STUDY SHOWS GOOD GUN HUGGERS ARE WORTHLESS AS TITS ON A BULL WHEN ATTEMPTING TO INVOKE SELF DEFENSE

You’ve heard the bullshit a million times: “The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” The only problem, it turns out, is that being a “good guy” isn’t good enough.

A new study by researchers at Mount St. Mary’s University shows that proper training and the ability to know how and when to apply lethal force is essential to not only “stopping a bad guy” but not killing yourself and other innocent bystanders. As Christopher Ingraham of The Washington Post reports:

Researchers recruited 77 volunteers with varying levels of firearm experience and training, and had each of them participate in simulations of three different scenarios using the firearms training simulator at the Prince George’s County Police Department in Maryland…

They found that, perhaps unsurprisingly, people without firearms training performed poorly in the scenarios. They didn’t take cover. They didn’t attempt to issue commands to their assailants. Their trigger fingers were either too itchy — they shot innocent bystanders or unarmed people, or not itchy enough — they didn’t shoot armed assailants until they were already being shot at

The study, it should be noted, was funded by a gun reform advocacy group National Gun Victims Action Council, and the sample size of 77 is rather small but the findings are significant and confirm what even the NRA says — more training goes a long way in preventing accidents in the event of emergencies. The researchers released some interesting video showing the difference between how trained professionals respond to crises and how the average Joe does.





The National Gun Victims Action Council considers itself a moderate gun control group advocating for “sane gun control”. They believe the first step to more sane control is requiring training for handgun ownership just as we currently do for the operation of cars and other heavy machinery.



The NRA, for its part, categorically opposes such measures.


[h/t Washington Post]




NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

We Took Turns Fucking A Replica of Reagan’s Eye Socket

Jon Stewart opened The Daily Show on Wednesday by addressing the media furor over his “secret” meetings with President Barack Obama, while mocking Fox News and Politico for hyping the encounters.

“It was a roundtable meeting with the President, Elvis — still alive — Minister [Louis] Farrakhan, and the Area 51 alien,” Stewart quipped. “We opened with the traditional Saul Alinsky prayer, sucked on the blood of the righteous, and took turns fucking a replica of the Reagan eye socket. The real Reagan eye socket is kept in the Smithsonian and is only fucked on Christmas.”

While Politico misidentified Stewart’s executive producer, Steve Bodow, as “Scott Budow,” Stewart said, Fox went out of its way to describe the meetings as Stewart being “summoned” clandestinely, despite the host’s visits being recorded on the official White House logs.

“Something is not a secret just because you don’t know about it,” Stewart chided, saying he agreed to meet with Obama because “If the president tells you to and you don’t, who the f*ck knows what would happen?”

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook,Daily Show Video Archive

In reality, the host said, his discussions with Obama played out not unlike his final interview with the president last week: spending the majority of the time arguing over issues like the Affordable Care Act website or the Veterans Affairs Bureau over salmon dishes.

Stewart did confess that, during his tenure leading the show, he had been approached by individuals ranging from “tech giants, to financial captains, to Billy Joel,” all basically asking, “Jon, why are you such an assshole?” — and the meetings with Obama were no different. Among those people, he noted, was Fox News chief Roger Ailes.

“In fact, in my entire tenure here of being yelled at by some very influential and powerful individuals — and Billy Joel — only with one of those people has a phone call ever ended with, ‘This conversation never happened, and if you say it did, I’ll deny it.’ And it wasn’t the fucking president,'” he said, while looking toward a graphic representing Ailes.





NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

JIMMY KIMMEL SLAMS DENTIST LION KILLER

Jimmy Kimmel took aim at the Minnesota dentist who illegally killed Cecil the lion near a national park in Zimbabwe.

The ABC talk show host said Walter Palmer, who owns a dental practice in Bloomington, had quickly become “the most hated man in America who never advertised Jello pudding.”

Kimmel wondered how a person could kill such a beautiful creature as Cecil, who was known for his apparent ease around humans.

“Is it that difficult for you to get an erection, that you need to kill things that are stronger than you?” he said. “If that’s the case, they have a pill for that.”

Kimmel said he wasn’t opposed to hunting on principle, but he said Palmer’s actions were disgusting.

“If you’re some asshole dentist who wants a lion’s head over the fireplace in his man cave so his douchebag buddies can gather around it and drink scotch and tell him how awesome he is, that’s just vomitous,” he said.

Kimmel showed photos of Palmer posing beside many other animals he had slain, including at least one illegal hunt, and said the dentist had “killed half of Noah’s ark.”

He teared up as he urged viewers to turn the lion’s senseless death into something positive by donating to the wildlife conservation group that had been tracking Cecil.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

GEORGIA WHITE FOLK RATCHET UP HATE AND STUPID

Witnesses at a birthday party in Douglasville, Georgia over the weekend said that festivities were interrupted when men waving Confederate flags threatened them and used racial slurs.

Cell phone video obtained by the Atlanta Journal Constitution shows police officers holding back people attending a birthday party as white men in trucks with Confederate flags and other flags drive by yelling at them.

“This is a child’s birthday party!” one woman shouts back.

According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the woman who posted the video on Facebook said that the men were armed and were on her property. She said that they threatened to “kill y’all n****rs.”





“I don’t mind them riding with their flags but I don’t want them going around threaten[ing] people in their yard like they did mine or harassing folks either,” the woman explained in her Facebook post.

Douglasville Police Chief Chris Womack told the paper that his department would release details about the incident later on Monday.



NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

VIRGINIA’S OWN KEN CUCCINELLI – STILL AN IDIOT

TEA-BAGGER CUCCINELLI STILL LIVING IN A CAVE

Former Virginia Tea bagger andAttorney General Ken Cuccinelli argued on Sunday that many Americans objected to the “Black Lives Matter” movement because it suggested that the lives of black people mattered more than whites and other races.

CNN political contributor Bakari Sellers explained during a panel discussion that the “Black Live Matter” movement had become a hot topic in the Democratic presidential primary because the lives of so many black people had ended during confrontations with police officers.

“You have African-Americans who literally do not get the benefit of their humanity,” he pointed out. “And that’s a problem. You know, in my next interaction — I’m the only person at this table whose next interaction [with law enforcement] may cause them to be a hashtag.”

“And that’s something that we feel, that’s a very deep pain,” Sellers said.

Cuccinelli argued that it was important to add the word “too” to the end of the “Black Lives Matter” slogan.

“Adding t-o-o at the end puts it in a context that makes sense,” the former Virginia attorney general insisted.

“But it’s implicit though,” Sellers noted.

“Well, you may say that,” Cuccinelli replied. “And there’s plenty of reason to understand that. But I don’t think every American hears it that way. They hear, ‘Here we are, yes we have this political motivation that we’re separating out this one category of Americans and saying they matter more than everybody else.’ That’s actually what a lot of people see.”

“We’re saying stop killing us,” Sellers remarked. “We’re saying, my life matters.” 

“I understand that, but that’s why you have the retort,” Cuccinelli opined. 

“No, all lives matter. We’re not leaving these out.”

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

TEA BAGGER TELLS STATE TO IGNORE ROE V WADE

“The federal courts don’t have the authority to make us kill babies,” according to Oklahoma Republican Party Chairman Randy Brogdon. “Are the Supreme Court justices going to come down to Oklahoma and make us stop?”

Brogdon, a former state senator who once called for Oklahoma to form its own militia separate from that National Guard — and who previously cast doubt upon the Pledge of Allegiance because he objects to the line “one nation, indivisible” — offered his interpretation of the Supreme Court’s lawful authority on Friday. One day earlier, he signed a fundraising email making a similar pitch. “As Chairman of the Oklahoma Republican Party, I call on the Governor and legislators to completely end the practice of abortion in Oklahoma,” Brogdon wrote in that email, adding that the state should “[s]hut Planned Parenthood down immediately for their illegal actions, and prosecute the abortion doctors who violate their oath to ‘do no harm.'”

The party chairman’s call to simply ignore court decisions protecting reproductive choice seeks to escalate many of his fellow Republicans’ attacks on legal abortion. Other states, however, have already gone so far in restricting abortion that it’s not clear that Brogdon’s proposal is as much of an escalation as it immediately appears to be.

Mississippi, for example, passed a law that, if upheld by the Supreme Court, will close the state’s last abortion clinic. A similar Texas law seeks to shut down many of the clinics in that state by imposing expensive obligations on clinics and difficult-to-obtain credentialing requirements on doctors who perform abortions. North Dakota enacted a law that could effectively ban abortion six weeks into pregnancy (a federal appeals court recently struck that law down, albeit reluctantly).

These laws, especially the Mississippi and Texas ones, place a premium on the cleverness of abortion’s opponents. These two states passed what amount to sham health laws — laws that appear, on the surface, to be intended to protect women’s health but which actually do little more than limit access to abortion. As one federal judge explained, “there is no rational relationship between improved patient outcomes” and the additional burden the Texas law places on abortion doctors.

Brogdon’s preferred tactic, by contrast, appears to be attacking abortion with a blunt object. He’s not looking for a clever workaround to what remains of Roe v. Wade, he just wants to outright ban abortion and prosecute doctors who perform it.

In the process, Brogdon also appears willing to openly defy court orders protecting reproductive freedom. It would be a major escalation in tactics if a state chose to openly defy the courts. It could also lead to a potentially dangerous struggle between the states and the federal government.

If Oklahoma were to “prosecute the abortion doctors,” as Brogdon suggests, the first question would be whether Oklahoma’s state courts would be willing to go along with this tactic — and whether a jury would be willing to convict based on a law that would almost certainly be struck down by federal courts. Assuming that the state courts did play along, the lawfulness of this conviction would ultimately be decided by the Supreme Court — or, barring that, by a lower federal court upon a petition for a writ of habeas corpus.

The events that would follow, if Oklahoma refused to obey a federal court order commanding them to release the incarcerated physician, could resemble a miniature Civil War. The doctor would remain physically in the state’s custody, most likely in a state prison guarded by state employees. Yet, while Brogdon is correct that the Supreme Court justices themselves wouldn’t “come down to Oklahoma and make us stop,” the federal government is fully capable of mustering superior force against a state that openly defies a court order. Just ask former Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus.

Nevertheless, such a standoff may be acceptable to Brogdon, with his doubts that the United States is, indeed, “one nation, indivisible.

[Cross posted from thinkprogress]

NFTOS 

STAFF WRITER

“LEARN TO SPEAK ENGLISH YOU FUCKING GARBAGE”

….Says New Yorker To MTA employee.

Not much to add except to say, “Holy Fuck, this woman is a first rate racist.” If this was the New York Post comment section it would came to life and started targeting public sector employees.

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

THOSE “GOOD GUYS WITH GUNS” ARE NEVER AROUND WHEN YOU NEED THEM

A bad guy with a gun opened fire at a movie theater in Lafayette, Louisiana on Thursday night. As of this writing, two of his victims are dead and at least seven others are wounded. No good guy with a gun rose from the audience to fell the lone gunman as he pumped bullet after bullet into the innocent crowd. The man concluded his rampage by turning his handgun on himself and taking his own life.

Louisiana, the state where this occurred, has some of the weakest — if not the weakest — gun laws in the nation. To give just one example, Louisiana recently enacted an NRA-backed state constitutional amendment providing that “the right of each citizen to keep and bear arms is fundamental and shall not be infringed,” and that “any restriction on this right” will be met with maximal skepticism by the states’ courts. The amendment also stripped out language permitting the state legislature to “prohibit the carrying of weapons concealed on a person.”

Similarly, Louisiana does not require gun dealers to obtain a state license. It does not limit the number of guns that may be purchased at one time. It forbids local governments from regulating firearms. And it has no laws restricting assault weapons or .50 caliber rifles. One study of all 50 states’ gun laws concluded that Louisiana has the laxest gun laws of any state.

The National Rifle Association claims that this absence of gun regulation is a good thing, in part, because it enables armed vigilantes to gun down murderers like the man who perpetrated the shooting in Lafayette. But the high rates of gun violence in Louisiana cut strongly against this conclusion. A 2013 report by the Center for American Progress examined all 50 states according to 10 factors related to gun violence. Louisiana received the worst rating of any state on several of these factors, including overall firearm deaths from 2001-2010, firearm homicides in 2010, and firearm homicides among women from 2001-2010. The report also rated Louisiana the worst state overall when all 10 factors were aggregated.

Nor is Louisiana, with its lax gun laws and high rates of gun violence, an outlier. To the contrary, the report concluded that “the 10 states with the weakest gun laws collectively have a level of gun violence that is more than twice as high — 104 percent higher — than the 10 states with the strongest gun laws.”

[Cross-posted from thinkprorgess]

NFTOS

STAFF WRITER

MEET JOE MASCIA

A candidate running for the Buffalo Common Council has refused to end his campaign after he was caught on tape using the N-word to describe black leaders.

In an audio recording obtained by The Buffalo News, Joseph A. Mascia can be heard complaining to a former employee about Mayor Byron Brown, Council President Darius Pridgen, Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples-Stokes, and Dawn Sanders-Garrett, who was Mascia’s boss at at the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority.

During the one-minute profanity-laced recording, Mascia manages to use the N-word eight times.

“The f*cking n*****s, man,” he tells the employee as the recording ends. “Once they get in power, forget about it. Forget it. They want it all.”

On Wednesday, Mayor Brown called on Mascia to step down as resident commissioner of the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority

“I have been made aware of the existence of a tape that allegedly contains statements that are unacceptable and inflammatory by any standard,” Brown said. “Clearly, if Mr. Mascia can’t deny making these statements, he should immediately resign his elected position as a commissioner of the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority.”

Mascia’s opponent, incumbent Fillmore Council Member David A. Franczyk, called the remarks “atrocious and vile.”

“It sounds like language in the 1860s old South,” Franczyk observed. “It’s pretty scary stuff.”

Mascia insisted to WGRZ that he would not resign his position at the Housing Authority, and said in a statement that he would not suspend his campaign.

“The statement was totally out of character,” Mascia wrote in an email apology. “I have deep regard and respect for the individuals mentioned in the recording and apologize to them personally and profusely. It is my hope that they will accept my sincerest apologies and forgive me for my weakness in that moment.”

“Regardless of my frustration at the time, there is no excuse for the language that I used. I will continue to fight for neighborhoods that have been neglected and people who have been ignored,” he continued. “I have no intention of interrupting my progressive, inclusive vision for our city and the Fillmore district. As always, I will make myself available to the community to discuss this or any other issue related to the Fillmore district or my candidacy.”

Mascia is the Erie County Conservative Party’s endorsed candidate for the Buffalo Common Council candidate. He has also entered a three-way Democratic Party primary for the post.

Joe Mascia, you are today's worst person of the word, congrats numbnuts! 

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

“I WILL LIGHT YOU UP”!

Newly released dashcam footage shows Sandra Bland's arrest before she was found dead in jail.

Justified? You be the judge.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

“PROJECTILE VOMIT OF DICKISHNESS”

TRUMP SPEWING "PROJECTILE VOMIT OF DICKISHNESS"

Jon Stewart returned to The Daily Show on Monday to scoff at Republicans who are suddenly willing to distance themselves from Donald Trump — but only after he bad-mouthed one of their own in Arizona Sen. John McCain.

“The only reason you like this guy in the first place is because of the terrible things he was willing to say about Obama,” he said. “But Trump has no control over the projectile vomit of dickishness that comes out of his mouth every time he opens it. It was inevitable some of his word puke was gonna get on you.”

The GOP should have known better, Stewart said, because the party had been down the same road in 2008 with Sarah Palin and her “Wasilla word salad.”

“Once you cast a spell and bring an Internet comment to life, it no longer belongs to you,” he explained. “Only this time, the chatroom troll emoji you’ve conjured has $10 billion of its own money.”

The Daily Show
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook,Daily Show Video Archive

Stewart also shot down Trump’s claim that he actually reversed course immediately after saying McCain was “not a war hero.” In fact, the host pointed out, Trump said, “He’s a war hero because he got captured.”

He also laughed off Trump’s complaining to NBC News that while “his hair is fine,” nobody comes to his defense when people make fun of his hair.

“First things first: your hair’s not fine,” Stewart said. “I agree, making fun of someone’s physical appearance is a cheap blow. But that hair? That is comedy entrapment. People are not attacking your hair — they are defending themselves from something that appears like it’s about to attack them.”

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

“TRUMPS DOUCHEBAGGERY”

Liberal Fox News contributor Jehmu Greene encouraged Republicans to “own up to the fact” that GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump’s “douchebaggery” reflected the base that had controlled the party for the past seven years.

After Sen. John McCain criticized Trump’s supporters as “crazies,” Trump fired back at a forum on Saturday by taking a shot at his war hero status.

Although Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol had praised Trump after he recently called Mexicans rapists, the magazine’s online editor told Fox News on Sunday that the candidate had gone too far by questioning McCain’s military service.

“It’s probably the beginning of the end for Donald Trump,” Daniel Halper explained, pointing out that Republicans did not like “the questioning of war heroes.”

“I hoped that it was the beginning of the end when he first dipped his toe in the waters,” Jehmu Greene responded. “Because this is just a continuation of his douchebaggery and has been accepted for so long that finally they’ve come to their senses because, I guess, he has now finally crossed the line. But he crossed many lines quite some time ago.”

At that point Halper tried to shift the conversation to activists who recently shouted down Democratic candidate Martin O’Malley after they perceived that he downplayed the “Black Lives Matter” movement by saying “white lives matter.”

Greene called that a “perfect line of distraction and deflection… when you have the person who is leading in the polls saying things about our military men and women that is so offensive and still not wanting to own up to the fact that in the Fox News poll he was at the top just last week.”

“What is going on in the Republican Party?” Greene continued. “What does it take for you all to take your party back from the crazies that have had control of it for about seven years now?”

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

FUCKFACE VON CLOWNSTICK [DONALD TRUMP] BECOMING A COMPLETE ASSHOLE

DONALD TRUMP CAMPAIGN PHOTO

AMES, IA — Each time Republican presidential candidate "Fuckface Von Clownstick" aka Donald Trump is given a public platform, he manages to offend even more Americans. On Saturday morning he took aim at Sen. John McCain and veterans, saying McCain is “not a war hero” because he was captured during the Vietnam War.

“He’s a war hero cause he was captured,” Fuckface Von Clownstick said during the Family Leadership Summit. “I like people that weren’t captured.”

Clownstick later told press that he would not apologize to McCain and that McCain picked the fight. The two have been feuding since McCain said that Trump is “firing up the crazies” after people gathered in Arizona to support the candidate who called immigrants from Mexico “rapists.”

McCain endured five and a half years as prisoner of war after he was shot down over Hanoi and badly injured — two of those years were spent in solitary confinement.

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

YO, ALL YOU HATERS AND BASHERS OF CAITLYN JENNER

ARMY SPECIALIST JOEY VINCENTE

Among the many barbs and accusations being flung at Caitlyn Jenner in the wake of her winning an Arthur Ashe Award is that military personnel are more deserving of awards for courage and valor than the former Olympian.

Buzzfeed reported on a response to those criticisms by U.S. Army behavioral health specialist Joey Vicente, posted a moving message to his Facebook wall in support of Jenner.

Vicente wrote:

Your negative opinions on Caitlyn Jenner and her deservedness of an award that you didn’t even know about until a few days ago are irrelevant.
Your definition of what or who a hero can or cannot be is irrelevant. 

40% of the transgender community have attempted suicide. What if I told you that her speech last night saved even one human being from attempting to take their life. I’d call that a victory on any scale. I’d call that (gasp)… heroic? 

You don’t like that a female who used to identify as male got an award at a ceremony run by ESPN? Here’s a hint: get over yourself. You are on the wrong side of history. Like many bigots of the civil rights era, you will one day have to answer for your hate, whether it is to your God, a loved one, or your few hundred Facebook friends that you think give the slightest bit of a shit about what kind of sandwich you ate or what kind of workout you got in today. 

You want to voice your opinion? Please, I beg that you do. But in using terms like “freak” or “faggot” you paint a much more vivid picture of yourself than you ever could of Caitlyn Jenner, a human being just now finally finding her comfort zone.

Vicente told BuzzFeed News that he posted the message because he wanted people to be more considerate about what they post to social media.

“Bigotry in any form is unacceptable and I guess I was just fed up with seeing people’s offensive remarks about a person they know nothing about,” he said.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

JUDGE RELEASES VIDEO OF POLICE SHOOTING UNARMED MAN

One federal judge thinks the taxpayers of Gardena, CA deserve to see the video of police officers opening fire on three innocent people, killing one. With the city getting ready to pay $4.7 million to the family of Ricardo Diaz-Zeferino, an unarmed man shot for putting down his hands, Judge Stephen V. Wilson believes the defendants should not be able to hide from their deadly mistakes.

During an investigation of a stolen bike in 2013, officers interrogated Ricardo Diaz-Zeferino — who was looking for his brother’s bike — and two of his friends. In the recently disclosed dash cam video, officers yell at the three men to raise their hands. After holding his hands above his head, Diaz-Zeferino lifts his hat, drops his hands, and tries to pull up his pants. Then he is shot eight times by three officers, who claimed they feared the man was armed. Eutiquio Acevedo Mendez was also shot once but survived the shooting.



The District Attorney later ruled the shooting was justified, although the City of Gardena consented to paying the family of Diaz-Zeferino $4.7 million. But the Gardena Police Department and city officials kept the dash cam footage sealed, arguing the video’s circulation could lead to pre-judgment of the officers. On Tuesday, Wilson wrote that the city could not withhold the video on those grounds.

“The fact that they spent the city’s money, presumably derived from taxes, only strengthens the public’s interest in seeing the videos,” Wilson wrote in a lengthy decision. “Moreover, defendants cannot assert a valid compelling interest in sealing the videos to cover up any wrongdoing on their part or to shield themselves from embarrassment.”

The federal appeals court issued an emergency stay pending appeal, but not before the Los Angeles Times obtained and circulated the footage.

Aside from the video itself, Wilson’s point about taxpayer money is relevant, given the number of police shootings and brutality incidents that occur every year. Though it’s extremely rare for an officer to face consequences, city governments dish out large sums of money to settle civil rights suits. On Monday, New York City agreed to pay the family of Eric Garner $5.9 million. But settlement money does not come from the officers involved or their departments. Most do not pay a dime. Instead, taxpayers foot the bill.

NFTOS

STAFF WRITER

HEY MERICA, THERE IS ONLY ONE AMERICAN FLAG!

JOHNNY CASH




It’s always great to see this countries “special patriots”; you know the ones, the guy with old 1980’s Chevy S 10 pickup truck with four confederate battle flags hanging high off the bed of the rusted ole jalopy, the flags rattling in the breeze as he drives the highways. The guy with the John Deere baseball cap with the bill of that hat laden with chewing tobacco juice, - who also is also dawning the two toned grease monkey shirt with his name sewn on so he doesn’t forget who he is.

The guy who never had the balls to really stand up for his country, dawn a uniform, stand a hill, and fight for the true American flag, the guy who’s ancestors never fought the civil war, but yet has the hard on for the confederate battle flag. Of course you’ve seen him, his ilk is everywhere.

I leave you “special Patriots “with the words to an old Johnny Cash tune:


RAGGED OLD FLAG


I walked through a county courthouse square

On a park bench an old man was sitting there

I said, "Your old courthouse is kinda run down"


He said, "No, it'll do for our little town"

I said, "Your old flagpole has leaned a little bit

And that's a Ragged Old Flag you got hanging on it"


He said, "Have a seat," and I sat down

"Is this the first time you've been to our little town?"

I said, "I think it is" He said, "I don't like to brag

But we're kinda proud of that Ragged Old Flag


You see, we got a little hole in that flag there when

Washington took it across the Delaware

And it got powder-burned the night Francis Scott Key

Sat watching it, writing 'Say Can You See'


And it got a bad rip in New Orleans

With Packingham and Jackson tuggin' at its seams

And it almost fell at the Alamo

Beside the Texas flag, but she waved on though


She got cut with a sword at Chancellorsville

And she got cut again at Shiloh Hill

There was Robert E. Lee, Beauregard, and Bragg

And the south wind blew hard on that Ragged Old Flag


On Flanders Field in World War I

She got a big hole from a Bertha gun

She turned blood red in World War II

She hung limp and low by the time it was through


She was in Korea and Vietnam

She went where she was sent by her Uncle Sam

She waved from our ships upon the briny foam

And now they've about quit waving her back here at home


In her own good land here she's been abused

She's been burned, dishonored, denied, and refused

And the government for which she stands

Is scandalized throughout the land


And she's getting threadbare and she's wearing thin

But she's in good shape for the shape she's in

'Cause she's been through the fire before

And I believe she can take a whole lot more


So we raise her up every morning, we take her down every night

We don't let her touch the ground and we fold her up right

On second thought, I do like to brag

'Cause I'm mighty proud of the Ragged Old Flag

History, heritage you say? There is only flag that has remained tall and proud through it all, and that is the American flag, not the battle flag of the confederacy.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

FOOD STAMP RECIPIENTS ARE LIKE WILD ANIMALS

The Republican Party of Oklahoma has decided that it would be a good idea to compare Americans who are on Food Stamps to wild animals.

So the Oklahoma GOP shared the following on their Facebook page, apparently not realizing that everyone in the world would then be able to see it:

Modern day Conservatives, about as Christian as the beast himself.






NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

“WE’RE HERE AS EMISSARIES FOR CHRIST”

A North Carolina teabagger told a religious gathering that his “primary mission” as a congressman was to promote the Gospel of Christ.

Rep. Robert Pittenger appeared last week alongside Reps. Trent Franks (R-AZ) and Louie Gohmert at the weeklong “Celebrate America” revival meeting in Washington, D.C., reported Right Wing Watch.

“The most important message that needs to be heard in this city is the Gospel and love of Christ,” Pittenger said. “This transforms lives.”

The congressman said he understood that recent “court rulings and unsettledness” had been painful to American Christians, but he urged them to promote their religious views to political rivals.

“I don’t hold fault with those who believe different from me – they just don’t know my savior,” Pittenger said. “They don’t know the one who loved me and gave himself for me.”

Pittenger said his chief priority as an elected official was to promote Christianity to voters and other lawmakers.

“That’s my primary mission as a member of Congress,” he said. “Yes, to serve my constituents, to serve my region, and my state, and my country — but we’re here as emissaries for Christ.”

The lawmaker drew gasps and then some delayed – but light – applause when he told the gathering that God loved President Barack Obama.


“God is working his heart, because we’re praying for him that he would know the love of Christ,” Pittenger said. “It transforms everything. It transforms everything we do and think and believe. I don’t care what issue that we work on in public policy and legislation, it all comes down to the reality of Christ.”

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

TRUMP TOP TEN LIST

Saying he was “glad to be out of the house” a retired and now bearded David Letterman was a surprise guest at a Steve Martin and Martin Short show at San Antonio’s Majestic Theater Friday night, saying Donald Trumps’s entry in the 2016 Presidential race made him realize he retired too early.

“I was complacent, I was satisfied, I was content, and then a couple of days ago Donald Trump said he was running for president,” Letterman said, pausing a beat to add. “I have made the biggest mistake of my life, I tell you.”

Letterman then proceeded to tick off one of his famous Top 10 lists, listing ten “interesting” facts about the bombastic businessman.

A selection includes, “That thing on his head was the gopher in Caddyshack,” and “Donald Trump weighs 240 pounds, 250 with cologne.”

Number one on the list?

“Thanks to Donald Trump, the Republican mascot now is also an ass.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

HE'S GONNA DO WHAT?

At a speech before the National Right to Life Committee’s annual convention in New Orleans Friday morning, 2016 Republican presidential hopeful Sen. Marco Rubio compared the fight to limit women’s access to abortion to the fights to end slavery and for women to win the right to vote.

Right Wing Watch reported that Rubio called the historic Roe v. Wade decision “historically and egregiously flawed” and said that he would fight to restrict women’s right to choose “at home and around the world.”

“Sometimes in contemporary American life, we come to believe that all the great causes are over, that the past generation fought all the important battles: abolition, the Civil Rights Movement, women’s suffrage,” he said to the assembled crowd.

“But it’s not true,” he said. “In fact, one of the most important battles is the one that you are engaged in now.”

NFTOS
STAFF WRITER

JUST HOW DID THIS IDIOT GET A WEAPON

Dylann Roof, the man accused of killing nine people at an historic black church in South Carolina, was able to purchase a gun — despite the fact that a background check should have prevented him from doing so. Shortly after this news became public, early reporting relied upon in a previous draft of this post indicated that Roof obtained a gun because “data was not properly entered in federal criminal justice computer systems.” The implication was that he may have managed to arm himself with a murder weapon because of a clerical error. In reality, however, the failure in the background check system stems from a more systemic problem.

According to a statement by FBI Director James Comey, Roof obtained the gun he allegedly used in the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church murders due to a rule that permits gun dealers to transfer firearms under certain circumstances even if a background check on the person seeking to buy the gun has not been completed. As Comey explains, “under federal law, a Federal Firearms Licensee must submit biographical information about a potential purchaser to [the National Instant Criminal ann RooBackground Check System], and NICS has three business days to perform a background check and clear or deny the purchase.” If the background check is not completed within three days, however, the gun dealer “has the discretion to proceed with the transaction.”

In this case, Roof attempted to purchase a firearm on April 11, a Saturday. The federal employee began the background check on April 13, which was the next business day after Roof attempted to buy a gun. According to Comey, the federal examiner’s “initial check of Roof’s criminal history showed that he had been arrested in South Carolina March 1 on a felony drug charge.” but “[t]his charge alone is not enough to deny proceeding with the transaction.” Thus, the examiner continued to investigate whether Roof was, in fact, ineligible to buy a gun.

On Thursday, April 16, the examiner had not yet completed the background check. Had she possessed all the information about this case, she would have known that “Roof admitted he was in possession of drugs,” and this fact would have been sufficient to deny him permission to buy the gun. Because the examiner did not have this information on April 16, however, “the case was still listed as ‘status pending,’ so the gun dealer exercised its lawful discretion and transferred the gun to Dylann Roof.”

Though it is impossible to know whether Roof would have obtained a gun through different means if he’d been prevented from making this particular purchase, it is possible that the nine people allegedly killed by Roof would be alive today if the examiner had been able to prevent the sale from happening until after she’d completed Roof’s background check. Instead, because the current legal standard prioritizes speed over completed background checks, Roof was able to obtain the gun he attempted to purchase on April 11.

[h/t thinkprogress]

NFTOS

STAFF WRITER

AS TOLD FROM A COPS PERSPECTIVE

Former Baltimore cop who has since blown the whistle on abuse and corruption he witnessed on the force and called the prosecutor in the Mike Brown case corrupt.

Michael Wood, who was a police officer for 11 years before retiring with an injury last year, blasted onto the national scene last month when he began tweeting illegal and violent things he saw his colleagues do to citizens.

On Wednesday, Wood went on “The Joe Rogan Experience” podcast to discuss law enforcement. When discussing the need for due process in police shootings, Wood called Robert McCulloch, the prosecutor who led the investigation into the shooting by Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson of unarmed black teenager Mike Brown, a criminal.

“He’s a criminal. He criminally covered up that indictment. There’s no way around it,” Wood said. “That’s what they did and no one seemed to care.”

When asked to explain by Rogan, Wood pointed to a saying that “you can indict a ham and cheese sandwich.”

The job of the prosecutor when pursuing an indictment is to “select the evidence that will get the charge,” he said.

“So the way that system actually is, is if there’s four of us in the room right now, if three of us think he did it and one doesn’t, we don’t even listen to the one that doesn’t,” Wood explained. “If you’re not a reliable witness you don’t even come in for the indictment.”

Instead, McCulloch selected unreliable witnesses that tainted it, when he should have brought in evidence and witnesses that were consistent, Wood said.

“And you would have had an indictment. And you would have had a trial,” Wood said.

The former cop said he believed Wilson ultimately would have been exonerated because from a law enforcement perspective, the shooting was justified.

“We would have at least heard the case. The problem is, the police walk away with nothing. That’s why when you see the indictments — South Carolina, there was no uprising,” he said.

In June, a grand jury indicted Michael Slager, a white South Carolina police officer, for murder. Slager was caught on video shooting unarmed Walter Scott in the back while he ran away.





Broadcast live streaming video on Ustream


Similarly, six police officers were charged by Maryland Attorney General Marilyn Mosby in the death of Freddie Gray, a black man who died of serious injuries while being transported in their police van.

Part of the problem with policing, he said, is that officers are ingrained with fear early on and feel everyone is a threat.

“They run around with fear, and they will shoot in a heartbeat because they are so afraid,” he said.

In a June interview with the Washington Post, Wood described an awakening he had while working as a police officer in which he realized he was part of a system that was biased and wrong. While doing surveillance, Wood discovered how much he had in common with people the police department often targeted.

“You start to see the cycle of how these kids get put in the system at a young age, often for doing nothing wrong, and how that limits their options, which pushes them into selling drugs or other crime,” he said. “You start to see that they never had a chance.”

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief
Roger West

STOP WORRYING ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE AND CONCETRATE ON CRIMES AGAINST CHRISTIANS

A Republican Climate Denier expressed anger at Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials on Wednesday for putting what he claimed was a misplaced priority on climate change.

Instead of studying the security risks posed by climate change — which include threats to infrastructure, disease spread, and increased refugees — Wing nut Rep. Jeff Duncan said DHS should worry about other things, including “illegal aliens murdering beautiful innocent lives” and “folks who want to do great harm to Christians.”

“Your priorities are wrong at the Department of Homeland Security,” he said at a House Homeland Security subcommittee hearing:

I think that we’ve got threats of ISIS; we’ve got cartels shooting at helicopters on the border; we’ve got unaccompanied children coming into this country; we’ve got illegal aliens murdering beautiful innocent lives in San Francisco; we’ve got a woman who had her head blown off in Los Angeles by someone.

There are events after events going on around the world that are true threats to the United states, folks who want to do great harm to Christians, want to do great harm to others.

They want to come to this country and end the American way of life, and for whatever reason, we’re now spending out hard-earned dollars on climate science and the belief that this is one of the biggest threats to national security.

Duncan’s comments can be found here, at around the 48 minute mark of the archived webcast.

Duncan’s outrage over DHS studying climate risks may have to do with the fact that he doesn’t think climate change is real. He stated as much on Wednesday at the hearing, asking three high-level DHS officials to explain “why the earth was warmer during the medieval times” (a oft-used claim that is false). He also stated that “this notion that man-made climate change is happening is wrong.”

More than 56 percent of congressional Republicans deny or question the science behind human-caused climate change. By contrast, 97 percent of climate scientist’s actively publishing research on the subject say climate change is real and humans cause it.

When assessing national security risks, the Department of Defense sides with the scientists. It doesn’t consider climate change a direct threat, but considers it a “threat multiplier” that can worsen direct threats such as terrorism and infectious disease spread.

At the subcommittee hearing, called to examine the DHS’ “misplaced” focus on climate change, one official said that only two to four of its employees worked on the climate components of the agency’s latest Quadrennial Homeland Security Review. In that review, the DHS said natural hazards driven by climate change could pose threats to infrastructure, thereby risking national security in some parts of the country.

[h/t thinkprogress]

NFTOS
STAFF WRITER

"I’LL HANG YOUR FAMILY FROM A TREE”

Says Lisa Marie Elberson – A Florida woman who is facing multiple charges after she was recorded on video shouting racial slurs and chasing black children with a baseball bat — but her husband said that she did nothing wrong.

According to The Orlando Sentinel, a 16-year-old resident of Lake County told deputies that that 29-year-old Lisa Marie Elberson chased him down a street in their neighborhood with a baseball bat and spat on him and his friends during an argument on Sunday.

A report filed by the Lake County deputies said that the incident began with a dispute between Elberson’s husband and one of the teens, which later escalated when Elberson picked up a black Louisville Slugger and began chasing the kids.

Video recorded by one of the teens showed Elberson shouting racial and homophobic slurs.

“I’ll hang your family from my tree,” she said at one point.

Elberson’s husband told WFTV that his wife used the n-word but he insisted that she never did anything wrong.

The husband said that his wife had taken the bat from his son to prevent it being used against the teens.

“So he wouldn’t hurt the boy, to make sure that everything was safe, and that all that was going on was to talk,” he argued. “He really doesn’t have nothing on her. He don’t have nothing. All he has is my wife yelling at him. And that’s all she did.”

The video, however, convinced Lake County deputies that a crime had been committed.

Deputies showed up at Elberson’s job later that evening and arrested her on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, child abuse and simple battery. Bond was set at $5,000.

VIDEO 1

VIDEO 2

Congratulations Lisa Marie Elderson, you are the world most despicable human in the world today! Enjoy asshat! 

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

AND HERE IS WHY THE FLAG MUST GO

RIGHT WING TEABAGGER LEE BRIGHT

Before he could address his belief that the Confederate flag should remain flying on the South Carolina State Capitol property, ultra-radical teabagger state Sen. Lee Bright decided to show the legislature the extent of his bigoted beliefs. In an almost three minute rant, he stood before the legislature and ranted against the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision legalizing gay marriage across the country and called out the White House for shining the “abomination colors” the night of the Court’s decision.

“Like President Reagan said, if we’re not one nation under God, we’ll be one nation gone under,” the lawmaker from Spartanburg, SC said early in Monday’s state Senate session. “And to sanctify deviant behavior from five judges… It’s time to make our stand and we’re not doing it. We can rally together and talk about a flag all we want, but the devil is taking control of this land and we’re not stopping him.”

He added that “we cannot succumb to what’s being done to the future of this nation” and that the state legislature should take a stand against “sin in the state of South Carolina.”





Bright has been one of the most vocal supporters of the Confederate flag in the state Senate. He proposed an amendment to allow voters to decide the fate of the flag which died during debate with a vote of 36-3. He also posted a “Keep the Confederate Flag” petition on his website offering other flag supports the chance to explain why it should stay flying.

“Let’s stand together and preserve a piece of our history that symbolizes states’ rights,” his petition said.

Bright ran an unsuccessful campaign to unseat Sen. Lindsey Graham, now a presidential contender, in the 2014 election. He has championed a number of extreme conservative views, including believing that the state should allow high schools to teach students to shoot guns and that anyone enforcing Obamacare should get a year in jail. He also also repeatedly sought to ban public funding for abortion for victims of rape and incest and funding for rape crisis centers.

Congratulations Lee Bright, you are today's asshat of the day, enjoy the recognition numbnutz! 

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

MEXICANS MORE DANGEROUS THAN SHARKS?

Conservative asshat Ann Coulter over weekend compared shark attacks to Mexican immigrants, who she concluded were much more dangerous.

During an interview on Fox News, Coulter argued that Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s controversial assertion that immigrants were rapists had been vindicated because a because the suspect in a recent San Francisco killing was an undocumented immigrant who had been deported five times.

“I’m dying to know if Jeb Bush attacks Donald Trump for his comments the actual day [Kate Steinle] was murdered by an illegal immigrant or the next day,” she quipped. “I’m gathering he won’t be speaking at her funeral.”

“You know, going into this weekend, the media was consumed with stories, Americans have to be on the lookout for ISIS attacks and terror attack expected, and oh, shark attacks,” Coulter declared. “I will bet you by the end of the weekend, more Americans will have been killed by Mexicans than by ISIS or by sharks.”

According to Coulter, the story of Steinle’s death had not been “covered up” like most crimes committed by immigrants because it had happened in a liberal city.

“There are so many drunk driving accidents, so many Americans being killed and raped in places liberals don’t go,” she opined. “They just take the cheap labor.”

Coulter argued that Republican candidates were making a mistake by campaigning to Latino voters because it was a lost cause.

“Whether it’s feminist, the abortion ladies, the gun hysterics, and now they are obsessed with getting the Hispanic vote,” she explained. “It repeatedly doesn’t work. And the most His-pandering president we ever had was George Bush, and it was ‘Oh whoa, he got 40 percent of the Hispanic vote.’ Well that’s still losing.”

[h/t The RAW Story]

NFTOS
STAFF WRITER

MEET ROBERT RANKIN DOGGART

Robert Rankin Doggart, a former candidate for Congress, admitted in federal court to “plotting the annihilation” of a village in New York that is home to many Muslims. Doggart’s plans included “burning down a school, a mosque and a cafeteria,” according to the criminal complaint.

“We’re gonna be carrying an M4 with 500 rounds of ammunition, light armor piercing. A pistol with three extra magazines, and a machete. And if it gets down to the machete, we will cut them to shreds,” Doggart allegedly said according to the transcript of a wiretap cited in the complaint. He also allegedly tried to recruit other individuals to participate in his plot through a Facebook group.

As part of a plea agreement, Doggart pled guilt to “interstate communication of threats” and faces up to five years in prison. He was in jail awaiting final sentencing.

But a federal judge, Curtis Collier, may not accept the guilty plea. He’s ordered the prosecution and defense to produce briefs proving that Doggart was a “true threat.”

Meanwhile, a different federal judge, Magistrate Susan K. Lee, released Doggart from jail “into the custody of two family members.”

Lee had previously found that Doggart was a “danger to the community.” The government appealed the decision to release Doggart to Judge Collier, who affirmed Lee’s decision.

Doggart’s release has drawn criticism from the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a Muslim advocacy group. “It is deeply troubling that an individual who has admitted to planning a religiously-motivated terror attack on American Muslims is now free, while the intended targets of his plot remain unprotected,” CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said in a statement. CAIR had previously criticized the prosecutor’s decision not to treat Doggart’s conduct “as an act of terrorism and to charge the alleged organizer of the attack as a terrorist.”

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center — and academics studying the issue — the United States has focused on combating Islamic extremism but given short shrift to other threats like domestic attacks by right-wing radicals. Since 9/11, “more people have been killed in America by non-Islamic domestic terrorists than jihadists.”

NFTOS
STAFF WRITER

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MERICA

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

TENNESSEE HARDWARE STORE OWNER PROVES IGNORANCE IS NOT BLISS

JEFF AMYX TODAY'S WORST PERSON OF THE WORLD

Following last week’s marriage equality rulings, opponents of marriage equality have been negotiating various strategies to avoid recognizing or respecting same-sex matrimony. A hardware store owner in East Tennessee took it upon himself to post a “No Gays Allowed” sign in his store window Monday. And if he did refuse someone entry to this story for being gay or lesbian, that would be perfectly legal.

Jeff Amyx, owner of Amyx Hardware & Roofing Supplies, switched the sign out on Tuesday with a new one that clarified, “We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone who would violate our rights of freedom of speech & freedom of religion,” complete with his signature.

Amyx, a baptist minister, has been adamant about his anti-gay beliefs, explaining to WBIR 10 News, “I’m going to take more persecution than them because I’m standing for what I believe in.” He will sell to gay people so long as they “behave” and don’t express their opinions in the store.

In an interview Tuesday with WATE, Amyx clarified, “I don’t hate people. It’s not the people I hate, it’s the sin that I hate.” He also admitted that he might preach to gay customers a bit.

Amyx said that the sign will remain “until they tell me it is illegal to have my freedom of speech and to my freedom of religion.” That could be a while. Tennessee has no statewide law protecting LGBT people from discrimination in public accommodations like hardware stores. In fact, Tennessee was the first state in the nation where state lawmakers passed a law forbidding municipalities from extending such protections. No protections exist at the federal level either.

That means that as blatantly offensive as Amyx’s business practices appear to be, there is absolutely nothing forbidding him from continuing to do so. He is a stark reminder that Friday’s marriage equality victory is by no means an end to the fight for LGBT equality throughout society.

Congrats numbnuts, you are today's worst person of the world, enjoy!

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

YOU’RE FIRED!

WING-NUT DONALD TRUMP FIRED BY MACY'S

The retail clothing giant Macy’s became the latest company to cut ties with 2016 Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump, following his campaign launch speech in which he claimed that some Mexican immigrants are rapists and drug dealers.

In its announcement on Wednesday, Macy’s made a strong statement in support of immigrants — saying that “respect for the dignity of all people is a cornerstone of our culture” and that Trump’s remarks “are inconsistent with Macy’s values” and that his “disparaging characterizations” aren’t an accurate portrayal of Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and Latinos.

“Macy’s is a company that stands for diversity and inclusion,” a statement released to CNN reads. “We have no tolerance for discrimination in any form. We welcome customers, and respect for the dignity of all people is a cornerstone of our culture. We are disappointed and distressed by recent remarks about immigrants from Mexico. We do not believe the disparaging characterizations portray an accurate picture of the many Mexicans, Mexican Americans and Latinos who have made so many valuable contributions to the success of our nation.”

“In light of statements made by Donald Trump, which are inconsistent with Macy’s values, we have decided to discontinue our business relationship with Mr. Trump and will phase-out the Trump menswear collection, which has been sold at Macy’s since 2004,” the company concluded.

There was already momentum for Macy’s to end its business relationship with Trump. Over 700,000 people have signed a longstanding moveon.org petition for the company to cut ties with Trump, a petition that gained steam after his racists remarks. The petition was initially created in the wake of Trump’s involvement in questioning the president’s birth certificate and his stance on climate change, KTLA reported.

Macy’s move to sever its decade-long tie with Trump comes after Univision and NBC canceled their business partnerships with Trump, saying the NBC reality show “Celebrity Apprentice” will no longer support him as host. Mexican billionaire Carlos Slims’ Ora TV has also ended a project with the real estate mogul. And in the fallout of Trump’s statement, Miss Mexico has declined to be in the Miss Universe pageant.

In response to the upheaval, this asshat stated on Wednesday that “clearly NBC and Macy’s support illegal immigration, which is totally detrimental to the fabric of our once great country.”

In another story, the GOP racists have come to trumps aide by making him number two in the GOP clown car. You can't make this shit up. 

[h/t thinkprogress]

NFTOS

Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West

COLORADO COP COULD CARELESS ABOUT BODY CAMERA

A Colorado police officer pleaded guilty to attempted third degree assault after he was recorded on body camera video repeatedly beating a handcuffed man.

Video of the December incident obtained by KMGH shows Federal Heights Officer Mark Magness appearing to punch and kick a suspect while pulling him from a patrol car at the police station. A minute later, Magness slams the man into a concrete wall.

Video later shows Magness flying into a rage after the man lunges at him inside a holding cell. Another officer reminds Magness that he is being recorded by body cam video, but Magness continues to beat the suspect.

“I’m sorry sir,” the bloody man says as he is thrown into a chair. Magness ignores him, pressing his fingers into his eyes and temples.

Although the man appears to be pinned into the chair, Magness accuses him of resisting and straps him down.

“We’re going to need medical,” the second officer calls out.

“I don’t care, strap him to the chair,” Magness says as the second officer again points to his body camera.

Dennis Discua told KMGH that Magness also used excessive force on him in 2009. The officer pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor and paid $517 in fines in that case.

“When I saw [this video] I remembered when he just grabbed me and I didn’t resist or nothing and he just pushed me and throw me all the way down,” Discua recalled. “The police are supposed to help people, not hurt people.”

The Federal Heights Police Department had not responded to a request for comment from KMGH. It was not clear if Magness had been suspended from the force.

NFTOS
Blogger-In-Chief

Roger West