ESPN dropped Hank Williams Jr.’s well-known “Are You Ready for Some Football?” opening song for Monday Night Football last night after the country singer compared President Obama to “Hitler” earlier in the day and called the president and vice president “the enemy.” Shortly after Williams made the comments on Fox & Friends yesterday morning, ESPN said in a statement, “We are extremely disappointed with his comments, and as a result have decided to pull the open from tonight’s telecast.”
Williams, a staunch conservative who is reportedly considering a GOP Senate run in Tennessee, said his comments were “misunderstood,” yet he seemed to stand by them:
“Some of us have strong opinions and are often misunderstood. My analogy was extreme – but it was to make a point.” […]
Williams Jr. adds, “Every time the media brings up the tea party it’s painted as racist and extremists – but there’s never a backlash – no outrage to those comparisons.”
Watch Williams’ uncomfortable appearance on Fox & Friends, in which he also seemed to make a pass at host Gretchen Carlson, via Media Matters:
But not everyone was offended. Tea Party Nation founder Judson Philips tweeted this morning, “I stand with Hank,” and suggested he will boycott the sports network of the incident. “If ESPN will not have Hank Williams because of his political beliefs I will not watch ESPN.” “No Hank, no football!” he added. There’s also a petition circulating on a conservative activist website calling on conservatives to “boycott ESPN and their sponsors just like the libs did to Glenn Beck.”
![jonathan-cunningham:
underthemountainbunker:
Top 1% of taxpayers receive more income than entire bottom half combined
From the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:
Tax policy should lean against the rising tide of income inequality, not exacerbate it. During the first three decades after World War II, economic growth was robust and widely shared: economy-wide productivity improvements were accompanied by significant increases in the living standards of most Americans. In recent decades, by contrast, the benefits of economic growth have not been widely shared. CBO data show that between 1979 and 2007, the average after-tax income of the top 1 percent of Americans grew by 281 percent, after adjusting for inflation, compared to just 25 percent for the middle 20 percent of Americans, and 16 percent for the poorest fifth of the population.[13]
The tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 provided the largest benefit to the highest-income households and widened these yawning income disparities. Under these tax cuts, households with incomes over $1 million stand to receive an average tax cut of $130,000 in 2012, according to the Tax Policy Center, equivalent to an increase of 6.3 percent in their after-tax income. Meanwhile, households in the middle of the income spectrum will receive tax cuts that equal 2.3 percent of their income. Households in the bottom quintile will receive an average increase in income of less than 1 percent. [14] (See Figure 3.)
Summary: after tax incomes from Bush’s tax cuts:
Households > $1 million: increase of 6.3%
Households in middle income: increase of 2.3%
Households in bottom quintile: increase of < 1%
The GOP has been actively engaged in bottom-to-top income redistribution. And because of God, guns, and gays, the fundamentalist teabaggers will vote for it — despite their own precarious financial situation.
Want it to stop? Vote next time.
via: @allisonkilkenny
Member this the next time someone complains about the poor paying no income taxes: they have so little income to pay from that it only makes sense.](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ls8izzgJmx1qf10tro1_400.jpg)
