Quick Note: Clueless House Proves They Don't Know Their Energy from Their Interior

The hard working members of our U.S. House of Representatives are on a five week hiatus right now; but did you know that just a few weeks before they left, the House actually passed a bill?  YES! And it had nothing to do with defunding, derailing or repealing the ACA!

Representative Steve Stockman (R-Texas) introduced a proposal that would bar the Department of Energy from standing in the way of the approval of offshore drilling permits. The Republican majority was so excited about this idea that they overwhelmingly supported adding it as an amendment to an appropriations bill that was about to be voted on.  The bill passed with a vote of 218 to 204.

Republicans are feeling pretty smug about getting this amendment written into law. While they're in their home states, I imagine they'll be bragging about this great accomplishment:  "Everyone knows those oil companies need to 'Drill baby, drill!' And we just made sure the road is kept clear for them!"

I wonder when someone is going to tell them that the Department of Energy doesn't have anything to do with drilling regulations or permits.  That's the job of the Department of the Interior.

It's like the Washington D.C. version of Dumb and Dumber.  You'd think if they're going to be charged with running the government, they might at least make an effort to understand how it actually works. 

August 4 - Monday Quote

I love this:

monday quote:    Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common. (Dorothy Parker, poet and satirist, 1893-1967)

Family Foundation Organizing a Fast. Dinner Will Be Served.

Victoria Cobb, President of The Family Foundation

The Family Foundation in Virginia is planning a big protest for later this year to demonstrate their unhappiness with the number of gay marriage bans being overturned by federal courts.  Acknowledging that the Supreme Court is likely to hear at least one of the state cases now winding their way through our court system, the group is getting their members ready to be at fever pitch come this August.

They acknowledge their fight will be hard with public opinion so obviously moving toward acceptance of same-sex marriage: "Only the church stands in support of God's design for marriage."

Their recent announcement:

"Jesus has issued a trumpet call and declared a holy fast to gather his people together for a time of consecration, to purify our way of thinking and cleanse our way of living.  Our state and nation are mired in confusion and post-modern thinking and nowhere is this more evident than in the current debate raging about what constitutes marriage.  The Supreme Court begins their session on October 6th.  We fully expect them to take a marriage case sometime in the next year.  Join us for 40 Days of Prayer, Fasting and Repentance for Marriage from August 27 through October 5, 2014."

what eye thynk:   While I disagree with their stand on same-sex marriage, I can't fault them for standing up for what they believe.  It is their right, and if they want to pray and starve themselves for 40 days, that's fine with me.  But, it turns out there is a catch to the "Fasting" part of the protest.  

In a second announcement, they added this interesting twist:  "Giving up physical food isn't necessary."

In other words, Virginia's Family Foundation is drumming up support for a fast where you never actually have to miss a meal.  Maybe that's where the "Repentance" part comes in.  You know, first you have the "Prayer"...then you go to McDonald's for the "Fasting" part...and finally you Repent that you super-sized it.

As James Parker of Addicting Info said, "It's official:  Family Foundation found the laziest form of protesting possible--protest by imagination."

Eye Recommend --- Abduction of Sunni Displays Gangland Edge of Iraqi Politics

ABDUCTION OF SUNNI DISPLAYS GANGLAND EDGE OF IRAQI POLITICS, by Tim Arango --
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/28/world/middleeast/baghdad-abduction-of-sunni-figure-displays-gangland-edge-of-iraqi-politics-with-intimidation-and-violence.html?_r=0

This article appeared a few days ago and solidified for me the need for the U.S. to keep out of Middle East politics...period.

"Just before midnight (a week ago) on Friday, Shiite militiamen in eight black S.U.V.'s rolled up to the Baghdad home of an important Sunni politician and abducted him and four of his bodyguards, a brazen move that threatened to further convulse a country already in the grip of a political crisis. 

For hours at a secret location on Baghdad's southeastern edge, the bodyguards said, they were beaten with a lead pipe, their tormentors demanding that they admit that their boss, Riyadh al-Adhadh, the president of Baghdad's provincial council, was preparing to support an invasion of the capital by Sunni militants fighting under the banner of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, who are in control of large mounts of territory in the north and west of Iraq.  The episode, which ended with the eventual release of the five men, was a vivid portrayal of what Iraqi politics looks like up close, playing out like a gangster movie and defined by its currencies of intimidation and violence.

The United States and other foreign powers have pressed for a political solution to Iraq's growing crisis, and President Obama has suggested that more military help...will come only with the formation of a new, inclusive government with meaningful roles for the Sunnis and Kurds, Iraq's two main minority groups...

...Yet the abductions are another sign that American demands for political reconciliation seem divorced from the reality of Iraqi politics.

After a harrowing ordeal, the abducted men were returned to their homes on Saturday afternoon...

...In Baghdad...the wholesale sectarian slaughter that nearly tore the country apart in 2006 and 2007 has not yet returned, but militias, loyal to a sect or sometimes to just a man, are back....It is a gangland culture deeply intertwined with the culture of Iraqi politics...

...(Several) Shiite militias aligned with Iran, (have) been given wide authority by (Prime Minister) Maliki to provide security in Baghdad, and root out so-called sleeper cells of Sunni insurgents inside the capital...Mr. Adhadh's abduction appeared to be one of these operations....

...Mr. Maliki's government has frequently singled out Sunni lawmakers using the pretense of terrorism charges...In late 2011, the government accused the Sunni vice president, Tariq al-Hashemi, of terrorism and later went after the Sunni finance minister, Rafi al-Essawi.  Mr. Hasemi, who now lives in Turkey, was sentenced to death in absentia.  Mr. Essawi also fled the country.

As the events played out near Mr. Adhahdh's home on Saturday, two young men sat in their furniture shop around the corner.  They recalled the days when one man had a monopoly on violence, a situation they said differed from today, when myriad militias and armed men have the power to kill and intimidate with impunity.

One of the men, Abu Abdullah, said, 'I think Iraq requires another leader like Saddam Hussein, who's like an official murderer.'

The other man, Abu Mohammed, also said the prescription for Iraq's chaos was to revert to the past, when, as he explained it, the power to kill was in one man's hands.

'Someone like Saddam has to bring law and order quickly to Iraq,' he said."

In America, when the opposing party doesn't agree with the President, they sue him. In Iraq, when the President doesn't agree with the Vice President, his party sees that he is sentenced to death.  There is no common ground here.

Iraq is a a microcosm of the Middle East as a whole, a region of fragmentation where loyalty to tribe and religious sect is valued over any sense of national identity.

The West's attempts to force a Western style democracy in places like Iraq have ended in an atmosphere that looks like the Mafia writ large.  Without "an official murderer" to keep the peace, Iraq has devolved into warring factions, each determined to rise to the top of killer elite--to become the new Saddam.

Our style of democracy may happen in that region someday, but it will happen at its own pace and in its own time.  It cannot be forced.  For now, we should confine our interaction to humanitarian aid and leave the warring factions to fight and die on their own.

Not one more American life.

Eye Recommend --- Border Failure Rocks House GOP Leadership

BORDER FAILURE ROCKS HOUSE GOP LEADERSHIP, by Steve Benen -- 
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/border-failure-rocks-house-gop-leadership

Simply unbelievable.

"It's hard to overstate what a humiliating failure this is for the House Republican leadership team, especially House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio). 

House Republican efforts to build support among their more conservative members collapsed Thursday as congress prepares to cut town for a month-long recess without first passing a funding bill to address the thousands of unaccompanied minors being detained at the U.S. border.

Confronted with the Republican leadership's inability to shore up enough votes, House Speaker John Boehner pulled the doomed legislation, which would have provided $659 million in emergency aid to the U.S. border."

Mr. Benen then explains that an emergency meeting would be held Thursday evening before Congress adjourned for their 5-week Summer vacation, but the news today (Friday) is that Congress will remain in session for an additional day to see if Speaker Boehner can corral more votes for the bill.

"It was the first real test for the new House Republican leadership team and they appear to have failed miserably.

In a statement, Boehner blamed President Obama for Republican's inability to pass their own legislation."

How it can possibly be seen as President Obama's fault that House GOP members refused to vote for a bill they themselves wrote is beyond me; but then blaming the President is easier for the Speaker than admitting his own ineffectual brand of "leadership" I suppose.  And it plays so well to the GOP's fact-adverse base.

"(Mr. Boehner) urged the president to take unilateral action regardless of Congress."

You have got to be kidding me!

"The timing is breathtaking:  literally yesterday, GOP lawmakers voted to sue Obama for circumventing Congress, and less than 24 hours later, Boehner is publicly urging Obama to circumvent Congress. 

The resulting image is a helpless party, lacking leaders, direction, and purpose.  House Republicans were desperate to prove they're capable of being a governing party, and in the process, they've proven the opposite...

...The real story today is one of epic incompetence and a party that's practically developed an allergy to completing the basic tasks of government.

This is, of course, great news for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who now appears to have more influence over what happens in the House than the actual House Republican leadership team.

But in the meantime, John Boehner's Speakership is turning into something of a tragedy.  How many times has he put together a bill, only to be betrayed by his own folllowers?  A Democratic source on Capitol Hill recently sent around a brutal collection of bills Boehner asked his members to support, only to see his own House GOP conference reject his appeals:  a grand bargain, a debt-celing bill in 2011, a payroll tax extension, a transportation bill, a farm bill, one fiscal-cliff bill, another fiscal-cliff bill, another farm bill, and then yesterday.  I think my source might have even missed a couple, including the collapse of Boehner's debt-ceiling bill in February 2014...

...Boehner has to be asking himself about the value of a leader with no followers.  As if we needed additional evidence, he remains the Speaker In Name Only."

Republicans across the country have been screaming that something needs to be done about the crisis at our Southern border.  The Senate, with bi-partisan support, quickly proposed a bill to deal with the problem.  The House refused to even read that bill, (because it was a bi-partisan agreement or because the President supported it--take your pick), saying instead they would write their own, which they did.  But then John Boehner pulled the bill because not enough Republicans wanted to vote for that one either.  

I imagine that even Southern Republican Governors are scratching their heads this morning. 

So what we have is a party that writes its own bill then refuses to vote for it and a party leader who wants the man he is suing for what he calls over-stepping his position to solve the problem himself by over-stepping his position.  

Someday, someone will write a doctoral thesis on this period in our history.  I suggest the title: Government as Farce, the Story of How the Republican Party Chased Its Own Tail Until It Choked On It. 

And Now They Can Add Suing the President to Their List of Koch Deeds

what eye thynk:   John Boehner is a liar and an embarrassment, a man completely in the thrall of the Koch brothers and their money, whose ineffectual leadership has left his party essentially rudderless while allowing nutcases like Ted Cruz to flourish.

Eye Recommend --- Judges Block Abortion Curb in Mississippi

The banner in front of Mississippi's last abortion clinic reads, "The Clinic Stays Open." 

JUDGES BLOCK ABORTION CURB IN MISSISSIPPI, by Campbell Robertson and Eric, Eckholm --
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/30/us/mississippi-abortion-clinic-federal-court-blocks-closing.html?ref=us

Finally some good news in the women's abortion rights fight.  

"A federal appeals panel on Tuesday blocked a Mississippi law that would have shut the sole abortion clinic in the state by requiring its doctors to obtain admitting privileges at local hospitals, something they had been unable to do."

Since the two doctors who run the last Mississippi clinic are not local to Jackson, where the clinic is located; and because abortion medical emergencies are so rare, the doctors could not reach the necessary threshold to be granted admission privileges in any of the seven hospitals local to the Jackson area. 

The whole issue is moot anyway since an emergency patient would be admitted to any hospital no matter where the emergency originated--whether in an abortion clinic, on a highway or in the patient's own backyard. 

"By a 2-to-1 vote, the panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled that by imposing a law that would effectively end abortion in the state, Mississippi would illegally shift its constitutional obligations to neighboring states...

...'A state cannot lean on its sovereign neighbors to provide protection of its citizens' federal constitutional rights,' Judge E. Grady Jolly wrote.

'Pre-viability, a woman has the constitutional right to end her pregnancy by abortion,' he continued.  This law 'effectively extinguishes that right within Mississippi's borders.'

Mississippi officials had argued that women seeking abortions could always drive to neighboring states...to obtain the procedure, an argument the panel rejected."

The state's argument that abortions were still available in nearby states was presented by Paul E. Barnes, a member of the Mississippi attorney general's office. The judges pointed out that similar laws are being challenged in Louisiana and Alabama and their passage would mean that the state could not claim that women would always be able to rely on neighboring states for abortion services.   This possibility was again raised in a footnote to Tuesday's decision.

"The decision did not overturn the Mississippi law or explore whether the admitting-privilege requirement was justified on safety grounds.  Rather, the panel said, the law could not be used to close the sole clinic in the state...

...Laurence H. Tribe, a professor of constitutional law at Harvard, said that the principle of state responsibility enunciated by the circuit court 'is deeply established and fully entrenched.'

'It goes not only to the issue of reproductive freedom but to the very character of the federal union,' he said."

"Mississippi officials did not say whether the state would appeal...

...State Representative Sam C. Mims, who was the chief sponsor of the law, expressed disappointment with the ruling, saying that the decision reflected a misinterpretation of its purpose.

'Abortion is still legal throughout the nation and, of course, still legal in Mississippi,' he said.  'This legislation did not deal with that; it only dealt with the regulation of abortion clinics.'"

Does Mr. Mims (R) think women are that stupid?  He says abortion is "still legal in Mississippi" and he was just trying to deal with the "regulation of abortion clinics."  Mr. Mims expects women to believe that the closing of all those clinics as a result of his regulations was just a little unintended hiccup.  He isn't really trying to outlaw abortion, honest.  Yeah, right.

As Mr. Tribe explained, no state can arbitrarily opt-out of a federal law while still remaining a part of that union...no matter how you distort or attempt to conceal your purposes.  

"In March, a panel from the same appeals court, composed of different judges, upheld a Texas law requiring admitting privileges, ruling that the closing of some but not all clinics within a state did not present an undue burden to women seeking abortion...

...While the Texas and Mississippi laws were nearly identical, the judges found that the effect in Mississippi, with a single clinic, made the law there...constitutionally distinct from the one in Texas...

...Politicians at the time of the law's passage, including the governor, welcomed the closing as a likely outcome."

But remember, they weren't really trying to get to that result.  Really!  Gosh!  We were jus' thinkin' about the li'l ladies in our li'l ol' state of Mississip and how they need pertectin' an' all.

Twist it anyway you like, a woman's right to legal and safe abortion is a United States law, and as citizens of the United States, woman are protected by those laws...even in Mississippi.