Gov Perry Opens the Door For Beck

Governor/Secessionist/idiot Rick Perry continues to embarrass the state of Texas by making Glenn Beck an honorary Texan.  I'm more than a little offended by this move as it amounts to an amnesty for Beck.  While the rest of us had to wait to achieve residency, Beck has it handed to him making in-state college tuition cheaper as well as allowing him to use our unemployment benefits. 

Drill When?

Regarding the natural disaster we are creating in the Gulf of Mexico. The Exxon Valdez had a capacity of 1.26 million barrels of oil when it ran aground in March of `89 resulting in it's "spill" though not all of that capacity was leaked. At the rate the sunken oil rig in the gulf is "spilling", it'll take a little over 3 weeks to equal the Valdez in scope without regard for lives lost.

Don't seem to hear much from the "drill here, drill now" crowd lately.

Good On The Health Care!

I'm really happy over the passing of the health care bill finally, as this was truly a case where private enterprise failed when left to its own devices. The icing on the cake I believe will be the hole dug by those who opposed the bill and I'm looking forward to watching all the explanations and excuses now that the commies have taken over and it didn't hurt. Even more to be pleased about is Rush Limbaugh making good on his promise to leave the country....surely he wouldn't lie about a thing like that would he?

Fortunately, It's Not About Gays Trying To Marry

James Wallace Fall is 58, lives in Minnesota and is married ...........twice........to his 10 year old niece (now 19) and her aunt.  He defended his actions to the police explaining that it was God's will that he take his niece.  It isn't clear when this guy relocated to Minnesota from Texas (`cause he must have come from down here) but at least he didn't catch "the gay"....God would really be pissed.

A Friend I Never Knew

I'm not real good at this but that really doesn't matter as it isn't about me.  I never knew Jon Swift personally but I would've liked to.  He has a great blog, was a gifted writer, and suddenly stopped posting a year ago for unknown reasons.  The subject of his last post would be enough for anyone to make a change, I don't know.  Jon Swift's real name was Al Weisel and he died on Feburary 27th, this year on his way to his father's funeral.  His Mother annouced the news of his death in the "comments" to his last blog post.

"Sometimes, there aren't words".... But in reality these aren't those times, dammit,  Go to the link above and read what he wrote.  Damn, he's good and I'll remember him for the thrill of reading him!

Jon Swift: Sometimes There Are No Words

Jon Swift: Sometimes There Are No Words
And sometimes "there are no words".....

"Xe" Are On The Road Again

So now Iraq is kicking out the "Xe" security folks in their country allowing them a couple of days to pack.  Seriously, can't we just change their name?  That seemed to help their image over here.

Gettin Our Maverick On

Part time governor, full time idiot, and occasional truth assassin on Fox "News" is in Texas stumping for secessionist/governor Rick Perry yesterday and today.  Fresh from a tea-bagging event (let your imagination run with it) her visit here only makes sense as we too don't require facts to get all mavericky and stuff and we love us some Palin!  Not that her visit here is a big deal but I wanted to post what I heard from a woman being interviewed on the local news yesterday. She apparently couldn't decide between Kay Baily (R-lying douche) or Rick Perry for Texas governor until she heard Palin endorse Perry and she's all Perry now bitches!

No wonder Texas is in a never ending shit storm against its own middle class when the middle class doesn't know enough to even consider alternatives to the same crap that have resulted in things like keeping 30% of  Texans without health insurance (or other equally appalling metrics like national education rankings, etc.).  Palin makes her mark like Perry, Kay Bailey, and numbers of others always have: incite the crowd to feed on the belief that everything wrong is the result of things like bad border security, Washington interference, and liberals instead of the asshole you put in office.

And another thing....how come Palin is addressed as "Governor"?  She quit that job so that shit should stop...just sayin.

Phelps, Bringin It To Houston!

Yep, we haven't had this much hate in town since Sean Hannity's "Freedom Concert" last summer. Thank God the folks from Westboro Baptist came through to give us that "Fred bounce"! Not sure if everyone knows but the city of Houston had the nerve to elect an open gay mayor right here in the middle of the Republic of East Texas (land of Cornyn, Kay Bailey, Tom Delay, Dick Armey, Bush(s)...I could go on). Annise Parker's swearing in ceremony was held today and the Phelps clan drove all the way down from Topeka to bless the occasion.

Good on Houston for electing someone on issues instead of fear/hate or other stupidity driven factors. And, good on Houston as well for takin one for the country because if the Phelps bunch is down here, they aren't fuckin up something somewhere else.

Politics suck, this should help!

willis is pretty much disgusted with everything political so I'm counting on the joy of the season to help my mood.....who better than muppets to bring cheer to anyone. Let me be the first to wish anyone that passes this way, Have a Very Merry One!

Invite Glenn Beck for Dinner? This would be the same and easier to stomach.

Shamelessly ripped off from The Chive.

Contradictions...

Obama's Nobel peace award may be a bit of a contradiction. Particularly right after announcing plans to add 30000 troops to the war in Afghanistan. Obama himself was very humble about the event although it gave those on the right some crap to feed on. My opinion is that while this may be a contradiction of sorts, it's not as bad as Bush (42) having a fuckin library.

Huckabee On The Daily Show Tonight

It'll be interesting to see what if anything, is said about Huckabee's commuting a 108 year sentence on Maurice Clemmons. Clemmons killed four police officers in Washington on 11/29 and was himself killed by police several days later. Huckabee caught a fair degree of grief from both the left and right for his actions while he was governor of Arkansas and has stood his ground.

I don't have much use for Huckabee. To me he is one example of what's wrong on the political right. I say "one example" as each of the republican nominees for the presidential election in 2008 brought their own slice of batshit crazy to the table (McCain = war is good, Rudy = everything is 9/11, Fred = senility, Tancredo = wholly crap!, etc). That and since then Bible-Huck got his own show on Fox to continue to show us why we should be thankful he didn't get close to being elected. That said, I'm backing Huckabee (just this once, dammit) sticking with his decision on Clemmons (one might say there's little else he can do and one would probably be right). However, living here in the Republic of East Texas and watching our Governor Perry repeatedly refuse to move on the death penalty against the recommendations of parole boards and others for several Texas inmates makes Huckabees's actions laudable by comparison....just sayin. It shows an unexpected degree of open-mindedness from a member of a crowd that views everything in black and white.

News.....

Apparent non-celebrities crash White House party, Tiger Woods wrecked his car, Oprah is gonna quit while Lou Dobbs did and Micheal Jackson is still dead. On less important matters, we are gonna send about 30000 (the population of Dorchester County, Maryland) more troops over to Afghanistan.........the most awesome war ever!

Palin, An Alternate Read

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Going Rouge! Looks like this has been out there for a few weeks but it's the first I saw it and certainly worthy of a willis post! Its full of contributions by writers like Jim Hightower, Juan Cole, Joe Conason, Chrstopher Hayes, etc. and can be purchased at the publishers ("Or Books") website. There is also an activity/coloring book out there by the same title. Either of these books I'll guess would be more entertaining and probably more honest than the book Palin quit her governor position to write for us.

Animation of US Airways Ditching

Additional related animations at the link. Presents a "real time" exchange of information with the visual of what's transpiring at the same time. Old news I know, but this enhanced version of the animation was just released......that and I think it's really cool!

A Fair Sunday

Live recoding of Bonnie Raitt doing "Too Long At The Fair". That's "Freebo" on bass behind her in the beginning of the song. Haunting melody that has stuck with me since I first heard it played by a solo guitarist at a coffee shop in Denver. Hard to find tunes in those days without Internet abilities. Bonnie did it in `72 on her "Give It Up" album which I believe is the only time it was recorded. I doubt anyone could have done it better.

Today is Bonnie Raitt's 60th birthday.

Death by "Numbers"

This is Khristian Oliver. He was executed last night in Texas at 32 years old. He committed a horrible crime when he was 20 when he shot and beat to death a man whose house he was burglarizing. The victim was shot 5 times and bludgeoned so badly he was unrecognizable. I'm not going to get into how I feel about the death penalty as we could be hear all night and you don't deserve that. The reason I bring up Mr Oliver is that his sentencing was determined by jurors who relied on bible passages to support their determination for execution. Specifically some sections of the Book of Numbers; "the murderer shall surely be put to death" and "the revenger of blood himself shall slay the murderer". Mr Oliver was a bad guy and maybe deserved what he got, I don't know. But I wonder if the jury happened to be all Muslim and used the Koran to arrive at their decision, how it would fly for Mr Oliver or anyone.

Doubt We've Seen the Last of Her

Carrie Prejean and the Miss California USA organizers have apparently settled their legal battle with each other. They were suing her for not showing up and she was suing them for religious discrimination so she can say "god" as much as she wants. The settlement is confidential of course however, the folks over at TMZ.com say she "folded like a cheap suit" during settlement negotiations when confronted with a solo sex tape. "We're told it took about 15 seconds for Carrie to reduce her demand for more than one million dollars to.....just validate my parking please."

So lets see..... fake boobs, hates gays, loves god and porn, zero contribution to society (except for maybe the porn, I'll have to see it first), and rivals "Joe the Plumber" for milking her notoriety for every thing it'll get her....yep, she's a republican. She'll be writing a book, running for office, or providing insightful analysis on Fox any day now.

Washing Machines to be as Safe as Airliners?

Electrolux announced Friday that it is going to close down its production facilities in Iowa and move the operation to Mexico. It represents about 850 workers in two small towns (Webster City and Jefferson). While moving jobs from Americans that bother companies with stuff like healthcare, vacations, living wages, sick pay, maternity leaves, etc. to locations that don't have to screw around with these distractions is nothing new, it deserves to be mentioned when ever it happens. On a side note, my brother tipped me off to the following NPR radio article that seems to match well with the Electrolux story.