Grampa Simpson at it again:
In comments made over the weekend, Senator John McCain R-AZ., blamed illegal immigrants for the some wildfires that have raged across his state of Arizona.
“There is substantial evidence that some of these fires have been caused by people who have crossed our border illegally,” McCain said Saturday at a press conference. “The answer to that part of the problem is to get a secure border.”’
The Senator from Arizona’s comments set off a wildfire of their own, as the Wallow Fire currently blazes across his state across 500,000 miles.
A forest service spokesman on the Wallow fire in Arizona says there’s no evidence that this specific fire was caused by immigrants.
I still can not believe that there are people who want to argue that there would have been no difference between the current Obama administration and a McCain/Palin reign of terror.
slag
Back in my day, only legal immigrants were allowed to buy matches.
different church-lady
Allow me to be the first to state that once again you are trolling your own blog (in spite of the fact that such a statement doesn’t make the slightest scrap of sense).
Dr. Loveless
Another day, another thing to blame the brown people for.
Barb (formerly Gex)
Sure some of them were started by people here illegally. But what about the rest of the fires which were started by people here legally?
That’s how this works, isn’t it? Or do I not understand wildfires?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
Of course there’s no difference: McCain wouldn’t have gone after bin Laden and Obama wouldn’t repeal DADT. See, they’re equivalent.
shortstop
Cole has characterized himself as “trolling my own blog” on multiple occasions. Don’t think he’s doing it this time, however.
slag
Either brown people, the gays, the feminists, or the environmentalists.
I’m surprised Gramps didn’t run the board with this one by claiming that undocumented lesbians started the fire when they were rushing through a candlelight vigil against climate change on their way to the abortion clinic.
Baud
Consider it progress. A few years ago, I’m sure McCain would have blamed the Arizona fires on the gays.
James E. Powell
No sane person really believes that “Obama is no better than [some Republican].” It is just hyperbole. There are a lot of good reasons to be frustrated with Obama. This is no more than an over-heated way of expressing that frustration.
There are, no doubt, a few people who actually believe this, but while they may be a vocal and visible component of the blogosphere, they are such a tiny part of the electorate that they can be safely ignored.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
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I’ve certainly never argued that there would have been no difference. However, your comment does beg the question: “On a scale of 1 to 100 percentage points, how much better is the Obama administration than a McCain administration would have been?”
.
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different church-lady
@ James E. Powell (#9)
Maybe they can be safely ignored, but they cannot be practically ignored — it would be like trying to ignore someone screaming at you with a bullhorn at a distance of 3 inches.
Lolis
My friend’s husband is a firefighter. He is currently traveling around the Southwest to fight fires. She told me a little know secret which is that firefighters have been known to start fires because many firefighters only get paid when they are working. Apparently there are a lot of limits about hours and pay that change all the time too. He believes it somewhat common practice to have firefighters start fires.
Baud
I’d put it in the high 90’s, but some may disagree.
slag
100,000,000,003. And if I followed Sarah Palin’s twitter feed, I’d probably give Obama more.
MikeJ
And some of them are actually employee by Republicans, (direfoglake).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
In the “I can’t believe it and at the same time it’s all too predictable” category, this vainglorious mediocrity is still treated as a wise elder statesman by The Village. See also, too, Lieberman, Joe, he’s in Israel with Glen Beck
jl
I am very critical of Obama on many policies.
I am especially critical of Obama on his economic policy. I don’t see it as betrayal. I think he doesn’t understand it very well, and is confused, and perhaps reluctantly, his on economics have evolved to align with Geithner’s.
In terms of electioneering, I think it is important to be careful how we criticize Obama. Politically active people who always show up for elections, very active people who usually work in them, probably won’t swing the next election. Probably less active voters will decide it, more by deciding whether to show up at the polls or not, than anything else.
The GOP and the corporate media, for their own reasons would like a dispirited Democratic electorate. It would be mistake to be critical in a way that discourages a very active and motivated electorate of Democratic and independent voters.
Violet
“This specific fire.” Which means, in wingnut-speak, that many other fires must have been set by immigrants. What other interpretation could there be?
OzoneR
Both sides do it. Republicans blame illegal immigrants for problems they didn’t cause, while Democrats disrespect them for criticize them for their misstatements.
Alex S.
Well… McCain also would have sent troops to Libya, ha!
Baud
Which he would have redeployed from Iran…
Mike M
Here in Phoenix at least, all our problems in Arizona are blamed on illegal immigrants, whether it’s the high cost of health care, the cost and poor performance of our schools, the lack of jobs, drug use, crime, etc. After housing construction collapsed here, the immigration population dropped dramatically, but you would never know it from listening to the local politicians.
Immigrants make convenient scapegoats, and I’m sure it was just as true 100 years ago when my ancestors stepped off the boat.
Loneoak
1, because 1 is already infinitely more than the terrifying zero that would have been the other option.
Sasha
Apparently, some of the circumstantial evidence is that these fires started where border crossings are common. (But doesn’t that make it equally likely that an anti-immigrant zealot set the fires in order to stem the unwashed tide?)
beltane
Why are all these rich old Aryans living so close to Mexico anyway? They son’t stand a chance against the Mexicans and their ability to cause all these natural disasters solely by virtue of their awesome Mexicaness.
shortstop
Ah, so you’re telling us that these fires could have been started not by immigrants, but by Latino firefighters?
ABL
Back in his day, McCain wore an onion on his belt… as was the style at the time.
Violet
Maybe McCain needs to invite the firefighters over to enjoy the tire swing and then all will be okay.
Comrade Dread
I knew it was the immigrants. Even when it was the bears, it was the immigrants.
jayackroyd
“I still can not believe that there are people who want to argue that there would have been no difference between the current Obama administration and a McCain/Palin reign of terror”
Can you link to some of those people, John?
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
ummm, yeah, despite all the airconditioning, and the trucked in dirt, and the pretense of lawns the rich folk have, arizona is a desert, and all the makings of wildfires are, and have been there.
interesting how human activity can affect something like this, but not, ah well nevermind.
perhaps the greater lesson is, that there are too many people in arizona for its climate, and the state has been overbuilt since man has made machines to ameliorate what were once hefty challenges to living year round in such a climate.
OzoneR
I’m sorry, but I don’t see it as “he doesn’t understand it very well.” I see it as “I did whatever I could realistically do,” and while some may see it as a cop out, that’s life…accomplishing what you can reasonably accomplish.
this is a country that loses its shit when a Congressman takes a picture of his penis, or a network removes “under God” out of a song that never had it in there in the first place. This is a country that accepts a network pulling out of a President’s speech after a national tragedy to broadcast a fucking football game. This is a country where a major network would rather run a low-rated rerun instead of the President talking about a major overhaul of healthcare.
In New York State, Democrats are about to trade in rent control and NYC school funding in order to get gay marriage passed, and they’re going to be treated as heroes for it. Gov. Cuomo scored a 75% approval rating for axing public workers, freezing pay and slashing benefits…simply because he did it on time.
America’s priority is not an economy that works. It’s their own little petty issues of personal importance.
Democracy is a system designed to exploit human nature (the greed for power) to do good. Politicians will do good if there are enough people demanding it. If that demand is not there, they won’t do it.
But this requires suspending the naive belief that the country that wants to default on its debt regardless of the damage it’ll do to the economy, secretly also wants a multi-trillion dollar taxpayer funded job program, or that the President 1/3 of them don’t believe was born here, even with evidence, is somehow going to change their mind.
Left Coast Tom
@James E. Powell (Cole, do you ever plan to fix your ‘reply’ button?!):
I don’t think anyone would disagree with your first sentence, in fact I think that’s pretty much the point. Some of us doubt the sanity of those who claim ‘Obama is no better than [insert moron here]’. The alternative would seem to be believing that those who state such views are consultants and/or fundraisers for [insert moron here].
Edit: I was about to ask where the Edit button was, but it appeared after about a minute of pondering! Anyway, as a resident of a famously fire-prone state (CA), I think it’s also important to say: “McCain: Fuck You”.
lol
“also”? You do realize we don’t have any troops in Libya, right?
OzoneR
they also loot like crazy. In New York, we call them land pirates.
OzoneR
Would’ve been fine with that.
ppcli
Hard to give an exact numerical estimate. Let’s just say that it is exactly the same percentage that sex on silk sheets with a young Helen Mirren followed by a double dram of 18-year old Highland Park single malt whiskey would be more desirable than prolonged death by hanging, drawing and quartering.
gerry
Poor John, when will you realize that if you are happy with crappy little differences, that is all you’ll be offered.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
The difference between Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, on the one hand, and John Roberts and Samuel Alito on the other, are “crappy little differences”? (Let me once again repeat my thanks to the people who told me there wasn’t a dime’s worth of difference between Gore and Bush)
Chukwu
@baud
As a brown person, I have to ask:
How is that progress?
asiangrrlMN
@ppcli, mmmmmm, Helen Mirren.
Grampy McCain can shut it. Sheesh.
Mark S.
@Violet:
Why does that always sound so much dirtier than it actually is? Even when I’m making the joke I have to remind myself it isn’t something gross like Santorum.
James E. Powell
@Left Coast Tom
What I am suggesting is that there are people who say “Obama is no better than …” but who do not really mean it, who are just upset, who are exaggerating to make a point, who are not crazy. And I am suggesting that we who do not say such things should not view such statements as an invitation to engage in internecine bickering, but rather to understand that it is just blowing off steam.
curious
boy, there’s just no end to the illegals’ ingenuity.
Linda Featheringill
Uncle #10
“On a scale of 1 to 100 percentage points, how much better is the Obama administration than a McCain administration would have been?”
98%. Well, maybe only 96%.
Ben
@Lolis
“It was a pleasure to burn things…”
Linda Featheringill
Mike M #22
Using people as scapegoats is an old practice. Nero and the burning of Rome.
HOWEVER, several cultures have taken the extra steps of punishing these scapegoats. Again, Nero and the burning of Rome.
[Aren’t you proud of me? I didn’t go Godwin at all. :-)]
Mike Kay (Team America)
THIS IS GREAT NEWS FOR ROMNEY!
Mike E
McCain is just employing the very reasonable Cheney Doctrine of 1% probability=100% wingularity
Linda Featheringill
#40
Baud, Chukwu has a point and deserves an answer.
Chukwu, baud might be a self-centered jerk but likely is just a verbally clumsy person. There’s a very good chance that he/she didn’t mean any offense.
Keith G
I am sure that there are such folk, but where is the list?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
ppcli
It’s Helen Mirren. Any age between 18 and now is fine with me.
Cliff in NH
100%
Name one evil thing that Obama did that McCain/Palin would Not have done?
Sure Obama has done some bad stuff, but what was the alternative?
Left Coast Tom
@James @ 44: We’re supposed to be the ‘reality-based’ folks. I believe that losing grip on reality for the sake of ‘making some point’ is harmful to those of us who share progressive goals.
burnspbesq
@ Uncle Clarence:
8,472.
Citizen Alan
For the record, while I have had serious complaints about Obama’s performance (and particularly his decisions to continue some of Bush’s worst policies), I have never thought or suggested that Obama has been remotely as bad as the Lich King of Arizona would be had God been so cruel as to inflict him on our poor nation.
Citizen Alan
That said, would the Lich King of Arizona be doing crap like this if he’d become President? I mean, he knows perfectly well that the GOP’s anti-immigrant bigotry will, over time, be a disaster for the party, and at one point, he supported immigration reform, didn’t he? Is he really an insane bigot or is he just demagoguing the issue because of his insane hatred for Obama?
OzoneR
No, but his party would
Berto
Don’t kid yourself.
Lucky thing Wall St. loves the cheap labor, lest (How high?) Obama go after the immigrants as well.
Left Coast Tom
@Alan @ 58: You’re writing that question about someone who only took a couple years to make kissy-face with George Bush after the latter spread racist rumors regarding his (the former) daughter for the sake of winning the SC GOP Primary.
glitter
He is fanning the flames of this and other lizard brain issues to throw up as much smoke as possible and obfuscate the truth. That is the modus operandi of movement conservatism today – because they got nuthin’. Doesn’t matter what they were ‘fer yesterday: if Obama is ‘fer it now they’re agin’ it.
Had Obama not been elected and the Right not lost their collective minds he may very well have not felt the pressure and been more relatively sensible…of course keeping in mind his giant angry ego.
NR
Forced everyone in America to give money to the same private insurance companies that have been murdering people for profit for years now.
Roy G
I heard McCain blamed the fire on the USS Forestal on illegal immigrants too.
Mnemosyne
This is true — McCain would have simply adopted the Paul Ryan “here’s a discount coupon” plan and let everyone fend for themselves.
It’s pretty sick that you think that implementing the Ryan plan and letting people die in droves would have been better than helping people buy health insurance, even from for-profit companies.
Mnemosyne
Here’s what what McCain would have implemented had he won: HR 6110
Yep — we all would have been better off if we had followed the Republican plan and ended CHIP this year instead of expanding coverage to allow people to keep their children on their healthcare plans up to age 26. Right, NR?
Cliff in NH
@nr
Ha, yup, Die quickly … Got evidence for what macain would have tried for health care for all americans?
keep in mind that the lack of primary care when people are young gets passed on as costs to all americans once they hit 65.
Cliff in NH
@NR
http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/apr2008/db20080429_854428.htm
Cliff in NH
@Mnemosyne
Just a quick glance, and as a trader I can say there is some evil shit right up front in that thing…
trollhattan
Always, always remember: Republicans hate you and no matter how little they leave you with, they’ll try to take that too.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/environment/epa-budget-cuts-put-states-in-bind/2011/06/08/AGbVpYdH_story.html
trollhattan
Sen. Jan Brewer has a nice ring to it. Also, too, Sen. Joe Arpaio. Don’t trust Arizona to do the right thing–Janet Napolitano is an outlier.
Ed Darrell
On a scale of 1 to 100? About 95 — and it’s that last 5 percent that disappoints the hopeful among us.
By the way, it doesn’t “beg the question.” “Begging the question” is an argumetative fallacy in which the argument assumes the point it claims to argue for. Say, “It raises the qusetion,” or “This question naturally follows . . .”
Cliff in NH
This is Lovely:
NR
FIFY.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
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@71 Ed Darrell
Au contraire, mon derrière. The phrase has a meaning outside the context of formal logic. I quote Merriam-Webster –
beg the question
1 – to pass over or ignore a question by assuming it to be established or settled
2 – to elicit a question logically as a reaction or response (the quarterback’s injury begs the question of who will start in his place)
Definition 2 is perfectly valid to use in this case, as I have, and I’ll thank you not to impudently question my use of the English language henceforth. I must say, balloonbaggers are not properly educated, nor good judges of presidents, but they do make fine – though errant – scolds.
.
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Cliff in NH
“(C) Special rule for employer-sponsored minimum
essential coverage.–For purposes of subparagraph (B)–
“(i) Coverage must be affordable.–Except as
provided in clause (iii), an employee shall not be
treated as eligible for minimum essential coverage
if such coverage–
“(I) consists of an eligible
employer-sponsored plan (as defined in
section 5000A(f)(2)), and
“(II) the employee’s required
contribution (within the meaning of
section 5000A(e)(1)(B)) with
[[Page 124 STAT. 217]]
respect to the plan exceeds 9.8 percent
of the applicable taxpayer’s household
income.
<> This clause shall also
apply to an individual who is eligible to enroll
in the plan by reason of a relationship the
individual bears to the employee.
“(ii) Coverage must provide minimum value.–
Uncle Clarence Thomas
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@ 56 burnspbesq
How would you rate FDR and any other president(s)?
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Mnemosyne
So we agree that you’re a sick bastard for thinking that McCain’s plan to end employer-based insurance and give families $2,500 apiece to buy insurance from those exact same companies would actually have been an improvement over the cost controls and profit limits in the ACA?
I guess you just like dead kids more than I do.
shano
lolis: that was the case in the last big fire in Az. in the White Mts. & Apache rez. started by a bored firefighter and a weird lost camper signal fire – at the same fucking time! It was a bizarre coincidence. We rescued wild horses from that fire. Many of them were absolutely great horses from army remount Morgan/TB descendants.
Could McCain pander lower? I do not think so. Pander blowback is a bitch.
Cliff in NH
@Cliff in NH
That is RE: NR @74 from:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PLAW-111publ148/html/PLAW-111publ148.htm
[111th Congress Public Law 148]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office]
[[Page 124 STAT. 119]]
Public Law 111-148
111th Congress
An Act
Entitled The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. <>
Edit: you will find even more relevant sections by searching the word “poverty”
Cliff in NH
Find “SEC. 1302. ESSENTIAL”
in this document:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PLAW-111publ148/html/PLAW-111publ148.htm
to see what NR calls worthless junk insurance
NobodySpecial
People love to derail.
Obama’s different than McCain, anyone who refuses to admit it is an idiot.
The difference is, Obama walked into 2008 with a large advantage at the table and refused to push that advantage as far as it could go. His communications team was no good at pushing even something as boilerplate as Democratic Party platforms. His strategy of leaving Congress alone to make legislation allowed his enemies in the party to slow down or subvert the legislation he wanted or claimed he wanted. His insistence on looking like a good guy by talking to Republicans made him hostage to not only the most hostile in his party, but the most hostile in the other party, who think he’s a dirty ni@@er who should be serving dinner to a President instead of sitting in his chair.
Of course, saying so makes you a lover of ponies, thoroughly unrealistic, a dirty hippie, or whatever Beltway approved insult can be appropriated.
DPirate
There is difference. There is not substantial difference.
Nemesis
Substantial evidence? Where?
The media are pathetic. How can such utter nonsense go unquestioned?
Oh yeah, its the mavericky maverick talkin.
Nemesis
Oh, BTW Sister Sarah Paylin is going to run for govenor of the fair state of AZ. Just watch.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Ah yes, he squandered that crashing economy, passed that totally uncontroverisal 800 billion dollar stiumulus that did nothing, and wasted the powerful position he was in when he had the unflinching and unquestioning support of stalwarts like Evan Bayh, Ben Nelson, Joe Lieberman, Claire McCaskill, Mark Pryor, Blanche Lincoln. Thoughtful, powerful progressive voices like Tom Carper, Jim Webb, Mark Warner, Dianne Feinstein, Max Baucus, Byron Dorgan. And that’s just the Senate! With a bench like that, Obama couldn’t pass single-payer. Obviously, it was a communications problem from the bully pulpit.
chopper
@Loneoak:
fuckin’ math, how does it work?
jayackroyd
My friend Stuart Zechman wrote this down, at some length (prolixity is his metier) a few years ago. h
http://bit.ly/lWumzG
He thinks, and I have come to agree,that this thing he calls “centrism” and many people call “neo-liberal” is an ideology that is profoundly different from New Deal liberalism-that it is not “moderate” or “pragmatic” liberalism, but an ideology that believes in a collaborative relationship, rather than an adversarial relationship, with large private organizations, and is not committed to New Deal policies of the government providing a pension and health insurance to the middle class.
Centrists favor things like abolishing Glass-Steagall, replacing Medicare with health insurance exchanges with premium support, cap and trade energy policies. They don’t believe that the public sector can create jobs (Goolsbee: http://bit.ly/mdkPLL)
This isn’t a position on the spectrum between Goldwater and LBJ. It’s a different way of looking at things from the way either of them view policy–it’s a technocratic, elites run things view of governance.
And it yields terrible policy, as we are living through.
nastybrutishntall
I agree with Senator Verbnounsecureborder.
Just this morning, I couldn’t find my keys, probably due to a damned illegal taking them.
Oops, they were in my pants. My bad.
But this still argues for a more secure border, because another day it COULD have been an illegal taking them, and then we would all have been less safe.
Evolved Deep Southerner
Mistermix beat you to this one.
I don’t mind that you all think alike and read the same things – I’d be surprised if you didn’t – but, Lord, it seems like after a while y’all would read each other’s stuff before posting.