In her new 30-second spot, Delaware Republican nominee Christine O’Donnell—who claims to have “dabbled in witchcraft“—begins by making it quite clear that she is not, in fact, a witch. But, with that black top, dark backdrop, and pale skin, it might be fair to say “She look like one?”
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Sunday! Sunday! Sunday!
I have very little to say, and even fewer excuses to make. So, instead, I propose a gift and we’ll pretend all of this never happened: You’re welcome, and I hope it’s still available, because that’s genius. Starts a little slow, but from about 2:30 on, it’s straight fire.
Continue reading...Christine O'Donnell's imaginary witchcraft
Slactivist: The oddest thing to me about Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell’s “I Was A Teenage Witch” claims is that so much of the reaction has accepted her claim that such a thing might be possible. It is not. Her claims of “dabbling” in what she called “witchcraft” are not true. The supposed witchcraft she describes is not something that exists. Such stories of bloody altars and Satanic covens are common and they are false. All of them. That is a matter of established fact. The supposed witchery O’Donnell describes is simply the stuff of Satanic panic...
Continue reading...The Politics of Birth Control
Pop Quiz: Match the country with its government’s birth control news: 1) In Country A, the president pledges to provide birth control to poor couples who want it. 2) In Country B, the legislature hedges on making any commitments to providing low-cost birth control to women who want it, in the face of loud opposition from Catholic Bishops. Ok, from the set-up of the question, you might already have guessed that Country B is the U.S. (come on, President Obama making pledges about birth control? Sounds like something Candidate Obama might have said…) The surprising part is that Country A is...
Continue reading...Atheists, agnostics, Jews and Mormons know more about religion than you do
The Pew Forum on Religion and Public life released a report today on America’s religious knowledge, and the findings were…pretty surprising? Atheists and agnostics, Jews and Mormons are among the highest-scoring groups on a new survey of religious knowledge, outperforming evangelical Protestants, mainline Protestants and Catholics on questions about the core teachings, history and leading figures of major world religions. On average, Americans correctly answer 16 of the 32 religious knowledge questions on the survey by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life. Atheists and agnostics average 20.9 correct answers. Jews and Mormons do...
Continue reading...Moody's "double agent" ratings: How the game is rigged
RJ Eskow: Despite all the evidence, Moody’s is still treated as a credible player … and one that’s powerful enough to send a warning shot across the bow of the United States government. It threatened to downgrade the US government’s debt last March if more wasn’t done to reduce the government’s debt. That’s the kind of rigged game we’re facing: One of the biggest sources of the government’s debt is the economic collapse. That collapse was enabled in large measure by the bad ratings issuing by rating franchises like Moody’s. Now Moody’s wants to hamstring the government’s...
Continue reading...Great Moments in Campaign Advertising: Morning in America
“Prouder/Faster/Stronger” A Reagan/Bush ad from 1984 featuring the famous tag-line “It’s morning in America,” was one of the—if not the—most effective campaign advertisements in U.S. history. A simple message—things are better now than they were four years ago, so why change?—yet, thematically very interesting. “Morning” both symbolizes the disappearance of the dark age of the 1970s, as well as the very real and non-symbolic message of people going to work. IMDBish fun fact of the day: The ad was directed by John Pytka, whose brother Joe Pytka directed “Space Jam.” Text: It’s morning again in America. Today...
Continue reading...Florida and Gay Adoption Laws
Kudos to Florida’s Third District Court of Appeal, which last week overturned the state’s thirty-year-old blanket ban on gay adoption. According to NYT, Florida was the last state in the country to have such a law, and Newly Progressive Gov. Charlie Crist came out in support of the decision, saying it was \”a great day for children.” It was an especially great day for plaintiff Martin Gill and the two boys (biological brothers) who he had been trying for years to adopt. Ironically, the Florida Department of Children and Families (DCF) strongly urged Gill to take in...
Continue reading...Nevada Republican nominee for Senate Sharron Angle makes fun of autism
It’s been awhile since we checked in with Nevada Republican Senate candidate Sharron Angle. In the video above, taken at a tea party rally last year, she openly mocks a Nevada law that mandates health insurance coverage for “autism” (air quotes hers). She says: “Take off the mandates for coverage in the state of Nevada and all over the United States. But here you know what I’m talking about. You’re paying for things you don’t even need. They just passed the latest one, is everything that they want to throw at us now is covered under ‘autism.’”...
Continue reading...On Teresa Lewis and the Problem of Capital Punishment
Last night, Teresa Lewis was executed in Virginia. The news stories I’ve seen all lead with the rarity of the death penalty being applied to a woman: Lewis was the first woman executed since 2005, and only the 12th in the 34 years since the death penalty was reinstated. There are questions about whether Lewis’ execution will lead the way to more women on death row being executed, but that’s not the most salient piece of the story. What matters more are the circumstances of her case and whether they merited the sentence received. There is no...
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