It’s so nice to know that we’re still living in that topsy-turvy, night is day, up is down world the Bush administration did such a wonderful job of inserting into our consciousness. Because now we know things like Jesus wasn’t interested in social or economic justice, Bruce Springsteen is unAmerican and OnStar will be used to impose martial law.

And that’s just from Glenn Beck. Add John Boehner, Liz Cheney, Karl Rove and a cast of thousands into the mix and, my god, the wonders never cease.

Forbes released its richest people in the world list this week, and, to no one’s surprise, they are getting richer. Yes, my friends, there are more billionaires this year than last, and they have more money.

In fact,  1,011 billionaires — out of a world population of 6.7 billion people — hold more than half the world’s wealth.

So Rush Limbaugh has threatened to move to Costa Rica if health care reform passes.

As Brian Dockstader wrote, the irony of this is almost too rich to believe. Given Rush’s well-known proclivities, you have to wonder: Why Costa Rica? If he’s looking for beaches, palm trees, and warm weather, why not head off to Somalia — that free-market paradise that’s implemented every aspect of the conservative political agenda Rush promotes, and in the process given the whole world such a shining example of why there’s no government like no government?

By the time you read this, Terrance and his partner of 10 years, Rick, will be legally married, courtesy of the District of Columbia’s new law. We at AWOP send our heartiest congratulations to Terrance, Rick and their two children. They were No. 12 in line to get the marriage license last week and tied the knot Tuesday.

Conservatives who squawk about the deficit — and Democrats who should know better, but squawk anyway — tend to do so selectively. That is, they tend to focus only on spending. But spending is only half of any deficit equation. After all, a deficit is “the amount by which expenditures or liabilities exceed income or assets.” When it comes to the government “income” really means “revenue,” and that means if we’re going to have an honest discussion about the deficit we have to talk about about taxes.

Just fill your basket full of sandwiches and weenies
Then lock the house up, now you’re set
And on the beach you’ll see the girls in their bikinis
As cute as ever but they never get a job

When Jim Bunning threw out the first pitch in the 2010 Contributors vs. Deadbeats ball game, we should have known the Let Them Eat Cake All-Stars would have been waiting on deck.

A conservative commenter here at AWOP (one who uses his brain a little more than most) had this to say on my last post, which had something to do with same sex marriage:

The point is that everyone is equal in the eyes of the law; bigotry and intolerance cannot be condoned on either end of the spectrum. To the extent that the state has any interest in proclaiming two people as married (another thorny subject) the state cannot discriminate as to whom you wish to marry, obvious exclusions excepted (siblings, cousins, parents).

Nice sentiment. Too bad it’s bullshit. He’s right, of course, in theory. But we don’t live in theory. We live in practice. Here’s my response:

But if we were all equal in the eyes of the law, there wouldn’t be a DOMA or a DADT and there would be an ENDA. If we were all equal in the eyes of the law, then the insurance commissioner in my state wouldn’t have fought tooth and nail to forbid insurance companies from insuring same-sex partners (he eventually lost, although the decision had nothing to do with equality under law). If we were all equal under the law, there would have been no Prop 8.

Of course, that argument that “we’re all equal under the law” destroys the conservative argument that “activist” judges shouldn’t be deciding if we queers can be protected from discrimination, like, for example, saying that under the law, the government can’t forbid same sex marriage.  The courts are exactly the place for those kind of decisions, not in the legislature and certainly not by ballot initiative — if we are all equal under the law, then you cannot write a law to take away rights. Right?

And that’s why there are non-discrimination laws protecting us, because there seems to be this unwritten exception clause that excludes certain people from that equality thing.

In 1844 Democratic presidential candidate James K. Polk ran on a platform of taking control over the entire Oregon Territory using the famous campaign slogan, “Fifty-four Forty or Fight!” (The northern boundary of the Oregon Territory was latitude 54°40′ – which is present day British Columbia). Polk planned to go to war to claim the entire Oregon Territory for the United States. Polk ended up negotiating the northern border at 49°.

But in this case we take Polk’s slogan and bring it into the 21st century. It is now 40 on $50 or fight. Today, North Carolina Republican Representative Patrick McHenry introduced a bill to remove Ulysses Grant from the $50 bill and replace him with St. Ronald of Reagania.

My adopted home town of Vancouver, BC is returning to normal this week. The party’s over, the Olympic banners are coming down, and the world is catching its planes for home. But the Canadian flags are still flying everywhere against the late winter skies, thanks to a seriously out-of-character burst of over-the-top Canadian patriotism brought about by the unprecedented performance Canadian athletes turned in at these Games.

There was a lot riding on this. Canada had hosted two previous Olympics (Montreal ‘76 and Calgary ‘88) — and hadn’t won a single gold medal at either of them. It’s been, frankly, a long-standing point of national humiliation. Skier Alexandre Bilodeau fixed this little oversight by winning gold in the mens’ freestyle moguls on Day Two, ensuring that they’ll be naming elementary schools for him all over Quebec. And from there, the wins began to rack up quickly. By the time the Canadian men’s hockey team closed out the Olympics with their own heart-stopping win over the US on Sunday, Canada had collected 14 gold medals — more than any other country (The US had nine).

Looks like queers in the District of Columbia are gonna get to marry, thanks, this time, to none other than the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court himself, John Roberts.

And please don’t confuse him with CNN’s John Roberts, who was a VJ on some Canadian version of  MTV back in the day. Justice Roberts did no such thing.

The Tea Party is shaping up to be 2010’s first major media darling. First came the storm of coverage that surrounded the Tea Party convention in Nashville two weeks ago. Then, they stole the show at last weekend’s CPAC conference in DC. Now, they’re gearing up for a new month-long road show that starts at the end of March — a repeat of last fall’s national tour, this time with more busses and, no doubt, more media coverage.

It’s obvious that the movement’s organizers have a professional touch for getting the corporate media’s attention. What’s less obvious is how much of this attention is deserved. The reporters following in their wake are devouring the narrative of scrappy Americans rising up in populist rage; but beyond that, they’re not asking many real questions about what this movement means, or whether it actually has the kind of clout that gets things done.