Toomey and Trump, Forever and Ever, Amen (update)

Now that U.S. Senate Republicans (with the notable exception of Mitt Romney) have voted to allow Our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Orange Pretender to get away with soiling the Constitution and act not unlike a tin pot dictator (here), which is all he ever was and ever will be, leave it to his sycophants to try and gloss over their ignominy in Dear Leader’s service.

Which brings us to this screed from “No Corporate Tax” Pat Toomey (R-Mistake) of PA (here)…

“Do these actions rise to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors necessary to justify the most obviously anti-democratic act the Senate can engage in — overturning an election by convicting the president?” In 1999, then-Sen. Joe Biden answered his own question by voting against removing President Bill Clinton from office.

It is this constitutionally grounded framework — articulated well by Biden — that guided my review of President Donald Trump’s impeachment and, ultimately, my decision to oppose his removal.

House Democrats’ impeachment articles allege that President Trump briefly paused aid, and withheld a White House meeting with Ukraine’s president, to pressure Ukraine into investigating two publicly reported corruption matters. The first matter was possible Ukrainian interference in our 2016 election. The second was Biden’s role in firing the controversial Ukrainian prosecutor investigating a company on whose board Biden’s son sat. When House Democrats demanded witnesses and documents concerning the president’s conduct, he invoked constitutional rights and resisted their demands.

The phrase “briefly paused” concerning the first matter is typically deceptive of course, because it implies that Trump would have released the aid anyway, and there is no indication that that would have happened; actually, all indications are that Trump would have continued sitting on it as long as possible.

And regarding the second matter, I give you this…

The release adds new documentation to the timeline of events in which Trump ordered the delay of military aid to Ukraine to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into investigating Biden and his son Hunter Biden, who sat on the board of a Ukrainian energy company, allegations that are central to the impeachment trial.

Also, as noted here…

“Public reporting shows how senior Ukrainian officials interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign in favor of Secretary Clinton and in opposition to then-candidate Trump,” Republicans wrote in a memo of “key points” distributed Tuesday ahead of the House impeachment inquiry’s first open hearings this week.

But behind closed doors, many of the witnesses who recently testified to House investigators balked at any such comparison to Russia’s efforts.

“We’re talking about a completely different scale of interference,” Army Lt. Col. Alex Vindman, a National Security Council expert on Ukraine, testified.

At the Kremlin’s direction, Russia’s intelligence services waged a pro-Trump disinformation campaign on social media and secretly stole tens of thousands of private emails from the Democratic National Committee, the U.S. intelligence community concluded.

That government-backed campaign was a “deep” and “insidious effort to undermine a foreign country’s elections,” Vindman said. In fact, last year the Justice Department indicted 25 Russian operatives for their alleged roles in election interference during the 2016 campaign – none has been taken into custody yet.

“What a couple of actors in Ukraine might do in order to tip the scales in one direction or another is very different,” Vindman noted.

Oh, and given this, the wingnuts absolutely had to find a way to try and destroy Lt. Col. Vindman (with help from #MoscowMarsha, as noted here). And as far as the Biden/Burisma allegations are concerned, I give you this.

Returning to Toomey…

The president’s actions were not “perfect.” Some were inappropriate. But the question before the Senate is not whether his actions were perfect. It is whether they constitute impeachable offenses that justify removing a sitting president from office for the first time and forbidding him from seeking office again.

Let’s consider the case against President Trump: obstruction of Congress and abuse of power. On obstruction, House Democrats allege the president lacked “lawful cause or excuse” to resist their subpoenas. This ignores that his resistance was based on constitutionally grounded legal defenses and immunities that are consistent with long-standing positions taken by administrations of both parties.

As far as Trump’s grounds for resisting subpoenas are concerned, I give you this.

Returning to Toomey…

Instead of negotiating a resolution or litigating in court, House Democrats rushed to impeach. But as House Democrats noted during the Clinton impeachment, a president’s defense of his legal and constitutional rights and responsibilities is not an impeachable offense.

I will grant Toomey a bit of a point on the timing of the impeachment inquiry and trial. However, the following should be noted here (namely, that the Democrats felt the timing was right for the impeachment given this year’s elections).

And I would be willing to go along with Toomey a bit if it weren’t for the fact that the U.S. Senate under #MidnightMitch has done NOTHING to improve the security of our election infrastructure in time for the fall (here).

Returning to Toomey…

House Democrats separately allege President Trump abused his power by conditioning a White House meeting, and the release of aid, on Ukraine agreeing to pursue corruption investigations. Their case rests entirely on the faulty claim that the only possible motive for his actions was his personal political gain. In fact, there are also legitimate national interests for seeking investigations into apparent corruption, especially when taxpayer dollars are involved.

Actually, the supposedly “faulty” claim rests on the testimony of Lt. Col. Vindman and Ambassadors Gordon Sondland and Bill Taylor, as noted here.

Returning to Toomey…

Here is what ultimately occurred: President Trump met with Ukraine’s president and the aid was released after a brief pause. These actions happened without Ukraine announcing or conducting investigations.

That’s right, but it happened only because of the whistle blower who filed the complaint against Trump, as noted here (the person that odious mongrel Rand Paul recently announced as noted here).

Returning to Toomey…

The idea that President Trump committed an impeachable offense by meeting with Ukraine’s president at the United Nations in New York instead of Washington, D.C. is absurd. Moreover, the pause in aid did not hinder Ukraine’s ability to combat Russia. In fact, as witnesses in the House stated, U.S. policy supporting Ukraine is stronger under President Trump than under President Barack Obama.

On the matter of Trump and Obama on military aid to Ukraine is concerned, I give you this. And as far as any further equivalency between Trump and Obama on Ukraine is concerned, I also give you this.

Returning to Toomey…

Even if House Democrats’ presumptions about President Trump’s motives are true, additional witnesses in the Senate, beyond the 17 who testified in the House, are unnecessary because the president’s actions do not rise to the level of removing him from office.

So, as far as Toomey is concerned, we have a “trial” that doesn’t need witnesses or testimony because he’s already made up his mind.

If you or I ever end up in a court of law, dear reader, I sincerely hope Toomey is a juror in our case, because he will no doubt attempt to bar witnesses or testimony against us also and thus work on our behalf for acquittal (snark mode off).

Toomey once more…

Nor do they warrant the societal upheaval that would result from his removal from office and the ballot months before an election. Our country is already far too divided, and this would only make matters worse.

As far as the “vox populi” stuff on Trump’s impeachment is concerned, it looks like 2/3rds of those polled wanted witnesses as his trial as noted here, though I will grant that you could go either way on the question of Trump’s removal. And besides, I’m old enough to remember the Clinton impeachment circus, and I don’t recall any concerns about “societal upheaval” at that time vs. now.

Returning to Toomey…

As Biden also stated during President Clinton’s trial, “the Constitution sets the bar for impeachment very high.” A president can only be impeached and removed for “Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.” While there’s debate about the precise meaning of “other high Crimes and Misdemeanors,” it’s clear that impeachable conduct must be comparable to the serious offenses of treason and bribery.

Bill Clinton was impeached for lying about a blow job. I don’t see any comparison between that and treason and bribery.

Toomey once more…

The Constitution sets the impeachment bar so high for good reasons. Removing a president from office, and forbidding him from seeking future office, overturns the results of the last election and denies Americans the right to vote for him in the next one. The Senate’s impeachment power essentially allows 67 senators to substitute their judgment for the judgment of millions of Americans.

Toomey really should give up this argument of raw numbers supporting Trump’s removal from office vs. opposing it, if for no other reason than this (another “vox populi” item – this too…as noted here, Mango Mussolini was acquitted, but not exonerated).

Toomey again…

The framework Biden articulated in 1999 for judging an impeachment was right then, and it is right now. President Trump’s conduct does not meet the very high bar required to justify overturning the election, removing him from office, and kicking him off the ballot in an election that has already begun. In November, the American people will decide for themselves whether President Trump should stay in office. In our democratic system, that’s the way it should be.

In response, I thought this Op-Ed from the Inquirer made some excellent points, including the following…

Sen. Toomey attempted to justify his vote by claiming that the president was simply invoking his constitutional rights in blocking testimony. His explanation ignores the fact that the witnesses have been blocked by an unprecedented and legally dubious blanket decree of absolute immunity that has already been resoundingly rejected by a federal judge. No defendant in America has the right to blatantly order witnesses not to testify in court, yet Sen. Toomey’s action sets a different standard for defendants who belong to one’s own political party.

To know Sen. Toomey’s true motivations, look no further than his own words: “We don’t need to drag this out any longer. … We should move as quickly as we can to get this thing over with.” His rationale for his vote to acquit is cut from the same self-serving cloth. The senator makes sweeping conclusions about the president’s other possible motives for withholding aid as witnesses with direct knowledge of such facts sit muzzled on the sidelines. The senator harps upon the potential damage to the country wrought by removing a president without stopping for even a moment to address the potential long-term damage done to our democracy by the president’s conduct.

Sen. Toomey’s collective responses are not those of a representative of the people looking to do impartial justice or seek the truth. They are the words of someone who voluntarily chose to put himself and his party above the people of Pennsylvania and his solemn duty to the Constitution.

I think it’s safe to say, based on this and Toomey’s votes, that he will also be bound to Generalissimo Trump by a “cord of steel,” as noted below. And that is exactly what Toomey deserves.

Update 2/8/20: Yeah, this sure was predicatable, wasn’t it?

Monday Mashup (10/13/14)

In the latest TERRA! TERRA! TERRA! news, I give you the following from Joshua Katz here…

America’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, revealed the name last week of a top secret, very small Al Qaeda cell operating inside Syria called the Khorasan Group. The revelation by Clapper was the latest in a series of seemingly authorized disclosures of highly sensitive national security information by the Executive Branch.

Khorasan Group isn’t a name that trips off the tongue. It isn’t sexy. It wasn’t appearing in newspapers and on websites every day. It wasn’t being talked about in Washington — until now. That’s because its name and organization were classified information. The fact that you had, in all likelihood, never heard of Al Qaeda’s Khorasan Group demonstrates the importance of the security placed around any information about this group and confusion in the White House about Al Qaeda.

As a former Operations Officer for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and an Army Ranger, I have risked my own life to provide this level of secure intelligence to our president and other policy makers.

Katz deserves our thanks and gratitude for his service, but if he’s going to criticize anyone for revealing what a supposedly secret bunch this outfit is (I know there’s nothing funny about terrorism, but the name of this gang sounds like a bunch of people making slipcovers), maybe he ought to blame some of his fellow wingnut media loudmouths too for saying that the group was made up (here); maybe if they’d kept their mouths shut, Clapper wound not have had to say anything (though, based on this, I wonder if this is a smokescreen too).

Here’s my point to Katz and anyone else who blames Number 44 over this; make up your minds on what the narrative is supposed to be as far as you’re concerned. Either blame the Obama Administration for hyping a new terror threat that wasn’t there OR blame them for revealing sensitive information about these life forms. You can’t do both.

Next, I give you the following from WaPo conservative quota hire Jennifer Rubin (here), on Teahadist U.S. Senate embarrassment Mike Lee of Utah…

(Lee) extolled Abraham Lincoln as the first great anti-poverty president. (“[I]n America’s original war on poverty, government did not give the poor other people’s money. It gave them access to other people. In Lincoln’s era that meant dredging rivers, building canals, and cutting roads. It meant the Homestead Act and land-grant universities. These public goods weren’t designed to make poverty more tolerable – but to make it more temporary. They reduced the time it took to get products to market, increased access to banks and land, and increased the speed at which knowledge could be developed and shared.”

What Rubin describes above sounds an awful lot to me like spending on infrastructure, and as noted here, Lee introduced a bill to pretty much eliminate federal transportation funding (it even has an acronym that spells TEA – blow that dog whistle a little louder, why dontcha?).

Lee is also leading a repeal of the Davis-Bacon Act (a perennial target for the Teahadists), the federal law that requires government contractors to pay workers the local prevailing wage (the Act is named for two Republicans, it should be noted, and it was signed into law by Herbert Hoover, a Republican president; I guess that’s typical for a guy who once said that child labor laws were “unconstitutional” here).

Turning back to the “values” political red meat that the Teahadists love, Lee had no problem with the Supremes as “unelected, politically unaccountable judges” when they decided Hobby Lobby, but that’s what he thinks of them now that they’ve decided to allow rulings on marriage equality to stand (here).

Oh, and speaking of our 16th president, he also said the following (noted here, tied to labor and the economy in general)…

“While we do not propose any war upon capital, we do wish to allow the humblest man an equal chance to get rich with everybody else.”

And as a commenter here noted (again, quoting Lincoln)…

“Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital.
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed.
Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.”

So what do Lee and the Teahadists have to say about that?

Cue the sound of crickets (and I don’t think we should need any motivation to vote for Dems in November, but in case we do, Rubin provides it here).

Further, someone from The Daily Tucker is (of course) in favor of genetically modified organisms (or GMOs for short) in our food, as noted here (more background is here)…

I have to admit that I don’t have a ready comeback in response to the data presented in the Daily Tucker post, but I would only present the anti-GMO point of view here, including data on the money spent by food companies to lobby against GMO labeling in California and Washington state, where much of our food is manufactured and/or processed (additional data on the problems already being caused by genetically modified foods is presented here – and if GMOs are supposed to be so damn safe, then please explain this).

(By the way, to their credit, ice cream makers Ben and Jerry decided to leave GMOs behind, as noted here).

Another thing…as noted here, there is a correlation between the pro-GMO forces and the climate change deniers and the “anti-vaxers,” which I found to be a bit interesting.

To conclude on this topic, I give you the following from this Jerry Rogers person at The Daily Tucker…

Over four dozen pieces of legislation have been introduced in nearly 30 states to require GMO labeling. Three states actually have labeling requirements on the books. These states and the others that will follow suit will end up disrupting the nation’s entire food chain, from farming to supply to retail. Americans will suffer with higher food prices and fewer choices, but for other parts of the world stuck in poverty, the impact will be a devastating loss of human life. The stakes are high.

Proof? Anywhere in sight??

The politics of GMOs need to catch up with the science. There is legislation that may be a good first step in doing just that. Introduced by Reps. Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.) and G.K. Butterfield (D., N.C.), the bill would preempt state laws and create national standards for food labeling under the sole authority of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Putting the issue of labeling under FDA authority will take it out of the hands of the anti-GMO activists. This simple act could reset the national debate over GMOs.

I’m not totally surprised to read that when you consider this. However, how ridiculous is it that the pro-GMO people want to see federal regulation as opposed to a “patchwork” of state laws, when they favor the states over the feds on practically everything else?

Continuing, it looks like someone from The Daily Tucker is back to screech about the ACA (here)…

Republican attorneys general have been administering the right medicine against this law since it was enacted. Just this week, a federal judge in Oklahoma agreed with Attorney General Scott Pruitt and declared unlawful certain regulations written by the IRS to implement the bloated statute.

I don’t know what the difference between a “bloated” and a “non-bloated” statute is, and I don’t think this Jessica Medeiros-Garrison person does either. What I do know is that Pruitt and other wing nut AGs for their respective states are basing their opposition to the ACA on some bogus claim that subsidies for Medicaid expansion can only be used for states with state-established health care exchanges, not federal ones, which Media Matters called “a counter intuitive claim that has been widely discredited” here.

Oh, and it should be noted that the federal judge who ruled in Pruitt’s favor, Ronald A. White, was appointed by George W. Bush (big surprise, I know – here). And as noted here, “to date, nine federal judges have considered this question of whether much of the law should be defunded. Only three — all of whom are Republicans — have agreed that it should be.”

While doing some assorted Googling for this item, I came across the following on Jessica Medeiros-Garrison here (a lawyer based in Alabama for the record), and it turns out that she was in the middle of a messy divorce from her husband Lee Garrison a year ago; neither one of these individuals embody what I would call exemplary moral character (I merely present a link to the details here; it’s up to you, dear reader, to do the rest if you so choose).

Moving on, I give you some of the lowest of the low-hanging fruit here from someone named Michael Schaus who concocted something called “10 Things Liberals Believe That Government Does Well” (he added his categories with snarky little comments, so I think it’s only fair that I should be allowed to reply):

1. Protecting our freedom

So who do you think is going to train, feed, house, and maintain all other responsibility for the world’s largest (and most expensive) military (here) – the state of Alabama?

2. Giving away land to common people

As noted from here…

The federal government owns 655 million acres of land in the U.S., 29% of the total 2.3 billion acres. It administers its public lands through four agencies: the National Park Service (NPS), which runs the National Park System; the Forest Service (FS), which manages the National Forests; theBureau of Land Management (BLM), which manages public lands; and the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), which administers the National Wildlife Refuge System. National Monuments are assigned a managing agency at the time of their designation by the President. The Forest Service operates out of the Department of Agriculture, while the other three agencies are in the Department of the Interior.

So yeah, I would say that the Feds do a good job in this area too.

3. Educating everyone

This provides a list of U.S. Department of Education funding as of August 25th of this year (if anyone out there is inclined to sift through all of these numbers and other data, have at it). And despite the Repugs’ war on public education in this country, students from overseas still flock to our universities, so I think the federal government does deserve at least a partial amount of credit for that, seeing as how the federal government subsidizes student loans and all.

4. Helping us retiring (sic) with dignity

As noted from here (under “Highlights”)…

At the end of 2013, the (Operations of the Old Age Survivors Insurance and Disability Insurance programs) were providing benefit payments to about 58 million people: 41 million retired workers and dependents of retired workers, 6 million survivors of deceased workers, and 11 million disabled workers and dependents of disabled workers. During the year, an estimated 163 million people had earnings covered by Social Security and paid payroll taxes. Total expenditures in 2013 were $823 billion. Total income was $855 billion, which consisted of $752 billion in non-interest income and $103 billion in interest earnings. Asset reserves held in special issue U.S. Treasury securities grew from $2,732 billion at the beginning of the year to $2,764 billion at the end of the year.

Not too shabby as far as I’m concerned…

5. Improving public health

As noted from here…

New York, NY, June 16, 2014—Despite having the most expensive health care system, the United States ranks last overall among 11 industrialized countries on measures of health system quality, efficiency, access to care, equity, and healthy lives, according to a new Commonwealth Fund report. The other countries included in the study were Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand Norway, Sweden Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. While there is room for improvement in every country, the U.S. stands out for having the highest costs and lowest performance—the U.S. spent $8,508 per person on health care in 2011, compared with $3,406 in the United Kingdom, which ranked first overall.

The United States’ ranking is dragged down substantially by deficiencies in access to primary care and inequities and inefficiencies in our health care system according to Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: How the Performance of the U.S. Health Care System Compares Internationally, 2014 Update, by Karen Davis, of the Roger C. Lipitz Center for Integrated Health Care at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health; Kristof Stremikis, of the Pacific Business Group on Health, and Commonwealth Fund researchers Cathy Schoen and David Squires. However, provisions in the Affordable Care Act that have already extended coverage to millions of people in the United States can improve the country’s standing in some areas—particularly access to affordable and timely primary care.

To hear this Michael Schaus guy, though, “Obamacare” is the reason for our health care ills in this country, not our supposedly glorious private sector (and I think it needs to be pointed out once again that, notwithstanding Medicare/Medicaid and the VA, there is no government-sponsored alternative).

6. Building our transportation network

Oh yeah, what is that supposedly awful federal government supposed to do about that?

Try this for starters (as well as the fact that the best the U.S. House Repugs could do is come up with some lame stopgap measure to keep the Federal Highway Trust Fund solvent, as noted here). So, that supposedly awful Kenyan Muslim socialist responded with this.

7. Investing in communications

This Schaus guy has a bit of a point here, but read this McClatchy article to learn about how Motorola pulled all kinds of tricks to try and establish dominance in the broadband market (once again, our glorious private sector at work – and I’m pretty sure Motorola has a lot of corporate “person” company here). So maybe our government would spend these funds more efficiently if it weren’t for the fact that the fund recipients are busy trying to gouge their customers and/or competitors.

8. Building our energy supply

Why is that supposed to be the job of the federal government when we give out all kinds of tax breaks to the oil biz, as noted here (though we should be doing the same thing for renewables, but of course we’re not, as noted here.)

9. Inventing the future (NASA)

Actually, I think we’ve done OK in NASA funding, all things considered (and fortunately, they still have the resources to do ground-breaking research such as this, which of course should be a “hair on fire” moment for anyone in a political capacity who cares about the future of this planet).

10. Defeating totalitarianism

See #1.

Of course, what else can we expect from Schaus, who (as noted here) used developments in so-called “smart” gun technology to baselessly claim that it was a confiscation scheme on the part of former Obama AG Eric Holder?

I also wanted to comment on this story…

Republican Gov. Tom Corbett said Monday (10/6) he supports a bill designed to prevent offenders from causing their victims “mental anguish,” a proposal launched after a Vermont college chose as its commencement speaker a man convicted of killing a police officer.

Corbett spoke at a Capitol event a day after Mumia Abu-Jamal gave a recorded address to about 20 graduates at Goddard College in Plainfield.

“Nobody has the right to continually taunt the victims of their violent crimes in the public square,” Corbett said.

He called the college’s choice of Abu-Jamal “unconscionable.”

The bill that advanced out of a House committee on Monday would allow a victim to go to court for an injunction against “conduct which perpetuates the continuing effects of the crime on the victim.”

OK, to begin with, I think allowing Abu-Jamal to give a recorded address to the Goddard graduates was a dumb idea. I don’t care if he’s a graduate of the school or not; someone should have stepped in and disallowed it. As far as I’m concerned, a line needs to be drawn somewhere, and I think doing so right at the feet of a convicted murderer of a Philadelphia police officer is a pretty darn good place (kind of makes me wonder what’s going on with that school anyway, since apparently they don’t give out grades…yeah, that will REALLY prepare graduates for the workforce).

However, this legislation is equally stupid, if not more so. How exactly does the author of this bill propose to establish the cause of “mental anguish”? Survivor flashbacks to the occurrence of the crime? An inadvertent mention of the crime from a passer-by in the form of an offhand remark? Having to watch an hour of Brian Kilmeade on Fox TV?

(OK, I’ll stop.)

Also, what exactly constitutes “conduct which perpetuates the continuing effects of crime on the victim”? By that standard, a candlelight vigil could prompt painful remembrances and thus be subject to penalty under this bill.

As I said, I’ll definitely grant the point that allowing Abu-Jamal yet another platform for his thoroughly undeserved celebrity is stupid. But concocting some bill that doesn’t pass the legal smell test falls under the heading of two wrongs trying to make a right.

Finally, as noted here, it turns out Mikey the Beloved in PA-08 has spent about $200 grand on “franking” for campaign ads telling us how wonderful he supposedly is (including online at Twitter and Google), which apparently is not illegal in any way; as the article tells us, there is a franking limit for Senate campaigns, but not U.S. House ones (and why exactly is that, I wonder?).

However, even though he’s running online ads, he still doesn’t advertise his Town Hall meetings (has he even had any during this campaign?). And it also doesn’t take into consideration his recent refusal to accept an invitation to a candidate’s forum hosted by the Lin-Park Civic Association and the Bucks County NAACP, even though he was notified about the forum five different times in August and September (his Dem opponent Kevin Strouse had no problem saying Yes).

With that in mind, I give you the following from the Strouse campaign…

Bristol, PA – Congressman Fitzpatrick, who missed 35% of his House Financial Services Committee hearings, is misleading his constituents with counter-terrorism theater and grandstanding on issues of national security. Fitzpatrick continues to mislead his constituents despite the fact that the Congressman’s Isolate ISIS Act is a duplicative effort that does nothing to further target ISIS’s financing.

Executive Order 13324, signed by President Bush in 2001, provides the necessary framework for the Treasury department to sanction terrorist funding. Perhaps if the Congressman showed up to his committee hearings he would understand the mechanisms that have been in place for over 13 years to target terrorist network financing and levy sanctions against complicit groups and individuals.

Strouse commented, “It’s extremely disappointing that Congressman Fitzpatrick would politicize national security problems that he clearly doesn’t understand. I fought terrorism as an Army Ranger in Iraq and as a CIA officer, so it’s time to set the record straight for the 8th District: Treasury already has the necessary authority to target ISIS’s funding, and has been doing so for quite some time. The issue that we ought to be addressing is that training the Syrian rebels will take much longer than Congressman Fitzpatrick and his colleagues have indicated.”

The Congressional authorization to train Syrian rebels expires in December. Strouse has previously pointed out how short-sighted this short term authorization is, and has emphasized on multiple occasions that adequately training an army takes longer than 90 days.

As early as 2008, Treasury was targeting the predecessor to ISIS. In February 2008, pursuant to Executive Order 13324, treasury took action against al Qaida in Iraq (AQI), which is the predecessor to ISIS. Instead of grandstanding on issues that are already addressed under current law, Congressman Fitzpatrick and his colleagues should be addressing the soon to expire authorization to train moderate rebel troops.

Time is short until the election, so if you are able to help the Kevin Strouse campaign in any capacity at all, please click here.

Thursday Mashup (4/3/14)

I know I’m a little behind on this, but better late than never – I give you Billo the Clown and his latest rant against Dem U.S. House Rep Barbara Lee (here…and of course, I’m going to overlook for now his cowardly language about Lee being a “race hustler,” whatever that is)…

O’REILLY: Sure, so the right wing, all conservative Americans, we all use, all of us, not any exceptions, we all use, phrases that denigrate African Americans. Do I have that right Congressman? Do I have that right?

Alright, let’s take a look at Miss Lee’s history. In 2011 she accused the entire Republican party of trying to deny black Americans the right to vote… the entire party. Also in 2011, she released a book that said the Bush administration Hurricane Katrina relief, because mainly blacks were involved. That is, they didn’t want to rescue the blacks, they wanted them to drown, according to this Congresswoman.

When it comes to denying African Americans the right to vote, Billo is actually correct here – Lee did say that (here). And as noted here, she’s absolutely right (and when it comes to Republicans and race, there’s no apology from Billo or any of his pals for this).

And when it comes to Katrina, I give you the following quote from Rep. Lee (here)…

“If ever anyone doubted that there were two Americas, this disaster has made this division clear,” said Representative Barbara Lee, co-chair of the Progressive Caucus. “The victims have largely been poor and black. The devastation from Hurricane Katrina only underscores the disastrous consequences of the Administration’s failure to take even the most basic steps to alleviate poverty in the United States.”

I can’t find anything factual to dispute that (though the notion that Dubya and co. wanted blacks to drown, or something, was put out there by Spike Lee, among others, with Lee making that great documentary to show exactly what happened).

Continuing with Billo…

In 2013, she branded Congressman Steve King a racist. She did the same thing to Bill Bennett, President Reagan’s former Secretary of Education. And Miss Lee claims she’s not a race hustler? How about pinhead Congresswoman? You like that better?

Again, I couldn’t find proof of that claim, but instead, I give you this concerning King and Lee…

In 2005, King successfully marshaled opposition to naming an Oakland post office after former Oakland city councilwoman and activist Maudelle Shirek because he believed that Shirek was “un-American.” After Democratic Congresswoman Barbara Lee accused him of McCarthyism, he said, “If Barbara Lee would read the history of Joe McCarthy she would realize that he was a hero for America.”

On the House floor, King blasted the Congressional Black Caucus and Congressional Hispanic Caucus as “separatist groups,” and suggested that a “very, very urban senator, Barack Obama” provided “slavery reparations” through the USDA Pigford II settlement with black farmers.

During the presidential election, King maintained if Obama won that Al-Qaeda “would be dancing in the streets in greater numbers than they did on Sept. 11 because they would declare victory in this war on terror.”

Actually, though, Billo is right again about Bennett (shocking, I know), but that is because he said that, if you abort every black baby, the crime rate would go down (here – I hope the repugnance of that remark speaks for itself).

I guess “racist” is in the eye of the beholder, huh?

Continuing with Billo…

Now this is a woman who is in the United States Congress, alright, who is flat out calling people with whom she disagrees, racists, whether they’re her colleagues, or me, or the entire Bush administration, or the entire Republican Party.

And this woman has the gall, the nerve, to get up there, alright, and then throw out terms like welfare queen. When has the Republican Party ever used that term? When have I ever used that term. The answer is, never, alright?

So not only is she a pinhead, a race hustler, she’s a liar. That’s who we have representing a California district… Barbara Lee.

As a literal quote from a Republican politician, be it The Sainted Ronnie R or anyone else, it’s true that the term “welfare queen” cannot be sourced (I was unable to do it anyway). However, I would argue that the context behind the term is far more important than the actual term itself (more is here and here).

I’ll tell you what – here is a link to about 378 posts from Media Matters that were the result of a search I conducted on the site for the terms “Bill O’Reilly” and “race.” And I’m sure more than a few of them will illustrate better than I can that he has no right to pontificate on that subject in particular.

Next, I thought it was a bit surprising to hear that Repug U.S. House Rep Mike Rogers is retiring for a job in right-wing radio, though it appears to be a pretty seamless fit of course (here).

And with that in mind, I think we should recall the following about the now-departing MI-08 rep:

Here is some interesting stuff about Rogers, his wife, and the so-called Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, otherwise known as CIPSA (about how Kristi Rogers would stand to benefit – more here)…and when it comes to CIPSA, here is what you need to know (fortunately, after passing the House of course, it appears to be stuck in the Senate)…

“It’s basically a privacy nightmare,” says Trevor Timm, a lawyer and activist with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “CISPA would allow companies to hand over private data to the government without a warrant, without anonymity, with no judicial review.”

Rogers said that those who oppose CIPSA are “teens in their basements,” or something, here (cute).

He said here that bombing Iran nuke sites wasn’t an act of war (oh, really?).

As noted here, Rogers didn’t share an intelligence notice from the White House in 2011 with fellow U.S. House members, leading to a vote to renew the Patriot Act in which at least 65 House members had “no way of knowing they were reauthorizing the ongoing creation of a database of the phone-based relationships of every American.”

He accused Edward Snowden of being a Russian spy here, with no proof whatsoever of course.

Rogers said here that the Obama Administration was “Mirandizing” terrorists on the battlefield, or something (yeah, remember that one?), which they weren’t of course, and so what if they were?

In conclusion, this tells us that Rogers infamously said, in essence, that you can’t have your privacy violated if you don’t know about it (ugh).

Don’t let the door hit you on the way out, Mike.

Further, in the Repugs’ latest effort to find another ideological hero, it looks like U.S. Senate primary candidate Ben Sasse (the “e” is silent, apparently) of Nebraska has emerged as the Teahadist favorite over more mainstream (I guess) Republican candidate Shane Osborn (here).

(I should back up and note that both Sasse and Osborn are running to win the nomination as the Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate in the contest to replace Mike Johanns, who is stepping down, with the campaign for November basically serving as a formality – I don’t want to imagine how pathetic it is to live in a place where the election is basically a choice between Republicans, and that is what we have here…love to be wrong.)

So let’s find out more about Sasse, then, shall we?…

As noted here, he basically was for Medicare Part D under Dubya (where Sasse was assistant to HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt, who was no prize either) before he was against it.

Here, Sasse wanted to move the nation’s capital to Nebraska (huh?).

And OF COURSE he was supported by fellow Teahadist Mike Lee (here).

As noted here, Sasse said the reason why so many were uninsured wasn’t because of poverty, but “job loss” (he also supports health care reform that makes coverage “portable”…which basically means that, despite what he says, he actually supports the ACA).

And as noted from here…

But (Sasse) also repeatedly criticized the president for pushing forward a bill (the ACA) without regard to cost, and without having a serious discussion with the public about what a new entitlement would mean for the nation’s budget deficit.

It still amazes me (though I guess it shouldn’t by now) how much Republicans absolutely refuse to accept the reality of the cost benefit towards reducing the deficit of the ACA (for starters, take a look at this).

Besides, as long as Sasse is going out about how bad the ACA supposedly is for his state…well, maybe he ought to look at this too (from here).

Update 5/1/14: Didn’t Dr. Dean say that Sasse was supposed to be reasonable or something (here)?

Continuing, I give you this from Glenn “Instapundit” Reynolds, complaining about how the dreaded “MSM” supposedly hates Republicans (appropriate for April Fools’ Day)…

California State senator (and, until last week, candidate for secretary of state) Leland Yee was well-known as an anti-gun activist. Then, last week, he was indicted for, yes, conspiring to smuggle guns and rocket launchers between mobsters and terrorists in exchange for massive bribes. Some highlights, as excerpted by San Francisco Magazine.

Yee told an FBI agent that, in exchange for $2 million in cash, he’d fill a shopping list of weapons, which he took personal responsibility for delivering, according to the indictment. He also allegedly “masterminded” a complex scheme bring illegal weapons into the country, agreeing to “facilitate” a meeting with an illegal arms dealer to arrange for the weapons to be imported via Newark, N.J. In arranging all of this, the indictment said, Yee relied on connections with Filipino terrorist groups who could supply “heavy” weapons, including the Muslim terrorists of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. Yee allegedly noted that the Muslim terrorists had no reservations about kidnapping, extortion and murder.

This all sounds like news. You’ve got charges of huge bribes, rampant hypocrisy, illegal weapons and even a connection with foreign terrorists — and from a leading politician in an important state.

But — and here’s the part Hollywood would miss — outside of local media like San Francisco magazine, the coverage was surprisingly muted. The New York Times buried the story as a one-paragraph Associated Press report on page A21, with the bland dog-bites-man headline, “California: State Senator Accused of Corruption.” This even though Yee was suspended, along with two others, from the California state senate in light of the indictment.

Yeah, don’t you hate it when a story about Dem corruption is totally ignored like that?

Just to compare and contrast, I did a Google search on “Leland Yee” and “guns” and generated about 11 million hits, which hardly qualifies as ignoring a story as far as I’m concerned (here).

Then, I did a search for Chris Christie and the 9/11 artifacts he tried to give to NJ mayors to win endorsements in last year’s election (which is far worse in my opinion) and came back with about 1 million hits (here).

But of course, Reynolds would have us believe that the media hates Republicans.

Reynolds goes on some more in his screed for “America’s Fish Wrap” about how the Kermit Gosnell stuff supposedly wasn’t covered (Gosnell is the Philadelphia “doctor” who ran an abortion clinic and was convicted on 3 counts of first-degree murder and one count of manslaughter and sentenced to life in prison).

Oh, please (as noted here, the NY Post, Rupert’s vanity rag, and the Murdoch Street Journal were late to the proverbial party on this, which means that conservatives forfeit the right to complain on this as far as I’m concerned).

Of course, Reynolds has been a paid propagandist for the right his whole career, such as it is, including this hilarious moment when he predicted doom and gloom for Number 44 in 2010.

Finally, I don’t want to devote a lot of time to the latest from “Pastor” Gerson of the WaPo here, in which he reviews the films “Noah” and “God Is Not Dead,” thus giving himself the opportunity to flaunt some imagined moral bona fides once again (I thought this was a good response).

As long as I’m on the subject, though, I want to take a minute or two and note that your humble narrator recently visited the nearby Regal Cinema in these parts with the teenaged one to watch “Noah” (Sunday, homework done, bored and couldn’t wait for some of the upcoming summer blockbusters, etc.).

(And by the way, two adult tickets for a Sunday show were $24, and a medium popcorn and two “medium” drinks, with each “medium” cup holding about a half a gallon of soda, were $19. And that was less expensive than playing the concession games afterwards, including pinball, Alien Hunter, etc. Thankfully, he appears to have left that phase behind. Also, I’m going to get into the plot, which I think everybody knows at this point now anyway.)

So the movie starts at about 8:30 after all the promotions and coming attractions, even though the advertised start time was 8:10 (I must admit, though, that the previews for “Spider-Man 2” and an upcoming movie on James Brown looked pretty cool). And of course, since we’re talking about a pic with Russell Crowe, there has to be a villain in the story. And it turns out to be someone named Tubal Cain, who kills Noah’s (Crowe’s) father when Noah is a boy.

Well then, Noah grows up, and the next thing you know, he’s married to Jennifer Connelly and they have three boys (I am honestly concerned about her – every time I see her in a role, whether it’s “Dark City” or “The Day The Earth Stood Still,” she looks more and more gaunt; I hope she stocked up on some carbs after she finished making the picture). And they come across a little girl who they take in after a battle, and Connelly looks at her belly wound, and says “She’ll never have children,” which is kind of a miraculous diagnosis in a way I guess.

Soon enough, they’re trying to escape the bad guys, and they end up journeying to this land where (as it turns out) giant rock people live, and they put Noah and his family into a pit. It turns out that these rock creatures are the “watchers” who were turned to stone by “the creator” when he flipped out after Adam and Eve took a bite of the apple (though the “watchers” were apparently punished for something else). Even though the watchers/rock things threaten mankind with destruction, Noah persuades them to help and they wreak havoc to protect him (I didn’t know somebody stuck “The Book of Michael Bay” into the middle of Genesis).

And when Noah needs help to build the Ark after seeing visions of a huge flood in dreams, the creatures take care of that too (leave it to “Optimus Shale and the Autorocks” to fulfill Biblical prophecy…and no, I didn’t come up with that one).

Also, about the little girl with the stab wound…she grows up to be Emma Watson, and Anthony Hopkins (Noah’s father) puts his hand on her wound and she miraculously becomes fertile again (didn’t even need Ron or Harry to wave their wands – tee hee). She also spends just about the entire movie crying also – maybe her agent didn’t get a good deal on the residuals.

Because it’s a Biblical epic, you can count on a mega-battle scene as Tubal Cain and his minions try to storm the Ark (using spears forged in a fire pit – um, didn’t all of that technology come a few thousand years after this?). Also, I swear I saw one of the minions running around with a helmet and visor, kind of like the one that kept falling in front of Terry Jones’s face in “Monty Python and the Holy Grail.” And Noah ends up flipping out when he finds out that Ila, Noah’s stepdaughter (Watson) is pregnant, since Noah believes that God tells him that man must not repopulate the earth, and Noah thinks he has to kill Ila’s two infant daughters (Noah eventually relents and lets the babies live, getting so depressed because he thinks that he failed God that he ends up on a massive bender, drinking wine from seashells in a cave – “The Hangover, Part 4” maybe?).

To sum up, I think that “Noah” is pretty good Hollywood-style entertainment (including some truly ground-breaking CGI stuff going on, though I wonder how that all will translate to the small screen on DVD). But as anything close to a literal interpretation of the Bible (and why would you be looking for that here anyway?), the movie, in my opinion, is all wet (sorry…couldn’t resist).

Tuesday Mashup (3/4/14)

This doesn’t matter to our corporate media (hell, they’re his cheerleaders, as we know).

Neither does this.

Nor does this.

Nor this.

Nope, our dear cousins at the news networks with initials for names (not counting the media wing of the Republican Party, of course) will ALWAYS “ride the tire swing” on behalf of you-know-who, as noted below (“EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH JOHN McCAIN!!! WHAT PEARLS OF WISDOM WILL HE EMPART NEXT???).

At this point in his career in public life, the senior Republican U.S. senator from Arizona is nothing but a pitiable shill for the warmongers and the “one percent” (seeing as how we live in the era of angry millionaires). And he will be forever bitter that a Democrat resides in An Oval Office as a result of the 2008 election instead of he and Caribou Barbie (perish the thought).

And regardless of what he ever says, he will NEVER be called out by the Beltway political-media-industrial complex for it.

Update 3/6/14: Shocked? Not me.

Next, it’s time for a trip through the looking glass again, as noted here…

(Last month), Oregon’s Ellen Rosenblum became the latest AG to abdicate her duty to defend (a state ban on gay marriage). And earlier (in February), a federal judge struck down Virginia’s traditional definition of marriage after Attorney General Mark Herring refused to defend it.

Herring’s defense of his abdication was typical of these attorneys general. He said he was putting Virginia “on the right side of history.” But the job of an attorney general is law not history, and Herring and the other AGs have failed at that job.

Herring put himself on the wrong side of the Virginia constitution, which bans same-sex marriage, the wrong side of recent Supreme Court rulings and most importantly, on the wrong side of his sworn duty to defend Virginia’s laws.

While he was at it, Herring also violated his ethical obligation to zealously represent his clients — the people of Virginia — who enacted the gay marriage ban through a 2006 ballot initiative.

And by the way, you can include PA’s Attorney General Kathleen Kane on the list of attorneys general choosing not to defend the indefensible (IMHO) DOMA for their state/commonwealth.

The author of this piece is Curt Levey, and I believe he has a rather interesting interpretation of what laws the Supreme Court should defend and which ones they shouldn’t (don’t worry – I’m being sarcastic). For, as noted here, The Supremes have already ruled against the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, which predicates the actions of attorneys general like Herring and Kane. Also, Levey tried to argue that the High Court should overturn the Affordable Care Law, and, in the process, ignored the fact that it has to do with interstate commerce (the Court of Hangin’ Judge JR has observed throughout that such a law is covered under the so-called “commerce clause” of the Constitution – if nothing else, this shows that Levey doesn’t truly have the understanding of the law that he claims to have…here).

As noted here from about four years ago, though, there really is no need to give Curt Levey the time of day at a reputable news site anyway.

Further, Repug U.S. Senator Rand “Fake Ophthalmologist” Paul of Kentucky, in pursuit of another way to try and burnish his wingnut bona fides, is opposing Dr. Vivek Murthy’s nomination as the next Surgeon General (here)…

Citing his work in political advocacy pushing for gun control and Obamacare, (Paul) threatened…to place a hold on President Obama’s Surgeon General Nominee.

In a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Paul explained his objection to Dr. Vivek Murthy, Obama’s choice for the position.

…

According to Paul, Murthy’s “primary policy goals” have been pushing stricter gun control laws and Obamacare, and that Murthy refers to “guns as a public health issue on par with heart disease and has diminished the role of mental health in gun violence.”

I’m not going to deal with Paul’s typically idiotic claim that Dr. Murthy “diminished the role of mental health in gun violence.” Instead, I’ll ask the following question; I wonder if Paul knows that Dr. C. Everett Koop, former Surgeon General under The Sainted Ronnie R, thought gun violence was a public health issue also (here)?

And in defense of Dr. Murthy, I give you the following (here, from Dr. Georges C. Benjamin, Executive Director of the American Public Health Association)…

We know that Dr. Murthy values prevention. As a member of the Advisory Group on Prevention, Health Promotion, and Integrative and Public Health, he is already working to give sound advice that brings together every facet of government — from education and defense to housing and transportation — to ensure health is considered across the full spectrum of national programs and policies.

He has demonstrated that he is a mature leader of men and women. As co-founder and president of Doctors for America, he brought together 16,000 physicians and medical students to advocate for quality, affordable health care for all. He has also been a leader in HIV prevention and education as president of Visions Worldwide. And finally, we know that Dr. Murthy has the bright mind to take the latest science and turn it into better health outcomes. He is well trained and as an instructor at Harvard Medical School and a physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, he’s successfully practiced at some of our nation’s most prestigious health care institutions.

Dr. Murthy has accomplished much in his 37 years. Because of his young age, however, some might question his readiness for such an important position. However, our nation has been privileged to have had many such successful young health innovators over the years. For example, Dr. Vivien Thomas helped devise the procedure to correct the “blue baby syndrome”; Dr. Robert Jarvik invented one of the first artificial hearts; Dr. Joseph Murray performed the first human kidney transplant; and Françoise Barré-Sinoussi was one of the key discovers of HIV as the virus that causes AIDS.

These groundbreaking health advancements, which have saved millions of lives, were made possible by four leaders younger than Dr. Murthy. Competence, not age, should be the major criteria for this important position.

Oh, and by the way, can we please dispense with this fiction that “Dr.” Paul is actually a certified ophthalmologist by a reputable board, OK (here)?

Continuing, did you know that “liberals are destroying the planet,” according to Ed Rogers? Why, he says so here, in a column where he posits that there should be a category of individuals who believe or, more precisely, don’t believe in climate change called the “Prudent Rationals” (yep, it gets pretty thick here quickly, if you know what I mean)…

“The Prudent Rationals” would be comprised of those whose attitudes comport with something like the following: They are generally respectful of the scientific community and are eager to listen to mainstream scientists and researchers. They want to hear from legitimate experts who acknowledge the variables, the uncertainties and, importantly, the mistakes and errors of climate science so far. This group could support a prudent plan to produce measurable benefits, but only if the plan were truly global in scope and the cost seemed to be proportional to the outcome. The “Prudent Rationals” believe it is reasonable to accept that there are consequences for continually pumping gases into the atmosphere. And it seems right that one generation should leave the planet better than they found it for the next generation. But we need to be realistic about technical science and political science. If we can’t act globally to limit these gases, we should be focusing on local pollution, not on plans that unilaterally wreck our economy and impoverish millions – if not billions – for nothing.

Laurence Lewis of Daily Kos answered all of this idiocy pretty well here, I thought (and for something that is supposed to be nothing more than some dastardly liberal plot, it should be noted that the CIA and the National Academy of the Sciences are going to spend about $630,000 to “study how humans might influence weather patterns, assess the potential dangers of messing with the climate, and investigate possible national security implications of geoengineering attempts” – here, so clearly, the “spooks” believe in the climate crisis, wouldn’t you say?).

After reading the WaPo column, though (and managing to keep down my lunch in the process), I got a little curious about Ed Rogers, so I decided to do a bit of investigating. And it turns out that, along with former Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, he runs the uber-lobbying firm BGR (here). For more information, this tells us more about the lobbying activities of BGR (no big “get” here I know, but I still think it’s interesting to see how wide their footprint is, as it were).

It should also be noted that Rogers is an old hand when it comes to taking shots at Democrats, trying to impugn then-Senator Barack Obama in his run for the White House in 2006 (here). And after peaking in revenue in ’07, the firm apparently saw a 25 percent drop up to ’10, blaming Obama for it of course, as noted here; however, I’m sure the item below didn’t help with the firm’s revenues either (here)…

This time around though, (Barbour, the “B” in BGR) is starting his new political and personal business projects at a sensitive moment. The former governor is also trying to put out a political firestorm in Mississippi that was sparked by 215 pardons — including 17 to convicted murders — he issued in his last days in office earlier this month.

The new GOP governor, Phil Bryant, has indicated he would back a constitutional amendment to limit the pardoning powers of the governor; and the state’s Democratic attorney general, Jim Hood, called Barbour’s sweeping pardons “an absolute tragedy for the victims involved in each of these cases.”

The high-decibel attacks on Barbour in the Magnolia state have sent shock waves up and down K Street where Ed Rogers, one of his partners at BGR, last week scrambled to contain the fallout.

According to sources, Rogers urged Barbour to move quickly to tamp down the controversy by giving his own full account of what he did and why he did it, lest it hurt Barbour’s effectiveness and image — and perhaps the firm’s lucrative bottom line.

But not to worry – I’m sure Rogers will end up just fine; he apparently “landed on his feet” in the manner noted below (here)…

TRENTON — A Washington lobbyist whose firm represents the Florida company that won the lion’s share of New Jersey’s debris removal work after Hurricane Sandy will host a fundraiser for Gov. Chris Christie’s re-election later this month.

The event will take place at the Virginia mansion of Ed Rogers, chairman of BGR Group, which lobbies members of Congress on behalf of AshBritt Inc. — a firm that has come under scrutiny because of a lucrative no-bid emergency contract it was awarded in the days after the hurricane.

The lobbying company was co-founded by Republican Haley Barbour, the former Mississippi governor who helped shepherd Christie’s career and was one of the people who recommended the state use AshBritt.

None of what I have cited here is illegal on the part of Rogers and his firm as far as I know. But I wouldn’t complain that anybody is “destroying the planet” if their own activities don’t exactly pass the smell test either.

Finally, I haven’t checked up our wet noodle PA-08 U.S. House Rep for a little while, so I need to bring everyone up to date a bit on Mikey the Beloved’s recent adventures (here, with a heaping helping of whining about supposedly “job-crushing” regulations, or something – I was tipped off to this when I received Mikey’s Email newsletter)…

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick (PA-8) delivered letters and copies of the film “Barrel of a Gun” to Senate offices in the nation’s capital Friday in an effort to educate Senators regarding the circumstances and events surrounding the murder of Officer Daniel Faulkner by Mumia Abu Jamal. The president’s nominee to head the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, Debo Adegbile, led efforts to recruit attorneys to pervert the justice system after Jamal’s just conviction for his heinous crime.
…

Fitzpatrick has ardently opposed the nomination of Adgebile (sic) since its announcement in early January, writing to the president and members of the Senate Judiciary committee and calling the recommendation ‘confounding.’ Prior to the Senate Judiciary’s 10-8 party-line approval of Adegbile’s nomination, Fitzpatrick spoke with Senators and urged them to consider the Adegbile’s involvement with the celebritization of Mumia through his legal representation.

Even by Mikey’s low standards, this is pretty repulsive stuff (and nice typo, by the way). As noted here…

On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and the 75 undersigned organizations, we are writing to indicate our strongest possible support for the nomination of Debo P. Adegbile to be Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice. Mr. Adegbile is a tireless advocate, a skilled litigator, and a well-respected member of the legal community who is extraordinarily qualified for and suited to this position.

Mr. Adegbile is one of the preeminent civil rights litigators of his generation. He is also a consensus builder. Mr. Adegbile has earned respect and admiration from a bipartisan set of colleagues, lawyers, and leaders, including former Solicitors General Paul Clement and Drew Days, because of his principled and measured approach to issues.

Throughout his career, Mr. Adegbile has distinguished himself as a highly effective and respected advocate who achieved successes both inside and outside the courtroom. The son of immigrants who worked his way from poverty to the top of the legal profession, Mr. Adegbile is a steadfast voice for equality and opportunity for all Americans. [Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, 1/7/14]

Also, while I will never defend Mumia Abu-Jamal, I think it’s also pretty safe to say that he’s still entitled to a legal defense, and I don’t see how representing Abu-Jamal constitutes a “celebritization (word?) of Mumia through his representation” Besides, as the Media Matters post tells us…

When he was a partner at Hogan Lovells, the letter (cited above) noted, Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. helped represent Florida death row inmate John Ferguson, convicted in the murder of eight people.

On top of all of this, I thought this was a well-done editorial by the Inky (shocking, I know) about Debo Adegbile, in which the paper accused anyone trying to connect him with Abu-Jamal of “blatant demagoguery” which was quite rightly called “sickening” (Mikey wasn’t mentioned, but Sen. Pat “No Corporate Tax” Toomey was).

In his newsletter, Fitzpatrick also tells us that about 11 million small business employees will see their premiums increase as a result of the Affordable Care Law. Of course, Fitzpatrick doesn’t tell us that 6 million small business employees will see their premiums drop (as noted here – also, we don’t know what kind of a percentage both of those numbers represent against everyone projected to enroll on the exchanges across the country).

And in conclusion, Mikey tells us with his typical whining petulance that “Congress makes the laws” here (I don’t know who this Dr. Larry Kawa is, and I don’t care – witness Mikey’s laser-like focus on “jobs, jobs, jobs”) and President Obama has no right to delay implementing the employer mandate in supposed unilateral executive fashion (sarcasm mode off).

However, as noted here from last August…

The strategy shifted again last month after the Obama administration announced a one-year delay of the law’s employer mandate. Boehner seized on the move to argue that the White House was giving a break to businesses but not to individuals by delaying only one of the two major mandates. He and Cantor quickly scheduled votes to delay both the employer and individual mandates, and they cheered when more than 20 Democrats voted for each bill.

So, while Fitzpatrick has called for a delay in implementing the individual mandate (which I ALSO don’t agree with, as noted here), he is having a typical hissy fit by accusing President Obama of trying to make his own law, or something, when in reality, Mikey’s own House congressional “leadership” had scheduled a vote to delay the employer mandate MONTHS AGO!

With all of this is mind, I would ask that you click here to respond (and I would like to point out the following to the Kevin Strouse campaign – if you expect to have any hope of pulling away enough independent voters in PA-08 from the “trending R” column to win election in November, then you should start pointing out stuff like this instead of me…trying thinking about that before you hit me up again for a campaign donation).

Friday Mashup (9/6/13)

I give you the following from the Bucks County Courier Times earlier in the week:

Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick used the national Republican Weekly Address on Saturday to criticize President Barack Obama’s policies for health care and energy.

“Nearly five years into the Obama presidency, the workers who drive our economy see nothing but roadblocks coming out of Washington,” Fitzpatrick said in the Labor Day weekend speech.

The 8th District Republican, who recorded the talk Thursday in Philadelphia, has been critical of Obama’s Affordable Care Act in visits to several area chambers of commerce in recent months.

No word on whether or not Mikey the Beloved has spoken to actual non-Chamber of Commerce residents of PA-08 for their feedback on the Affordable Care Act, by the way (I’ll address his comment about the ACA and the alleged increase in premiums shortly…and in the matter of the Keystone XL pipeline which Mikey also supports, I give you the following from here and here).

I wonder if it’s supposed to be a bit of a backhanded compliment to Mikey that he was asked to give the Repug response to Obama’s weekly address on what probably is the day when people are least likely to pay attention to it because it’s the last unofficial weekend of summer (and by the way, to respond to “roadblock Mikey” properly, click here).

And keeping with the theme of the health care law, I give you the following from here (looks like The Weakly Standard needs a copy editor)…

A local report from Green Bay, Wisconsin says that health care premiuns (sic) could increase up to 125 percent because of Obamacare:

…

Half a million Wisconsinites will soon have to open up their pocket books for health care coverage,” says a local anchor. “And new estimates show, it may be costly. … The state’s office of the commissioner of insurance released estimates of how premium rates for individuals will be changing under the Affordable Care Act.”

In response, I give you the following from here…

(A Rand Corporation) Analysis suggests that comparisons of average premiums with and without the Affordable Care Act may overstate the potential for premium increases. Sweeping statements about the effects of the Affordable Care Act on premiums should be interpreted very carefully because the law has complex effects that differ depending on individuals’ age and smoking status, the actuarial value of the plan chose, individuals” eligibility for federal tax credits, and state implementation decisions. Once we adjust for age, actuarial value, and tobacco use, nongroup premiums are estimated to remain unchanged at the national level and in many states. Further, after accounting for tax credits, average out-of-pocket premium spending in the nongroup market is estimated to decline or remain unchanged in all states considered and in in the nation overall. [RAND Corporation, Accessed 9/4/13]

In addition, this may be the most definitive post I’ve seen yet on supposed rate increases under HCR (with further “food for thought” here).

Next, I know I’m a little late with this Labor Day-related commentary also based on this from The Philadelphia Inquirer, but here it is anyway…

Organized labor is so powerful in Philadelphia that people in this town might not realize unions are in real trouble nationally. Labor Day is a good time to reflect on that reality.

Just a few days ago, union picketers made the local TV news by blasting the amplified sound of a baby’s recorded cries during daily protests of nonunion work at a hotel, disturbing guests and a Center City neighborhood. Weeks earlier, a strike at the Pennsylvania Convention Center threatened a major convention.

Meanwhile, the political clout of labor leaders such as electricians boss John “Johnny Doc” Dougherty can be calculated by the number of Philadelphia officials who all but genuflect in the presence of a man who controls a significant source of campaign contributions.

Far be it for me to leap to the defense of “Johnny Doc,” but to say that the Inky is “painting with a broad brush” here is an understatement (a bit surprised that the Inky didn’t also blame the Teamsters for blowing up the inflatable rat that they often do in an effort to shame companies that hire non-union workers; as far as I’m concerned, that’s free speech and I have no problem with it).

I would only point out once more the contributions of the union movement to workers of all sectors of our economy, some of which are noted here. And I would say that the video noted here shows pretty well that the decline in union membership and the rise of income inequality pretty much go hand in hand.

The Inquirer points out that the downward trend in union membership began in 1983, which is two years after perhaps the most catastrophic anti-union event perpetrated by our government, and that was the firing of the air traffic controllers as part of the showdown with PATCO (their union at the time) by The Sainted Ronnie R, as noted here, the reverberations of which we are still feeling today.

Continuing, I give you some genuine hilarity from Erick (“Son of Erick”) Erickson of Fix Noise here, in response to Number 44 on Syria…

George W. Bush, getting congressional approval for military operations seven days after the September 11th attack was not bending the arc of history, but John Harwood will probably spend the next week of reporting telling us all exactly how arc bending Barack Obama is.

Sooo…is “Son of Erick” actually beating on John Harwood for supposedly carrying the water, as they say, of President Obama? And not doing the same for Former President Nutball? Really???

As noted here, Harwood said the following about Number 43…

…the 9/11 attacks gave (Bush) enough standing eventually to take the nation to war against Iraq.

Oh, and as noted here, Harwood also once criticized Obama when Number 44 decided to “move…out from behind speechmaking lecterns.” And as far as Harwood supposedly sucking up to Obama goes, I also give you this.

And is Erickson referring to the same Harwood who once claimed that Dubya was “doggedly advancing conservative goals on taxes and national security” here? Oh, but according to “Son of Erick,” Harwood should have claimed that Dubya was “bending the arc of history,” or something.

And as we know, Erickson is always a model for prudence and discretion in his “reporting” of the news stories that touch our lives on a daily basis. Right?

Gosh, if I didn’t know better, I’d swear Erickson is taking hallucinogenic drugs (and no, I won’t stop linking to that until Harwood apologizes, something I’m sure he’ll never do).

Further, I give you the following from former Repug U.S. House Rep Pete Hoekstra, also on the Syria crisis (here)…

Why did partisanship disrupt our foreign policy unity? Was it due to political opportunism or genuine policy differences?

We may never know.

Actually, I think we know right now – as noted here, Hoekstra and Former PA Senator Man-On-Dog tried to circulate a discredited claim about Saddam Hussein’s WMD. Also, as noted here, Hoekstra opined in April 2009 that the reaction of the Obama Administration to the ”enhanced interrogation” methods of our prior ruling cabal “are demonstrating how little President Barack Obama and some Democratic members of Congress understand the dire threats to our nation,” which was particularly stupid on Hoekstra’s part because all Obama wanted to do basically was to “turn the page.”

(By the way, the same prior post from yours truly notes the truly wretched “sock puppetry” of Hoekstra in the matter of feeding the bogus claim to Time’s Joe Klein that the version of the FISA bill from the Democrats required warrants for every foreign terrorist’s call and that the bill thus gave the same rights to foreign terrorists as American citizens…yes, the Dems eventually caved on FISA, to their shame, but that doesn’t make the Hoekstra/Klein episode any less galling.)

As noted here, Rachel Maddow basically said that everyone from Bushco should just go away when it comes to opining on Syria, since they were so catastrophically wrong on Iraq (I would argue that that extends to all other foreign policy issues also). Based on this bit of wankery from Hoekstra, I think that goes for him too.

Finally, I should note that BP ran a full-page ad in the Murdoch Street Journal on Thursday with quotes from Tom Donahue of the “U.S.” Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers whining about how BP has already paid $10 billion in damages and blaming those dastardly trial lawyers once again – typical.

In response, I give you the following:

This tells us a bit about the lawsuits currently pending against BP, including Florida joining a four-state suit.

This tells us that, maybe and just perhaps, the reason why those dastardly trial lawyers are involved is because BP is suing the EPA (so I guess the government isn’t entitled to represent itself?).

This basically tells us that accusing settlement victims of “taking money they don’t deserve” isn’t exactly going to “win hearts and minds” either (and the Journal ad cites the “U.S.” Chamber, but doesn’t note that BP is a member).

This tells us that the gulf oil spill’s settlement administrator has said that BP’s claims of fraud are “spurious” and “unfounded.”

Oh, and by the way, BP wants to “halt the Deepwater Horizon claims process” altogether, as noted here.

That makes them the scum of the earth as far as I’m concerned.

Friday Mashup (8/30/13)

I came across this item from clownhall.com and columnist Walter Williams, and I thought it best to offer it pretty much with just my opinion on it and no links to other stuff (he’s upset because his employer, George Mason University – first sign of trouble – apparently has told him that he has to attend some kind of sexual harassment prevention training; sounds like it was mandated across the board for all university employees)…

I’m guilty of gross violation of equality of opportunity, racism and possibly sexism. Back in 1960, when interviewing people to establish a marital contract, every woman wasn’t given an equal opportunity. I discriminated against not only white, Indian, Asian, Mexican and handicapped women but men of any race. My choices were confined to good-looking black women. You say, “Williams, that kind of discrimination doesn’t harm anyone!” Nonsense! When I married Mrs. Williams, other women were harmed by having a reduced opportunity set.

I’ve read this paragraph about four times, and I still can’t totally get my head around (as they say) the unbelievable egotism of that remark, to say nothing of sexism.

I will give Williams points for consistency, though. As noted here from about three years ago, he was cited by Ed Schultz for saying pretty much the same thing, equating mistreatment from a private business as the same thing as what one does when picking a spouse (at the time, he also complimented a caller for the caller’s wife being “under control” or something). The line about other women “having a reduced opportunity set” when Williams decided to marry is an obnoxious new wrinkle, though.

This, to me, is part of what lies in the coal-black heart of movement conservatism, my fellow prisoners, and that is a loathing bordering on outright animosity towards anyone or anything that isn’t in their little club (women, minorities, LGBT individuals, the poor, the elderly, children, anyone who has paid into a government entitlement of any kind who, quite rightly, now expects a payout for any one of a number of reasons, etc.).

One more thing – if my employer told me “Doomsy, we just implemented a company-wide policy dictating that everyone has to take a sexual harassment awareness course within a year,” guess what? I would do it and be grateful for the opportunity to still collect a paycheck (though I’m sure Williams, who occasionally sits in for the OxyContin addict on his radio show, has at least one other “revenue stream” to draw on if his employer fires his sorry ass to enforce a principle…how lucky can a guy get?).

Next, I have to admit a bit of perverse curiosity to see how the wingnutosphere covered the 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech; I saw some truly ponderous piffle that I decided to ignore…but then I happened to come across this from Jennifer Rubin of Jeff Bezos Daily…

President Obama has consistently and deliberately tried to identify with Ronald Reagan, Abraham Lincoln and FDR. It’s not enough to let pundits and the public make these analogies, the president goes out of his way to announce his connection with these historical giants, no matter how strained the analogy. Who can blame him? He’s a president whose approval is under water, whose domestic agenda is stalled and whose foreign policy is in utter disarray. A failing president naturally wants to walk in others’ shoes.

As far as Obama’s approval rating being “under water,” this from Fix Noise (yeah, I know) has him at 42 percent – not great I know, but a number Obama’s wretched predecessor would have grabbed with both hands, as it were, if he had the chance.

And speaking of Former President Highest Disapproval Rating In Gallup Poll History and a “connection with…historical giants, no matter how strained the analogy,” I give you this from the 2000 Rethuglican National Convention in the City of Brotherly Love (and as noted here, Rubin is a Dubya cheerleader from waay back)…

Mr. Chairman, delegates, and my fellow citizens … I accept your nomination. Thank you for this honor. Together, we will renew America’s purpose.

Our founders first defined that purpose here in Philadelphia … Ben Franklin was here. Thomas Jefferson. And, of course, George Washington — or, as his friends called him, “George W.”

And that was before he was even “elected” (sorry to make you revisit that).

And another thing – the only way Obama “associated” with Dr. King was to make a speech to commemorate the anniversary. How does that qualify as “associating”? Others, including veep Joe Biden, gave speeches – does that mean Biden is “associating” with Dr. King too? If not, why not?

Actually, given all of this, I think the former ombudsman for the WaPo is definitely onto something here.

Continuing, I came across a bit of a curious item here…

MSNBC’s Karen Finney on Monday hung up on conservative talker Hugh Hewitt after he repeatedly asked her during an interview on his radio show to say whether Alger Hiss was a communist.

Hewitt had Finney on his program to discuss her statement on her weekend show that Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s rhetoric on health care is reminiscent of the “fear stoking” of Joe McCarthy, who she said “also wanted to take his country back, then it was from the communists who had supposedly infiltrated it.” While Cruz’s mission might be different than McCarthy’s, Finney told viewers of her show “Disrupt,” “the rhetoric sounds eerily the same.”

Well, apparently, after Finney called into Hewitt’s show, the host started badgering her with questions asking her if she knew of any communists that had infiltrated the U.S. government during the McCarthy era. And things predictably went downhill from there to the point where Hewitt started badgering Finney also with the Alger Hiss stuff.

When I heard about this, the following question occurred to me: why would Finney call into the Hewitt show in the first place? Did she honestly think Hewitt would be interested in having a serious discussion of whether or not “Calgary” Cruz was really using tactics a la Joe McCarthy? How would she not know that, typical for right-wing media, she would be attacked immediately for some minor or even imaginary point, with the fairly substantive issue she raised being totally ignored?

As far as I’m concerned, a phrase used to describe our politics any more with a variation of the name “McCarthy” in it is a bit trite by now. I’m not saying we should ignore real or potential demagogues, only that, if we’re going to engage in accusations, we should be as precise as we can be.

That being said, I don’t know if Cruz is really the Joe McCarthy of our era or not (no many culprits to choose from, unfortunately…Steve King, Louie Gohmert, Steve Stockman…almost a new one every week). What I do know is that, when the comparison to McCarthy was mentioned to Cruz, he embraced it, as noted here (to me, the correct answer should have been “I don’t appreciate that comparison, I wish you wouldn’t make it, and I defy you to show me how it is appropriate,” which of course would lead to a substantive discussion – exactly the sort of thing Cruz doesn’t want, apparently).

And in the matter of Alger Hiss, I don’t know whether he was a communist or not. I do know that he was convicted of perjury, not espionage, and he spent the rest of his life trying to clear his name (and in a bit of a historical quirk, he managed to outlive his chief accuser, then-Republican U.S. House Representative Richard Nixon of Whittier, CA, by two years).

Further (and I don’t know if anyone else will care about this except me, but here I go anyway), I came across the following item from The Weakly Standard…

President Obama and Attorney General Holder met with a group of 18 mayors at the White House on Tuesday afternoon. The meeting was billed as a discussion “with mayors from cities around the country to discuss reducing youth violence.” And although Republicans hold about a quarter of mayoral positions in the fifty largest cities in the U.S., only one Republican mayor was in attendance at the meeting: Greg Ballard of Indianapolis. The remaining mayors included sixteen Democrats and one independent.

According to recent data, there are twelve Republicans among the mayors of the fifty largest U.S. cities. Twelve of the eighteen cities represented at the White House meeting are among those fifty.

OK, so the inference is pretty clear here that President Obama wanted to meet pretty much with Democratic mayors and nobody else. Got it.

So, with that in mind, I put together the following table from the information linked to Wikipedia nested in the Standard post on the 50 largest U.S. cities as well as other information in the Standard post, and I came up with the following table (R stands for Republican, D for Democrat, and I for Independent, in case you had any doubt about that).

Name	City	R	D	I	Attended
Bach, Steve	Colorado Springs	X
Ballard, Greg	Indianapolis	X			Y
Barrett, Tom	Milwaukee		X		Y
Bartlett, Jr., Dewey	Tulsa	X
Berry, Richard	Albuquerque	X
Bing, Dave	Detroit		X
Bloomberg, Michael	NYC			X
Booker, Cory	Newark, NJ		X		Y
Brewer, Carl	Wichita		X
Brown, Alvin	Jacksonville		X
Castro, Julian	San Antonio		X
Cluck, Robert	Arlington, TX	X
Coleman, Michael	Columbus, OH		X
Cook, John	El Paso		X
Cornett, Mick	Oklahoma City	X
Dean, Karl	Nashville		X
Emanuel, Rahm	Chicago		X
Filner, Bob (for now)	San Diego		X
Fischer, Greg	Louisville		X
Foster, Bob	Long Beach		X
Garcetti, Eric	LA		X
Goodman, Carolyn	Las Vegas			X
Gray, Vincent	Washington, D.C.		X		Y
Hales, Charlie	Portland, OR		X
Hancock, Mike	Denver		X
Jackson, Frank	Cleveland		X
James, Sly	Kansas City, MO			X	Y
Johnson, Kevin	Sacramento		X		Y
Kinsey, Patsy	Charlotte		X
Landrieu, Mitch	New Orleans		X		Y
Lee, Ed	San Francisco		X
Leffingwell, Lee	Austin		X
Mallory, Mark	Cincinnati		X		Y
McFarlane, Nancy	Raleigh			X
McGinn, Mike	Seattle		X
Menino, Thomas	Boston		X
Nutter, Michael	Philadelphia		X		Y
Parker, Annise	Houston		X		Y
Price, Betsy	Fort Worth	X
Quan, Jean	Oakland		X		Y
Rawlings, Mike	Dallas		X
Rawlings-Blake, Stephanie	Baltimore		X		Y
Reed, Chuck	San Jose		X		Y
Reed, Kasim	Atlanta		X
Regalado, Tomas	Miami	X
Rothschild, Jon	Colorado Springs		X
Rybak, R.T.	Minneapolis		X		Y
Sessoms, Will	Virginia Beach	X
Slay, Francis	St. Louis		X		Y
Smith, Scott	Mesa	X
Stanton, Greg	Phoenix		X
Stothert, Jean	Omaha	X
Swearengin, Ashley	Fresno	X
Walling, Dayne	Flint		X		Y
Ward, Molly	Hampton		X		Y
Wharton, A.C.	Memphis		X		Y

What we learn is that, as the Standard tells us, 11 Republican mayors were indeed absent.

Do you know, however, how many Democratic mayors were absent also? 23, that’s how many.

And they are as follows:

Bing, Dave
Brewer, Carl
Brown, Alvin
Castro, Julian
Cook, John
Dean, Karl
Emmanuel, Rahm
Filner, Bob (for now)
Fischer, Greg
Foster, Bob
Garcetti, Eric
Hales, Charlie
Hancock, Mike
Jackson, Frank
Kinsey, Patsy
Leffingwell, Lee
Hales, Charlie
Hancock, Mike
Jackson, Frank
Rawlings, Mike
Reed, Kasim
Rothschild, Jon
Stanton, Greg

I should add that I do not have any information from the White House on who was actually invited (and I‘m assuming the Standard is correct in who actually attended), so the table above reflects a bit of guesswork on my part from the available information.

I realize that the wingnutosphere really doesn’t have a reason to exist unless it’s trying to gin up one type of “scandal” or another, but as these things go, this one is pretty “weak tea.”

Finally, it seems that conservatives overall are all lovey-dovey with actor Ashton Kutcher over a speech he recently gave at the Teen Choice Awards, in which he stated the following (recounted here by Cal Thomas of Fix Noise, self-appointed spokesman for supposedly all things moral)…

Following screams from young female fans in the audience, Kutcher silenced them with a motivational message that bordered on inspiration. He told them: “I believe that opportunity looks a lot like hard work. … I’ve never had a job in my life that I was better than. I was always just lucky to have a job. And every job I had was a steppingstone to my next job, and I never quit my job until I had my next job.”

Kutcher wasn’t through: “The sexiest thing in the entire world is being really smart and being thoughtful and being generous. Everything else is c–p … that people try to sell to you to make you feel like less. So don’t buy it. Be smart, be thoughtful and be generous.”

…

If only Washington politicians would think and talk this way.

Actually, one of them did recently, stating the following from here (and yes, he’s African American – probably just gave it away)…

We know that too many young men in our community continue to make bad choices. Growing up, I made a few myself. And I have to confess, sometimes I wrote off my own failings as just another example of the world trying to keep a black man down. But one of the things you’ve learned over the last four years is that there’s no longer any room for excuses. I understand that there’s a common fraternity creed here at Morehouse: ‘excuses are tools of the incompetent, used to build bridges to nowhere and monuments of nothingness.’ We’ve got no time for excuses – not because the bitter legacies of slavery and segregation have vanished entirely; they haven’t. Not because racism and discrimination no longer exist; that’s still out there. It’s just that in today’s hyperconnected, hypercompetitive world, with a billion young people from China and India and Brazil entering the global workforce alongside you, nobody is going to give you anything you haven’t earned. And whatever hardships you may experience because of your race, they pale in comparison to the hardships previous generations endured – and overcame.

…

“Be a good role model and set a good example for that young brother coming up. If you know someone who isn’t on point, go back and bring that brother along. The brothers who have been left behind – who haven’t had the same opportunities we have – they need to hear from us. We’ve got to be in the barbershops with them, at church with them, spending time and energy and presence helping pull them up, exposing them to new opportunities, and supporting their dreams.

And yes, it was this guy (and by the way, Mr. President, on an unrelated but much more urgent matter, please read this).

But of course, talking down to others and implying (or even saying outright) that they are somehow immoral or inferior, as Thomas does here about Hollywood and Washington politicians overall, is definitely taking a page, as it were, out of the movement conservative playbook.

Which, more than anyone else, was written by this guy.

Update: And this generates a sigh of relief on Syria, by the way – how much do you want to bet that, had Number 43 still been in charge, bombs would be dropping all over the place with scores dead and unaccounted for (and legitimate this time) WMDs all over the Middle East, threats of terrorism would be erupting from all over the region, and the demented child-king in An Oval Office would have sneered at the world, saying, “Are you with us or are you against us?” (with families of military members anxious over which God-forsaken location on earth their loved ones would be sent this time).

Wednesday Mashup (8/14/13)

Looks like it’s time to rally around the supposedly oh-so-put-upon American Legislative Exchange Council, as the Murdoch Street Journal tells us here…

The campaign to suppress political speech has found its next tactic, using outrage over Trayvon Martin’s killing in Florida as a hammer. (Last) Wednesday, Illinois Democrat Dick Durbin sent a letter to corporate and nonprofit supporters of the American Legislative Exchange Council, asking them to disclose their positions on stand-your-ground legislation that ALEC supported in Florida in 2005.

ALEC is a group of state legislators from around the country that promotes center-right reform ideas, mostly on economic issues. It has had success spreading those ideas, which has made it a target of liberal activists trying to cut off its funding.

Like the Repugs did successfully to ACORN, a left-wing advocacy organization which no longer exists, let’s not forget.

Enter Mr. Durbin. “Although ALEC does not maintain a public list of corporate members or donors, other public documents indicate that your company funded ALEC at some point during the period between ALEC’s adoption of model ‘stand your ground’ legislation in 2005 and the present day,” Mr. Durbin writes in the letter to groups and companies that have donated to ALEC.

Since support for ALEC doesn’t “necessarily mean” that it endorses every position taken by the organization, Mr. Durbin continues, he is “seeking clarification” on whether companies that have “funded ALEC’s operations in the past currently support ALEC and the model ‘stand your ground’ legislation.” Oh, and by the way, the letter concludes, he intends to make the responses public at a Congressional hearing in September.

Translation: If your company engages in political debate or supports conservative groups, he will tie your name to controversies or force you to publicly disclaim positions taken by groups you support. Mr. Durbin knows that if he can drive a wedge between ALEC and its corporate donors, it will help cripple the group’s influence on issues like tax policy and education and remove a significant voice for conservative reform in the states, including Illinois.

“Conservative reform” being code for gutting clean air and water laws, trying to abolish public school education, disenfranchising poor and minority voters, et cetera…

The plan also sends up a flare for Mr. Durbin’s allies at agitprop outfits like MoveOn.org, which will then target for public abuse and perhaps boycott the companies whose names Mr. Durbin exposes.

By the way, isn’t it interesting how the Journal refers to ALEC as a group that “promotes center-right reform ideas” and MoveOn.org is an “agitprop outfit.”

The strategy was used against Target retail stores in 2010, when MoveOn pushed a boycott because Target donated to a group that in turn donated to a GOP candidate for Minnesota Governor.

MoveOn “targeted” Target, if you will, because the company did indeed donate $150,000 to a Minnesota politician who opposes gay marriage, but decided not to give a matching amount to pro-gay candidates for balance (here).

Did Target have a right to do that? Yes. Did MoveOn.org have a right to push its boycott in response? Again, yes.

To me, it just sounds like democracy in action (which is messy at times, for a reason). Of course, leave it to the Journal to view it as a lefty conspiracy, or something.

ALEC was targeted last year when former White House aide Van Jones accused the group and its donors of racism during the election-year fight over voter ID laws. Through letters and media smear campaigns…

Proof?

…the group succeeded in getting such non-profiles in courage as Coca-Cola, Mars and Kraft to stop donating to ALEC. One result is that ALEC closed its task forces that dealt with non-economic issues.

That was an effort to minimize the political fallout for members and donors around issues that weren’t ALEC’s core mission, but now Democrats are back for more.

Oh, so the Journal knows what ALEC’s “core mission” is? Oh, right – “center/right reform ideas”…uh huh. And apparently, that includes widespread lobbying while claiming tax-exempt status, as noted here.

Mr. Durbin knows that companies making hamburgers or allergy drugs don’t care about stand-your-ground laws. His goal is to scare them with reputational damage by mentioning them in the same breath as Trayvon Martin. This is how the modern left—via the IRS, the Federal Election Commission and now in Congress—tries to stifle political debate.

Ha and ha (and I would say that writing an editorial like this without noting that the Journal is itself a member of ALEC is an attempt to “stifle political debate” also, as noted here – and of course, lefties were targeted by the IRS too, a fact the Journal choose to ignore).

Oh, and assuming a bill is ever signed into law containing language directly from an “agitprop outfit” like MoveOn.org (this Michigan “right to work” bill received that treatment, including language that came directly from ALEC), I’m sure the Journal will let me know – yeah, right.

Update 8/15/13: More here…

Next, I have a feeling that the other Bush brother is getting a little antsy about all the big media love doled out to fellow Repugs (and potential 2016 presidential candidates) Rand “Fake Ophthalmologist” Paul and Ted “Calgary” Cruz (to say nothing of Governor Bully, of course), and I guess the former FAL guv thought he had to make a splash somehow (here)…

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) on Wednesday criticized actor Matt Damon, a vocal public-school advocate, for sending his children to private school.

Matt Damon Refuses to Enroll Kids in Los Angeles Public Schools. Choice ok for Damon, why not everyone else? http://t.co/yHrTbakeIW

— Jeb Bush (@JebBush) August 6, 2013

“I’ll take ‘Desperately Trying To Remain Relevant Somehow’ for 100, Alex!”

There are a few directions you can go with this, but for now, I’d like to point out the following (here, in which the Daily Kos diarist notes that the “research” in support of school choice is largely bankrolled by the Walton Family, the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, and the usual coterie of right-wing propagandists)…

School choice may, in fact, hold some promises for reforming education since “choice” is central to human agency and empowerment. But the school choice movement and its advocates are the least likely avenues for us ever realizing what school choice has to offer because the advocates are primarily driven by ideology and funding coming from sources that have intentions that have little to do with universal public education for free and empowered people.

And the growing evidence that corporate charter schools as the latest choice mechanism are causing harm–in terms of segregation and stratification of student populations–is cause for alarm for all people along the spectrum of school reform and school choice. [5]

If a school choice advocate sticks to the talking-points script and will not acknowledge the overwhelming evidence that out-of-school factors determine student outcomes, that evidence is mounting that choice stratifies schools, and that evidence on how school is delivered (public, private, charter) is mixed and similar among all types of schooling, then that advocate isn’t worth our time and isn’t contributing to a vibrant and open debate that could help move us toward school reform that benefits each student and our larger society.

And on top of that, this tells us the following…

Charter school trends vary substantially across different regions of the country. Latinos are under-enrolled in charter schools in some Western states where they comprise the largest share of students. At the same time, a dozen states (including those with high concentrations of Latino students like Arizona and Texas) report that a majority of Latino charter students attend intensely segregated minority schools. Patterns in the West and in a few areas in the South, the two most racially diverse regions of the country, also suggest that charters serve as havens for white flight from public schools. Finally, in the industrial Midwest, more students enroll in charter schools compared to other regions, and midwestern charter programs display high concentrations of black students.

…

Since Brown v. Board of Education, public schools have been compelled to address this disparity. That public schools have been inconsistent in this mission is a conclusion that is not in dispute.

Charter schools on the other hand, — especially those operated by national Charter Management Organizations like KIPP and National Heritage Academies — tend to reinforce geographic racial patterns in their marketing appeals. On their websites and in their printed materials, these charter chains invariably promote their abilities to educate “underserved” communities and “close achievement gaps,” even though there is no evidence that charters in general are any better at this than traditional public schools. In fact, many of them are worse.

But beyond all of that, this tells us, among other things, that Jeb Bush is criticizing actor Matt Damon for doing something Bush did himself (oh, and last I checked, Matt Damon isn’t a potential candidate for any government office whatsoever).

However, I’ll let a professed Jeb Bush supporter get the last word here…

Actually, no, he isn’t.

Continuing, it looks like John Lott is all up in arms (pun intended) over keeping the identity of gun owners a secret (here). Funny, but I didn’t see NRA members being so shy when it came to showing off their hardware at a Starbucks in Newtown, CT recently, as noted here (the place where the Sandy Hook school carnage took place last year, for the benefit of anyone who has somehow forgotten that – to the credit of the Starbucks store, it closed early on Friday, but it should not have had to do that).

(I suddenly realized that, in accordance with the ALEC editorial earlier, the Murdoch Street Journal would probably try to accuse me now of suppressing the legitimate free speech of the NRA…I have a two-word response, and it isn’t “happy birthday,” or “lock n’ load.”)

I wonder if Lott is trying to hide the identity of gun owners also because, as determined in a 1994 study noted here, male gun owners were 2 ½ times more likely than non-gun owners to be arrested for non-traffic offenses? And by the way, as noted from the same HuffPo link, a 2012 survey found that most guns used in mass shootings were legally purchased – just an FYI.

Honestly, though, I think Lott and his pals have nothing to worry about (just whipping up phony outrage as usual). From what I’ve read, Gawker and the New York Journal News took so much flak for publishing the names of New York gun owners that I think the chilling effect of that alone would be enough to prevent anyone else from doing it.

Further, I give you Mark Hemingway of The Weakly Standard (here)…

On August 15, 2012, at 10:46 a.m.—one year ago this week—Floyd Lee Corkins entered the lobby of the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C. He was carrying a backpack that contained 15 Chick-fil-A -sandwiches, a Sig Sauer 9mm pistol, and 100 rounds of ammunition. Corkins has since pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing for the crimes he proceeded to commit. He’s set to spend decades in a prison cell and fade into obscurity.

But Leo Johnson deserves to be remembered for his heroism that day. The building manager for the Family Research Council was manning the front desk that morning and let Corkins enter the building under the pretense he was a new intern. The video of what happened after that is remarkable.

After Corkins takes a suspiciously long time rummaging through his bag to produce identification, Johnson cannily stands up and walks around the desk to get a closer look at what Corkins is doing. Corkins bolts upright, gun in hand. Without the slightest hesitation, Johnson rushes Corkins, who fires twice. A bullet shatters Johnson’s left forearm. “And I just couldn’t hear anything, my arm just kind of blew back. So at that point I was thinking: ‘I have to get this gun,’ ” Johnson told The Weekly Standard. “That was my sole focus—I have to get this gun—this guy’s gonna kill me and kill everybody here.”

From there, Johnson somehow manages to push Corkins across the lobby and pin him against the wall with his bad arm. “I just started punching him as hard as I could, until I could feel his grip loosen,” recalled Johnson. Eventually he takes the gun from Corkins with his wounded arm. Before long, Corkins is subdued on the ground. Corkins now admits that it was his intention to shoot everyone in the building. There’s no question Johnson saved a lot of lives.

Leo Johnson’s actions were heroic, absolutely, and Hemingway’s piece tells us about all of Johnson’s difficulty with rehabilitation and medical bills, as well as caring for his elderly mother and very elderly grandmother (and yes, Corkins is just another cowardly idiot with a gun).

But if you think all of this is just a setup to take a shot at us lefties, then you win a commemorative Mexican terrorist doll with the face of Repug U.S. House Rep Louie Gohmert (the commemorative model with the face of Steve King has “calves the size of cantaloupes”).

Continuing…

There’s a lot that should be said about Johnson’s heroism, starting with the fact that it hasn’t been widely recognized. Over the last few years, thanks to events such as the Gabrielle Giffords shooting and the George Zimmerman trial, the media have been subjecting us all to a constant and unavoidable national debate about the nexus of politics and violence. This has been unusually perplexing because the media persist in having this debate even when no connection between politics and violence exists.

Really?

The Family Research Council shooting is one of the few inarguable examples of politically motivated violence in recent years, yet looking back a year later, the incident has garnered comparatively little attention. Corkins openly admits he selected the Family Research Council because the Christian organization is one of the leading opponents of gay marriage in the country. He had Chick-fil-A sandwiches in his backpack because the CEO of the fast-food chain was under fire for publicly supporting a biblical definition of marriage. Corkins said he planned to “smother Chick-fil-A sandwiches in [the] faces” of his victims as a political statement. And in case that didn’t make his motivations transparent, right before Corkins shot Leo Johnson, he told him, “I don’t like your politics.”

Later in the column, Hemingway blames the Southern Poverty Law Center (as if they had anything to do with Corkins and his criminal behavior) for designating the Family Research Council as a “hate group” (with Leo Johnson basically wondering why anyone would do such a thing – making that designation against the FRC, I mean).

I’ll tell you why – as noted here…

The SPLC gave the Family Research Council the designation due to anti-gay speech from its leaders, which the SPLC says includes calls for gay men and lesbians to be imprisoned.

Labeling the Family Research Council a hate group puts one of Washington’s most powerful social issues advocates into the company of groups like the Nation of Islam and the now mostly defunct Aryan Nations in the eyes of the SPLC, which tracks 932 active hate groups in the U.S.

Groups are labeled hate groups by the SPLC — which made a name for itself by using civil lawsuits to severely weaken the KKK and other white supremacist groups — when they “have beliefs or practices that attack or malign an entire class of people, typically for their immutable characteristics,” according to the group’s website.

…

The main offender in the eyes of the SPLC is Peter Sprigg, the FRC’s senior researcher and vocal opponent of the gay rights movement. In May, Sprigg told me that an end to Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell would lead to more American servicemen receiving unwelcome same-sex fellatio in their sleep, part of a long line of reasoning from Sprigg suggesting that gay men are more likely to be sex offenders than anyone else.

…

SPLC Research Director Heidi Beirich told me the FRC is part of a growing list of what the SPLC calls anti-gay groups masking themselves under the guise of conservatism or Christianity.

“What this really is is a wholesale defamation attack on gays and lesbians,” Beirich said. “Some of the stuff is just as crude if you compare it to, say, the Klan’s racism. But a lot of it’s a little more sophisticated and they try to make it more scientific even though what they’re pushing are falsehoods.”

I wish Leo Johnson all the best in his recovery, and he is of course entitled to his opinion no matter how much I may disagree. But to use the horrible attack he endured as an excuse to whitewash the FRC’s bigotry is a whole other level of repulsive that I didn’t think I could ever imagine from the wingnutosphere until now.

Finally, it looks like Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina (do I need to mention the party?) is shocked, shocked I tell you! to hear Dem Senator and Majority Leader Harry Reid tell us that Republicans don’t like Obama because he’s an African American (here)…

Yeah, don’t you hate it when somebody makes up stuff like that?

“Instead of engaging in serious debate about the failed policies of this administration – from the ever-increasing burdens created by the national health care reform plan to the tax and spend approach to economic recovery, along with countless others – Democrats are once again trying to hide behind a smokescreen,” the Republican said.

Added Scott: “Our country deserves more from those in Washington. I hope Senator Reid will realize the offensive nature of his remarks and apologize to those who disagree with the President’s policies because of one thing – they are hurting hardworking American families.”

(Just as a reminder, this tells us once again that the “jobs” plan from congressional Republicans won’t create actual, y’know, jobs.)

And when it comes to “hurting hardworking American families,” Scott has a pretty good (which is to say, bad) track record, as noted here…

Scott attempted to prevent the families of striking workers from receiving food stamps (including kids).

He also tried to hurt the NLRB’s ability to go after law-breaking employers.

In addition, he also authored a bill that would have stripped the National Labor Relations Board of its ability to penalize companies that illegally move jobs in retaliation for workers exercising their legal rights.

Scott also supported a reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act that determined that immigrant, Native American and LGBT women should be afforded no protections at all, as noted here.

Oh, and Scott also helped slash South Carolina’s HIV/AIDS budget and defended billions in subsidies to Big Oil. He also floated the idea of impeaching Obama over the 2011 debt ceiling nonsense (which led to the sequester, let’s not forget, in which “Man Tan” Boehner said he got “98 percent” of everything he wanted). And while he sat on the Charleston (SC) County Council, he wanted to spend an unlimited amount of money to display the Ten Commandments outside of a government building (all of this awfulness is noted here).

In conclusion, I’d like to point out that I think Harry Reid is wrong. Scott and his pals don’t oppose Obama because he’s black.

It’s merely because he’s a Democrat.

A Repug “40” Fraud On Health Care Reform

(Image from Public Citizen/Flickr)

As noted here from last Friday…

WASHINGTON — House Republicans plan a 40th attempt at repealing Obamacare (this) week, with legislation that would block the Internal Revenue Service from enforcing or implementing any portion of the health care reform law.

House Republicans have scheduled a vote next Friday on Rep. Tom Price’s (R-Ga.) Keep the IRS Off Your Health Care Act of 2013.

“Public distrust continues of agency that has dozens of powers under Obamacare, and whose actions President Obama has called outrageous,” said Doug Heye, spokesman for House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.). “As an ever increasing number of Americans — including labor unions and moderate Democrats — worry that Obamacare has become a nightmare, it is critical to prevent the IRS from implementing any portion of the law.”

Both House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) issued statements Friday afternoon blasting Republicans for the anticipated vote.

“It is only fitting that Republicans would waste the last week at work this summer voting for the 40th time to repeal the Affordable Care Act and continue their record of no jobs bills, no budget agreement, and no solutions for the middle class,” said Pelosi.

“Every day wasted on yet another repeal bill that will never be taken up by the Senate, much less survive a presidential veto, is another day that could have been spent advancing legislation to create jobs for the middle class, negotiating a balanced and bipartisan approach to deficits that can end the painful budget sequester, or debating a path forward on immigration reform,” added Hoyer.

Yep, that about says it as far as I’m concerned.

I should point out that, when I first became aware of the full extent of the stupidity in the U.S. House on this issue (scheduling repeal votes when, as noted in the Ezra Klein clip from here, health care reform is a “done deal”), they had only scheduled 31 repeal votes. And in response, I put together a series of posts from here focusing on 31 Republican U.S. House members who opposed health care reform (including our own Mikey the Beloved at #2 – I also mentioned then-Dem-reps Mike Ross and Dan Boren).

Well, since we’re now up to a 40th scheduled vote, I would say that it’s time to feature 9 more Republicans in the U.S. House, and in no particular order, here they are…

#32 – Blake Farenthold (TX – 27)

• Here, he compared the unemployed to drug addicts (nice).
• Here, he opposed funding food stamps (as part of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP) even though he received millions in farm subsidies (and he definitely had company on this one).
• And of course, as noted here, he wouldn’t be a good little Repug unless he was a member of the anti-science climate denier caucus.
• He was also a little too slow, to say the least, about realizing that budget cuts hurt the economy here.
• As noted here, his sister harbored a murder suspect (usually I leave civilians out of this stuff, but this is beyond the pale).

Update 8/12/13: This is yet another reason to vote Farenthold and his pals out of office as far as I’m concerned.

#33 – Diane Black (TN – 06)

• Here, she introduced legislation that basically bars federal government funding on Planned Parenthood (oh brother – yeah, like that would stand up to a court challenge).
• Here, she introduced legislation barring gays from adopting children (“Let’s see now, ‘Christian compassion,’ ‘Christian compassion’…I know they talk about it in the Bible somewhere, but I can’t find it!”).
• Here, she said that she “children with pre-existing conditions and chronic illnesses should not have to be covered under their parent’s plan by insurance companies. Her reasoning is that insurance companies would lose too much money” (wonder if she owns any stock?).
• Oh, and remember the supposedly humorous Email sent from Black’s aide Sherri Goforth (as in “Go forth and be stupid,” I guess) depicting President Obama as two eyes appearing against a black background (here)? And Goforth was merely “reprimanded” by Black in response, apparently.

#34 – Raul Labrador (ID – 01)

I give you Labrador on immigration (here)…

“The people that came here illegally knowingly — I don’t think they should have a path to citizenship,” he said on NPR, according to Talking Points Memo. “If you knowingly violated our law, you violated our sovereignty, I think we should normalize your status but we should not give you a pathway to citizenship.”

“Normalize your status”? What does that even mean? And as the story tells us, only about 10 percent of this country actually sides with Labrador.

Of course, Labrador is quick to blame Obama on immigration, as noted here – “A speech is not a bill?” Bills are supposed to come from Congress, not the White House, you moron.

And as noted from here, Labrador says that the Dems want to cover undocumented workers in health care reform, which is patently untrue…

This month, Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Idaho) blamed a standoff over health-care benefits for his decision to drop out of bipartisan talks with seven colleagues who were negotiating a House alternative to the Senate immigration proposal. That has forced House leaders to proceed with a series of smaller-scale proposals next week in lieu of a sweeping agreement.“

When I joined the group, I was told that the aliens would have to pay for their own health care,” Labrador told Fox News. “Now that has changed. And I can’t agree to all of the exceptions.”

Frustrated Democrats argue that Republicans are picking a fight where one does not exist. In both chambers, Democrats say, they have agreed that illegal immigrants would not be eligible for public benefits – including health-care subsidies and Medicaid – as they embark on a path to permanent legal status, which would take at least 10 years under the Senate plan.“

We have said since day one that undocumented people will not have access to subsidies in the Affordable Care Act,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said last month. “Any thought that we want to do something different than that is simply not true. It is a bottom line. No need to even discuss it.”

But of course, according to Labrador, the failure to pass immigration reform is the fault of the Dems – uh huh.

Update 8/26/13: Yeah, how dare those pesky civil rights workers get all “negative” (here)! Gosh, why can’t they sing and dance while facing voter ID obstruction and disenfranchisement?

#35 – Tom Cotton (AR – 04)

• Here, he said that he didn’t think women were qualified to serve in the military (nice – it should be pointed out, though, that Cotton actually did serve, unlike most other Repugs).
• Here, he said that Iraq was involved in 9/11 (ah, a golden oldie…oh, and when it comes to evaluating Number 43 and “Deadeye Dick,” Cotton believes 9/11 shouldn’t be included, as noted here).

The Arkansas Times link also tells us that he, like many others in his party, voted against relief for the victims of Hurricane Sandy, and he’s a darling of the Club for Growth, no matter how that affects his congressional district…figures.

Cotton is a bit of a rising GOP star, though – he’s being prompted to challenge conservadem Mark Pryor for Pryor’s U.S. Senate seat (and apparently, based on this, he’s in…yep, no problem with ambition here, having not even finished his first term in the House after winning the seat vacated by Mike Ross).

And like a whole bunch of House Repugs (including Mikey the Beloved), Cotton voted to separate SNAP funding from the farm bill (here). Oh, and Cotton wants to punish not only those who violate economic sanctions against Iran (OK), but their family members too, as noted here (um, and why?).

Update 8/1/13: And I’m sure the Pryor campaign will have fun with this also.

Update 8/9/13: Why do I have a feeling that the fun is just beginning with this guy (here)?

#36 – Tim Huelskamp (KS – 01)

What a prize this guy is, if I do say so…

As far as Huelskamp is concerned, you’re not allowed to discuss gun control (particularly in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook carnage) because you would be advocating a “political agenda” (here).

He also said here that he would file a constitutional amendment to try and restore DOMA, despite the fact that it was overruled by John Roberts and The Supremes (but just remember, it’s “jobs, jobs, jobs” as far as Huelskamp, Cantor and Boehner are concerned). And in keeping with that, he spread more BS here about how kids supposedly do better in dysfunctional hetero families than functional same-sex ones (to the point where even Fluffyhead called him on it).

Basically, Huelskamp is such a Teahadist not job unwilling to compromise that he’s been removed by fellow Republicans from committee assignments (voted against the Violence Against Women Act, also voted against Sandy relief – of course…here).

But how do his constituents feel, I wonder…

“We hear criticisms that [Huelskamp] won’t get along, but that’s not what we elected him for. We elected him to vote for principle,” said Paula Carr, a 64-year-old who sells and repairs lawn and garden equipment. “Compromise is why we’re in the condition we’re in now — too much compromise over the last 30 years.’’

With all due respect to Ms. Carr, the main reason for the “too much comprise” over the last 30 years is because you’ve had the proverbial rug pulled out from under you by Republican politicians selling you “values voter” snake oil while income inequality has gotten worse and worse and worse. And at the risk of sounding like a snotty liberal, I should point out that it was up to you to overcome what I’m sure is your longstanding dislike of people with my political opinion and study the issues that truly matter with an open mind. And apparently, you failed to do so, to the point where you have sent a numbskull like Huelskamp to Washington, where he can do damage not just to your district but the whole country (and that quote means that you’re just as oblivious to that now as before).

Oh, and don’t count on Huelskamp to help with immigration reform either, since he thinks that appealing to Hispanics is “very discouraging” (here).

Take a bow, you voters in KS – 01…heckuva job!

Update 10/09/13: What a pathetic little slug (here).

Update 1/29/14: Yep, Huelskamp is just another “one trick pony” – when all else fails, just attack that gol-danged “li-bu-ruul media” (here – and as far as BENGHAZI! is concerned, as I’ve said at least half a dozen times, I don’t recall any outcry at all when our ambassador David Foy was murdered in Pakistan in 2006).

#37 – Jim Bridenstine (OK – 01)

• Bridenstine said here that the Supreme Court doesn’t get to decide which laws are constitutional, or something, in response to a question about the Affordable Care Act (Marbury v. Madison, jackass).
• He called President Obama “an incompetent, vengeful liar with no moral compass” on the floor of the U.S. House (here – yeah, just keep blaming us libs for how uncivil we were to Dubya; as usual, conservatives look in the mirror and see everyone’s reflection but their own).
• He demanded that Obama apologize to Oklahoma here for allocating funding for climate change research here (um, aren’t you just the slightest bit curious about what caused the Moore tornado, congressman?).
• And of course, being a typical Teahadist, Bridenstine is afraid “Man Tan” Boehner will “cave on taxes” because of the sequester, as noted here (maybe, instead of “taxes,” Bridenstine should worry about this instead; fat chance, I know).

(From the Chattanooga Times Free Press)

#38 – Scott DesJarlais (TN – 04)

I wish it could be said that all nine Repugs in this post are truly facing electoral problems for next year, but except for DesJarlais, I don’t think that’s apparent at the moment (love to be wrong). I guess the “line in the sand” for the Teahadists is when you betray them on “values” issues, as opposed to issues that actually impact their lives such as the sequester, jobs, health care, the environment, etc. (what a joke).

With that in mind, I give you this…

• He was fined $500 for having affairs with patients here (he’s an OB-GYN, I believe).
• Here, he apparently pressured one patient who was his mistress into getting an abortion (nice guy).
• Here, he supported his ex-wife’s decision to have two abortions prior to their marriage (as far as I’m concerned, that should be kept in the family, but don’t parade yourself as a “family values” Republican if you have these skeletons in your proverbial closet, OK?).
• Also according to Politico (above link), DesJarlais “lavished gifts” on one patient he had an affair with, including an expensive watch and plane tickets.

When even the chairman of the state’s Republican Party says that he doesn’t expect DesJarlais to be re-elected next year…well, I guess the “fat lady,” as they say, is getting ready.

Update 1/31/14: Gee, aren’t those pesky unintended consequences a real bitch, as noted here? Ha and ha…

#39 – Ted Poe (TX – 02)

Going further down the rabbit hole as they say, people…

• Here, Poe quoted the KKK Grand Wizard on the U.S. House floor (lovely).
• Here, he held a health care “town hall” in a funeral home (interesting messaging…oh, riiight – “death panels”; I get it now).
• Poe said here that the U.S. gave aid to Cuba and Venezuela (uh, no).
• Here, he tried to rally the nation against the supposedly grave danger faced by incandescent light bulbs (pretty sad when you’re a “sock puppet” for Erick “Son of Eric” Erickson).

And speaking of Poe, the video from here with him along with Steve King and Louie Gohmert is kind of silly, but fun (and it speaks truth to stoo-pid).

And last but perhaps least…

#40 – Stephen Fincher (TN – 08)

• Here, Fincher basically says that if you don’t work, you shouldn’t eat (Welcome to Gulag USA, despite the fact that Fincher gets huge farm subsidies, as noted here).
• This tells us that, like many others in his party, he voted against relief for the victims of Hurricane Sandy.
• Here, he introduced a bill requiring drug testing of 20 percent of welfare recipients and applicants (of course, if Fincher were interested in doing anything besides trying to score cheap political points, he might look a little further south to see if it actually does any good, as noted here).
• Also, based on this, it looks like he doesn’t know how to file a campaign disclosure statement properly (i.e., he “claimed to have almost no assets at the start of his campaign, and has since filed multiple inconsistent financial disclosure forms, revealing significantly greater assets.”).
• He probably should also get a new press secretary too while he’s at it (here – some truly obnoxious “tweets” from someone named Elizabeth Lauten…nothing wrong with her having an opinion even though I most certainly don’t agree, but…and call me old fashioned, I know…aren’t government employees supposed to be non-political?).

I think that brings us up to date, and I sincerely hope that I don’t have to revisit this topic (though, knowing this bunch, I have a feeling I will – sigh).

Update 8/29/13: I didn’t know what to do with this item exactly, so I decided to tack it onto the end here; even though the racism on display is positively enraging, I think it demonstrates pretty well the complete and total failure of just about all of our corporate media to educate this country on the urgent issue of how the Affordable Care Act addresses our health care needs.

Wednesday Mashup (7/24/13)

Time to “bring the crazy” once more (here)…

Attorney General Eric Holder – the first and only sitting Cabinet member in 225 years to be cited for contempt of Congress – has politicized the United States Department of Justice to the breaking point.

Shortly after a Florida jury found George Zimmerman innocent of murder on Saturday night, Holder announced that DOJ would conduct a criminal civil rights investigation.

The FBI had previously conducted a lengthy investigation that found no evidence that Trayvon Martin’s death stemmed from racial motives.

Disregarding the Florida jury and the FBI, Holder is prolonging a deeply unjust and unwarranted investigation in response to demands from Rev. Al Sharpton and his ilk.

Holder has no legal grounds on which to stand. The federal government’s limited constitutional powers do not extend to commonplace murders, whose prosecution is the job of the states.

The authors of this piece of dookey from Fix Noise are former Bushies John C. “Torture” Yoo, former deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel, and Robert J. Delahunty, former special counsel to our prior ruling cabal.

To me, this is particularly amusing (in a dark kind of way, I’ll admit) given the fact that, as noted here, Yoo and Delahunty once collaborated on “secret legal opinions” that “included assertions that the president could use the nation’s military within the United States to combat terrorism suspects and to conduct raids without obtaining search warrants.”

And they say that Eric Holder has “politicized the United States Department of Justice to the breaking point.”

Pot, meet kettle.

Besides, as noted here from Tucker Carlson’s Crayon Scribble Page, Holder is blamed for not doing enough on the Trayvon Martin murder (with the claim that the tip line on George Zimmerman is pretty much lip service from the Obama Administration on this issue).

Geez, wingnuts, will you please get your propaganda straight?

Next, I don’t really have a lot to add, but I wanted to highlight the following from U.S. House Rep (and Senior Democrat on the House Education and Workforce Committee) George Miller of California here (telling us that “fourteen members of Congress voted to keep millions of dollars of their own federal farm subsidies but not to extend nutrition aid for low-income working families”)…

…14 Republican members of Congress, who each voted for a Farm Bill that excluded a nutrition title for the first time in four decades, have received more than $7.2 million in government farm subsidies, or an average of $515,279 in handouts. At the same time, they have a combined net worth of as much as $124.5 million, according to public records.

In stark contrast, the typical household receiving aid under the farm bill through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) has a gross monthly income of only $744, and their average monthly SNAP benefit—which every member detailed in this report voted against extending— is just $281.

And the fourteen are (drum roll, please)…

Robert Aderholt (AL-04)

Blake Farenthold (TX-27)

Stephen Fincher (TN-08)

Vicky Hartzler (MO-04)

John Kline (MN-02)

Doug LaMalfa (CA-01)

Tom Latham (IO-03)

Frank Lucas (OK-03)

Cynthia Lummis (WY-AL)

Randy Neugebauer (TX-18)

Kristi Noem (SD-AL)

Marlin Stutzman (IN-03)

Mac Thornberry (TX-13)

David Valadao (CA-21)

I’ll keep an eye on these characters, probably most of whom are Teahadists; hopefully, as worthy Dems come forward to challenge them, I’ll be able to update this post accordingly.

Continuing, it looks like, when it comes to the whole “liberals are as bad as conservatives, and to prove it, here is more false equivalence” beat, Politico is on it, all right (here)…

For the first time in Colorado history, two state lawmakers will face recall elections for their support of tougher gun control measures.

Colorado’s Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper signed an executive order on Thursday setting the date for the recall elections of the pair of Democratic state senators.

Under pressure of a campaign by the NRA, Senate State President John Morse and Pueblo Sen. Angela Giron will face the first recall effort in Colorado history.

Oh noes! Could it be that Dems are facing electoral trouble for supporting common-sense gun legislation?

Uh, no (well, not to this point anyway) – as noted here from about a week ago…

Today, Mother Jones is reporting on the status of recall campaigns backed by the NRA after Colorado Democrats dared to pass stronger gun laws in their state.

This sort of fight is to be expected, if laws to curb gun violence are passed anywhere — after all, the NRA and its gunmaker masters profit from gun violence coming and going. They need gun violence to encourage sales, both from the violent and those afraid enough to get their own guns.

And while I don’t mean to make light of the recall campaigns in Colorado, it’s good to see that they haven’t worked out very well so far.

There’s more from the Mother Jones story linked to the Daily Kos post, including the precious little item about Jaxine Bubis, running against state senate president John Morse, and her foray into erotic fiction (let me guess – “The elongated barrel shimmered and glistened, sleek, cool and confident. He revealed it to me for only an instant before he shoved it into the holster fastened against his hip, tied to the inside of his muscular thigh. He kept the firing pin at the ready, cocked, if you will.”).

OK, I’ll stop.

And oh yeah, did you know that Colorado apparently wants to secede from itself? As noted here…

“The people of rural Colorado are mad, and they have every right to be,” U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner, a Republican from Yuma, Colo., told Denver’s 9 News last month. “The governor and his Democrat colleagues in the statehouse have assaulted our way of life, and I don’t blame people one bit for feeling attacked and unrepresented by the leaders in our state.”

Bless Gardner’s pointed little Repug head – surprised that he somehow didn’t make the list of 14 above. But not to worry…

This sounds like it’s going in the same direction as the Repug efforts to recall Democrats in Wisconsin who stood up to Gov. Hosni Mubarak Walker, as noted here (and let us do what we can to ensure the same result in both states by clicking here – the recall election in Colorado against Morse and Giron is scheduled for September 10th).

Update 7/29/13: Fine – go ahead and shoot each other, wingnuts, but leave everybody else alone, OK (here).

Further, in case anyone out there was wondering what former Repug U.S. House Rep (and one-time presidential candidate – no, really) Thad McCotter was up to…well, wonder no more.

Here, he opines on the sad story of The Motor City, which, as we know, recently declared bankruptcy. However, if you’re looking for a way forward from “Mad Thad,” keep looking (instead, he offers what one would consider the typical bromides, such as the following)…

Only when this realization – this practical optimism – is matched to Detroit’s titanic resilience will the redemption commence. If bankruptcy is viewed as a challenge rather than an epitaph, an abandoned property will become an opportunity, a humble hope will become a bustling shop, a neighborhood will become a community, a community will become a family, and a redeemed Detroit will become a reality.

Oh, and I also give you this…

As our city has gone from “The Arsenal of Democracy” to the “Motor City” to the “The D” to “The Done,” Detroit’s outlook has become one of pessimistic resilience; she expects the worst and works to survive it. Integral to this ability to survive is the capacity to detach herself from the worst as it occurs. To wit, Detroit’s gut reaction to the “news” the city is bankrupt was? “No shit.”

Such language from a supposedly up-standing Catholic like Thad; what a bold and brazen article!

Oh, and let’s not forget this too…

Finally, admittedly: as a longstanding object of national derision, Detroit knows that in some quarters her bankruptcy has been met with gloating. Fine, but know this: if she does not rise from these ashes, Detroit will become an ominous milestone of American decline, from which no quarter will be spared.

The notion that Detroit’s fall will necessarily trigger a wave of big-city bankruptcies in this country was debunked here by Jared Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (Professor Krugman had a word or two to say about that here). Yes, there is much to do when it comes to investing in this country (jobs, infrastructure, etc.), but while the checklist is pretty long, that doesn’t mean that we have cause for a panic.

Turning to someone like McCotter on these matters is a stretch anyway, though; I realize that, being a Michigan resident, he’s a candidate for a column like this, but he’s no stranger to wingnut demagoguery – as noted here, he once provided a lesson in “how to speak Democrat,” let’s not forget (charming).

And by the way, speaking of The Daily Tucker (where McCotter’s piece originated), it looks like, based on the above pic, it is still in need of a copy editor.

Finally, it’s time to turn to matters in PA-08, where we in these parts are of course represented by Repug “Mikey The Beloved” Fitzpatrick; this recent Guest Opinion from his PR factory tells us the following…

As our nation’s economy begins to recover, it is imperative that the United States bring manufacturing jobs back to America. This goal has been at the top of my agenda, And so I was pleased to read the series published in the Courier Times and Intelligencer: “Made in the USA.”

The series highlighted local, small businesses and the importance of domestic manufacturing and its impact on manufacturers’ bottom line, their employees, customers, and communities.

And from that point, Mikey launches into an entire self-congratulatory narrative about his supposedly tireless focus on “jobs, jobs, jobs,” including this…

According to my revitalization plan, “Made in America,” stands for quality, value, and ingenuity — all important to industry, and ones clearly conveyed through the newspaper’s “Made in the USA” series. Without a doubt, the role of government is important. To bring manufacturing back to America, we must promote a variety of federal and national initiatives: lowering taxes and promoting certainty to encourage businesses to remain in the United States, reining in overreaching ineffective and onerous federal regulation to help businesses grow, engaging in “Buy American” and other pro-growth initiatives, and encouraging workforce development.

Umm, I don’t really see bringing down unemployment anywhere in that list (which is, of course, nothing but RNC boilerplate anyway). Do you?

And get a load of this…

In Congress I’ve supported countless bills that empower small businesses and manufacturers, some of which resulted from my meetings with business owners, manufacturers and workers in Bucks and Montgomery counties.

And I’m sure some of those supposedly countless bills to invigorate the economy were noted here.

Here are a couple of questions; if Fitzpatrick supposedly cares so much about the economy, then why didn’t he encourage his Repug “leadership” of “Man Tan” Boehner and that sleazy weasel Eric Cantor to schedule votes on two bills that could make a difference – the Workforce Investment Act sponsored by Dem John Tierney of Massachusetts (here) and the Innovative Technologies Assessment Act sponsored by Chris Van Hollen of Maryland (here)? Or, better yet, why didn’t he sign on as a co-sponsor to one or both of the bills (Dem senior House Rep Steny Hoyer also had some good ideas – some of which dovetail with Mikey’s a bit – here…of course, Hoyer had his at least three months prior to Mikey’s).

More typical for the party in charge of the House, though, are stories like this one, where congressional Dems walked out on an Education and Workforce Committee hearing run by chairman John Kline of Minnesota; Kline was trying to consolidate 35 job-training bills apparently without much Dem input and designating them for funding to the states as block grants (and indiscriminately cutting funding for the bills in the process). To me, this is asking for trouble (Kline’s actions, I mean).

Indeed, when actual economists (as opposed to Beltway talking heads) are asked about the impact of the Repugs’ supposed “jobs, jobs, jobs” agenda, we find out that it won’t, in fact, create actual, like, y’know…jobs, as noted here (and more on Mikey when it comes to this subject can be read from here).

Something tells me, however, that Mikey and his PR factory at the Courier Times are getting a little skittish about next year’s election. I’m not sure what else could explain the paper’s “hit piece” of an Op-Ed that it printed yesterday on Kevin Strouse, who could be considered the front-runner at this point in the Democratic primary for the right to face Mikey in the general election (the supposedly august Courier Times Op-Ed board said that they don’t have confidence in Strouse, even though they apparently have spent no time whatsoever yet actually talking to him).

The editorial did follow the standard anti-Dem formula, though…

Reference to Nancy Pelosi? Check.
Sneaky inference that that’s where he gets all of his campaign dough? Check.
Note that he’s not a “longtime resident” of Bucks County? Check.
Statement that he’s a product of “pure party politics” (as if Fitzpatrick isn’t)? Check.

This is all the more reason to support Strouse, as far as I’m concerned (or Shaughnessy Naughton – either Dem would be better than two more years of Mikey the Beloved).

To help Kevin Strouse, click here.

Wednesday Mashup (7/17/13)

Part of me truly wanted to avoid this recent column by Stu Bykofsky, but I believe it is too rank to be ignored (on the matter of PA AG Kathleen Kane’s decision not to enforce the commonwealth’s indefensible Defense of Marriage Act)…

It doesn’t matter whether you support or oppose gay marriage, this is an issue of law, current law.

The state Attorney General is substituting her own preferences to Pennsylvania law, which she is sworn to uphold. Ms. Kane doesn’t get to decide constitutionality, the courts do that.

This is materially no different than George Wallace blocking the entrance to a school because he didn’t agree with the court knocking down segregation. It is different only in that we don’t like where he was, but (most of us) do like Kane’s position. But that it (sic) not the issue. The issue is obeying (and in Kane’s case) defending the law, even if not palatable.

(Frankly, couldn’t she just have assigned a low-ranking, inexperienced attorney, who would botch the job? She could have. I think she is show-boating here.)

In response, I give you the following from here…

In a public statement on Thursday, Kane said, “I cannot ethically defend the constitutionality of Pennsylvania’s version of DOMA where I believe it to be wholly unconstitutional,” adding, “It is my duty under the Commonwealth Attorneys Act whenever I determine it is in the best interest of the Commonwealth to authorize the Office of General Counsel to defend the state in litigation. Additionally, it is a lawyer’s ethical obligation under Pennsylvania’s Rules of Professional Conduct to withdraw from a case in which the lawyer has a fundamental disagreement with the client.”

So Kane didn’t kill the case. Not at all! Instead, she rightfully disclosed a conflict of interest due to a difference of opinion, and passed the case along to Gov. Corbett.

How many politicians do you know that disclose a conflict of interest? You can count that number on one hand.

Oh, and paging “Byko” for this one…

Kane also didn’t sabotage the case by accepting it and then giving it to a lackey – an awful suggestion that has been made by some.

Instead, she took the high road and essentially recused herself and her office from handling the case.

Kane’s decision is making national news. But it shouldn’t. She’s hardly the first attorney general to refuse to participate in a case involving this or any other hotbed social issue.

Back when California Gov. Jerry Brown was the state’s Attorney General, he refused to defend California’s anti-gay-marriage measure, Proposition 8. Just last month, the U.S. Supreme Court addressed the case, ruling that those who defended Proposition 8 didn’t have legal standing to do so.

Time will show very soon that PA’s DOMA law is unconstitutional, too – the same way that Loving v. Virginia declared that banning interracial marriages was illegal.

And as far as “Byko” and the comparison between Kane and George Wallace (really?) is concerned, I give you this…

Of course, while similar on the surface (the law is involved?), Kane’s position isn’t really like Wallace’s at all! In Brown v. Board of Ed., the Supreme Court said that states could no longer segregate their own schools. In the Supreme Court’s DOMA decision this year, it was ruled that the federal Defense of Marriage Act is not constitutional, though doesn’t say the same about Defense of Marriage Acts passed in individual states.

When Wallace stood in front of the University of Alabama in 1963, he was refusing to enforce a federal court order to allow three students with perfect qualifications to attend the school.

(And somehow, I find it hard to believe that Eric Holder or another Justice Department attorney would ever show up on the steps of the governor’s mansion in Harrisburg, arguing with Tom “Space Cadet” Corbett about whether or not straights should be allowed to marry, parroting this iconic photo of Wallace with Kennedy Justice Department lawyer Nicholas Katzenbach.)

I will admit that there’s a bit of posturing by Kane going on here, since I’m pretty sure that she once claimed in her primary campaign against Patrick Murphy that the Attorney General didn’t have the right to decide which laws should be enforced. However, I definitely believe that she’s acting in the interests of the “greater good” here.

Besides, Kane is, aside from the head prosecutor in PA, also the chief administrator of law enforcement. Given that, what kind of judgment would it show if she committed personnel and resources of her office, all on the public dime, to defending a law that, on the federal level, had recently been invalidated by the U.S. Supreme Court?

Next, if we’ve recently suffered a gun tragedy or a miscarriage of justice of some type over guns within the last week or so, you can always count on John Lott to pop up with more demagoguery and misinformation to try and show that it’s all the fault of those dastardly liberals somehow (here)…

Comments by President Obama, Al Sharpton and others surely stirred up the racial aspects of the case and appear to have led some blacks across the country to attack whites to avenge Trayvon Martin

Really? Obama “stirred up the racial aspects” by urging calm? Before he presses on another ugly piece of propaganda for Fix Noise, Lott should actually try reading their web site once in a while (here).

Also, Reverend Al said that the protests in the wake of the Trayvon Martin verdict were mostly nonviolent here, which is also borne out by this clip from Rachel Maddow here.

Of course, this isn’t the first time that John Lott has either demonized African Americans or whitewashed attempts to marginalize them at the ballot box, as he did here, claiming that he somehow wasn’t able to name a single person who was disenfranchised from voting in the Florida 2000 presidential election.

I don’t know what’s in the minds of these people when they concoct this garbage. And I really don’t want to know either.

Further, I got a bit of a laugh out of this item (here)…

Ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) charged that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was engaged in “unprecedented data collection.”

“The CFPB is collecting credit card data, bank account data, mortgage data and student loan data,” Crapo said on the Senate floor Tuesday. “This ultimately allows the CFPB to monitor a consumer’s monthly spending habits.”

Crapo’s comments came just hours after the Senate voted 71-29 to end debate on the nomination of Richard Cordray to lead the CFPB. A final vote on Cordray’s nomination could come as early as today.

I’d recently read comments from Mikey the Beloved to this effect also. And in response, let me ask this; who isn’t engaged in massive data collection these days (not approving it – just asking the question).

And in defense of Cordray, I give you this…

Cordray replied that the credit card and mortgage payment data are widely available and are bought from companies such as Argus and from credit records, which the CFPB is using to work with the Federal Housing Finance Agency to construct a national mortgage database. “The information is not personal but is anonymized,” he said. “If people want to misunderstand and think that it’s invading privacy based on speculation, I’d simply say, that’s not what it is.”

The bureau must gather such data if it is to prepare cost-benefit analysis of the structure of markets and to deliver reports required by Congress, he added. “If we didn’t, you’d be disappointed with us and rightly so.”

Similarly, the CFPB’s consumer complaint database, which has accumulated nearly 100,000 complaints about lenders, does not risk disclosing personal data, Cordray said. The complaints are “scrubbed” of personal identifiers after confirming that the complainer has a commercial relationship with the company. “We use it to communicate to companies on how to improve, and to the public too,” he said. “We need more of this, not less.” He did promise Crapo a visit from his staff to clarify the bureau’s privacy safeguards.

Also, while I’m on the subject of Cordray, allow me to congratulate him due to the fact that he was finally confirmed by the Senate as part of a recent deal “aimed at freeing up seven stalled appointments President Barack Obama has made to the consumer agency, the National Labor Relations Board and other agencies,” as the AP via HuffPo tells us here.

And concerning the NLRB part of the deal, I give you the following whining from Sen. Charles Grassley here (from “Tiger Beat on the Potomac,” as Charles Pierce rightly calls it)…

…Grassley (R-Iowa) said the decision to block Cordray ultimately helped lead to a deal that forced two previous nominees for the National Labor Relations Board to be replaced with new candidates as part of a broader Senate deal struck this week over how executive branch nominees will be handled going forward.

“We got two illegally appointed NLRB people off the agenda,” he said. “It was pretty important when the court says somebody’s been illegally appointed that they don’t get Senate confirmation.”

The two NLRB appointees in question, Sharon Block (a former labor counsel to Senator Edward M. Kennedy) and Richard Griffin (former general counsel for the International Union of Operating Engineers), had been serving on the board since January 2012, appointed by Obama during a Senate break after Republicans blocked their confirmations (as the New York Times tells us here).

The “legality” of Block and Griffin’s appointments was decided by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit; as noted here, the court issued a ruling that, in essence, also retroactively invalidated about 300 other recess appointments of this type by prior presidents since 1981 (and of the three judges on the appeals court panel, one was appointed by The Sainted Ronnie R, one was appointed by Bush 41, and one was appointed by Bush 43).

And I think we also need to recall the following from here…

When Obama took office, the NLRB only had two members. In April 2009, Obama nominated three people to serve on the NLRB – Mark Pearce (D), Craig Becker (D) and Brian Hayes (R). Yet Senate Republicans’ silent filibusters were effective in preventing a Senate vote on these nominees.

In March 2010, Obama recess appointed Becker and Pearce to the board. In June, the Senate confirmed Pearce and Hayes, but continued to block Becker.

When Becker’s recess appointment expired on Jan. 3, 2012, the NLRB didn’t have a quorum to make decisions. Confronted with Senate Republicans intent on undermining the NLRB’s authority, Obama made three recess appointments – Sharon Block (D), Richard Griffin (D) and Terence Flynn (R) – to guarantee a fully functioning board. These members joined Pearce and Hayes, who left the board in December 2012. (Flynn resigned after an ethics scandal in March 2012.)

So basically, that’s the history of the Repugs doing their best to gum up the NLRB since Obama was first elected in 2008. In fact, they have such an animus towards the NLRB (how dare an agency of government create such a “burdensome” environment for business by allowing workers to present and seek redress of grievances??!!) that the House, apparently believing that the Senate would end up allowing the NLRB appointments, decided to make things worse on their own by passing the utterly odious HR 1120 here, which basically shuts down the NLRB altogether (Mikey the Beloved commendably voted No).

Grassley should shut his proverbial pie hole on matters related to the NLRB and Obama’s recess appointments overall. The actions of his party may not have been illegal, but that doesn’t mean that they didn’t stink to high heaven anyway (besides, based on this, it looks like Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao got outfoxed for a change).

Update 7/18/13: And depressing though it is, here is more food for thought on this subject (to me the name James Sherk is a bit Dickensian).

Finally, I’m glad to hear that this guy is back on the air (here). I’m sorry that he will no longer be a political voice; I think that’s a monumental waste, but it was even worse for a reporter and broadcaster of his caliber to be effectively blackballed from TV journalism altogether.

So good luck, Keith, and just bite your lip if the Texas Rangers make it to the World Series and Former Commander Codpiece starts strutting and yakking all over the place, trying to take credit for something he didn’t do, as usual.