The Air Force being a secular progressive hellhole overrun by the proselytizing of evangelical airmen, and by megachurch pastors given limitless access to their institutions (Al Qaeda? This is your way in.), it’s difficult to believe the military could have problems with a certain corrosive culture:

On Tuesday, the Pentagon will release the annual report on sexual assaults in the military, which shows some startling numbers.

While the report will show that the number of reported assaults in fiscal year 2012 rose only 6 percent to 3,374 — up from 3,192 a year before — the number of people who made an anonymous claim that they were sexually assaulted but never reported the attack skyrocketed from 19,000 in FY11 to 26,000 in FY12.

So you can see sexual assault is not much of a problem. Victims who make anonymous claims, by the thousands, are a different story. Some of this may be due to the military’s direct approach to problem-solving. It may be difficult to understand why when an airfemmeman is assaulted she doesn’t just fire an AIM-9 Sidewinder up someone’s Command and Control Center then send David Martin the digital replay. Hello, Dateline.

Air Force Officer Accused of Sexual Battery
by ARLnow.com | May 6, 2013 at 3:20 pm

The chief of the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response branch of the U.S. Air Force was arrested and charged with sexual battery in Arlington over the weekend.

Lt. Col. Jeff Krusinski is accused of fondling a woman in a Crystal City parking lot early Sunday morning.

. . or why she doesn’t just go all mountain lion on his face. That works pretty good when you forget where exactly you parked your F-22 Raptor at the Crystal Springs Applebee’s. Or when you’re just a citizen.

“A drunken male subject approached a female victim in a parking lot and grabbed her breasts and buttocks,” according to a Arlington County Police Department crime report. “The victim fought the suspect off as he attempted to touch her again and alerted police.”

“Jeffrey Krusinski, 41, of Arlington, VA, was arrested and charged with sexual battery,” police said. “He was held on a $5,000 unsecured bond.”

And maybe that’s the point. When you’re not in the military, you don’t have commanding officers like this guy. You can fuck up a douche pretty good without having to worry about your career, or your life.

You’re at the side of the road. You turn your head and you notice WaPo blogger Jennifer Rubin standing next to you. You nod. She nods. Civil enough.

Here comes the parade. Local kids in Boy Scout uniforms, looking a little stunned, wave as they tread by. Girls in sequined leotards showboat and twirl batons. The high school band marches past, blaring a meaty Sousa march. In comes the cavalry, or the deputy sheriffs on horseback, with beards at the ready and sidearms holstered. The wind blows. The smell of hot dogs. The back end of the affair thins out. There’s another high school band, but not as polished. Getting quiet. Dogs meander by. Parents walk on.

You turn to Jennifer. ‘Not bad,’ you say.

Jennifer replies. ‘So much for the grebes.’

Obama owes much to Bush (all Americans do, in fact), including economic policies he inherited and took credit for — TARP, the auto bailout.

How? What? Does she know that people can read this? American people? Millions out of work, millions more on food stamps, 60 and 70 hour work weeks on minimum wage. And we owe George W. Bush.

Obama was handed a military success in Iraq (and then fumbled it away by withdrawing all troops to leave Iraq wallowing in sectarian violence).

How was it a military success in 2009? Because we were there at the time? The old sects and tribes and warlords all despised each other irrespective of our having parked a trillion dollars worth of armed technology downtown. And how was the “success” lost? Because we’re not now slaughtering all the Baghdad bombers and jihadis? Lockdown for the far-flung and despised. What a good reason to keep dying.

Osama bin Laden hunt and drone missile program, both successes, were undertaken by Bush.

While I was piss drunk last night I began to hum the overture for a comic opera. That doesn’t make me Rossini. I assume the reason this woman is compelled to editorialize is that her parallel universe is so astonishing.

Representative Steve Stockman of Texas gets himself plenty riled up over the passing of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher:

“While many mourn, Baroness Thatcher reminded us ‘I fight on I fight to win,’” Stockman said in statement. “The best way to honor Baroness Thatcher is to crush liberalism and sweep it into the dustbin of history.”

Annhilation. Extinction. Aaarghh. Curiously, in the middle of all this death, and ruin to come, the Republican shows a remarkable dainty side.

. . Baroness Thatcher inherited a country that was demoralized, economically broken and bankrupted by expansive government. Unlike Obama, Baroness Thatcher restored prosperity and optimism. Where Obama has failed, Baroness Thatcher succeeded. While Obama forges chains of dependency and government bloat, Baroness Thatcher took a sledgehammer to the machinery of liberalism. Baroness Thatcher’s record . .

Hoo the Baroness, and the Baroness, and the Baroness. I had no idea the same guys who enjoyed whittling the pig fat from their teeth could hold such respect for peerage. Had it been the Queen who died, they’d have had to wheel in a crane to pick Stockman from the floor. This too is a howler:

In a statement following the announcement of Thatcher’s death President Obama called the Iron Lady “one of the great champions of freedom and liberty, and America has lost a true friend.”

A champion of liberty? In a swine’s eye. How about these doings, for freedom’s sake? Thatcher called the African National Congress “a typical terrorist organisation.” Their leader, Nelson Mandela, later negotiated the end of Apartheid, freeing millions from government oppression. He then became South Africa’s first democratically elected president.

Meanwhile she called herself “President Botha’s candid friend.” P.W. Botha was the last great champion of official state-sponsored racism. He suffered a stroke while trying futilely to preserve it, then resigned his presidency. Botha later refused to testify at the Truth and Reconciliation hearings because, among other atrocities, he’d have to confess to being a domestic terrorist. He authorized the bombing of the South African Council of Churches headquarters.

And:

The Thatcher government supported the Khmer Rouge keeping their seat in the UN after they were ousted from power in Cambodia by the Cambodian–Vietnamese War. Although denying it at the time they also sent the SAS to train the Khmer Rouge alliance to fight against the Vietnamese-backed People’s Republic of Kampuchea government.

This would be after, not before, the Khmer Rouge slaughtered two million Cambodians in a genocide. Given a situation where it wasn’t necessary to choose between evils, Thatcher chose to support the modern-day Nazis.

Maggie never cared for freedom. She favored authority. And rather than use that power to liberate the oppressed, she employed it to decimate her political enemies, like the union coal miners. Which is exactly why Rep. Stockman is such a big fan, with his ‘destroy all liberals’ schtick. Good luck with that.

When England was the whore of the world
Margaret was the Madame
And the future looked as bright and as clear
as the black tarmacadam

. . I never thought for a moment
that human life could be so cheap
But when they finally put you in the ground
they’ll stand their laughing and tramp the dirt down

The greatest man who ever lived. I will buy America a ballroom. Why am I seeing China in a tent? I have made eight billion dollars. Why do you think you can criticize me? I have purchased a golf course. It will become incredible? Yes. Iraq had as much oil as Soadie Arabia. Why didn’t we steal it? Why not give it to the Marines? Everybody is stupid.

August 15, 2012. Krauthammer To Romney: Unleash Paul Ryan.

September 21, 2012. Scott Walker: Unleash Paul Ryan.

March 12, 2013. American Enterprise Institute: Unleash Paul Ryan!

A ‘free’ Paul Ryan being preferred to the one we know. The familiar Ryan has played this game too long:

He cuts deep into spending on health care for the poor and some combination of education, infrastructure, research, public-safety, and low-income programs. The Affordable Care Act’s Medicare cuts remain, but the military is spared, as is Social Security. There’s a vague individual tax reform plan that leaves only two tax brackets — 10 percent and 25 percent — and will require either huge, deficit-busting tax cuts or increasing taxes on poor and middle-class households, as well as a vague corporate tax reform plan that lowers the rate from 35 percent to 25 percent.

Ryan is an ideologue and a clown, and even apolitical Americans have figured it out. He proposes massive tax cuts for megatentacle corporations and the rich, then couples those with throwing millions of people out of Obamacare and Medicaid, many of them children. And he leaves military spending intact, but of course he slashes Medicare. In other words, the programs and adjustments Americans favor, he decimates. The villains, he hands your tax dollars.

It’s a fantastical right-wing dream. Nothing but an effort to turn the government inside out and hang it on a philosophical hook. It’s a wizard’s spell cast upon the commons, courtesy the Dungeons And Dragons crowd at the American Enterprise Institute. But now, ladies and gents, the American Enterprise Institute:

1. If the GOP’s Medicare reform plan is such a good idea (and budget deficits are such a problem), it should be implemented before 2024. Ryan knows this, surely.

2. There’s no Social Security reform plan.

3. The plan repeals Obamacare, which is highly unlikely. Better to have shown how the ACA can be fixed.

4. The plan lowers the top tax rate to 25%, which, like an Obamacare repeal, ain’t going to happen . .

Even his friends admit he’s full of shit. Now would a good time to remind ourselves of the real Paul Ryan. This is who the radical GOP has tasked with erecting the new power structure:

He’s been in Congress for nearly 13 years, but Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has only seen two of his bills pass into law during that time.

Ryan, who Mitt Romney has tapped as his running mate, passed a bill into law in July 2000 that renames a post office in his district. Thanks to Ryan, the post office on 1818 Milton Ave. in Janesville, Wis., is now known as “Les Aspin Post Office Building.”

The other time Ryan saw one of his bills become law was in December 2008, with legislation to change the way arrows (as in bows and arrows) are hit with an excise tax.

The guy’s renamed a post office. And he’s lowered the tax on arrows. Now he’s going to fundamentally disrupt the government we’ve had in place since World War II, resulting in the upheaval of millions of lives? I don’t think so.

K-Lo with the perfunctory Hosannas:

Benedict’s Message: Go to Jesus
by KATHRYN JEAN LOPEZ

The message: Catholics, be who you claim to be — live lives of prayer and faith . .

Every visible thing this man has said and done as pope has pointed us to Jesus, seeking to build up the body of Christ to a radically new level of engagement.

Pointed to Jesus you say?

Father Stephen Kiesle was assigned to the Oakland, California, diocese. After molesting two boys in a rectory in 1978, he was tried and convicted of sexual assault. But the Church would not release him. After serving his probation, he asked to be de-frocked. The Church would not release him. Diocese officials sent a formal entreaty to the Vatican asking for a ruling on Kiesle, but the Church refused. Finally in 1985, after two more requests, the Vatican’s ethics chief responded:

. . This court, although it regards the arguments presented in favour of removal in this case to be of grave significance, nevertheless deems it necessary to consider the good of the Universal Church together with that of the petitioner, and it is also unable to make light of the detriment that granting the dispensation can provoke with the community of Christ’s faithful, particularly regarding the young age of the petitioner.

It is necessary for this Congregation to submit incidents of this sort to very careful consideration, which necessitates a longer period of time.

In the meantime your Excellency must not fail to provide the petitioner with as much paternal care as possible and in addition to explain to same the rationale of this court, which is accustomed to proceed keeping the common good especially before its eyes.

Let me take this occasion to convey sentiments of the highest regard always to you.

Your most Reverend Excellency

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger

Kiesle was finally de-frocked two years later. In 2004, he was imprisoned.

More than a half-dozen victims reached a settlement in 2005 with the Oakland diocese alleging Kiesle had molested them as young children.

“He admitted molesting many children and bragged that he was the Pied Piper and said he tried to molest every child that sat on his lap,” said Lewis VanBlois, an attorney for six Kiesle victims who interviewed the former priest in prison. “When asked how many children he had molested over the years, he said ‘tons.’”

Benedict’s message: Screw the Children. Good riddance.

And now. A man yoinks on his weensy.

Obama, silent about union violence in Michigan, immediately reacts to Connecticut school shooting
Jeff G. | Protein Wisdom

Predictable as the sunrise. Sayeth the Light Bringer and erstwhile armory to the Mexican drug cartels . .

Look at him go!

. . stoking race hatred, engaging in class warfare, and terming our political opponent our enemies, or “teabaggers,” or mental defectives — then use every last tragedy, be it the shooting of Gabby Giffords or the Aurora theater shooting or the murder suicide of an NFL linebacker or the Oregon mall shooting or today’s shooting . .

UNNGGH! AARRGGH.

Just days before the biggest importantest election in the history of the third rock from the sun, Definer of Civilization and Arouser of Those Who Form It Newt Gingrich shoots Mitt Romney’s campaign. No kidding. You heard me. Newt breaks the news to his e-mail slaves that Romney lost the election. There’s not thing-one anyone can do about it:

The email, titled “What’s really at stake this Tuesday …” came from Gingrich Marketplace – a newsletter coordinated by conservative news group Human Events.

“The truth is, the next election has already been decided. Obama is going to win. It’s nearly impossible to beat an incumbent president,” advertiser Porter Stansberry wrote in the email to Gingrich supporters. “What’s actually at stake right now is whether or not he will have a third-term.”

Apparently the Gingrich Marketplace missive was meant for the cutthroat titans in the second and third rings whirling around the mass of all political gravity, Newt, and not the Romneyfans in the sticks. So now the nobodies know what “Gingrich the historian applying the lessons of history to public life” has known for awhile and has been sharing with his Upper Moondog Thetans. Willard M. Romney: Dead Man Walking.

Conservative news group Human Events manages the Gingrich Marketplace emails, but Gingrich has a say over which advertisers can have their messages go out to the list . .

Human Events Vice President Joe Guerriero said the email was “a mistake.”

“It was actually scheduled to run on another of our lists,” Guerriero said.

And, no, Obama cannot legally run for a third term. Unless, once again, you-know-who already knows something we don’t.

Big giant Christian blogsite Renew America. Obama is Kenyan, abortion destroys the nation, Founding Fathers do weep over their Bibles. It’s a fairly dramatic place, blog-wise. Lots of giant things to read about and take away from there, dreadful things either sneaking up on the unwary Christian or wiping the United States right out.

Take Mormonism, apparently. The President of RA is a former Mormon, and his name is Stephen Stone. Stephen keeps a number of links pinned at the top of the front page for you to read about the evils of his former church. Those people are a horrible and authoritative (?) bunch, he thinks.

I was wondering if Renew America were ever going to take a formal stand on the Mitt Romney candidacy. Now they have. Stephen has recently gotten the Alan Keyes’ bat signal to waylay, in a Christian way, mind you, candidate Mormon Mitt Romney.

In view of the public record, the election features the most powerful communist in the world — Barack Hussein Obama (who, as the name betrays, also happens to be the world’s most powerful exponent of Islam), someone clearly intent on dismantling our republic from top to bottom; and the most liberal Republican nominee ever, a pragmatic lawyer and “venture capitalist” with little discernible moral core — responsible as governor of Massachusetts for introducing same-sex marriage into the United States by executive edict, for introducing socialized medicine through a state healthcare plan upon which Obama modeled his monopolistic “Obamacare”; and for perpetuating the legacy of Roe v. Wade through his policies as governor, even after claiming to be pro-life — in other words, a “conservative” imposter, Mitt Romney.

Romney isn’t officially conservative enough for Stephen, or Alan. Okay. Anything else?

We might well say that voting for evil — even if perceived as a lesser one — is what got us as a country into our current predicament, with two unrepresentative parties leading us toward the brink of destruction. We need to cast off such self-defeating behavior and resolve only to vote for that which is, of itself, meritorious, truth-based, and constitutional.

That precludes voting for either Barack Obama or Mitt Romney.

So Mitt is evil and you can’t vote for him. Thank you Renew America for stabbing the one remaining Republican candidate right in the neck. Cheers.

The world splits nicely into two political classes. Ask Mitt Romney.

In one live the Americans. They are producers, they are job makers, they are wealth creators, they are hard working and responsible. They care about their own lives.

And in the other live the Obama voters.

“. . there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…These are people who pay no income tax.”

They are moochers, they are parasites, they are grasping and greedy. They are the people who pay no income taxes. As if that should be possible in a fair and decent world, and what else is there to know?

Funny you should ask. You should know why it is that some people pay no taxes.

. . Congress has repeatedly used the income tax to encourage or subsidize specific activities. We subsidize kids with the child credit, college attendance with multiple higher education credits, retirement with all sorts of tax-favored savings plans, work with the earned income credit, and child care with, you guessed it, the childcare credit.

That’s how someone who would normally pay taxes ends up paying none. It happens with lower-income drug dealers and porn princesses after the tenement rugrats — whose really? who knows? — cry out for nanny-coddler care or a Berkeley indoctrination. Suddenly their tax burdens go from “Patricia Nixon” to “Honey Boo-Boo.” And when the Army veteran whiners choose to put away a bit of their usual cigarette money for retirement, in hopes of getting in a little post-PTSD staring at sunsets somewhere, their taxes go from “Operation Desert Storm” to “Al Qaeda.”

No one could ever call the Republican candidate a freeloader. He never shirks, kiddo. Nothing demonstrates Mitt Romney’s dogmatic love of country like the way he avoids Cayman tax shelters, Swiss dodges and fed-bamboozling deductions with a fervor that can only be described as wildly patriotic.

Mitt Romney to George Stephanopoulos on Good Morning America:

“Let me tell you, George, the fundamentals of my tax policy are these. Number one, reduce tax burdens on middle-income people. So no one can say my plan is going to raise taxes on middle-income people, because principle number one is keep the burden down on middle-income taxpayers.”

Just to be clear, who would middle income people be?

“. . middle income is $200,000 to $250,000 and less . .”

$250,000 a year? Nice. A family of four living in, say, Texas on $250,000 a year is living large. The neighbors would call them something other than middle class. Those folks would be “rich.” If there were any justice, this would end his campaign.