R i g h t a r d i a

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.

Saturday, March 31, 2012

The truth about Dick Cheney's heart transplant

For some reason, Dick Cheney started to like hip hop and jazz after his heart transplant.

source: Barbara's Doodle Blog

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Ann Coulter calls Newt Gingrich a hunchback

Ann Coulter attacked GOP candidate, Newt Gingrich, Friday. she saying you can't have two affairs and run for president.

On Fox & Friends, Coulter said Gingrich was "an interesting person to talk to" but said he is "not presidential material."

She said House Speaker's controversial past was "like being a hunchback."

source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/31/ann-coulter-newt-gingrich_n_1393724.html

graphic: Barbara's Doodle Blog

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VA Disability Benefits Questionnaires (DBQs) streamline veteran claims

by The Major

Disability Benefits Questionnaires (DBQs) are medical examination forms used to capture essential information for evaluating disability compensation and/or pension claims. You can download these from the Va website: http://benefits.va.gov/TRANSFORMATION/dbqs/ListByDBQFormName.asp

WASHINGTON -- The Department of Veterans Affairs announced today the release of 68 new forms that will help speed the processing of Veterans’ disability compensation and pension claims.

“VA employees will be able to more quickly process disability claims, since disability benefits questionnaires capture important medical information needed to accurately evaluate Veterans’ claims,” said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki. “Disability benefits questionnaires are just one of many changes VA is implementing to address the backlog of claims.”

The new forms bring to 71 the number of documents, called disability benefits questionnaires (DBQs), that guide physicians’ reports of medical findings, ensuring VA has exactly the medical information needed to make a prompt decision.

When needed to decide a disability claim for compensation or pension benefits, VA provides Veterans with free medical examinations for the purpose of gathering the necessary medical evidence.

Veterans who choose to have their private physicians complete the medical examination can now give their physicians the same form a VA provider would use. It is very important that physicians provide complete responses to all questions on the DBQs. VA cannot pay for a private physician to complete DBQs or for any costs associated with examination or testing.

“By ensuring relevant medical information can be found on one form, we will cut processing time while improving quality,” added Under Secretary for Benefits Allison A. Hickey.

DBQ’s can be found at http://benefits.va.gov/disabilityexams. The newly released DBQs follow the initial release of three DBQs for Agent Orange-related conditions.

Veterans may file a claim online through the eBenefits web portal at https://www.ebenefits.va.gov. The Department of Defense and VA jointly developed the eBenefits portal as a single secure point of access for online benefit information and tools to perform multiple self-service functions such as checking the status of their claim.

Servicemembers may enroll in eBenefits using their Common Access Card at any time during their military service, or before they leave during their Transition Assistance Program briefings.

Veterans may also enroll in eBenefits and obtain a Premium account in-person or online depending on their status.

Rightradia had a small part to pay in the development of the DBQ. We sent an email to iris.va.gov more than 2 years ago suggesting it provide vets with a checklist of the medical evidence a vet needs to start a claim.

The first DBQs were used for the Agent Orange presumptive conditions like ischemic heart disease.

We also pointed out that the VA C&P exams were redundant for people who have medical insurance and the C&P exams should only be primarily used for the indignant as the C&P physicals were originally designed.

The Major has a serious endocrine condition and asked his primary care doctor to complete the Endocrine Diseases DBQ. Note that this DBQ does not cover thyroid/parathyroid or Diabetes Mellitus.

Next week The Major has a medical appointment with his endocrinologist and he will get the Thyroid/Parathyroid DBQ signed.

Be aware that Pituitary shortfalls related to lutenizing hormone and follicle simulating hormone can cause anosmia: the loss of smell. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anosmia

Of interest, there is a DBQ for the loss of smell an taste.

In addition, Hypothyroidism can also cause gall bladder disease leading to a Cholecystectomy (gallbladder removal). There is a DBQ for gall bladder conditions as well.

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National Organization for Marriage want hostility between gays and blacks

National Organization for Marriage's (NOM) memos were released that indicate it plans to fan hostility between blacks and gays to help with it campaign against gay marriage.

The strategic goal of this project is to drive a wedge between gays and blacks -- two key Democratic constituencies," states one of the memos. "Find, equip, energize and connect African American spokespeople for marriage, develop a media campaign around their objections to gay marriage as a civil right; provoke the gay marriage base into responding by denouncing these spokesmen and women as bigots.

Carrie Prejean, a glamorous,"noncognitive" celebrity

The documents that emerged as a result of a Maine lawsuit investigating election campaign fraud and then were leaked by the Human Rights Campaign.

One of the memos cited efforts to recruit glamorous,"non-cognitive" celebrities to promote its cause, some of the non-cognitive celebrities would probably include former dethroned Miss California, Carie Prejean, the infamous advocate of 'opposite marriage" Another is Kirk Cameron, the evangelical who tired to prove that God existed, and Victoria Jackson, an aging SNL has been.

The Huffington Post's rogues gallery of homophobes included among others: Mel Gibson, Donald Trump, Adam Carolla, 50 Cent and Blake Shelton. We wouldn't be surprised if other "non-cognitive" country singers jumped onto this bandwagon.

Another non-cognitive candidate Rightardia would recommend is Stephan Baldwin. Early in his career, Baldwin starred in a movie about a M-F-M threesome. This was before he met his Evangelical wife.

graphic: Perez Hilton

sources:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/28/nom-gay-marriage-glamorous-noncognitive-celebrites_n_1386458.html?ref=mostpopular#s817222&title=Blake_Shelton

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/27/nom-anti-gay-marriage-plans-hrc-revealed_n_1382388.html

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Gov. Scott Walker has a bad week after recall set and court loss

3/30/2012

By Doug Cunningham

Wisconsin U.S. District Court Judge William Conbley has struck down key provisions of Wisconsin’s anti-union Act 10, giving public employee unions a victory on dues check-off and the annual re-certification elections. Here’s the remedy the court ordered:

…the court will enter an injunction requiring a return to automatic dues deductions for all members of public unions no later than May 31, 2012. This should give sufficient time for the defendants to seek a stay of this injunction from the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, and for government entities to adopt a workable procedure to return to automatic deductions should the Seventh Circuit deny a stay, while balancing the plaintiffs’ and their now-voluntary members’ rights to a return to payroll deductions.
Consistent with the above, the court will also immediately suspend Act 10’s annual, mandatory recertification of general employee unions by an absolute majority of their members.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s administration can still appeal this ruling.

Wisconsin’s Government Accountability Board today officially set the recall election against Walker for June 5th, with primary elections set for May 8th.

More than 900,000 valid recall signatures were turned in forcing Walker’s recall over his attack on public worker collective bargaining.

A new poll from NBC/Marist shows any generic Democrat challenger to Walker beating the governor 48-46 percent.

photo source: http://www.blogforarizona.com

source: Workers Independent News

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Alan Grayson's peculiar House opponent

Mark Oxner's first ad suggests some Disney animators have run amok

Alan Grayson's deliriously dippy opponent, Mark Oxner, appears to be upset that the public has tagged Oxner as a bigot for running an ad depicting President Barack Obama as the evil captain of a slave ship, holding young white girls in chains. So now Oxner has a new ad out, arguing that I’m the real bigot. This is what psychiatrists refer to as “projection.”

Here is Mad Mark’s argument:

The million members of the national organization Democracy of America chose me at their "Progressive Hero" last month. (By a margin of about 4-to-1, actually.)
If DFA says that I’m a “Progressive Hero," then Grayson must be a progressive.
Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood (“oooooooh, Planned Parenthood!!"), also was a progressive.
Margaret Sanger advocated "eugenics and abortion," says Oxner, "to prevent the wrong kind of people from having children."
"Therefore" (and this seems like assault and battery on the very concept of "therefore") Grayson also must be an advocate of “eugenics and abortion." At this point in Oxner’s new ad, several cute little babies are obliterated by a big red circle with a line through it.
And then Oxner scolds me, saying, "there’s no such thing as the 'wrong kind of people.'"

Sometimes, a syllogism becomes a silly-gism. This is one of those times.

To recap, in Oxner’s first ad, he accused our first African-American President of being captain of a slave ship full of white girls. And now, in Oxner's second ad, he accuses a Jewish person, with relatives who died in the Holocaust, of being a believer in Nazi eugenics. How . . . sensitive. Or, nutty as a fruitcake. A fruitcake with extra nuts in it.

That really is a heaping helping of bonkers. I didn’t realize that you could buy that many tickets on the Crazy Train.

Seeing as how Oxner thinks that Grayson so obsessed with racial purity, he must think that it was utterly hypocritical of me to marry a woman who is not white, and then for us to have five beautiful children together.

Here is a multiple choice question. Is Mark Oxner:

(a) Unbalanced;
(b) Unglued;
(c) Unhinged; or
(d) Unzipped?

Answer: there is no way – NO WAY – that a crazy bigot like Mark Oxner belongs in Congress.

If that’s how you see it, too, then please toss a few drachmas into our "Beat the Bigot" fund.Because as Dan Quayle said, a mind is a terrible thing to lose. Just ask Mark Oxner.

Courage,

Alan Grayson

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Mittens not a popular candidate

The Democrats have a 20 point edge over Republicans with female voters, too.

Will the big spending one per centers with their SuperPacs be able to buy another election for the GOP?

Don't forget that Rick Scott bought the Florida governorship and defeated an excellent Democratic candidate, Alex Sink.

Never underestimate the GOP.

graphic source: Mario Piperni
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Friday, March 30, 2012

Obama by Van Gogh

Obama Van Gogh

AZRainman, The Freaking News

The Freaking news always has these cool contests in which they ask the contributing artists to paint like the old masters. Van Gogh was an early Expressionist.

I worked for a man who had Dutch heritage. He told me Van Gogh is pronounced phonetically as Van Gawk.

"Starry, Starry Night" and the American flag is a nice touch.

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Mark Fiore: The iWhine

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Mitt and Paul: Double Trouble for the middle class

Uploaded by DemRapidResponse on Mar 29, 2012

DNC video "Mitt Romney & Paul Ryan: That's Amore"

Now you know why Mitt doens't want to disciss his plans for America. He's in bed with Paul Ryan.

Steve Israel, DCCC, said:

House Democratic candidates will make this election a referendum on the Republican budget that gives millionaires a $394,000 tax cut while costing seniors thousands of dollars more for Medicare and that gives oil companies a tax cut while giving middle class families a college tuition hike.

License: Standard YouTube License

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Ryan Plan is seeped in class warfare

What did you expect from frat boy, Paul Ryan, defense cuts?

The DCCC reports:

House Republican Budget Would Give People Making Over $1 Million Per Year a $394,000 Tax Cut. “New analysis by the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center (TPC) finds that people earning more than $1 million a year would receive $265,000 apiece in new tax cuts, on average, on top of the $129,000 they would receive from the Ryan budget’s extension of President Bush’s tax cuts.” [Center for Budget and Policy Priorities,3/27/12; see also Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, Table T12-0078 and T10-0132]
source: Daily Kos

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Also sprach the Catfood Commissioners

March 30 (Bloomberg) -- Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, who co-chaired President Obama's Deficit Reduction Commission, speak about the U.S. budget deficit.

Tonight on Charlie Rose@ 7p & 10p ET.

Rightardia has suggested Social security can be fixed by getting rid of the Social Security cap that is $110,100 for 2012. The Social Security part of the FICA tax is regressive and the burden of this tax has been on the middle class since the inception of this program.

Medicare is a tougher nut. The shrinking numbers of American workers are part of the problem. This program will need to streamlined and tightened up.

Of course, Social Security and Medicare are entitlement programs funded by the FICA payroll tax. For the most part, the taxes collected from these programs are not discretionary.

Income Tax funds a variety of discretionary federal programs and defense takes the biggest bite, about 30 per cent. However, when you add in Veterans Affairs and Homeland Security, the cost of defense is about 60 per cent of federal discretionary spending.

Rightardia is well-aware of the Transition 21 efforts of General Shinseki in the VA. The VA is trying to streamline a Byzantine system.

However, Homeland Security is a growth system that is using tremendous resources to fight a limited threat: terrorism. Homeland Security seems to be intent on bugging the US communications infrastructure using a justification of Islamic extremism.

Many Americans were aghast when the cost of the Iraq War approached $ one trillion. Guess what! The life cycle cost will hit $ 4 trillion as veteran's claims are added into the overall cost.

Want to prevent another stupid war?

Stop electing Republican war monkeys like Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich!

Any of those three will get the US into another war, probably in the middle east.

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SCOTUS: Elections do have consequences

That is why we have five corporate vegetables on the Supreme Court.

graphic: Anti Repblican Crusaders
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Al Jazeera English: How the West de-democratised the Middle East

The US has been prevaricating in the middle east for along time with little effect. The Al Jazeera article explains some of the outcomes of Western democratization. The author also notes that Islamic societies have no notion of the separation of church and state.

"Is Islam compatible with democracy?

The predominant answer for many years was "no". Among others, Elie Kedourie, MS Lipset, and Huntington advocated such a position. Bernard Lewis, "the most influential postwar historian of Islam and the Middle East", who offered "the intellectual ammunition for the Iraq War", was most vociferous in upholding this position. Their main argument was that, unlike Christianity, Islam was unique in not differentiating religion from the state and hence democracy was impossible in Muslim polities. Against this doxa, I make three arguments.

First, the position that Islam is incompatible with democracy was false from the beginning, because it served imperial ambitions of the West and violated Muslims' self-perception that, not only is Islam compatible with democracy, it was one of the engines of democratic empowerment.

Second, I argue that the West's discourse of democratisation of the Middle East is dubious because it hides how the West actually de-democratised the Middle East. My contention is that, from the 1940s onwards, democratic experiments were well in place and the West subverted them to advance its own interests. I offer three examples of de-democratisation: The reportedly CIA-engineered coup against the elected government of Syria in 1949, the couporchestrated by the US and UK against the democratic Iran in 1953 and subversion of Bahrain's democracy in the 1970s. I also touch on the West's recent de-democratisation in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Third, I explain that the Middle East was de-democratised because the West rarely saw it as a collection of peoplewith dynamic, rich social-cultural textures."

See the complete article at:
How the West de-democratised the Middle East - Opinion - Al Jazeera English Subscribe to the Rightardia feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/blogspot/UFPYA

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AFL-CIO: Sen. Harkin’s “Rebuild America Act” Is Visionary And Inspiring

Senator Tim Harkin

By Doug Cunningham

Iowa Senator Tim Harkin is introducing the “Rebuild America Act”, a sweeping grand vision of how we can rebuild an economy that lasts for all Americans. AFL-CIO Director of Government Affairs Bill Samuel stated:

Senator Harkin has introduced a very comprehensive bill. It’s really a progressive vision for the country to rebuild the middle class, put people back to work, strengthen families. It’s everything you’d like t see our government do that’s it not doing now.

Harkin’s “Rebuild America Act” includes $300 billion for infrastructure, strengthens Social Security and makes it easier for workers to join unions.

And it pays for these things in part by creating a Wall Street speculation tax, ending tax breaks for companies that outsource jobs and raising the capital gains tax while closing the carried interest loophole for the rich.

Samuel says it’s rare for members of Congress these days to come up with a truly alternative vision to the austerity programs pushed by the political right, the wealthy and big business. Like Harkin, Samuel believes if politicians campaign on this they can win. Samuel added:

This bill actually is a vision. It paints a picture about how we can share prosperity among all Americans, putting people back to work, rebuilding our infrastructure, repairing our safety net and insisting that shared sacrifice start at the top. So this is the kind of vision that is so lacking in politics right now, that if people would open their ears and eyes I think they would be very impressed with what Senator Harkin has done.

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West Wing Week: "I've Got Seoul, " 3/30/2012

Uploaded by whitehouse on Mar 29, 2012

Welcome to the West Wing Week, your guide to everything that's happening at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

This week, the President traveled to the Republic of Korea to attend a nuclear security summit where he also visited the DMZ, held a series of bilateral (and one trilateral) meetings, and gave a major address to students at Hankuk University.

Back at home, the kitchen garden got underway with this year's first planting.

Download this video

Public Domain.

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Far Left Side: The Same Ol' Excuses

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Thursday, March 29, 2012

China Daily: Damned if you do, damned if you don't

The Chinese have a point.

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Bay of Fundie: Fundies and Evagleicals

There is an interesting article in the Bay of Fundie that make as a distinction between fundies and Evangelical Christians. As the author notes:

Fundie or fundy (plural fundies) is a pejorative slang term used to refer to religious fundamentalists of any religion or denomination, although it is primarily directed towards fundamentalist Christians. The term is intentionally derogatory, and is used most commonly by those opposed to the Christian Right movement.

See the complete article at: http://www.bay-of-fundie.com/

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Laurel Thatcher Ulrich: Well-behaved women seldom make history

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Another day, another Christian TBN dollar

The Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) bills itself as the world’s largest Christian network.

It is in the middle of a legal battle involving allegations of massive financial fraud and lavish spending.

It is alleged that TBN purchased a $100,000 motor home for family dogs and that Paul Crouch Sr. bought a $50-million luxury jet for his personal use

Brittany Koper, a former TBN official and the granddaughter of its co-founder, Paul Crouch Sr., was fired after she blew the whistle on fiancial faoud in TBN.

One of the lawyers for Koper's team said:

No good deed goes unpunished at TBN.

source: All Hat No Cattle

source: http://articles.latimes.com/2012/mar/23/local/la-me-0323-televangelist-feud-20120323

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Al Jazeera: Giant land snails threaten South Florida

Uploaded by AlJazeeraEnglish on Mar 29, 2012

Investigators in the United States are trying to find out how a destructive species of snails entered the country. Al Jazeera's Andy Gallacher reports from Miami.

These snails carry a rare form of meningitis.

License: Standard YouTube License

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