things have to be seen and head to be believed. [Via Huffington Post.]

I’m writing something longer that will incorporate this, but I was so blown away that I wanted to go ahead and post it now. I’ll connect it up to some other things in a bit.

Marrying other species? Wait a minute. Other species?

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