Abusive Assholes Might Have A Change of Heart.

Mississippi state Rep. Andy Gipson (YouTube).

Mississippi state Rep. Andy Gipson (YouTube).

Domestic violence as grounds for divorce? No, no, those abusive asses might have a change of heart, y’know. Could happen, right? Wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. That said, Rep. Andy Gipson really thinks marriage ought to be a prison for abused spouses.

The Republican chair of the Mississippi House Judiciary B Committee this week killed a bill that would have made domestic violence grounds for divorce.

According to Mississippi Today, Republican Chairman Andy Gipson said that he would not take up Senate Bill 2703 before a Tuesday deadline, effectively allowing the bill to die.

The bill would have amended Mississippi law “to create domestic violence as additional grounds for fault divorce.”

[…]

Gipson, who is a Baptist pastor, has said that laws should encourage people to stay married.

“At a time I think we need to be adopting policies that promote marriage and people sticking together, I have some serious concerns about opening the floodgates any more than they already are,” the lawmaker explained. “I think the floodgates are already open and this just tears the dam down.”

“We need to have policies that strengthen marriage,” Gipson added. “If a person is abusive, they need to have a change in behavior and change of heart.”

Jesus fuckin’ Christ. You know what I think, Mr. Gipson? I think being christian ought to be a legal bar to being a politician. Especially asshole christians like yourself.

Via Raw Story.

You Can’t Kill Light.

You Can’t Kill Light.

This is what we need! More please. And sign the letter, too.

Out of a place of darkness I began to think of all the amazing individuals, known and unknown who have risen up and created movements that change history. This is in honor of the people who truly do make America great.

We built a fire
The fire burns bright
You can blow hard
But you can’t kill light

We come together
Sometimes we fight
You can knock us down
But you can’t kill light

You Can’t Kill Light
No you can’t kill light

We built a railroad
Out of the past
We nailed down every tie
And we won’t go back

High in your tower
Of steel & glass
You can sign the order
But we won’t go back

No we won’t go back,
we won’t go back

We built this house
That we could share
Now you want it for yourself
But we’re still here

You think we’re different
It makes you scared
So you raise a wall around you
But we’re still here

We’re still here,
we’re still here

We lay the table
We shared our cup
Now you tell us we’re not welcome
But we don’t give up

We outlast hate
We rise above
You can knock us down
But you can’t kill love

You can’t kill love,
no you can’t kill love

We built a fire
The fire burns bright
You can blow hard
But you can’t kill light

We come together
We come to fight
You can knock us down
But you can’t kill light

You can’t kill light
No, you can’t kill light

– Monica Pasqual

Via Plus.

Border Wall Becomes A Message Wall.

Mexican activists opposed to U.S. President Donald Trump’s immigration policies left graffiti on the border fence seperating the two countries with a message to the leader.

“We are neither criminals nor illegals. We are international workers,” it said.

Trump has vowed to build or extend a wall between the two countries and deport millions of undocumented Mexican workers living in the U.S.

“We decided to do this here, on the wall, to reject (U.S. President) Donald Trump’s racist policies against the people of the world and specially against the persecution that our Mexican brothers are going through on the other side of the border,” said activist Lluvia Rocha.

Via Youtube.

Tiny Rallies.

The Tiny Tyrant hasn’t been feeling validated enough lately, so he called for Trump fans to have rallies to make ‘merica great and all that shit, BIG HUGE MASSIVE MORE MASSIVE THAN EVER BEFORE rallies. The result was on the teeny tiny side.

Full story here.

White Lies Matter.

Daniel Kaluuya in “Get Out.” CREDIT: Universal Pictures.

Daniel Kaluuya in “Get Out.” CREDIT: Universal Pictures.


Last October, I posted about the film Get Out: Get Out: Making White People Mad. (Trailer is at the link). I still haven’t seen it, but I am looking forward to it. Think Progress has a serious look at the film, but be warned, it’s full of spoilers, so if that sort of thing upsets you, don’t click over. (I was spoiled last year, but it doesn’t diminish my desire to see the movie at all).

What Get Out encapsulates so well is that modern racism can manifest not just as straightforward hate but also as a mix of jealousy and disdain that, in many ways, can be much more sinister. Disgust, on the part of white people, that black people have the audacity to excel at anything, joined with a desire to siphon off that excellence, to restore some rightful order.

Peele’s comedy and horror bonafides are well established from his run on Key and Peele, as is his ability to be deft and analytical about race without sacrificing the joke or the story at hand. Get Out, which Peele wrote and directed, marks his feature debut. He started making the movie when Trayvon Martin was killed; as he told the New York Times, “What originally started as a movie to combat the lie that America had become post-racial became a movie where the cat is out of bag, and now we’re having this conversation.”

Though he expected the movie to premiere in a different kind of America — namely, one with a different president — Peele said this 2017 context made the movie “more relevant. The liberal elite who communicates that we’re not racist in any way is as much of the problem as anything else. This movie is about the lack of acknowledgment that racism exists.”

Spoilery article here.

Free People! God Given Liberty! No Healthcare!

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) wants to ensure that no part of Obamacare is “left behind.” CREDIT: CNN.

Rep. Steve King (R-IA) wants to ensure that no part of Obamacare is “left behind.” CREDIT: CNN.

The shameful, craven republicans aren’t even attempting to hid behind their various cowardly excuses anymore. They simply want to repeal ACA, they don’t want to replace it at all. Of course, this is hardly news to people who have been paying attention.

Last week, CNN obtained a draft Congressional Republican bill to replace the Affordable Care Act with a plan that would replace subsidies with smaller tax credits, allow insurance to charge senior citizens more, decimate Medicaid, and cause millions of Americans to lose their coverage altogether.

On Monday and Tuesday, however, a trio of prominent House Republicans made it clear that even this bill was not conservative enough for them. While the bill would mean the loss of health insurance for millions of Americans, they object to provisions in the bill that would help some people remain covered.

Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC), who chairs the House Freedom Caucus (a group of a few dozen of the most conservative Republicans in Congress), announced on Monday that he could not support that proposal because included refundable tax credits to help people pay for health insurance and some tax increases. “A new Republican president signs a new entitlement and a new tax increase as his first major piece of legislation? I don’t know how you support that — do you?” he asked, adding that many members of his caucus would be willing to vote against the leaked draft.

Rep. Mark Walker, another North Carolina Republican and chair of the Republican Study Committee (a group that calls itself the “conservative caucus of House Republicans” and includes more than 170 of the 238-member GOP majority), followed suit soon after.

“The draft legislation, which was leaked last week, risks continuing major Obamacare entitlement expansions and delays any reforms,” Walker said, adding that the proposal “kicks the can down the road in the hope that a future Congress will have the political will and fiscal discipline to reduce spending that this Congress apparently lacks.” He said he would urge colleagues to oppose the proposal.

On Tuesday, Rep. Steve King (R-IA), joined the pile-on. He told CNN’s Chris Cuomo that he presumed the leaked plan did not include entirely “hard facts,” but said the he wants to see only “a full, 100% repeal of Obamacare.” “I don’t want any of it left behind,” he explained, because “a free people that are the recipients of God-given liberty… have had our health taken over by the federal government.”

Think Progress has the full story, and video, if you can stand to watch the smug and stupid King.

San Francisco.

If the counterculture of the 1960s and ’70s had an anthem, this was it. Written by John Phillips, performed by Scott McKenzie. I’d say it’s past time a counterculture rose again, a whole generation with a new explanation.

If you’re going to San Francisco
Be sure to wear
Some flowers in your hair
If you’re going to San Francisco
You’re gonna meet
Some gentle people there

For those who come
To San Francisco
Summertime
Will be a love-in there
In the streets of San Francisco
Gentle people
With flowers in their hair

All across the nation
Such a strange vibration
People in motion
There’s a whole generation
With a new explanation
People in motion
People in motion

For those who come
To San Francisco
Be sure to wear
Some flowers in your hair
If you come to San Francisco
Summertime
Will be a love-in there

If you come to San Francisco
Summertime
Will be a love-in there

– John Phillips.

So you can’t build a counterculture in one day. You can start by signing a letter. Pass it on.

Pebbles.

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These are depictions of the war in Syria – but they have been delicately composed with stones. They are the work of 52-year-old Syria-based artist and sculptor Nizar Ali Badr, who publishes pictures of his creations on Facebook.

[…]

When the Syrian conflict erupted in 2011, Nizar saw tragedies unfolding – homes destroyed, families displaced, children killed. He began to re-create the things he saw in stone.

“I didn’t have a camera to record any of my work,” he said, in a phone interview from Latakia, Syria. “As soon as I finished, I looked at it for some time and then destroyed it to make a new one.”

His stone art became a way to express his emotions and the worries that kept him awake at night, and to share those feelings with the world.

[…]

In the past, Nizar glued the stones on to cards, but now glue is too expensive. Nearly as soon as he has created a piece of art he dismantles it and begins piecing together a new image.

“I take photos of the artwork. This is the only way to preserve them and make sure people will see them,” he said.

[…]

Nizar has created more than 25,000 scenes from daily life in Syria since 2011, he said. He doesn’t sell any of his pieces; he never intended to make a living out of it.

“I am a human before anything else. The conflict has caused me a lot of pain and I sometimes can’t sleep at night,” he said.

“My only consolation is the work I do and therefore I don’t see it as a source of revenue. It is pure passion for stone art. I want to communicate human emotions that people everywhere in the world share, such as love, hope, and sadness.”

[…]

“When I saw all these families being forced to leave their homes, I felt pain. Why should anyone be forced to leave their home?”

Through his art, he tries to showcase the sacrifices people make and the risks they take to escape war and persecution, he said.

Many of his images depict families and children. He attempts to convey the suffering of the most vulnerable and the burden of being on the move.

Nizar Ali Badr’s works are searing in their poignancy, go and have a look at them all. Share them. Remind everyone you know that war is not desirable. It’s a reminder we Americans need right now.

See and read more here.

We Must Win Wars Again!

Reflections, Lee Teeter, 1988.

Reflections, Lee Teter, 1988.

War. We need more war. We must win those wars! Fuck people, fuck the environment, fuck the economy, fuck healthcare, all we want is cannon fodder – get your young asses over here so we can kill you for no reason! Jesus Fuck.

In a speech to American governors, President Donald Trump attacked the military, saying “We never win wars anymore. We never fight to win. We have to start winning wars again.’

The message was a preface to Trump’s budget announcement that he plans to increase military spending. The United States already spends more in defense than any other country in the industrial world by multitudes. Trump explained that when he was in high school they won wars with major tank battles. In the past he’s spoken out on the lack of battleships that the U.S. military has.

Trump received four draft deferments during the Vietnam War for bone spurs.

That useless, craven caitiff found a convenient, and monied way to get out of the draft. He’s all for other people dying though. I still remember the name of the Lieutenant on my POW MIA bracelet. No word of him was ever heard, or at least no information was ever released. All the government cared about was covering up the travesty of that so called war. I remember handing out those bracelets, a call to action, a mass remonstrance to our government for their shameful actions. Looks like it’s shameful action time again. Trump will start a war so he can feel like a big man. Any takers on whether or not this asshole will try to reinstate the draft?

Fuck. Fuck you, Trump, fuck every single goddamn person who brought us here.

Full story here.