Tag Archives: Dumbassery

Sad, Sad GOP-on-GOP Action

Posted on July 27, 2012 | Leave a comment

As reported by Politico and the Times Free Press, Tennessee’s Republican Gov. Bill Haslam (pictured left) is being criticized by (at last report) nine local and at least one national republican groups.  The resolutions request that Republican leaders take  “appropriate action against the administration of Governor Bill Haslam” because his actions have created a loss of “confidence in our Governor during an election year.”

Haslam has committed two infractions worthy of this action.  One, he hired, Samar Ali, an incredibly talented new International Director for the Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Affairs and two, for retaining employees from the previous (Democratic) administration.  Oh, by the way, that director is a Muslim and one of those retained employees is openly gay.

Both the Williamson and Stewart County resolutions are available for review at The Tennessean.  Amongst a host of tenuously linked assertions, unrelated facts and out-of-context citation in the Williamson County resolution offers:

“WHEREAS, Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam has elevated and/or afford preferential political status to Sharia adherents in Tennessee, thereby aiding and abetting the advancement of an ideology and doctrine which is wholly incompatible with the Constitution of the United States and the Tennessee Constitution.”

The Stewart Country resolution is more simplistic but attacked Ali more directly:

“One of the latest Executive Service Employees has included Samar Ali, an expert in Shariah Compliant Finance which is one of the many ways Islamic terrorism is funded. She is also a one-time Obama appointee and her family has a long history of supporting the Democrat Party.”

The Stewart Country resolution also added that the governor “allowed and retained openly [sic] homosexuals to make policy decisions in the Department of Children’s Services.”

Verdict

The groups making these statements clearly do not understand the difference between a talented lawyer that happens to be Muslim and a terrorist.  They also  intimate (without defending the position) the a homosexual is unable to make decisions where children are concerned.

In a sweeping judgment we accuse every single individual that has signed these documents of Dumbassery and Dickory, both in the Second Degree.   To his great credit there is no indication that the governor plans to change his policies based on these resolutions.

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Posted in Campain 2012

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Church and State: Islam is a Religion Too?

Posted on July 15, 2012 | 1 comment

As reported by American’s United in “Louisiana Revelation: School Voucher Funding – It’s Not Just For Christians Any More” Louisiana state rep. Valarie Hodges (Republican) is now unsure of her support for Gov. Bobby Jindal’s patently unconstitutional (but still ratified) law allowing taxpayer money to fund private religious schools.  According to the Livingston Parish News the representative is quoted as:

Rep. Valarie Hodges, R-Watson

“I actually support funding for teaching the fundamentals of America’s Founding Fathers’ religion, which is Christianity, in public schools or private schools.” and “I liked the idea of giving parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian school.”  Later she added, “Unfortunately it will not be limited to the Founders’ religion.”

While the founders religious preferences are still debatable it’s very likely that many (if not most) would be very uncomfortable with the evangelism of today.  It’s also true that many of the most well-known and most respected of the founding father’s (Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Adams, Wilson, Morris, Madison, and Washington for example) are also those most critical of religion.

Jefferson, of course, is credited with coining the term “separation of church and state” in a letter to the Danbury Baptist Association:

“Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship,  that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between church and State.”

Representative Hodges clearly needs to review her history.  Finally she ends: “We need to ensure that it does not open the door to fund radical Islam schools. There are a thousand Muslim schools that have sprung up recently. I do not support using public funds for teaching Islam anywhere here in Louisiana.”

Verdict

For Representative Hodges clear ignorance of her own history and the US Constitution she easily earns a charge of Dumbassery in the First Degree.  For her blatant (and illegal) favoritism of her own religion she also garners an additional charge of Dickory in the Second Degree.

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Posted in Church and State

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Classic Sadness: The 2003 “Mission Accomplished” Speech

Posted on July 14, 2012 | Leave a comment

Photo by Wikipedia

On May 1st, 2003 – less than six weeks after the start of a conflict many would argue is still ongoing – President Bush announced “Major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed.”  An enormous banner reading, “Mission Accomplished,” ruffled in the breeze behind him.

Of course we now know that although “Major Combat Operations” stopped the conflict continues to this day and has claimed (by varying accounts) the lives of over 4,500 U.S. servicemen and  women and tens-of-thousands of Iraqi (some estimates are in the hundreds of thousands) after this announcement.

It may be argued that the case depends completely on the definition of “Major Combat Operations” but semantics aside the hubris and spectacle of the day would haunt the administration.  Bush would later say in 2009, “Clearly, putting ‘Mission Accomplished’ on an aircraft carrier was a mistake.”

Verdict

The administration’s later admissions concerning the inappropriateness of the banner coupled with the legitimate points about the definition of what was being announced soften the blow here.  While history may very well treat the former president more harshly we can only sentence him to Misdemeanor Douchebaggery for hiding behind technical definitions and ignoring the broader implications.  We also add the charge of Dumbassery in the Fifth Degree simply for being unable to see how easily this could bite him in the ass.

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Posted in Classic Sadness

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