Sunday Funnies

More inductees into this week's Hall of Shame

So many morons tried to apply after the doors were closed that I finally had to weld the door shut on the previous post and start this one.

-- Let's begin with Dr. and Sen. Donna Campbell of San Antonio (and Wonkette). It's SFW but unsafe for your sanity.

Texas Doctor Senator Idiot Lady Says No Abortions Because Men Bleed From Their Butts

(Campbell) would just, as a doctor and a woman, prefer it if the great state of Texas require that abortion clinics meet the regulatory standards for surgical centers, which would just happen to shut down all the state’s abortion clinics but five. But she has a super-good reason for this: because men bleed from their butts, and if a man is bleeding from his butt, then in the ER “We have a surgeon on call. But we don’t have a surgeon on call for someone who is hemorrhaging from the uterus.” Dr. Sen. Campbell, y’all!
 
Most people watching this stream of consciousness performance art from Dr. Sen. Campbell would think: maybe if a woman shows up at the ER hemorrhaging from her uterus, the ER should be required to get a surgeon on call? That seems like it would be a good law. We think Dr. Sen. Campbell should introduce it.

Yes, there is video of her saying these things.



-- RNC chair Rinse Pubis Reince Preibus believes that the fountain of all wisdom in regard to GOP recruitment efforts and gay marriage -- and even women's reproductive rights -- flows from Fox News commentator Mike Huckabee. Some of The Huckster's musings on the topics are republished at the link.

The Onion and Andy Borowitz meeting together in committee could not come up with anything more hilariously ironic than that.

-- The man who could turn Texas blue: Rick Perry.

Rejecting the federal money (for Medicaid expansion) might not pose an immediate political threat to Texas Republicans, whose coalition revolves around white voters responsive to small-government arguments. But renouncing the money represents an enormous gamble for Republicans with the growing Hispanic community, which is expected to approach one-third of the state’s eligible voters in 2016. Hispanics would benefit most from expansion because they constitute 60 percent of the state’s uninsured. A jaw-dropping 3.6 million Texas Hispanics lack insurance.

Texas Democrats are too weak to much affect the Medicaid debate. But if state Republicans reject federal money that could insure 1 million or more Hispanics, they could provide Democrats with an unprecedented opportunity to energize those voters—the key to the party’s long-term revival. With rejection, says Democratic state Rep. Rafael Anchia of Dallas, Republicans “would dig themselves into an even deeper hole with the Hispanic community.”

In 1994, California Republican Gov. Pete Wilson mobilized his base by promoting Proposition 187, a ballot initiative to deny services to illegal immigrants. He won reelection that year—and then lost the war as Hispanics stampeded from the GOP and helped turn the state lastingly Democratic. Texas Republicans wouldn’t be threatened as quickly, but they may someday judge their impending decision on expanding Medicaid as a similar turning point.

This is absofuckinglutely dead solid accurate. It's also the last shred of logic that might change the governor's mind before the current legislative session expires... or finally flush his presidential aspirations down the toilet and out to the Gulf of Mexico.

I would prefer the former at the terrible price of losing the latter.

-- The only person who comes close to being as violently, arrogantly ignorant as Rick Perry appears to be the new owner of the Houston Astros, Jim Crane.

Larry Dierker will no longer be a part of the Astros organization after April 15, and his departure will be a wrenching moment for anyone who has been a fan of Major League Baseball in this city for the last half-century.

Dierker, the former Astros pitcher, broadcaster and manager who made his Houston debut in 1964 at age 18, said this week he turned down a new contract with the Astros that included personal appearances and studio work on Comcast SportsNet Houston because he did not consider such duties to be “meaningful.”

[...]

Dierker acknowledges he was angry and upset that he did not get the CSN game analyst’s job vacated by Jim Deshaies, and that’s understandable. His booth work was a significant transition between his days as one of the best pitchers in franchise history in the 1960s and ‘70s and his five years (1997-2001) as arguably the most productive manager in the team’s history.

He was, and is, one of the most popular figures associated with the Astros, and he could have spent the next few seasons signing autographs at Larry’s Big Bamboo at Minute Maid Park and chatting about the Astros during CSN’s pre- and postgame shows.

The effronteries just keep piling up: the switch to the AL, the fire-sale destruction of the team that began under Uncle Drayton and has been continued by Crane, the animosity over TV contract negotiations that began months ago with the Rockets and now linger into spring. It might even be appropriate to mention that in a market that worships the Bushes, playing golf with Obama was a bad PR move. (Even the timing of the golf game, not to mention Crane's O&G investments, is not enough to overcome the disgrace of being in a foursome with Tiger Woods, US trade representative Ron Kirk, and the president. Crane's still overcompensating for those ugly racial rumors that surfaced during the due diligence period of his purchase of the team, it appears.)

How could a guy so rich be so stupid? When points of view as disparate as super-agent Scott Boras and fossil/MLB analyst Peter Gammons agree that the Astros will suck for a long, long time, you might be risking your fan base and your current revenue stream and perhaps even the long-range value of your investment. Everybody seems to understand this except Crane and George Postolos and whatever else serves as a brain trust over on Crawford Avenue.

-- Got any more nominees for the HOS? Put them in the comments. But please, no Ted "Carnival" Cruz. I've made it this far ignoring him; I'm going to press on.

Cuba Libre

A normally routine bit of Washington bureaucracy could have a big impact on U.S. relations with Cuba, either ushering in a long-stalled detente or slamming the door on rapprochement, perhaps until the scheduled end of the Castro era in 2018.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry must decide within a few weeks whether to advocate that President Barack Obama should take Cuba off a list of state sponsors of terrorism, a collection of Washington foes that also includes Iran, Syria and Sudan.

Cuban officials have long seen the terror designation as unjustified and told visiting American delegations privately in recent weeks that they view Kerry's recommendation as a litmus test for improved ties. They also hinted the decision could affect discussions over the release of jailed U.S. subcontractor Alan Gross, whose detention in 2009 torpedoed hopes of a diplomatic thaw. 

There's more there, including the reminder that taking this action would not change anything with regard to the half-century economic embargo against the island nation.

My opinion is that the Obama administration would be savvy if it were to completely normalize Cuban relations not only by removing them from this list, but also lifting the embargo and taking other steps necessary to realize the economic potential an open relationship with Cuba could present. Anybody still want to call me a socialist?

Fidel Castro has one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel. His brother Raul wants to pull a Pope Benedict (in five years, anyway). As for Cuba's best friend -- it hasn't been Russia for more than 20 years -- well, there's a changing of the guard in Venezuela, as you may aware. The times are ripe for more change.

By opening markets between the two countries, the president would give a unexpected boost to the US economy.  He would signal that the US does not wish to antagonize or provoke confrontation everywhere in the world (as it is perceived to be doing in Afghanistan, Pakistan, the Korean peninsula, the Middle East, etc.). On the heels of a generally well-received trip to the Holy Land, and in a speech full of the awe-striking rhetorical flourish which is the foundation for his global reputation, another olive branch extended to a long-time adversary in our own hemisphere would be a significant, sea-changing development and a broad brush stroke in a legacy he has shown interest in burnishing.

But the greatest blow to be struck would be entirely political in nature. Obama could crush the GOP in Florida -- and elsewhere -- by taking bold and peaceful commercial action in the Western hemisphere. Just as a generation of Cubans came to despise JFK (and Democrats generally) after the Bay of Pigs, so an American president could seal a relationship with that generation's children and grandchildren... for another couple of generations.

Noramlizing relations would also diminish a sore spot with the rest of the vast Latin American community: ending the "wet foot/dry foot" immigration policy that causes so much resentment among Mexican Americans would further advance the already-bright prospects for CIR.

Just to make clear, I am not advocating another free trade agreement in Latin America. It needs to be fair trade. And while I agree with the many views that the situation with Alan Gross should be resolved beforehand, a full and complete normalization of relations with Cuba is long overdue.

Removing Cuba from the terrorist-state list would be the proper first step in the right direction. And there should be more to quickly follow it.

Hall of Shame roundup

-- Disgraceful. John Zerwas and the rest of the Republicans in the Lege are content to watch Medicaid expansion (read: poor sick people) wither and die. Of course they couldn't do it without Rick Perry's help. What Kuffner said, especially this part.

1. The reason that so few doctors are taking new Medicaid patients is because the reimbursement rate is so low. Of course, the reimbursement rate is entirely at the discretion of the legislature, which Zerwas doesn’t mention, so this problem is entirely within their power to solve if they wanted to. Yes, that would cost more money, but it’s not like having millions of uninsured people isn’t costing us a ton already.

2. There’s still no clear idea what the Republicans want in a non-Medicaid solution. I presume they’re aiming for something like the Arkansas plan, once their pipe dreams of no-strings-attached block grants are officially beheaded, but nowhere does Zerwas say what he thinks the answer should be.

3. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The Republicans have had ten years to do something about the appalling lack of health care access for so many people in Texas. They have done exactly nothing, unless you count all the things they have done to make the problem worse.

-- Harris County commissioners continue to perform the same acute neglect on the Astrodome. Ed Emmett in fact seems to be following the same script as Zerwas ("this is not a good idea, but don't ask me if I have a better one"). NFL commissioner Roger Goodell unhelpfully fills the void.

-- Another thing your governor doesn't give a shit about: anybody's opinion on whether the Texas Enterprise Fund needs an audit, internal or independent. When you see so much bipartisan legislation emerging to rein in Governor NoCare in some form or fashion, you know he's overstayed his welcome.

But a lot of Republican voters are going to have to be convinced NOT to vote for him in 2014. Either that or Democrats are going to have to register, and turn out, an enormous number of people who do not typically vote in non-presidential years. To which would you assign a greater probability of occurrence?

-- Steve Stockman Tweets his brain farts. Don Rumsfeld does, too. My favorite response to Rummy was from comedian Patton Oswald, quoting Walter Sobchak from The Big Lebowski: "STFU Donny, you're out of your element".

-- Get ready for another long, hot, dry summer. Rick Perry's long-range weather forecast is the same as his "solution" to gun violence: Pray harder.

Update: No HOS roundup would be complete without mentioning Harry Reid's latest capitulation, on the assault weapons ban. The Senate Majority Leader is looking like a bigger loser than Alan Colmes used to on Hannity, and as pathetic as the Republicans at CPAC. When you regularly get your ass kicked by the weakest link, Harry, it might be you and not the other guys.

Update II: Louie Gohmert's one-day record for stunning technological ignorance (not his "Huffington Post simpletons") is broken by... Louie Gohmert. I tried to leave him out, folks, I really did. He forced his way in.