Paul Kurtz is a moron. Again.

Oh, Paul Kurtz. Is it just me, or are you terminally stupid? You start your most recent article about how much harder the press is on Obama on his second press conference compared to his first one.

First of all - did you hear some of the questions? They were OK, I guess - I did like Chris Todd asking about sacrifice. But where were the questions about executive privilege and if he's going to let Rove claim it during testimony? Where were the questions asking about the use of presidential powers to deny access to reporters to treaty documents or allow terrorist defendants access to their accusers documents?

Second, and this is where Commander Stupid comes in, is this:

Breaking with tradition and using a prepared list...

First sentence, and Kurtz is forgetting that other presidents - like the *last one* used a prepared list of which reporters to call upon. And, for the most part, odds are that every president knows which reporter they're going to call upon beforehand.

But good old Paul Kurtz, he of the "the press is soooo important, even when we're acting like lick spittle dogs towards any presidential administration and asking hard questions of CEO's like CNBC did", must have the memory of a goldfish when it comes to other presidents.

I heard about Limbaugh offering to debate Obama

Evidently, Mr. Limbaugh feels that his ideas and show are important enough that the President should come down and debate him about whether or not the President Obama economic plan is the right one, or if Mr. Limbaugh's plan of "cut taxes" is better for the economy.

The problem with this, of course, is that you don't know how anyone will "win" the argument. Do we expect President Obama to suddenly say "Dude, I totally get it now - just cut taxes and the miracle of the market will provide roads and education for people and health care! Why didn't I see it before!" And we certainly don't expect Mr. Limbaugh to say "You know, now that I see it your way, I can understand why you think the providing health care untethered from your job, or why increasing education funding is such a big deal. I've changed my ways!"

Yeah. I don't see it happening either.

So, let's try this "debate" thing in another way. How about if President Obama and his supporters and Mr. Limbaugh and his Republican party that he leads take their case to the American people. Now, this is going to get kind of complex, but we should split it up three ways. There can be locally leaders in proportion to the populace - we'll call them "Congresspeople", and they'll stay in the debate for 2 years. Then there are people we'll call "Senators", and they'll stay in the debate for 6 years. And finally, the President, who gets to stay in the debate for 4 years at a time.

Every 2 years, we have this thing called "an election." If people think that Mr. Limbaugh and his representatives are right, they'll elect them, and they can help in shaping laws. If they think that President Obama and those who agree with him are correct, then they can vote for them instead.

This way, the American People can continually see how the debate is shaping out, which ideas work, and which ones don't, and shape the country.

Of course, this also means that Mr. Limbaugh would actually have to get out there and run for office himself, instead of staying safe behind his microphone, where he can lob grenades and accusations all he wants without actually having to get his hands dirty by, you know, really putting his ideas and energy out there to see if they actually work or not.

I think this sounds pretty fair. We'll have to write down all of these rules, though. Maybe on some piece of paper, start it out with the words "We the People...."

The Difference Between "I hope you fail" and "I think you'll fail"

To all those trying to defend Limbaugh by saying "He doesn't want *the President* to fail, just his *ideas* to fail": I think your ideas are fair -you're trying to defend the guy who doesn't want the President's *ideas* to succeed.

But even if that's true - the fact that he says he wants him to fail, which means *the country may fail along with him*, is what most people have a problem with.

Let me show you how other people see it.

Imagine there's a patient with a failing kidney - they're own fault, really. They were told to lay off the alcohol and the fatty, salty food. And now all of their bad habits have caught up with them.

Dr. Ron Paul says "You know what, just let it fail. The other kidney will pick up the slack, and if it doesn't, then I guess other people will learn." Nobody listens to him, though, so he won't be in the story any more.

Dr. Obama says "I think we can let him keep the kidney - prop it up a little with some medicine, and tend to him. Eventually, the kidney will come back, and the patient will be well again with two fully functioning kidneys. Yes, he was stupid, and he'll have to learn his less, but we have to think about the patient."

Dr. Limbaugh says "Are you nuts? If you just put him on medicine, he'll be on that medicine for the rest of his life, and it'll be more expensive, and he'll always be sickly. The best thing to do is just remove the damaged kidney permanently - he can function with one, and he'll act better in the future by not abusing his last kidney."

Dr. Obama comes back "Why do that? I think he'll only be on medication for a little while, he'll have to change his habits, and he'll be as good as new."

Dr. Limbaugh responds "You fool - once he starts that medication, he'll never be off of it!"

Now, at this point, we have two differences of opinion. Dr. Limbaugh thinks Dr. Obama is going to fail. That's reasonable. He thinks that the patient is going to suffer long term consequences and be on medicine for the rest of his life that he'll become dependent on, when surgery will cause less long term harm and expense (in Dr. Limbaugh's opinion).

This is where Dr.Limbaugh, though, loses it. "Yeah? Well, I hope you fail! I hope you fail so people will see that your ideas are stupid! I hope the patient goes into shock as the failing kidney completely dies and the patient is forced to come into surgery like they should have in the first place! Because if your idea works, then every other patient is going to go looking for a drug decision instead of the surgery they really need!"

Dr. Limbaugh might have a point, and he might even, possibly, maybe, be right. But the second he started with the "I hope you fail so your ideas don't take root" - he lost any moral standing in the argument. Because if Dr. Obama fails, then the patient stands a good chance of dying.

And hoping the other guy fails and the patient dies just because you think he's wrong isn't noble or patriotic - it's being a dick.

Proof of Obama's Evil!

BTW: there's also:



Of course, this is all actually from this story, where it turns out his target was Gibbs - and he muffed it.