Prosperity Gospel

Also known as "Wish in one hand and shit in the other":

Stephen Biellier, a long-distance trucker from Mount Vernon, Mo., said he and his wife, Millie, came to the convention praying that this would be “the overcoming year.” They are $102,000 in debt, and the bank has cut off their credit line, Mrs. Biellier said.

[. . .]

The Bielliers were at the convention a few years ago when a supporter made a pitch for people to join an “Elite CX Team” to raise money to buy the ministry a Citation X airplane. (Mr. Copeland is an airplane aficionado who got his start in ministry as a pilot for Oral Roberts.) At that moment, Mrs. Biellier said she heard the voice of the Holy Spirit telling her, “You were born to support this man.”

She gave $2,000 for the plane, and recently sent $1,800 for the team’s latest project: buying high-definition television equipment to upgrade the ministry’s international broadcasts.

I almost feel sorry for these poor, dumb crackers...


Tags: prosperity gospel, fundie follies, kenneth and gloria copeland are douchebags

The Obligatory Heath Care Post

mr. olio and I took a nice little vacation up the coast. No computers, no cell phones, no work—it was lovely. We walked on the beach and flew kites every day and read books and ate like horses every night—good times! When we got back I had another appointment with the retina specialist and got some very good news: I won’t need a fourth injection for a while, if ever.

I’m lucky in that I have insurance, but so far I’ve had to wait for over a month each time for the insurance company to authorize my treatments—and while I'm waiting for authorization I always expect to be turned down because I’ve exceeded some arbitrary limit. Oh: And they won’t even pay for the drug, I have to! And I’d be screwed if I ever lost my job and either needed to purchase my own policy or to get insurance through another employer, because then I’d be blacklisted on account of my “pre-existing condition.”

So whenever I hear politicians say “socialized medicine” means delays in treatment or compromised care, I think to myself, “That sounds exactly like what I’ve got right now, minus the premiums, co-pays, and nagging insecurity!”

Tags: universal health care, socialized medicine

Goodbye...

...you ignorant, bloodthirsty piece of shit.

“Hello?...Tony? Pootie?....anybody there?”


Tags: goodbye, george w bush, goodbye george w bush, rat bastard, goodbye george w bush you rat bastard, smug, goodbye george w bush you smug rat bastard, half-witted, goodbye george w bush you smug half-witted rat bastard

Déjà vu

All over again:

[T]he fortunes of the bottom 50 percent of Americans are worsening, with that group earning 12.8 percent of all income in 2005, down from 13.4 percent the year before, the paper said.

[. . .]

[W]hile the IRS data goes back only to 1986, academic research suggests that the last time wealthy Americans had such a high percentage of the national income pie was in the 1920s.

Hmm…the 1920s, you say? The decade that began in the grip of the red scare? When anti-immigrant sentiments were high and the Ku Klux Klan was resurgent? The decade that brought us the infamous Scopes Monkey trial?

Oh. That sounds about right..

Tags: us economy, class warfare

Bush v Krugman

One says the economy is “fine”; the other sees things a little differently.

Good News!

According the WaPo, weekly wages have fallen for three years in a row, “reflecting higher inflation, the modest pace of pay increases and the impact of rising health insurance costs on take-home pay.” Clearly, the president’s fiscal policies are designed to make sure we can all get to heaven.

Yeah, But…

Himself, during the SOTU: “I urge the Congress to act responsibly, and make the tax cuts permanent.”

So where is this $439.3 billion going to come from, exactly?

Bonus: Scroll down in the link above to see this little gem:

“‘Now in the fifth year of this global war, the ideas and proposals in this document are provided as a roadmap for change, leading to victory,’ said Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld…”

Hey. . .did he just admit that his “ideas and proposals” from the first four years were a total cluster-fuck?