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Washington Post: The White House says a more aggressive effort to nab deceptive government contractors and deceitful Medicare recipients is paying off – to the tune of billions of dollars.
The Obama administration plans to announce Tuesday that the Justice Department recovered more than $5.6 billion in fraud committed against the government in fiscal 2011. Almost $3.4 billion of the funds came in civil fraud recoveries, with more than $2.2 billion tied to criminal fraud, according to administration officials familiar with the announcement who were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
The announcement is tied to a Cabinet-level meeting to be held Tuesday regarding plans to cut wasteful government spending across federal agencies and departments.
Full article here
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Thank you Meta
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Bloomberg: U.S. economic data are outperforming expectations by the most in nine months, a trend Federal Reserve officials may incorporate into their policy statement tomorrow.
The Citigroup Economic Surprise Index, a daily measure of whether economic data is better or worse than economists’ projections, improved to 85.7 on Dec. 2, the highest since March 9, after the Labor Department reported an unexpected drop in the jobless rate….
“Most of the economists are missing the underlying strength” in the world’s largest economy, said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. The Fed will “modestly upgrade the economic outlook but change little else.”
November unemployment at the lowest level in more than two years and manufacturing running at the fastest pace in five months are among data that may dissuade Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and fellow central bankers from pursuing a third-round of large scale asset purchases. At the same time, the Fed may still see “significant downside risks” for the economy as Europe’s financial crisis evolves.
More here
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Business Insider: It didn’t get much attention, but this morning the latest NFIB small business optimism survey came in stronger than expected, as more and more corporations see good sales and decent business conditions on the way.
This is important, in part, since small businesses have been rather negative on the economy, even while large companies have reported record earnings.
More here
Thanks Loriah
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Chicago Sun Times: President Barack Obama’s top strategist, David Axelrod, predicted much more scrutiny of GOP frontrunner Newt Gingrich, citing the “homespun wisdom” of Ald. Dick Mell (33rd) as he compared Gingrich to a monkey on a pole exposing his butt.
“…. Last week you all left him for dead at the checkout counter at Tiffany’s and now he’s back, a lion in winter,” Axelrod quipped. “That’s L-I-O-N by the way, I don’t want to stir up any trouble here.”
…. “In certain ways [Gingrich] fits the role for this, because as we pointed out earlier in the week he is the original tea partier. You know, he brought that kind of politics to Congress in the early 90s, he led three government shut downs in order to try and roll back environmental protection…roll back the Department of Education and education programs, he wanted to cut Medicare, he wanted to give more tax cuts to the wealthy. He was really a forerunner of what we see today.”
“I told my colleagues yesterday a bit of homespun wisdom that I got from an alderman in Chicago some years ago when one of his …colleagues wanted to run for higher office and he was really dubious. He said:
“Just remember the higher a monkey climbs on a pole, the more you can see his butt.”
So, you know, the Speaker is very high on the pole right now and we’ll see how people like the view.”
Full article here
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President Obama arrives to speak at a campaign event in Washington, Dec. 13
“If you stay steady, we’re going to win this thing …. This is going to be tough. But, I just want to remind all of you that you didn’t decide to support Barack Hussein Obama because it would be easy.”
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Washington Jewish Week: When flames swept through Israel’s Carmel Forest last year, destroying dozens of homes and lives, President Barack Obama didn’t hesitate to help, said Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to the U.S….
…. Netanyahu directed his ambassador to, “Quick, go ask President Obama for help.”
That’s when Oren entered the White House and asked to see the president. “I told him the situation and without hesitation, President Obama turned to one of his aides and said, ‘get Israel whatever it needs. Now,’” Oren recalled.
….”America has 11 fire-fighting planes; the next morning, 8 of them took off for Israel, along with a team of fire-fighting commandos.” “Later that night,” Oren continued, “I learned, that the President left the Hanukkah reception and flew secretly to Afghanistan. Upon arriving, he called Washington and the first question he asked, ‘Has Israel gotten its planes?’”…..
Full article here
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The Obama Diary 
Nice!
“Common sense for me is re-electing Barack Obama” — Carole King, hero!
That was a wonderful line. 😀
WORD!
“Common sense for me is re-elected Barack Obama” Anniebella!!!!!!!!!!
I watch the video, by I could hardly stand Joe and his gang. Did you catch the look on Halperin face as she talked about President Obama? You can tell he didn’t like what she was saying. I love what she was saying. Thank you Ms. King.
Now how about that, for Morning Joke?????? Ummmmmm 🙂
Way to go Ms Carole King. I thought that old Jerk Scarface was going to stroke out! Ha Ha!
Wonderful endorsement of our Great PBO. I love and will support anyone who supports our
President. Thank you Carole King.
Wow, she is so articulate. Love the line “Common sense is electing Barack Obama.”
This is beautiful!!!!
http://www.whitehouse.gov/iraq?utm_source=wh.gov&utm_medium=shorturl&utm_campaign=shorturl
Scroll down and check it out!!
Excellent. They’ve certainly got the right visual arts people on the team, and – obviously – the right message. Thank you, President Obama, Vice President Biden, Mrs. Obama, and Dr. Biden for all you continue to do in support of our precious military heroes.
An extraordinary page indeed!
Thanks so much for this Meta. First of all, this WH is filled with a team of digital wizards. They blow my mind everytime. Second of all, the interactive webpage was just so touching. For the past three years, this administration has held the military and its family members close to its heart and cared for them in so many bountiful ways.
Oh, what a great, great piece of work! Well, done, message clear, good links. I hope people who need to will come to the site. I hope that gay vet in New Hamphire(?) who asked Romney the gay marriage question will get out of that Ron Paul reactionary wasteland and vote his real interests. But then, the Choistas have a directional problem, hate-filled GPSs.
That is one COOL site, really like it
Now that’s what I call unwavering support. It annoys me how these pundits always try to get Obama supporters to say their “disappointed” in him somehow. They must get some type of satisfaction out of that. Carole King wasn’t having it. Love!
Yes, every Democrat MUST be asked the playbook question..”.Are you disappointed in the President?” Did we every hear this chorus when GW was running for reelection? I think not. But ti be fair..it was the whining of the PL that gave them this talking point.
Crossroads GPS Dropping $500K Lump Of Coal In Ben Nelson’s Stocking
The conservative group Crossroads GPS, in which Karl Rove has been a key player, has reserved more than $500,000 in TV ad time in Nebraska, with an apparently very ambitious goal for the holiday season: Scaring Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson into retirement.
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/
That’ll get the economy going again. How productive in helping the middle class.
Not.
Wow, Joe really tried to load that question up for her, didn’t he?! Smacked right back into his face, he looked like he had gas.
Was that Dick Halperin sitting there with the glare on his face? I haven’t watched him in so long, I forget what he looks like.
That sure was the hack, sitting there, eating his peas, hating it!
I didn’t see anyone except Carole, Mika, and the joester. Maybe, not enough light on my screen..oh well I missed his dickhead.
Carole is an Exceptional spokeswoman for PObama! Ignorant joe doesn’t know that PBO accomplished quite a lot during his first two years in Congress and this needs to be out there since they’re trying to push it under their rug.
Here’s a list of 111 Accomplishments from the Obama Admin in his first two years in Office from TiMT on ThePeople’sView..
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/2011/09/so-that-ignorance-wont-be-reason-why.html#comment-302015019
Lol, oh my, Gas??? Very uncomfortable, not good :-(, but I’m loving It 🙂
Always loved her music, Now I know that I love and respect HER!!! Carole King!!! WOOOOO HOOOOOO!!!!!
Good morning Miss Chips, girl you rock the universe! I saw Carole King this morning on Morning Joke and I was just jumping up and down and cheering! And her full throated support of the President stunned ol Joe so bad he did his usual thing when he doesn’t like something: he started trying to talk over her. Now I’ve gotta go buy Carole’s Christmas CD!
Yes. I can’t think of a better way to stimulate the economy!
Carole King was one of my favorite singers in the 60s. How nice to see she is still moving forward. Carol I thank you for your support of our president. I am definitely going to buy the album. Yahoo. Good morning to all.
Yes, she’s now a 69-year-old woman living (and politically active) in Idaho. Still singing! And continuing to sing the praises of President Barack Obama.
Wow Jacqueline, 69? She looks amazing!
I agree! All of us 60-somethings look amazing. (ha ha ha)
Being 68 isn’t so bad. It is a matter of attitude. Believe in yourself, be able to laugh and you will always be beautiful.
68 with a heart of gold.:)
Yeah. What about us 70 somethin’s? Some of us are still in the mix.
She is goood. And so polite.
And what was hackperin yammering about ‘are you campaigning for romney/” ? Fucking moron.
And that’s the headline he has over the video of Carole on his ‘Page’ – he’s truly the most insufferable dick on earth.
THIS
So typical of these self-absorbed, useless hacks. He says one thing he thinks was clever – and that’s his headline. Grrrrr.
Exactly! Me, me, me!!!
100% concur.
His father must be ashamed of him…
Chips, do you mean Morning Joe or Halperin? They are close to a tie for “most insufferable dick on earth”. Mecham is also in the race.
Ah yeah Bill, it’s a tie between those two!
Oh no, Chips I agree with Bill, you’ve got to throw Jon Meacham into the race. There’s something so personal about his dislike of PBO. He’s always commenting about the fact that PBO can’t “connect” with everyday people and he especially can’t connect with white people and people from the South. He’s always repeating that meme and his appearance on yesterday’s Morning Joe made a lot of people uncomfortable. Meacham is from the South himself and when he starts yammering that PBO can’t connect with white people and people from the South, it made eyebrows especially on twitter raise sky high. A little too dogwhistle for me. He even did the same thing on Meet The Press. At this point, I’m like just come out and say you don’t like the President because of his skin color. Because everytime he keeps bringing up that “connectedness” BS topic and relating it to race and region, it makes whatever surrounding he inhabits become very weird.
You’re right UT. The “Obama can’t connect with people” is dog whistle language. The truth is, you NEVER hear that specific phrase used by critics of Obama who are Asian, Hispanic, Native American or Black. So I usually translate it to mean that the person who uses that language is projecting their own personal and racial discomfort with the President’s skin color.
What angers me is that his way of presenting the problem puts the responsability at Barack Obama’s feet.
How about saying the uncomfortable truth, that is that SADLY, some white people in the South don’t want to comnect with him.
Sometimes, the only thing that comforts me when I see so much unfair criticism of PBO , is when I imagine decades from now in the history books, how readers will be horrified at what all those bigoted people, those pseudo-journalists said about one of the greatest presidents in history.
BINGO! Couldn’t have said it better myself!
This. He didn’t want to hurt Newt or Robney. boo hoo.
Let’s all give Carole a standing ovation! She said just what needs to be said and she said it well! Bravo!
That video is wonderful. She had the dicks going and they looked like…dicks. Thanks to TOD for keeping us on top of the great people who support PBO!
Yes Indeedy!!! 🙂 Bowing, smiling, and grinning 🙂 🙂 🙂
Carole King and James Taylor are two of my favorite artists. No surprise that they are also O’bots.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) — The United States is awash in gasoline. So much so, in fact, that the country is exporting a record amount of it.
The country exported 430,000 more barrels of gasoline a day than it imported in September, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That is about twice the amount at the start of the year, and experts and industry insiders say the trend is here to stay.
The United States began exporting gas in late 2008. For decades prior, starting in 1960, the country used all the gas it produced here plus had to import gas from places in Europe.
http://money.cnn.com/2011/12/05/news/economy/gasoline_export/index.htm
I guess this proves that ” Drill Baby Drill ” was just another lie .
Ll I have to say is thank god for PBO! I’m telling you, history Will remember PBO very fondly.
This makes me question why we need the KeystoneXL pipeline.
The Repugs and their friends in oil and gas want that pipeline because they plan to sell that gas outside the US for huge profits. But the gostfiggers don’t tell that to the American people.
He really is keeping the promises he made during the 08 campaign. Rock on PBO!
Lynn Sweet has a photo up on Twitter of today’s meeting of PBO’s Chicago team in D.C.: http://twitpic.com/7st82f
Nice……while the naysayers keep underestimating them and spewing verbal diarrhea, the team keeps slugging on behind the scenes. The Obama team have got to be one of the best run political teams in our nation’s history. Behidn the scenes they’re like this political juggernaut that is getting ready come 2012 to destroy whoever the opponent is and I can’t wait. I love how they aren’t taking a break this christmas season, instead they’re lining up more and more camapign fundraisers to make sure the politcal war chest is stuffed to the coffers. Love it!
Yup. That’s what Al Giordano said a a few months back. The silent sentinels.
NEW YORK — Southwest Airlines Co. on Tuesday said it ordered 208 new Boeing 737 aircraft with a value of nearly $19 billion.
The Dallas airline, which operates an all-Boeing fleet, placed a firm order for 150 of the 737 Max, a new version of Boeing’s most popular plane with more fuel-efficient engines. Southwest also ordered 58 next-generation 737s.
Because discounts are common, Southwest won’t pay the full $19 billion list price.
http://www.king5.com/home/Southwest-orders-208-Boeing-737s-valued-at-19B-135501493.html
CAMPAIGN TO CUT WASTE (Happening Now)
====================================
The White House
V.P. Biden holds “Campaign to Cut Waste” Cabinet Meeting
HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebeilus and Treasurry Secretary Tim Geithner are participating.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/live/vp-biden-holds-campaign-cut-waste-cabinet-meeting-0
Lawmakers reached an agreement Monday on the $662 billion Defense authorization bill they believe will satisfy White House demands to avoid a veto over the detention of terror suspects.
House and Senate Armed Services Committee leaders changed the bill to add a provision saying that FBI and other law enforcement’s national security authority would not be affected by provisions mandating military custody of terror suspects.
A White House veto threat has been hanging over the Pentagon policy bill for the past month, but House and Senate Armed Services Committee leaders said Monday the new language would address the Obama administration’s biggest concerns with the mandatory military detention of terror suspects.
http://thehill.com/blogs/defcon-hill/budget-approriations/198945-deal-reached-on-defense-authorization-bill
December 13, 2011
Why Newt, not Mitt?
As I ponder with no little fascination Newt Gingrich’s sudden frontrunner status, the question haunts: Why would the Republican base so enthusiastically pursue a sinister earthworm like the former Speaker, when that base knows perfectly well that he is abjectly unelectable?
The commentariat’s word on the street about GOP primary voters is that they seek not only a nominee who will viciously slander Barack Obama throughout the general campaign, but whose slander will culminate in a crushing defeat of same. Assuming that for the base the outcome equals in importance the preliminaries, then why the unmistakably unelectable Gingrich?
The answer, I think, is this. Somewhere in the subconscious substrata of the base’s collective mind there thrives the seed of an undeniable fear: No Republican challenger is going to beat Barack Obama. Earlier the base watched as more competent Republican pol after more competent Republican pol — Mitch Daniels, Jeb Bush, Haley Barbour — refused the thrown gauntlet. And each rather conspicuously did so not because they loved their nuclear families more intensely this year than any other, but because they knew that against Obama, they too were likely unelectable.
http://pmcarpenter.blogs.com/p_m_carpenters_commentary/2011/12/why-newt-not-mitt.html
Newt is a vicious, amoral man. We cannot overstate how he is dangerous for America. If he’s the nominee, he won’t win but he will make the political climate even worse than it is right now. He would be as damaging if he ends up candidate for vp.
It’s almost erie how he is the exact opposite of Barack Obama, intellectually, morally, spiritually.
I often mention the work of Bob Altemeyer on authoritarians. His book “The Authoritarians” is available free online, easy to find. Watching Newt these days makes me think of the book. Newt is certainly the perfect example of an authoritarian leader, one who scores high on what Altemeyer calls the Social Dominance Oriention scale. Those types of leaders are the worst, the most dangerous. Combine that with the influence of religious fundamentalism in the GOP and you have the potential for something scary.
I’m confident that americans would have enough common sense not to elect this guy, but at the same time I think it’s important to not underestimate the challenge of a Gingrich candidacy. When people are scared for the future, they’re more vulnerable to demagoguery, to scapegoating, to divisive rhetoric, things in which Gingrich excells.
Yes, and they are capable of extreme violence along with this scapegoating. They are a criminal band, from top to bottom–white collar, blue collar, fraud (electoral and social), deception, assassination. Those who have no moral boundaries to their hatred, racism, manipulation, and make lying a justifiable form of political manipulation, are the most dangerous to our democracy. As for the ignorant on whom they prey, I will always remember the gurgles of the so-called stunned German populace crying, “but we didn’t know!” Bullshit then, and bullshit now. In a democracy the citizen has a responsibility to “know.” That is why the Conservatives/Republicans fight so hard to destroy the instruments for the educating of the citizenry–the arts, the schools, the press.
“Opinions founded on prejudice are always sustained with the greatest of violence.”
Francis Jeffrey (1773 – 1850)
Indeed!
*Lovepolitics*, I hear you loud and clearly. Newt sound just like he’s demon possessed. Frightening!!! Look People, It’s praying time, this cannot happen.
Here’s a long history of newt’s lies and hypocrisy from Media Matters’ Political Correction categorized in all its hateful gory details..here’s just one section..
“Gingrich Advises GOP Candidates To Slur Democrats With Words Like “Sick,” “Traitors,” And Anti-Flag. From Mother Jones:
1990 Gingrich’s political action committee, GOPAC, sends out a memo titled “Language: A Key Mechanism of Control” to several thousand Republican candidates running for state and local offices. It includes a list of words they should use to describe Democrats:
decay, failure (fail) collapse(ing) deeper, crisis, urgent(cy), destructive, destroy, sick, pathetic, lie, liberal, they/them, unionized bureaucracy, “compassion” is not enough, betray, consequences, limit(s), shallow, traitors, sensationalists, endanger, coercion, hypocricy, radical, threaten, devour, waste, corruption, incompetent, permissive attitude, destructive, impose, self-serving, greed, ideological, insecure, anti-(issue): flag, family, child, jobs; pessimistic, excuses, intolerant, stagnation, welfare, corrupt, selfish, insensitive, status quo, mandate(s) taxes, spend (ing) shame, disgrace, punish (poor…) bizarre, cynicism, cheat, steal, abuse of power, machine, bosses, obsolete, criminal rights, red tape, patronage.
http://politicalcorrection.org/factcheck/201105110003
Maybe this is newt’s time to be buried by all the Good in the World and who better than one President Barack Obama?
President Obama said the other night that it really doesn’t matter who the GOP nominee is. They are all espousing the same failed GOP policies, and America will have to decide if they want to continue to live a deception under the GOP, or fight for a legitimate and fair future. So, even if those “more competent Republicans” had gotten into the race, they were all going to be playing the same card – the GOP failed policies. All of them would endorse the Paul Ryan plan to kill Medicare and Social Security. All of them would espouse the same failed policies of more and more tax cuts for the rich. All of them would push for less and less equality for the middle class. All of them woudl be trying to balance the budget ont eh backs of the poor and seniors. All of them (except Ron Paul – who doesn’t know what he’s doing here) are pushing for more war and more military spending. All of them are pushing for more drilling and fracking, which is destroying the environment and endangering the very ground beneath us. All of them are denying any move to deal with climate change. And all of them would be busting unions and trying to push destructive and hateful social programs. There’s not one candidate from the right – running or biding their time until 2016, who isn’t pushing these failed GOP policies.
So – it comes down tot he American people deciding what the country actually stands for, and how it’s going to proceed into a much more competitive, globalized future. Go with the GOP, and the future is one that benefits a very few for a very short time – and then those few skip out to foreign lands after making this a third world, divided country. Go with the Democrats, and the near future continues to be one of reshaping the social framework of this country so that it’s more sustainable, better connected, and more reliable – but this includes more years of difficult decisions and re-evaluation of priorities and values. The country needs to grow up – and 2012 will be a decision point whether people still want to pretend that they can keep their heads buried, or whether they take ownership of the future. My two cents.
Theo, this should be posted somewhere as a Letter to Editor. Very concise, very real. My 2 cents 😀
I’m supporting the letter to the editor idea, Theo. Go for it in your local media!
not only as a letter to the editor, but also on many blogs out there. The “left” has to wake up and realize what’s at stake.
I enthusiastically second your “2cents” edp4bho! This is really a brilliant commentary, Theo67!
YES..it would be an excellent LTTE! Thank you, ed~
Well stated, Theo67! Pointed, clear, cogent and well-written.
Fabulous comment theo.
Co-sign! Send this to your local paper. It is terse and on-point! Bravo.
KABUL, Afghanistan—U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrived in Afghanistan Tuesday to meet with commanders, as the U.S. grapples with an eroding relationship with Pakistan that has complicated supply routes and helped fuel insurgents in the east.
While he was upbeat about security progress in Afghanistan, Panetta was also likely to hear some somber news from commanders as they wrestle with the withdrawal of 23,000 more troops in the coming year, the transition of security to Afghan forces and the near collapse of coordination with Islamabad along critical portions of the border.
His visit here is the second stop on a holiday tour that began in Africa and will also take him to Iraq, Libya and Turkey. He will be the first U.S. defense chief to visit Libya, which is emerging from an eight-month civil war. In Iraq, he will participate in a ceremony that will shut down the U.S. military mission there after nearly nine years of war.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2011/12/13/panetta_in_kabul_as_us_ties_with_pakistan_erode/
This is fun:
10 Cool iPad Apps From Uncle Sam
http://www.informationweek.com/news/galleries/government/mobile/232300178?pgno=1
BREAKING NEWS !!!!!!!!
Gary Busey endorsed Newt Gingrich. ( Even though he has never met him, is from Texas and endorsed Trump earlier this year )
hahahahahahahaa !!!!!
😆 😆 😆 😆 is this a joke?
Nope:
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/gary-busey-newt-gingrich-272809
Hahahahahaha 😆 😆 😆 😆 my sentiments exactly. At best Busey is a joke; at worst Busey is a JOKE.
Cool, he has the coke-head vote now.
t-rump can go suck an egg now. his minion ditched him.
Who is Gary Busey?
I believe he is the one who was arguing with “Meatloaf” on the Donald’s teevee show that PBO joked about humiliating Trump at the correspondent’s dinner.
Okay I know who Busey is, NOBODY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
a two bit actor who played villain in b class hollywood movies.
A so-called actor, but definitely a slimy creep.
Really? Could he be anymore of a stupid asshole?
Check out this interview between Lawry and that lowdown heifer Andrea Mitchell. They are talking about PBOs interview on 60 minutes. She leads off saying something like: “a lot of people were surprised by how unprepared PBO seemed by all this common place questions about his sagging poll numbers, and blah, blah, blah.” Lawry’s answer was dynamite. Then that dumbass said:”oh, but what about the passion, he didn’t really talk with a lot of passion”- or something equally as stupid as that. Lawry stopped her in her tracks with his answer. WTF is wrong with the media going on this Obama is sad/depressed/not passionate binge? Are they really that fucking desperate for something to talk about? What about the end of the war in Iraq, or how PBO is exporting more oil than ever or how ACA is working? What fucking fuckers they are. 😡
http://video.msnbc.msn.com/msnbc-live-with-bashir/45644219
Mrs. Alan Greenspan is full of fail.
Andrea should be asked if her husband is a loser? for his co-signing of the free tax-breaks to the rich…
Andrea won’t answer that but I will, yes her husband is a loser co-signing this tax cuts for the rich.
The Bush tax cuts. I am so fed up with people like Andrea Mitchell, Chris Matthews, all this anti-Obama B.S.
I think she projects on the President because her husband is a loser and history will tell the entire story. I also know she is a 1 percenter and they want to continue the idea of reverse Robin Hood.
She has always been Hillary’s girl. Plus when Alan G was working with Bill, they socialized as couples. She has a narrative in which Hillary is a godess and PBO is a loser. l cannot stomach the woman. She is snipe.
An important factor in POTUS’s problems with the Beltway is the resentment of the numerous allies and friends of the Clintons. What saddens me is that the resentment has not subsided.
Things are always difficult for a president who is a democrat, but this fracture in the party adds to the challenge for President Obama.
I think it’s deeper than that. The Obama’s aren’t prone to partying or inviting the upper crust to dine and dance in the White House. Instead they invite the common ppl and that is soooo terrible. No fancy hats, gowns, or balls. That’s pissing some ppl off.
The Bush tax cuts. I am so fed up with people like Andrea Mitchell, Chris Matthews, all this anti-Obama B.S…… Yes and so am I. Thias Is all because of skin color. Yes, Skin Color. What In the heck has Skin Color have ever done to anyone????? Really???? 🙄
Newt is all about passion, historically. 😉
Leave it to the idiots to turn that into PBO being depressed. Why the hell do these people get paid?
Hey, Andrea, ask Osama bin Laden if the President was unprepared or not passionate. Ask him.
No brain. No beauty to compensate. So why is she still on teevee ?
Exactly. You’d think she’d have the sweetest personality to make up for those horrendous looks and lack of intelligence. I’ve seen gargoyles with nicer faces.
I mean msnbc could easily hire a smart,young whippersnapper at a fraction of what they pay this moronic, charmless woman. Her and crowley – the two women journos I can’t stand.
They already have Alex Wagner and Chris Hayes. Not much difference – just younger versions.
I don’t know who are the dumber bricks, their ‘reporters’ or msnbc .
Mitchell disgusts me! It’s the same thing with her everyday, Obama bash this, Obama bash that, what is her beef?! Sorry Andy, but SoS Clinton lost, but now she is a team player, get over it! So annoying with these bullshit, pardon my french, narratives she’s trying to create!
Unless you are a qualified psychologist, psychiatrist or other lawfully credentialed mental health professional, your psychobabble crap about PBO being “Depressed” whatever the hell that means should be relegated to the bottom of the toilet bowl and flushed down to the septic tank where it belongs.
Ms. Greenspan has a lot of her own issues to be depressed about. Maybe for once in her life she needs to stop projecting and look in the mirror.
Could anyone please tweet mrs alan fail greenspan and let her know she’s a big whining failure? Her Whines aren’t going anywhere and “We See You, Andrea”?
I hate posting miserable stuff, but good grief, Dennis Cardoza (D-Calif) wrote one ugly piece on the President for The Hill – “Dem lawmaker blasts ‘Prof. Obama’ as arrogant, alienating”.
http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/cardozas-corner/198861-the-professorial-president
WTF is wrong with these people?
If you’d like to send him your, em, best wishes:
http://twitter.com/RepCardoza
Isn’t he not running for re election next year? Good riddance if that’s true. Unless he’s representing a red district in Cali, he has no excuse. Even Ben Nelson is smart enough not to badmouth the President FFS.
THIS! Good riddance to stink-ass trash!
Looks like he and some others are whining about having their toes stepped on, or so they think. Nothing is weirder than watching elected adults act like spoiled brats. “He needs ME”. Oh goody.
I guess he trying to line up at a job lobbying or working for the Kocaine brothers.
he has been making noise for weeks now. he is retiring, who gives a shite ?
Then I won’t waste my precious energy on his retiring ass, I will go blast Andrea Mitchel instead for that nonsense of PBO is sad, not passionate blah, blah, blah.
I blasted Andrea for that dumb shite yesterday. We have a 99% jerks on the TV calling themselves journalist. It’s gotten to the point that there is almost no one to watch.
I’m down to regularly watching only two: Rev. Al and Martin Bashir. Once in a while, I try to watch the other vultures but, invariably, they make me cringe.
Sounds like Andrea and Matthews are working together.
Yeah but I think he stepped way over the line with this one, this was friggin’ Teabagger speak! No harm in smacking the ****er down.
I sent him my best wishes that HIS comments were arrogant and alienating.
😉
Just re-tweeted that, beyond perfect.
perfect bwd. I’ll steal it.
Excellent BWD! I will be retweeting this for sure.
I chimed in too, said his blog was embarrassing.
and people don’t read the comments. it’ll make you more miserable. but tweeting repcardoza might make you feel better. tweeting this to attackwatch. thanks chips.
I tweeted him something snarky….I couldn’t help it……grrrrrrrr
😉
.
The Hill comment section is a gathering space for the teabaggers. Teabaggers have no life therefore they are able to post on news sites.
Should send this to Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, too. These people need reigning in – this is an election year. The President isn’t working for Congress – he’s working for the people of this country who need help! The very people that this Cardoza is supposed to be representing – that’s why he’s called a “representative”. For him to make it about his ego – is the height of arrogance and selfishness.
They are very jealous of PBO intelligence…they feel intellectually inferior…therefore they attack. Smart people know this.
Perfect comment Linda……it’s absolutely true.
“they feel intellectually inferior”
one correction – they ARE intellectually inferior
Linda and the people like Andrea Mitchell, Chris Matthews, don’t like the fact that Obama doesn’t waste his time with them, giving them an interview, or inviting them to the WH. Plus I think they are supporters of Hillary, they love Bill, and they are just stupid. Maybe Andrea and Matthews are the one who is depress. No passion, have you seen that husband of hers, I can see why there is no passion. Why she maybe depress.
How infuriating…….arrrhhhh,.what a loser,.
I love how “professor” has become another insult/scare phrase and intelligence is seen as a threat. When one attempts to do research, hold honest debates, and maintain a level of respect, it is “arrogant and alienating”. 😆 There’s a reason why Cardoza is retiring, and it’s because people who think like him are becoming obsolete.
Ha, exactly QuietObserver, once again being educated and smart is seen as a bad and threatening thing 🙄
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama’s Democratic allies in the Senate are using a critical year-end spending bill as political leverage to try to force Republicans to negotiate bipartisan legislation to extend payroll tax cuts and unemployment benefits due to expire at the end of the year.
An administration official said the president called Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., over the weekend and urged him hold up the massive $1 trillion-plus spending package until an agreement is reached on the tax cuts and the unemployment benefits.
Republicans controlling the House have instead charted their own course on the payroll tax, rolling it together with a provision to speed permitting of the controversial proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline and other provisions favored by Republicans.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jz8rdj6Bj6kVGATZ29tV4x8SG3hg?docId=99925d952c604d2686de3806539474dd
“and other provisions favored by Republicans”
What a crock. The only thing they favor is anything that will bring down President Obama’s agenda. How they could sleep at night is beyond me.
Beohner pretty much admitted that he’s going to pass his ugly bill, throw it over the fence to the Senate, and then leave town. And the media is complicit – they reported this morning that the “House Republicans” are set to pass the Payroll tax cut today – neglecting to point out that it won’t pass the Senate, and is chock full of stuff that will harm everyday Americans and particularly the unemployed.
Chips, can you post up the Harvey Weinstein clip from piers?
Yes, I’d love to see that one too!
Didn’t see that Michele, will have a look!
I’ve been hearing wonderful things about that interview from the people on this site. I like Harvey because he is big and if bullied he knows how to bully back. I recall him being on morning joke and Joe never asked him one question about the President and I believe it had something to do with Joe doesn’t know how to handle people who are not afraid of him…
Reverend Al Sharpton’s Speech at Stand for Freedom: Voting Rights Rally on Dec. 10
A photo from the march:
ACLU files federal lawsuit against Wi.’s voter ID law:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-aclu-files-federal-lawsuit-over-wisconsins-voter-id-law-20111213,0,3638935.story
Good. Git ‘r’ done, ACLU.
EXCELLENT news!!
Lynn Sweet has a great article on Axelrod saying about Newt: ‘just remember the higher a monkey climbs on a pole, the more you can see his butt.’
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2011/12/axelrod_on_newt_the_higher_a_m.html
I love David Axelrod. He’s an absolute beast and you would never know it just by looking at him.
Huff Puff Headline on that.
” Axelrod Compares Gingrich To A Monkey ” ( for real ) Which reminds me of PBO talking to students about politics
Thank you for the video. This man is exceptional, exceptiomal. A man of wisdom in a political culture so devoided of it. No wonder the Beltway is uncomfortable with him. He’s too sophisticated for them, he thinks and operates at a whole different level.
As somebody who lives inside the Beltway, I can attest to what you say.
I got he compared him to a monkey’s butt
LOL…..love David’s mind !!
24Sass, and what a butt to see.
BWD posted this last night. I think it bares a re-posting.
Obama 2012 Headquarters Upbeat but Phasers Set to Kill.
The closing, and very telling, graf:
Ha, love this:
This is a good one.
lol funny
Washington, D.C. – The U.S. Department of Energy today announced more than $7 million to fund four projects in California, Washington and Oregon to advance hydrogen storage technologies to be used in fuel cell electric vehicles. The 3-year projects will help lower the costs and increase the performance of hydrogen storage systems by developing innovative materials and advanced tanks for efficient and safe transportation. These investments are a part of the Department’s commitment to U.S. leadership in advanced fuel cell technology research to help domestic automakers bring more fuel cell electric vehicles into the mainstream market.
“Targeted investments in cutting-edge hydrogen storage technologies will spur American ingenuity, accelerate breakthroughs, and increase our competitiveness in the global clean energy economy,” said Energy Secretary Steven Chu. “As we focus on energy security, strengthening our portfolio to include domestically-produced hydrogen and American-made fuel cells for transportation and energy storage applications will create new jobs and reduce carbon pollution.”
http://energy.gov/articles/energy-department-awards-more-7-million-innovative-hydrogen-storage-technologies-fuel-cell
I was going to pass on the information about Dennis Cardoza (D) CA saying the president should be teaching at a university. I see it’s already on here. I called Cardoza’s office in DC and told the aide I thought it was bad news (or words to that effect). To rikyrah, I have wondered about why newt (small n) is running—I tend to agree that the GOP knows that they have already lost this election and having newt (small n) as their loser might not be as painfull. “The only reason we lost ” sez they “is because newt (small n) has so much baggage”. Who knows–maybe it’s just because they are so friggen nuts!!!!!
The White House says a more aggressive effort to nab deceptive government contractors and deceitful Medicare recipients is paying off — to the tune of billions of dollars.
The Obama administration plans to announce Tuesday that the Justice Department recovered more than $5.6 billion in fraud committed against the government in fiscal 2011. Almost $3.4 billion of the funds came in civil fraud recoveries, with more than $2.2 billion tied to criminal fraud, according to administration officials familiar with the announcement who were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
The announcement is tied to a Cabinet-level meeting to be held Tuesday regarding plans to cut wasteful government spending across federal agencies and departments.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/post/white-house-56-billion-in-fraud-recovered/2011/12/12/gIQA9IdSqO_blog.html?wprss=federal-eye
When the CBC, PL and Willard “Ken doll” Romney claim that PBO is “cutting medicare” this is what they are referring to. They are mighty PIZZED that their fellow cronies in the industry will no longer be able to profit off scamming the poor and elderly with overpayments to Insurance companies. So what do they do? Try to undermine the administration by LYING to the voters about the President cutting Medicare.
Thank You Mr. President. The honest people in this country who have a shred of decency and integrity HAVE YOUR BACK, Sir.
In any other country, a second term would be a landslide for such governing.
amk, I’ll go you one better. In any other country, his accomplishments would mandate a coronation.
Instead – many people want someone like David Cameron, whose blustering has isolated the UK and he refuses to back down or move to a compromise. On the surface, he’s making it sound like he was putting his country first. But, if Europe doesn’t recover, then he may be proven right for rejecting the deal, but the UK will suffer anyway because of a depressed and disbanded European Union. So, he’s cutting off his nose to spite his face. In this case, all of Europe needed to work together to restore confidence and find solutions. By wanting to have his cake and eat it too, Cameron has put a grey cloud over the Europe compromise, made it toothless because it’s not enshrined in the 27 European constitutions, and dimmed the prospect that this deal could emerge as a full solution. Very short-sighted, and very selfish.
in any other country, he woukd have beaten McCain by at least a 20 points margin in 2008.
Heads Up, Jay Carney’s press briefing:
http://edition.cnn.com/video/flashLive/live.html?stream=4
Bloomberg: U.S. economic data are outperforming expectations by the most in nine months, a trend Federal Reserve officials may incorporate into their policy statement tomorrow.
The Citigroup Economic Surprise Index, a daily measure of whether economic data is better or worse than economists’ projections, improved to 85.7 on Dec. 2, the highest since March 9, after the Labor Department reported an unexpected drop in the jobless rate….
“Most of the economists are missing the underlying strength” in the world’s largest economy, said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. The Fed will “modestly upgrade the economic outlook but change little else.”
November unemployment at the lowest level in more than two years and manufacturing running at the fastest pace in five months are among data that may dissuade Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and fellow central bankers from pursuing a third-round of large scale asset purchases….
More here: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-12/forecasters-miss-by-most-in-nine-months-amid-improving-u-s-data-economy.html
In the realm of the stupid: ND Sheriff Used Predator Drone To Arrest ‘Sovereign Citizens’.
Can we expect a Darrell Issa investigation?
Romney did it again….their new ad….taking President Obama’s comment from the 60 minutes interview out of context.
President Obama: ”That reversing a culture here in Washington, dominated by special interests, it was gonna take more than a year. It was gonna take more than two years. It was gonna take more than one term. Probably takes more than one president.”
Romney’s ad uses the last sentence, “Probably takes more than one president,” and implies Obama was talking about fixing the economy. But as you can see from the transcript above, this is simply false. Obama was actually talking about changing the culture in Washington, not fixing the economy.
Dishonest POS! I’m sick of these people.
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/39598_Romneys_New_Ad_Contains_Yet_Another_Dishonest_Obama_Quote#rss
Willard is so used to lying, he believes he is telling the truth when he is actually lying.
Romney need to e focused on defeating that despicable opponent Gingrich to win the nomination instead of focusing on PBO at this time. He is a loser.
I feel the need to share with you my most loved spam comment ever, just found it now – it’s from, um, ‘Constipation remedies’:
“An fascinating discourse is couturier remark. I judge that you should compose writer on this topic, it power not be a sacred mortal but mostly people are not enough to talk on such topics. To the succeeding. Cheers like your rise and shine The Obama Diary.”
I’m not sure whether to say thank you or ….. 😕
The emailer has read too much “Finnegans Wake”.
Wow…. Is that supposed to be English ?
When I used to read DK he always did a diary called ” This week in hate mail ” or something like that. They were pretty funny, but sometimes just plain vile.
This sounds like it was translated using Google, and the translation didn’t come through all that well. But, from the gist of it – it’s all good.
Definitely a translation! Oh dear. 😆
I understand – ‘it power not be a sacred mortal’ as ‘it might not be …’ [the word ‘might’ meaning ‘power’ in some contexts] but that’s all I was able to translate. 😉 tho I tried…..
“This fashion remark** would make a fascinating discussion. I think you should do a piece/post on this topic. It might not be a ….. being. since most people are not knowledgeable enough to talk on such topics. To your success. (?) Congratulations on your ‘Rise and Shine’ at The Obama Diary.”
**[Don’t ask me which fashion remark. I’d speculate that this comment came in during the Christmas tale post?]
Rats! Now I’m going to be returning off and on to see if I can solve this ‘ word puzzle’ in a meaningful way.
😆 This translating will keep you busy all day VC!!
I don’t even know what that mean! Is it english? lol
I’m not entirely sure, ChristiMtl, but I think I’ll stay friends with this nice spammer ….. sorry ….. person, just in case I ever need a constipation remedy. 😉
Good decision. 😉 I think this is a friendly spammer-person though I couldn’t come up with ANYTHING to justify a constipation remedy.
Maybe the “constipation” referred to them being blocked from posting? Now, I’m committed to the word puzzle, too…
Send it to Screechy Palin for translation… lol
Hahahaha. 😆
That sounds like Sarah The Quitter. 😯
Ok I take that back, she might be a PBO supporter and English is NOT her first language. I apologize to “Constipation 😆 😆 Remedies” for judging you. ROFlMAO though for her Username.
Vice President Joe Biden and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner announced Monday that the federal government would stop printing presidential one dollar coins for circulation as part of a campaign to reduce waste, fraud and abuse in government.
“At the Treasury Department, we’re continuing to work hard in support of President Obama and Vice President Biden’s efforts to cut waste and streamline government,” Geithner said in a statement. “Putting a stop to the minting of surplus $1 coins represents a significant opportunity to reduce costs and improve efficiency. In these tough times, Americans are making every dollar count, and they deserve the same from their government. We simply shouldn’t be wasting taxpayer money on money that taxpayers aren’t using.”
Pool-
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! I buy $50.00 of each coin to give to the kids in my family and the neighborhood @ Christmas. Several years ago, a dollar store in my area went out of business; they had Presidential $$ collection folders selling 4 for $1 and I purchased 50. For a mere $250 (4 Pres & 1 Native American $), spread-loaded over the year, I am able to gift 50 children with something more meaningful than a Mickey D’s gift certificate.
And they probably will still produce “collectible” rolls, which are the same damn coins in a different wrapper — $25.00 roll sells for 39.95. Damn, damn, double damn!
Sorry that this will curtail your Christmas tradition, Alycee, though hopefully not this year. Maybe you can make a concerted effort to buy up $1 coins over the next month or so, before they disappear completely? Also, have you ever been to an ‘estate’ auction? On a chance adventure to an ‘estate’ auction, a friend and I once found several cases of collectible coins grouped per year. They were not of monetary value, but it was neat to buy a couple cases.
I’m good to go for this Christmas, the Garfield $ came out in November. I am really disappointed. I am retired and on a fixed income, yet, at the cost of $50 during the months of January, February, May, August and November, I am able to gift 50 young folks with something both educational and of monetary value; a gift they actually keep! Its funny, the first year that I gave the coins and book, one of the college aged kids pulled me aside and asked to trade the check I had given her for one of the books (which contained $8.00); her rational — she’d spend the check, however, the book she’d keep forever.
The Presidential $ have been released one per qtr since feb 2007 and since 2009, the reverse (tails) design of the “Sacagawea” $ changes each year to celebrate an important contribution of Indian tribes or individual Native Americans. The program was scheduled to run through the second qtr of 2016, ending with the Gerald Ford $. I went to the Treasury website, and as I suspected, the collectors rolls will still be produced (price & shipping TBA) which means a $25 roll will probably cost $50!
Sorry for rambling on, just needed to vent my disappointment…
http://www.treasury.gov/connect/blog/Pages/Reducing-the-Surplus-Dollar-Coin-Inventory-Saving-Taxpayer-Dollars.aspx
Click to access Pres$1coinBROCHURE.pdf
I’m with you on this one. We really should be doing the opposite–using 1 dollar coins instead of a dollar bill. Coins last forever, bills have to be replaced. And–if I’m not mistaken–coins don’t come from the Federal Reserve, meaning we’r enot paying interest on them like we are on Federal Reserve Notes (or dollar bills.)
Some well deserve publicity for Chip:
Oooops, that’s really not what I meant!!!
This:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1102815
Sorry about that.
jackeens ? who knew ? 🙂
It’s Democratic Underground? Ouch….isn’t it as bad as DK?…..
I could hang out in that DU cesspoll in 2007 for about a week before I fled. Now bwd sez they’ve reformed,
Ah no, amk, BWD didn’t say that – she just linked to the BHO-supporting group at the site, the rest of it is still most probably poison!
Oh there’s a BHO supporting group at the site? Good to know, I’ll check it out
I stand corrected. 🙂
Ha, thanks BWD! Those names make me nostalgic, some of my best pals from my days there. I should point out, though, I had waaaaaaaaaaaay too many enemies to count at that place!
‘Jackeens’, eh? Why not ‘Jilleens’?
Very glad you’re here, and not there! I, for one, would never have found you if you were just part of the BHO-supporting group, 😆 and what a loss that would have been for moi! 😦
Sail on TODville!
Jackeens: A mildly pejorative term for Dubliners 😆
And I’d have missed out on meeting up with YOU, ya crazy girl! Hugs!
Yes, Chipsticks. I remember Jackeens with great fondness, asked her once if she was Irish after I discovered Jackeens was a synonym for Dubliner, didn’t know then or now that it was a pejorative term, though! . Now I see I was talking to YOU! What a wonderful surprise.
I didn’t know, either, that DU had an Obama site. I kept up with DU for many years until I couldn’t take some of the comments. Haven’t been there for ages. Glad, glad, glad that you started your own blog!
I can’t believe that was you Chipsticks!!!
I’m so glad that you started your own site so we could see the goodness and super smarts in YOU!
The vicious jackals did you and the world a favor with all their PObama HATE, Chips! They’re just too damn ignorant to know it.
What a lesson in what great things can be done when we don’t stick around frothng at the mouth hate.. More than a few of us were going through major shock from all the lies directed at our Democratic President. Until we figured out that they were suckers who lapped up everything the profiteering “left” was feeding them.
Like Michael Moore for one..yeah.
OH MY GAWD. I was never a DU person but I used to follow Jackeens doggedly until one day she disappeared. I noticed people were asking about you but I didn’t know what happened and finally removed the bookmark, sadly. WOW, so glad you morphed into Chipsticks!!!! WOWZERS!!
New Obama campaign ad-
Per POLITICO’s Mike Allen, Obama campaign advisers in a press briefing this morning compared Mitt Romney’s bet to another famous political gaffe — that of George H.W. Bush, who looked baffled when he saw a barcode scanner at a grocery store checkout counter during the 1992 campaign. Bush had been in the White House so long he apparently hadn’t seen one.
Campaign spokesman Ben Labolt told reporters today: “The $10,000 bet may end up being Mitt Romney’s grocery store-scanner moment.”
http://www.politico.com/politico44/2011/12/obama-campaign-compares-romney-bet-to-bush-gaffe-107216.html
W/ video.
Southwest orders 150 737 max planes and 58 others from Boeing!
Gee wiz, try to divide us a little more, Politico.
Says, that Clinton was better for the Blacks than Obama.
Oh Lordie.
This is ludicrous. When Clinton (a caucasian) was in office he did not come into office facing what PBO encountered. There is absolutely no comparison. PBO is still trying to correct some of Clinton’s policies. I could say more as an AA, but I will leave it there. 🙂
Didn’t Clinton enact “welfare reform” with Newt Gingrich? How did that work out? Politico – a good source for garbage.
Yes! I was ready to strangle him with my bare hands. During the Lewinsky thing, I KNOW I would strangle him if I had a chance — what a way to ruin an entire democratic presidency: for a blow job by (my take) a plant in the west wing. For a hugely touted “brain” how could he not see what he was doing?
But the welfare thing was, actually, much worse.
Correction — I should have said, “how could he not see how he was being played?” Because he was most certainly played.
He was great alright. Great at making sure more of us ended up in prison on small time drug charges. They need to go on somewhere with that lie. Clinton administration may have created jobs, but believe me when I tell you that he was not that great for people of color. It just seemed that way b/c the CBC was all up his ass.
What you said Symmetry11.
Eight Years of Clinton-Gore: The Price of Lesser-Evilism
By Lance Selfa
Two-thirds of congressional Democrats supported Clinton-Gore’s 1994 Omnibus Crime Control Act. This $33 billion monstrosity expanded the use of the federal death penalty to 60 crimes, appropriated $10 billion for a vast expansion of prison building, and offered money to localities to hire 100,000 police. In 1996, Clinton’s Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act greatly curtailed death row prisoners’ habeas corpus appeals and established arbitrary time limits on death row appeals. On Clinton’s watch, the U.S. prison population nearly doubled and the number of executions jumped to its highest level in four decades.
~snip~
http://www.isreview.org/issues/13/clinton-gore.shtml
You got it symmetry11!!
“Clinton administration may have created jobs”…yep, thanks to the dot-com bubble 🙂
Not to take anything away from former President Clinton, because he was better than what we got stuck with the last 8 years before POTUS; but if Clinton is to be praised for gifting Bush with a surplus to start his “dumb war”, then he should be blamed for setting poor people back as well.
He “reformed” the welfare system just the way folks on the Right wanted, and he is responsible for the prison industrial complex we are stuck with today.
SMH as they try to rewrite history, goes to show how right former President Bush is when he said, history will judge him (Bush) a success. Yep, how soon do we forget!
Jovie, you may be interested in reading this article.
The Clinton Fallacy: Did blacks really make big economic gains during the ’90s?
By Melissa Harris-Lacewell |Posted Thursday, Jan. 24, 2008, at 12:46 PM ET
There is no evidence to suggest that African-Americans were in a better economic position than whites at any time in American history, including during Clinton’s presidency. In fact, striking gaps in income, employment, and wealth continue to distinguish black economic reality in the United States. Clinton’s administration did keep inflation low and reduce unemployment. This was a rising tide that lifted many boats, including some black ones.
~snip~
He relished this bond and often acknowledged his honorary blackness. It is important to remember that the description of Clinton as black was prompted by his experience of personal, public humiliation at the hands of his political foes. It is not a claim about his racial heritage, but instead a reaction to his experience with and use of cultural markers that often stand for the denigrated elements of black life in America.
As Clinton performed blackness, real black people got poorer. The poorest African-Americans experienced an absolute decline in income, and they also became poorer relative to the poorest whites. The richest African-Americans saw an increase in income, but even the highest-earning blacks still considerably lagged their white counterparts. Furthermore, the ’90s witnessed the continued growth of the significant gap between black and white median wealth.
Read more: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2008/01/the_clinton_fallacy.html
Ya right! I suppose that’s why the incarceration rate of young black males and females skyrocketed during his presidency. There are other things I could go into that debunks this statement by Politico, but I no longer find it useful to waste time and energy on idiotic statements by media people who are preoccupied with denigrating President Obama.
Addendum to one of my posts.
WH stops dollar coin circulation saving 50 million per year. -AP
Good article from mike Allen-(no snark)-
The Obama campaign will get some help next year from a Democrat who knows something about getting reelected — Bill Clinton.
Campaign manger Jim Messina said at a briefing for reporters Tuesday morning that he and top strategist David Axelrod “got to spend a little time with President Clinton about a month ago, discussing his involvement in the campaign.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1211/70361.html
I hope Bill Clinton really does come through. But this Mike Allen needs to know that the Clinton Machine was defeated by the Obama Machine. They know a little bit, too.
Exactly!
Dem Senators to Obama administration: On Plan B, it’s put up or shut up time
This letter — which is signed by Patty Murray, Barbara Boxer, Kirsten Gillilbrand, Maria Cantwell and 10 male senators — is strongly worded stuff, particularly when directed at a Democratic president. It stops just short of accusing the Obama administration of deliberately ignoring science in making this decision. It also puts the administration in an awkward spot. Either it produces a scientific rationale that’s acceptable to these Senators, which will will be extremely difficult at best, or it will face more criticism for failing to justify its policy, reinforcing the sense that this Democratic administration abandoned science and put politics first.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/dem-senators-to-obama-put-up-or-shut-up-on-plan-b/2011/12/13/gIQAYOc4rO_blog.html
These Senators need to explain why it’s so important for them to fight for 10 year olds to secretly take a massive dose of hormones in order to prevent a pregnancy, rather than seeking a doctor’s help and adult supervision to handle the actual problem? Democrats are their own worst enemies.
What is their leverage here? Do what we say or we’ll jeopardize your 2012 chances?
It does seem like it doesn’t it? ”Do what we say or we’ll jeopardize your 2012 chances”.
Looks like it’s time for a TOD bombs away at these jokers.
Theo, this comment is making its way into a fax to signators of that letter. Thanks for helping me write my letter!
You’re welcome. Their knee-jerk reaction made my blood boil, so thanks for getting it into a cogent format. I’m sneaking onto TOD during a day long meeting, so I can’t properly respond.
Fax Sent to Sens. Patty Murray (WA), Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.), Barbara Boxer (Calif.), Richard Blumenthal (Conn.), Daniel Akaka (Hawaii), Carl Levin (Mich.), John Kerry (Mass.), Tom Harkin (Iowa), Al Franken (Minn.), Frank Lautenberg (N.J.), Ron Wyden (Ore.), Maria Cantwell (Wash.) and Jeff Merkley (Ore.). Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)
Thanks again.
Would they please let it go? Just because science says it safe does not mean its safe. For example, the birth control pills Yaz. They were thought to be safe by the FDA before they were put on the shelves for the consumers to get. Come to find out years later Yaz was in fact more dangerous than other birth control pills. I ‘ ve taken Yaz and thank god I had no problems. Instead of removing Yaz from the market, the FDA wants Bayer to put a big warning label on the Yaz. Another thing is Plan B does not guarantee that the girl will not get pregnant, just like other birth controls.Also girls 16 and under don’t use the birth control methods that are available now.
Forget the science what about the parental rights.
Parental rights lose a little steam with me when I know for a fact that girls are sexually abused too often by their own fathers. Here in Utah, for instance. In the poorer Southeast. In fact generally, in affluent families, too. So not so much parental rights, as safety of the child.
The first thing I thought of when I read of the morning after pill becoming available to all females, even very young ones, was horror. The many health concerns arising from promiscuous use of the pill — for instance, a bad reaction, scared me to death. One of my daughters shortly after her marriage had problems with vision which turned out to be a very bad reaction to the pill. Would a twelve-year-old realize that black spots in her vision might signal a very real danger?
The Yaz reaction was a more visible problem and well reported, but there are others — blood clotting for one, which never bothered me. In fact I still take the pill for bone thinning. But it was a real problem for Ethy.
I don’t understand how requiring guidance for children when purchasing this drug is “ignoring science.” Seriously, what am I missing?
you are not missing a darn thing QuietObservier.
Exactly.
They probably get campaign contributions
From the pharmaceutical industry that ultimately stands to benefit if the prescription provision is removed.
Those senators are absolutely right about this. The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine, and the FDA said that Plan B’s availability to girls between 11 and 16 was absolutely scientifically valid. The Obama administration overruled the science on this out of some moral or political calculus. Whatever their reasons, the fact is that the Obama administration overruled the science, which is something I cannot possibly agree with.
I would not want my daughter to be able to get that . No way…
I have to say, I’m with Michael Tomasky on this –
A Progressive Defense of the White House on Plan B
Kathleen Sebelius is getting flak for her Plan B decision. But Michael Tomasky defends the administration’s position because of the ethical issues raised by minors using the pill.
I get the reasons for liberal outrage at the Obama administration’s Plan B decision. But I can’t quite join in the indignation … it seems to me that to call this merely a case of politics cynically trumping science is way too dismissive of some concerns that parents with all kinds of political views might have about their teenage daughters buying this pill without their knowledge.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/12/09/michael-tomasky-a-progressive-defense-of-the-white-house-on-plan-b.html
+1,000,000,000 for the comment. Plus, I agree with the Tomasky piece. He’s the only one from the so called left who applied any logic in his article about HHS Sebelius’s decision and didn’t use childish and petty emotions to personally and rabidly attack PBO.
Tell you what. Let ’em pass the bill and at the same time let’s give little girls birth control pills when they get their first training bra.(snark)
These assholes want control over a womans vagina, why not her children. 😦
Kevin Pua – welcome to TOD but I call bullshit on this one.
underage sex with babies under 17 = Rape
Why the hell should any child get access to Plan B without a prescription from a doctor? I tell you this, If I were to ever find out my child was able to purchase a drug like this over the counter I am going off on the establishment that allowed them to purchase it.
If I am responsible for my underage child, they better damn well stay out of my decision making to include allowing my kid to purchase the morning after pill without a discussion with a doctor. I could give a crap about what American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, and the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine, and the FDA believes. They can do for their kids what they want but they have no right to trample on the rights of parents to care for their own child.
Bottom line is PO and Sebellius has it right. Whether folks disagree with it is not important. You want your child to get access to the drug, tell them go get the prescription. Win win for everybody.
Now about the American Jobs Act . . .
Hey Kevin Pua – I wanted to clarify that my disgust isn’t with you but with officials that want to usurp the rights of parents.
I don’t see why getting a prescription is such a big deal. Getting a prescription is the only requirement for underage kids. No rights are infringed on except the one that they would prefer to implement which is to infringe on the rights of parents. So why the outrage?
How does requiring a prescription for Plan B translate into overruling science? That simply makes no sense. and we are talking about babies. Still growing into their bodies. Why is taking the extra step of talking to a doctor a big deal?
I am glad that Sebellius said no. As a parent I am grateful that someone is protecting my rights.
again, welcome and hope you continue to participate.
In the press release HHS said they agreed with the science. So no they are not overruling science in requiring the label to be understandable for 11 year olds.
Science is not always right.
The science was not overruled – Plan B is available to girls between 11 and 16. They need a prescription because they may lack the maturity of using the drug in an appropriate manner. I could go along with an argument that the restriction should not apply to 15 or 16 year olds, but an 11 year old girl is most certainly in dire need of consultation if she has need for this drug. This is NOT an issue of women’s rights, it is an issue of protecting children. A school girl has to ask the nurse to get an aspirin – but we should let her go to the neighborhood drug store and self-medicate with a poweful hormone. Where is the common sense here?
Kevin, don’t make it sound that as if this medication has been banned for usage for underage girls. And using science as a figleaf for your poutrage is pathetic.
And I cannot possibly agree with you, or anyone else, who thinks that for under age girls, Plan B contraceptive should be dispensed like candy. Girls between the ages of 11 and 16 are still children; they still require adult guidance and adult supervision. PERIOD!
Democrats have got to stop shooting themselves in the foot. These Dem senators should know better.
December 13, 2011 1:15 PM
At the intersection of dishonesty and hypocrisy
By Steve Benen
In the debate over the weekend for the Republican presidential candidates, Mitt Romney offered to bet $10,000 on a health care claim, generating all kinds of attention. But just a couple of minutes earlier, Romney made a claim that was far less colorful, but far more dishonest.
As part of a discussion on the Affordable Care Act, Romney told viewers, “Let’s not forget, only one president has ever cut Medicare for seniors in this country, and it’s Barack Obama. We’re gonna remind him of that time and time again.”
Jonathan Cohn, who generally avoids using the “l” word, calls Romney’s claim “a flat-out lie.”
There are a few relevant angles to this. The first is the notion that Obama’s health care law “cuts Medicare.” It’s an inherently dubious claim — as has been explained many times before, “The Affordable Care Act does reduce Medicare spending by $500 billion over the next 10 years. But here’s the catch: Those dollars aren’t taken out of the current budget, they are not actual cuts, and nowhere does the bill actually eliminate any current benefits. The $500 billion is all in future spending reductions and come through the law’s attempts to slow projected growth, not cut spending.”
The second is the notion that “only one president has ever cut Medicare.” Cohn knows better.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal/2011_12/at_the_intersection_of_dishone034086.php
I’m sure some here would appreciate this…….
Joe Scarborough Says He Might Vote For Third Party If Newt Is GOP Nominee
MSNBC host and former Republican congressman Joe Scarborough has made no secret of his dislike for Newt Gingrich, but he took the tough talk to a new level this morning. Here are his commnets, via The Hill:
If I have to choose between Barack Obama and Newt Gingrich — a guy that George Will said would have been a marvelous Marxist and who is the opposite of being a small-government conservative — if Ron Paul’s running as a third-party candidate, I’m going to give him a long look.
His main reason – Gingrich’s supposed fondness for ‘big government’ – echoes recent comments by Glenn Beck, who said yesterday:
“If I have a gun to my head, I’ll vote for Mitt Romney [in the general election], and if it’s Newt Gingrich and there’s a third party and it’s Ron Paul — and I don’t agree with his Middle Eastern policy, at all — I might consider Ron Paul as a third party.”
Source: http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/updates/2716
This deserves a……
Someone up thread already said that Joe Scarborough is part of that “Americans Elect” nonsense. They are itching for a third party. Sad for them that they’ll still lose.
That’s why I never got why the conservatives always claimed that Morning Joe was liberal. It’s not. They spend more time bashing the president than Fox. I personally, however, have a problem with the schilling they do for Huntsman. This goes for Mika who is supposed to be the advocate for liberalism versus Joe’s conservatism. They are head over hills for Huntsman, Bloomberg, Paul Ryan, and Christie—-all Republicans. They never have praised a Democrat the way they do these Republicans. It’s sickening. That’s why I stopped watching them months ago—and my mornings have never been better,
Really ? I thought he was part of ” No Labels ” with Bloomberg….. ( who Halperin was pushing as a 3rd party candidate today )
Buddy Roemer is going after the Americans Elect nomination.
I believe the Americans Elect is the same as No Labels.
Desraye, I don’t think so. No Labels was started by political operatives from both parties and is very transparent. Americans Elect was started by Wall Street types and is somewhat secretive as to where their money originated. Some believe Michael Milken is involved. The son of Milken’s top assistant is the public head of it.
You are correct…the seed money of 5.5 million came from Peter Ackerman. His son is running it.
Peter Ackerman was born in New York City, Nov 6 1946, and educated at Colgate University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (Tufts University) where he earned a PhD in International Relations.[10]
After his graduation he joined the junk-bond dealers, Drexel Burnham Lambert, and for most of the next fifteen years, he was the right-hand man to Michael Milken the “Junk-Bond King”.
Here’s a re-post about Americans Elect from a previous thread.
Americans Elect Board of Advisors: Names and Connections
The following is an annotated list of the Board of Advisors for Americans Elect, the 501c4 corporation with plans to nominate its own candidate for President of the United States in 2012. Starting from a previously unpublished Americans Elect document obtained by the Los Angeles Times on July 26 2011, the list below is a work in progress, containing not just the names of the Board of Advisors contained in the Americans Elect but also hyperlinks to information about the Board of Advisors’ relevant affiliations. Additional known roles in Americans Elect and its predecessor Unity08, if any, are indicated in parentheses. Annotations are incomplete and being added on a daily basis; a lack of information about a person’s affiliations should not be interpreted as a lack of affiliations themselves.
~snip~
http://irregulartimes.com/index.php/americans-elect-board-of-advisors-names-and-connections-july-26-2011/
Personally, I think they’re all part of the same movement. No Labels has Huffington, Bloomberg, I think Huntsman was reported to be involved at one point, McCain, too. And then the 1% are sponsoring the Americans Elect. In any case, they’re all planning to be spoilers for 2012, and introduce their candidate(s) in the summer.
theo~ I think you’re on to something. I think both organizations are focused on preventing President Obama from being re-elected. This is the information that I found on No Labels’ website.
Partners
Jonathan Crane, director for Research for the Coalition for Evidence-Based Policy, is a supporter of No Labels. Mr. Crane has been a senior fellow at the Democratic Leadership Council, a domestic policy advisor to Vice President Al Gore and an assistant professor at the University of Illinois.
Dave Walker, founder and CEO of the Comeback America Initiative and a No Labels co-founder, has worked closely with No Labels, participating in telephone town halls and even placing second in a POLITICO-sponsored “parlor game” to select an independent candidate for president after being drafted to run by No Labels members. Dave is the former U.S. comptroller general under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, and is the former head of the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO).
No Labels supporter Maya MacGuineas is president of the CRFB and has participated in events like the No Labels “Conversation with America” townhall forum with Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz and No Labels Co-Founders John Avlon, Robert S. Kaplan and Lisa Borders.
PolicyMic
http://nolabels.org/partners
exactly.
Buddy Roemer is Chris Hayes’s candidate.
Rachel Maddow seem to like him a lot as well…..
Just look at an interview with him, her tone…..and see the difference when she interviewed Ambassador Rice and David Plouffe.
Her agenda is very clear.
hogwash….he’ll be defending Newt in no time
I dunno…there is some deep seated resentment there. Either way I could give two scoops who he votes for . What bugs me is that they operate on the pretense that this is a counterweight to FOX, which it is not. At least FOX promotes conservative views, not candidates. There has to be some FCC rule against openly campaigning for or against a candidate. The very least, it blurs the lines between news and opinion. I don’t mind guests saying who they are for and against, but when you have someone who has 3 hours of airtime, operating under the false pretense of a “news program”…there has to be some consequences. I know he got in trouble *cough* for donating to a campaign, but I would rather he donate in private than air out who he is going to vote for on National T.V. Especially since MSNBC says Morning Joe is “news” and not “opinion”
He won’t be defending Newt because he knows that Newt cannot beat Obama. Scarborough hates Obama so much that he automatically hates anyone whom he thinks will improves Obama’s chances of remaining in the WH. That alone is driving his hatred of Gingrich more than any policy issue.
Hi everyone, I couldn’t find video of Harvey Weinstein’s interview with Toad-head Morgan, only the audio from the podcast – so, here you go. Love the fella. Harvey, not Toad-head.
December 12, 2011
Romney Meets a Veteran
Posted by Amy Davidson
The Republican candidates are not having shining moments when it comes to dealing with gay veterans. One example of this came in a Fox News debate this fall, when the candidates, asked by gay service member on active duty in Iraq, all but froze when some in the audience booed him. There wasn’t even the rote thanks for his service you’d expect even there, on the planet of the G.O.P. race. Then there was another transmission from that world last week, when Rick Perry came out with an ad in which, dressed in a denim shirt and Carhartt jacket, he said,
Perry may not have much of a serious chance now—though really, with this cast of characters, who knows—but Romney does, or did. A video of him talking to a gay veteran in a New Hampshire diner gives one a sense of why he didn’t have more of one. Romney sat down in a booth with two older men, Bob Garon and Bob Lemire; according to Politico, they were regulars there, known to the waiters as “the Bobs.” As the Boston Globe put it, “Though Romney had no reason to know it, Garon—a 63-year-old from Epsom, N.H.—was sitting at the table with his husband.” Garon was wearing a baseball hat referring to his time in Vietnam—“Vietnam veteran!” Romney said when he saw him, not by way of introducing himself (he has no military experience) but perhaps to demonstrate his eye for textual details. Garon asked Romney where he stood on gay marriage. Romney was against it; when Garon followed up by asking why a same-sex partner shouldn’t get the veterans’ benefits available to spouses, Romney repeated that “I believe that marriage is a relationship between a man and a woman, and we apparently disagree.” What is striking is how Romney, despite picking up—sooner than some of his rivals might have—what Garon thought of the issue, completely fails to turn this into any sort of a human moment. You are a politician; here is an old man, sitting next to you in a diner, who, one way or the other, has had a complicated life. There was no strand Romney could seek out and hang on to? Ask what years he fought in the war, express some sense of respect or internal struggle—anything. (Except, maybe, propose a wager.) This is how they said goodbye
Garon: And you know, I also learned something and New Hampshire is right. You have to look a man in the eye to get a good answer, and you know what, Governor, good luck.
Romney: Thank you, appreciate it. Have a good day to you, sir.
Garon: You’re going to need it.
Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/closeread/2011/12/romney-meets-a-veteran.html#ixzz1gRTQVT00
How Wal-Mart Could Reelect Barack Obama
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/ten-miles-square/2011/12/how_walmart_could_reelect_bara034069.php
Talks about how papa Sam Walton made his money by being inventive. “Viewed by most as a ‘down-home’ guy who continued to drive his old pickup truck long after he had become a billionaire, Walton’s common man appeal belies his true financial genius – the ability to use his vendors’ money to finance the growth of his operations.”
and then goes on to talk about how much wealth the Waltons have
“According to the Survey of Consumer Finances, the combined net worth of Sam’s family equals the combined wealth of the entire bottom 30 percent of Americans.”
Goes on to discuss the issue of income inequality
At the end of the day, it won’t be about the specifics of how we should or should not – or even if we should or should not – control the income disparity in America that now exceeds anything we have seen in our history. It will be about the common sense among what we now call “the 99 percent” who can’t help but see that something is fundamentally wrong in our country when one family can possess so much of the nation’s wealth – particularly when they provided no great innovation or advancement in and to the American way of life- while so many are suffering.
Elections are emotional events. Americans vote their pocketbook and their “gut.”
And while we can accept -and even cheer – those who accomplish great wealth as a result of great innovations that improve the lives of Americans and others throughout the world, we know all too well that much of the nation’s wealth is in the hands of people who have done little to nothing to benefit our way of life.”
Working on jobs as usual:
Sen. James Inhofe Addresses GOP’s Concerns About Bestiality
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2011/12/13/388607/sen-james-inhofe-address-gops-concerns-about-bestiality/
Business Insider: It didn’t get much attention, but this morning the latest NFIB small business optimism survey came in stronger than expected, as more and more corporations see good sales and decent business conditions on the way.
This is important, in part, since small businesses have been rather negative on the economy, even while large companies have reported record earnings.
More here: http://www.businessinsider.com/chart-of-the-day-small-business-hiring-plans-2011-12
The establishment of the GOP DO NOT want Newt to win the nomination, which is odd to me since he appears to be more conservative than Mitt.
The establishment can’t control Newt. They can control Mitt.
Yep. The man doesn’t have any deep knowledge in anything and is weak in character. He would be a puppet of the big lobbies and the military industrial complex. Reagan without the likeability. Gingrich is not that knowledgeable either and has big character defaults but he wouldn’t be as easy to control because he’s erraric and very authoritarian.
Sh!t just got real (funny that is )
Trump Pulls Out Of Newsmax Debate
CNN is reporting that Donald Trump has pulled out as moderator of a Newsmax Republican debate slated for the end of December. Only Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum agreed to participate in the debate.
It would have been hilarious…….
His excuse is even more hilarious…..does that clown think he’s fooling anyone?…..not a chance
‘I’m Not Willing To Give Up My Right To Run’
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/donald-trump-dropping-out-as-moderator-of-newsmax-debate/
Hahahaha. Shit just got as “real” as the fox on Trump’s head.
Just for you UT 🙂
Gingrich with ” Invented ” person Yassar Arafat.
oops
Thanks Linda. I just twitted your comment. Oops indeed.
Chysler may reopen detrot plant, bring back Viper- Detroit Free Press
That is great. I hope it happens…. They really need jobs there…they are trying to fend off Snyder taking over under his emergency management authority.
Just yesterday I read that the FBI labeled Detroit the 2nd most dangerous city in America.. Flint MI. is first.
If the state congress ever got out of the pocket of Ambassador Bridge owner Mouron and backed the government funded plan that would be 15,000 jobs created overnight.
I’m looking for a post in one of the earlier threads about Jon Huntsman which details some of his more dangerous Republican policies that voters need to be aware of. Some idiot at Old Orange is pushing a diary about the Gingrich-Huntsman debate yesterday trying to build some kind of narrative that Huntsman is “more evolved than Obama” on issues related to China. I’m not even sure what their point is since apart from the fact that it’s not true, Huntsman has several other “less evolved” policies such as the full endorsement of the Ryan Plan that would royally screw most ordinary Americans. I can’t seem to find that post and I don’t recall who posted it. I will keep looking anyway.
I believe Huntsman just this weekend reiterated his love for the Paul Ryan budget – including more tax cuts, and the end of Medicare and Social Security. I think if you google it, you’ll get some hits. That alone should disqualify him from any Democratic support. He’s also got some company ties to Iran, and spent his time as China Ambassador focusing on making his family business more wealthy.
Democrat better be working on oppo research on Huntsman just in case.
Polls Don’t Reflect GOP Split
by BooMan
Tue Dec 13th, 2011 at 01:01:08 PM EST
According to the latest PPP/Daily Kos/SEIU poll, less than a third of Americans think Barack Obama will be defeated in next year’s election. I confess that I am little surprised to see such a small number. The key swing ‘independent/other’ category is in rough agreement with the overall numbers. Just 31% of independents think Romney would win, while only 27% think Gingrich could pull it off. Yet, a new USA Today/Gallup Swing-State Poll shows a Republican enthusiasm advantage and some worrisome results for the president.
I think the key dynamics are starting to show, but they aren’t necessarily showing up in the polls, yet. The Republicans may be generically more motivated. That’s natural for the party out of power. But they’re horribly split over their two front-runners, both of whom are simply unacceptable to a huge swath of the party. Once they have to settle for a candidate, I think the enthusiasm rating of the Republican base will take a major nosedive.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2011/12/13/1318/3054
This doesn’t make sense, since polls last week were stating that Republicans are generally very unenthusiastic about the 2012 election. And there have been signs for a while that they are planning to focus on the Senate, House and lower level offices around the country, because they’ve all but given up on the Presidency.
BS—27% of Republicans call their candidates weak, 51% call them average from NBC’s new poll. I dunno Gallup/USA Today has been trending rightward lately. If you look at their polls on their website, they have Paul at 8%–which is malarkey because the guy has at least double that in all of the network polls. My only guess is that their polls are skewed heavily to Republicans and Conservatives.
Or that Gallup is a garbage polling outlet.
December 13, 2011 2:10 PM
The ‘evidence’ bolstering voter-fraud allegations
By Steve Benen
To rationalize the “war on voting,” Republican policymakers point to the scourge of voter fraud. The problem, of course, is that the allegations of fraud are largely imaginary, and GOP officials are really just looking for excuses to block traditionally-Democratic constituencies from voting.
But wait, Republicans say, occasionally there really is fraud. In fact, the Republican National Lawyers Association (RNLA) released a report last week to document all the cases of voter fraud that have been prosecuted over the last decade.
And what did the group turn up? A grand total of 311 cases. Given the larger national context — over 131 million Americans voted in 2008, for example — that’s an infinitesimally small number.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal/2011_12/the_evidence_bolstering_voterf034087.php
Looking good, Mr President:
President Obama arrives to speak at a campaign event in Washington, Dec. 13
“If you stay steady, we’re going to win this thing …. This is going to be tough. But, I just want to remind all of you that you didn’t decide to support Barack Hussein Obama because it would be easy.”
Truer words have never been spoken. Look at his ears. So cute. 😀
He’s a cutie pie. I want to grab his ears. LOL no disrespect intended.
What a hunk ! Swoon.
I love my President!
I’m with you Mr. President. All the way.
Fashion model good looks, I tell ya’!
Love Carole so much!!! Just WOW.
TaaaaaAAAAAAaaaaaLLLLLllllllly! Hiya 😉
GIIIIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRRRRRRLLLLLLLLLLL!
(((HUGS)))
Hey – am in the middle of reading this – so interesting:
On conservatives losing their minds – (which I LOVE – just saying….)
http://nymag.com/news/politics/conservatives-david-frum-2011-11/
Ah, admit, you’re just swooning over the pic over that article:
oh and :vomit:
Is there a naughty mat for Newt?
Newt is a walking naughty mat.
raotflmbo – good one LL
Hi Tally, good to see you! Wonder if you’ll tell me who is your favourite soccer ….oops! football team in the European league? [**whisper whisper – There was a recent controversy here over two teams and I’m curious where your vote would have fallen. **]
Just wanted to know. 😛
[Chips, I still don’t understand why I always got some variant of that name in the workplace? First they’d say I was shy, then after a few years they’d mysteriously be using the ‘T’ word without your attached compound. Strange. Really strange. 😉 ]
Also – I actually do not know to what controversy you speak of. Seriously. I feel stupid. 😥
Great video, but I never would have guessed you were a Man U fan.
Chips is a Man U fan because she loves living in delusion land. People who live in the real world and have their feet firmly planted on the ground know that Chelsea is the way to go. True Blue all the way!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 😀 😀 😀
oh. my.
I am definitely not getting in the middle of this.:D
Well, I must fly my Chelsea flag high, so…
F**k em all,
F**k em all,
United, West Ham, Liverpool,
Cos we are the Chelsea and we are the best,
We are the Chelsea so f**k all the rest…
😀
YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! +1,000,000,000 co-sign! 😀
I love English Premier League football, but not growing up with it I have the half term governor’s approach to a favorite club, “All of ’em. Any of ’em”, except for Liverpool because it is Morning Joe’s team and is owned by the Boston Red Sox. I need to settle on one, but it is difficult.
Let me help you with that decision Bill.
*Chants* chelsea…chelsea….chelsea…CHELSEA….CHELSEA…..CHELSEA…CHELSEA!!!!……CHELSEA!!!!…..CHELSEA!!!!!!
I’ll repeat LL’s chant:
F**k em all,
F**k em all,
United, West Ham, Liverpool,
Cos we are the Chelsea and we are the best,
We are the Chelsea so f**k all the rest…
Once you become a True Blue fan…….you’ll never regret it. 😀
HAAAAAAAA – I have to be honest, I am an LA GALAXY GIRL through and through, and at the risk of not upsetting our GODDESS IN CHARGE, I don’t really follow Euro footy.
I am more of a PLAYER follower however, because my hormones place me in my own personal Naughty Cell. So having that in mind – i’d be more apt to watch an Inter Milan game right now….. until the Gs sign Dreamy Diego.
You should watch Chelsea matches so you can observe the next Galaxy designated player, Didier Drogba. So, I leave you with this little ditty:
Didier Drogba, tra lala,
Didier Drogba, traaa lalala,
Didier Drogba, tra lala,
Didier Drogba, traaa lalala
I think David is going to stay.
I have to say, Drogba didn’t impress me that much during the WC.
Tue Dec 13, 2011 at 10:55 AM PST.
Romney campaign responds to claim by Mitt Romney that he is ‘progressive’
by Jed Lewison
Mitt Romney’s campaign is responding to this video of himself in 2002 saying “I am not a partisan Republican” and “my views are progressive” …
Mitt Romney said he was ‘progressive’ as a gubernatorial candidate. … by blaming Democrats:
The very last thing the Democrats want to do is run against Mitt Romney. That is why they are focused on his campaign and not on the economy. The Democrats are continuing their campaign of deception in their strategy to ‘kill Romney.’ If anyone has a question of how Mitt Romney will govern as president, take a look at his record of creating jobs, cutting spending, and protecting the sanctity of life and traditional marriage. That was his record as Governor and that will be his record as president.
Of course, nothing in that statement explains why Mitt Romney declared himself to be a “progressive” and I’ll bet you $10,000 that it won’t convince a single conservative Republican to vote for Mitt Romney. This isn’t some slice-and-dice O’Keefe editing job … this is Mitt Romney in Mitt Romney’s own words.
.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/12/13/1044923/-Romney-campaign-responds-to-claim-by-Mitt-Romney-that-he-is-progressive?via=blog_1
Good afternoon TOD family
there is definitely more god news in the air, I can’t keep up with al these encouraging stories.
The president’s speech in Kansas was one of his best. I decided to slice and dice it.
Everyday a new piece will come out (there are 10)
today’s piece
The basic bargain that made this country great has eroded
Key phrases:
Grandparents believed in an America where hard work paid off, responsibility was rewarded, and anyone could make it if they tried — no matter who you were, where you came from, or how you started out.
Today, we are still home to the world’s most productive workers and innovative companies. But for most Americans, the basic bargain that made this country great has eroded.
Fewer and fewer of the folks who contributed to the success of our economy actually benefited from that success.
Those at the very top grew wealthier from their incomes and investments than ever before. But everyone else struggled with costs that were growing and paychecks that weren’t
http://www.whatisworking.com/2011/12/basic-bargain-that-made-this-country.html
Simply AWESOME!!
😀 😀 😀
Fantastic, you are a WARRIOR!!!!
Thank you, WiW, for your unrelenting focus on the positive in our campaign to 2012! You are a champion!
xxxxxx
Got to go give my offspring a ride to a college exam, then hang around for 3+ hours, as the buses are on strike and it’s too much to come back home, then go back later! Ai yi yi! Maybe, I’ll take my laptop with me and see if it will work from a hallway . 😉
Hey guys – this may have already been posted (been busy hand addressing our office HOLIDAY cards – yes, they’re holiday cards. My boss is Jewish, and I get all those MAJOR holidays off TOO, and it ROCKS!!!))
GIANT DOUCHEBAG ALERT: Who crashes someone’s meal just to insult them? That would be giant GOP Douchebag Romney:
~~~WATCH THE VIDEO~~~
http://unicornbooty.com/blog/2011/12/12/romney-accidentally-crashes-married-gay-vets-date-while-trolling-for-anti-gay-votes/
100 Black Men of America, Inc. and University of Phoenix Bring Education and Mentoring Services to Underserved
http://www.whatisworking.com/2011/12/100-black-men-of-america-inc-and.html
Keeping the Beat: A Teacher Talks About Schools, Music Education, and the American Jobs Act.
http://www.whatisworking.com/2011/12/keeping-beat-teacher-talks-about.html
Tunisia swore in their new President!
Let’s find who to blame.
Washington Jewish Week: When flames swept through Israel’s Carmel Forest last year, destroying dozens of homes and lives, President Barack Obama didn’t hesitate to help, said Michael Oren, the Israeli ambassador to the U.S….
…. Netanyahu directed his ambassador to, “Quick, go ask President Obama for help.”
That’s when Oren entered the White House and asked to see the president. “I told him the situation and without hesitation, President Obama turned to one of his aides and said, ‘get Israel whatever it needs. Now,'” Oren recalled.
….”America has 11 fire-fighting planes; the next morning, 8 of them took off for Israel, along with a team of fire-fighting commandos.” “Later that night,” Oren continued, “I learned, that the President left the Hanukkah reception and flew secretly to Afghanistan. Upon arriving, he called Washington and the first question he asked, ‘Has Israel gotten its planes?'”…
Full article here: http://washingtonjewishweek.com/main.asp?SectionID=88&SubSectionID=275&ArticleID=16246
Thank you, Chip. Matthew 6:4. President Obama the first Jewish President.
That is my favorite – well, the entire SOTM – but especially that – PRAY in secret, GIVE in secret, don’t brag or waive or shout about your shit. STFU. The Lord sees you.
😀 😀 😀
Guess Which Candidate Is The Most Organized In Iowa?
With less than a month to go until the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses, you’d probably think the candidate with the most offices and the the biggest operation in the Hawkeye State would be a Republican.
You’d be wrong.
The Obama campaign is touting what it says is already a superior ground operation in Iowa, saying the offices and thousands of volunteer hours it already has up and running in the state are a sign that it’s better prepared for the general election than the other side.
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/
OK, so it looks like Christiane Amanpour is leaving This Week. Whatever, I don’t watch but I know you guys think she’s not very good so that’s probably a good thing. But don’t get your hopes up for a replacement, especially when you see beltway insiders pushing BS like this:
Tapper makes me GAG. I had to turn off the DPB today because his voice and whining just drives me nuts.
He has a very condescending attitude. Always inserts himself in the story somehow…I’m not concerned I used to watch Russert religiously (at least he was fair) but Gregory does nothing for me. If anything, Fareed is the only Sunday talk that I watch.
Didn’t Tapper turn down a gig to be Bidens press secretary or something recently? He’s a dink, but off the WH Press corp beat he’d be a dink to both sides. Right now he seems himself as the voice of the opposition.
Nah, he was never considered for anything in the WH and if he said so, he was probably lying. I don’t think they would want that level of toxicity and sloppiness in the WH. He’d probably be a continuous leak to the press and the GOP.
Tapper is a Repub. Why would Biden ask that fool to be his press secretary? These folks like to pretend that they turned down gigs from the WH (e.g., Krugman) when the opposite is true.
On the one hand I’m happy Christiane is leaving. She was terrible as the host of TH and that’s being kind. Watching her lob softball questions to GOP guests was nauseating. On the other hand Jake Tapper is the scum of the earth. Everytime I see him smugly and snidely carry GOP water in the press briefings I just want someone to smack him hard. So, like you said Meta, it’s not a win win that’s for sure.
I’m sure she’s happy too – she was never that kind of reporter before. I’m sure she hated having the corporate muzzle on.
I remember an exchange she had with a GOP shill during the Iraq War. Basically he was castigating her for not being pro-war in her reporting; she said that it wasn’t her job to be pro-war, but to report accurately. That’s the Christiane that I liked.
Paging Joe Asborough
Pew Poll Obama: 46% Approve, 43% Disapprove
You guys wanna bet what Pew led off on the write up of this poll.
Lemme Guess:
“Obama’s TOAST For 2012!!!”
Asborough = WIN
ROFLMAO
The White House has formally threatened to veto a GOP-authored bill that would link the extension of a payroll tax cut that President Obama has sought to other Republican priorities.
The House is scheduled to vote later Tuesday on the measure, which would extend for a year a reduction in the payroll taxes paid by millions of workers from 6.2 to 4.2 percent. But the bill would also require a speedy decision on construction of the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline.
Obama had previously said he rejected linking the two issues, but he had not said officially that he would veto the measure if it passed.
In a statement, the White House said the House bill “plays politics at the expense of middle-class families, … breaks the bipartisan agreement on spending cuts that was reached just a few months ago” in the August debt deal and “would inevitably lead to pressure to cut investments in areas like education and clean energy.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/2chambers/post/white-house-threatens-to-veto-house-payroll-tax-cut-bill/2011/12/13/gIQAYjKCsO_blog.html
And it also defunds obamacare!
THIS.
And NPR announced this without referencing the glitch which is the Keystone XL pipeline provision. Shilling for continued funding from GOP butchers, obviously.
Well the political battle is going to be fierce in the coming days. I hope democrats have the president’s back. I wouldn’t be surprised if President Obama ends up making an address to the nation prime time about this, to counter the “both sides are responsible for the gridlock” BS that the media will surely push.
The Obama campaign is touting what it says is already a superior ground operation in Iowa, saying the offices and thousands of volunteer hours it already has up and running in the state are a sign that it’s better prepared for the general election than the other side.
The numbers are indeed stark. While no Republican candidate has more than one campaign office in Iowa, the Obama campaign has eight offices open across the state.
What has all that manpower done since April, when the reelect kicked off? Some stats from the Obama campaign in Iowa:
• Held over 1,000 trainings, planning sessions, house parties, and phone banks.
• Made over 250,000 calls to supporters.
• Held over 2,500 one-on-one conversations.
• Opened eight campaign offices across the state for the November 2012 election- Cedar Rapids, Sioux City, Des Moines, Waterloo, Davenport, Iowa City, Dubuque and Council Bluffs.
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/12/team-obama-were-the-most-organized-campaign-in-iowa.php?m=1
Wow. They really are a political juggernaut. Underestimate them at your peril GOP.
Some idiot by the name of Steven M. (who probably is a Romney supporter) over at the Booman Tribune is claiming that Gingrich has dropped considerably in the Iowa polls meaning that Romney will probably be the GOP nominee. Then he goes on to say that Romney will beat Obama if he is the GOP nominee. Some of these bloggers spend way too much time in delusional PL circles and not enough time assessing reality on the ground.
Well, Gingrich has dropped in Iowa, according to the latest PPP poll. But it’s not Mittens’ who’s benefiting, but Ron Paul. Festivus has come early for us. 🙂
If memory serves correctly, Mike Huckabee won Iowa in 2008 and then went on to a miserable defeat by John McCain… so to quote Halprin, Gingrich falling in the polls in Iowa is good news FOR JOHN MCCAIN!!!!
That NEVER gets old.
I don’t trust that PPP poll at all. It seems like an outlier. Every other poll taken in the last week has Newt up 10+, and PPP finds he’s only up +1 on Paul? Doesn’t sound right – also Paul’s favorables skyrocket and Newt’s plummets – seems fishy when nothing really happened other than the debate which Newt more than held his own in.
All I know is that I shall have a plentiful supply of popcorn and Manhattans on Jan 3. Now I just have to decide whether to watch on MSNBC or BBC World.
Wow, this is staggeringly fantastic!!!!
And they’re the only major campaign *not* facing a make or break caucus only weeks away.
I have a suspicion that the “meme” of an inevitable Obama-Biden defeat has done far more harm to the President’s opponents than it has to the President.
This should be on the air in Iowa, NH, Virginia, Florida, NC.
Oh it will be…… in 3…2…1…
Eric Cantor is a liar just like all the Republicans .
He wants those who can afford it to step up to the plate and spend their money on health care but not on taxes? JERK!
MORON!
Donald Trump pulls out of Iowa debate over ‘conflict of interest’
BWWAAHHHAAA!
Donald Trump is a moron. I wonder if the establishment has anything to do w/ him pulling out. They HAVE to realize that their current primary is a clown show.
An excellent link I actually found from a poster on HuffyFluffy:
http://obamaachievements.org/
A Short List of Barack Obama’s Major Progressive Achievements Thus Far
Our main achievements list is being updated, and will be released in the fall of 2011. You can read about the effort here.
In the meantime, you may find the following useful as you try to educate people about the realities of the Obama administration, as opposed to the many myths, rumors, and allegations made about it.
In a very pointed essay about how wrong some libertarian-left bloggers can be, Booman Tribune (@booMan23) outlined a very good summary of just some of the major progressive achievements of the Obama administration.
Obama has overhauled the food safety system
Advanced women’s rights in the work place
Ended Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) in our military
Stopped defending DOMA in court.
Passed the Hate Crimes bill.
Appointed two pro-choice women to the Supreme Court.
Expanded access to medical care and provided subsidies for people who can’t afford it.
Expanded the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP)
Fixed the preexisting conditions travesty [and rescissions] in health insurance.
Invested in clean energy.
Overhauled the credit card industry, making it much more consumer-friendly.
While Dodd-Frank bill was weak in many respects, it was still an extremely worthwhile start at re-regulating the financial sector.
He created a Elizabeth Warren’s dream agency: The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
He’s done a lot for veterans
He got help for people whose health was injured during the clean-up after the 9/11 attacks.
None of these things were priorities for Republicans. They actively opposed, directly or indirectly through obstruction, every single item on this list. In fact, they succeeded in killing a Cap & Trade bill in the Senate after it had passed through the House.
All of these things are improvements that would not have occurred under a McCain-Palin administration. Moreover, a McCain-Palin administration would have moved in the other direction on most of these issues, or come up with even worse compromises.
Booman then concludes with:
The president has achieved a tremendous amount under the circumstances. And it matters greatly that he not be replaced by Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, or Michele Bachmann. Or even Ron Paul.
Something has to be done about the WH press corp! Watched the briefing this am and can’t stand the front row. This is the best this country can do???? It is so insulting to this country that these jr. high types are there with their snark. I want to roll my eyes and say “Oh plllleasseee” in my best jr. high school voice. Is there anyone to talk to about those idiots?
I could not agree more. The jackals are obsessed with process, feelings, and who’s up and who’s down. They can’t ask a question that doesn’t have at its root a GOP talking point. On top of that, the questions are dripping with sarcasm, snark and gotcha. It’s like a game. I have actually seen Ed “Cheshire Cat” Henry sit with a goofy smile on his face as he asks the Fox questions of the day. And Nora “Ice Princess” O’Donnell sits on her perch with her legs crossed in the front row and snarls her questions at Jay each day. And the biggest snarl of them all comes from Jake Tapper. He always seems to have a bug up his arse about something obscure.
It’s no wonder that President Obama has to do so many interviews with LOCAL media. The jackals are becoming irrelevant. The daily briefings are a waste of time. I can’t imagine how a so called reporter waits all day to ask such stupid questions. Jay Carney has been doing a terrific job but it is really sad that he has to deal with such nonsense. He and we deserve better.
And the noose continues to tighten around the Murdochs in the UK: Emails warned James Murdoch on extent of hacking.
First two grafs:
If Baby Doc Murdoch knew, then you can bet Papa Doc did as well.
HHS grants $14M for school-based health centers
December 08, 2011 | Rene Letourneau, Managing Editor
WASHINGTON – The Department of Health and Human Services granted more than $14 million Thursday to 45 school-based health centers across the country, increasing the number of children served at the centers by nearly 50 percent. Clinics receiving the awards are already providing healthcare services to 112,000 children. Funded through the Affordable Care Act, the grants will enable the centers to expand their capacity and modernize their facilities, which will allow them to treat an estimated additional 53,000 children in 29 states.
School-based health centers enable children with acute or chronic illnesses to attend school, and improve the overall health and wellness of all children through health screenings, health promotion and disease prevention activities. Typically, a school-based clinic provides a combination of primary care, mental health care, substance abuse counseling, case management, dental health, nutrition education, health education and health promotion activities.
~snip~
http://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/hhs-grants-14m-school-based-health-centers
HHS offers online insurance finder for small biz owners
November 21, 2011 | Mary Mosquera, Contributing Editor
WASHINGTON – Small business owners can find and compare health insurance plan choices with a new tool provided by the Health and Human Services Department. The web-based health insurance finder tool is designed to enable small employers to research locally available products and promote a more transparent and competitive marketplace for health coverage.
With the interactive tool, small business owners can access insurance products in a given zip code, sorted by out-of-pocket limits, average cost per enrollee, or other factors. The tool can also supply a summary of cost and coverage for small group products that shows the available deductibles, range of co-pay options, included and excluded benefits, and benefits available for purchase at additional cost.
Small enterprise owners can filter product selection based on whether the plans are health savings account eligible, have prescription drug, mental health, or maternity coverage, or allow for domestic partner or same sex coverage.
http://www.healthcarefinancenews.com/news/hhs-offers-online-insurance-finder-small-biz-owners
Did everyone see this???
Under President Obama, the nation’s deficit will shrink to less than $1 trillion in 2012, the Treasury Department announced yesterday. The deficit in 2011 and 2010 was $1.3 trillion. Treasury projects that the budget deficit for fiscal year 2012 will come in at $996 billion.
The federal deficit has not been below $1 trillion in at least four years, and the last president to reduce the deficit rather than increase it was Bill Clinton.
The automatic expiration of the Bush Tax Cuts at the end of next year will eliminate most of the $996 billion that remains over the next decade.
This should be the biggest story of the week if not the entire month, but I won’t hold my breath. I’m sure the beltway is busy deciding how to spin this as bad news for Democrats.
The beltway media will allow President Bush cronies to state that it’s been because of Bush policies pushed by Republicans that the deficit is being reduced, thus why President Obama is a failure and that we must vote for one of their cronies next year as President.
And I cry BULLSHIT! Make them prove it…bet they can’t
As well as this handy dandy little “filibuster chart”….guess who won the prize??!!
http://bobcesca.com/blog-archives/2011/12/republican-obstructionism.html
Hi everyone, new post:
http://theobamadiary.com/2011/12/13/evening-all-13/
ok – I thought I got this link from this page – but now I can’t find it. I was going to THANK whomever posted it, but FRAK!
Great article by Sullivan –
http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2011/12/all-american-prejudice.html
And – I REALLY want to go to this wedding!!!
You don’t see folks getting their skivvies in a bunch over the Amish. What’s the difference?
Quote of the day!
Two Iowa pastors: Newt Gingrich is “empty suit with broken zipper.”
http://dmreg.co/v8hFDg
😆