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Business Gorillas posted:Isn't the Qatari government ran by a monarch or dictatorship or something? I remember reading a story in Time recently about it and they threw a reporter or poet in jail for life because he wrote a piece that the government found unflattering. Yeah, they're a fairly typical Arabian absolute monarchy which is pretty repressive and has an awful human rights record. They supported the NATO mission to overthrow Gaddafi but they're less keen on democracy closer to home- they sent troops to help the Bahrain government repress the protests there for example.
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Jan 3, 2013 01:12
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Crameltonian posted:Yeah, they're a fairly typical Arabian absolute monarchy which is pretty repressive and has an awful human rights record. They supported the NATO mission to overthrow Gaddafi but they're less keen on democracy closer to home- they sent troops to help the Bahrain government repress the protests there for example. I imagine we won't see making political progress for another considerable amount of time, depending weather or not we go back to the policies of the Cold War.
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Jan 3, 2013 01:24
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Right, anything involving Qatar's interests geopolitically should probably be taken with a grain of salt on Al Jazeera. So stuff about Syria in particular (where Qatar's government has been backing the Salafi factions of the rebels since the beginning of the civil war) isn't much better than what you'd get on CNN talking about American interests or whatever.
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Jan 3, 2013 02:54
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Zeroisanumber posted:It's interesting. A-J has been trying to expand their international profile for a while now, and this would be a step in the direction of becoming a legit cable news channel. Considering Time Warner Cable's already announced they're dumping Current in response, and surely others are soon to follow, probably not.
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Jan 3, 2013 05:38
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watt par posted:Considering Time Warner Cable's already announced they're dumping Current in response, and surely others are soon to follow, probably not. Haha what the gently caress? "Oh no, the A-Rabs are buying it?! BURN IT DOWN."
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Jan 3, 2013 05:46
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Bathtub Cheese posted:Right, anything involving Qatar's interests geopolitically should probably be taken with a grain of salt on Al Jazeera. So stuff about Syria in particular (where Qatar's government has been backing the Salafi factions of the rebels since the beginning of the civil war) isn't much better than what you'd get on CNN talking about American interests or whatever. Bwuh? I was always under the impression that as long as it didn't deal DIRECTLY with Qatar (so suspicious silence on domestic issues and foreign funding decisions) AJ was pretty comfortable with being proper journalists. Admittedly even in their most nervous moments re the Emir they're still usually a better regional news source than any Westerners except possibly the BBC.
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Jan 3, 2013 05:52
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Glitterbomber posted:Haha what the gently caress? This is literally the only thing I could think of as a "rational response" from TWC. What the gently caress do they care? Al Jazeera beating CNN in the ratings?
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Jan 3, 2013 05:56
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For what it's worth, Nielsen says CURRENT shows up in just 59,260,000 households - 51.67% of TV owners. That means all people who have it on a cable package they subscribe too, the number who actually watch it is less. For comparison, standard networks like ESPN gets 98,903,000 - 86.23% and the Weather Channel, the most widely available cable/satellite channel, gets 100,205,000 - 87.36%.
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Jan 3, 2013 05:57
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Talking about right-wing media, has anyone done any study on whether or not mass-mailing people DVDs of anti-Obama propaganda was effective? I thought that was an interesting touch from the last election. Definitely better than robocalls or youtube videos. I'm curious to see if it actually affected voting patterns in any way, even slightly.
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Jan 3, 2013 07:54
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Phone posted:This is literally the only thing I could think of as a "rational response" from TWC. What the gently caress do they care? Al Jazeera beating CNN in the ratings? The standard line is Current's ratings were too low, which why they also dumped Ovation, which is mostly performing arts and documentaries, though in that case it was to add another sports channel.
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Jan 3, 2013 08:18
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cheerfullydrab posted:Talking about right-wing media, has anyone done any study on whether or not mass-mailing people DVDs of anti-Obama propaganda was effective? I thought that was an interesting touch from the last election. Definitely better than robocalls or youtube videos. I'm curious to see if it actually affected voting patterns in any way, even slightly. Not sure there is anything on DVDs yet specifically, there are barely any studies out yet on the 2012 election overall. Independent expenditures across the board (D and R) only had 1/3rd of their money go to races that won. This is party due to the corollary between close races getting more money and partly because Republican independent expenditure groups were hilariously inefficient. Karl Rove got terrible returns on his money and not many other Republican groups did much better. This is 2012 specific though, in 2010 what independent groups there were did pretty well. So far there is just not that much data for examining the effectiveness of outside projects like the DVDs.
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Jan 3, 2013 08:22
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The dark money and 501(c)(4) groups weren't so much inefficient as they were scams.
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Jan 3, 2013 08:29
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As a barometer of how pathetic the right wing and its media have become, this is the latest "issue" they are pushing. That Hillary Clinton faked getting a concussion in a 'conspiracy' to duck Benghazi investigations: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujE0-lZ_yqI Several of them even after the doctors came out to announce her status, are still pushing this and refusing to apologize for being loving idiots. quote:Bolton said, "I didn't think that was the effort to begin with.. I think it's the too cute by half approach... that's going to end up damaging her and damaging her credibility." Spacedad fucked around with this message at 08:57 on Jan 3, 2013 |
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Jan 3, 2013 08:51
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By the by, any chatter from the pundits about the Sandy relief meltdown? I know it's got its own thread, but this is a talking-head question.
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Jan 3, 2013 09:10
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Spacedad posted:As a barometer of how pathetic the right wing and its media have become, this is the latest "issue" they are pushing. Yeah I got to hear over Christmas how Hillary's injury was in order to avoid Benghazi hearings so that she will be clean for the 2016 election. I asked how she is going to pull that for the next four years if Benghazi actually is a Big Deal but whatever. I feel sad that people still think there's some shadowy Obama/Hillary motive that they did something bad there but they can't explain what that possibly could be since they were hammered so hard that it was A Thing during the election and can't turn it off.
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Jan 3, 2013 14:53
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Glitterbomber posted:Haha what the gently caress? Al-Jazeera also owns BeIN Sport and that just got added to my lineup because they bought the rights to a bunch of top-tier European soccer (France's Ligue 1, Italy's Serie A, Germany's Bundesliga, UEFA Champions League and Europa Cup, etc). It's also probably going to kill Fox Soccer Channel in America since Fox just lost English Premier League rights to NBC/Univeral, so it's a neat thing all around.
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Jan 3, 2013 15:54
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Glitterbomber posted:Haha what the gently caress? "There isn't any right to not be offended. Why don't you change the channel?  "
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Jan 3, 2013 15:55
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Regarding CurrentTV: I'm going to enjoy the predictable Freeper response that the "TERRORISTS" are sneaking into America using the 1st Amendment as cover. Never mind that Saudi royalty is the largest minority owner of Newscorp. No sir - don't look at that man behind the curtain.
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Jan 3, 2013 16:22
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watt par posted:Considering Time Warner Cable's already announced they're dumping Current in response, and surely others are soon to follow, probably not. Yet another symptom that TV Cable is dying a slow slow slow death, and people should stop subscribing. I don't own cable TV and I really don't think hardly anyone should in this day and age. 99% of TV is garbage you don't want to watch. The shows you do want to watch are usually available free (with ads) online as they come out in episodes, or if you are really keen on them, you can get them from itunes or something. (And in that case, you get them without ads.) That said, I'd say that the al jazeera english app on my iphone is one of my most-used apps. A free streaming international news channel, that while carrying biases themselves, is still worlds better than ANY American TV cable news network? Sure! redshirt posted:Regarding CurrentTV: I'm going to enjoy the predictable Freeper response that the "TERRORISTS" are sneaking into America using the 1st Amendment as cover. Never mind that Saudi royalty is the largest minority owner of Newscorp. No sir - don't look at that man behind the curtain. Or that Geraldo Rivera gave away troop locations live on Fox. Spacedad fucked around with this message at 20:48 on Jan 3, 2013 |
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Jan 3, 2013 19:55
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redshirt posted:Regarding CurrentTV: I'm going to enjoy the predictable Freeper response that the "TERRORISTS" are sneaking into America using the 1st Amendment as cover. Never mind that Saudi royalty is the largest minority owner of Newscorp. No sir - don't look at that man behind the curtain. Beck basically made that argument today. He was particularly upset because The Blaze looked into buying Current but were denied due to not sharing the same values. "Heh, so Al Gore means to say he shares his values with Al Jazeera?? These guys broadcast Osama bin Laden!!!"
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Jan 3, 2013 21:15
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Just heard the most idiotic birther-esque argument from Alex Jones. He and his guest said that to be a natural-born citizen of the US, BOTH of your parents have to be US citizens. Thus it doesn't matter where you're born, so even if you concede Obama is from Hawaii, his father being Kenyan disqualifies him. And so now is the time to flood Eric Holder's inbox with your indignant rage. I guess they forgot about the 14th amendment? By their own logic every child of an immigrant is a non-citizen, which is so clearly insane and would mean vast swathes of the US would be non-citizens receiving all the benefits thereof. It's also variation on this argument, but somehow even dumber: http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/citizen.asp BanjoFish fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Jan 3, 2013 |
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Jan 3, 2013 21:15
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fake edit: ^^^Oh hey, building on that concept... Well, you can tell WorldNetDaily is getting desperate. After seeming to finally give up on their plan to crash the electoral college to keep Obama out of office, they have now posted an open letter to Chief Justice Roberts saying that if he swears in Obama, he's violating the Constitution and will be impeached. quote:In addition to the nationality of Mr. Obama Sr. listed on Barack Obama’s birth certificate, we know that Obama Sr. was not an American citizen because of correspondence surrounding his stay in this country. quote:Given the gravity of this situation, we therefore urge you to take the honorable course of action and refuse to administer the oath of office to Mr. Obama. And yes, this will also require you to explain to the nation in the clearest possible terms why you have been compelled to take this most extraordinary action. I mean, I hate picking on WND because it's essentially the estranged e-mail forwarding racist uncle of the news media, but remember, Rick Santorum is now an official contributor to the site. They have an audience. And since they're essentially the last bastion of Birther thought left, it's interesting to see how they implode.
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Jan 3, 2013 21:32
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BanjoFish posted:Just heard the most idiotic birther-esque argument from Alex Jones. He and his guest said that to be a natural-born citizen of the US, BOTH of your parents have to be US citizens. Thus it doesn't matter where you're born, so even if you concede Obama is from Hawaii, his father being Kenyan disqualifies him. And so now is the time to flood Eric Holder's inbox with your indignant rage. If taken to its logical conclusion, wouldn't this mean the only people who are actually citizens were native Americans? The whole nation of immigrants thing probably doesn't get a lot of play on Alex Jones though.
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Jan 3, 2013 21:34
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Sword of Chomsky posted:If taken to its logical conclusion, wouldn't this mean the only people who are actually citizens were native Americans? The whole nation of immigrants thing probably doesn't get a lot of play on Alex Jones though. That's what I was wondering. Both my parents were natural born Americans and their parents were but that's where it ends. My grandparents weren't all born to two Americans. So doesn't that make my grandparents not citizens? And since my parents didn't have citizens as parents doesn't that make them not citizens? And then where does that leave me? Crap. I'm an illegal immigrant despite being 3rd generation born in the US?
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Jan 3, 2013 21:54
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The WorldNetDaily argument is idiotic, but it's about Natural Born Citizens, which is the requirement to be POTUS, not being a citizen of the U.S. So Arnold Schwarzenegger is a citizen with all the associated rights, but not eligible to be POTUS. It's idiotic because the Natural Born condition has never been defined with precision. If it's so clear cut an issue as they now claim, how come no one knew this four years ago?
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Jan 3, 2013 23:08
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BanjoFish posted:Just heard the most idiotic birther-esque argument from Alex Jones. He and his guest said that to be a natural-born citizen of the US, BOTH of your parents have to be US citizens. Thus it doesn't matter where you're born, so even if you concede Obama is from Hawaii, his father being Kenyan disqualifies him. And so now is the time to flood Eric Holder's inbox with your indignant rage. Alex Jones is a special sort of idiot. He once argued that the Government adds chemicals like fluoride into water and food to turn people gay as a way of establishing population control. No! Not my sippy juice box! 
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Jan 3, 2013 23:31
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ShadowCatboy posted:Alex Jones is a special sort of idiot. He once argued that the Government adds chemicals like fluoride into water and food to turn people gay as a way of establishing population control. 
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Jan 3, 2013 23:33
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There's plenty of precedent for "natural born citizen" to mean "citizen at birth" - which would be governed by the 14th amendment and some other laws. So again they are insane since Obama was born in the US and it doesn't matter where his parents are from. So either they have to stop being scared of anchor babies or admit they have no standing.
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Jan 3, 2013 23:42
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They've been pretty much sticking their fingers in their ears and going "LALALALALA" every step of the way on this whenever people shoot the fish in a barrel of their birther 'case.' So obviously they're going to keep being scared of anchor babies while pretending they have standing. It's a good thing that we can regard them as politically irrelevant for the most part though. They're only just going to become more and more delusional and paint themselves further into a corner of insanity with no relation to reality.
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Jan 3, 2013 23:53
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DivisionPost posted:Hey, who wants to see what Glenn Beck is up to? So much for the 1st amendment, eh Glenn Baby?
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Jan 3, 2013 23:58
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Defenestration posted:I thought this was already hilarious that a supposed "news" pundit would stick his fingers in his ears and completely go LALALALA at the President of the United States, but then I saw that this rule does not apply to Beck himself, just his underlings. People like Beck are itty bitty mad tyrants who slaver at the power that comes with controlling other human beings. And just like 'big' tyrants, they find scapegoats to project their tyranny on and deny that they are tyrants. Which would explain why Beck wants total Stalinistic control of airbrushing Obama's image. See, Beck's not the tyrant - he's not the overinflated ego and petty childish control freak. It's dat Obummer - who Beck and only Beck can give the proper airbrushing presentation for, so he thinks. Spacedad fucked around with this message at 00:06 on Jan 4, 2013 |
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Jan 4, 2013 00:00
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Defenestration posted:I thought this was already hilarious that a supposed "news" pundit would stick his fingers in his ears and completely go LALALALA at the President of the United States, but then I saw that this rule does not apply to Beck himself, just his underlings. Fascism is stylish. example: Hugo Boss and the Nazis 
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Jan 4, 2013 00:05
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Phone posted:Fascism is stylish. Several of them wore some pretty fetching neckties.
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Jan 4, 2013 00:07
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I listened to Hannity on the drive home and am listening to Levin now and I was intrigued by how, after trashing the fiscal cliff deal and attacking Boehner and McConnell, they both predicted that U.S. debt would be downgraded over the coming budget battle. Of course, it would all be Obama's fault. They are already greasing the wheels for the GOP to shut the government down in two months.
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Jan 4, 2013 00:41
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radical meme posted:I listened to Hannity on the drive home and am listening to Levin now and I was intrigued by how, after trashing the fiscal cliff deal and attacking Boehner and McConnell, they both predicted that U.S. debt would be downgraded over the coming budget battle. Of course, it would all be Obama's fault. They are already greasing the wheels for the GOP to shut the government down in two months. See, here's the thing though. It's been this kind of stuff for the last four years running. Even most GOP voters aren't Koch Bros. level super billionaires who can indulge fits of political pique while Rome, and the markets, burn. 8 years is a hell of a long time to let the economy be in the shitter to stick it to Obama. Whether they are sympathetic with the cause or not, if intransigence and debt ceiling shenanigans cause a market crash and any possible recovery to die in the crib, the country as a whole WILL assign the blame to the GOP. Aren't there devastating political consequences for this at SOME point? I live among and work with a huge tribe of GOP voters who are probably largely in the "one to a few million bucks net worth, make a lot but under a million dollars yearly" group who, while fairly secure economically, will be seriously adversely effected by a market crash or continued weak economy. They no longer have the option or luxury of trying to get Obama out of office, and I seriously doubt they will benefit from continued lovely economy for four more years much less a full blown crash. If at all rational they will want things to recover just for their own families, businesses and retirement accounts to do better. I will be watching very closely their reaction if their own party insists on driving the train off the rails in a couple of months.
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Jan 4, 2013 00:52
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I love how his little sychophant sidekicks giggle nervously at nearly everything he says. It kinda completes the whole picture.
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Jan 4, 2013 02:14
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I love listening to Levin. At this point all he can do is grasp at straws and ask his people to be obstructionist assholes and primary EVERYONE who voted for the guy. I love how, at this point, Republican no longer means Conservative and it's now a completely different class of political entity. Please, please, please, please splinter the right even more. The further these people drive one another apart the better this nation is going to be in the long run. I have never in my life been happier to have the extreme right around.
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Jan 4, 2013 02:48
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My personal favorite bit of birther blather is the 14th Amendment Citizen theory. You see, since the slaves were freed under the terms of the 14th amendment, no black person can be a natural born citizen, but rather a unique category of person known as a '14th amendment citizen', so no black will ever qualify to be President.
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Jan 4, 2013 03:07
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sicarius posted:I love listening to Levin. At this point all he can do is grasp at straws and ask his people to be obstructionist assholes and primary EVERYONE who voted for the guy. I love how, at this point, Republican no longer means Conservative and it's now a completely different class of political entity. Please, please, please, please splinter the right even more. The further these people drive one another apart the better this nation is going to be in the long run. I have never in my life been happier to have the extreme right around. I view Levin as just a straight up anarchist. He continually fumes about how we live in tyranny and don't need government in our lives. I like to think of him and his kind as wanna be mountain men, but they have no idea the amount of deprivation involved in living that lifestyle.
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Jan 4, 2013 03:23
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I just checked out Redstate; is it usually this bad. http://www.redstate.com/fmeekins/2013/01/03/racemongers-rally-to-gay-marriages-defense/
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Jan 4, 2013 03:34
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