This blog is dedicated to progressive and liberal thought. It also discusses new technology, how technology affects privacy and developments in Russia, China, Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Rightardia fully supports the rights of workers to organize, the feminist movement, and all Americans regardless or ethnicity, sex or gender.It uses humor, satire and parody to expose conservative thought for what it truly is: BS! Rightardia contributes to the DNC, DCCC, DSCC and MoveOn.Org.
Scott may be the first Florida governor to be recalled
Raleigh, NC – Rick Scott was elected by one point over Alex Sink last fall, and even as he prepared to enter office last December, PPP found that only about a third of voters liked him, and 43% disliked him.
Scott spent S70 million to win the gubernatiroal race. Hint: this might give you and idea what a billionaire named Donald Trump would be like as president.
But instead of building good will in the last few months, Scott has continued to turn voters off.Only 32 per cent approve of his job performance , but 55 per cent disapprove.
His own Republicans only approve of him by a 57-27 margin, and independents mirror the overall results.
But the main thing he has done is tick off Democrats, who have gone from 60% unfavourable to an 81% disapproval in three months.
As a result, Scott would overwhelmingly lose in a rematch to Sink, 56-37.
Dean Debnam, President of Public Policy Polling said:
Since then (the election) he hasn’t done much to win over either the folks who didn’t vote for him or the folks who supported him because he was a Republican despite having some reservations about him personally.
State Representative Rick Kriseman, (D-St-Petersburg), has filed a proposed constitutional amendment that would allow Florida voters to recall state legislators, cabinet members, and Governor Scott.
To set up a recall vote, a petition would require signatures equivalent to 15% of the votes cast in the last election.
March 31, 2011 (2:30)
RSS Feeds
Share inShare
Lawmakers in the Buckeye State passed a bill limiting public sector unions' collective bargaining rights.
Ohio Dems Vow to Fight New Anti-Union Bill and have 90-days to collect 230,000 signatures to get the new law on the ballot.
I was talking to a friend of mine the other day and he was lamenting the fact that his 6 year old daughter still had an imaginary friend.
He was concerned about the fact that she could often times be heard talking to her imaginary friend, that she would regularly ask her imaginary friend what choices to make, and she would ask her imaginary friend for help on occasion.
My friend was concerned that his daughter was being labeled as "strange" by her friends. Or that his daughter might have some emotional problems.
I told him "fear not". Her affliction is quite common and some people never recover from it.
He was baffled and asked what the hell I was talking about. I simply told him that today there are literally billions of people on earth who regularly talk to their imaginary friend.
They confide in that friend. They ask their friend for guidance. And they ask for help all the time.
But even though there is no proof - not one shred in 2000 years of their imaginary friend's existence - it was socially acceptable to have this friend and to be very vocal about it.
Perhaps children should organize a religion around their imaginary friends. No one would question them again. And they could even get some serious cash out of it!
Don
This friend, of course, is referred to as God in many societies. But there are strong similarities to a child's imaginary friend . . . But no one seems to question the existence of the adult's imaginary friend.
Rightardia wasn't talking about that imaginary friend. We were talking about the other one: your soul.
Shaman and priests learned centuries ago that they could not prevent a beloved one from dying or a wrongly accused person like Jesus from being executed. But they had a Catch 22, the soul.
In fact, the apostles were flabbergasted that the Romans dispatched Jesus so easily. Of course, Jesus' soul, the Holy Ghost survived intact.
Today, if you are willing to contribute money to a church and perhaps your estate when you die, you too can be guaranteed entrance into heaven, just like Jesus.
The Morning Joe's Mika lowers the boom on "The Donald." Rightardia suspects "The Donald" who is obviously a country club Republican is trying to bridge the gap with the Tea Party with his birther nonsense.
Would you like to know what a billionaire president would o to the country? Take a gander, at Rick Scott, the grifter governor of Florida.
Scott is changing the law so the state doesn't have to maintain a database on narcotics like Oxycontin (Hillbilly heroin), Medicaid recipeints will be forced into private clinics and state workers will have to be drug tested.
Unlike recently elected federal officials who have to transfer their assets to a blind trust, Scott transferred the ownership of his company, Solantic, to his wife.
Soalntic will greatly benefit by the change to Florida law on Medicaid and mandatory drug testing for state employees.
Most of the Hillbilly heroin in Eastern Kentucky is from Florida because of the lax law that Mike Fasano, the GOP State Senator District 11 fixed. Rick Scott wants the law repealed.
Do you think the state wills save money with any of these changes? Medicaid charges will likely double and it will cost the state as much as $300,000 annually to drug test even one per cent of Florida's employees.
BTW in the latest polls we have seen, Donald Trump is not a player.
Trump is now claiming that the long form Certificate of Live Birth (COLB) might list Obama's religion as Muslim.
You would think Trump would have better things to do than act like a right wing stooge.
Make Florida for the living, too. Call Senator Bill Nelson
Heads up: Congress is debating a budget plan that would be devastating to Florida. Will you pass this along?
Senators Bill Nelson and Marco Rubio need to hear from all of us about it right now, before they cut a deal in the next few days.
Please spread the word about all of these proposed cuts to Florida:
$64 million would be cut from federal funds for clean and safe water in Florida.
6,100 Florida children would be immediately cut from Head Start, which provides comprehensive early childhood development services for at-risk children ages zero to five.
$368 million would be cut from Pell Grants, affecting all 565,000 higher education students with those grants in Florida.3
Job training and employment services would be effectively eliminated for 5,700 dislocated workers, 6,000 low-income adults, and 15,000 youths age 14 to 21.
$9.6 million would be cut from law enforcement assistance, taking cops off the beat.
It's especially galling when the same budget protects tax breaks for corporations like GE and the very rich.
Just last night the news broke that Congress may be close to striking a deal on the budget. Now is the only time we can influence the outcome.
Can you call Senator Nelson and ask them to oppose these cuts in the budget? You can pick one of the cuts in this list to highlight in your call.
Obama's approval raings have been remarkably stable. It peaks in the low fifties and Rightardia saw it drop the high thirties once for the low. Most of the time it hangs between 43 and 49 per cent.
Gallup has Obama's approval is at 49 per cent today, and on March 14, Zogby had the president at 47 per cent.
We have seen Obama's rating drop on weekends and when he is abroad. His ratings spring back during the week and when he returns from foreign visits.
What is the world in NewMax talking about? Is this some funky poll that only the right wingers follow like some of Frank Lundt's shoddy work?
Dr Richard Wiener of the Research Corporation for Science Advancement, and the University of Arizona recently stated:
In a large number of modern secular democracies, there's been a trend that folk are identifying themselves as non-affiliated with religion; in the Netherlands the number was 40%, and the highest we saw was in the Czech Republic, where the number was 60%.
The counties in which religion is becoming extinct are:
Australia, Austria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland.
Rightardia looks at religion as a tax-exempt sales organization that is dysfunctional. Religions want you to believe in a God and that people have souls. A particular religion will protect your soul if you contribute money and time to the church.
It is essentially a quid pro quo transaction. You scratch the church's back and you'll get into heaven.
In the US are there are two kinds of Christian churches: the mainstream protestant and Catholic churches are the feel-good churches. They want you to feel good about yourself and believe that you are doing the Lord's work by coming to church and socializing with other members of the church. At least these churches understand the basic tenets of Jesus.
The other wing of Christianity is the evangelical and fundamentalists, many of whom are militant. The fundies take the words in the bible literally and believe these were etched in stone by God.
Most 'good Catholics" know that, at best, 25 per cent of what is written in the bible are the words of Jesus. Most bible scholars would contest even that figure.
Thomas Jefferson even wrote a version of the bible. The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth, that removed the supernatural chapters written by the four evangelicals.
Evangelicals are focused on proselytizing others and have wickered American nationalism intro the bible. The Nazis did the same thing with German nationalism.
That is why the Nazis had Teutonic crosses pointed on their aircraft and tanks. There were actually more of the crosses on Nazi weapon systems than the swastika. Killing Jews and Slavs was God's work to Hitler.
Of course, The swastika had also been called the "twisted cross."
Who are the biggest beneficiaries of this Ponzi scheme? That would be the church leaders at the top of the religious food chain. The catholic pope lives the opulent life style of a king and Benny Hinn lives in "a palatial estate with ocean and city views." He also make $5,000,000 tax free dollars a year.
The St. Petersburg times even wrote a story about the Salvation Army and found the top leader living in a $300,000 home. All of the Salvation Army's top administrators are ordained clergy.
Well, God help those who help themselves, doesn't she?
Ohio became the most recent state to watch as decades old collective bargaining rights were stripped from hundreds of thousands of public sector workers. And the death of Ohio labor leader Bill Sams as he fought against this legislation makes the loss all the more poignant. Jesse Russell reports:
What’s next for Ohio workers now that the battle over SB5 moves to the Governor? Plenty. Democratic District 8 Rep. Armond Budish, during a speech against the union right’s stripping legislation on Wednesday, laid out what’s on the horizon for both public and private sector workers.
[Budish]: If you work in the Building Trades you’re next. There already hard at work to eliminate prevailing wages. And folks who work for a living but are not union members, don’t think you escape. You don’t escape the Republican attack on working families either. They’re coming after you. Just look at House Bill 61, for example, which would effectively limit or eliminate time and a half pay for people who work overtime –private employees.
After SB5 was passed ending 30 years of collective bargaining rights Democratic Rep. Debbie Phillips rose for a point of personal privilege. She paid tribute to Bill Sams, the President of the Southeastern Ohio AFL-CIO, who died of a heart attack on his way to fight the bill Wednesday:
[Phillips]: Bill Sams was an individual who lived what he believed everyday and he worked everyday for working families in Southeastern Ohio.
Ohio became the most recent state to watch as decades old collective bargaining rights were stripped from hundreds of thousands of public sector workers.
And the death of Ohio labor leader Bill Sams as he fought against this legislation makes the loss all the more poignant. Jesse Russell reports:
What’s next for Ohio workers now that the battle over SB5 moves to the Governor? Plenty. Democratic District 8 Rep.
Armond Budish, during a speech against the union right’s stripping legislation on Wednesday, laid out what’s on the horizon for both public and private sector workers.
Budish: If you work in the Building Trades you’re next. There already hard at work to eliminate prevailing wages. And folks who work for a living but are not union members, don’t think you escape. You don’t escape the Republican attack on working families either.
They’re coming after you. Just look at House Bill 61, for example, which would effectively limit or eliminate time and a half pay for people who work overtime –private employees.
Part of the problem is that federal wage and hour law is weak. You do have the right to be paid and to receive overtime, but that's about it. There is nothing in the law about paid holiday or vacation time.
Republicans hve been chipping away at overtime law, and also in Maine the governor there wants to relax the law on child labor.
"India's population has increased to 1.2 billion people this year, although growth actually slowed for the first time in 90 years, census officials have said.
The South Asian nation, second only to China in terms of its total population, added 181 million people in the past decade, said C Chandramouli, the census commissioner.
State Senator Mike Fasano is concerned with the progress two anti-consumer bills are making as they head through the Florida Senate.
Senate Bill 408 is a comprehensive property and casualty insurance package that removes some very good consumer protection provisions that are currently in law.
Senate Bill 1714 makes vast changes to the way Citizens Property Insurance Corporation operates, including allowing for huge future increases in homeowners insurance premiums.
“I have been a vocal opponent of SB 408 from the moment it was filed,” Senator Fasano states:
I attempted to improve this bad bill in committee but the insurance industry wields great power in Tallahassee.
Many of my colleagues voted to pass this bill out of committee and give it a swift passage to the Senate floor.
The legislation drops the requirement that insurance companies must offer full sinkhole coverage if homeowners are willing to pay extra for it.
Without the requirement Senator Fasano fears that all insurers, including Citizens, will no longer offer this coverage.
The potential for homeowners and potential homeowners could be devastating.
Banks and other mortgage holders that require full coverage could force homeowners to pay exorbitant premiums from insurance companies of the lender’s choice if the general market no longer offers the coverage.
Many Florida insurance companies didn't make as much money as normal last year because of sink hole claims and because attorneys were successfully suing insurance companies that weren't paying the sink hole claims.
Professor Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith, who chaired the report, said he was "not surprised" by this increase because of China's massive boost to investment in R&D.
Chinese research and development (R&D) spending has grown by 20% per year since 1999, now reaching over $100bn.
Approximately, 1.5 million science and engineering students graduated from Chinese universities in 2006.
Sir Smith said:
I think this is positive, of great benefit, though some might see it as a threat and it does serve as a wake-up call for us not to become complacent.
The report stresses that American research output will not decline in absolute terms and raises the possibility of countries like Japan and France rising to meet the Chinese challenge.
But the potential for China to match American output in terms of sheer numbers in the near to medium term is clear.
TALLAHASSEE, FL -- The parents of two young girls who were killed are speaking out against Gov. Rick Scott's plan to cut the unit that tracks online sexual predators.
Somer Thompson's mother, Diena Thompson, wiped away tears in Tallahassee. Ms. Thompson told lawmakers the story of her daughter's horrific killing.
Thompson said Somer's accused killer was being investigated by the state's cybercrime unit before the killing.
She said:
It's a huge mistake with disastrous endings to it,” said Thompson.Mark Lunsford's daughter, Jessica, was raped and killed in 2005. He said the governor's cuts will mean more kids will become victims.
Discussing the situation in Libya with Fox News's Greta Van Susteren, Sarah Palin said, "I haven't heard the president state that we're at war. That's why I too am not knowing -- do we use the term intervention? Do we use war? Do we use squirmish? What is it?"
BTW, skirmish is not a military term that is commonly used. Contingency would be a better word than skirmish.
Rightardia expects Secretary Gates to refudiate Palin's statement.
This message is both in the old and new testament. In Romans 8:28,"God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God".
The Bible says "The Lord Will Provide in (Genesis 22:9-14)." It also says this in Philippians 4:19 "And this same God who takes care of me will supply all your needs from his glorious riches which have been given to us in Christ Jesus."
Most good Christians know that the domain of God is in the heavens and Satan's domain is the Earth:
Enoch 6-9 when he writes the following: "And wickedness very long continued and widespread pervaded all the races of men, until very little seed of justice was in them. For unlawful unions came about on earth, as angels linked themselves with offspring of the daughters of men, who bore to them sons, who on account of their exceeding great were called Giants. The angels, then, brought to their wives as gifts teachings of evil, for they taught them the virtues of roots and herbs, and dyeing and cosmetics and discoveries of precious materials, love-philtes, hatreds, amours, passions, constraints of love, the bonds of witchcraft, every sorcery and idolatry, hateful to God; and when this was come into the world, the affairs of wickedness were propagated to overflowing, and those of justice dwindled to very little."
This means that all of the money and other wordy goods on Earth belong to Satan. When you give a church money, you are giving the Mammon of Satan to the church.
Over time this will thoroughly ruin the church as is the case of the evangelicals and the fundamentalists who have been thoroughly corrupted by the Republican Party.
The demon Mammon is worshipped by Republicans
This corruption has been so perverse that evangelicals and fundamentalists have completely lost the meaning of the Bible. Many think the Bible is really about capitalist money grubbing and fighting communism. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
If a church is, in fact, doing the word of God, it should not need monetary contributions form parishioners at all. As Silver Silverman has often stated: "Jesus is Magic."
This means the angles in heaven, the Lord, the Holy ghost and God himself will provide for the temporal needs of a true Christian pastor who is worthy of the Lord' s charity.
The Lord will provide. A devout Christian church leader should expect donations to magically appear in the collection plate. Large checks should magically appear in the mail as well. This is because thee Lord provides.
So the next time you are about to drop a donation into the churches' collection plate, hold on to the Satan's Mammon and let those mystical resources automagically flow into your God fearing church.
Never do Satan's work by contributing money to a church. Test the faith of your pastor by withholding those donations.
Indeed, the Lord will provide. You can count on it!
CENK UYGUR: Joining me now is former Democratic Congressman Alan Grayson to answer some of those questions.
That conflict of interest blows me away. He's got a company making millions of dollars from drug tests and he's pushing the drug tests all over Florida? I mean, should they investigate that? What should they do about that?
ALAN GRAYSON: Well, look, he spent $70 million to buy the office of governor in Florida. He wants a return on his money. He promised us that he would run state government like a business. What we didn't realize is he was going to run it like HIS business, like it's all his. And that's exactly what he has been doing. It's not only what you said. In addition to that, he wants to cut all state funding for health care clinics. There are 4 million people in Florida who can't afford to see a doctor when they're sick. They have to go to health care clinics. He's going to shut them all down so that they will be forced to go to Rick Scott's clinics.
CENK: I mean, it's beyond absurd. So, again, you know, let me turn to the prescription problem because that's a whole, another thing. Why does he not want to track these prescription drugs?
AG: Well you said it. Florida has nine times as much as the rest of the country combined. I think eight times as much is Rush Limbaugh alone. It's exactly what you said. I don't think he wants to take the heat from Rush Limbaugh.
CENK: You think it's just that simple? On Rush Limbaugh alone, he's like, let's leave these guys alone.
AG: Well look, all the right-wing leaders have catered to Rush Limbaugh for years and years. He says jump and they say how high. You're seeing that now with the governor of Florida.
CENK: Let's go back to the election for a second. There's a new poll out that says if the elections were held today, Rick Scott would actually lose by 19 points. That's a huge swing. So obviously the people of Florida, once that he got into power, and it didn't take long, we're like, whoa, that is not what we expected. So what did they expect and what did they get?
AG: Listen, this is somebody who made his fortune by cheating sick people. And the only reason why he got in in the first place is because Democrats in Florida, like Democrats all across the country, simply didn't vote in 2010. And it's like Ed Koch said in his last election.
He said, “The voters have spoken, and now they will be punished for it.” And that's exactly what you are seeing in Florida. We're being punished for it. This is someone unfit to be governor; this is someone who is unfit for any job. My thinking was that he would get elected, he'd assume office and then he'd pardon himself and quit, but unfortunately he's doing far worse than that.
He's using the state of Florida to stuff money in his own pocket, because he thinks the real problems facing Florida today, with 4 million people without health insurance, with 13% unemployment, the real problem in Florida is that Rick Scott doesn't have enough money, and he's dead set on doing something to correct that problem.
CENK: So final question for you. What can the people of Florida do about this? Now that they realize the scam he ran on them and you've seen they don't like him anymore, and they're like, whoa, I didn't know he would funnel all this business to his own companies, now run by his wife, what can they do about it?
AG: Look, it's a fundamental problem. The government is being run by a corrupt clique called the Republican Party of Florida. The last person in charge of the Republican Party of Florida was led away in chains and has been indicted.
It's as if the state has been taken over by the mafia, that's how bad the Republican Party of Florida is. Unfortunately the governor himself appoints five of the nine members of the Florida's Ethics Commission. So you can be sure that all those republicans are going to do nothing about this. The only recourse we may have in the end is to storm the Bastille.
CENK: What if he says, hey you know what? Look, I'm going to make more money; this money is going to get funneled to my companies because I'm going to drug test everybody? I'm going to drug test you and your dog and all that money is going to get funneled to me. What are you going to do about it? What can we do about it?
AG: I'm just glad that Rick Scott's company doesn't do proctological examinations, because then we would all have to bend over and cough.
CENK: Congressman Grayson, you are definitely clear on the topic. We appreciate your time tonight. Thank you.
Florida Democratic Party Chairman Rod Smith released the following statement:
Rick Scott and the Republican politicians in Tallahassee clearly don’t understand the consequences of their actions because their extreme agenda will put the safety of Florida’s communities at risk.
“Rather than cutting waste, fraud and abuse from government to balance the budget, Republicans are proposing cuts to law enforcement including slashing the funding for the Cybercrimes Unit.
Republicans are refusing to provide the tools and support the procedures which prosecutors, sheriff deputies and police officers need to put criminals behind bars.
“Instead of working to ensure speedy justice prevails, Republicans are simply focused on attacking the courts.
And now, Republicans are pushing to privatize Florida’s prisons rather than focusing on how to keep violent criminals behind bars.
The Florida Democratic Party will continue fighting to hold Republicans accountable because we believe keeping Florida’s communities safe is the paramount responsibility of our government.
On behalf of all Floridians, I call on the Governor and the Legislature to rethink their priorities, withdrawal their proposals and focus on keeping Florida’s communities safe.
Posted by Ellie Schafer on March 29, 2011 at 6:11 PM EDT
The White House Easter Egg Roll is now less than one month away! Each week brings new exciting information and opportunities related to this year’s event.
On Monday, the official 2011 White House Easter Egg Roll logo and souvenir eggs were announced.
The logo features a jumping Easter Bunny, representing this year’s theme Get Up and Go!, in support of the First Lady’s Let’s Move! initiative to raise a healthier generation of kids.
This year’s eggs come in the pastel colors purple, pink, green, and yellow. The eggs are handmade in the United States from wood that is harvested using strict environmentally friendly practices. Each egg will feature a stamp of the logo, and the signatures of both the President and First Lady. The souvenir eggs can be purchased online through the National Parks Foundation.
Eggs for the 2011 Easter Egg Roll photographed on the South Lawn of the White House. March 24, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Chuck Kennedy)
This contest is open to local Elementary and Middle School students in Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia. The winning artist will have the opportunity to bring their whole class to this year’s Easter Egg Roll. The submission deadline is Monday, April 4th at 11:59 pm EDT. You can learn more about the contest here.
Here’s an example of just one of the many great submissions we’ve received so far:
2011 Easter Egg Roll poster contest submission by Caroline, age 10.
The Easter Egg Roll has been an important White House tradition for over one-hundred and twenty years, and has grown to become the largest event held at the White House each year.
This year’s Egg Roll will be attended by visitors from every corner of the United States, who will travel great distances for their visit to the People’s House.
Bringing members of the public in for the Easter Egg Roll is just one important way that we’re working to make this the most open and accessible White House ever.
26 days and counting! Time to start getting excited!
On Monday, the official 2011 White House Easter Egg Roll logo and souvenir eggs were 
