Friday Mashup (10/21/11)

(Videos for tonight are questionable, by the way.)

No, that sleazy weasel Eric Cantor didn’t bail on his speech at Penn’s Wharton Business School here because he’s a gutless worm afraid of criticism. Of course not. It’s all the fault of those damned “Occupy” protesters in Philadelphia, isn’t it (here)?

(And of course, why the U of P would think that Cantor is someone who could actually impart anything not totally self-serving in a speech is another matter.)

And it looks like there’s more bad polling data for Number 44 based on this (he’s only at 41 percent approval, apparently...that would have been a stratospheric number for Dubya before he was done, but that's a whole other tale to tell).

Well, according to this, he leads potential Repug presidential candidate Willard Mitt Romney by 4 points and the rest of that motley bunch by substantial margins. Also, when it comes to jobs and the economy, I would say that this shows that President Obama is on the right track (and I thought this was a humorous take on all of this…if the presidential vote had occurred in 2007 instead of 2008, it would have paired Hillary Clinton against Rudy 9iu11ani).

Next (and in keeping with the whole “Obama job approval” thing), Repug political consultant David Gergen tells us the following (here)…

…in America, we are speeding toward the 2012 presidential elections, and talk quickly turns to the political considerations here. President Obama appeared Thursday afternoon in the White House Rose Garden to celebrate this "momentous day in the history of Libya" and to declare that "one of the world's longest dictators is no more."

As Obama pledged his support to Libya's future, many in the crowd and watching at home surely began to wonder about the president's own future. It is a much-discussed irony that a president elected largely around domestic concerns has gone on to amass some sterling foreign policy bona fides, while his approval on matters stateside sinks deeper and deeper. But what impact, if any, will his string of overseas successes have on his standing -- and re-election prospects -- here at home?

The first, most obvious answer is: not much.

Maybe, but it should be noted that Obama got a “bounce” of sorts after he authorized the mission to take out bin Laden (as noted here).

However, I think we should also reconsider the support given to Gaddafi (I guess that’s how you spell this dude’s name at long last) by our prior ruling cabal; this tells us of the U.S. business lobby that helped to keep him in power full of the usual right-wing suspects.

Also, anyone remember the lie about how Obama was getting us into Libya to help al Qaeda (from the usual gang of idiots, as noted here)? It should also be pointed out that Obama also approved funding for an organization run by one of Gaddafi’s sons, which drove the wingnuts typically bonkers (even though Dubya did the same thing, as noted here – also, as long as I’m talking about Fix Noise and Libya, I should bring back this golden oldie once more).

(In addition to all of this, I should note that at least Gergen didn't say that Obama's support on Libya had "crumbled" - and by the way, speaking of foreign policy, kudos to the president for this also.)

Continuing, it looks like Lisa Simeone from that supposedly “liberal” network NPR got bounced because she participated in an “Occupy Wall Street” event (here).

To highlight the total absurdity of Simeone losing her job in this manner compared to the relentless promotion of the Teahadists by The Roger Ailes Propaganda Machine (for which no one at that network has been so much as even disciplined in any way at all), I give you the following here from Eric Boehlert of Media Matters.

Finally, it looks like out Repug PA-08 U.S. House rep haz a sad (here)…

In Kate Fratti’s column last Thursday, she characterized a small-business owner here in Bucks County as an “extortionist” based on a conversation I had with the Courier Times editorial board two weeks ago. This misguided and misinformed accusation not only misrepresents the story I recounted in our meeting, but also the intentions and desires of Bucks County job creators.

The example I cited during our meeting was of a local manufacturer who has been in business for over 40 years, during which time his work has included some defense contracting. During the first 10 months of my term in Congress, I have visited dozens of local small businesses and met with the owners of countless more.

I’ll spare you the rest of Mikey’s boilerplate here – just the usual pabulum of “making government live within its means,” “uncertainty,” blah blah blah. However, I would say that he’s being particularly thin-skinned here, especially since Fratti actually included some quotes from the “job creators” Mikey professes to love for the opposing point of view in her column (something which Mikey, in typical fashion, doesn’t provide here – and by the way, I think it’s an “amateur hour” move by the newspaper not to link back to Fratti’s column in the online version of Fitzpatrick’s screed today).

For once, I would actually like to read about Fitzpatrick meeting with individuals at job fairs to hear their side of the story instead (and of course, Mikey professes ignorance on what the “Occupy Wall Street” movement is supposed to be all about – he can read this for starters).

As far as the bit about supposedly “burdensome” government regulations, I would actually like to hear which regulations Fitzpatrick and these supposed job creators are referring to (and on that subject, I thought this was typical for TV’s most notorious propaganda outfit). And if Fitzpatrick thinks that it is impossible for those zany Teahadists to oppose job creation just to hurt Obama, he should read this. And for good measure, he should read this to find out just how much he is on the wrong side when it comes to economic matters (yes, the charts show how the Senate voted, but they might as well show how House Republicans did also).

The majority of the voters in PA-08, in their eternal, dunderheaded stupidity, chose to send him to Washington last November and send Patrick Murphy home. And Fitzpatrick has done absolutely nothing since to show that he was worthy of the office.

I’ve asked it before, I’ll ask it again, and I’ll expect to ask it plenty more times before Fitzpatrick is finally gone, but ask it I must…

Where are the jobs, Mikey??!!