Stockpiling Piss.

Shutterstock

Shutterstock

The Intercept directs our attention to a Bloomberg report from earlier this year that reveals Robert Mercer — a hedge fund manager who is also a major funder of a pro-Trump Super PAC — has been funding the creation of a massive stockpile of human urine in Oregon.

The urine is being collected by the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine, a research outfit founded by Arthur Robinson, a chemist who unsuccessfully ran for Congress in 2010 with financial help from the Mercer family. So far, Robinson and his institute have collected and 14,000 frozen samples of human urine.

What is Robinson’s interest in urine?

It seems that he believes that analyzing urine with an expensive piece of equipment called a mass spectrometer will be able to help him predict patients’ future likelihood of contracting diseases, thus creating a whole new era in the realm of preventative medicine.

“He’ll use the spectrometer to decode the chemical patterns in urine, the red flags that warn of disease before it strikes,” Bloomberg writes. “The human life span will stretch. It’s hard to judge the credibility of his claims; although he earned a Ph.D. from the University of California at San Diego in the 1960s, he hasn’t published peer-reviewed research on diagnostic medicine in decades.”

Despite the fact that Robinson hasn’t produced any recent peer-reviewed research, Mercer has spent $1.4 million funding this gigantic urine storage center.

Blood transfusions, miracle pee! Oh all the things the super rich think will magically extend life. Given the intense fright and paranoia all that wealth seems to engender, I’m glad I’m not rolling in money. Not that I wouldn’t mind having a bit more, life’s rough when you’re prone to outbreaks of stone brokeness. That said, I think all around, I’m a whole lot happier, enjoying life moment by moment and day by day, rather than constantly fretting how I can stick around longer, so no one can get my money, power, or privilege. Strikes me as a miserable way to live.

Via Raw Story.

Trigger Happy Cops? Yes.

Indianapolis police shoot homeowner (Vic Ryckaert/Twitter).

Indianapolis police shoot homeowner (Vic Ryckaert/Twitter).

Officers were called shortly after 4:30 a.m. to a robbery call at a home in the Warren Woods neighborhood, reported the Indianapolis Star.

The homeowner opened his garage door when officers arrived, and they found him standing inside armed with a gun.

Police shot the man at least once in the midsection, believing he was the robbery suspect.

They soon realized their error, after initially reporting the suspect had been shot, and the man remains in serious condition at an area hospital.

Police learned the homeowner’s wife had arrived home from a work a short time earlier and was held up at gunpoint by a robber who then took her car keys.

The robber was unable to start the car and then fled on foot, but not before the couple reported the attempted carjacking.

The suspect remains at large.

Other residents of the neighborhood, which is 59 percent black according to U.S. Census records, said the shooting was outrageous.

“I think that’s really crazy,” said resident Angela Parrott, who has lived in the neighborhood for about a year. “What do we have, trigger-happy police officers out here now?”

The homeowner’s name has not yet been released, and police said the shooting remains under investigation and will be presented before a grand jury.

“Our prayers and thoughts are with him and the rest of the family,” said Randal Taylor, the assistant chief of investigations for Indianapolis police. “Just an unfortunate occurrence.”

No. No Mr. Taylor, this was not an unfortunate occurrence. An unfortunate occurrence is something like dropping your keys in a deep puddle of mud, when you’re running late and dressed up. Shooting someone in the abdomen? That’s intentional. It’s also bloody stupid, because the way cops are trained to act is bloody stupid too. You cops know damn well that just about every person in uStates is armed, you know that very well, given the sheer amount of cops who are against gun control, so cops going on autoshoot is especially stupid. Stupid isn’t strong enough. Words, need better, newer words for the depth of this ongoing malicious paranoia. What happened to “drop your weapon” before opening fire? Is that passé now? What about all that chemical spray, tasers, all that stuff? It would seem that every cop out there has decided to go full on scaredy pants and just open fire on anything and anyone.

Oh, I know the answer, pick me! The answer is 59 percent black.

Via Raw Story.

Trump’s Louisiana Donation: The Winner Is…

Family Research Council leader Tony Perkins Bil Browning

Family Research Council leader Tony Perkins.

Yes, that’s right, Tony Perkins, head of the Family Research Council, a rabidly anti-queer religious extremist.

Donald Trump has reportedly donated $100,000 to help Louisiana residents affected by disastrous floods — but he’s put it in the hands of an anti-LGBT church whose interim pastor is Tony Perkins, head of the infamously homophobic Family Research Council.

I want to emphasize that reportedly, because supposedly, Trump has made donations before, but they have an interesting way of never showing up anywhere.

Trump visited the church, located in the Baton Rouge suburb of Greenwell Springs, and made other stops in the area at the invitation of Perkins. The church is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination, which believes that being LGBT is a sin. The Greenwell Springs church’s website includes a “Statement on Marriage and Sexuality,” which reads in part:

We believe that any form of sexual immorality, such as adultery, fornication, homosexuality, bisexual conduct, bestiality, incest, pornography or any attempt to change one’s sex, or disagreement with one’s biological sex, is sinful and offensive to God.

It asks church employees and volunteers to “abide by and agree to” the statement and “conduct themselves accordingly.”

[…]

Perkins, as a Louisiana delegate to this year’s Republican National Convention, took credit for helping to create what even the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay conservative group, termed the most anti-LGBT platform in party history. It continues to oppose marriage equality, denounces the Obama administration’s call for transgender students’ access to gendered facilities of their choice, and contends that parents have a right to enroll their children in any kind of therapy. The last is a thinly veiled endorsement of “ex-gay” therapy, even though major medical groups condemn it as ineffective and harmful, and several states and cities have barred licensed professionals from subjecting minors to it.

The Advocate has the story.

Adding Insult to Injury.

August 18th, 2016. Reuters.

August 18th, 2016. Reuters.

Indianz.com reports:

Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier of Morton County has been largely responsible for law enforcement at the site and he has accused protesters of shooting guns, carrying weapons and even threatening to use pipe bombs against his officers. But tribal members told The New York Times that the “bombs” were mistaken for sacred Chanunpa pipes used in ceremonies.

It’s bad enough the feds and “homeland security” has decided to lie about why they pulled the camps’ water supply and air conditioned trailer. This wouldn’t have anything to do with intimidation and force, oh no. *spits* And seriously, Chanunpa are pipe bombs? Please, the last thing we need is stupid cop paranoia.

WE ARE STANDING. WE ARE RESISTANCE. JOIN US.

Support Sacred Stone Camp. Legal Fund Help. Rezpect Our Water.  Sign the Petition. Sign urgent petition. And Washington DC people, don’t forget – the hearing is tomorrow! Susan Sarandon has tweeted that she will be there, among many others.

Live news from the camp, I’ll update when possible.

A Classic Coulter Meltdown.

Image: Ann Coulter speaks to Fox News (Screen capture).

Image: Ann Coulter speaks to Fox News (Screen capture).

While demographic trends have shown that people of color are increasingly opposed to the predominantly white party and are growing in number, Coulter pins the GOP’s downfall not on Donald Trump but on Clinton’s “illegal” voters.

“If Hillary wins … she has said, Tim Kaine has said, amnesty for all illegal immigrants,” Coulter continued. “We know that’s 30, 40 million. She’s going to throw open the southern border. She’s going to more than quadruple the number of Muslim refugees we bring in.”

The ultimate result will be: “There will be no hope for any Republican ever winning another election,” she concluded. “There’s no point to what I do, what talk radio hosts do, what Fox News does,” she said. “Nobody goes to the game when you can’t win.”

Oooh, now that’s what I call a result! Of course it won’t happen, but we sure as hell can hope. The world would be so much better with such absences. Back to reality, there will never be a lack of things for the alt right to be hysterical over, because frothing and freaking out is the only thing they know to do. Well, that and whine about being persecuted.

Coulter seemed to be giving up on her crusade against the mainstream media. “I’ve been recommending that since the Mexico debate in his speech to get fair coverage. But I’m not sure it’s worth it,” Coulter said. “Because look, if he loses, Hillary has edge.”

That doesn’t mean Coulter wouldn’t take a job if Trump offered her a show on TrumpTV. “I would love to go into business with him,” she said.

She also noted that some have said that Trump has softened his immigration approach but they’re wrong. “If there’s one thing we’re going to get out of a Trump presidency, it’s a wall,” she said.

TrumpTV. Right, well that’s Fox 2.0 on steroids, ennit? Oh, that fucking wall. Why on earth are idiots everywhere enamored with this monumentally stupid idea? Absurdly, this whole wall thing, from the beginning, has brought that awful movie Pacific Rim to mind. Now, that flick was fun in the popcorn sense, but I about lost it when it spent all this time on people building this monumentally stupid wall, against massive, super-powerful critters, who of course, wiped out years of time and money wasted in no time at all. As soon as they showed people building that wall, I yelled “what the fuck are doing that for?” Anyone with sense could have said “that won’t work”. Well, this monumentally stupid wall won’t work either.

Full story here.

Fucking Assholes.

Hateful fucking bigots. *spits* Oh, and the military is flying copters over the camps. Armed helicopters. *spits again*

Louisiana Floods, But Climate Change A Chinese Hoax.

CREDIT: AP Photo/Max Becherer.

CREDIT: AP Photo/Max Becherer.

…According to Elizabeth Crisp, a reporter for The Advocate in Baton Rogue, Trump drove through areas littered with flood debris in his motorcade, and then visited a local church where he spoke with both flood victims and disaster relief volunteers. He then signed autographs before leaving.

[…]

But Trump’s visit, coupled with his calls for sympathy for the victims of the flooding, is ironic, considering his denial of climate change, which is expected to increase the likelihood that devastating floods like the one in Louisiana will occur.

“Climate change has already been shown to increase the amounts of rain falling in the most intense events across many parts of the world, and extreme rainfall events like this week’s Louisiana storm are expected to grow increasingly common in the coming years,” Bob Henson and Jeff Masters explained over at Weather Underground. Which is to say that while climate change can’t cause a single weather event — and while floods certainly would occur in a world without climate change — global warming is making the odds of these extreme events more and more likely.

Trump, however, does not believe that climate change is a problem worth solving. He has called it a “hoax” and argued that it was concept “created by and for the Chinese.” He has called for the United States to pull out of the Paris climate agreement, which many view as the best chance for avoiding the most catastrophic effects of global climate change. Under a Trump administration, policies to cut greenhouse gas emissions would take a backseat to his promises to mine for as many fossil fuels as possible.

If Trump truly is concerned for the people of Louisiana, supporting policies that would make devastating flooding like this more likely is a strange way of showing it. Environmental groups took notice, with the Sierra Club decrying his visit as “campaign theatrics.”

“Let’s be clear: Donald Trump is taking his reckless and dangerous denial of climate science to the heart of a crisis fueled in part by climate change,” Sierra Club Political Director Khalid Pitts said in a statement. “That’s like a tobacco lobbyist offering health tips at a cancer ward.”

Trump’s running mate, Indiana Governor Mike Pence (R), asked Republicans in Congress in 2005 to cut spending before sending disaster relief funds to Louisiana in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. In 2012, then-Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney faced backlash when he visited Louisiana in the wake of Hurricane Isaac; Romney and running-mate Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) supported a budget that would have slashed federal disaster funding.

[…]

Trump apparently kept his own plans for a visit quiet, and did not call Edwards before planning his trip. Edwards welcomed Trump’s visit, but warned against using the visit as a photo-op, suggesting that instead Trump volunteer or donate money to the LA Flood Relief Fund. According to reporters in Louisiana, Trump’s visit included no volunteer time or announcement of financial contributions.

Trump isn’t just a con man who owes massive amounts of money to all manner of people and a habitual fraud, he’s a dyed in the wool conspiracy kook. This man makes only one life better, his own. As far as he’s concerned, the rest of us can go to hell, a hell he’d be more than happy to usher in.

Full story at Think Progress.

Where is the f*cking check?

Republican presidential nominee makes campaign stop in flood-ravaged Louisiana (Screen capture)

Republican presidential nominee makes campaign stop in flood-ravaged Louisiana (Screen capture)

The Governor of Louisiana asked the President to stay put, because rescue efforts are still going strong, and there simply are not resources to deal with something like a presidential visit, so that’s what the President did, not being an ego-bloated ass. Speaking of ego-bloated asses, when Trump announced plans to go tromping about flood ravaged Louisiana, the Governor once again asked for officials to stay put, and said if Trump wanted to help, he could donate money.  One of Trump’s advisers with sense also attempted to explain that this would be a bad idea, but no, Mr. Ego just had to show up. Why, I don’t know. What I do know is he got the exact reception he deserved from Neva Butkus.

Where is the fucking check?

“Alright, y’all,” wrote Baton Rouge resident Neva Butkus, “I need to clear some things up.”

Butkus — a Chicago native who has worked with the City Year teaching program — said that she “has spent this entire week running donation centers, organizing volunteer efforts, and will be doing demo work on houses all this weekend.”

She wrote, “Our Governor has explicitly asked Obama to NOT VISIT at this moment because our first responders are STILL saving people’s lives. YES, It has been a week and there is still standing water. Tens of thousands of people are displaced. This is a NIGHTMARE and our governor does not want to shut down interstates that are BRINGING IN SUPPLIES just to escort our President into the city.”

She went on to say that Donald Trump’s visit was not welcomed by any residents she knows because it tied up precious resources that could be used in rescue and relief efforts.

“He is exploiting an opportunity to look as if he is welcomed during a tragedy,” she said.

“Our Governor literally told him (as this article shows) that Trump is welcome in our state but if he’s coming he better be volunteering or writing a sizable check to assist with recovery,” continued Butkus. “A 60 second video of him unloading play-doh from a truck does not count.”

Finally, she demanded, “Trump. Seriously. Where is the check. Like where is the fucking check. My people are drowning. My co-workers and family and friends have lost everything. My friends and co-workers that haven’t lost everything are taking off work (my boyfriend is taking PTO) to clean out people’s homes and rip out sheet rock and carpet. Give us money or GTFO. I don’t want to see you in your suit in AUGUST carrying boxes off a truck like you care about us. Louisiana is an incredible place. Baton Rouge is my home and I have watched people drop EVERYTHING to help one another during this time. The whole country seems to be floored by the generosity and love that our residents show each other during tough times, but to us this is normal. This is Louisiana. And you do not belong here.”

Via Raw Story.

Lesbian and Transgender Hillbillies are Coming to Get You.

A lesbian couple sitting in a sunny field (Shutterstock.com)

A lesbian couple sitting in a sunny field (Shutterstock.com)

Well, the right wing has found something new to froth about, there are LGBT people in rural areas! Really, who knew. After all, everyone knows all LGBT people are in urban areas, struggling to get their glitter just right or something. There couldn’t possibly be native rural or Southern LGBT people, and farming? Forget about it. Of course, the truth is that there are lots of LGBT people all over the place, and queer folk in rural areas, the South in particular, have more difficulties in getting together with other queer folk, and don’t have near the resources of other rural people, especially farmers. The 15th annual Nationwide LGBT Rural Summit was held at Drake University in Des Moines, IA on Aug. 18. That would be the fifteenth one, but of course, right wing asses seemed to just now find out about it, and are joyful in the hissiness on display over yet another sign that the sky, it be falling, as all us queers are the 5th column intent on destroying the good ol’ conservative heart of Amerikka. Oh yes.

The right-wing freakout over the summit began at conservative website The College Fix, which mocked the summit, complained that it was a waste of tax money and denied that LGBT people living in rural areas might face any special hurdles.

By August 16, the Washington Free Beacon picked up the story, wailing that the summit will enable “lesbian and transgender hillbillies how to get subsidies from the government.”

“The all-day summit will teach lesbian and transgender hillbillies how to get subsidies from the government like rural housing loans and ‘community facility grants.’ Bullying will also be discussed,” said the Beacon.

Then, none other than Rush Limbaugh picked up on the story.

“Have you heard the latest Democrat scam?” Limaugh asked on his program. “Have you heard about the Agriculture Department’s financial grants to lesbian farmers? You think I’m making this up? See, this is how they do it.”

“(W)hat the point of this is, folks, it’s not about lesbian farmers. What they’re trying to do is convince lesbians to become farmers,” he insisted.

“I’m like you; I never before in my life knew that lesbians wanted to be farmers. I never knew that lesbians wanted to get behind the horse and the plow and start burrowing. I never knew it. But apparently enough money can make make it happen, and the objective here is to attack — they’re already attacking suburbs, and that has been made perfectly clear by what happened in Milwaukee. And they’re going after every geographic region that is known to be largely conservative. They never stop, folks. They are constantly on the march,” said Limbaugh, whipping the story up into another Obama conspiracy.

World Net Daily joined in the panic and ousted Breitbart.com editor Ben Shapiro’s blog The Daily Wire called it “dumbest thing Feds have EVER Spent your tax dollars on.”

Lesbian farmers don’t exist, said the Wire’s Amanda Prestigiacomo.

“I mean, if I don’t know that the chocolate milk I’m drinking was originally obtained from a lesbian milking a cow, things could really breakdown [sic],” she wrote.

Oh yes, we are seriously contagious there, alt right folks, so perhaps you should all get out of the rural areas, and don’t eat or drink anything you haven’t produced yourself. It’s the only way to be certain. We’re coming for you, yes we are. Yep.

Via Raw Story and Media Matters.

‘Black Lives Matter’: They Should Be Ashamed of Themselves.

kkk-1471380951-6956Oh, the KKK. Gad, they are a whiny bunch of assholes. Seems they are planning to, um, attend a Black Lives Matter Rally on Long Island this Sunday. I’m just going to include the choicer whiny bits here, and boy, are there a lot of them. Click over for the full article, including rally organizer Vanessa Vascez-Corleone’s priceless response, which includes an open invitation, as it seems the Klan’s idea of attending is to lurk in a ‘secret place’.

The Ku Klux Klan, the oldest American hate group in existence, has a message for those organizing Black Lives Matter rallies on the East End: “They should be ashamed of themselves.”

And now the KKK, with its long history of murder and violence, plans to bring members to a Black Lives Matter rally scheduled for Sunday in Westhampton Beach, according to a man identifying himself as a high-ranking KKK member. That rally is slated to begin at noon at the traffic circle near Village Hall.

Speaking Tuesday with Patch, Gary Monker, who said he is the Exalted Cyclops, or chief officer, in New York of the Loyal White Knights of the KKK, said many people have misconceptions about the organization.

“We’re the only organization right now standing up for whites, upholding the second amendment of the Constitution,” he said. “We are not a hate group. We are Christian and we’re trying to restore America back to what it used to be.”

This incredible litany of whine is rich with opportunities for mockery, so everyone, please, mock away, on every possible platform, and show these buffoons up for what they truly are: vile bigots crying crocodile tears over their inability to openly terrorize and murder at will. There’s plenty of material coming up.

[Read more…]

We Won’t Be Able to Pee Anywhere, Oh No!

Sandy Rios.

Sandy Rios.

Whip out those hankies and you’ll be able to catch crocodile tears!

Christian activists’ boycott of Target hasn’t exactly been a rousing success so far, as the company this week announced that it’s spending $20 million to expand its available restroom options while at the same time remaining inclusive toward transgender people.

Right Wing Watch notices that Christian activist Sandy Rios is so scared that the boycott of Target will be a flop that she fears she’ll never be able to use a public restroom again.

“If we do not keep the pressure on Target, this will quickly — we know how major corporations are, they are scared to death of anything that isn’t politically correct — this will spread like wildfire, we will not be able to go to the bathroom anywhere,” she told Breitbart’s Alex Marlow. “What’s at stake is all the other companies around this country that will just cave, they just will.”

Oh my, it would be nice if you could figure out that this is the way the rest of us already feel. We’ve been living fear of a public lav because of people like you, Ms. Rios. If you really want to settle this, just self ban yourselves from public lavs. Unfortunately, since Breitbart’s nastiest, slimiest, sleaziest, most unethical asshole, Stephen Bannon, has hired onto the Trump campaign, Breitbart is busy whipping this all up again, into a massive frenzy of bigotry and hate.

Full story here.

Trump Will Make Jesus Come Back.

Frank Amedia.

Frank Amedia.

Frank Amedia, a pastor who says he is serving in a volunteer capacity as Donald Trump’s “Christian policy” liaison, said last month that God told him last year that Trump would win the GOP nomination and that he believes Trump has been “raised up” to help pave the way for the Second Coming.

Amedia spoke with Steve Strang, the founder of the Pentecostal magazine Charisma, on Strang’s podcast on the day Donald Trump effectively won the Republican presidential nomination; the podcast was posted online last week.

[…]

“In this instance, it’s not because Donald Trump has heralded his faith or the name of God, but the Lord has put His favor upon him, and how amazing it is that the favor of God can overcome so many mistakes, so many bumbles, so many things that otherwise we would think would destroy somebody in business, destroy them in politics, destroy them in relationships. But yet it’s very evident it was the will of the Lord to do this and here we sit now.”

Amedia then told Strang that he believes there is “a skirmish going on” in the “heavenlies” right now that “is the beginnings of the preparation of the way of the coming of the Lord.”

As part of this preparation for the Second Coming, he said, a “breaker anointing” has taken place, giving Trump the power to break up “established norms” that have not served the “Kingdom of God.” (This is a reference to a passage in the Old Testament Book of Micah about the end of days.)

Breaking up the established norms. Hmm, okay, I think that can be translated as “only white, straight christians who are politically incorrect are okay, yessir!”

“And this breaker anointing is manifesting in so many different facets on earth today,” he said. “One of them is the political realm, one of them is right here in the United States, and I perceive that Donald Trump has been raised up with that breaker anointing to just begin to crush all of the strangleholds that have been placed upon this country. And, let’s face it, this country influences the world. And the positions that he’s taken, albeit in not quite the personality that you and I would walk out into, is accomplishing in establishing a lot of what were established norms and are established norms that haven’t been very effective at all on serving the principles of the Kingdom of God.”

Um, Frank, I hate to break this to you, but just up there ^, you were yakking about Jesus coming back, raining down destruction and all that; now you’re yakking about how Trump is gonna make this a god huggin’ power to be feared country again, dominating the world, and taking its rightful place as bestest country ever. I think you need to pick here. Hmmm. Jesus or power. Power or Jesus. Power…or what now?

Via Right Wing Watch.

Cop Union: Accountability? Uh uh, Give Us Money.

San Antonio Police Chief William McManus can’t meaningfully discipline his officers under current contract rules. CREDIT: AP Photo/Eric Gay

San Antonio Police Chief William McManus can’t meaningfully discipline his officers under current contract rules. CREDIT: AP Photo/Eric Gay.

City leaders in San Antonio will soon vote on a new union contract for police officers that contains no reforms to accountability processes for cops, because the officers’ union wanted more money before agreeing to higher standards.

Mayor Ivy Taylor brought a seven-point list of reforms to union negotiators this spring, the San Antonio Express-News reports, but none made it into the contract. If the City Council ratifies the deal on September 1, the city will continue to face tight limits on how it can discipline officers.

Any misconduct records older than two years cannot be used to justify punishment for new incidents. Short suspensions that officers do not appeal get erased and converted into simple reprimands on their records after two years.

Taylor’s seven-point wishlist would have ended each of those rules, giving the Chief of Police greater ability to punish repeat offenders and examine patterns of behavior across an officer’s full career when deciding to suspend, demote, or fire a cop.

“The (police) chief (William McManus) and I feel that it is important, but the union was not willing to consider that and they wanted to be paid for any changes in the disciplinary process,” city manager Sheryl Sculley told the Express-News.

The contract already includes a 14 percent raise over four years. The raises union officials reportedly sought in exchange for reform would have been over and above those pay bumps — something that one activist called “essentially extortion.”

[Read more…]