Country singer suggests that if she were not Canadian she would have voted for Donald Trump. That does not go over well.

Courtesy of The Guardian: 

If she had been able to vote in the US election, she would have plumped for Donald Trump, she says. “I would have voted for him because, even though he was offensive, he seemed honest. Do you want straight or polite? Not that you shouldn’t be able to have both. If I were voting, I just don’t want bullshit. I would have voted for a feeling that it was transparent. And politics has a reputation of not being that, right?”

This comes from a rather long article all about Shania Twain's career, throat operation, the end of her marriage, etc.

However it was that statement up above that caught the attention of the internet.

And then all hell broke loose.

By the end of the day Twain was walking that remark back as quickly as she could.

I would like to apologise to anybody I have offended in a recent interview with the Guardian relating to the American President. The question caught me off guard. As a Canadian, I regret answering this unexpected question without giving my response more context (1/4)

— Shania Twain (@ShaniaTwain) April 22, 2018

I am passionately against discrimination of any kind and hope it’s clear from the choices I have made, and the people I stand with, that I do not hold any common moral beliefs with the current President (2/4)

— Shania Twain (@ShaniaTwain) April 22, 2018

I was trying to explain, in response to a question about the election, that my limited understanding was that the President talked to a portion of America like an accessible person they could relate to, as he was NOT a politician (3/4)

— Shania Twain (@ShaniaTwain) April 22, 2018

My answer was awkward, but certainly should not be taken as representative of my values nor does it mean I endorse him. I make music to bring people together. My path will always be one of inclusivity, as my history shows. (4/4)

— Shania Twain (@ShaniaTwain) April 22, 2018

I am not going to pile on with everybody else, mostly because Shania Twain was one of the few country artists who did not make me want to shove red hot pokers into my eardrums.

Having said that I just want to add that after reading her  ridiculous statement my response is "That Don't Impress me Much."

(Sorry, couldn't resist.)

The takeaway from this is that Donald Trump is without a doubt the most divisive person in the country, and ANYBODY, including once huge stars who made country music palatable, who suggests that they either did or would have supported him should be aware that people will react in a very emotional manner. 

The closer we get to the Trump inauguration the more I feel that Keith Olbermann is accurately channeling my outrage.

As I mentioned recently, I once thought that Olbermann was a little over the top with his anti-Trump tirades.

However the more we learn about how Trump "won" this election, and the closer we get to D-Day (Which is what I call the Trump inauguration.), the more I start to feel that there IS no level of outrage that is too severe for what we are witnessing.

And my other takeaway is that Keith Olbermann needs a wider audience, and that some cable network needs to provide him a venue for this outrage which he is channeling on our behalf.

Yes, yes you can.

I think this guy has a pretty firm grasp on what it means to be a Christian in this day and age.

Nancy French, channeling Bristol Palin, claims that controversy over Starbucks new red cups attempt to make "Christians look stupid." Update!

Courtesy of Bristol Pikore account.

Courtesy of Brancy's blog: 

Over the past few years, Starbucks has rolled out their “red cups” right after Halloween to signal the start of the holiday season. Usually adorned with snowflakes and reindeers, this year the cups were given a makeover in a more sleek all red ombre look. 

And somewhere, somehow someone took offense to the change, claiming it was part of the war on Christmas. (Does she mean "someone" like leading GOP candidate Donald Trump?)


And the media RAN with it. They used one small group’s opinion about the cups and began attributing it to the greater Christian community. The mainstream media and the Left love their outrage machine where they claim the world is ending because any number of tiny people have expressed hurt feelings on social media. So now, they’re taking a tiny fraction of people’s response and attributing it to all conservative Christians. 

Do not buy in to the media hype surrounding this story!! 

It is just another attempt by the LEFT to make Christians look stupid. As a former barista (And reports are that she was TERRIBLE at that job.), I buy my coffee locally. (Shout out to Mocha Moose!) 

Christmas is a celebration of the birth of the Prince of Peace. So how about we take the media’s attempt to make us all seem crazy and stupid, and turn it in to an opportunity to truly share the love of Christ with our neighbors and communities who are hurting so much this season.

Okay well I am not going to suggest that Christians are all stupid because that is unfair. (The argument can be made that they are not utilizing all of their critical thinking skills, but that is a topic for another time.)

However the loudest voices within the fundamentalist Christian community, one of which is now batshit crazy Ben Carson, DO say incredibly nutty things all of the time.

By the way the video of the guy who started this stupid controversy has now been viewed over 14 million times.

And there is now an online petition urging people to "Dump Starbucks" and I can assure that was not started by a liberal Atheist.

So blaming the media for covering that video, and the other angry responses to Starbucks, instead of blaming the idiot who made that video and the morons who got outraged right on cue, is ridiculous and unfair.

If Christians want to receive less negative coverage by the press perhaps they need to do something about the whackadoodles representing their faith, instead of blaming those who notice how many whackadoodles are representing their faith.

And by the way while we are on the topic, Nancy French is ABSOLUTELY one of those whackadoodles. As she has proven over, and over, and over again.

Update: Well guess who else is now weighing in?

Courtesy of Mrs. Claws Facebook page:  

You know I'm passionate about protecting the heart of Christmas! And these next couple of months really can be "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year!" 

Funny, though, how some grinches on the Left take things too far in attempts to make all us jolly revelers look ridiculous, lumping us in the same box concerning misplaced outrage over a coffee cup's non-controversy. 

My daughters spent many summers employed as hardworking baristas; I love their take on faux concern over Starbucks red Christmas cup and why you should enjoy your festive cuppa'joe anyway!

Same BS different orifice. 

The real e-mail scandal that Republicans DON'T want to talk about.

@amychozick @marstu67 @HillaryClinton pic.twitter.com/PJfWgblkw0

— Idea (@idea46) August 15, 2015

Republicans are having a field day with their fake outrage over Hillary's private e-mail server, but the fact is that it does not even come close to the crap pulled by the Bush administration.

The Washington Post agrees with Bristol Palin's ghostwritten blogpost. Nancy French is very excited.

Okay so this Washington Post reporter (Not a very good reporter since she fails to recognize that Bristol Palin does not write her own blog.) posted an article that kind of agrees with Brancy's post from August 10th, in defense of Donald Trump.

In the article the reporter suggests that faux outrage never works and that Brancy's post was calling Erick Erickson out over using it: 

Whether or not we agree about the validity of the question, Bristol Palin’s got a point. This is not a winning strategy, and if you don’t grasp why, it’s because you misunderstand the whole reason the “outrage industry” works. 

One of the things I’ve been most struck by, whenever I find myself in rooms of people who all share the same beliefs (on whatever side of the aisle) is how ready they are to assume that the people who do not share those beliefs are being disingenuous. That beliefs you disagree with are somehow less genuine than those you share because No Intelligent Person Could Truly Believe Such A Thing or because They’re Just Claiming That They’re Offended To Shut Us Up — as though there were some big red Outrage Button that could be pressed, on cue, to achieve a desired political result. 

That would be too easy. 

And when you don’t assume sincerity on the part of your opponent, you wind up with fauxtrage.

This of course sent a thrill up the leg of Nancy French:

Well, this rarely happens. Thanks, Alexandra!

But here's the thing that this Washington Post reporter seems to have missed.

Fake outrage was EXACTLY what Nancy French was whipping up with her column.

She was attacking Erick Erickson's refusal to allow Donald Trump to attend his event, by bringing up sexist things that he himself had said in the past.  Including one incredibly overblown incident pertaining to Sarah's fake cleavage.

So not only did this reporter not realize that Bristol did not write a word of the blog post, but in her zeal to agree with a Palin she failed to realize she was congratulating Bristol for engaging in the exact same thing that she was condemning others for doing.

If she had taken even five minutes to do a little research she would have found that the Palins have made a cottage industry out of "fauxtrage" as she calls it.

From calling David Letterman a pervert for making a joke about her daughter, to suggesting that Joe McGinniss moved in next door to see in to Piper's bedroom, to taking every question about Trig Palin's bizarre birth story and framing it as an attack on a child with Down syndrome, Palin has refined this practice down to a fine art.

So once again ANOTHER ill informed reporter buys into the Palin mythology, and provides them with unearned credibility.

Well great now I feel outrage. And not "fauxtrage" either.

Facebook user creates fake account so that he can troll people outraged at Target over new gender neutral policies.

Courtesy of Today:  

Earlier this week, Facebook user Mike Melgaard decided to pose as the customer-service branch of Target. Seemingly, it wasn't hard to do. All it took was simply creating the Facebook alias, "AskForHelp," which sported the Target logo as a profile pic. He went on a tear, responding to complaints about the Minneapolis-based retailer's decision to remove "gender-based signage." These dissatisfied customers apparently want to find "girl" toys in one aisle, and "boy" toys in another.

Okay I am not usually an advocate of trolling, these examples are pretty damn funny.

As you can imagine this did not go over very well with some Facebook users, and Target made sure to let people know that he was not an actual representative.

However there were signs that they were secretly pleased that somebody was taking these idiots to task.

Gotta love it.

Well if this next Presidential election is determined solely by money raised, then we might as well just give it to Jeb Bush now.

Courtesy of HuffPo: 
  
Jeb Bush's presidential campaign announced Thursday it had raised a combined $114 million since the former governor of Florida began exploring a run for the White House earlier this year. 

"Jeb is encouraged and grateful for the tremendous early support and enthusiasm his candidacy has generated since he launched his campaign," Woody Johnson, Bush's national finance chairman, said in a statement. "We are confident our campaign will have the resources needed to get Jeb’s conservative record, message and vision for the future out to voters across the country.” 

Bush's campaign said it had raised $11.4 million in the 16 days since the governor announced his candidacy last month. The haul amounts to an average of $700,000 raised per day in the first two weeks of his official campaign. Aides to Bush did not yet disclose how much cash the candidate has on hand, nor did they share the number of donors who contributed to his fundraising total. Presidential candidates are required to report those details and other fundraising information to the FEC by July 15th.

That essentially leaves virtually all of Bush's rivals on the Right in the dust, and even Hillary Clinton so far is only announcing donations of around 45 million. (Though it should be noted that the superPAC backing her, Priorities USA, has not announced their donations as of yet.)

I think it is becoming crystal clear that if politics is now just a numbers game, which is how Republicans want it set up, that the ONLY person who has any shot at beating Jebbie is Hillary. 

And that is sad for a lot of different reasons. 

Personally I am sickened by this whole thing and really, really want somebody to introduce a bill to get all of this money out of politics. And then of course have the pull to get it passed.

I am literally embarrassed for the rest of the world to see how we conduct our so-called "democracy" here in the United States.

Ted Nugent posts open letter to Facebook using the word "retard." Sarah Palin to go on the attack in 3..2..oh let's face it she's going to let this slide.

From Nugent's Facebook page.

Courtesy of Media Matters:

National Rifle Association board member Ted Nugent shared an open letter "to all the braindead hippie logic-challenged dipshits in the media" that mocked individuals with mental disabilities with the line, "Not every retard can read, but look at you go, little buddy." 

In two weeks, Nugent will appear on Sarah Palin's Sportsman Channel show. Palin, who has a child with Down syndrome, has compared the use of the word "retard" to using racial slurs. 

Of course as we know Palin ONLY gets fired up about the word being used if it was used in private by a member of the Obama administration.

However if one of her tribe, for instance Rush Limbaugh, uses the word than her response is somewhat...oh what's the word...hypocritical: 

"They are kooks, so I agree with Rush Limbaugh," she said, when read a quote of Limbaugh calling liberal groups "retards." "Rush Limbaugh was using satire ... . I didn't hear Rush Limbaugh calling a group of people whom he did not agree with 'f-ing retards,' and we did know that Rahm Emanuel, as has been reported, did say that. There is a big difference there."

"Look sometimes using the word makes you a jerkface, and other times it makes you a freedom loving constitutional conservative. Simple."

Yes there is a difference. One group is made up of people that Palin likes, and the other is made up of people that she is constantly attacking. 

"No Trig, when Uncle Ted or Uncle Rush say the word it is funny and patriotic, but when liberals use the word they are just haters who want to victimize children and their service dogs."

Conservatives finally notice that a teacher has been asking his students to recite a rewritten Pledge of Allegiance for the past twenty years. Did you guess they were outraged? Well you were right.

Courtesy of Campus Reform: 

A tenured professor at Metropolitan State University (MSU) in Denver required students pledge their allegiance to a racist, sexist, homophobic America that targets "blacks," and "women who want abortions," in the name of Jesus. 

 Dr. Charles Angeletti, a self-proclaimed atheist and socialist professor of American Civilization at the publicly funded Denver university, required students recite the satirical Pledge of Allegiance during the fall 2014 semester according to a class flier obtained by Campus Reform. 

"I pledge allegiance to and wrap myself in the flag of the United States Against Anything Un-American and to the Republicans for which it stands, two nations, under Jesus, rich against poor, with curtailed liberty and justice for all except blacks, homosexuals, women who want abortions, Communists, welfare queens, treehuggers, feminazis, illegal immigrants, children of illegal immigrants, and you if you don't watch your step.”

Seems accurate to me. 

When asked why he had the students recite this, the professor responded thusly:

“We’re very racist, we’re very repressive, we’re very Christian oriented, we don’t tolerate other kinds of thinking in this country,” Angeletti told Campus Reform. 

“I could go on and on—and do in my classes for hours about things that we need to do to make this a better country.” 

Angeletti, who has taught at MSU since 1967, has a B+ grade on RateMyProfessor.com, but one former student addressed Dr. Angeletti’s liberal bias.

Dr. Angeletti admits he is “biased” and says that he has distributed the pledge for 20 years because it helps people look differently about what goes on in this country. 

“We are scared to death of anything un-American,” Angeletti said. 

During the interview, Angeletti repeatedly affirmed his love for America, his disdain for “family values people,” and his course, clarifying that he supports diversity of thought and allows his students to “say and do anything.”

Of course this freaked out those on the Right, including Greta Van Susteren who used this to further the Fox News agenda of attacking "liberal" education in America.

It should be noted that this is a UNIVERSITY class that is offered as an elective and is not mandatory for graduation.

Personally I think educators who challenge student's perception of their country, their religion, and even themselves are helping to create a generation of rational thinkers and that can only be good for the country.

John Fogerty has some opinions on the Republicans claiming that his song "Fortunate Son" was inappropriate for a Veteran's Day concert.

So I am sure you all remember that Bruce Springsteen, and a number of talented musicians, played the song "Fortunate One" during the Concert of Valor at the National Mall in Washington D.C. and that Right Wing literally lost their minds over it.

So in a recent Rolling Stone interview John Fogerty, who wrote the song, was asked about that response:  

"'Fortunate Son' is a song I wrote during the Vietnam War over 45 years ago," Fogerty said in a statement. "As an American and a songwriter, I am proud that the song still has resonance. I do believe that its meaning gets misinterpreted and even usurped by various factions wishing to make their own case. What a great country we have that a song like this can be performed in a setting like Concert for Valor. 

"Years ago, an ultraconservative administration tried to paint anyone who questioned its policies as 'un-American,'" he continues. "That same administration shamefully ignored and mistreated the soldiers returning from Vietnam. As a man who was drafted and served his country during those times, I have ultimate respect for the men and women who protect us today and demand that they receive the respect that they deserve." 

What the conservative mouthpieces either failed, or refused to understand, is that the song is VERY supportive of the soldiers themselves. Who the song was criticizing were the politicians who start these wars and then send American sons (And now daughters) to die in countries that THEIR children will only ever visit in times of peace.

Both John Fogerty and Bruce Springsteen are American institutions, and I would put their patriotism up against anyone. Especially some conservative jackass sitting on his fat ass, sipping Fox newsroom coffee, and faking outrage in order to rile up the paint chip eaters.

Fogerty goes on to point out that he recently performed "Fortunate One" at "A Salute to the Troops: In Performance at the White House" just last week. A performance by the way that was broadcast on PBS.

And guess which song he played? That's right.

And the outrage from the Right Wing?

Only this.

Right Wing outrage of the day. Bruce Springsteen played an anti-war song during concert to celebrate Veteran's Day.

Courtesy of TPM:  

Pretty much everyone has had something to say about Springsteen's performance Tuesday at the "Concert for Valor," an HBO musical event for veterans held on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. 

Performing with Zac Brown and Dave Grohl, Springsteen sang "Fortunate Son," Creedence Clearwater Revival's classic Vietnam War-era anthem that examines issues of class and jingoism in America. John Fogerty, the CCR frontman, said that his own experience as a drafted serviceman served as an inspiration for the song. 

"I was the same age as the soldiers serving in Vietnam and from the same lower-middle class as them," Fogerty once said. 

But to some conservative ears, the song hit the wrong note at Tuesday's concert. 

"The song, not to put too fine a point on it, is an anti-war screed, taking shots at 'the red white and blue,'" wrote Ethan Epstein at The Weekly Standard. 

The performance was made even worse, Epstein contended, because "Fortunate Son" is "an anti-draft song, and this concert was largely organized to honor those who volunteered to fight in Afghanistan and Iraq." 

The Boss has been in the Fox News crosshairs all day, too. On Fox Business Network, Stuart Varney questioned why Springsteen, "an outspoken leftist," would play politics with the troops. 

"So much for HBO's 'Concert for Valor,'" Clayton Morris said at the outset of this morning's "Fox & Friends." 

On Fox's "Outnumbered," co-host Andrea Tantaros professed to be a fan of both Springsteen and Grohl, but wondered why they didn't just go with a different song. 

"It's amazing to me that nobody — think of all the people that are involved in a concert like this — nobody had the brains to stop and say, 'You guys might want to pick a different song,'" Tantaros said.

Gee, I really like the song.

Apparently this is the portion that pissed off the Right Wing so much:

It ain’t me, it ain’t me 
I ain’t no Senator’s son 
It ain’t me, it ain’t me 
I ain’t no fortunate one 

The song is written about how fundamental unfair it is that politicians start wars in which their children are not forced to fight and die.

Personally I would think that it is a sentiment shared not just by veterans of Vietnam but by the soldiers of today.

This song is not anti-veteran, it's anti-war. I feel very confident in saying that the vast majority of veterans are not pro-war, and therefore embrace the sentiment.

And of course the song is also anti-warmonger.

Perhaps it is that last part which irritates the Fox News crowd so much. You know the same ones who helped spread the Bush Administration propaganda and cheered from the sidelines as we sent thousands of young soldiers to their deaths.

Jon Stewart takes on the newest Benghazi outrage.

I loved this part in response to the Fox News contention that nobody besides them seems to care about Benghazi. Which by the way is true.

 "Okay I think I see the problem. You think people's failure to match your level of outrage is based on ignorance. That after nearly a hundred network news stories, hundreds of cable news stories about Benghazi. Thirteen Congressional hearings, fifty further Congressional briefings and twenty five thousand pages of official findings concerning what happened in Benghazi. That if we all only knew about it....we would care."

After that statement Stewart brilliantly compares this single intelligence failure that has the Fox News panties in a twist, to all of the incalculable intelligence failures of the Bush administration, none of which seemed to cause any outrage whatsoever, and in fact which Fox News eagerly helped to paint over.

The word for today kids, is "hypocrisy."

Now Sarah Palin's mad at ESPN because (Buy my book!) they did not accept a hospital advertisement (Buy my book dammit!) that mentioned God and Jesus (Seriously I have truckloads of these stupid things!) and if anybody thinks she has an ulterior motive they are probably just an angry atheist.

Photo of Sarah Palin's old house before she moved to Arizona.

Courtesy of Phony Festivity Fanatic's Facebook page:

ESPN, you've come a long way, baby... from your known wholesome, bold Americana "persona" to now being afraid to support freedom and not being bold enough to allow acknowledgement of the "Reason for the Season." So disappointing. Well, I hope you guys catch and enjoy the Christmas spirit anyway! 

Palin then links to an article over at Breitbart where, as we know, journalistic ethics goes to die, discussing the terrible transgression by ESPN:   

The commercial mentions that thousands of people in the community send "messages of hope to sick and injured children who may not be able to come home for the holidays." 

"At... Cardinal Glennon Children's Medical Center, we celebrate the birth of Jesus and the season of giving, bringing hope to the many children, parents, and families that we serve," an announcer says in the ad before mentioning that the hospital's patients are "filled with hope" because they receive daily messages from the "treasure chest" beneath its "tree of hope." 

The ad concludes by asking viewers to "help us reveal God's healing presence this Christmas. Send your message of hope at Glennon.org." 

ESPN reportedly found "we celebrate the birth of Jesus" and "help us reveal God's healing presence this Christmas" to be "problematic." 

So once again a business decision made in recognition of the fact that there is a growing number of their viewers who are NOT Christians and who may find such a commercial objectionable, or even insulting to their belief system or lack thereof, has been twisted as an "attack on Christmas and Christianity."

By the way how is it that Palin does not recognize that "freedom" also entails the freedom to pick and choose the advertisements you want broadcast on your network without some anorexic bitch trying to lay a guilt trip on you about it?

But I guess when you have unsellable merchandise you really only care about your own freedom to drum up business by attacking everybody in your line of sight. 

You know, just like Jesus would do.

Rachel Maddow debunks the newest Right Wing outrage over the "fact" that President Obama omitted God from the Gettysburg Address. He didn't.

This courtesy of Raw Story:  

According to Media Matters, Burns specifically asked the president to read from the “Nicolay Version,” which was written before the phrase “under God” was added: 

“It is rather for us, the living, we here be dedicated to the great task remaining before us – that, from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here, gave the last full measure of devotion – that we here highly resolve these dead shall not have died in vain; that the nation, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” 

The phrase, however, was changed slightly by the time the speech was delivered by Lincoln: “that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom.” 

By Tuesday morning, the news had become one of the top stories on conservative websites like the Drudge Report, The Daily Caller, the National Review Online and WMAL. The Daily Caller did eventually correct their report to note that Burns had requested the “Nicolay Version” of the speech.

This story was ALL OVER the Right Wing blogosphere yesterday. I knew when I first heard it that it was nothing.

I swear that these idiots spend all day, every day simply waiting for something that they can feel outraged over. 

Fox TV Studios May Be Producing NBC’s Hillary Clinton Miniseries. Right Wing outrage in 3..2..never.

Courtesy of Mediaite:  

Remember how the Republican National Committee threatened NBC and CNN to call off their planned Hillary Clinton projects lest they not get any of the Republican primary debates in 2016? Well, if the RNC is serious about taking a stand, the party may end up limiting its debates to other networks, but mainly Fox News. There’s just one teensy, tiny, little problem: 

Fox Television Studios may be producing NBC’s Hillary miniseries. 

The New York Times broke the news late Friday, which will almost assuredly not be followed by threats to boycott debates on Fox. 

Leslie Oren, a spokesman for FTVS, as the studio is known, confirmed that NBC is in “the early stages” of discussions to bring the Fox unit in as the production company on the as yet unnamed mini-series, which will star Diane Lane as Mrs. Clinton. 

“There is no deal yet,” Ms. Oren said. But should a deal be completed, FTVS would become the distributor of the film internationally. FTVS is the production arm of 21st Century Fox’s entertainment group. 

Naturally, the argument here would be, “Fox News and Fox Entertainment are two completely different things! Don’t judge one for what the other is doing!”

Oh yeah, and that worked so well for NBC when THEY tried it. 

So it should be VERY entertaining to hear how "Rinse once and Prebus" responds to this little nugget of information. Don't you agree?

Jahar Tsarnaev: Rolling Stone cover heartthrob or dangerous terrorist?

This is the cover that is causing Twitter to go crazy today and attracting outrage from both the Left and the Right, Mostly the Right.

Much of the anger has been focused on the fact that Tsarnaev looks TOO attractive on the cover, and some have compared his cover to the one done for Jim Morrison of "The Doors."

However in my opinion it does not even reach the level of "controversy" when it comes to Rolling Stone covers.

After all this is a magazine that once had THIS image on its cover.

Not to mention this one:

And as for glamorizing hateful figures Rolling Stone would be hard pressed to beat this one:

Comparatively speaking it is a little difficult to get TOO worked up.

After all the idea is to attract interest and if this kerfuffle is any indication they have certainly done that.

Here is is a taste of what the actual article reveals: 

• As Jahar lay in the boat, surrounded by SWAT teams and police, FBI negotiators mentioned a public plea for his surrender from his former wrestling coach. An agent on the scene later told the coach that it could have been this name from the past – and the memory of that past – both of which were invoked during the standoff, that convinced Jahar to ultimately give up. 

• Around 2008, Jahar’s older brother Tamerlan confided to his mother that he felt like "two people" were inside him. She confided this to a close friend who felt he might need a psychiatrist, but Zubeidat believed that religion would be the cure for her son’s inner demons and growing mental instability, and pushed him deeper into Islam. 

• Jahar never spoke about 9/11. Once, though, he let slip to a high school friend that he thought the terrorist attacks could be justified, and pointed to US policies towards Muslim countries and US drone strikes and other attacks as his rationale. 

As a parent who was shocked to learn that my daughter not only believed that Jahar Tsarnaev had died along with this brother back in April, but who also believed that there was a government conspiracy involved, I am interested in getting more facts to help me understand exactly what did happen and how the United States can keep it from happening again.

(And yes I recognize that part of keeping that from happening again might be exactly the type of program the details of which are currently in Edward Snowden's possession in a Moscow airport.)

So ultimately I think the fuss over the photo is much ado about not very much. If the point was to attract attention and readers, Rolling Stone did just that. If the point was to turn Tsarnaev into a terrorist version of a rock god I think that is only something we could determine after reading the article. But I somehow doubt it.

Komen apologizes for taking funding away from Planned Parenthood, and promises that funding will resume uninterrrupted. Update.

Courtesy of The Scoop Blog:

Komen for the Cure just released the following statement from Nancy Brinker and the Susan G. Komen Board of Directors: 

We want to apologize to the American public for recent decisions that cast doubt upon our commitment to our mission of saving women's lives. 

The events of this week have been deeply unsettling for our supporters, partners and friends and all of us at Susan G. Komen. We have been distressed at the presumption that the changes made to our funding criteria were done for political reasons or to specifically penalize Planned Parenthood. They were not. 

Our original desire was to fulfill our fiduciary duty to our donors by not funding grant applications made by organizations under investigation. We will amend the criteria to make clear that disqualifying investigations must be criminal and conclusive in nature and not political. That is what is right and fair. 

Our only goal for our granting process is to support women and families in the fight against breast cancer. Amending our criteria will ensure that politics has no place in our grant process. We will continue to fund existing grants, including those of Planned Parenthood, and preserve their eligibility to apply for future grants, while maintaining the ability of our affiliates to make funding decisions that meet the needs of their communities. 

It is our hope and we believe it is time for everyone involved to pause, slow down and reflect on how grants can most effectively and directly be administered without controversies that hurt the cause of women. We urge everyone who has participated in this conversation across the country over the last few days to help us move past this issue. We do not want our mission marred or affected by politics - anyone's politics. 

Starting this afternoon, we will have calls with our network and key supporters to refocus our attention on our mission and get back to doing our work. We ask for the public's understanding and patience as we gather our Komen affiliates from around the country to determine how to move forward in the best interests of the women and people we serve. 

We extend our deepest thanks for the outpouring of support we have received from so many in the past few days and we sincerely hope that these changes will be welcomed by those who have expressed their concern.

I also just heard this on MSNBC so it is official.

Wow!  Way to go ladies!

I am very impressed with how aggressively people spoke out concerning this outrage. I have not seen a response this fast since the SOPA outrage last month.

I still have no idea how Komen rationalized making this controversial decision in the first place, but I think this will serve as a lesson to EVERYBODY in the future to not bend to the anti-women political agendas of the Right Wing fringe, Especially when it comes to something as important as fighting cancer and supporting women's health issues.

Update:  While I still believe that this is a victory for those who are fighting to improve women's health in this country, I also realize that the "cancer," if you will, that still exists in the form of Karen Handel within the Komen foundation, is still a lingering malignancy that should be removed.

However I think the only way THAT will happen is if keeping her as VP negatively impacts their funding.  If you click here you can see a list of their "corporate partners" who provide the majority of their donations.  Perhaps a couple thousand e-mails sent to those on this list might kick start the countdown to the end of Karen Handel, and her right wing supporters, influence on this organization.

Couldn't hurt.

Update 2: According to the Plum Line, the Komen Foundation has NO plans to change their leadership or promise to provide donations to Planned Parenthood in the future:  

I just got off the phone with a Komen board member, and he confirmed that the announcement does not mean that Planned Parenthood is guaranteed future grants — a demand he said would be “unfair” to impose on Komen. He also said the job of the group’s controversial director, Nancy Brinker, is safe, as far as the board is concerned. 

I asked Komen board member John Raffaelli to respond to those who are now saying that the announcement doesn’t necessarily constitute a reversal until Planned Parenthood actually sees more funding. 

He insisted it would be unfair to expect the group to commit to future grants. “It would be highly unfair to ask us to commit to any organization that doesn’t go through a grant process that shows that the money we raise is used to carry out our mission,” Raffaelli told me. “We’re a humaniatrian organization. We have a mission. Tell me you can help carry out our mission and we will sit down at the table.” 

Pushed on whether this means the new announcement wasn’t really a reversal, Raffaelli pushed back, arguing that Komen, in response to all the criticism, had removed politics from the grant-making process. “Is it really unclear that we’re changing the policy to address criticism?” he said.

So Nancy Brinker is safe, as I assume Karen Handel is as well, and there is no definitive promise to continue the foundation's relationship with PP.

I think it is the appropriate time to say fuck the Komen Foundation, and, as so many have already suggested, to send out money directly to Planned Parenthood.

Here is their link to donate.