President Bush Signs Law Protecting Retirement Savings for Same-Sex Partners

While gay rights activists were engaged in fits of apoplexy over Barack Obama’s selection of Rick Warren to deliver the inaugural invocation, outgoing President George W. Bush quietly took a small step toward ensuring equality for same-sex partnerships by signing The Worker, Retiree and Employer Recovery Act of 2008 (WRERA).

American employers will soon be required to allow the partners of gay and lesbian employees to inherit 401(k) retirement savings accounts without incurring tax penalties. The newly signed legislation will allow any designated beneficiary to roll retirement savings over into an IRA, a benefit employers may limit to spousal survivors under current law.

As you might imagine, commenters in the progressive/gay blogosphere had a little trouble giving “Bushitler” credit for taking this small but meaningful step. The upstanding folks at Minnesota Independent reveled in Bush’s perceived betrayal of his base and engaged in a little Christianist bashing (just for good measure.) The gang at Think Progress is pretty sure this law only got the thumbs up because BushCo failed to read the legislation attentively, possibly due to a drug-induced stupor. To be fair, a few commenters at The Huffington Post offered Bush their gratitude; others celebrated what was termed a fundie smackdown, but explained that the legislation was only approved by Bush so he could throw one last bone to his log cabin cronies.

Perhaps it’s best that the mainstream media ignored the passage of this law. There’s always something to be said for avoiding a large scale outbreak of Bush Derangement Syndrome.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on January 3, 2009

1 Comment 

Time for the GOP to Disown Chip Saltsman

Hey, you know what Republicans need? More racially charged baggage weighing them down while the liberal establishment works feverishly to paint the GOP as a band of increasingly irrelevant dinosaurs clinging to their irrational hatred and bigotry with every ounce of their rapidly waning strength.

Enter Chip Saltsman.

Chip Saltsman is the former campaign manager for Mike Huckabee, and is currently in the running for national RNC Chair. I missed this story while diligently maintaining my holiday sugar high, but James Richardson was around to summarize why Saltsman is an utterly embarrassing drag on the GOP:

In an exercise of political suicide, Republican National Committee Chair hopeful Chip Saltsman distributed a controversial CD by conservative satirist Paul Shanklin to national committee members this month for Christmas.

First played on Rush Limbaugh’s popular, though often taboo, radio show, the 41-track CD, entitled “We Hate the USA,” featured the racially-charged song “Barack the Magic Negro.” After all, nothing says “Christmas” like racial insensitivity…

Defending the ill-conceived Christmas goodie bag as a good humored joke, Saltsman told The Hill: “Paul Shanklin is a long-time friend, and I think that RNC members have the good humor and good sense to recognize that his songs for the Rush Limbaugh show are light-hearted political parodies.”

HA HA, get it, “negro” is a funny word.

Much like his fellow candidate for RNC Chair Katon Dawson, Chip Saltsman assumes his history of social and political relationships with minorities absolves him of all past, present, and future charges of racism. He expects that calling the songs on the CD “light-hearted political parodies” will further insulate him from politically disruptive accusations. And when that failed, he actually tried to argue that the phrase “magic negro” was fair game for anyone (read: white conservatives) to toss about because the media let it slide when black liberal David Ehrenstein titled an article “Obama the ‘Magic Negro.'” Double standards, you know.

Chip Saltsman isn’t just feeding the liberal narrative of a racist GOP, he’s laying out an all-you-can-eat buffet spread. The liberal political machine lusts after this sort of fare with an obscene passion, and maladroits like Chip Saltsman treat the loudest voices on the left to exactly what they hunger for: more fuel for the myth that the GOP is the party of intolerance and bigotry.

At best, Chip Saltsman’s Christmas gift to the members of the RNC was racially insensitive, politically clumsy, and just all around ill-advised. Whatever his intentions, Saltsman’s appallingly immature decision to distribute the CD speaks far louder than his graceless defense of his blunder. He is a political strategist, not a radio blowhard who uses terms like “Negro” to shock his audience into listening for another hour.

Saltsman demonstrated an atrocious error in judgment and a profound failure to anticipate the consequences of his actions.  Fortunately this time, one of those consequences was the fizzling of his campaign for RNC chair.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 29, 2008

3 Comments 

Dreaming of a Green Christmas

Looks like Santa’s dreaming of a green Christmas this year, or so one “author” would have your kids believe. Apparently he’s at his workshop with the elves raiding his stash of last year’s hoarded wrapping paper in preparation for regifting the old toys he’ll be refurbishing just for you.

“They arrived back at the North Pole and Santa had a grand idea,” the book reads. “He leaned in toward Swift [the head elf] and told him his new plan. ‘We will collect all of the old toys, Swift, and make them new again. We will reuse last year’s wrapping paper. And we will harness the great North Pole wind to help power up the toy shop.’”

Hey Santa: thanks, but no thanks. I’ll stick with the slightly more traditional lump of coal in my stocking. Or will that be replaced with vials of ethanol?

I hope the new and improved eco-Santa won’t be too upset with 4-year-old cancer patient Hannah Garman for asking for a ton of Christmas cards this year. Using all that paper to fulfill a dying child’s wish might not fit into his green agenda.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 23, 2008

Leave a Comment 

Make Little Hannah’s Christmas Wish Come True

I’m a Christmas card slacker, but I’m making an exception this year.

There will be no excuses when it comes to sending one very important card to one very brave little girl named Hannah Faith Garman. 4-year-old Hannah is suffering from an aggressive brain cancer called glioblastoma multiforme. Her doctors expect her short life to last only a few more weeks, and her Christmas wish is to get as many cards as she can. A friend of the family writes:

Right now she has lost most of her motor skills. She is confined to bedAnd cannot really do anything or play with the gifts she is getting frompeople, but she LOVES getting cards – she has gotten so many from people she does not know and jus t loves to have grandma read about the people who send Them and see their pictures and is so proud of all her cards. Her room is just filled with cards.When asked what she wants for Christmas she said she wants to see howMany Christmas cards she can get. Many people have passed this wish along to their churches, prayer groups, friends and family. There are school groupswhere children are making her cards. People are including pictures so shecan see who it i s that i s sending her the card.

If you would like to help with her wish, please send her a card at:

Hannah Garman
704 Orchard Rd
Lititz, PA 17543

Hannah’s father Darin posts photos and updates at CaringBridge.com. On Thursday he wrote, “Hannah opens every card we receive and the card is read to her. It is one of the few things she can do while being in bed all day.”

Please take a moment on Sunday or Monday to send a card to let Hannah know how many people are thinking of her and praying for her health. There is also a Hannah Garman benefit fund set up at Ephrata National Bank to help the family with medical expenses.

Thanks to Stacy at Smart Girl Politics for bringing Hannah’s Christmas wish to my attention. Michelle Malkin has more, including a photo gallery of Hannah.

Let’s all help make Hannah’s Christmas wish come true.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 21, 2008

Leave a Comment 

Marrena Lindberg: Portrait of a Liberal

Perched on a stool in a television studio, Marrena Lindberg pulls out her prized possession: a photo of Stephen Colbert. She squints her eyes slightly, scrunches up her face, and emits a slightly tortured mewl that falls somewhere between whine and sigh. That, she explains somewhat clinically to the naked adult film star on her right, was just one of the 40 to 50 Colbert-induced orgasms she experiences every day.

My better half and I watch in horrified fascination as the heavyset Ms. Lindberg plugs The Orgasmic Diet, a nutritional regimen we imagine does little for one’s figure or sex life. As our tear-inducing laughter subsides, she demonstrates one more hands-off, six second Colbert-gasm.

And thus, our first night of upgraded cable service came to an end. (Best recession ever, by the way.) We’ll be a little more careful about surfing past the HBO range of channels from now on.

As distasteful as it was to watch this woman humiliate herself by faking orgasms on television, I couldn’t help but wonder what kind of person does such a thing. I completely understand why she appeared on the Katie Morgan show – she’s got books to sell – but who the hell gets on TV and drools over a picture of Stephen Colbert while pretending to Kegel her way to climax in less than 10 seconds?

Enter Google.

42-year-old Marrena Lindberg is an overweight Wiccan divorcée who indulges her stalker-like obsession with Stephen Colbert by posting prolifically on the ColbertNation forums using the handles Eris and zaneblue. She likes to write about the unseemly details of her sex life, but her political nonsense almost eclipses her sexual nonsense.

Ms. Lindberg has more than a touch of Palin Derangement Syndrome, reads DailyKos, comments regularly on HuffPo, and thinks George Bush stole the elections in 2000 and 2004. Oh, and predictably enough, she hates corporations and neocons. Of course, all that typical liberal ire is to be expected, considering the Rethuglicans are preventing her from getting the government to foot the bill for her research into female orgasms. As she wrote several weeks ago in a verbose letter she bribed Dan Savage to publish:

I can’t get funding because of the Republicans in power, there’s no funding for any non-pharmaceutical research, much less for a study on God forbid female sexuality.

Someone might want to let Marrena Lindberg know that the Democrats won control of Congress in 2006. If only she knew before donating all her “spare money to Obama.” She could have saved her cash to load up on Colbert centric spank material.

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 19, 2008

33 Comments 

Finally, A Lawsuit I Can Get Behind

I have little patience for frivolous lawsuits that drain taxpayers’ wallets to give lowlifes an outlet for their vanity or easy access to get rich quick by exploiting the letter of the law. That’s why I get almost giddy when a fully merited lawsuit surfaces.

Michelle Malkin reports that Fox Business Network filed suit against the U.S. Treasury Department over failure to respond to legitimate Freedom of Information Act requests. The Network sought data on the allocation of bailout funds that … gasp … would give the American public the transparency promised by Hank Paulson when he ascended to the bailout throne earlier this year.

Kevin Magee, Executive Vice President, FOX News commented, “The Treasury has repeatedly ignored our requests for information on how the government is allocating money to these troubled institutions. In a critical time like this amidst mounting corruptions and an economic crisis, we as a news organization feel it’s more important than ever to hold the government accountable.”

Steven Mintz, Esq. of Mintz & Gold LLP, and legal counsel for the network added, “Despite the several requests for expedited information filed by FBN, it has become apparent that the Treasury will not cooperate without mounting legal pressure. Therefore, we have filed a complaint in the Federal Court in New York and ask the Court to make the Treasury provide the information sought by the journalists at FBN.”

Justice and government accountability – dare I hope?

Published by Jenn Q. Public on December 19, 2008

1 Comment 

← Previous Page — Next Page →