KeepHip.com

(This isn't a new story, but I can go some time without reading non-political news.)

When I saw the headline "Search for Missing Mom, Shantina Smiley, Resumes" I thought it may have actually been about a black woman, but of course I was wrong. What the hell was I thinking?

More New Left Media:

So sad.

According to Jim Cramer, "Health Care Passage 'Will Topple the Stock Market'":

While a vote on health care reform legislation appears to be imminent, should it pass it could have broader economic implications, even if the bill itself won’t take effect for some time.

As CNBC “Mad Money” host Jim Cramer predicted – if it passes, get ready to see a sell-off on Wall Street. Cramer appeared on CNBC’s March 18 “The Kudlow Report,” with his former broadcast partner Larry Kudlow. Kudlow asked Cramer to elaborate on his theory ObamaCare could send the financial markets reeling or “topple the stock market,” as Kudlow described it.

“First, it is the single biggest impediment to the stock market going higher,” Cramer said. “And a lot of this has to do with what's not being talked about enough with how it's going to be paid and also about what it will do to small business formation. This bill is a disaster for both.”

CNBC is dredging the bottom of the barrel for this fear-mongering. Everyone knows Jim Cramer, of all folks, should never be taken seriously.

Especially when we already know health care insurance premiums have doubled in the last 9 years and will probably double again in the next 6 years: an increasing rate of failure for the private insurance market I have yet to see a conservative address.

"‘Amateur’ Steele deemed a ‘liability’ by most GOP insiders"

"The Misinformed Tea Party Movement":

In short, no matter how one slices the data, the Tea Party crowd appears to believe that federal taxes are very considerably higher than they actually are, whether referring to total taxes as a share of GDP or in terms of the taxes paid by a typical family.

Tea Partyers also seem to have a very distorted view of the direction of federal taxes. They were asked whether they are higher, lower or the same as when Barack Obama was inaugurated last year. More than two-thirds thought that taxes are higher today, and only 4% thought they were lower; the rest said they are the same.

As noted earlier, federal taxes are very considerably lower by every measure since Obama became president. And given the economic circumstances, it's hard to imagine that a tax increase would have been enacted last year. In fact, 40% of Obama's stimulus package involved tax cuts. These include the Making Work Pay Credit, which reduces federal taxes for all taxpayers with incomes below $75,000 by between $400 and $800.

In short: "Tea Partiers" are just as uninformed as I'd imagined. The last part of that quote may in part be Obama's fault: he's just not talking about his tax cuts as much as he should.

One question remains for me though - how does a "movement" that garners a couple hundred people per gathering deserves so much press? There's no correlation between the size of this movement and the press they get. In fact, the press seems uninterested in noting how pathetic the Tea Party turnouts usually are, despite free and constant promotion from FOX News.

Liberals are drinking this Kool-Aid too, usually liberals treat this tiny fringe movement as if they will actually have some effect on the 2012 elections.

Flashback to 2002 and you'll remember that war protesters got several orders of magnitude higher turnouts for their demonstrations and somehow they got far less press. They were all too busy cheer leading us into another war, I guess, to note that the people weren't clapping in the stands.