Film star Ashley Judd is reportedly considering running for the Senate in her native Kentucky, challenging Mitch McConnell.

If you imagine this will provoke howls of misogynist hatred and creepy sexual innuendo from the right wing, you’re right on the money, of course, and Breitbart.com’s always sleazy Ben Shapiro is leading the caveman charge today: ACTRESS ASHLEY JUDD MULLS SENATE RUN.

There are probably thousands of photos of Ms Judd that Shapiro could have chosen to illustrate this, but he went right for the naked shot because objectification of women is what the right wing audience craves, and nobody’s more eager than Shapiro to please the drooling knuckle-draggers who love Breitbart.com.

The article? Well, you probably already know what it says; Shapiro writes these like Mad Libs — just fill in the blanks with the usual insults. Ashley Judd is an evil liberal progressive leftist commie who supports women’s rights. The horror. Cue 500 comments insulting her on every possible level.

It’s ironic in a very sick way that Shapiro attacks Judd for speaking out against sexism, in a blatantly sexist attack piece. These people are not right in the head.

Then there’s her militant feminism, which led her — an actress who has made her fame and fortune from her beauty — to rip into the media for questions about her puffy face, which she called “a misogynistic assault on all women.” She complained about “the assault on our body image, the hypersexualization of girls and women and subsequent degradation of our sexuality as we walk through the decades, and the general incessant objectification is what this conversation allegedly about my face is really about.” That’s a mouthful from a woman who posed completely nude for Norma Jean & Marilyn.

Jazz piano legend Dave Brubeck died on Wednesday at the age of 91, the Chicago Tribune reports.

Exclusive Milken Archive footage of the Dave Brubeck Quartet performing St. Louis Blues by W. C. Handy. Recorded live at Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Dave Brubeck, piano; Bobby Militello, saxophone; Michael Moore, bass; Randy Jones, drums. For more Dave Brubeck videos, please visit [Link: www.milkenarchive.org….]

Brubeck’s iconic signature piece, “Take Five:”

He’s influenced so many musicians that his impact on our culture will last as long as humanity does, even if everything he ever personally recorded were to magically disappear tomorrow.

Amazon’s Dave Brubeck Library

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio is the latest GOP politician forced to “clarify” his anti-science comments: Rubio: Science, Faith ‘Not Inconsistent’ on Earth.

Speaking with POLITICO’s Mike Allen at a Playbook Breakfast event, Rubio clarified his beliefs about how the universe was created, saying he believes science’s conclusions — that the earth is four and a half billion years old — and his faith’s answers about the earth’s age aren’t mutually exclusive.

“Science says it’s about four and a half billion years old and my faith teaches that that’s not inconsistent,” the possible 2016 GOP presidential contender said. “The answer I gave was actually trying to make the same point the president made a few years ago, and that is there is no scientific debate on the age of the earth. I mean, it’s established pretty definitively as at least four and a half billion years old … I was referring to a theological debate and which is a pretty healthy debate.”

I’m long past the point of even thinking about giving Republican politicians the benefit of the doubt on issues like this one. Rubio is walking it back because he got stung by the negative publicity associated with admitting his creationist beliefs, and that’s the only motivation for his remarks.

More importantly, he doesn’t just talk about it, Rubio has actively worked to legitimize the teaching of creationism in Florida public schools, and has previously said the teaching of evolution “destroys the family” and compared it to communism under Fidel Castro.

Let’s get real: Marco Rubio is now pretending to “correct” himself because he can’t continue doing this kind of work with the media spotlight on him. And he is by no means an outlier in the Republican Party; creationism is the norm among GOP politicians.

It’s helpful to look back at the remarks that prompted this; here’s what Rubio actually said:

I’m not a scientist, man. I can tell you what recorded history says, I can tell you what the Bible says, but I think that’s a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. I’m not a scientist. I don’t think I’m qualified to answer a question like that. At the end of the day, I think there are multiple theories out there on how the universe was created and I think this is a country where people should have the opportunity to teach them all. I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says. Whether the Earth was created in 7 days, or 7 actual eras, I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to answer that. It’s one of the great mysteries.

The bottom line, and the real purpose behind his comments about the age of the Earth, is to promote the teaching of creationism in public schools. This is a default Republican Party position.

Apparently, Tina Brown, publisher of the Daily Beast, sees nothing wrong with sharing the opinion pieces of heartless bastard Rick Santorum with whacked out conspiracy website World Net Daily, because today Santorum shows up at the Daily Beast with another column, still lying about the UN disability rights treaty just voted down by Senate Republicans: Santorum: UN Disabilities Treaty Would’ve Had Bureaucrats Unseat Parents.

I won’t even quote from this repulsive drivel, in which Santorum again shamelessly uses his own disabled daughter to advance his dishonest claims. I’ll just point out that every word in it is utterly false, including “the” and “and.”

The fact is that no UN treaty can ever supersede the US Constitution or the laws of the United States, as ruled many times by the Supreme Court. Santorum is promoting a flat out, scurrilous, evil lie, deliberately told to mislead people. Why does the Daily Beast publish far right dishonesty like this?

From World Net Daily straight to the Daily Beast. Bad craziness on steroids.

Related:
Republican Lunatics Vote Against Rights of Disabled People
Rick Santorum Now Writing for World Net Daily: ‘The UN Wants to Kill My Daughter’

In yet more evidence why CNN’s attempt to become a second Fox “News” has landed it third among 24-hour cable news outlets, Piers Morgan hosted a “debate” between Bill Nye The Science Guy and a guy named Marc Morano, a longtime climate change denier…who just happens to be a paid oil industry hack.

The latter, of course, was not disclosed.

*Sigh*

Offering two “viewpoints” about temperature data and suggesting that scientific facts are up for “debate” is misleading in and of itself. During the segment, Morano claimed that we “have gone 16 years without global warming according to UN data.” Nye pushed back, saying “This will be the hottest two decades in history, in recorded history. So when you throw around a statement like the UN says it’s not the hottest 20 years, I got to disagree with you.” But the audience was left unaware that Morano was highlighting a short time period to obscure the overall warming trend, as illustrated by this chart from Skeptical Science:

Image: skeptscience-realistclimate.gif

It’s not surprising that Morano seized the opportunity to spread confusion about climate change. His website is sponsored by the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow, an organization that has received funding from oil companies. As New York Times reporter Andrew Revkin explained, “industry-funded groups have used the media’s tradition of quoting people with competing views to convey a state of confusion even as consensus on warming has built.” Morano has promoted extreme attacks on climate scientists and those that accept global warming. His website often publishes the email addresses of scientists, leading to a barrage of hate mail, and he defended a billboard campaign comparing those who accept climate science to the Unabomber, saying it was “edgy.”

Money quote from Nye, “We just don’t agree on facts. So we aren’t getting anywhere.”

H/T - Media Matters

Belkin USB 2.0 4-Port Ultra-Mini Hub: Electronics

Product Features

Compact design ideal for travel

4 downstream ports with data transfer rates up to 480Mbps

Compatible with both USB 2.0 and USB 1.1 devices

Convenient plug-and-play installation

Backed by a lifetime warranty

Amazon has a great price today on this compact USB Hub with free shipping for Prime members — makes a fantastic stocking-stuffer!

Belkin USB 2.0 4-Port Ultra-Mini Hub

You may have heard that Senate Republicans voted today to defeat a United Nations treaty to protect the rights of disabled people, but you may not have realized how completely insane some of the Republican arguments against this treaty were: How Unhinged Rhetoric Sank a Disabilities Rights Treaty in the Senate.

The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities failed to capture the 2/3 vote needed for ratification in the U.S. Senate today due to fierce Republican opposition. Many Republicans and their allies in the conservative movement claimed that the treaty codifies abortion into law, even though that preposterous claim was rejected by the National Right to Life Committee and Sen. John McCain. Along with the false charges about abortion, opponents of the treaty claimed it will undermine U.S. sovereignty and harm children. Critics like Rick Santorum warned that the treaty may kill his disabled daughter; Glenn Beck said it could create a “fascistic” government and Sen. Jim Inhofe alleged the treaty would help groups with “anti-American biases.”

One of the lesser-known but extremely active opponents of the bill was homeschooling activist Michael Farris.

During an interview with Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council, he claimed that the treaty will prompt the United Nations to ‘get control’ of children with glasses or ADHD and remove them from their families.

Read the whole thing. It’s a sad snapshot of today’s deranged Republican Party.

This is the official lyric video for John Hiatt’s “We’re Alright Now,” from his great new album Mystic Pinball (now on sale at the Amazon MP3 Store for only $5.99).

This is one of John Hiatt’s best records in years, with a stellar band and some powerful stories, and I highly recommend it. Rock at its best.

More samples from the album:

Today at the Washington Times, Ted Nugent has emerged again from his ammo bunker with one of his typically freakish rants. Years ago, Nugent’s wild man act used to be amusing, but now it’s devolved into pure right wing hateful ugliness as he advocates “slaughtering” Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and prohibiting citizens on welfare from voting.

The three sacred entitlement cows in the room that no politician wants to poke are Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. A blinding statement of the obvious is that we are never going to get our financial house in order until these sacred entitlement cows are not only poked, but slaughtered. Until the slaughter is over, everything else is just taxation window dressing. …

Let’s also stop the insanity by suspending the right to vote of any American who is on welfare. Once they get off welfare and are self-sustaining, they get their right to vote restored. No American on welfare should have the right to vote for tax increases on those Americans who are working and paying taxes to support them. That’s insane.