If Barney Frank were a Republican who responded to every question by blaming Democrats, he would become a punching bag for those in the mainstream media.  But, it’s only we right-of-center bloggers who notice the non-answers and mean-spirited rhetoric that this unhappy Massachusetts Democrat offer whenever he’s asked a question not ready made for his left-wing talking points.  He just goes ahead and attacks Republicans, oftentimes demanding that they live up to a standard he could never meet.

Here, we’ve got Andrea Mitchell asking this career politician about SEC officials watching porn on the job and instead of addressing their dereliction of duty, Barney blames Republicans!

Over at Hot Air, Allahpundit sums it up, “Because, see, the GOP favors less regulation of Wall Street, which naturally was all the country’s chief securities policemen needed to know to justify spending thousands of work hours surfing sites like ‘skankwire.’”

Seems Barney’s default answer to any question he can’t answer (or where the answer might conflict with the narrative he’s peddling) is to blame Republicans.  (Guess he didn’t get the memo from the President about the change he’s trying to bring to Washington, you know breaking that pattern “where everybody is always looking for somebody else to blame.“)

Barney keeps trotting out the same old rhetoric, the same old attacks and folks in the media think he’s so smart.  Guess we know what counts for intelligence in their book.

No matter what the facts are, some in our mainstream media are eager to push the meme that opponents of President Obama are encouraging violence and promoting bigotry.  Heck, evidence could emerge showing that Tea Parties are more peaceful than Anti-War protests, but that wouldn’t matter much to those who use only a limited number of adjectives (all with negative connotations) when describing protesters for non-approved causes.

Every time these folks see conservatives taking to the streets, they think back to the 1960s and the opponents of integration.

And while they’re shocked, shocked that some protesters hoist signs saying angry and offensive things, they seem to have just plum forgotten some “eight years of anti-Bush rhetoric“.  Well, yesterday, Rush Limbaugh took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to take these folks to task over their collective amnesia:

Liberals are perfectly comfortable with antigovernment protest when they’re not in power.

From the halls of the Ivy League to the halls of Congress, from the antiwar protests during the Vietnam War and the war in Iraq to the anticapitalist protests during International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings, we’re used to seeing leftist malcontents take to the streets. Sometimes they’re violent, breaking shop windows with bricks and throwing rocks at police. Sometimes there are arrests. Not all leftists are violent, of course. But most are angry. It’s in their DNA. They view the culture as corrupt and capitalism as unjust.

Dissent which was once an expression of patriotism has now become evidence of sedition.  A charge which Rush roundly rejects: (more…)

As I was reading yesterday a print-out of Daniel Henninger’s Wall Street Journal piece, I recalled (yet again) how then-candidate Barack Obama responded to a question about the deficit reaching an “astounding record high of $455 billion dollars“:

There is no doubt that we’ve been living beyond our means and we’re going to have to make some adjustments. Now, what I’ve done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut.

And yet, once in office, Mr. Henninger noted, Mr. Obama has presided over a severe spending spree.

When the financial crisis piled in atop a recession, the Democrats’ academic/pundit economists blandly convinced the party to wave a $787 billion stimulus at the problem in early 2009. Then, on April 30, the Democrats passed an FY 2010 budget of $3.5 trillion. This year the FY 2011 budget hit $3.8 trillion, reaching a post-World War II high of 25% of GDP. In March, they passed the trillion-dollar health-care bill. Total headline spending commitments in one year: about $9 trillion. That’s a lot of “trust” to ask for during a recession with 9% unemployment. And now a sense is building of some broad middle-class tax grab. After soaking the rich, comes the deluge.

Interesting when I went to check these numbers, I couldn’t find them in my initial searches of the various White House web pages.  They buried them underneath a lot of verbiage about a new era of fiscal responsibility, you know, in contrast to that “inherited” legacy of misplaced priorities.

So, via Wikipedia where I turned (so as to get my posts done in time to get back to my dissertation), I found the FY 2010 Budget was 3.552 trillion and that for the upcoming Fiscal Year 3.83 trillion.  After plugging a few numbers into my trusty, dusty calculator, I come up with a spending increase of 7.8% from President Obama’s first budget to his second.  And this at a time of an inflation rate just over 2% (well, that’s for the last four months; overall for 2009 it was -0.4%).

Net spending cut, that ain’t.  No wonder trust in the government has reached a new low.

Asking whether a bailout backlash is building, Will Collier asks an important question:

A variation on the same question can be asked regarding the massive 2009 “stimulus” package, most of which has been routed to propping up profligate state and local governments: why isn’t the so-called public sector cutting back along with the rest of the country? Almost all of the job losses since the late-2008 crash have been in the private sector. States and localities are literally going broke because of irresponsible promises politicians made to government employees. Why should their financial status be any different from, say, construction workers whose jobs dried up in the real estate collapse?

Emphasis added.  Via:  Glenn Reynolds.

As I have mentioned previously, we GayPatriot bloggers only rarely consult with each other about our posts.  And this morning as I woke up to check the blog and go through my e-mail, I realized that unbeknownst to me, Bruce and I had posted on the same topics.

Perhaps, I should have inquired further when, in response to my request yesterday that he let my DADT post lead for a few hours, Bruce said he had some items scheduled.  Should have checked the pending posts. It is uncanny that we posted on the same things, offering similar takes, but with slightly different “spins.”  Well, this does show the difference in our styles.  :-)

Oh, those Teabaggers are back at it again… Trying to scare the American public by spreading lies and distortions and “misinformation” about the Stalinization of Health Care Act of 2010.

Comes today a report from one of these right-wing extremist groups with the dubius claim that:

the law falls short of the president’s twin goal of controlling runaway costs, raising projected spending by about 1 percent over 10 years. That increase could get bigger, since Medicare cuts in the law may be unrealistic and unsustainable, the report warned.
…
The report projected that Medicare cuts could drive about 15 percent of hospitals and other institutional providers into the red, “possibly jeopardizing access” to care for seniors.

Who’s this organization, praying on the fears of Americans, and distorting the purely beneficial results of Obamacare? The Department of Health and Human Services.

Naturally, likely hoping to avoid getting Olbermanned, the economists who authored the report included the caveat that it “does not represent the official position of the Obama administration.”

Nevertheless, Barack Obama is the CEO of the Federal Government, and a brach thereof just issued a report, based on the facts and their projections, that speaks negatively of his most favored piece of progressive legislation (so far). Should we expect Henry Waxman to summon him to testify in front of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce?

-Nick (ColoradoPatriot, from an undisclosed secret HQ)

Can you imagine how feminist leaders would react if a talk show host agreed that a prominent Democratic female politician should pose nude for Playboy?

Well, responding to the unfunny “comedian” Sarah Silverman’s crack “about whether Sarah Palin should pose for Playboy” on his program last Tuesday, Larry King agreed when she said, “I think she should go for it”.

At least one feminist leader, Lulu Flores, president of the National Women’s Political Caucus, spoke out, telling “POLITICO that King’s comments were, ‘waaaaayyy inappropriate.’”

But, don’t you have the sense that if a conservative comedian made this kind of crack on, say, O’Reilly, Beck or Hannity, we’d be hearing a lot more about it?

(H/t:  Reader Peter Hughes.)

Gallup reports today that the Party Affiliation Gap in U.S. is the Narrowest Since 2005 as “more independents lean to the Republican Party”:

The advantage in public support the Democratic Party built up during the latter part of the Bush administration and the early part of the Obama administration has all but disappeared. During the first quarter of 2010, 46% of Americans identified as Democrats or leaned Democratic, while 45% identified as or leaned Republican.

The latest results, based on aggregated data from Gallup polls conducted from January to March of this year, show the closest party division since the first quarter of 2005, when the parties were tied at 46%. Democrats enjoyed double-digit advantages in party support in 11 of 12 quarters from the second quarter of 2006 to the first quarter of 2009.

By the end of last year, the Democratic advantage had shrunk to five points (47% to 42%), and it narrowed further in the most recent quarter.

Hmmm. . . what happened since the end of last year?  I think some really big, really unpopular, really expensive bill passed.  Wonder if that had anything to do with the Democratic downturn?

These numbers caused Ed Morrissey to ask:

Republicans managed to preserve a majority in both chambers of Congress and re-elect a President in 2004 while trailing in party identification by three points in the annual Gallup survey.  How will they do while trailing by a single point in 2010?

Jim Geraghty offers a cautionary note for the GOP, “Apparently the movement includes little or no increase in the number of self-identified Republicans and is almost entirely among independents describing themselves as leaning towards the Republicans.”

We’ve belabored the point how, despite the promise of Obama’s apologists that once Congress passed health care, it would start becoming increasingly popular, public opinion has, if anything, moved in the opposite direction.  Now, we learn that another Democratic claim is falling by the wayside, the multi-billion dollar boondoggle is going to increase our health care costs.  Blogging law professor William A. Jacobson explains:

The gloss is off the Obamacare rose, if it ever were there. The Office of the Actuary of Medicare has released a report which finds that Obamacare will increase, not decrease, health care costs, and … (wait for it because you never would have guessed) … the financial assumptions were unrealistic!

(Via Instapundit.)  The good professor cites this AP report:

President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul law will increase the nation’s health care tab instead of bringing costs down, government economic forecasters concluded Thursday in a sobering assessment of the sweeping legislation.

A report by economic experts at the Health and Human Services Department said the health care remake will achieve Obama’s aim of expanding health insurance — adding 34 million Americans to the coverage rolls.

But the analysis also found that the law falls short of the president’s twin goal of controlling runaway costs, raising projected spending by about 1 percent over 10 years. That increase could get bigger, however, since the report also warned that Medicare cuts in the law may be unrealistic and unsustainable, forcing lawmakers to roll them back.

No wonder, Jacboson writes, “Democrats refused to delay the vote on Obamacare even though the Medicare Actuary was not able to complete his analysis and cost estimates in time for the vote.”

And get this, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told the House Appropriations Committee she had no idea how much the “high risk” pools were going to cost (via Gateway Pundit.)  Shouldn’t she have given this testimony before Congress voted on the Democrats’ health care overhaul?

*NB:   Shortened title to fit it on two lines.

Wow.  Seems like The Gays are becoming the most hated-on group by Leftists next to The Joos these days.

I mean our own President Obama can’t stand being around gays and even disagrees with gay rights progressive Dick Cheney on most issues.  Come to think of it, our left-wing Congress has been in power for three years and hasn’t done a thing to roll back America’s most oppressive gay legislation that was signed by President Bill Clinton (D) in the 1990s.

And now another Socialist leader, Bolivian President Evo Morales, has gone all nutty and picked on the eeeeeevil homosexuals.

Bolivian President Evo Morales was under fire on Wednesday for suggesting that eating hormone-injected chicken could provoke male deviance at a global climate change summit.

Bolivia’s opposition and homosexual groups criticized comments made by Morales at the first “people’s conference” on climate change the previous day, in which he said that chicken producers inject birds with female hormones and “when men eat those chickens, they experience deviances in being men.”

The Bolivian president also suggested that the European diet made men go bald.

Spain’s National Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Transsexuals and Bisexuals sent a protest letter to the Bolivian embassy of Madrid, calling Morales remarks “homophobic.”

The president of Argentina’s homosexual community, Cesar Cigliutti, said: “It’s an absurdity to think that eating hormone-containing chicken can change the sexual orientation of a person.”

“By following that reasoning, if we put male hormones in a chicken and we make a homosexual eat it, he will transform into a heterosexual,” he added, in online comments.

Thank goodness there is a sane voice of reason in Bolivia — a conservative.

Right-wing Bolivian deputy Andres Ortega criticized Morales for recounting “urban legends” at the conference which sought to draft new proposals for the next UN climate talks in Mexico at the end of the year.

“I thought it was a place to talk about science and real and positive things about preserving the environment,” Ortega said.

A side note:  funny how the AFP news item doesn’t identify Morales as a Socialist, but can’t wait to identify Ortega as “right-wing”.  Nah, no media bias there.

So, I’ve come to the conclusion that Leftist/Socialists either secretly loathe gays, or they are just completely insane.

Do I have a vote for “all of the above”?

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

Huh?  (h/t – Blogger phenom Gabriel Malor)

It’s happened so often that it’s now a cultural cliche: the gay politician pretending to be straight. In most parts of the nation, homosexuality or bisexuality is a clear electoral liability.

Not in Center City’s 182d state House district. There, it’s a badge of honor.

Veteran Rep. Babette Josephs (D., Phila.) last Thursday accused her primary opponent, Gregg Kravitz, of pretending to be bisexual in order to pander to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender voters, a powerful bloc in the district.

“I outed him as a straight person,” Josephs said during a fund-raiser at the Black Sheep Pub & Restaurant, as some in the audience gasped or laughed, “and now he goes around telling people, quote, ‘I swing both ways.’ That’s quite a respectful way to talk about sexuality. This guy’s a gem.”

Kravitz, 29, said that he is sexually attracted to both men and women and called Josephs’ comments offensive.

“That kind of taunting is going to make it more difficult for closeted members of the LGBT community to be comfortable with themselves,” Kravitz said. “It’s damaging.”

I’m not even sure what to say.  I’m truly text-less (the blogging version of being speechless).   I used the category “Leftist Nutjobs” because one or both of them just HAVE to be.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

I realize this title sounds likes the punch line from a bad joke.  I mean, you know, I thought it was the lesbians who played softball while the gay men went to the Oscars.  On Tuesday:

National Center for Lesbian Rights (NCLR) clients and the law firm of K&L Gates LLP filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington challenging the discriminatory practices of the North American Gay Amateur Athletic Association (NAGAAA). The lawsuit alleges that NAGAAA violated Washington’s laws governing discrimination in public accommodations, and state consumer protections by implementing and enforcing a “two heterosexuals per team” cap during the 2008 Gay Softball World Series in Seattle, and also violated the plaintiff softball players’ rights by subjecting them to a series of invasive questions about their sexual orientation and private lives in front of more than 25 people, most of them strangers.

Now, first of all, I think this is a stupid rule.  But, the NAGAAA is a private organization.  And a private organization has should have the right to set its own criteria for membership.  If it had wanted to allow only gay men to play on its teams, then the state should not prevent it from doing so.

But, I also agree with NCLR Staff Attorney Melanie Rowen who called the “inquisition” into players’ private lives, “outrageous.”  It is particularly disgusting that a gay organization would not just countenance, but also conduct a public interrogation into individuals’ private lives.

(To be sure, given that this was a private organization questioning the players, any individual player could have walked out at any time.  I wonder if any did.)

That said, as a matter of Washington State law, it appears NCLR is on the money.  And I commend them for taking the case as a matter or principle.  It shows they truly support non-discrimination laws, even when they limit the freedom of gay organizations.  They have more integrity than many in our society. (more…)

This is rich.  A candidate is trying to gain some traction in a center city Philadelphia contest for state House by claiming to be bisexual, yet his opponent, a 26-year veteran of the Pennsylvania legislature is calling him on the alleged ruse:

Veteran Rep. Babette Josephs (D., Phila.) last Thursday accused her primary opponent, Gregg Kravitz, of pretending to be bisexual in order to pander to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender voters, a powerful bloc in the district.

“I outed him as a straight person,” Josephs said during a fund-raiser at the Black Sheep Pub & Restaurant, as some in the audience gasped or laughed, “and now he goes around telling people, quote, ‘I swing both ways.’ That’s quite a respectful way to talk about sexuality. This guy’s a gem.”

Mark Segal, publisher of the Philadelphia Gay News, ”We’ve hit a new high point when candidates are accused of pretending to be gay to win a seat”.

Far be it for me to inquire into Mr. Kravitz’s sexuality.  If he says he’s bi, I’ll take his word on it.  Heck, I was bisexual once too.

UPDATE:  Commenting on this kerfuffle, Joe Gandelman writes:

It’s yet another sign of how mean-spirited American politics has become, where people can’t stick to issues but feel they MUST — on the radio, on cable talk shows, among bloggers, in blog comments, in political campaigns — go after someone personally if they dare to a)see things differently or b)somehow stand in the way of their ambition or the ambitions of a person or political party that they support. It all seems to tie in with road rage on the highways, shopping cart rage at supermarkets and more. It’s as if America has become converted to a nation of sullen teenagers.

Via Instapundit.

So, is Mr. Gandelman saying it’s a personal insult to call someone “straight”?

Bolivian President Evo Morales should thank his lucky stars that he’s a socialist and not a conservative, otherwise he might become the laughing stock of the chattering classes. The Hugo Chavez crony is

. . . under fire on Wednesday for suggesting that eating hormone-injected chicken could provoke male deviance at a global climate change summit.

Bolivia’s opposition and homosexual groups criticized comments made by Morales at the first “people’s conference” on climate change the previous day, in which he said that chicken producers inject birds withfemale hormones and “when men eat those chickens, they experience deviances in being men.” . . . .

Spain’s National Federation of Lesbians, Gays, Transsexuals and Bisexuals sent a protest letter to the Bolivian embassy of Madrid, calling Morales remarks “homophobic.”

The president of Argentina’s homosexual community, Cesar Cigliutti, said: “It’s an absurdity to think that eating hormone-containing chicken can change the sexual orientation of a person.”

I’m sure Joe Solmonese is struggling with the proper means to react.  On the one hand, Morales expressed a crackpot theory that makes some social conservative notions about the causes of homosexuality seem sensible by contrast.  On the other hand, he is a socialist who generally says all the “right things” about the causes of global oppression.

It’s just social conservatives who say silly things about people like us.  Left-wingers also have some pretty hare-brained notions about homosexuality.  Let’s hope the national gay organizations do a better job of acknowledging it.

(H/t: Gateway Pundit)