An internal memo makes abundantly clear what many on the left have been pointing out: the only reason the GOP has a House majority is gerrymandering; their own memo notes that Democratic candidates received more than a million more votes than Republican ones in this election.

How does this produce a House majority? District-line chicanery, made possible by stacked state houses. They can’t win on the merits, so they game the rules.

Larry Wilmore on the appropriation of Martin Luther King day.

Well, maybe a little, but there’s no way it could’ve compared with the experience of being there in 2009, after so much hard work and intense focus.

I am, however, a little sad that I wasn’t able to be there so that I could replenish by supply of this:

Yes, I bought some in 2009, and yes, it was good — if it hadn’t been, why would I want more?

It’s all over the news and opinion feeds that Mitt Romney did not attend the inauguration, and as such was the first losing candidate in 24 years to skip the ceremony.

That’s technically true, but only technically. As Talking Points Memo notes:

But that’s not really fair. By my count, he’s the first losing nominee since Michael Dukakis (24 years ago) who didn’t have a current elected position in DC when he was running. Bush (92), Dole (96), Gore (00), Kerry (04), McCain (08). In other words, the other guys basically had to be there, as presidents, vice presidents or senior members of the Senate.

So slam that job-gobbling Mormon for all sorts of other things, but not this. This one’s not fair.

A Utah businessman has been bragging about firing two workers to avoid the costs of “Obongocare” — and states he chose those workers because of their support for the President last fall. All this, of course, despite the fact that the business in question is too small to be affected by the new law.

“Obongocare.” The mind boggles.

From John Roderick, in conversation with John Hodgman:

It’s one thing to outlaw discrimination, an entirely other and much more difficult thing to end discrimination; one thing to raise taxes, an entirely other and much more difficult thing to persuade people that higher taxes benefit them. We have the harder job, and the onus is on us to do a better job. Conservatives base their appeal on greed and fear. If we truly believe that liberalism appeals to people’s generosity of spirit, we should be prepared to try harder and set a higher standard for ourselves than just shouting down the opposition. The Republicans own the tone of our national discourse now, and it’s a disgrace. High-mindedness is not naive, it is the soul of liberalism: an appeal to reason on behalf of justice.

Sure, he’s still dead, but it’s important to remember just what a fucking loon he was.

“REPUBLICANS ACCUSE OBAMA OF USING POSITION AS PRESIDENT TO LEAD COUNTRY“

Clinton/Biden 2016: Because Joe Shouldn’t Have To Move.

(For the purposes of comedy, we should should ignore that both are really too old to run again. At Inauguration Day in 2017, HRC will be about 68 and a quarter, and Biden will be over 72. Reagan, who was clearly too old, was two weeks shy of 70 in January of 1981.)

That is, of course, no surprise at all.

The national office of the Boy Scouts of America has taken the unprecedented step of reversing a local council’s Eagle award decision, officially denying Ryan Andresen the rank on the grounds that he is gay.

Advancement in the Boy Scouts is essentially automatic up until Eagle; you do your merit pages and whatnot, reach the requisite time in the prior rank, and you get promoted. Eagle is different; you have to complete a significant service project, and then go before a (local to your troop) committee for review. I always saw this step as a final check, so to speak, to avoid promoting fairweather Eagles not actually committed to scouting — resume padders or people otherwise unfit at the character level, I guess. My own committee had only one person on it other than my scoutmaster, if I recall correctly, but other councils may do it differently. In any case, it is that body whose decision is final. They forward the paperwork to some office, and your Eagle kit comes back to be awarded at the next Court of Honor.

That BSA would rescind the decision of a local council here is enormous, and it shows precisely how much of a pawn of right-wing interests the group has become — and makes it clear that cries of “well, it’s just the national office that’s bigoted; my local group is fine!” are misguided. That the Mormon church is the single largest supporter of Scouting is a major part of this problem.

It’s a damn shame. My experience with Scouting in the middle 1980s was formative and valuable. There are no mini-Heathen to steer away from it, but the overt, bigoted, rightward trend has absolutely kept me from volunteering my time with local scouting groups, which is something I always thought I’d be happy to do. I certainly never thought I’d feel the level of shame for their behavior that I do now. Dammit, I’m from Mississippi; I don’t need another group acting all stupid for me to be ashamed of — magnolia-tinged shenanigans take up enough of my head-shaking as it is.