Sarah Palin

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“Old Man Trump Knows Just How Much Racial Hate He Stirred Up”

January 21, 2016 in Excerpts, Politics | Permalink

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It’s not all bad news for Track Palin in the wake of his domestic violence charges. The Yankees just offered him a contract.

After Sarah Palin’s asinine attempt yesterday to blame President Obama for her son’s recent arrest, it made me wonder if Obama was also responsible for Track’s alleged legal problems from a decade ago, before he enlisted. The Palin boy must have been suffering from (PTSD) Pre-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

In the usual perplexing Palin fashion, she accused Obama of “not supporting the troops” as she was endorsing Donald Trump, the only national American politician in memory to actually demean the troops. How perfect.

More Trump news: In an excellent Gawker post by Will Kaufman, the writer dug through the Woody Guthrie Archives to find documents about the songwriter’s painful period in the 1950s living in a Beach Haven building owned by the Trump paterfamilias, Fred. It speaks to a real-estate empire built, in part, on racism.

An excerpt:

‘Old Man Trump’s’ color line

Only a year into his Beach Haven residency, Guthrie – himself a veteran – was already lamenting the bigotry that pervaded his new, lily-white neighborhood, which he’d taken to calling “Bitch Havens.”

In his notebooks, he conjured up a scenario of smashing the color line to transform the Trump complex into a diverse cornucopia, with “a face of every bright color laffing and joshing in these old darkly weeperish empty shadowed windows.” He imagined himself calling out in Whitman-esque free verse to the “negro girl yonder that walks along against this headwind / holding onto her purse and her fur coat”:

I welcome you here to live. I welcome you and your man both here to Beach Haven to love in any ways you please and to have some kind of a decent place to get pregnant in and to have your kids raised up in. I’m yelling out my own welcome to you.

For Guthrie, Fred Trump came to personify all the viciousness of the racist codes that continued to put decent housing – both public and private – out of reach for so many of his fellow citizens:

I suppose
Old Man Trump knows
Just how much
Racial Hate
he stirred up
In the bloodpot of human hearts
When he drawed
That color line
Here at his
Eighteen hundred family project ….

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“Her Embrace Of Mr. Trump Also Has A Biblical Subtext”

January 20, 2016 in Excerpts, Politics | Permalink

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Sarah Palin’s halting, incoherent endorsement speech for Donald Trump is the sort of thing that usually comes from the mouth of a nativist stroke victim, a fan of medicines or an imbecile. Sometimes all three at the same time.

It’s amusing that Palin, who’s always pretended to be a great supporter of American troops and has repeatedly excoriated President Obama, even today, for not showing them enough respect (though he always does), is now an ardent advocate of the only national American politician in recent memory (ever?) to mock our service people. What makes it worse is Trump, who requested multiple military deferments and has never seen a bunker that wasn’t on a golf course, ridiculed the extreme sacrifice of the very person, John McCain, who made Palin’s ascendency possible.

From Edward Luce at the Financial Times:

To chants of “USA, USA”, America’s best known hockey Mom briefly stole the limelight during the 2008 election before embarking on a career as a conservative entertainer. Her 2016 comeback, which she kicked off with an endorsement of Donald Trump on Tuesday, may turn out the same. Should Mr Trump becomes the next US president, Ms Palin could be his secretary of energy (as he has promised). Failing that, she will return to her life in Alaska as a fading social media star.

Yet her embrace of Mr Trump also has a biblical subtext. Ms Palin was John the Baptist to Mr Trump’s Jesus. Years before Mr Trump trashed conventional wisdom by boosting his poll numbers with gaffes, Ms Palin had patented that style of campaigning. The more tongue-tied Ms Palin seemed, the more intensely her supporters backed her. The more the media mocked her, the more her fanbase exulted. Mr Trump has elevated that approach into an art form. In an age when knowledge is a mark of elitism, ignorance is power. It is also great marketing.

During the 2008 campaign, Ms Palin famously could not think of a single newspaper title she read. She also failed to recall the name of a founding father. Likewise, she was pilloried for citing Alaska’s proximity to Russia as evidence of her foreign policy credentials. The more derision Ms Palin suffered, the greater her heartland appeal. This is how Ms Palin’s “teachers, and teamsters, and cops and cooks, and stay-at-home Moms,” also felt. Mr Trump has collected Ms Palin’s hockey puck and skated on with it. When he betrayed ignorance of the “nuclear triad” in a recent debate, experts were floored. How could someone auditioning to be commander-in-chief be unaware of America’s three nuclear delivery platforms? Mr Trump’s admission did him no harm. His supporters knew how it felt to be the butt of liberal sneering.

Ms Palin’s endorsement also highlights a lesser known breach — that between “movement” conservatives who tend to be more ideological and generally back Ted Cruz in Iowa, and Mr Trump’s more populist fan base.•

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“Belt Buckles Really Pretty Much Don’t Stop Stabbing”

November 9, 2015 in Excerpts, Politics | Permalink

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Considering the poll numbers of Donald Trump and Ben Carson, we all owe Sarah Palin an apology, don’t you think? 

You remember Sarah Palin, right? She was a bear-meat peddler who briefly governed the petro-socialist state of Alaska. I think she once hired a hit man to kill a rival cheerleader. Okay, I’m not sure about that part. That might have been the plot of a Lifetime movie I watched once in an airport lounge. But it still brings her to mind, doesn’t it?

I can still recall those halcyon days of 2008 when a Sarah Palin took the stage at the Republican National Convention and won the hearts and minds of those white Americans who were waiting for a spiteful poseur to express their grievances in a pre-Duck Duasty version of a Maoist “Speak Bitterness” meeting. Scrutiny did not become her, however, and Palin was eventually voted off the island due to her sheer idiocy and meanness, exiled to Elba or Arizona or somewhere. Now she’s merely a hologram of hate, activated occasionally in her camera-filled basement.

Those standards of basic competency, decency and honesty are longer with us less than a decade later, so on behalf of everyone, I’ll offer a mea culpa: Sorry, you horrible person, that you aren’t the dangerously unprepared nutbag to capture the imagination of white nationalist half-wits this time around. Take solace in knowing that this year’s models and their overt bigotry have served to redeem you from the absolute worst to almost the absolute worst, the way you once managed to make Dan Quayle seem interchangeable with Thomas Jefferson. You wore your simple mind on your sleeve but at least not on your hat.

From Eric Bradner’s CNN report on the GOP campaign, a modern story of belt buckles and pharaohs:

[Trump] said he hopes Carson “comes out great” from the scrutiny.

But Trump also implied that Carson’s story about attempting to stab someone in his youth — only to have his knife broken when he hit a large belt buckle — was hard to believe.

“Belt buckles really pretty much don’t stop stabbing,” Trump said. “They turn, they twist, things slide off them — pretty lucky if that happened.”

Trump said Carson’s description of his childhood temper as “pathological” is disturbing.

“It’s a serious statement when you say you have a pathological disease, because if I understand it, you can’t really cure it,” Trump said.

Speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation” Sunday morning, Trump also cited Carson’s belief that the pyramids were built to store grain as another reason to question his judgment.

“So, you’re talking about storing grain in the pyramids. Well, they have very little space. They have space for small rooms, where the pharaohs had their coffins and where the pharaohs were buried, essentially,” Trump told host John Dickerson. “So, a lot of — a lot of things are going on. And I don’t know. I just don’t know what to think. I hope it — I hope it works out fine for Ben. I just don’t know what to think.”•

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“Here’s My Question… What Changed?”

January 29, 2015 in Excerpts, Politics | Permalink

I’ll always remember what that staunch supporter or meritocracy Charles Murray replied when asked by the New York Times Magazine in 2008 about a certain Wasilla-based Republican:

NYT: What do you think of Sarah Palin? Charles Murray: I’m in love. Truly and deeply in love.

All because she stood up at a convention and read a speech someone else wrote that was full of lies. Can you imagine if the Obamas had behaved like the Palins for the past six years, what odious theories Murray would have espoused? 

At the Daily Beast, Matt Lewis, apparently the last person in America to get the memo that even staunch conservatives have long disdained the adult baby who (briefly) governed Alaska, belatedly announces the love affair is over. You don’t say? It’s a perplexing missive from deep inside an echo chamber. The opening:

Has conservative genuflection at the altar of Sarah Palin finally come to a halt?

In case you missed it, her speech in Iowa this week was not well received on the right. The Washington Examiner’s Byron York called it a “long, rambling, and at times barely coherent speech” and National Review’s Charles C.W. Cooke said she slipped into self-parody. And there’s more. The Examiner’s Eddie Scarry, for example, contacted several conservative bloggers who were once Palin fans, but have since moved on.

But here’s my question… what changed?

Yes, in 2008, Sarah Palin delivered one of the finest convention speeches I’ve ever heard (trust me, I was there), but she hasn’t exactly been channeling Winston Churchill ever since. Remember her big speech at CPAC a couple of years ago? You know, the one where she took a swig out of a Big Gulp and said of her husband Todd: “He’s got the rifle, I got the rack.” Not exactly a great moment in political rhetoric.

So why is anyone surprised when, this weekend, she said: “‘The Man,’ can only ride ya when your back is bent?”

Demosthenes, she is not, but there’s nothing new about Palin’s penchant for populism or lowbrow rhetoric. What does feel new is that she has finally gotten around to roundly losing conservative opinion leaders. (OK, this has been a long time coming. In 2011, Conor Friedersdorf noted that the hard right was skewering Palin, and that Kathleen Parker had been vindicated. And as recently as this past April, I wondered whether it was finally safe for conservatives to criticize her publicly. But it does feel like we have finally reached a tipping point where criticizing Palin isn’t only acceptable for conservative opinion leaders, it’s now almost expected.)•

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“We’re Experiencing The Best Year In Our History”

January 5, 2015 in Excerpts, Politics, Science/Tech, Urban Studies, Videos | Permalink

You get the feeling sometimes that people with money aren’t necessarily very good at economics, or perhaps their politics are more informed by ego and privilege than reality. The U.S. economy does not have to be a zero-sum game as some seem to think.

From death panels to massive layoffs to runaway inflation, many threats have been leveled at President Obama’s policies, particularly during the 2012 election, by the Romneys, Palins, Trumps, Fiorinas, Wynns and Welchs of the world. From a Hamilton Nolan Gawker post about Westgate Resorts CEO David Siegel, who said he’d be forced to fire all his employees if Obama was reelected:

“Siegel—also known for being the subject of the documentary The Queen of Versailles about his doomed attempt to build himself and his wife America’s largest house—did not end up firing everyone directly after Obama won the election. But what about now, two years later? The pernicious effects of Obama’s socialistic policies have had ample time to take hold. What horrible fate has now been visited upon Siegel’s employees after the Obama administration has see to it that he is thoroughly ‘taxed to death,’ as Siegel warned in his letter?

In October, Siegel raised his company’s minimum pay to $10 an hour. ‘We’re experiencing the best year in our history,’ Siegel said.”

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2 Sarah Palin Reactions To Free Speech

December 22, 2013 in Politics, Urban Studies | Permalink

I don’t have to tell you that Sarah Palin is a liar, a hypocrite and a fool, but I will. Her reaction about Martin Bashir being fired by MSNBC for his comments about her followed by her response to Phil Robertson’s suspension by A&E for his comments about gay people.

“It was refreshing to see though, that many in the media did come out and say, ‘Look our standards have got to be higher than this’,” Palin said this morning on Fox News Channel‘s Fox & Friends. “Those with that platform, with a microphone, a camera in their face, they have to have some more responsibility taken.”

“It was refreshing to see though, that many in the media did come out and say, ‘Look our standards have got to be higher than this.’ Those with that platform, with a microphone, a camera in their face, they have to have some more responsibility taken.”

"Free speech is an endangered species. Those 'intolerants' hatin’ and taking on the Duck Dynasty patriarch for voicing his personal opinion are taking on all of us."

“Free speech is an endangered species. Those ‘intolerants’ hatin’ and taking on the Duck Dynasty patriarch for voicing his personal opinion are taking on all of us.”

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About Recent Examples Of Delusional Behavior

July 31, 2012 in Misc. | Permalink

Dick Cheney: Unqualified, unprofessional, unrepentant.

Ego is blinding, and none of us are immune. But life allows some examples to be writ large.

  • Dick Cheney said this weekend that Sarah Palin wasn’t qualified to be Vice President, and who can argue? A few people in powerful positions in the media seem to think they can still make a buck off her obnoxious idiocy, though they’re pretty much alone at this point. But you know who else wasn’t prepared for the job? Dick Cheney. Because of his arrogant incompetence, thousands of our soldiers and tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of Iraqi civilians died. Yet he goes around smugly believing he’s an incredibly accomplished person, free to judge the qualifications of others. Cheney is still the textbook example of why you hire a person, not a résumé.
  • Mayor Mike Bloomberg wants to keep New Yorkers from drinking extra-large sodas, but he has said little or nothing about declaring war on toxic Wall Street products. He would probably assert that he is capable of legislating against the former but not the latter, but that argument doesn’t wash. As owner of Bloomberg News and mayor of America’s finance center, he should have been a relentless advocate for cleaning up Wall Street. Since the financial sector cratered our economy, he’s been largely silent about white-collar criminals, reducing himself to a highly selective technocrat who is oblivious to things that make him personally uncomfortable. I guess you can’t expect much more from someone who circumvented the free vote of the people and made a handshake deal with another billionaire behind closed doors to enable a third term for himself.
  • Mitt Romney thinks himself a good and moral person, but how can someone believe that while working to take health insurance away from more than 30 millions at-risk Americans? It doesn’t add up. If he gets his way, people who wouldn’t have died will die.
  • Sad to hear about Jonah Lehrer’s complete unraveling at the New Yorker. He’s obviously a bright and gifted person, but one with deep flaws of a seemingly pathological nature. I hope he figures out the bad stuff and can proceed with the good, though he needs to permanently step away from journalism. I always pause when people are lavishly rewarded at a young age, before they’ve had a chance to fail and struggle. The praise can freeze still-developing people in time, encouraging their gifts but also their flaws. Why change and grow when their behavior has led them to great heights so quickly? It seems dangerous to grant approval before time has been able to complete the growth (and vetting) process.•

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“Do You Think The Pakistani Government Is Protecting Al Qaeda Within Its Borders?”

May 20, 2011 in Politics, Videos | Permalink

During her final broadcast as anchor of the CBS Evening News, Katie Couric takes one more righteous jab at Sarah Palin. At the 2:00 mark.

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Shocker: Donald Trump Shaves Bo The Dog, Burns Down White House

April 20, 2011 in Fake, Humor | Permalink

 

Donald Trump: Using the Republican Party the same way he used Marla Maples. (Image by Michele Sandberg.)

That orange-headed fuckface Donald Trump upped the ante early today in his fake run for the Presidency, bringing his ridiculous unilateral feud with President Obama directly to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Trump sneaked onto the lawn and took an electric razor to First Dog Bo, shaving profanities into his coat, and set fire to the White House, burning to the ground what the homely narcissist dubbed “that old, unclassy dump.”

“I can’t prove that Obama wasn’t born in America if I don’t desecrate his Portuguese Water Dog,” said Trump, as he stood near the charred remains of the Lincoln bedroom. “I’m a very smart man. I went to the best schools. I got very good grades. I know what I’m doing.”

Because President Obama is aloof the way many Kenyans are, he ignored the fire and refused to confront his make-believe rival. That won’t stop Trump, though. He is going forward with a round of debates without Obama, hiring the homeless man with the golden voice Ted Williams as a suitable stand-in for the incumbent. The debate will be moderated by Trump’s fellow NBC celebrity, Guy Fieri, who is both stupid and useful.

Tracking polls are showing that Trump is already drawing strong support from gigantic assholes across the country. Now he can probably add to his constituency arsonists and people who own dogs with the word “cocksucker” etched into their back. Still, it won’t be easy to win the Republican nomination with strong competition from Sarah Palin, the other lady who’s even crazier than Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney, Haley Barbour and Brett Favre’s penis. They’re all equally qualified to run the country. But Republicans are just happy to have a candidate who makes Newt Gingrich look morally upstanding by comparison, even though Trump is actually more liberal than Obama on almost every issue.

For their part, NBC executives love the free publicity that Trump brought the network by burning down the White House, and are only disappointed that he didn’t also defecate into the lap of the Lincoln Memorial.

“Apprentice has nearly doubled its ratings from last season and is now averaging almost 8 million viewers an episode,” said one network exec, pulling his head out of his ass long enough to speak. “It’s one of the very few shows we have that is in the zeitgeist and gets those kinds of numbers. So, we certainly want him back. And we’d also like to develop a sitcom for that cocksucker dog.”

Trump is either using his fake Presidential run to boost his ratings and fame by being an even a bigger whore than usual, or perhaps he’s having a complete mental breakdown as the result of suddenly realizing that he’s spent his life renting wives and somehow losing money on casinos.

Whatever the reason, Trump has vowed that when he becomes President he will build a new White House, which won’t be white but gold, and he will install in each bedroom a slot machine and an Eastern European model who swallows. The new building, it can be sure, will look like a huge bag of shit.•

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At The Very Least, Grandma Ain’t Helping Matters

January 9, 2011 in Politics | Permalink

March 22, 2010: Sarah Palin–“Commonsense Conservatives & lovers of America: ‘Don’t Retreat, Instead – RELOAD!’ Pls see my Facebook page.”


March 25, 2010: Rep. Gabrielle Giffords–“We’re on Sarah Palin’s targeted list, but the thing is that the way that she has it depicted has the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district, and when people do that, they’ve gotta realize there are consequences to that action.”

January 8, 2011: Rep. Gabrielle Giffords shot in Tucson rampage; federal judge killed.

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Shocker: Sarah Palin Murders, Effs A Caribou

December 7, 2010 in Fake, Humor | Permalink

Uses guns to compensate for small penis. (Image by Therealbs.)

Just a couple of weeks after clubbing a fish to death on her reality TV show, Sarah Palin attempted to demonstrate her superiority over yet another species when she shot and murdered a caribou. If you’ve followed Sarah Palin closely, you can tell that she’s very insecure because the average member of the reindeer family is brighter than she is and more qualified to be President of the United States. In order to mask her fears, Sarah Palin uses firearms to demonstrate that she is a member of the superior race.

After needing just 43 shots to kill the caribou, Sarah Palin opened its chest with a bowie knife and drank some of its blood. She smeared the rest of the blood on her chest and face like war paint. Then she lowered her trousers and straddled the dead reindeer and violated it repeatedly.

In addition to her utter stupidity, another thing that bothers Sarah Palin is that she has a pretty small penis. I mean, it’s big for a woman, but it’s still not very big. While her ding-dong may be tiny, it’s still functional and worked fine as she humped the newly murdered deer. Bristol stood by and watched proudly as her mom penetrated the slaughtered animal, but she did not participate for fear that she would become pregnant with the child of a dead caribou.

Fuck you, Snowflake Jr. You’re next.

For her part, Sarah Palin tried to preempt any criticism she would receive about the episode with a post on her blog. “Unless you’ve never worn leather shoes, sat upon a leather couch or eaten a piece of meat, save your condemnation of tonight’s episode,” she wrote. “I remain proudly intolerant of the hypocrisy of those who would oppose the fucking of dead livestock.”

After she was done doing the deed with the dead deer, Sarah Palin strutted around bottomless for a while and ordered her lackeys to tell her that her cock is very gigantic. Then she waved her johnson all around and took a leak in a pond to remind nature that it is her bitch. Sarah Palin hasn’t decided what kind of animal she wants to kill and fuck next, but it will probably be a lamb. Their meat tastes good and they’re kind of plush and sexy.

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Shocker: The Pope Getting All Crunk And Nasty

November 21, 2010 in Fake, Humor | Permalink

Pope Benedict XVI: Works blue. (Image by Rvin88.)

Many people were stunned to learn that Pope Benedict XVI justified condom use for male prostitutes with AIDS in a recent interview. It’s the first time the Vatican has ever acknowledged that there’s a circumstance when condoms are acceptable. Some pundits think this may be a sign that the Catholic Church is showing progress when it comes to sexuality, but based on some other statements he made, it seems that the Pope may have just been effed up like Charles Barkley during the Q&A. Here are some more comments from the Pope about other times it’s okay to use condoms:

When Boning Sarah Or Bristol:
“These two get pregnant if you sneeze on them. Even Octomom snickers. You might even want to double-bag it, or you could find yourself on the Levi Johnston Election Committee. And now that she’s constantly prancing around in the great outdoors pretending to like nature for the reality show cameras, Governor Snooki is especially horned up.”

When Fisting A Porn Star Outside Of Marriage:
“This is an instance where you need latex gloves instead of condoms, but we’re still talking rubber. Listen, if you marry the porn star, you can go raw fist. But if this is, say, a one-off thing at a Halloween party, you need to wrap that hand. I recommend Rubbermaid, but anything with a latex base will suffice.”

When Having Butt Sex With A Midget:
“If we’re talking, like, under four feet tall or something like that, then you need to use a lubed-up sack for comfort’s sake. I’m not suggesting that butthole size is completely determined by height, but let’s err on the side of caution in this matter.”

When Watching Tiger Woods Golf:
“You can’t be too careful. He’s like Caligula with a 3-iron.”

When Being Counseled By A Catholic Priest:
“Do you not read the papers?”

More Fake Stuff:

 

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“Sarah Palin As Nominee Is Up A Few Points…Although I Do Not See Why”

November 4, 2010 in Excerpts, Politics | Permalink

Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour: Desperate to be President. (Image by George Armstrong.)

Economist Tyler Cowen analyzes Tuesday’s election results pretty well on his blog. An excerpt:

“Just 32% of the Tea Party candidates won; admittedly that figure should be adjusted by the rate of incumbency (a lot of Tea Party candidates were challengers).  In any case, there was not a Tea Party tidal wave.  Sarah Palin as nominee is up a few points on InTrade.com, although I do not see why.  Haley Barbour is also up and Chris Christie is down considerably (why?).  Given that the Democrats did better than expected in the Senate, Obama’s reelection chances look better now than they did a week ago.  The Republican strategy is not dominating in broad constituency, MSM-reported, ‘lots of scrutiny’ races, even with an abysmal economy and a not so popular health care bill.  My mental model of Obama is that he will cut deals with the Republicans, even on (mostly) their terms, if indeed any deal is on the table.  I would be pleased if critics of the Obama presidency would indicate their managerial background and expertise, yet few do.  How many of them could manage a team of ten people with any success?”

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Decoder: Recent Comments From Critics Of The So-Called Ground Zero Mosque

August 19, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Sarah Palin: Dr. Laura's wingwoman. (Image by David Shankbone.)

Sarah Palin tweet: Mr. President, why are they so set on marking an area w/ mosque steps from what you described, in agreement with many, as “hallowed ground”?

Decoder: It’s amusing that I suddenly think New York has hallowed ground. Since gaining national recognition, I’ve made it clear time and again that I have only disdain for New York City, that I think it’s less American than other places in the country. But the second it became politically expedient to think New York City contains hallowed ground, I was happy to play my cards from that end of the deck.

Sarah Palin: Nobody argues that the freedom of religion that the Muslims have [permits them] to build that mosque somewhere.

Decoder: Yes, the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion “somewhere.” Maybe in Trenton or someplace like that. Secaucus–that’s a good place for religious freedom.

Newt Gingrich: You know, Nazis don’t have the right to put up a sign next to the Holocaust Museum in Washington. We would never accept the Japanese putting up a site next to Pearl Harbor. There’s no reason for us to accept a mosque next to the World Trade Center.

Decoder: I’ve just compared Muslim-Americans who haven’t broken any laws to Nazis. Abridging the rights of Muslim-Americans today because we are at war with Al-Qaeda is no different in principle than Japanese-Americans being denied rights during WWII.

Terrorists want you to eat this delicious, delicious sandwich.

Newt Gingrich: America is experiencing an Islamist cultural-political offensive designed to undermine and destroy our civilization.

Decoder: Some guy just opened a falafel stand not four miles from where I live. It’s like Pearl Harbor with chickpeas.

Rep. Peter King: There are too many mosques in America.

Decoder: I have already tried to say this comment was taken out of context, but the unedited video makes it clear that it wasn’t. I am a sad and prejudiced man.

President Obama: I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding. That’s what our country is about.

Decoder: I was being more honest and accurate when I said, “Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country. And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances. This is America. And our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable.” But then some Democrats who are running for reelection this fall gave Rahm Emmanuel an earful, so I had to backtrack somewhat. I should stick to defending the Constitution.

More Decoders:


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Decoder: Republicans Campaign To Extend The Bush Tax Cuts For The Wealthy

August 12, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Sarah Palin: Recently outwitted by a salmon. (Image byTherealbs2002.)

Sarah Palin: You don’t take money from the private sector and grow government with it and that’s exactly what Obama has in mind with this expiration of Bush tax cuts proposal of his. His commitment to let previous tax cuts expire will lead to even fewer job opportunities for Americans.

Decoder: If these tax cuts for the wealthy, which have been around for nearly ten years, are so good at creating jobs, why has job creation declined during that time? Before they existed, during the Clinton years, job creation was much better.

Sarah Palin: [Letting the Bush tax cuts expire] is going to result in the largest tax increase in U.S. history and again it’s idiotic and my palm isn’t large enough to write all my notes down on what this tax increase will result in. [I’ve written on my hand that it will raise taxes] 3.8 trillion over the next ten years so I didn’t say 3.7 trillion and get dinged by the liberals saying I didn’t know what I was talking about.

Decoder: Of course, the liberals could say that I’m a lying, resentment-filled jackass who has a cheat sheet written on her hand like a small child.

Sarah Palin: [The more] job creators are taxed, the fewer dollars they have to reinvest in their own businesses and hire more people the worse it is for more Americans.

Decoder: Most of the people who will lose these tax cuts for the wealthy aren’t job creators, they’re bankers and brokers. If you give bankers and brokers extra spending money, most of the jobs they will create are in the cocaine and prostitution sectors.

Bush tax cuts: Creating jobs. (Image by Tomas Castelazo.)

John McCain: I think the worst thing we can do to the American people during these tough economic times is raise taxes which is what the effect of the expiration of the Bush tax cuts would be.

Decoder: But this is what I said about these same Bush tax cuts in 2001: “I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us at the expense of middle-class Americans who need tax relief.”

Senator Mitch MocConnell: The only way you narrow the deficit is to get the private sector moving again.

Decoder: Or you could let the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy expire. That would reduce the deficit by roughly 30%. That would work, too.

Rep. John Boehner: The only way we’re going to get our economy going again and solve our budget problems is to get the economy moving.

Decoder: I was supposed to say the same thing as Mitch McConnell, but I’m such a moron I can’t even deliver rehearsed lines.

Rep. John Boehner: What we have to do is we have to get our arms around the spending spree that’s going on in Washington, D.C.

Decoder: Like, for instance, tax cuts for wealthy people.

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Decoder: Sarah Palin Defends The Tea Party Against Charges Of Racism From The NAACP

July 16, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Sarah Palin: Community organizers deserve to be mocked by a celebrity loudmouth. (Image by Tricia Ward.)

Sarah Palin: I am saddened by the NAACP’s claim that patriotic Americans who stand up for the United States of America’s Constitutional rights are somehow “racists.”

Decoder: It’s merely a coincidence that a group of white citizens discovered that there is corruption in Washington at the very second that the first African-American President took office. And the Birther movement, which I’ve encouraged, that states Obama isn’t a U.S. citizen has nothing to do with seeing him as illegitimate because of his race.

Sarah Palin: This is some typical divisive politics that is so absolutely unnecessary.

Decoder: Everything I do is about being divisive. When I stood up at the Republican National Convention and mocked young people who work as community organizers, trying to bring some hope to our poorest communities, that was divisive. When I tried to sidetrack health-care reform with the death-panel nonsense, that was divisive. When I told tea Party members to “don’t retreat, reload,” I was being divisive.

Sarah Palin: The Tea Party Movement is a beautiful movement, full of diverse people.

Decoder: Some of the white Tea Party members are tall and some not as tall.

With liberty and justice for all. (Image by dbking.)

Sarah Palin: Both Todd and I were raised to measure a person according to their capacity and willingness to love, work, forgive, contribute, and show good character.

Decoder: But I outgrew that stuff and became a resentment-driven, lying, accusatory selfish creep.

Sarah Palin: I know how Tea Party Americans feel to be falsely accused

Decoder: I was once accused of not being a complete tool. False.

Sarah Palin: [The Tea Party is made up of] folks of all walks of life who, for the most part, happen to oppose President Obama’s policies. Not the color of his skin. They don’t care that he’s half-white or half-black.

Decoder: They don’t care about the half-white part.

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Decoder: Sarah Palin’s Recent Comments About Arizona’s Immigration Law And The Gulf Oil Spill

June 1, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Sarah Palin: Spill, baby, spill. (Image by David Shankbone.)

Sarah Palin: We’re all Arizonans now.

Decoder: No wonder why it’s so fucking hot outside today. I was just thinking that it was like an Arizona desert out there. I’m sweating my balls off. I’ve got the ceiling fan going, but I’m probably going to have to turn on the A.C.

Sarah Palin: There has been a great deal of misinformation out there about Arizona’s effort to address the consequences of illegal immigration.

Decoder: I should know since I’ve been spreading a lot of that misinformation. It’s similar to when I claimed that I was the one who put a stop to the “Bridge to Nowhere” when I was Alaska Governor. That was complete bullshit.

Sarah Palin: The rest of the world is watching what’s going on in Arizona.

We're all sweating like Arizonans now. (Image by Tallguy1982.)

Decoder: Malta is fascinated and Andorra is transfixed. Seriously, I will not stop until I have completely marginalized and ruined the Republican Party. And there is seemingly no one in the GOP with the gumption to stand up to blather from me and Glenn Beck the way Obama stood up against the the drumbeat of war prior to the invasion of Iraq. That’s the Republican who could be an architect for rebuilding the party.

Sarah Palin: Government can and must play an appropriate role [in the Gulf oil disaster]. If a company was lax in its prevention practices, it must be held accountable. It is inexcusable for any oil company to not invest in preventative measures. They must be held accountable or the public will forever distrust the industry.

Decoder: Wouldn’t it make more sense if the government regulated the industry beforehand so they we could avoid disasters rather than holding them accountable afterwards? Oh, that’s right. I’ve spent the last couple of years screaming that government must deregulate all industries and labeling anyone who disagrees as a socialist.

Sarah Palin: I repeat the slogan “drill here, drill now” not out of naivete or disregard for the tragic consequences of oil spills….I continue to believe in it because increased domestic oil production will make us a more secure, prosperous, and peaceful nation.

Decoder: Actually, the idiotic slogan I used during the election was “drill, baby, drill.” I am trying to distance myself from that phrase in wake of the Gulf disaster because it makes me sound more foolish than ever. But the word “baby” has never seemed more appropriate.

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Decoder: Sarah Palin And Bill O’Reilly Discuss The National Day Of Prayer Controversy

May 11, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Sarah Palin: "Unalienable" right to be loud and stupid. (Image by Tricia Ward.)

Sarah Palin: You can just go to the early documents of our Founding Fathers and see how they crafted a Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. They knew our unalienable rights don’t come from man, they come from God.

Decoder: Perhaps if I had actually read these documents, I would know that it’s “inalienable” rights.

Sarah Palin: I think we should just kind of keep this clean, keep it simple. It’s pretty simple.

Decoder: I’m pretty simple.

Sarah Palin: Go back to what our Founders and founding documents meant–they’re quite clear we would create law based on the God of the bible and the Ten Commandments.

Decoder: God must have thought that slavery should be legal and women shouldn’t have the vote. Or maybe those documents were drawn up not by God but by really smart but really fallible men.

Sarah Palin: I have said all along that America is based on Judeo-Christian beliefs.

Decoder: Certainly the Founding Fathers who had Judeo-Christian beliefs were informed by them, but they didn’t think this was a country specifically designed for people with any particular religious beliefs. And the Founders were pretty aware of the dangers of blurring the lines between church and state.

Sarah Palin: It’s ironic that here on National Day of Prayer, there is so much controversy about whether or not we’re a nation built on Judeo-Christian beliefs and whether or not we can even talk about God in the public square.

Deocder: I mostly use the public square to mock community organizers who try to help the poorest people and give them hope. Jesus would have crotch-punched these losers.

Bill O'Reilly: Screamed God's name a lot during phone sex.

Bill O’Reilly: On the National Day of Prayer, you can pray to a tree.

Decoder: God is completely okay with my phone sex habit.

Sarah Palin: Well that new kind of world view that I think is a kind of step toward the fundamental transformation in America that some want to see today it is an attempt to rewrite and revisit history.

Decoder: Like when I tried to rewrite history and claim that I opposed the Bridge to Nowhere project in Alaska.

Bill O’Reilly: America has transformed a great deal since 1776 and it’s a much more secular society.

Decoder: That woman who sued me for sexual harrassment said that I bragged about owning a vibrator shaped like a cock.

Sarah Palin: Margaret Thatcher and other foreign leaders think that America is so great and exceptional because we base our laws on God of the Bible, the Old and the New Testament.

Decoder: If I had read the Declaration of Independence, I would know that America doesn’t have to try to impress the British. Also: Making laws based on the Bible would lead to huge amounts of bloodshed and suffering.

Bill O’Reilly: We can only trust in God in our own homes, but we once we got outside, we can’t.

Decoder:  I have a hands-free device so I can talk and masturbate at the same time.

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Decoder: Sean Hannity And Sarah Palin Discuss Arizona’s Immigration Law And Other Matters

April 29, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Sarah Palin: Hunted for that fur at Neiman Marcus.

Sean Hannity: Now if protesters actually sat down to read the [Arizona immigration] law they would find that racial profiling is explicitly prohibited.

Decoder: Seems odd then that so many ultraconservatives–Karl Rove among them–think the law is unconstitutional.

Sarah Palin: And shame on the lamestream media again for turning this (Arizona immigration law) into something that it is not.

Decoder: Like when I tried to turn health-care reform into an argument about “death panels.”

Sarah Palin: I wish that our President would stand so strong and proud under one Constitution reminding America that we are all one America. We are all in this together. And instead of dividing, according to demographic or race or gender.

Decoder: I spent most of the Presidential campaign trying to appeal to what I called “the real America,” which was incredibly divisive.

Sarah Palin: We rattle them when we talk to these liberal elites about what it is that most Americans believe in.

Decoder: Oh, and that sounds pretty divisive, too.

Sean Hannity: Equipment manager for the lacrosse team.

Sean Hannity: You know, look, I watched with fascination and almost bewilderment, the attacks on the Tea Party Movement. Look, I’ve experienced a lot of this throughout my career. I — look, I’m on the air four hours a day, I can take it but to attack citizens that are just expressing that they think government is too big, our debt is out of control, and we’re on the wrong path on national security, seems bewildering to me.

Decoder: I am bewildered because I’m ignoring the racist overtones, the violence-laced language and the people comparing Obama to Hitler.

Sarah Palin: Yes, the President is looking for cover to allow him to break yet another campaign promise that he would not increase taxes.

Decoder: Although he actually seems to have stuck to all of his campaign promises so far. And my hero, Ronald Reagan, who explicitly promised “no new taxes,” raised them six times.

Sarah Palin: I’m sick and tired of hearing about Obama and the White House coming out with yet another crisis that has to be fixed by government, sticking it to the people and taking more of what we earn and produce.

Decoder: Middle-class taxes are at near-historic lows.

Sarah Palin: They’re, you know, community organizers. They’ve been spending other people’s money for so long that I think a lot of the free-enterprise principles that so many of us believe in, it’s all foreign to them.

Decoder: I will continue to mock people who help poor communities. I want them to feel a great sense of shame for trying to bring some hope to downtrodden neighborhoods. They deserve abuse from a highly paid celebrity loudmouth like me.

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Decoder: Sarah Palin’s Comments During April

April 17, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Intelligence at historically low levels. (Photo by Tricia Ward.)

Sarah Palin: Is this what their “change” is all about? I want to tell ’em, nah, we’ll keep clinging to our Constitution and our guns and religion.

Decoder: Because Jesus loved guns, especially assault rifles. He would shoot you in the head and use your skin to fashion a rucksack.

Sarah Palin: How’s that hopey, changey stuff working out?

Decoder: Oh, pretty good? You mean you like middle-class tax cuts, health-care reform, stem-cell research, the Lilly Ledbetter Act and a President who can pronounce the word “nuclear”? I didn’t realize those things would be popular.

Sarah Palin: We need to cut taxes so that our families can keep more of what they earn and produce, and our mom-and-pops, then, our small businesses, can reinvest according to our own priorities, and hire more people and let the private sector grow and thrive and prosper.

Decoder: Middle-class tax rates are near historically low levels.

Sarah Palin: Do you love your freedom?

Decoder: The freedom to ignore me. The freedom to realize that incoherent resentment has no purchase on leadership. The freedom to know that I will never, ever be President because I’m wholly unqualified.

Sarah Palin: Now, the President, with all the vast nuclear experience that he acquired as a community organizer, as a part-time senator, and as a full-time candidate, all that experience, still no accomplishment to date with North Korea and Iran.

Decoder: I love making fun of community organizers. Remember when I stood up at the Republican National Convention and ridiculed Obama for being a 22-year-old who dedicated three years of his life to working for Catholic charities? I want to make sure that young people who want to help others will be ashamed of themselves.

Sarah Palin: Don’t retreat, reload!

Decoder: Freud was really wrong about women having penis envy, except when it comes to me.

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Decoder: Sarah Palin’s Recent Comments At The John McCain Reelection Rally And Other Venues

March 28, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Gun violence is a subtle metaphor for encouraging voting.

Sarah Palin: Nobody gave us a Teleprompter this time around. I had to write my notes on my hand again.

Decoder: Every time I try to make an obviously intelligent person like Obama seem stupid, I end up revealing how dumb I am. Maybe I should realize that I’m in no position to question anyone else’s intelligence.

Sarah Palin: I couldn’t wait to get some of the McCain-Palin team back together again.

Decoder: Some of them but not most of them. Most of them thought I was unfit and unintelligent.

Sarah Palin: John McCain is leading the party of ideas.

Decoder: Like his idea that Republicans should no longer cooperate with Obama on any issue, even issues they actually agree on. That way the whole country can be spited.

Sarah Palin: We know violence isn’t the answer. When we talk about taking up our arms, we’re talking about our vote.

Decoder: I’ve purposely not made that clear in the past. I’ve said it in a way that sends a mixed message of gun violence to the crazier elements of the crowd.

Sarah Palin: When I talk about it’s not a time to retreat, it’s a time to reload, I was trying to inspire people to get involved in their local elections and these upcoming federal elections.

Decoder: I wasn’t actually encouraging gun violence; I just wanted it to sound that way.

Sarah Palin: [Don’t believe] this BS coming from the lamestream media.

Decoder: They accurately reported that I put rifle scope targets on a map of Democratic representatives on my Facebook page. They also dared to report facts about Tea Party members using racial and homophobic slurs and spitting on congresspersons they didn’t agree with.

Sarah Palin: This is just the beginning of our efforts to take back our country.

Decoder: We must take back our country from a non-white guy who’s worked really hard to educate himself and achieve. He dares to govern after being chosen by a majority of Americans in a free election.

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Decoder: Mitt Romney’s Recent Remarks On “Larry King Live”

March 25, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

Larry King: I forgot my suspenders at Duke Zeibert's.

Mitt Romney:
Some elements in the bill are good and many are bad. And the Democrats want to talk about the couple of maraschino cherries that are on top of the pile of dirt. But let’s talk, also, about the pile of dirt.

Decoder: Every time I look at you, Larry, I think of a pile of dirt. Usually it is being shoveled on top of a coffin.

Mitt Romney: Health care is no longer going to be the purview of states and individuals and families.

Decoder: Or the blood-sucking, money-grubbing health-care industry.

Mitt Romney: What I am is a defender of the truth.

Decoder: Like a Mormon Superman.

Mitt Romney: [Sarah Palin] is an energetic, positive force in the Republican party, a leader in our party, and having a positive impact on bringing out a lot of folks that were in the silent majority.

Decoder: They’re actually an annoyingly loud minority. But I like her because she isn’t actually going to run for President because then she’d be exposed as a fringe candidate, a Ron Paul in a dress.

Mitt Romney: I think [the Tea Party] is a good thing. I think it’s a good thing to see people becoming more involved in the political process.

Mitt Romney: Great hair and fungible politics.

Decoder: I used to be a basically decent guy if no rocket scientist. But I am now prepared to say anything and pander to anyone to become President. I’ve flipped my opinions on abortion and health-care reform with the casual ease of someone with no integrity.

Mitt Romney: But overall, the Tea Party movement is about reasonable men and women who are very concerned about the excessive growth of government.

Decoder: Yes, they’re the reasonable bigots.

Mitt Romney: I think my party’s basic core philosophy is much more attuned to [the Tea Party] than that of the Democratic party.

Decoder: We don’t have any non-white members, either.

Mitt Romney: [John McCain] is one of those guys that’s able to move things and make things happen.

Decoder: Except if you need someone to produce a steady stream of urine. He can’t make that happen.

Mitt Romney: I know some people say, gee, your Massachusetts health care plan isn’t conservative. I say oh, yes it is.

Decoder: Oh, no it isn’t.

Mitt Romney: [Running for President in 2012] is not a decision I have made yet.

Decoder: Of course I’m running. Do your think I’d be willing to stare at your reptilian face without a payoff?

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Decoder: Sarah Palin’s Keynote Address At The Tea Party Convention

February 7, 2010 in Humor, Politics | Permalink

This is a party of the people--working-class people who will pay me $100k for a speech. Ka-ching!

Sarah Palin: I look forward to attending more Tea Party events in the near future. It is just so inspiring to see real people.

Decoder: Real white people, that is. Real racist white people who aren’t really good spellers and who are resentful about having an African-American President.

Sarah Palin: Now, in many ways, Scott Brown represents what this beautiful movement is all about. You know, he was just a guy with a truck and a passion to serve our country.

Decoder: A guy without pants. A guy who did bottomless stuff. A guy who let it flap in the breeze. Also: Pointing out that he owned a truck makes it look like I’m connecting to working-class people, when I’m collecting $100K for a speech.

Sarah Palin: The Tea Party movement is not a top-down operation. This is about the people, and it’s bigger than any king or queen of a Tea Party. And it’s a lot bigger than any charismatic guy with a Teleprompter.

Decoder: But not bigger than a charismatic woman with notes scribbled on her hand.

Sarah Palin: The stakes are too high right now, and your voice is too important. So work hard for these candidates, but put your faith in ideas.

Decoder: Or vague buzzwords and catchphrases that have no real meaning.

Sarah Palin: Because that’s not how radical Islamic extremists are looking at this. They know we’re at war. And to win that war, we need a commander-in-chief, not a professor of law standing at the lecturn!

Decoder: I don’t like professors, with their gotcha questions. They were always giving me bad grades at all five of the colleges I attended.

Sarah Palin: And you know, it’s no wonder that our President only spent about nine percent of his State of the Union Address discussing national security and foreign policy, because there aren’t a whole lot of victories that he could talk about that night.

Decoder: He hasn’t started any cool wars yet.

Sarah Palin: Just like you…probably just so tired of hearing the talk talk talk…Tired of hearing the talk!

Decoder: Although I can’t shut my resentful piehole for five minutes.

Sarah Palin: We need clear foreign policy that stands with the people and for democracy—one that reflects both our values and our interests, and it is in our best interest, because democracies—they don’t go to war with each other. They can settle their differences peacefully.

Decoder: Actually, democracies do go to war with each other. I am a complete fucking idiot–a complete fucking idiot with a $100K check in my pocket!

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Urban (And Rural) Studies: Smalltown America And Brain Drain

January 3, 2010 in Misc., Politics | Permalink

I am angry because my people, the whites, have been oppressed for too long!

Soft-headed demagogues like Sarah Palin try to draw a divide between American small towns and urban centers during election season, but similar problems plague both segments of our society: education, drugs, poverty, health care, etc. I came across The Rural Brain Drain, a smart article by married sociologists Patrick J. Carr and Maria J. Kefalas in a September Chronicle Review that articulately addresses how both the city mouse and the country mouse often end up in the same trap.–though, yes, the problems are more dire in small towns. They also offer some common-sense solutions. An excerpt:

“The Harvard University sociologist William Julius Wilson famously describes how deindustrialization, joblessness, middle-class flight, depopulation, and global market shifts gave rise to the urban hyper-ghettos of the 1970s, and the same forces are now afflicting the nation’s countryside. The differences are just in the details. In urban centers, young men with NBA jerseys sling dime bags from vacant buildings, while in small towns, drug dealers wearing Nascar T-shirts, living in trailer parks, sell and use meth. Young girls in the countryside who become mothers before finishing high school share stories of lost adolescence and despair that differ little from the ones their urban sisters might tell.”

Read the full article.

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Sarah Palin May Finally Be Wrong About Something

December 3, 2009 in Misc., Politics | Permalink

ME WANT PIZZA!

ME WANT PIZZA!

Everyone hates a know-it-all. The kind of person who has the answer for everything and makes the rest of us feel like baboons. Sarah Palin is such a person. She excelled at all 12 colleges she attended, continually moving on in pursuit of greater intellectual challenges. Brainiac. But I think I finally caught her at something less than 100 percent accuracy. No, I swear.

On a recent Fox News appearance, Palin said the following to into the petrified rock that is Greta Van Susteren’s head:

“There’s been a lack of acknowledgment by our president in understanding what it is that the American military provides in terms of, obviously, the safety, the security of our country. I want him to acknowledge the sacrifices that these individual men and women — our sons, our daughters, our moms, our dads, our brothers and sisters — are providing this country to keep us safe.”

Well, smarty pants, you may have whiffed on this one.

  • Obama praises troops for progress in Iraq.
  • Obama praises troops during surprise visit to Iraq.
  • Obama visits wounded U.S. troops in Germany.
  • Obama praises troops bravery after base attack.
  • Obama visits wounded soldiers at Walter Reed.
  • Obama honors fallen soldiers.
  • Obama praises military during visit to a Florida naval base.

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