Republicans are continuing their attempts at a post-election reinvention, talking a lot about the middle class and tapping Florida’s Senator Marco Rubio to tout their agenda tonight. Rubio may know a lot about public reinventions, but his record of voting with the far-right fringe of the Republican Party underscores he knows nothing about the middle or class.
President Obama, closing out the first State of the Union address of his second term. (via shortformblog)
The most powerful last quarter of any SOTU in recent history.
Things that are true about Chris Christie:
- He is the governor of New Jersey
- He loves Bruce Springsteen (like, a lot)
- He is fat
- He sucks
He does not suck BECAUSE he is fat, and his fatness should have NOTHING to do with the criticisms against him. I’m so tired of the snide remarks about Chris Christie’s weight in articles, on television, and in blog posts.
Reasons that Chris Christie sucks:
- He enacted HUGE cuts to NJ’s education budget, possibly violating the state’s constitution.
- He’s anti-choice in a variety of ways, including support for mandatory waiting periods, and state-mandated parental notification.
- Believes marriage rights should only be extended to couples consisting of “one man and one woman.”
- Thinks that “the free market” is the best way to solve the health care crisis in this country.
There are more, of course, but NONE of them are “Chris Christie sucks because he’s fat.” Stop. Fat-shaming doesn’t become okay just because this fat politician sucks. Every time Christie does an interview, there’s some joke or bit or question about his weight, and even though he says he doesn’t mind, it’s at the very least a huge waste of time.
We could be asking Christie about his policies in the time we spend giggling at his waistline - we could be demanding he account for the millions of dollars he pulled from poor school districts, but no, it’s more fun to laugh at his appearance.
At worst, this interviews enforce the cultural belief that it’s OKAY to laugh at fat people, that it’s ACCEPTABLE to use them as a punchline, that their weight is any of our damn business.
Chris Christie definitely sucks, but not because of his weight.
WORD to all of this. Here are some additional reasons Chris Christie is awful:
- He spends an inordinate amount of time traveling around the country instead of staying home to govern the state that elected him.
- He may have done well with his Sandy response, but remember when Christie abandoned NJ to go to Florida after we got sacked with some of the worst blizzards we had seen in a while?
- As of late 2012, more than one third of this state is living in poverty. As a reminder, NJ has the third highest cost of living in the US.
- Poverty in NJ has increased every year that Christie has been governor.
- Thanks to Christie’s push for exclusionary zoning laws and to abolish the Council on Affordable Housing, it’s becoming more and more difficult for the middle class to afford to live in NJ.
- Foreclosure filings fell 3 percent nationally in 2012 from 2011′s levels but under Christie, they increased in New Jersey by 55 percent.
- Christie has vetoed a millionaire tax increase not once, or twice, but three times.
- Chris Christie vetoed the minimum wage increase bill.
- Under Christie, NJ’s debt grew by $6 billion in fiscal year 2012.
- NJ’s economic performance is ranked 47th in the nation. Our economy is shrinking while the economies of 43 other states are growing.
- Our unemployment rate is currently 9.6% (pretty much the same it was when Christie took office) and lags behind the national unemployment rate by nearly 2%. We’re still losing thousands of jobs. If unemployment rates included those who have given up looking for work, it is estimated our unemployment rate would be around 10.3%.
- Christie is not shy about letting his former life as a lobbyist color his governing decisions. Look at his support for JCP&L after their abysmal performances in all the storms we’ve had lately.
- Christie has campaigned for other Republicans who supported Todd Akin’s “legitimate rape” comments.
- He believes women are not half his constituency but are a special interest group that Republicans shouldn’t have to “cater to.”
- He cut funding for reproductive health care services, resulting in the closure of 6 family planning health centers (many in lower-income neighborhoods that are in desperate need of affordable health care), and a decrease of 20% in patients served.
- Christie will not allow NJ to participate in a Medicaid Family Planning Expansion authorized under federal health care reform. This expansion could save the state at least $43 million annually.
There are lots of reasons to hate this guy, but his appearance is not one of them. So, fellow progressives, especially you progressive New Jerseyans: stop mocking Chris Christie’s weight, because this is the last guy on earth I want to defend.
No, no, I’m not really an OB/GYN, but I play one in Congress.
welp
I’m just gonna put this here and walk away quietly.
BAM.
The official White House response to the Death Star petition is pure comedy. (via shortformblog)
Funny, and actually pretty informative.
In my imagination, someone from the Bush Administration would read the petition and respond with “stfu, nerd”. That is, if they had dared to accept questions, or pretend to care about common concerns, or just had a sense of humor.
Les Fiscal Misérables
- Republicans in both houses of Congress lose their shit over RESTORING taxes for very wealthy Americans to pre-Bush-tax-cut levels from more than a decade ago;
- Republicans in both houses of Congress, meanwhile, say absolutely nothing about letting two-year-old payroll tax cut expire — a move that means up to thousands of dollars in taxes for every middle-class American.
- Don’t let anyone fool you: the Republican Party only cares about the rich. If you’ve ever had any doubts, then duh.
Probably the greatest photo of Joe Biden this year.
