Huckabee

I don't think Huckabee is going to run for president, but if he does, I think he'd be one of the more formidable opponents for Obama. He has some crazy beliefs (creationism, flat tax, anti-gay marriage, etc.) but he doesn't seem like a crazy person. This is significant! Almost all the Republicans actually seem somewhat unhinged and/or out of the mainstream. We all know how Sarah Palin is, but there are others. Here's Tim Pawlenty, who won't win but is really trying, introducing himself to the American public.



I mean, that's weird. Real life isn't a movie. It's just strange. This type of stunt may appeal to the far right of people who vote in Republican primaries, but not to regular Americans.

How about Haley Barbour? He's so out there that he won't even commit to denouncing one of the founders of the KKK. That's crazy! He also talked about going to go see a MLK rally in the 60s in order to pick up girls. What! I know some liberals think that Americans are stupid and racist, but most people won't vote for a guy with that kind of background. It's too far out there.

Anyway -- Huckabee seems rational all the time. He's folksy and well-spoken and humble and funny. And guess what he did today. Defended Obama regarding his ties to Jeremiah Wright! More than anything else, this makes me think he'll run. He knows he's well-positioned to win the primaries, and is already trying to highlight that he's not a crazy nut. Good strategy!

Tiger Dog

You know why China is gonna beat America? INGENUITY. For example, they have created tiger-dog and panda-dog.

Daylight Savings Wackiness

Did you know that Arizona does not observe Daylight Savings, but the Navajo Nation within Arizona DOES?! That's wild.

Beck: Reform Judaism = Radical Islam

On his radio program, Beck says Reform Judaism is "almost like radicalized Islam."

Beck's a clown, but clowns are kind of scary.

Long, wonky, nerdy, tangential post on why Republicans are wrong

Back to nerdy posts! Alright, this chart basically shows the fallacy of the Republican diagnosis of what ails the economy. Republicans in general decry 1) all government spending 2) the size of government. These are not the same things. The size of government is (basically) all the people the government employs. Government spending IS a real problem in that it is unsustainable. But the causes of its instability are entirely divorced from what Republicans say the problem is.

Deficits 101: all a deficit means is that the government is taking in less money than it's spending. It's like if you make $40,000 a year but spend $45,000. That's it. So if that happens, you'd probably want to check out where your costs are coming from and cut them where you can. Oh good more charts:
 
 Charts are great. Anyway, a few things should stick out to you here. Two costs are flat -- "other spending" (things like the military, education, etc. etc.) and "social security" will cost basically the same now as the always will. The driver of the future deficit is almost completely health care costs. In other words, if you want to be serious about the deficit you should focus on health care reform.

Oh wait. Didn't Obama do something like that? I seem to remember something about ObamaCare cutting about $450billion in medicare costs over the next ten years? Wow! That is actually a lot money. By comparison, the House Republicans right now are debating about cutting between...$66million and $100million in cuts. If you extend that by ten years, that's still about 1/50th the amount of cuts Obama passed in health care reform. And that's exactly where we should be focusing.

Sorry, that was a huge tangent, but it's important. The cuts the Republicans want are utterly superfluous to our long-term fiscal condition, and hurtful in the short-term. They're cutting programs like Pell Grants so middle class kids can go to college, Head Start so poor kids can get pre-school education, heating subsidies for people who can't afford it in the winter, and great programs that are demonstrated to work, like Teach For America. They are NOT cutting Medicare/Medicaid, and they actually criticized Obama for making those cuts (they also just claim without any basis that the cuts won't happen. I don't understand that argument at all...they're in the law.)!

The takeaway is this: look at the chart at the top of the page. In the last year, the percentage of private sector people being hired has gone steadily up, while the number of people in the public sector (people employed by the government) has gone down. The Republicans are now proposing cutting MORE people from the public sector. How will this strengthen our economy in the short term, and how will it help cut the deficit in the long term? Public sector employment has next to nothing to do with the deficit.

OK.

New Guest Blogger

In the coming days and weeks, we'll be rolling out some guest bloggers. You've already met Asian Correspondent Tricia Honggr. Next up will be the famed Number 2 Meal Orange Soda Contributor, blogging about a certain dog with a ghost paw.

The Greatest Movie of All Time

Asian correspondent Honggr reporting live here for the first time!

This cinematic masterpiece is called TipToes (with a solid 29% on Rotten Tomatoes) and I can't believe I didn't know about it until now (thanks Daniel Tosh!). Here is the basic plot:

Matthew McConaughey knocks up Kate Beckinsale. His family happens to be all dwarves and he kind of has a problem with that. Sometimes. But anyway, he didn't tell Kate about his family's genetic situation until it was too late and she spends a good amount of time debating whether or not to keep this baby that may potentially be a dwarf.

Real quote from the movie: "So you had a circle jerk with a bunch of little people? I would love to see that!"

Spoiler alert, baby is a dwarf. McConaughey ends up dumping Miss Kate after she gives birth to his dwarf baby because it would be easier for her to raise this baby alone rather than having McConaughey around. Because McConaughey has a problem with dwarves, remember?

Then she falls in love with McConaughey's twin, who also happens to be a dwarf, and also happens to be Gary Oldman (you know, Sirius Black... Commissioner Gordon!). Right, because sometimes, a twin is 10 years older and more British-y than the other twin. It totally happens all the time. Oh, and Patricia Arquette is involved somehow.

Anyway, the movie is not a comedy.