Tonight's Diary Rescue is brought to you by the stellar efforts of ItsJessMe, Rexymeteorite, shayera, dopper0189, grog and vcmvo2 with Bentliberal as editor.

Welcome to Diary Rescue, your daily cure for the meta blues.

On this day - On August 17, 1959, Miles Davis released the legendary jazz recording Kind of Blue, on LP (that's vinyl, people). In 1982, the first Compact Discs (CDs) were released to the public in Germany - no word on when the last ones will be released. In 1962, the 3 other Beatles replaced Pete Best with Ringo Starr. And a birthday of note in 1887 – Marcus Garvey, a Jamaican-born Black rights activist, who you can read more about here.

Tonight's rescued diaries:

• dengre tears apart Fred Hiatt's attempt to establish equivalency between the left and the right on the "birthright citizenship" debate in Classic Fred in the WaPo... (and Tom walks). (rexymeteorite)
• In Two More Innocent Men Released in Texas as Critical Reforms Wait, Edwin Colfax The Justice Project describes how poor eyewitness procedures are responsible for wrongful convictions exposed by DNA evidence. (vcmvo2)
• Word Alchemy continues a series exploring the practical side of non-fiction writing and publishing in To Tell The Truth: Stylistics. (ItsJessMe)
• The BigotBasher reports on how leading Republicans like "Ambassador" John Bolton and Newt Gingrich will be sharing a platform with a group of hard right race baiters in Come on Republicans - how much lower can you sink? Republicans join up with European hate groups. (dopper0189)
• LiberalCanuck wonders when the usual right wing noise makers will start objecting to Other "Ground Zero" Outrages. (grog)
• CharlotteLucas gives a 97 year-old woman's perspective on the "teabagger movement" in I Won't Be Invited To a Tea Party. (vcmvo2)
• It's almost two decades overdue, but it's never too late for a tribute as beautiful as A belated funeral for my friend Sam K. Myth, by Shocko from Seattle. (ItsJessMe)

jotter has High Impact Diaries: August 16, 2010.

brillig brings Top Comments - Idle Games Edition.

Please promote your own favorites in the comments and use as an Open Thread.

If, like me, you occasionally like to slap your forehead at how old you are getting, here is today's installment: best birthday wishes are in order for Donnie Wahlberg: the older brother of actor Mark Wahlberg, a solid actor in his own right, but best known for his years in the boy band New Kids on the Block.

The one-time teen idol turns...41 years old today.

Also celebrating birthdays today: actor Sean Penn (who turns 50), football coach and commentator Jon Gruden (who turns 47) and international footballer Thierry Henry (who celebrates his 33rd birthday today).

Before, we celebrate with a heaping helping of the Tuesday edition of the Wrap, a reminder that tonight sees two states out West heading to their ballot boxes, as the primary season continues.

Check back on the Wednesday edition of the Wrap to find out how the ballots were cast in Washington State (a beautiful state, might I add, having been there on vacation just two short weeks ago) and Wyoming....

THE U.S. SENATE

AZ-Sen: Parraz internal claims close race for Democratic nod
Picking up a poll that slipped through the cracks last week: a new internal poll from Senate contender Randy Parraz has him within striking distance of the long-perceived frontrunner in the Democratic field, Tucson councilman Rodney Glassman. Glassman still leads, even in Parraz's poll, nabbing 20% of the vote to 17% for Parraz. The internal poll, by Dem pollsters Winning Connections, showed a ton of undecideds (nearly half of the electorate) still up for grabs in the August 24th primary.

IL-Sen: PPP poll gives Giannoulias the slight edge in Land of Lincoln
Given the dreadfully conservative electorate projected by PPP in Illinois (the electorate went for Obama in '08 by just nine points, in a state Obama carried by 25), things could certainly be worse here. That said, it is still anyone's ballgame in Illinois, as Democratic state treasurer Alexi Giannoulias holds a narrow edge over Republican Congressman Mark Kirk (37-35). Green Party nominee LeAlan Jones lingers well behind at 9% of the vote, which is a pretty lofty stat for a third-party candidate. Kirk has to be pretty mortified by these numbers. It is hard to imagine that the Dems won't regain a little bit of their electorate here. Furthermore, the Democrat is carrying moderate voters here by seventeen points, despite Kirk's longstanding insistence that he is a moderate. Lastly, the poll included the Green Party option (Jones), but not the Libertarian Party (Mike Labno) or the Constitution Party (Randy Stufflebeam) candidates, which might have inflated Kirk's stats a little bit. It is worth noting, however, that Jones drew equal numbers from liberals and conservatives, indicating that some conservatives might already be using him as a protest vote.

KY-Sen: Electorate matters in Paul-Conway race, according to Ipsos poll
Like most pollsters as of late, the team at Reuters/Ipsos see a very different race in Kentucky, depending on the composition of the electorate. If the race is screened only by voter registration, the race between Republican Rand Paul and Democrat Jack Conway is all knotted up at 40%. However, when the likely voter screen is dropped, Paul opens up a slight lead (45-40) over Conway. One thing keeping Conway alive is that Democratic enthusiasm is only slightly less than GOP enthusiasm in the Bluegrass State. Also, President Obama's numbers, while far from awesome, are not as low (44/55 job approval spread) as some other southern and border states.

LA-Sen: Traylor internal claims runoff possible in GOP primary
There are a lot of grains of salt to accompany this poll, but a local pollster has done some internal polling for GOP Senate challenger Chet Traylor, and finds a potentially competitive contest in the Pelican State. The poll, done by local GOP pollster Verne Kennedy, has Vitter at 46%, with Traylor at 34%. In that scenario, the two candidates would then advance to a runoff election. This stands in stark contrast to other polls, which have found Vitter way ahead and Traylor stuck in single digits. One of the potential reasons why--it appears as if Kennedy (in a pretty sizeable breach of pollster standard operating procedure), asked questions about Vitter's checkered past before asking the trial heat questions. Interestingly (and this must be a typo, the article in question says that a whopping 44% of the sample was not employed.

NH-Sen: GOP primary goes negative as it enters the final month
With less than a month until the primaries in the Granite State, and with polls showing longtime frontrunner Kelly Ayotte in the catbird seat, the GOP primary for the US Senate is finally turning a bit nasty. Free-spending businessman Bill Binnie is gunning for Ayotte, jumping on her for failing to be diligent in her duties as state attorney general, and featuring victims of a major fraud that Binnie argues that Ayotte missed in her term as AG. This came on the heels of state party chairman John Sununu asking for the campaign to remain positive, a request that was swiftly denied by Binnie, who argued that he had a right to "defend himself" in the campaign.

PA-Sen: More GOP electorate yields less support for Sestak in PPP poll
As Tom Jensen noted yesterday, PPP has moved to a likely voter screen for their state-by-state polling. The net result? A much more conservative electorate in the Keystone State, and a high single-digit lead for Republican candidate Patrick Toomey (45-36) over Democrat Joe Sestak. In a sign of how severe the enthusiasm gap is in Pennsylvania, John McCain carried the state among the likely voters of the state in 2008 (of course, he lost the state by ten points in 2008). The good news, if any, for Sestak: the undecided voters went pretty solidly (52-36) for Obama in 2008.

THE U.S. HOUSE

AZ-03/AZ-05: GOP primaries turn very interesting in final week
Jeremy Duda of the Arizona Capitol Times posted some of the latest news emanating from the Congressional primaries in Arizona, and a couple of items are pretty darned interesting. In the 3rd district, which takes in much of the northern suburbs of Phoenix, Duda reports that Ben Quayle's position as the presumptive frontrunner in the race has disappeared amid his own flailing campaign gaffes. In his place, it appears that self-funder Steve Moak and former state legislator Jim Waring have moved into the co-favorite position. Democrats have already coalesced around the fairly impressive campaign of attorney Jon Hulburd. Meanwhile, several miles to the southeast in the Tempe-based 5th district, 2008 nominee and former Maricopa County Treasurer David Schwiekert is taking a potentially perilous premature victory lap. Schweikert announced he is cutting back his advertising buys, because he is so confident of a primary win that he wants to start piling up resources for the general election. Leading to the question: how stupid will Schweikert feel if potential contenders Jim Ward and Susan Bitter Smith catch and pass him in the final week?

CA-05: Give me $20,000, or the campaign is dead!
Those in my age group will fondly recall televangelist Oral Roberts reporting that he would be "called home" by God if he could not raise $8 million dollars in a handful of months (note: it worked. He raised that amount, and then some). Republican candidate Paul Smith (challenging incumbent Doris Matsui in this staunchly Democratic Sacramento-based district) is a bit less lofty in his goals, but the tactics are pretty darned similar. Smith has announced in an email blast to his supporters suspended his campaign against Matsui, and is threatening to pull the plug permanently if they cannot raise $20,000 on his behalf by the end of the month.

GA-02: GOP internal says longtime Dem Rep. is endangered
Despite the relatively red state of his district, longtime Democratic Rep. Sanford Bishop (arguably the most conservative African-American in the Democratic delegation, until Artur Davis came along) has repeatedly won re-election by solid margins. That may well change this cycle, if a new internal poll for GOP nominee Mike Keown, Bishop enjoys just a six-point edge over the Republican. The campaign also claims that Keown leads by twelve points among those who know both candidates. This is often a ridiculously flawed metric in a House race, however, since it is pretty damned unlikely that anyone in one political party has ever heard of the nominee of the other party this early in the campaign.

GA-08: Marshall also has narrow lead in GOP internal polling
Keown is not the only Georgia GOP challenger tossing around internal polling data. The campaign of Republican state legislator Austin Scott have also released internals showing a Democratic incumbent with a mid-single digit edge. The slightly dusty poll (late July) from American Viewpoint puts incumbent Democrat Jim Marshall at 44%, with Scott five points back at 39%. Marshall survived a close challenge against Mac Collins in 2006 before winning by a wider margin in 2008.

GA-12: Primary challenger not done with John Barrow yet
Democratic Congressman John Barrow thought he was done with Savannah-area former legislator Regina Thomas when he defeated her 59-41 in July's Democratic primary. Evidently, Barrow was wrong. Thomas is evidently preparing a write-in campaign for Congress in the 12th district, where Barrow is pretty strongly favored over lightly-funded Republican challenger Ray McKinney. Thomas argued that Barrow's capitulation to the right on far too many issues necessitated her staying in the race.

RACE FOR THE HOUSE: GOP pollster releases data in twelve districts
Ayers McHenry and Associates, in what appears to be an ongoing series, has released numbers in twelve potentially vulnerable Democratic districts. Perhaps unsurprisingly, given the partisan nature of the pollster, the numbers are pretty bleak for the Democrats, although they do maintain leads in half of those districts. Below are the trial heat numbers for each district, in alphabetical order:

Despite being partisan numbers, only a couple of these strike me as starkly out of whack. NY-25, for one: when Buerkle's own leaked internals had her down nine, I am not sure I am buying a toss-up here. Also, I wonder a lot about that PA-12 poll, wondering what could have happened to cause Critz to bleed more than a dozen points in just three months.

The National Review, who were among the first to post these numbers, hinted that more numbers are to come in the Midwest and the West.

THE GUBERNATORIAL RACES

CO-Gov: Tancredo's main target might not be the Democrat
Much like the RGA took dead aim at the Independent candidate in Massachusetts (even to the extent that they largely left incumbent Democrat Deval Patrick alone for a while), it appears that right-wing Independent Tom Tancredo is more interested in destroying Republican Dan Maes than Democrat John Hickenlooper in Colorado. Check out his first blast fundraising email, which knocks Hick a bit, but really takes a big cut at the GOP nominee:

Last week, Colorado's Republicans had the unenviable task of choosing from two of the worst candidates in recent memory.
In the contest choosing which candidate was less embarrassing, Dan Maes barely won. But what kind of candidate is Dan Maes?

Maes claims to be an executive and yet he has had no executive experience.

He claims to be a businessman but made less than the poverty level the past two years.

Maes boasts about his record as police officer in Kansas where he was fired after only a short period of time.

He claims to be against amnesty, but a few short months ago he was for it.

Incredibly, the Maes campaign has reported that over $42,000 in campaign contributions were slipped directly into his own pockets for "mileage reimbursement."

In short, Maes is a man with no discernible credentials to be a candidate, much less a Governor.

It is not hard to see Tancredo's gambit here. Since Maes has made it pretty clear that he is not stepping aside, the only way that Tancredo can win is by turning Maes into a footnote. While Democrat Hickenlooper has enjoyed huge leads in recent polling, the combined Maes-Tancredo vote is only a few points behind Hick's share of the vote. Which is why it is incumbent on Tancredo to end Maes, and vice versa. Expect the internecine warfare to continue, with John Hickenlooper as the primary political beneficiary.

FL-Gov: Race heats up as campaign heads into final week
There is no shortage of news emanating from the Sunshine State, as the heated (and on the GOP side, ugly) battle for Governor of the state heads into the final week of the primary season. Bill McCollum, whose campaign was on a bit of a shoestring at the last, has saved nearly $1.3 million for the final surge. But that pales in comparison to GOP rival Rick Scott, who has cut himself a check for $3.7 million for one last, light-eclipsing campaign ad surge. That brings Scott's total to roughly $38 million when all is said and done. Meanwhile, a new poll out from McLaughlin and Associates (on behalf of the Chamber of Commerce) shows that Scott's profligate spending may well be for naught. The pollster shows McCollum up double digits on Scott (45-33), as the campaign heads into its final days.

Meanwhile, Democrat Alex Sink has made news of her own, as she has given the nod to Gainesville-area former state senator Rod Smith as her choice to be state Lt. Governor. Smith won a very respectable 41% of the vote in his own bid for the office back in 2006 against former Congressman Jim Davis.

THE RAS-A-POLL-OOZA

A quiet day for the House of Ras, with two Senate races getting the Ras-sy treatment. Both of them show big leads for Republicans in races that most folks deem as competitive match-ups. In Ras's defense, independent pollsters (Ipsos and PPP) have shown similar numbers in both races over the past week.

OH-Sen: Rob Portman (R) 45%, Lee Fisher (D) 37%
PA-Sen: Patrick Toomey (R) 46%, Joe Sestak (D) 37%

You really cannot make this stuff up. After the Supreme Court upheld a $20,000 judgment against Orly Taitz for filing "frivolous lawsuits," in her never-ending quest to prove that Hawaii isn't a state, the birther queen:

... once again compared herself to Nelson Mandela. "Nelson Mandela was in prison for years, he went against the regime, but ultimately he prevailed," Taitz said. The fine, said Taitz, "was means of intimidation and harassment."

Let's see ... dentist, real estate agent, and conspiracy theorist, versus a man who spent 27 years in prison for the crime of fighting for racial equality, Nobel Peace Prize recipient, the former president of South Africa, not to mention having the United Nations declaring July 18th "Nelson Mandela Day," to "mark his contribution to world freedom."

The only thing these two have in common is ... uh ...

Question for the anti-mosque activists in the GOP and the conservative movement: how close is too close?

The reason I ask is that there's already a mosque within a few blocks of Ground Zero; it's called Manhattan Masjid and it is four short blocks away from the site of the former World Trade Center.

Here's a map showing the existing Manhattan Masjid and the proposed Cordoba House:

It's only a few hundred feet from the current proposal, and just like the building in the current proposal, the street in front of this building was filled with dust and debris from the tragic events of 9/11, so it is physically connected to the attack.

Wyatt Cenac of The Daily Show visited the site earlier this month and Jon Stewart pointed out that it's been around since before the World Trade Center was built.

So here's the question for anti-mosquers:

1. If the currently existing mosque is too close to Ground Zero, by what method should the congregants be removed? Arrest? Angry mob? Or maybe the building should be crushed to rubble by a wrecking ball? What would make you feel good?

2. If it's not too close, where is the line of demarcation? How wide should the mosque exclusion zone be? 3 blocks? 2.2 blocks? 3.8 blocks? And on what basis is that line of demarcation drawn?

I guess I have one last question for them: how many of you anti-mosque yokels even knew there already was a mosque in the same general area?

Or, as emptywheel says, the same place Judy Miller stored her Scooter/Plame notes--under her desk. In 2007, a CIA staffer found a handful of tapes that escaped the shredder, or whatever means the CIA used to destroy damning evidence of them torturing detainees. The existing tapes, the AP reports are of 9/11 plotter Ramzi Binalshibh being interrogated in a secret Morrocan prison.

The two videotapes and one audiotape are believed to be the only remaining recordings made within the clandestine prison system.

The tapes depict Binalshibh's interrogation sessions at a Moroccan-run facility the CIA used near Rabat in 2002, several current and former U.S. officials told The Associated Press. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because the recordings remain a closely guarded secret.

When the CIA destroyed its cache of 92 videos of two other al-Qaida operatives, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Nashiri, being waterboarded in 2005, officials believed they had wiped away all of the agency's interrogation footage. But in 2007, a staffer discovered a box tucked under a desk in the CIA's Counterterrorism Center and pulled out the Binalshibh tapes.

A Justice Department prosecutor who is already investigating whether destroying the Zubaydah and al-Nashiri tapes was illegal is now also probing why the Binalshibh tapes were never disclosed. Twice, the government told a federal judge they did not exist.

Marcy has been following the interrogation tapes particulary closely and has a great deal more, including the possibility that these tapes could shed light on the torture of Binyam Mohamed, who claims that the worst of the torture occured at this same secret prison. Mohamed and al-Shibh were there at the same time, and as Marcy notes, "What are the chances that the Moroccans acting as our proxy treated al-Shibh much differently than they treated Mohamed?" She concludes:

These tapes may well undo at least three of the lies the government told to cover up its torture and its counterterrorism mistakes. If John Durham–-who the AP notes has expanded his investigation to include possible obstruction tied to these tapes–-does anything with the tapes.

Okay, I'll admit it.

I'm standing with Sarah Palin against the Burlington Coat Factory Mosque (BCFM), aka the Ground Zero Mosque, located two blocks from Ground Zero.

Now, I don't want you to jump to conclusions. Please, hear me out. You'll see that I'm right.

My problem with the BCFM is not that it's two blocks from Ground Zero. It's that it's even closer -- one short block -- from the New York Dolls Gentleman's Club (NSFW link).

Here's a picture:

Just one of the many establishments the BCFM puts at risk

It's not that I'm a bigot.

It's just that I know that if the BCFM becomes reality, all the dancers at NY Dolls will end up being forced to wear burkas. And really, what good is a strip club if all the strippers are in burkas? Don't you think Wall Street executives unwinding after hard morning's work deserve to see some flesh if they pay for a lap dance? And that's not even the biggest problem: if the dancer is in a burka, how will the customer really know it's a woman underneath the cloth? This is one place where Don't Ask, Don't Tell just won't cut it!

So please, stand with me. Stand with Sarah. Stand up with one voice and demand BCFM find another place to go. Your nation is counting on you.

If, while reading this snippet of an interview with Wisconsin GOP Senate frontrunner Ron Johnson, you feel the stupid starting to burn a bit, do not be alarmed.

It is probably just due to the sunspots:

A global warming skeptic, Johnson said extreme weather phenomena were better explained by sunspots than an overload of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, as many scientists believe.

"I absolutely do not believe in the science of man-caused climate change," Johnson said. "It's not proven by any stretch of the imagination."

Johnson, in an interview last month, described believers in manmade causes of climate change as "crazy" and the theory as "lunacy."

"It's far more likely that it's just sunspot activity or just something in the geologic eons of time," he said.

Excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere "gets sucked down by trees and helps the trees grow," said Johnson.

Average Earth temperatures were relatively warm during the Middle Ages, Johnson said, and "it's not like there were tons of cars on the road."

He said he disagreed with any government spending to try to address global warming. A strong economy is the best way to preserve a good environment, Johnson said.

Never mind for the moment (as Eric Kleefeld at TPMDC noted) that sunspot activity has actually declined as of late.

Never mind that a group of scientists from the University of Guelph in Canada have released a study saying that there has been decline in tree growth despite increased CO2 levels, due to "warming induced stress."

Never mind that we have at present the conundrum of ever-increasing CO2 concentrations (up 36 percent since pre-industrial times) and ever decreasing trees (the total acreage of tropical forests is about half of what it once was).

What really matters here is that this little bit of "scientific logic" from Johnson is far from unprecedented. Indeed, there has been quite a trend developing with this guy. As Think Progress noted, this is not the first little bit of scientific theory to drop from the lips of candidate Johnson:

Unfortunately, Johnson’s anti-science, anti-environment views aren’t limited to his bizarre theory about sunspots. Last June, he claimed that global warming saved Wisconsin from turning into a glacier, saying he was “glad there’s global warming ... We’d be standing on top of a 200-foot thick glacier.” He has also told the press he is open to oil drilling in Wisconsin’s Great Lakes.

Interestingly, in the same interview where Johnson was pooh-poohing global climate change, he did manage to walk back the "drilling in the Great Lakes" thing.

Not because of the potentially disastrous effects on the natural wonders that are the Great Lakes, however. Johnson explained that "the Great Lakes oil reserves are too small to be worth drilling."

So, no drilling in the Great Lakes. But not because Johnson is concerned about the consequences of such action. Nope. No drilling in the Great Lakes simply because, in true Republican fashion, Johnson is concerned that the oil companies wouldn't make enough money off of it.

Asked in a local TV interview about his views on the Burlington Coat Factory Mosque, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) delivers a textbook example of how Democrats can turn the mosque "issue" around on Republicans, dismissing it as a made-up controversy fueled by the likes of Karl Rove to divide America and distract from a discussion of the sorts of policies we need to strengthen the economy:

Partial transcript:

QUESTION: Are you for or against the mosque issue?

BROWN: Oh, I think it’s a local decision. We’re not at war with a religion, we're at war with terrorism. And I thought it was interesting, the first clip on your news story is Karl Rove who is great at dividing the country and turning people against people. I mean, this and the Fourteenth Amendment and other issues -- conservatives who simply want the president to fail are using issues like this, the Fourteenth Amendment, the mosque, to distract the public away from what we need to be doing -- that's passing a jobs bill, paying special focus on manufacturing. We in Ohio know how to make things, and we ought to have a real manufacturing policy in this country.

QUESTION: You talk about manufacturing, let's turn to unemployment right now. You have fought for extending benefits to people unemployed for about two years now. While companies are posting profits, they are still cutting jobs, especially in manufacturing. The latest numbers show unemployment in Ohio is at 10.5%, but that's down from 11% in March. You're in Cleveland today for a couple of events related to jobs. Talk to us a bit about that.

Notice that while Brown directly answered the question -- not just saying that he felt it was a local issue, but also saying that it was wrong to suggest Muslims are an enemy -- he also avoided getting bogged down in the mosque issue by turning it around against Republicans, saying that their obsession with the mosque is evidence that they aren't focused on the economy. As a result, Brown managed to spend almost the entire interview talking about his own views on jobs and the economy, communicating the message that he wanted to communicate instead of letting Republicans control the dialog.

Appropriately applied, it doesn't take much political jujitsu to turn a perceived liability into an asset. Republicans can spend all their time talking about the mosque, but as long as Democrats remain focused on jobs and the economy, it will still be Democrats who are addressing the nation's top priorities -- no matter what Karl Rove may say.

It's a Mosque-erade:

In light of the news that Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation, the parent company of Fox News, made a $1 million donation to the Republican Governors Association, it looks like Rupert is violating his own Standards of Business Conduct:

2. No payment shall be made to, or for the benefit of, any public official in order to induce or entice such official to: enact, defeat or violate any law or regulation for the Company’s benefit; influence any official act; or obtain any favorable action by a governmental agency or official on behalf of the Company.

Note that a spokesman for Murdoch defended the donation by saying:

News Corporation believes in the power of free markets, and the RGA’s pro-business agenda supports our priorities at this most critical time for our economy.

... but apparently Murdoch's standards of conduct only apply to his employees so he's in the clear for the payoff to Fox News for a job well done.

MSNBC is reporting that former Gov. Rod Blagojevich was found guilty on one count of perjury in his federal corruption trial. The jury was unable to reach a unanimous verdict on the other 23 counts he was charged with.

The guilty verdict carries a maximum penalty of five years in prison and a $2000 fine.

No word yet on whether federal prosecutors will retry Blagojevich.

Today's NYT has an eye-opening article detailing how Republicans nationwide are seeking to make the Burlington Coat Factory Mosque a top 2010 issue.

The article contained a pair of quotes from GOP candidates that I think illustrate the Republican Party's core dysfunction on the mosque issue. First:

"Ground zero is hallowed ground to Americans," Elliott Maynard, a Republican trying to unseat Representative Nick J. Rahall II, a Democrat, in West Virginia’s Third District, said in a typical statement. "Do you think the Muslims would allow a Jewish temple or Christian church to be built in Mecca?"

The flaw in Maynard's reasoning is as obvious as it is astonishing: effectively, his argument is that New York City in the United States of America should be more like Mecca in Saudi Arabia. Maynard looks towards Saudi Arabia and sees a nation in which there are zero churches and synagogues and he gets jealous. He wonders why it is that America cannot become a Christian nation in the way the Saudi Arabia is an Islamic nation. He explicitly rejects one of America's greatest achievements: the separation of church and state. He seeks to set us back to the pre-revolutionary era. He doesn't see America as a shining beacon on a hill; he sees America as a flawed nation because it is not sufficiently similar in form to theocracies in the Middle East.

Amazingly, Maynard's views seem to be fairly widely held on the right. They just don't seem to value the religious freedom which makes America great.

The second quote is a tad less astonishing, but equally revealing:

"It is very troubling to see President Obama again turning a deaf ear to the thoughts and concerns of a majority of Americans," said James Renacci, a Republican candidate in Ohio’s 16th District, who said people at a recent public meeting were furious about the mosque proposal.

While I will concede that most Americans oppose the location of the mosque, I also believe President Obama was speaking for most Americans when he defended the right of Muslims to build houses of worship anywhere that a house of worship of the Christian, Jewish, Hindu, or any other faith could be built.

But I will also note that the mosque issue is nowhere near the top of the list of "thoughts and concerns of a majority of Americans." Jobs and the economy are atop that list. And while President Obama has talked about jobs and the economy and his plans for accelerating the recovery, Republicans have been absolutely, completely, totally silent.

Instead of talking about the issue that matters the most to Americans -- jobs and the economy -- Republicans want to talk about whether it's okay to build a mosque two blocks from Ground Zero. (There's already one four blocks away.)

As I argued yesterday, it's a real mistake for Republicans to dwell on the mosque -- it's like the Bill Ayers of 2010. Sure, many Americans are uncomfortable with the mosque, but it has about as much to do with the Democratic Party as Bill Ayers did with Barack Obama.

Yet nonetheless, as the AP reports, Republicans are stepping up their offensive against the mosque -- and they're attacking President Obama, even though he's not on the ballot, and the issue pales in importance to the economy.

By focusing so much energy on such a minor issue, Republicans are giving Democrats an easy opportunity to play jujitsu, pointing out while the GOP is obsessed with the mosque, they are virtually silent on the economy. They literally have a more detailed plan on dealing the mosque than they do for dealing with the economy. And the reason is simple: Republicans don't have a plan for the economy, or at least they don't have a plan that they are willing to publicly describe.

It's conceivable that the GOP's attempt to turn 2010 into a referendum on a mosque will be successful, but their gambit will only work if Democrats allow it to happen. As long as Democrats point to the GOP's silence on the economy, it will backfire -- bigtime.

Two hundred twenty years ago today, George Washington wrote:

It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights. For happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support.

Happy anniversary.

PPP. 8/14-15. Likely voters. MoE 4.1% (6/12-13 results)

Tom Jensen:

In a race pitting two of the weakest Senate candidates in the country Alexi Giannoulias continues to hold a small lead over Mark Kirk, 37-35, with Green Party candidate LeAlan Jones pulling 9%. Voters in the heavily Democratic state it seems would narrowly prefer a Democratic candidate they don't like to a Republican candidate they don't like.

Kirk does have a big lead with independents, 36-20. But you can't win as a Republican in Illinois without winning over a fair number of Democratic voters and Kirk just isn't doing that right now. He's getting only 5%. Kirk's getting 74% of the Republican vote while Giannoulias is getting 72% of the Democratic vote and it's going to be very hard for Kirk to win unless the party unity gap ends up being bigger than that.

Both candidates continue to be very unpopular. Giannoulias' favorability is 26/42 and Kirk's is 26/34. Independents have a negative opinion of both of them, and each of them is viewed more unfavorably by voters of the opposite party than they are favorably by their own party base. Only 51% of Democrats have a favorable opinion of Giannoulias and just 49% of Republicans have a favorable opinion of Kirk so neither contender is doing much to fire up even their partisans.

These polls results are premised on an extremely depressed Democratic electorate. Those surveyed report having voted for Barack Obama by only 9 points, in contrast to his actual 26 point victory in the state in 2008.

As Jensen points out, the fact that Giannoulias maintains a lead over Kirk is evidence of the tremendous weakness of Kirk as a candidate, given the communications challenges that have been faced by Giannoulias and his campaign team. Kirk is one of the few NRSC-backed candidates to win a seriously contested GOP primary, but he hasn't escaped the GOP's curse with terrible Senate nominees. (Kirk's problem has been lies about his own personal history and military record, not Paul-Angle-Buck wingnuttery.)

Giannoulias appears to be picking up support from the Green Party candidate, perhaps partly because he's campaign has recently begun emphasizing progressive themes like his support for creating a progressive caucus in the Senate and the need for filibuster reform. If he can continue consolidating progressives behind his campaign -- and generate some more enthusiasm from Obama voters -- he may prove to be too much of a challenge for Mark Kirk to handle, given the extent of Kirk's self-inflicted damage.

Our first action email went out today. It is the first email in a campaign to reform Senate rules and end the filibuster.  Sign up for this campaign here.

A lot of you will ask, justifiably, “what possible difference can a petition make?” As progressive activists, you probably get 10-20 requests to sign a petition every week, and they don’t seem to have much impact.  So, in the spirit of openness, let me explain to you our thinking behind this action.

1. The first goal of the petition is to use it to get meetings with Senators, or their staff.  If we get a lot of signatures, we can meet with returning Senators and candidates for Senate,when we deliver the petition to them. During those meetings, we will have a chance to ask them if they support changing Senate rules with only a simple majority vote on the first day Congress is in session next year.

2. Through these meetings, if we get 51 returning and potential Senators in support of changing the Senate rules with 51 votes, then we will have proven that the Senate rules can be changed with 51 votes.  Obtaining such proof is the first threshold in actually changing the Senate rules next year. From that point, other actions will follow.

3. Finally, if you take the action, then we will know you are interested in taking part in other, later actions we will conduct on Senate rules reform.  We need a list of which activists are, and are not, interested in order to conduct this campaign. That way, we will contact the right people for future actions on this topic.

That is theory of change behind the petition.  If it sounds workable to you, and if you want to join the campaign to change the Senate rules, and even end the filibuster, then click here and sign up.

The thinking behind Senate rules reform as our first action came at Netroots Nation. There were few, if any, larger applause lines than calls to end the filibuster. Attendees asked Senators, and candidates, question after question on the filibuster. There seemed to be a huge groundswell of support behind it at the conference, making it an easy pick for our first action.

In the coming days and weeks, there will be chances to participate in other campaigns. And no, they will not all be petitions, calls for donations, or exhortations to contact your member of Congress. We will engage in a variety of campaigns and we will offer a variety of ways for people to get involved in those campaigns.  So, even if you are not interested in the filibuster campaign, sign up to receive alerts on other topics here.

Also, we are aware that some technical issues have arisen from the pop-up page and the emails. Hopefully, a fix that was put in place on the pop-up should prevent you from seeing it multiple times on the same device in the same browser. But remember, if you have your cookies disabled, you are going to see it much more frequently.

Please, join up to help end the filibuster, and post your questions, critiques and suggestions in the comments.

• Even though about 80% of teabaggers are Republicans, Freedomworks Dick Armey and Matt Kibbe say that:

  The tea party movement is not seeking a junior partnership with the Republican Party, but a hostile takeover of it.

• Will these ever see the light of day?

  The CIA has tapes of 9/11 plotter Ramzi Binalshibh being interrogated in a secret overseas prison ...

  The two videotapes and one audiotape are believed to be the only remaining recordings made within the clandestine prison system ...

  When the CIA destroyed its cache of 92 videos of two other al-Qaida operatives, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Nashiri, being waterboarded in 2005, officials believed they had wiped away all of the agency's interrogation footage. But in 2007, a staffer discovered a box tucked under a desk in the CIA's Counterterrorism Center and pulled out the Binalshibh tapes.

  A Justice Department prosecutor who is already investigating whether destroying the Zubaydah and al-Nashiri tapes was illegal is now also probing why the Binalshibh tapes were never disclosed. Twice, the government told a federal judge they did not exist.

• MoveOn.org is targeting Target.
• It seems that all that talk from Republicans about privatizing Social Security was a figment of our imaginations:

  DANA PERINO: I don’t know of a single Republican who actually wants to do what the Democratic ad just said. It’s sad for the Democrats…they still can only run on fear of something that somebody is not suggesting.

  ED ROLLINS: The President’s out there saying ‘Republicans are going to take away your Social Security.’ There’s no Republican, basically, standing up and saying that, and we haven’t for a very long time.

  JOE SCARBOROUGH: How stupid does he think Americans are? Not only will Barack Obama not allow Social Security to be privatized, Republicans will not allow Social Security to be privatized.

• It never ends:

  A suicide bomber sat for hours Tuesday among hundreds of unprotected army recruits before detonating nail-packed explosives strapped to his body, killing 61 people and casting new doubt on the ability of Iraqi forces as U.S. troops head home.

• Want to feel old?

  For students entering college this fall, e-mail is too slow, phones have never had cords and the computers they played with as kids are now in museums.

  The Class of 2014 thinks of Clint Eastwood more as a sensitive director than as Dirty Harry urging punks to "go ahead, make my day." Few incoming freshmen know how to write in cursive or have ever worn a wristwatch.

• An activist judge, no doubt:

  The immigration judge who granted President Obama’s aunt asylum three months ago based his decision on the fact that an anonymous federal official had disclosed information about her immigration status to the media, a “reckless’’ act that exposed her to heightened threats of persecution in her native Kenya, according to the ruling, obtained yesterday by the Globe.

• Pitiful:

  A year-long study (from early 2009 through early 2010) of media coverage of African Americans found what little coverage blacks attracted focused on specific episodes and people rather than on broader issues. In fact, nearly one-fifth (19.4%) of all coverage studied had to do with the arrest of and controversy surrounding Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates.

• A look at homelessness, unemployment and suicide rates.
• Josh Marshall thanks God:

  In a dark moment like this when expediency and emotion are carrying the day, I'm thankful that we have a robust and growing political movement which supports a consistent and absolute adherence to the Constitution in all matters, everywhere and at all times.

The problem Congress created in opening up the supplemental nutrition assistance program, or food stamps, in order to fund teacher funding and state aid wasn't just robbing Peter to pay Paul, it was opening up the program to the idea that it could be raided for other programs. Now it's happening again, in an incredibly self-defeating proposal coming out of the Senate.

The House will soon consider an $8 billion child nutrition bill that’s at the center of the first lady’s “Let’s Move” initiative. Before leaving for the summer recess, the Senate passed a smaller version of the legislation that is paid for by trimming the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps.

The proposed cuts would come on top of a 13.6 percent food stamp reduction in the $26 billion Medicaid and education state funding bill that President Obama signed this week....

Democrats have turned to the food stamp program because funding increases enacted in the stimulus package last year were already scheduled to phase out over time. The changes proposed in the state aid and nutrition bills would simply cut off that increase early, in March 2014. Because the cuts would not take effect for more than three years, Democratic leaders have voiced the hope that they will be able to stop them in future legislation.

But House liberals are balking now, saying that while they swallowed the food stamp cuts to pay for urgent funding for Medicaid and teachers, they will not vote for more cuts in the child nutrition bill. In a letter sent this week to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), 106 House Democrats urged the speaker to take the House version of the child nutrition bill, which does not slash food stamps, rather than the Senate version....

The $4.5 billion Senate bill would expand eligibility for school meal programs, establish nutrition standards for all food sold in schools and provide a 6-cent increase for each school lunch to help cafeterias serve healthier meals. The $8 billion House version includes more money for expanding access to school lunches for children in low-income households.

Those are all critical programs for childhood nutrition, particularly expanding access for more children. That will be especially true when the food stamp cuts hit and their parents won't be able to provide adequate food at home. Forcing parents to go hungry so their kids can eat at school is insane. We've come to expect that from the Senate where appeasing the "moderate" Snowe and Collins to get anything done is now essential. It's also unacceptable.