News Roundup for 12/29/09

Far deadlier than terrorism

-Headline of the day-
"Terrorism Still Less Deadly in US Than Lack of Health Insurance, Salmonella."

And by a wide margin. A poster at Firedoglake crunches the numbers and, if you include the Ft. Hood shootings as terrorism, 16 Americans have died from terrorist attacks this year. This also includes the Holocaust Museum shooting and the assassination of abortion provider Dr. George Tiller.

Meanwhile, 45,000 people have died from the lack of health coverage and 600 have died from Salmonella. The poster asks, "Clearly, providing health care to all Americans is beyond our capabilities, so when do we launch the $700 billion-a-year War on Salmonella?"

Also beating terrorism: 20,000 deaths from "unintentional falls." Here's hoping some stimulus funding buys railings. (Firedoglake)


-Rove kicked out of the house-
Dirty trickster Karl Rove and his wife of 24 years, Darby, have divorced. Which is understandable, since Karl's a total prick. Former White House press secretary Dana Perino -- who apparently still works for Karl -- said in a statement, "Karl Rove and his wife, Darby, were granted a divorce last week. The couple came to the decision mutually and amicably, and they maintain a close relationship and a strong friendship. There will be no further comment, and the family requests that its privacy be respected." We should give Rove as much space as he undoubtedly would've given any Democrat in the same situation, which is none.

I guess after tearing the country apart, he just couldn't kick the habit and tore his own family apart. (New York Times)


-Bonus HotD-
"Fox And Friends To Obama: Quit It With Your Big Words Like 'Allegedly.'"

Fox and Friends, the show that's such unbelievable bullshit that you wish there was a stronger word for bullshit, is not known for its smarts. Knowing their audience very well, FOX News aims the show straight at the 5th grade dropout demo by making it as stupid as possible.

FOX analyst Peter Johnson, Jr. does a great job of dumbing the show down for people who find Sesame Street confusingly highbrow. In discussing the president's response to the failed suicide bombing in Detroit, Johnson said that Obama wasn't exciting enough. "You rarely see him getting fired up," he said, "but in this instance the use of the term 'allegedly,' to your point, that's Harvard Law School talking, that's not commander-in-chief talking. So he needs to you know change his, some would say, rhetoric."

See, because if he changes his rhetoric, then terr'ist won't try to hurt us anymore. How's that work? How should I know; I'm not the big expert on this stuff, Johnson is -- and he didn't clarify.

The record for stupidity still goes to an earlier statement by Pete, when he said that "the true meaning of Christmas is that you don't destroy babies. You don't destroy children." Remember that part from A Christmas Carol?

Yeah, neither do I. (Talking Points Memo, with video)