Welcome to The Now

OK. So what was your other point about Tea Party misconceptions? My other point was that [Tea Partyers are] not crazy. People want to say that they’re crazy, and they’re really not. They want to maintain their social position, their social prestige; and as Frederick Douglass once said, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never has and it never will.” So it’s rational to want to hold onto your position; it’s completely rational. It’s about the means through which [Tea Partyers] do that — that’s what the problem is. One could say, “Maybe they need to be more educated!” But that’s another fallacy as it pertains to the Tea Party: People think they’re dumb. They’re not dumb. Twenty-six percent of all strong Tea Party identifiers have at least a bachelor’s degree. People think they’re poor, or that they’re working-class. No, they’re not. Twenty percent of all Tea Party households have at least a $100,000 of income. So they’re not dumb, and they’re not working-class

R.I.P., Casey Kasem . Scientists would like you to stop with these , please. 50 Cent blah-blahs . How desperate is FoxNews to talk bad about Hillary Clinton?

California Mayor forced to resign after throwing poop on critic's lawn . New Anchor in court for choking wife .

I guess some people don't understand what rape/sexual assualt really is, why people do it and how important an issue it is. First there's the story of Wagatwe Wanjuki : she was sexually assaulted when she was a student at Tuffs University. Instead of tracking her assailant down, the school told her that she should leave. By peer coincidence, the Dean involved advised her attacker.   Then George "I switch to talking about baseball when I stick my foot in my mouth about politics" Will decided to get involved and claimed Wanjuki just wanted some sympathy .What a hero! If things couldn't get worse, there's Lawrence Lockman . Let's just go to the quote: “If a woman has (the right to an abortion), why shouldn’t a man be free to use his superior strength to force himself on a woman? At least the rapist’s pursuit of sexual freedom doesn’t (in most cases) result in anyone’s death.” So in the political "Fair Exchange is no Robbery" realm, a wom

General Petraeus (who conservatives LOVED back when G.W. Bush was president) and Glenn Beck (who conservatives LOVED back when he was on FoxNews) have both taken stances on Iraq that don't fit with their conservative-created caricature. For the former general, he pretty much says that if Iraq has become a nation-wide version of the Hatfields and the McCoys, we should stay out of it . Beck, meanwhile, is giving what best can be described as a mea culpa : "From the beginning, most people on the left were against going into Iraq. I wasn’t.... Liberals, you were right. We shouldn’t have." What's next: Dick Cheney donating money to orphans of both sides of the last war? 

The 5 Geek Social Fallacies . Not that I'm a big fan of horoscopes, but this does explain some things . When exposed to the benefits of the Affordable Care Act, even Republicans must tell the truth ... ...but please; keep your politics out of my comics !

Here's the thing about the Bible: if you are a practicing Christian who adheres to it's teachings, you can't pick and choose what parts to endorse. The Bible was put together to be followed as a whole, so either you do that or you deal with the various interpretations of certain books. What you don't do is pluck a verse and/or story to use as justification for killing someone who, in your eyes, is a sinner : A little-known Oklahoma state house primary candidate is getting some national attention this week, after a local magazine found Facebook comments he made last year that appear to endorse killing homosexuals—via stoning, specifically.  Republican Scott Esk made the comments on another user’s link to a BBC article which quotes Pope Francis last July telling reporters “if a person is gay and seeks God and has good will, who am I to judge?”  Esk responds by quoting Bible verses from the book of Romans and Leviticus which some Christians interpret to cond

I remember a few years back when conservative pundits were saying that Barack Obama's election proved that America had finally moved forward in terms of race relations. I also remember how the conservative media immediately went on a political temper-tantrum that caused our government to be, at best, stagnant. Anyway, I came across two different stories regarding "post-racial America." One is about a black man who has been converting people out of the KKK .  It's a brave mission he's undertaken, and I hope he can continue it unabated. Then there's a story about a Texas councilwoman who believes that the reason schools are doing poorly is because black people are on the school board . She's standing by her comments. So this is a snapshot of America right now: a black man risking his life to show members of one the most racist groups in American history the upside of tolerance, and an elected official claiming that black people corrupt each other as w