Just heard a little bit of interesting info on the Diane Rehm Show’s Friday News Roundup from last week.

So as we all know, Iran has been building uranium enrichment facilities for a while now, but the number of functional enrichment facilities in Iran is smaller than it was since it began its enrichment program a… while back. A pretty long time ago? Don’t know the year, sorry.

But it kind of puts into perspective why, for example, we haven’t blown that country to smithereens, and why the world community doesn’t seem as preoccupied with it as the U.S. does.

Thats easy! Its because the GOP is America’s Racist Party. And in Harlem there are mostly black people, you see.

And while I’m thinking about it, Salon partially answered their own question earlier today in this piece (tipped to us by WTPWB’s biggest fan JEG, IV), describing in no uncertain terms the RNC’s fundraising strategy, which more or less boils down to jingoistic appeals to fear and difference. A PowerPoint presentation obtained by Politico and created by RNC Finance Director Rob Bickhart’s office describes the Republican rank-and-file as “Reactionary” and includes a slide titled “The Evil Empire“, which is littered with photographs of Obama. The Democratic Party’s response was venomous, as you can imagine.

Other attention-piquing items:

• The RNC self-applies the term “business” to describe its operation. You’d have a hard time getting away with that term on the left, I think (even though they’re essentially correct).
• If you attend a fundraising event, you’re likely to be given, and I quote, “Tchochkes!!!!!!!!!!” (thats 10 exclamation marks there, appearing more than once).
• There’s more space dedicated to Citizens United v. FEC than any other single thing in the document (with the exception of Tchochkes!!!!!!!!!!).

I do see the humor there obviously, but just beneath that is what could be a truly intriguing portrait of what its like to be a blind man in a seeing world. For example, as a man of sight, I have difficulty understanding what Paterson would have wanted with the free World Series tickets that have now become the subject of ethics inquiry and possible criminal charges against the Gov. Doesn’t seem worth it.

A few governors may have rather loudly condemned the stimulus money, but that did not stop them from quietly accepting it,” Crist said in defending himself. “Given our budget shortfalls, and given that Floridians were paying for part of the stimulus package, doesn’t it make sense to spend our energies maximizing the benefit of that package? Isn’t it our duty to advocate for Florida to receive its fair share? Isn’t that more helpful to Floridians than engaging in hollow ideological posturing that achieves nothing?

(emphasis mine)

[via Hotline on Call]

Don’t say the Republicans aren’t doing anything; they’re on pace to surpass a historic benchmark! “The frequency of filibusters — plus threats to use them — are measured by the number of times the upper chamber votes on cloture. Such votes test the majority’s ability to hold together 60 members to break a filibuster. Last year, the first of the 111th Congress, there were a record 112 cloture votes. In the first two months of 2010, the number already exceeds 40. That means, with 10 months left to run in the 111th Congress, Republicans have turned to the filibuster or threatened its use at a pace that will more than triple the old record.”

Why not just let the Republicans actually filibuster? Given that the main (perennial) criticism of Congress is that they “don’t get enough done” doesn’t it stand to reason that people aren’t going to be thrilled about an electoral minority stopping legislation entirely?

(Politico, I’ll be expecting my job offer, salary and benefits package any day now)

The hired murderers / certified morons over at Blackwater have done it again, and again, and again. And again today!

It seems to be that — because Blackwater doesn’t have nearly enough guns already — the security firm illegally diverted weapons from a U.S. weapons facility for its own soldiers’ employees’ “personal use” … skeet shooting, I would imagine, given the payload, which included more than 500 AK-47s (by the way, I wasn’t aware the U.S. military had the AK in its aersanal, on account of their tradition as a commie gun and the fact that we have the roughly equivelant M16, but, I mean, I guess if you have a military you’re gonna find some AKs in there).

So why not just find the fucker who signed off on that? That’s easy. His name, according to “official records”, is Eric Cartman:

As in that Eric Cartman.

This in the midst of Blackwater (now Xe services, but since I don’t know what the fuck that means, and Blackwater sounds more menacing, I’m sticking with that) looking to land a bid to train Afghan police forces. Which means — as if it weren’t already — Afghanistan is about to become the spot for black market AKs.

[via Daily Kos]

[via Peter Combe at a tale of a few cities]

That’s “Milk, Eggs, Bread, Hope and Change.”

I like it. We need a little less Tony Snow and a little more C.J. Cregg behind the podium.

But wait, there’s more. See Gibbs dryly explain that President Obama is “opposed” to slavery, after the jump.

As much as we’d love to see John McCain get rolled by his own party, WTPWB predicts McCain over primary challenger J.D. Hayworth, but it’ll be closer than anticipated (lets get saucy and say within five percentage points). McCain will ride that victory into the November generals, where he will best an upturned mop with a bucket for a head (D-AZ) by approximately 16 points.