Attorney for Stormy Daniels says that she can describe Donald Trump's genitalia in "great detail."

(Relevant portion starts at around the 9:00 mark.)

Courtesy of Mediaite:  

Michael Avenatti, the lawyer to porn star Stephanie Clifford (better known as Stormy Daniels), said in a Wednesday interview with Megyn Kelly Today that his client has a whole lot more to say about her alleged affair with the president. 

The interview arrived after a 60 Minutes segment featuring Clifford in March, in which she described her interactions with Trump and claimed to have sex with the president shortly after the birth of his youngest son. In the segment, host Anderson Cooper focused largely on the timeline of events, as well as the threat she said she received in the parking lot of a fitness class while in the midst of sharing her story on Trump with a tabloid magazine years before the election. 

Apparently, there’s a lot left to be told about the affair. 

“When she sat for that interview, it actually lasted over two hours in length … the portion that the American public saw was only about 14 or 16 minutes,” Avenatti said Wednesday. “CBS, they’re a conservative network. There’s a lot of information that was said that did not make it into the final 60 Minutes piece.” 

“For instance, she can describe the president’s genitalia in great detail, that did not make it into the piece,” he added.

God I hate Megyn Kelly, who I still think is carrying water for the conservatives, but I thought that this interview was interesting and worthy of being shared.

I actually think that one of Trump's greatest fears is for one of the many women who saw his penis describing it on national television.

So about that Stormy Daniels interview.....

Courtesy of HuffPo: 

What’s important here is the way Trump and his circle of enablers went about trying to cover up these (alleged) affairs, while Trump himself was seeking the top political office in the country. 

Trump’s personal lawyer and his allies at the National Enquirer used nondisclosure agreements to silence these women, taking a page from the corporate playbook. 

NDAs are already far too common in the business world, used to paper over a host of misdeeds, most crucially sexual harassment and discrimination. Disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein is perhaps the most egregious abuser of NDAs, which allowed him to harass and assault women for decades. 

“Donald Trump is acting like he personally owns this information, as though he can act like a king and take any measures to control the way people talk about him,” said Heidi Kitrosser, a professor of constitutional law at the University of Minnesota Law School. “You can’t do that when you’re acting with the power of the federal government.”

Now I will admit that is important to learn, but not so much because it reveals that Trump is a misogynist who controlled women with threats of lawsuits or used his wealth to buy their silence.

But what is most important about that is what Vox reported late last night: 

Stormy Daniels’ 60 Minutes interview was, in its way, fascinating. But it ultimately failed to shed light on the two most interesting questions posed by this entire imbroglio, presumably because Daniels herself doesn’t know the answer.

1. How many other sexual partners has Trump paid hush money to? 
2. How many foreign intelligences services know about one or more of those women? 

Trump has secrets that Trump regards as worth keeping. 

And while that put Daniels under pressure, it means that entities with more power and sophistication than an adult film actress can use those secrets to put pressure on Trump. The president has successfully cultivated an image as so flaky and incompetent, that his many baffling decisions on the world stage — from leaking Israeli intelligence to the Russian foreign minister to undercutting his own administration’s policy on Qatar to mysteriously leaving Japan off a list of allies exempted from steel tariffs — generally get written off as evidence that Trump is flaky and incompetent, rather than being actively manipulated by foreign actors.

Exactly!

Now I alluded to this last night in the comments section, because that is the truly relevant point that is being revealed with this interview, and the one Karen McDougal gave a few days ago.

Donald Trump's careless lifestyle has rendered him vulnerable to blackmail, and manipulation by just just about ANYBODY. And that includes foreign governments.

I am still in the first 100 pages of David Corn's book "Russian Roulette" but I have already learned that Donald Trump went to Russia a variety of times in the 80's, 90's, and 2000's, at least once at the invitation of the Kremlin.

We know that the Russian government has a habit of gathering embarrassing information on American celebrities and politicians that can be used later, yet Trump seems to have clumsily wandered into that lion's den on multiple occasions.

What's more, according to the book, Trump bragged to friends and associates that the Russian women were "without morals," which indicates to me that his interactions with them were less than dignified, and may in fact have been truly pornographic.

And of course all of this was talked about in that Christopher Steele dossier which the conservatives are so desperate to dismiss as "fake news."

So do I think there is a "pee tape?"

Hell, I think the pee tape might only be the first course in a depravity riddled sequence of DVDs which Donald Trump is desperate to see left buried until long after he has shuffled off this mortal coil.

And it was THAT probability which was driven home last night during this interview with Stormy Daniels.

P.S. By the way I would suggest that the trolls simply give up on trying to shame Stormy on social media.....

Yes, I am. Nice to meet ya! https://t.co/kUdVLRWwu0

— Stormy Daniels (@StormyDaniels) March 26, 2018

....it simply doesn't work.

Donald Trump is thinking of publicly fighting the Stormy Daniels allegations. Yes please.

Courtesy of TPM: 

President Donald Trump is reportedly mulling over whether to maintain his silence on his alleged pre-presidency affairs with porn actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal, according to a Wall Street Journal report Friday. 

WSJ reports that Trump, who has previously denied the allegations, privately discussed with his advisers about the possibility of “publicly” fighting the allegations “on Twitter or elsewhere.”

Trump’s advisers reportedly assured him that “there is no sign the allegations are hurting him with voters” and that fighting back publicly “would look inappropriate for the President to engage in a public spat with.”

Please, what do lawyers know?

They should just let Trump be Trump.  Right?

Trump is also apparently telling people behind the scenes that this whole Stormy Daniels thing is nothing more than a political hoax. 

For his part Daniels' attorney is ready to throw down hard.

Courtesy of the Daily Beast:

“The president may be able to fire Mr. [Robert] Mueller and others who may challenge him, but he cannot fire me, or my client. We will not be going away any time soon,” Michael Avenatti, Daniels’ attorney, told The Daily Beast. “If they [in Trumpworld] are upset about what has transpired over the last two weeks, they are really going to be upset when they see what is going to transpire over the next few months—because the last two weeks haven’t been a warm-up lap.”

And Trump is actually very worried.

Inside the chronically chaos-driven Trump White House, Stormy Daniels is a high-profile hassle and headache that now must be managed on a daily basis. According to two sources familiar with the situation, the White House press operation has at least one person whose job it is to monitor the latest developments on the Daniels front.

As well he should be.

Note: (a) not all of our evidence will be mentioned/displayed tonight – that would be foolish; (b) we are not sure what CBS will include but we know a lot from the full interview will have to be cut bc of the time allowed; (c) tonight is not the end – it’s the beginning. #basta

— Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) March 25, 2018

Now THAT is the kind of lawyer Trump wishes he could get on his Russia legal team.

Still if Trump is such a bad ass then let him tackle this thing head on.

After all if he is going to be such a pussy about it then perhaps he will have to start grabbing himself.

All I know is that at around 6:00 PM Alaska time, I am going to be watching a certain porn star screw the president of the United States on national television.

If you do not want to wait that long here is a transcript of what she will say.

Figuratively speaking of course.

Here is a key portion:  

Anderson Cooper: He was showing you his own picture on the cover of a magazine. 

Stormy Daniels: Right, right. And so I was like, "Does this-- does this normally work for you?" And he looked very taken-- taken back, like, he didn't really understand what I was saying. Like, I was-- does, just, you know, talking about yourself normally work?" And I was like, "Someone should take that magazine and spank you with it." (LAUGH) And I'll never forget the look on his face. He was like-- 

Anderson Cooper: What-- what was his look? 

Stormy Daniels: Just, I don't think anyone's ever spoken to him like that, especially, you know, a young woman who looked like me. And I said, you know, "Give me that," and I just remember him going, "You wouldn't." "Hand it over." And-- so he did, and I was like, turn around, drop 'em." 

Anderson Cooper: You-- you told Donald Trump to turn around and take off his pants. 

Stormy Daniels: Yes. 

Anderson Cooper: And did he? 

Stormy Daniels: Yes. So he turned around and pulled his pants down a little -- you know had underwear on and stuff and I just gave him a couple swats.

Oh that is not going to go over very well with his base. 

Attorney claims that Stormy Daniels was physically threatened by Trump or one of his associates.

JUST IN: Stormy Daniels' lawyer Michael Avenatti tells @Morning_Joe that his client has been "physically threatened."

"I think it will become apparent to people when they tune in to 60 minutes ... the details related to the threat." pic.twitter.com/l3xGXjciS4

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) March 16, 2018

So that is what I woke up to this morning.

According to the attorney some of these incidents even happened during the campaign.

And before any Trump defenders start arguing that Trump would not be this stupid, take a look at this story: 

Lawyers for President Donald Trump’s family hotel business threatened a Panamanian judicial official handling a dispute related to Trump Hotels’ management of a 70-story luxury hotel, according to a complaint filed with the anti-corruption division of Panama’s chief prosecutor. 

The complaint reviewed by The Associated Press said lawyers from the firm representing Trump’s hotel management business accosted a justice of the peace, Marisol Carrera, in her office after she ruled against Trump’s business on a minor issue in the fight over control of the Trump-branded luxury hotel. The abuse continued, she wrote, even after she called police to defuse the situation.

Trump has a long history of using strong arm tactics and intimidation to get his way.

But threatening a woman who he once had an affair with is a new kind of low.

Not that doing so will change anything as there are at least six more women coming forward with similar stories. Two even have their own NDA's.

By the way that 60 Minutes segment with Stormy Daniels is now scheduled to air next Sunday.

I have a feeling it will be a ratings hit.

Trump lawyers looking for way to stop 60 Minutes from airing interview with Stormy Daniels tonight. Update!

@michaelavenatti@StormyDaniels @andersoncooper@60minutes pic.twitter.com/U3pf6DHEaf

— Michael Avenatti (@MichaelAvenatti) March 8, 2018

Courtesy of Buzzfeed:  

Lawyers associated with President Donald Trump are considering legal action to stop 60 Minutes from airing an interview with Stephanie Clifford, the adult film performer and director who goes by Stormy Daniels, BuzzFeed News has learned. 

“We understand from well-placed sources they are preparing to file for a legal injunction to prevent it from airing,” a person informed of the preparations told BuzzFeed News on Saturday evening. 

It was not immediately clear what legal argument the lawyers would be making to support the considered litigation, and Trump and his legal team often have threatened litigation without following through on those threats in the past.

The action would be the latest in a flurry of developments in a case that began just before the 2016 election when Cohen paid Clifford $130,000 in return for her silence about a sexual relationship she allegedly had with Trump in 2006. At the time, Trump was under intense pressure over comments he’d made about his treatment of women in the run-up to the vote.

The entire way that the Trump team has handled this problem has been clumsy and sophomoric.

It is like one of those stupid sitcoms where the protagonists are trying to break into a room to delete an embarrassing phone message, and it only ends up causing even more problems for them.

Attempting to stop this interview only proves that what Stormy Daniels is going to say is true, and could harm Donald Trump in some way.

Update: So a new update says the interview will not be aired until next Sunday. 

Boy somebody is working overtime to keep this story off of the air.

Steve Bannon breaks with Trump. Calls firing of James Comey "the biggest mistake in modern political history."

Courtesy of The Hill: 

Asked during an interview on "60 Minutes" Sunday if it was true that he called the Comey firing the "biggest mistake in political history," Bannon said, "That probably would be too bombastic, even for me, but maybe modern political history." 

Bannon told interviewer Charlie Rose that had Trump not fired Comey, the president would not be faced with an investigation into possible Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election. 

"I don't think there's any doubt that if James Comey had not been fired, we would not have a special counsel," Bannon said, referring to Robert Mueller. 

“We would not have the Mueller investigation, we would not have a Mueller investigation in the breadth that clearly Mr. Mueller is going in.”

I agree with Bannon that there would likely be no Special Counsel assigned to this instigation, however I do not think the FBI's version would be really any less aggressive.

What the Russians did was an attack on our very democracy, so the law enforcement agencies were simply not going to sit back and do nothing about it.  

And even before the firing of the FBI Director Trump was showing signs of guilt and making attempts to obfuscate, so that would only have drawn more intense scrutiny even without this blatant attempt to sabotage the investigations.

60 Minutes expose reveals that members of Congress spend up to 30 hours a week on the phone raising money.

Courtesy of Mediaite:  

“The number one priority they tell new members of Congress is: raise money, raise money, raise money,” David Jolly (R-FL) told CBS’s Norah O’Donnell as part of 60 Minutes Overtime. 

The story that O’Donnell was covering for 60 Minutes dealt with the call centers that elected officials spend upwards of 30 hours per week inside of with one express purpose: make phone calls to influential donors to raise money. 

Holy crap! This is stunning!

No wonder nothing ever seems to get done in Washington.

I think that this "Stop Act" is a good first step in getting money out of politics, which clearly is something that needs to happen as asking for money seems to be the job one for politicians in Washington right now.

And then after that we need campaign finance reform and for a new Supreme Court to reverse the Citizen's United decision.

Just imagine how politics would be changed for the better if all of that were to happen.

I'm fantasizing out loud again aren't I?

Still a boy can dream, can't he?

Trump takes to Twitter to attack the President over his "60 Minutes" interview.

President Obama was terrible on @60Minutes tonight. He said CLIMATE CHANGE is the most important thing, not all of the current disasters!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 12, 2015

Great, everyone is saying I did much better on @60Minutes last week than President Obama did tonight. I agree!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 12, 2015

I swear it's like watching a four year old call another kid "Doody-head" on the playground.

I think the reason is most likely because the President said this during his interview:

Obama said Trump had tapped into something that "exists in the Republican Party that's real. I think there is genuine anti-immigrant sentiment in the large portion of at least Republican primary voters." U.S. President Barack Obama speaks at a Democratic fundraiser for Senator Patty Murray in Seattle, W … 

"He is, you know, the classic reality TV character," the Democratic president said, adding it was not surprising Trump had received a lot of attention in the campaign's early stages. 

Asked if he thought Trump would eventually disappear from the race, Obama replied: "I'll leave it up to the pundits to make that determination. I don't think he'll end up being president of the United States."

Which is backed up by this statement made to Fox News on today:  

"He can't say, 'I think he's going to make it,' in all fairness," Trump said of Obama's prediction. "He can't say...'Well I think he's going to be the next president.'"

You know Donald Trump keeps arguing that he is not the product of his mother having sex with an orangutan, but if so then why does he keep throwing his feces around, and why did he drop his suit against Bill Maher.

P.S. By the way I watched that 60 Minutes interview and thought the President did just fine.

For those who have wondered how such a well respected news program as 60 Minutes could have fallen for the Benghazi conspiracy theories, I think we may now have an answer.

Courtesy of Brad Blog:  

The President of CBS News is David Rhodes. He was hired in February 2011. He was formerly the Vice President of News at Fox "News". 

Again, the current President of CBS News was formerly the VP of News at Fox "News". 

According to his bio posted at CBS: "Rhodes began his career as a Production Assistant at the newly-launched Fox News Channel in 1996, where he later became Vice President of News. At the network he managed coverage of three presidential elections, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, hurricanes including Katrina, and was the channel's Assignment Manager on the news desk the morning of September 11, 2001." 

That means, as The Nation's Greg Mitchell pointed out at the height of the recent CBS News/60 Minutes Benghazi report controversy (before CBS was finally forced to retract the entire fake story), that Rhodes "was the guy who worked hand-in-glove on the biased, often propagandistic, Fox 'coverage' of the run-up to the Iraq war, the 2000/2004/2008 elections, the Plame affair, the worst years in Iraq, and all other things Bush and Cheney, and so on." 

Again, the guy who cut his teeth in the news business, beginning as a Production Assistant and working his way up to become VP at Fox "News", is now the President of CBS News.

Well now, I guess that puts everything into perspective now doesn't it?

Not only did 60 Minutes drink the Kool-aid on the Benghazi story, they have continued to carry the Right Wing water in more thinly veiled attacks against President Obama, including a clearly biased and fact free report on the President's policies on clean energy that aired Sunday night.

You know, and this may be somewhat off topic (But then again not so much), but part of the Seven Mountains Dominionist mandate (The same group behind Sarah Palin's rise to power.) is to infiltrate the secular media and start to change the focus from within to start reflecting Biblical points of view and more Christian friendly political opinions.

I'm not saying definitively that this is a product of that program, but it would not be too far off base to imagine that the Right Wing may have adopted that model as their blueprint for inserting their own sleeper cells into once trustworthy bastions of journalism.

Lara Logan takes "leave of absence" after flawed 60 Minute Benghazi report.

Courtesy of the New York Times:

The CBS News correspondent Lara Logan and her producer, Max McClellan, made serious errors in an Oct. 27 report on the attack on the American compound in Benghazi, Libya, and will take leaves of absence, the network announced on Tuesday. Four Americans died in the Sept. 11, 2012, attack, including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens. 

The moves come after weeks of criticism directed at a “60 Minutes” report which was based on an interview with a hired security agent, Dylan Davies, whose comments to CBS News were later discredited. 

CBS did not specify the length of the leave of absence for its two staff members, nor whether they would continue to be paid. In general, television correspondents do not lose salary unless they are suspended. 

Beyond Ms. Logan, who has been a rising star at CBS News, the review could have implications for the leadership of Jeffrey Fager, the chairman of CBS News, who is also the executive producer of “60 Minutes.” Mr. Fager sent an email to the staff on Tuesday, saying: “As executive producer, I am responsible for what gets on the air. I pride myself in catching almost everything, but this deception got through and it shouldn’t have.” 

He added: “We are making adjustments at ’60 Minutes’ to reduce the chances of it happening again.”

I can see the Fox News coverage of this already, "Benghazi claims yet another victim."

Man you would think at this point even the Right Wing would avoid Benghazi at all cost.

You know if they had any journalistic integrity whatsoever.

Which of course they don't.

SNL takes on Toronto mayor Rob Ford.

I actually only found this mildly amusing until they got to the last part.

I think it is hilarious that after the Benghazi debacle 60 Minutes is now ripe for mocking, which SNL did to perfection.

CBS has apologized for reporting lies about Benghazi. What do you say Fox News?

Courtesy of Media Matters:  

By the end of Fox News' regular programming schedule at 11 PM EST on November 8, the network had acknowledged the fact that CBS pulled its 60 Minutes report in only one 26-second segment. On Special Report, host Bret Baier stated, "CBS is backing off a report on 60 Minutes -- we told you about last week -- that relied on a source whose credibility has crumbled."

I actually don't expect Fox to issue an apology, or retract anything they report, about this, the fast and furious debacle, or the fake IRS targeting Tea Party organizations "scandal."

After all only actual news organizations are directed by journalistic ethics.

The 60 Minutes "expose" on Benghazi may destroy the last of CBS's journalistic credibility.

Courtesy of Media Matters:  

The Benghazi "witness" featured in a CBS 60 Minutes report that galvanized new discussion of the administration's response to the attack previously said he never got near the diplomatic compound on the night of the attack, according to a report from The Washington Post. 

The revelation comes just days after Fox News reported that they had previously been using the same man as a source, but broke contact after he asked the network for money. Two days after the CBS report aired, Threshold Editions, an imprint of Simon and Schuster that "specializes in conservative non-fiction," published the supposed witness' book, The Embassy House: The Explosive Eyewitness Account of the Libyan Embassy Siege by the Soldier Who Was There. According to the Post, the book "largely comports with the 60 Minutes account." 

Together, these details paint a damning picture of the credibility of the supposed eyewitness -- and that of the CBS report which promoted his story. 

During the October 27 report, which was based on a year-long investigation by correspondent Lara Logan and producer Max McCellan, Logan described the man, identified as "Morgan Jones, a pseuodonym he's using for his own safety," as "a security officer who witnessed the attack." She explained that during the attack, "Jones scaled the twelve-foot high wall of the compound that was still overrun with al Qaeda fighters"; during an interview, he told her he had personally struck one of those terrorists in the face with his rifle butt. After the attack, "Jones" claimed in the report that he went to the Benghazi hospital and saw Ambassador Chris Stevens' body. 

"Jones" also told CBS' audience that he had been worried about the compound coming under attack, and that Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith, who died in the assault, had shared similar concerns with him. 

But according to the Post, "Jones," whose real name was confirmed as Dylan Davies, revealed none of those details in the incident report to his security contractor employer that he wrote following the attack. Instead, he wrote that he never got near the compound that night and learned of Stevens' death from a colleague. From the Post: 

In Davies's 21 / 2-page incident report to Blue Mountain, the Britain-based contractor hired by the State Department to handle perimeter security at the compound, he wrote that he spent most of that night at his Benghazi beach-side villa. Although he attempted to get to the compound, he wrote in the report, "we could not get anywhere near .  . . as roadblocks had been set up." He learned of Stevens's death, Davies wrote, when a Libyan colleague who had been at the hospital came to the villa to show him a cellphone picture of the ambassador's blackened corpse. Davies wrote that he visited the still-smoking compound the next day to view and photograph the destruction.

Okay can we finally be done with this Benghazi thing now?

I mean even the most ardent Right Wingers must be smelling the decaying of the dead horse's corpse by now, don't you think?

Sarah Palin pimps a 60 Minutes "expose" on the Social Security Disability Insurance program. Well you know what THAT means!

One time Palin supporter, who may be having second thoughts.

Courtesy of the Heartless Harridan's Facebook page:

In case you missed it, "60 Minutes" did an excellent segment on the waste and fraud in the Federal Disability Insurance Program. Kudos to Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and his staff for leading the investigation into this. And thank you, CBS, for covering it! 

She then links to this story on 60 Minutes in which Steve Kroft, with the help of Senator Coburn and some shady attorneys, supposedly lays bare the overwhelming fraud within the Social Security disability programs.

Now in my job I actually do some work with this program so I was surprised at how aggressively and unfairly 60 Minutes seemed to go after them. And apparently I was not alone, as indicated in the comments section of their own website.

Here is a sampling:  

I am a Social Security Disability Attorney in New York City. I watched the website recording of a 60 Minutes spot that aired last night and was disheartened by the sophistry I witnessed. Anytime I hear words like "It's been called a Secret Welfare System," which has been ravaged by waste and fraud, I cringe. First of all, I would like to know who has called it a secret welfare system --incendiary remarks like that must be backed up with facts. Secondly, who says it has been ravaged by waste and fraud -- this uncorroborated remark was left hanging out there as if it accurately reflected the System as a whole.

I also find it troubling and unacceptable that the only attorneys discussed in the program were Binder and Binder and Eric C. Conn. There were so many others you could have contacted about their experiences with the System. 

 Mr. Kroft, this irresponsible and short-sighted report should never have aired. I am surprised and disappointed in 60 Minutes, a program I have long admired, Please go back to the drawing board and deliver a revised program worthy of the name 60 Minutes. 

Here is another: 

Agree with all that this is a shameful 60 Minutes segment. Not that I doubt some lawyers are making money or that some of our fellow citizens are marginal disability recipients. Rather that 60 Minutes has what I hope is sheer ignorance (and not something else) wrapping the sheep's clothing of revealing fraud around the wolf of Tom Coburn who is a fervent advocate of Republican efforts to destroy America's safety net. Coburn's fundamental mission is not to reform Social Security Disability, but to destroy it by privatization. Too bad 60 Minutes is an enabler in his efforts. 

And another: 

I am one of the allegedly evil attorneys on TV .It might help for people to learn the day I heard of this story the two clients I signed up are typical of our business. The first was a fellow with very bad sarcoidosis affecting many aspects of his ability to work including hands , feet, breathing ,stamina. He was trying for many years to learn what was wrong with him but could not get access to treatment or meds. He is a very religious , humble man who would love to work and has been unable for years ; his church may not be able to help any longer. 

The second was a family whose mother described an adult daughter unable to work for many years now with debilitating psych issues since age 8 including a horrific set of symptoms associated with obsessive compulsive disorder along with severe depression . Ridicule and stigmatize her associated panic attacks after you have spoken with her and her family. The mom called because she reported she never wanted to bother with a claim before , but recognizes she can no longer support this adult daughter whom she had home schooled . 

The truth , as I tell interviewees each day, is that contrary to the harsh stereotypes now circulating with the help of 60 Minutes and other media is that it is very hard to get Social Security disability ;they're gonna think and treat you with cynicism and sometimes almost like a fraudster . Scapegoating those on the receiving end of " hard things happen to good people " is not fair reporting and does great damage. Tom

Then I did a quick Google search to find out if any other news outlets had addressed this obviously biased report.

I quickly found this over at Media Matters:  

Proof that the current health care system is robbing the middle class.

On last night's 60 Minutes Steve Kroft reveals the real reason that health care costs are so high in this country:

If you want to know why healthcare cost so much in this country, consider this. It is estimated that $210 billion a year, about 10% of all health expenditures, goes towards unnecessary tests and treatments and a big chunk of that comes right out of the pockets of American taxpayers. 

I doubt there are too many of us surprised to learn that our "for profit" approach to health care is encouraging malfeasance within the medical community and  making it almost impossible for the average American to afford necessary medical treatment.

And yet there are no lack of those on the Right Wing willing to yell from the mountaintops that our health care system is "the best in the world."

You know saying something over and over does not make it true.

My fervent desire is that after the Affordable Care Act is fully implemented that it will eventually evolve into a single payer system that will ultimately replace the corrupt and predatory system that have currently.

Hey, a liberal can dream can't he?

(H/T to Addicting Info)

These people may represent our last hope of passing serious gun control legislation in this country. 60 Minutes interviews the families of Newtown.

Personally I don't know how ANYBODY could be unmoved by the testimony of these families, and with them now focusing on reaching out to the Washington politicians there is some hope that the NRA may not have the same ability to purchase the votes that they need to block legislation as they have in years past.

(Part two can be found here.)

President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's interview on 60 Minutes from last night.

Part One

Part Two

I will resist any urge to tell you what I think this is all about, and instead simply provide this platform for all of you to discuss YOUR impressions.

However as you discuss I WILL offer a somewhat interesting image from our friends over at Politicususa:

 

Take it for what it's worth.

Clip from 60 Minutes unprecedented joint interview with President Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Okay if this is not some kind of endorsement for Hillary Clinton in 2016 then I will eat my hat.

The President has NEVER done a joint interview with anybody except Michelle and clearly there is a subtext here.

Anybody not agree with that?

The entire interview will be broadcast tonight. I think I will make a point of watching it.

Mark Kelly: Gabby was "troubled" by Palin's crosshairs map. On the other side of common decency Fox News claims Diane Sawyer committed "journalistic malpractice" by including reference to Palin and crosshairs map in 20/20 segment.

Courtesy of The Hill:

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) was "troubled" by a crosshairs chart that appeared on Sarah Palin's Facebook page, showing the congresswoman a target. 

"She was troubled that her district was one of twenty targeted on Sarah Palin's Facebook page and website," Giffords' husband, Mark Kelly, writes in their book "Gabby: A Story of Courage and Hope." 

Kelly recounts that Giffords' told him that "Palin's rhetoric had no place in political discourse." "It sends the wrong messages," he recalls Giffords saying. "It's a dangerous thing to do." 

After Giffords' was injured in the Jan. 8th shooting in Tucson, Ariz., Kelly writes that Palin's "rhetoric came quickly into my head." He notes that when President Obama called to express his condolences, "I told him Gabby and I had found Palin's website troubling." He admits he "vented" to Obama about his frustrations and that the president listened to his complaints without "commenting on them directly." 

Kelly admits "I don't know if the shooter in Tucson even looked at Sarah Palin's website" but he notes politicians "need to tone it down, speak more respectfully." 

He writes that Palin, who was contemplating a presidential bid at the time, never called although he was told by Palin adviser John Coale that "Sarah and her husband, Todd, were 'devastated' by the tragedy." 

Palin, at the time, posted a note on her Facebook page: "My sincere condolences are offered to the family of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and the other victims of today's tragic shooting in Arizona. On behalf of Todd and my family, we all pray for the victims and their families, and for peace and justice," she wrote. 

But Kelly writes: "I thought Sarah Palin might call to say she wished Gabby well and that she was praying for her and the other victims. We heard from many Republicans offering heart-felt messages. Given that a lot of the discussion in the wake of the shooting had singled out Palin, I expected she might also want to clear the air." 

He even imagined what he would say to Palin, writing he planned to "graciously accept her words of consolation" and then add his own thoughts: "'You are not responsible,' I planned to tell Sarah Palin, 'But you are irresponsible.'" 

But "she never called," he notes.

Obviously considering how upset Giffords had been about the map, the idea of her husband immediately thinking of it after she was shot makes perfect sense.  And his expectation that Palin would have reached out to his devastatingly injured wife would have been completely appropriate under the circumstances. (Because of course he did not know Palin like we do.)

Therefore having it included in this segment also makes perfect sense. In fact if it had been left out it would have seemed cowardly of Sawyer and the producers of 60 Minutes, and indicated that they had gone out of their way to avoid upsetting the Palin-bots and Teabaggers.

But that is certainly NOT the way that Fox News sees it:

The documentary, which also contained the first public interview with Giffords since the shooting, was ruined by a gratuitous attack on tea party opponents of health care reform and on Sarah Palin toward the end of the one-hour special. A short segment showed Giffords confronting an angry crowd of constituents at a town hall meeting. Palin was shown briefly, as was the infamous cross hairs map. 

The segment was shown without context or detail. As Giffords is deservedly a national heroine because of how far she has recovered, the segment gave the clear impression of tea partiers as an angry mob and Sarah Palin as the cause of the shooting. 

ABC News and Sawyer committed journalistic malpractice by dredging up the old accusations without also showing evidence that debunked them. Palin and her map had nothing to do with Giffords' shooting, as was implied in the segment. Jared Loughner, Giffords' assailant, was an insane man who likely never heard of Palin and certainly was unaware of the cross hairs map. Yet ABC chose not to mention this. 

Really? So illustrating the out of control political rage, and the rhetoric that fanned the flames of that rage which was so pervasive around the time Giffords was shot in the head, is NOT good journalism?  Considering that it was this incident which inspired the President of the United States to call on Americans to " help usher in more civility in our public discourse," how could 20/20 have left it out?

So what do you think, did 20/20 take a cheap shot at Sarah Palin and the Teabaggers or are the folks at Fox just angry that bringing up the rhetoric and Palin's crosshairs map reflects badly on their pathetic brand of  yellow "journalism?"

60 Minutes reports on the "Sovereign Citizens" movement in this country. This should chill the blood of EVERY law abiding American!

These are VERY dangerous people, and it seems there are more of them coming out of the shadows every day. Like Alaska's own Schaeffer Cox.

(CBS inserted two commercials into this embed which I have no control over. However it is a story important enough to patiently sit through them in my opinion.)