Emails Reveal McCain Campaign Misled The Public About Palin’s $150K Plus Shopping Spree
Emails Reveal McCain Campaign Misled The Public About Palin’s $150K Plus Shopping Spree
One of the more interesting moments of the 2008 presidential campaign came when Politico revealed that the Republican National Committee had spent over $150,000 on clothes and accessories from luxury stores for Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin and her family. The high-end shopping spree conflicted with Palin’s image of a modest hockey mom. When confronted with the news, a campaign spokesperson replied, “It was always the intent that the clothing go to a charitable purpose after the campaign.”
But in an online-only companion piece to his big new profile of the former Alaska governor, Vanity Fair’s Michael Gross reports that internal emails and other records reveal that this claim and others about the fate of the clothes were false:
The records of those purchases also reveal that Palin’s later claims—that “we had three days of using clothes that the R.N.C. purchased” (at the Republican National Convention) and that she understood the clothes to have been “loaned to us during the convention”—were completely false. So was the spin of Palin’s campaign spokesperson, who stated on October 22 that “it was always the intent that the clothing go to a charitable purpose after the campaign.” On October 23, in a previously unpublished e-mail (quoted below), Palin wrote that she had no idea the clothes would eventually need to be returned, and suggested that she believed the items were being given to her and her family as gifts.
There was at least one other incident in which the campaign misrepresented purchases for Palin. The day before daughter Bristol’s birthday, Palin aides exchanged emails about buying her a birthday present, with one saying they had “picked up a few dress options at saks during the event today.” That staffer charged $1,312.94 at Saks 5th Avenue in Cincinnati the same day. However, that charge was later mislabeled “as if it were made not for Bristol but for the candidate’s appearance on Saturday Night Live. (The memo line reads ‘Clothes-SNL.’).”
Yet, the spending continued. Throughout October, Palin staffers bought more than $9,000 worth of items for Palin and her family that “would seem to stretch the boundaries of what constitutes a legitimate campaign expense,” including a jersey for Palin’s daughter Piper, a $316.94 pair of Bose headphones, “Intimates” and “Workout Clothes,” and a “Jewelry case.”
At first, Palin was wary of accepting the new clothes, writing of a $3,500 jacket, “I don’t spend that much money on my clothes in a year.” However, Palin “grew accustomed to the privilege of a designer wardrobe—not only for herself but also for her family,” and tired to hold onto some of the items when the campaign eventually made good on its promise to donate them. When an aide came to Alaska to collect the wardrobe, she said, “all of a sudden, [Palin] couldn’t find stuff.” Indeed, as ThinkProgress has noted, Palin seems to appreciate the finer things, requiring that for speaking engagements, she be treated with chaffered SUVs, first class airfare or private jets, and “deluxe” hotel suites.
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Anti-Bailout Tea Party Group Puts Millions In Bailed-Out Bank
Anti-Bailout Tea Party Group Puts Millions In Bailed-Out Bank
One of the driving forces behind the Tea Party movement is its opposition to the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP), which Congress passed at the height of the financial crisis and President Bush signed into law in October 2008. In fact, the Our Country Deserves Better PAC, which heads the Tea Party Express, lists one of its overarching principles as “opposition to bailouts.” They deride bailouts as “dangerous,” “quasi-socialism,” and “immoral.”
Bank of America has received $45 billion from the federal government, making it one of the largest recipients of TARP money. It is no surprise that the Tea Party Express has derided companies that took bailout money, even singling out Bank of America by name at a Pennsylvania rally last year. What is surprising is that for all its anti-TARP vitriol, the Tea Party Express holds all its funding in the bailed-out bank.
According to FEC records, the Tea Party Express’s parent organization, the Our Country Deserves Better PAC, keeps its funds exclusively in a Bank of America branch in Corona, CA. Lest you think Bank of America was their only option in the area, a rudimentary Google Map search found over a half-dozen other banks in Corona alone that have not received TARP money. If the Tea Party Express truly believes that bailouts are dangerous and immoral, why is the group putting millions of dollars into a bailed-out bank?
Bolton On Running For President In 2012: ‘I’m Not Saying No’
Bolton On Running For President In 2012: ‘I’m Not Saying No’
Earlier this week, when the Daily Caller asked neoconservative war hawk John Bolton if he wanted to run for president in 2012, the former (recess-appointed) U.N. ambassador wouldn’t rule out the possibility. “You know, as somebody who writes op-eds and appears on the television, I appreciate as well as anybody that…there is a limit to what that accomplishes,” he said. But today on Fox News, Bolton indicated that he’s getting more interested in making a run for the White House, saying, “I’m not saying ‘no’”:
HOST: Are you running for president in 2012?
BOLTON: Well it’s a great honor when people ask me that question and I have been asked that question. I don’t think anybody involved in politics should worry about that until after the elections this fall because I think they’re so important. So that’s to the extent I get involved, that’s where I’m going to put my focus for now.
HOST: So you’re not saying no?
BOLTON: I’m not saying no, that’s right.
Watch it:
“What concerns me,” Bolton told the Daily Caller, “is the lack of focus generally in the national debate about national security issues.” ThinkProgress would be eager to witness Bolton campaign on his ideas:
– Bomb Iran, (or at least allow Israel to do it) and change the regime.
– Endless wars (because “we’re not going to eliminate violent conflict until homo sapiens ceases to exist as a separate species”).
One thing is clear. If Bolton does decide to run for president, he probably won’t have the support of his former boss.
Purported Eco-Terrorist Angered Over ‘Immigration Pollution And Anchor Baby Filth’
Purported Eco-Terrorist Angered Over ‘Immigration Pollution And Anchor Baby Filth’
James Jay Lee
Programs must be developed to find solutions to stopping ALL immigration pollution and the anchor baby filth that follows that. Find solutions to stopping it. Call for people in the world to develop solutions to stop it completely and permanently. Find solutions FOR these countries so they stop sending their breeding populations to the US and the world to seek jobs and therefore breed more unwanted pollution babies. FIND SOLUTIONS FOR THEM TO STOP THEIR HUMAN GROWTH AND THE EXPORTATION OF THAT DISGUSTING FILTH! (The first world is feeding the population growth of the Third World and those human families are going to where the food is! They must stop procreating new humans looking for nonexistant jobs!)
Lee’s immigration screed bears a troubling resemblance to views and policies espoused by anti-immigrant groups such as NumbersUSA, the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), Progressives for Immigration Reform, and others. Just this past month, FAIR released “The Environmentalist’s Guide to a Sensible Immigration Policy.” The report connects immigration to “pollution, sprawl, congestion, and ecological degradation,” complaining that “so-called environmentalists pretend as if this connection does not exist.” As usual, FAIR prescribes an overall reduction in immigration as the solution to the country’s environmental woes (in slightly more diplomatic terms).
It’s not a coincidence that many of these are amongst the same groups that have always supported changing the 14th amendment to deny “anchor babies,” or the American-born children of undocumented immigrants, citizenship — long before the debate entered the political mainstream this summer. Read more about Lee and the anti-immigrant environmental movement at the Wonk Room.
Koch-Funded Organizations Launch New ‘Rally For Jobs’ Campaign To Protect Big Oil Profits
Koch-Funded Organizations Launch New ‘Rally For Jobs’ Campaign To Protect Big Oil Profits
Our guest blogger is Joshua Dorner, Communications Director for Progressive Media.
As ThinkProgress and others have reported, Koch Industries and its billionaire owners, Charles and David Koch, have played a leading role in the apparently successful effort by polluters to stymie Senate passage of comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation.
Not content to simply stop progress, however, the Koch brothers and various Koch-funded organizations have also been actively trying to roll back existing clean air and clean energy laws — both at the state and national levels. David Koch, who lives in New York City and whose company is based in Kansas, is secretly bankrolling the Proposition 23 effort to roll back California’s landmark clean energy law. Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity helped make opposition to “cap-and-trade” a Tea Party talking point and then launched its so-called “Regulation Reality” tour to attack Supreme Court-mandated Clean Air Act regulations being finalized by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Today, a new Koch-backed national effort to protect the energy industry, dubbed “Rally for Jobs,” begins with rallies in Texas and will continue next week with events in New Mexico, Colorado, Illinois, and Ohio. While the American Petroleum Institute, Big Oil’s Washington lobbying arm, is the “presenting sponsor” of the Rally for Jobs tour, several Koch-backed groups are also involved:
• FreedomWorks, whose Koch-founded precursor, Citizens for a Sound Economy, received some $5.7 million from Koch foundations.
• Americans for Prosperity, which received at least $5.1 million from Koch Foundations from 2005-2008 and is an offshoot of the Koch-founded Citizens for a Sound Economy Foundation, which itself received more than $6 million from Koch foundations.
• The American Highway Users Alliance, of which Koch Industries is a member.
• Americans for Tax Reform, which received $60,000 from Koch Foundations from 1997-2008.
• The Institute for Policy Innovation, which received $35,000 from Koch foundations.
• The National Petrochemical and Refiners Association, of which Koch Industries is a member.
• The National Taxpayers Union, which has received $20,000 from Koch foundations.
• The Natural Gas Supply Association, of which Koch Industries appears to be a member.
• The Texas Prosperity Project, on whose board of directors sits Bill Oswald, Government & Regulatory Affairs Director at Koch Industries.
• The Corpus Christi Chamber of Commerce, which recently held an event sponsored by Flint Hills Resources, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Koch Industries.
The Rally for Jobs tour is the latest astroturf attempt by Koch and the rest of Big Oil to use the economic anxiety gripping the nation to stave off any new attempts to crack down on the industry’s emissions and to block new accountability measures in the wake of the BP oil disaster. The front group’s website uses standard energy industry boilerplate repeating the false claim that increased energy use and economic prosperity are inexorably linked:
More energy equals more jobs, higher incomes and greater economic growth. We must come together to tell Washington that our livelihoods depend on the oil and natural gas industry and consumers who rely on access to affordable energy will not be overlooked.
Just yesterday, the Center for American Progress released a report showing that a concerted national energy efficiency program (i.e using less energy, not more) could create 625,000 sustained jobs over ten years, spark $500 billion in investment, and save ratepayers $64 billion that they could then use more productively.
The Rally for Jobs website also implies that the federal government is blocking energy production and somehow threatening jobs, presumably referring to the Obama administration’s deepwater drilling moratorium in the Gulf of Mexico. The oil industry and some elected officials have been fearmongering over the moratorium for months, but a front page New York Times article from last week noted that job losses as a result of the drilling ban have simply “failed to materialize.” Further underscoring how unreliable the claims of the oil industry often turn out to be, just two of the 33 deepwater rigs idled by the moratorium have actually left the Gulf.
It seems that politics and the fall election may also have played a role in selecting the tour’s stops. Canton, Ohio and Mokena, Illinois, the sites of two stops next week, are not generally known for their role in oil production, but they do happen to be home to vulnerable freshman House Democrats–both of whom voted for comprehensive clean energy and climate legislation last year. Indeed, Jack Gerard, the president of the American Petroleum Institute, noted that “we have always encouraged our employees to engage in political activities.”
If this all sounds strangely familiar, it’s because many of the same Koch-backed groups participated in a nearly identical effort last summer. The so-called “Energy Citizens” campaign was widely mocked as the height of energy industry astroturfing, especially after documents were uncovered showing that 15 of the 21 Energy Citizens events were actually planned by oil industry lobbyists.
It seems that when it comes to astroturf groups protecting polluters, almost all roads eventually lead back to the “Kochtopus.”
In 2008, Sarah Palin Had No Idea Who Her ‘Political Heroine’ Margaret Thatcher Was
In 2008, Sarah Palin Had No Idea Who Her ‘Political Heroine’ Margaret Thatcher Was
A new Vanity Fair profile reveals some new information about former half-term Alaska governor Sarah Palin. Like this:
Early in the 2008 campaign, when John McCain’s aides discovered that Alaska-size gaps existed in Palin’s general knowledge (among those previously unreported: she had no idea who Margaret Thatcher was), they from time to time would give her some books to read in hopes of improving the candidate’s learning curve.
This is interesting, as Palin wrote on her Facebook page in June 2010:
I have received an invitation for a visit to London, and part of that invitation included the offer of arranging a meeting between myself and one of my political heroines, the “Iron Lady,” Margaret Thatcher. I would love to meet her and hope I’ll be able to arrange the trip in the future.
As I wrote last year when I offered her birthday wishes, Baroness Thatcher’s life and career serve as a blueprint for overcoming the odds and challenging the ’status quo.’ She started life as a grocer’s daughter from Grantham and rose to become Prime Minister — all by her own merit and hard work. I cherish her example and will always count her as one of my role models. Her friendship with my other political hero, Ronald Reagan, exemplified the special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom.
Perhaps Palin subsequently learned who Thatcher was from one of the books the McCain campaign gave her to read. Or perhaps the latest post was a bit of artistic license by Rebecca Mansour, the 36-year-old former screenwriter who Vanity Fair reports was hired in 2009 to ghostwrite Palin’s Facebook page.
Pawlenty To Accept Medicaid Match Because It ‘Doesn’t Further Some Stupid Policy Agenda’
Pawlenty To Accept Medicaid Match Because It ‘Doesn’t Further Some Stupid Policy Agenda’
As he issued an executive order preventing the state from applying for any of the grants available in the new health care law, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty signaled that he would accept $263 million in federal dollars to bolster the state’s Medicaid program — funds he previously described as a “bailout” of the states. “The federal government should not deficit spend to bail out states and special interest groups,” Pawlenty said earlier this month after the House reconvened for an emergency vote and passed a $26.1 billion bill providing aid to state governments. “Minnesota balanced its budget without raising taxes and without relying on more federal money. The federal government’s reckless spending spree must come to an end.”
Putting aside the fact that the $26.1 billion measure was fully paid for (and even reduced the deficit by $1.4 billion), Pawlenty searched for another explanation as to why he’s willing to accept a transfer of federal funds into the state Medicaid program but would not apply for grant dollars authorized by the health care law. The enhanced Medicaid payments are “not Obamacare” and won’t “further some stupid policy agenda,” he concluded:
“We’ll likely take that money,” Pawlenty said in an interview at the State Fair Tuesday. “It’s not Obamacare, it is something that we were going to be doing anyhow…”We’re going to take the money for those things that we were going to do anyhow and for the Medicaid (money), we were going to do that anyhow,” Pawlenty said. [...]
Further, the governor said, Minnesota is a net donor to the federal government — sending in more money than it gets back — so “where it’s appropriate and where it’s wise and doesn’t further some stupid policy agenda or otherwise concerns us or sign us up for something that is unsustainable or otherwise cause us a problem, we’re going to apply for those other pots of money.”
Earlier this year, Pawlenty rejected federal funds from the health care law to expand the state’s Medicaid program, a point he highlighted in yesterday’s executive order.
The Huffington Post notes that Pawlenty is requesting federal grants for abstinence-only education that are funded by the Affordable Care Act. Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) said yesterday that “members of the Pawlenty administration thank me” for voting in favor of health care reform.
REPORT: CEOs At Top 50 Companies That Laid Off Most Workers Raked In Millions In Compensation
REPORT: CEOs At Top 50 Companies That Laid Off Most Workers Raked In Millions In Compensation
The Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) released its annual report on executive compensation today — “CEO Pay and the Great Recession.” “I’m afraid that this year’s report will raise just about everybody’s blood pressure,” lead author Sarah Anderson said. Indeed, the report found that “CEOs of the 50 firms that have laid off the most workers since the onset of the economic crisis took home nearly $12 million on average in 2009.” Those CEOs’ combined compensation totaled $598 million, while at the same time, their companies eliminated 531,363 jobs despite reporting a 44 percent average profit increase for 2009.
More staggering is the level of executive pay, according to IPS:
[A]fter adjusting for inflation, CEO pay in 2009 more than doubled the CEO pay average for the decade of the 1990s, more than quadrupled the CEO pay average for the 1980s, and ran approximately eight times the CEO average for all the decades of the mid-20th century.
American workers, by contrast, are taking home less in real weekly wages than they took home in the 1970s.
The Kansas City Star took a closer look at some of the CEOs and companies in IPS’s report:
Fred Hassan, former CEO of Schering-Plough, presided over announced layoffs affecting 16,000 workers after a 2009 merger with Merck. He resigned after the merger, receiving “golden parachute” compensation in 2009 of more than $49.6 million to rank as the highest-paid layoff leader.
The top five companies announcing the most layoffs for the study period were General Motors (75,733); Citigroup (52,175); Bank of America (35,000); Caterpillar (27,499) and Verizon (21,308). Among those top five, the biggest compensation package — nearly $17.5 million — went to Ivan Seidenberg, CEO of Verizon.
According to IPS, American CEOs make 263 times the average compensation for American workers, up from the 30 to 1 ratio in the 1970s. For comparison, the average compensation of a Japanese CEO is less than one-sixth that of their American counterpart and 16 times more than the average Japanese worker.
But on top of the lavish CEO pay at the expense of the American worker, many of these top-layoff firms received money from the taxpayer bailouts in 2008. Of these, IPS notes, “American Express CEO Kenneth Chenault took home the highest 2009 pay, $16.8 million, a sum that included a $5 million cash bonus. American Express has laid off 4,000 employees since receiving $3.39 billion in TARP funding.”
“These numbers all reflect a broader trend in Great Recession-era Corporate America,” the IPS report says, “the relentless squeezing of worker jobs, pay and benefits to boost corporate earnings and maintain corporate executive paychecks at their recent bloated levels.”
Bush-Era Iraq War Architects Emerge To Demand ‘Credit’ For Iraq War ‘Success’
Bush-Era Iraq War Architects Emerge To Demand ‘Credit’ For Iraq War ‘Success’
In April 2006, ThinkProgress produced a report titled “The Architects of War: Where Are They Now?” We wrote at the time, “a review of the key planners of the conflict reveals that they have been rewarded — not blamed — for their incompetence.” Referencing our report in July 2007, New York Times columnist Paul Krugman wrote, “To read that summary is to be awed by the comprehensiveness and generosity of the neocon welfare system.”
Flash forward to today, and the answer to our original question of the Iraq war architects — “where are they now?” — can be answered quite simply: They’re on your TV screens, in your radio, and in your newspapers — shamelessly demanding credit for the work they’ve done.
For example, consider former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Doug Feith. According to the Pentagon Inspector General’s office, Feith delivered a briefing to the White House in 2002 that “undercut the Intelligence Community” and “did draw conclusions that were not fully supported by the available intelligence.” What is he doing now? In an interview with NPR yesterday, he blasted Obama for not properly crediting the “success” of Iraq:
He didn’t say America is more secure. And that’s the kind of statement that could help explain to the American people why we need to persevere and do all the things that he’s pledging to do in the future. … And then he also, in January of 2007, just when the surge was getting underway, proposed legislation that would have ended the war in March of 2008. And had that legislation succeeded, it would have prevented the success that he celebrated in his speech tonight.
Another example: former National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, who took blame for allowing President Bush to make the false claim in his 2003 State of the Union address that Iraq was trying to purchase uranium from Africa to build a nuclear weapon. What is he doing now? In an interview with the New York Times, Hadley demanded Bush be given “credit” for Iraq:
“I thought I owed it to the former president that somewhere out there somebody gives him some credit and points out that he’s the one actually that started withdrawing U.S. troops and he’s the one that set up the framework for both a long term relationship with Iraq and a December, 30 2011 end date,” Mr. Hadley said in an interview.
And there’s also former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, who conceded the case for invading Iraq was determined based on what could be easily sold to the public. “For bureaucratic reasons we settled on one issue, weapons of mass destruction, because it was the one reason everyone could agree on,” he said. In an op-ed in the New York Times this Monday, Wolfowitz was more magnanimous about sharing “credit” with U.S. soldiers, Iraqi forces, and the Iraqi people. Wolfowitz, who incorrectly predicted Iraq’s reconstruction would be paid for with Iraq’s oil, urged Obama to maintain “a long-term commitment, albeit at greatly reduced cost and risk.”
And on your TV sets, you’ll frequently see Ari Fleischer — the prominent pre-war mouthpiece who said Iraq would “shoulder much of the burden” for reconstruction, who said the Iraqis would “rejoice,” and who claimed that there was no chance “of losing the peace.” On both CNN and MSNBC over the last 24 hours, Fleischer has bemoaned that Bush isn’t being given enough credit for ending the war in Iraq. Watch it:
Alan Simpson Says Veterans Who Are Agent Orange Victims Are ‘Not Helping Us Save The Country’
Alan Simpson Says Veterans Who Are Agent Orange Victims Are ‘Not Helping Us Save The Country’
The Republican co-chair of President Obama’s Deficit Commission, former Sen. Alan Simpson, has been the subject of controversy recently following comments he made comparing the Social Security system to a “milk cow with 310 million tits.” Critics of Simpson’s comments took offense not only at his vulgar language but at his apparent belief that the Social Security system is in dire straits and may require cuts in benefits to stay solvent.
Now, Simpson has turned his focus to a different topic: veterans receiving disability benefits as a result of being exposed to Agent Orange in the Vietnam War. Speaking to the press, Simpson complained that these benefits run “contrary to efforts to control federal spending,” and even went as far as to say that “the irony” is that “the veterans who saved this country are now, in a way, not helping us to save the country in this fiscal mess”:
The system that automatically awards disability benefits to some veterans because of concerns about Agent Orange seems contrary to efforts to control federal spending, the Republican co-chairman of President Barack Obama’s deficit commission said Tuesday.
Former Wyoming Sen. Alan Simpson’s comments came a day after The Associated Press reported that diabetes has become the most frequently compensated ailment among Vietnam veterans, even though decades of research has failed to find more than a possible link between the defoliant Agent Orange and diabetes.
“The irony (is) that the veterans who saved this country are now, in a way, not helping us to save the country in this fiscal mess,” said Simpson, an Army veteran who was once chairman of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee.
“It’s the kind of thing that’s just driving us to this $1 trillion, $400 billion deficit this year,” said Simpson of the benefits. “It’s not that I’m an uncaring person, but common sense is the most uncommon thing in Washington.”
Given that the VA estimates that providing care for veterans exposed to Agent Orange would cost only $67 billion over the next decade, it is difficult to imagine why Simpson would see the program as prime for cost-cutting. If the deficit co-chair is really serious about cutting waste out of the government and tackling the deficit, there are far more attractive targets. Earlier this year, Rep. Barney Frank’s (D-MA) Sustainable Defense Task Force identified nearly $1 trillion in waste that can be cut from the defense budget over the next ten years simply by eliminating outdated Cold War-era programs.
Meanwhile, as the Center for Economic and Policy Research demonstrates with its Health Care Budget Calculator, if the United States were to move to a more efficient health care system — which could be done partly by offering an efficient Medicare-style insurance plan to all Americans, which commission member Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) advocates for — like those of our Canadian and European neighbors, our debt would virtually disappear over time.
ThinkFast: September 1, 2010
ThinkFast: September 1, 2010
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) conceded defeat in her primary race against tea party-backed Joe Miller last night, after a count of absentee ballots made it clear she would fall short. “It’s been a long week,” Murkowski told reporters. “I don’t see a scenario where we could win.” Miller moves on to face Sitka Mayor Scott McAdams in the general election.
In an address from the Oval Office last night, President Obama claimed no victory but said it was “time to turn the page” on the war in Iraq. The president also emphasized the dire state of the U.S. economy, and linked it in part to the war. “We have spent over a trillion dollars at war, often financed by borrowing from overseas,” Obama said. For a trip down memory lane, visit our Iraq War Timeline here.
“The 10 banks that received the most bailout aid during the financial crisis spent over $16 million on lobbying efforts in the first half of 2010,” as Congress was focused on debating its financial reform bill. The spending was 26 percent higher than over the same period in time in 2009.
Deploring the suspected arson at the site of the future Murfreesboro, TN mosque, Gov. Phil Bredesen (D) said, “I would ask everybody to remember this is a country whose deepest origins are in religious freedom.” The governor asked his state’s residents “to please have great respect for anyone’s religious preferences and their rights to practice those in the United States.”
Top U.S. commander in Afghanistan Gen. David Petraeus said yesterday that the Taliban is expanding its presence across the country even as U.S. and coalition forces close in on insurgent strongholds. “Levels of attacks have gone up and that’s a manifestation of us increasing our resources substantially and taking away safe havens,” he said, “And when the enemy’s safe havens are threatened they fight back.”
Bomb attacks in Afghanistan killed 21 U.S. servicemembers within a 48-hour period, in what may be the deadliest year yet for American forces. Petraeus warned that the fighting will “get harder before it gets easier.”
The first face-to-face talks between Israeli and Palestinian leaders since 2008 will begin today, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will meet with President Obama in the White House. Expectations are low, but U.S. officials are hopeful they can at least get the two sides to agree to a second round of talks next month.
The Obama administration yesterday “formally challenged a court order barring the federal government from funding human embryonic stem cell research.” The Justice Department asked U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth “to suspend a temporary injunction he issued last week blocking the funding and filed a notice of plans to appeal the decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals.”
And finally: Former House Speaker and current FreedomWorks chief Dick Armey told the Texas Tribune that he’s not interested in being the leader of the tea party movement because he’s too busy caring for his goats. When asked if he would step up to lead the movement, Armey replied, “Oh, no, no, no, no. I’ve got 34 goats that depend on me daily. I couldn’t be away that long.”
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Ohio Tea Party Survey To Candidates: Reject Gay Rights, Let God Deal With Climate Change
Ohio Tea Party Survey To Candidates: Reject Gay Rights, Let God Deal With Climate Change
Yesterday, after soliciting input from the GOP base, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) announced that “the long-awaited Republican manifesto” will be released after lawmakers return to Washington in September. One part of that base that has been particularly vocal and influential is the Tea Party. But while some Republicans view the Tea Party as toxic to the GOP, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) has fully embraced the Tea Party’s input, stating that members “represent the same values, concerns” of “tens of millions of other Americans” and that “we should listen to them, we should work with them and we should walk amongst them.”
If Boehner “walked among” Tea Party members in Erie County, OH, they may provide interesting insight for his new “manifesto.” As the Guardian’s Leo Hickman reports, a local Ohio newspaper the Sandusky Register obtained an email sent out last week by a local Tea party group called The Freedom Institute of Erie County. According to the email, the Tea Party group is creating a “Conservative voter guide” on the positions of candidates seeking office in upcoming elections in order to “rate, recommend, and endorse candidates” based on how they answer 15 questions. While such surveys may be fairly “mundane,” it’s the questions outlining the group’s priorities that provide, as Hickman puts it, “a hearty serving of insight with a side order of jaw drop”:
Now let’s hear those 15 questions. (The document states that the respondents should give one of the following answers: A = Agree; D = Disagree; U = Undecided; A* = Pro-life with exceptions of Rape or Incest, * = Added comments; NR = No Response; CR = Incumbents Conservative Rating.)
1. The Right to Life is a Constitutional right, therefore innocent human beings should have legal protection from conception until natural death. If you hold any exceptions please state them.
2. The regulation of Carbon Dioxide in our atmosphere should be left to God and not government and I oppose all measures of Cap and Trade as well as the teaching of global warming theory in our schools.
3. Marriage is defined as being between a man and a woman, any other type of Union is not marriage.
4. Children should not be placed into foster homes where the parents are homosexual, bisexual, or transgender.
5. Parental consent should be required for sex education that teaches more than direct abstinence.
6. The second Amendment to the Constitution [the right to keep and bear arms] should not be weakened in any way.
7. Only US citizens should be allowed to vote and a photo ID should always be required to vote. (The Mexican government requires a photo ID and fingerprint).
8. I oppose Ohio’s State Income Tax.
9. I oppose the Obama Health Care Reform and would like to see more affordable healthcare through a competitive, open, and transparent system.
10. I oppose the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy of the military and believe that all same sex partners should be banned from combat duty in the military because of the propensity to transmit blood-borne diseases in the theatre of battle.
11. I support a law that will allow the people to place on a ballot all collective bargaining agreements of all government associations, unions, and guilds, for their expressed approval. Defeat of such an agreement would mean government workers would not be immune from the free market system.
12. I oppose card check for voting to implement a Union as this could give unions an unfair intimidation tactic to implement unionisation.
13. I am not an economic pacifist. I believe that we need to protect our economic borders in order to ensure free and fair trade. Tariffs should be used to stop the wealth and jobs of Americans from leaving her borders.
14. The Federal Reserve as it is currently conceived needs to be abolished or at the very least audited.
15. I advocated moving our currency to a debt-free supply-side labour-based currency.
The email’s author, the Freedom Institute Steering Committee member Jon P. Morrow, tells candidates to “please keep it short sweet and simple” as their answers will “reach 1,000+ Republicans and at least 4.000+ Independents that have a history of voting conservatively.”
According to its website, the Freedom Institute’s purpose is to act as the government’s watchdog and to “raise funds to advocate, advertise, educate, and inform the public on constitutionally conservative positions and conservative candidates we endorse.” Membership only requires taking “the Patriots Oath” constructed by Iran Contra operative Oliver North and right-wing Focus on the Family founder Dr. James Dobson. But ab endorsement, it seems, requires a rejection of LGBT rights and that environmental regulation be “left to God.”
While Boehner has not outright endorsed the group’s principles listed in the survey, significant bastions of the conservative establishment, including the Heritage Foundation and the Koch-funded Cato Institute, are listed as “partners” of the group. President Obama, however, gets his own separate tab and title: “the enemy.”
9/11 Victims’ Families Group: Sept. 11 Mosque Protests ‘Disrespect The Memories Of Our Loved Ones’
9/11 Victims’ Families Group: Sept. 11 Mosque Protests ‘Disrespect The Memories Of Our Loved Ones’
One of the chief arguments critics have employed against the construction of the proposed Islamic center near Ground Zero in New York is that the center would be “insensitive” to the families of the victims of the 9/11 terror attacks. “[T]he overriding concern should be the sensitivities of the families of the victims,” wrote Abe Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League, who surprised many by coming out against the Islamic center. “The question here is a question of sensitivity, people’s feelings,” said former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani. Some 9/11 families “are crying over this,” he added.
But now a “key” 9/11 victims’ families group is breaking with the mosque opposition movement, demanding that an anti-mosque protest planned for September 11th be rescheduled, “and, if it isn’t, that participants back out.” In an email to members reposted by Politico, Dennis McKeon (who started the group Where to Turn as a clearinghouse of information about the attacks and subsequent plans to redevelop Ground Zero) wrote that any protests planned for the ninth anniversary of the attacks “disrespect the memories of our loved ones on this sacred day at this sacred site”:
As most of you probably know there is a proposed protest rally against the mosque being planned for 9/11. There are also reports that there is a pro mosque rally in the works for 9/11 as well. … We have always stood against any rallies scheduled for September 11th and we will do so again with these events.
We will be joining other 9/11 organizations in asking that the organizers change the date for these events. If they refuse to change the date we will also ask those scheduled to appear to withdraw from the events.
Over the past 9 years more and more of what’s been going on at Ground Zero has excluded the families. …
We will never support such activities that disrespect the memories of our loved ones on this sacred day at this sacred site.
Indeed, while conservative critics have attempted to co-opt the families of the 9/11 victims for political purposes, painting them as monolithically opposed to the proposed community center, in reality, their opinions are split, much like those of other New Yorkers.
The September 11th protest is to be the biggest yet, featuring former U.N. ambassador John Bolton, right-wing media tycoon Andrew Breitbart, and Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders, a proud hater of Islam. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was scheduled to deliver a video address, but canceled under mysterious circumstances. The protest is being organized by anti-mosque crusader Pamela Geller, who has organized other demonstrations against the proposed center, and uses her blog Atlas Shurgs to pump out new smears against the project’s organizers every day.
Sebelius Brushes Off Pawlenty’s Political Moves To Thwart Health Reform In His State
Sebelius Brushes Off Pawlenty’s Political Moves To Thwart Health Reform In His State
Whereas the overwhelming majority of states and governors who oppose the federal health care law are accepting its grants, Minnesota Governor and GOP Presidential hopeful Tim Pawlenty (R) is only interested in the abstinence-only portions of the law. Pawlenty has issued an executive order (EO) preventing the state from applying for any more federal funding, noting in campaign-like rhetoric that reform “represents a dramatic attempt to assert federal command and control over this country’s health care system” and “includes unprecedented federal intrusions into individual liberty”:
NOW, THEREFORE, I hereby order that:
All executive branch departments and agencies are directed that no application shall be submitted to the federal government in connection with requests for grant funding for programs and demonstration projects deriving from the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“PPACA” or “the Act”) (Pub.L. 111-148) unless otherwise required by law, or approved by the office of the Governor.
The order puts Pawlenty out of sync with many cities, counties, and businesses in his state — 97 of which applied for the law’s reinsurance grants. But the sheer transparency of Pawlenty’s effort was not lost on HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius today, who when asked about the governor’s EO, visibly snickered before noting that Minnesota residents are already benefiting from reform:
SEBELIUS: I’m afraid of citizens of Minnesota may be the victims of whatever it is that’s coming their way. I know we have companies from the great state of Minnesota who have applied to be part of this plan. … I know that we have seniors in Minnesota who have received $250 checks for prescription drug coverage because they have reached the prescription drug doughnut hole. … So I have no idea if those are the kinds of benefits he intends to eliminate for the citizens of Minnesota.
Watch Sebelius’ reaction at 0:28:
In the order, Pawlenty also notes that he has already determined that Minnesota will “not participate in the early expansion of the Medicaid entitlement program offered by the federal government as part of the legislation” or apply for federal grants that could help the state review unreasonable premium hikes.
Cross-posted from The Wonk Room.
Sharron Angle’s Plan For Education: Eliminate All Of It
Sharron Angle’s Plan For Education: Eliminate All Of It
Speaking at a forum for the right-wing Steamboat Institute last week, Nevada GOP Senate candidate Sharron Angle effectively declared that public schools should cease to exist. Early in her speech, Angle reiterated her belief that America should abolish the federal Department of Education because education is “better taken care of at the state level.” Yet, in response to an audience member’s question, Angle also highlighted her work to de-fund Nevada’s public schools:
We had a two-thirds rule in our constitution, that the people passed not once, but twice, saying that it would take a two-thirds vote of both houses of the legislature to pass a tax increase. We had 15 strong assemblymen . . . of which I was the whip. And I began to do what you do as a whip, and that was to say to these guys, “guys, we need to hold strong against this tax increase. We cannot stand a big tax increase like this. …”
During that time, the governor sued the legislature to make us raise taxes by a simple majority and the supreme court went along with it. At my own expense, I hired a fellow out of Claremont Institute, Dr. John Eastman, to take this case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, to fight for our Constitution.
Watch it:
Angle’s tale of her bold battle against taxes is only half of the story. In 2003, the Nevada legislature enacted a budget which did not include education funding, on the theory that they would take up a second bill which ensured that the public schools could remain open when the school year began. Because the Nevada Constitution requires both a balanced budget and the state to fund education, this second bill would include a combination of tax increases and education spending.
The two bill strategy broke down, however, when a minority of the state Assembly — led by Sharron Angle — refused to enact any bill which raised the new revenue required to reopen the public schools. Because a two-thirds majority is necessary to enact any tax increases, Angle’s minority was on the verge of shutting down all public education in the state of Nevada.
Eventually, the Nevada Supreme Court thwarted Angle’s plans. The court case which Angle refers to, Guinn v. Legislature of the State of Nevada, waived the two-thirds supermajority requirement in order to ensure that the state met its constitutional obligation to provide public schools. So when Angle says that she appealed this decision to the U.S. Supreme Court “to fight for our Constitution,” she really was fighting against the Nevada Constitution’s requirement that all children have the opportunity to obtain a public education.
In other words, Angle supports a two-step process to reform education in the United States:
- Phase One: Eliminate all federal funding of education.
- Phase Two: Eliminate all other funding of education.
Mary Louise Parker Calls O’Reilly An ‘Idiot’ For Attacking Jennifer Aniston’s Comments On Single Motherhood
Mary Louise Parker Calls O’Reilly An ‘Idiot’ For Attacking Jennifer Aniston’s Comments On Single Motherhood
Earlier this month, Fox News host Bill O’Reilly went after actress Jennifer Aniston for saying “women are realizing more and more that you don’t have to settle, they don’t have to fiddle with a man to have that child.” O’Reilly slammed Aniston, herself a single mother, for “throwing a message out to 12-year olds and 13-year olds that hey, you don’t need a guy, you don’t need a dad.” “That’s destructive to our society,” he added. As ThinkProgress noted, Aniston quickly fired back, calling his comments “insulting [to] women.” “Of course, many women dream of finding Prince Charming (with fatherly instincts), but for those who’ve not yet found their Bill O’Reilly,” Aniston told People sarcastically, “I’m just glad science has provided a few other options.”
Now, fellow actress and single mother Mary Louise Parker has come to Aniston’s defense, telling Vanity Fair that O’Reilly’s comments make him sound “like an idiot.” Parker noted that many “people don’t plan on being single parents,” and, in a move that is sure to be incredibly insulting to O’Reilly, said she doesn’t even know who he is:
Why is being a single mother destructive? Give me a break. He sounds like an idiot. Who is he again? Maybe he’s right, I don’t know. I don’t think you necessarily have to be part of a traditional nuclear family to be a good mother. A lot of children from traditional nuclear families have really unhappy childhoods, and they have dysfunctional, distant parents who don’t pay attention to them.
Also, some people don’t plan on being single parents. It’s not like you’re sitting at home and thinking, ‘Wow, I’d really like to do this by myself. I’d love to wake up six times a night and change diapers and have nobody to help me. That’d be great!’ I certainly didn’t do that. I think that opinion is pretty narrow-minded. People like him – and I don’t even know who he is, so this is just a guess, they usually just say shit like that for attention. He probably comes from a nuclear family and didn’t get enough attention as a child.
“O’Reilly should just build a dunk tank and stay in it until all the single moms are done with him. I hear Sandra Bullock throws a mean fast ball,” the gay feminist blog SheWired editorialized. But of course, this is hardly the first insensitive or chauvinistic comment O’Reilly has made about women. Ironically, the O’Reilly-Aniston spat came almost 90 years to the day after the enactment of 19th Amendment, which guaranteed a woman’s right to vote, and while many were recognizing its anniversary.
Koch Industries Applies For Federal Funds From Health Care Law It Opposes
Koch Industries Applies For Federal Funds From Health Care Law It Opposes
Fred Koch
The contradictory practice of opposing the health care law while applying for its funding has been common among states. As the Wonk Room points out, 19 of the 22 states that are suing the federal government over health care reform have applied for the law’s rate review grants and at least 7 of those states also applied for the reinsurance dollars.
Republicans In Disarray: Losing Candidates Increasingly Unwilling To Unite Behind GOP Nominees
Republicans In Disarray: Losing Candidates Increasingly Unwilling To Unite Behind GOP Nominees
For months, a civil war has raged between Tea Party activists and the GOP establishment for the heart of the Republican Party. While House Republicans have tried to co-opt the movement by creating a Tea Party Caucus, corporate Tea Party leaders like Dick Armey and Matt Kibbe scoff at the idea, declaring instead, “The movement is not seeking a junior partnership with the Republican Party. It is aiming for a hostile takeover.” Meanwhile, despite public overtures, the Republican establishment has spent millions fending off Tea Party primary challenges.
It is no surprise, then, that in a multitude of races where Tea Party candidates have faced off against establishment Republicans in a GOP primary, the losing candidate is rejecting customary practice by refusing to endorse the winner. For a party that is supposed to have a banner year, immense disunity could spell trouble for the Republican Party. Here is a list of races this cycle — most of which pitted an establishment candidate against a Tea Party candidate — where the losing candidate has refused to officially endorse:
AZ-SEN: Sen. John McCain soundly trumped former Rep. J.D. Hayworth in the August 24 primary. Afterward, McCain never received a congratulatory phone call and Hayworth, who has not endorsed McCain, never received an invitation to a GOP unity event.
WA-SEN: Sarah Palin-endorsed Tea Partier Clint Didier was trounced by establishment candidate Dino Rossi on August 17. Didier has since withheld his endorsement until certain policy demands are met; Rossi isn’t budging. Didier’s spokeswoman responded, “So is Dino saying, ‘F*** you’ to those people [who supported Didier]? ‘F*** you,’ I don’t need your votes?”
MO-SEN: On August 3, Rep. Roy Blunt secured the GOP nomination over Tea Party candidate Chuck Purgason. Four weeks later, Purgason still has not officially endorsed Blunt.
FL-GOV: Rick Scott defeated Bill McCollum on August 24 in one of the most bitter primaries of the year. McCollum has since refused to endorse Scott, saying instead that “I still have serious questions…about issues with his character, his integrity, his honesty.”
CA-GOV: The bad blood didn’t end after Meg Whitman trounced Steve Poizner on June 8. Whitman continued to attack Poizner on the radio, leading the latter to declare that Whitman “apparently hasn’t gotten the memo that the primary is over” because she is “still misrepresenting my track record.”
NV-GOV: Brian Sandoval toppled Gov. Jim Gibbons on June 8. Sandoval spokesman Mary Sarah confirmed to ThinkProgress that Gibbons has not endorsed Sandoval following the primary.
IA-GOV: Bob Vander Plaats lost a contentious campaign to former Gov. Terry Branstad on June 8. Then, after Vander Plaat’s supporters fell just short of usurping the lieutenant governor slot against Branstad’s wishes, Vander Plaat himself said that he will not endorse Branstad for governor.
SC-GOV: After Nikki Haley secured the GOP nomination on June 22, one of her primary opponents, Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, pointedly refused to show up for a unity rally.
NY-23: After Doug Hoffman drove RNC-endorsed Dede Scozzafava out of the 2009 special election because she wasn’t sufficiently conservative. Scozzafava proceeded not only to withhold an endorsement from Hoffman, but went even further and threw her support instead to Democrat Bill Owens.
SC-04: On June 22, Tea Party challenger Trey Gowdy defeated Rep. Bob Inglis 71 percent to 29 percent. Price Atkinson, a spokesman for Inglis, confirmed to ThinkProgress that Inglis has not endorsed Gowdy following the primary.
WA-03: Establishment candidate Jaime Herrera topped Tea Party candidate David Castillo on August 17. Afterward, Castillo would not endorse Herrera in the general election.
PA-04: On May 18, Tea Partier Keith Rothfus beat out GOP favorite Mary Beth Buchanan. ThinkProgress called Rothfus’s campaign, where a press contact who declined to give her name confirmed that Buchanan has not given an official endorsement.
IN-04: Todd Rokita defeated Brandt Hershman on May 4. Since then, Zach Zagar from the Rokita campaign confirmed to ThinkProgress that they “haven’t had any contact with Mr. Hershman’s campaign since the primary.”
KS-04: Mike Pompeo emerged out of a crowded field on August 3 but embittered himself with his primary rivals in the process. None of his three GOP opponents have endorsed his campaign.
FL-08: Daniel Webster emerged from a crowded GOP field on August 24. However, one of his top primary opponents, Kurt Kelly, was conspicuously absent at last night’s unity rally.
If you know of other races where the losing candidate refuses to endorse the winner, email ThinkProgress and let us know.
Scarborough’s Crew Mocks The ‘Young Guns’: ‘Worst Idea Ever’
Scarborough’s Crew Mocks The ‘Young Guns’: ‘Worst Idea Ever’
Reps. Eric Cantor (R-VA; 47 years old), Paul Ryan (R-WI; 40 years old), and Kevin McCarthy (R-CA; 45 years old) have authored a self-aggrandizing new book set to be released next month titled “Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders.”
The book’s marketing campaign comes with a comical ad trailer, featuring a lofty soundtrack and soaring accolades (“They are ready to make history. Together, they are ‘The YOUNG GUNS!’ Innovative, energetic, forging new solutions.”) Watch it here.
All the egotistical self-praise from the “young guns” was too much for former Republican congressman and MSNBC host Joe Scarborough. This morning, he and his crew incessantly mocked the new marketing campaign, debating whether it was a “parody.” “Never make up your own nickname,” cautioned co-host Willie Geist. Scarborough joked that the three congressmen “were” the future of the Party until their latest ego trip. Calling the ad “awful,” Scarbrough said it was “the worst idea ever.” Watch it:
Hotline reports that House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) receives only 3 mentions in 191 pages. Former President George W. Bush “earns just 4 references, the same number as TN 08 candidate Stephen Fincher (R).”
Another challenge posed by the rollout is that Cantor has thus far been unwilling to publicly embrace his co-author Ryan’s budget roadmap, which is included in the book.
Recall, Ryan’s “roadmap” includes privatizing Social Security and Medicare, while at the same time repealing the estate and corporate taxes. The Ryan roadmap would lose $2 trillion over a decade, while requiring 90 percent of taxpayers to pay more, according to an analysis by the Citizens for Tax Justice.
On repeated occasions, including in recent interviews with Laura Ingraham and the National Review, Cantor has been asked directly whether he’d be willing to endorse the Ryan roadmap, and he has pointedly refused to do so. Apparently, the “young guns” are having some growing pains.
Hate Radio Host Bill Cunningham Says He Will Broadcast From Boehner’s Office On Election Day
Hate Radio Host Bill Cunningham Says He Will Broadcast From Boehner’s Office On Election Day
On his nationally syndicated radio program Sunday night, hate radio host Bill Cunningham said that he will broadcast his show from the office of Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) on this November’s Election Day, and was invited by Boehner himself. “I’m going to do my show that day from the portico of the Speaker of the House’s office in the U.S. Capitol. I’ve been invited there by the new Speaker of the House, John Boehner, and I’ll be the only radio talk show host in the speaker’s office, doing my show from the portico overlooking the Washington Monument,” Cunningham said. “And I’m going to do it.” Listen here:
Cunningham is a prominent Ohio-based vitriolic hate radio host who was recently given a nationally syndicated television contract. In announcing his Election Day broadcast from Boehner’s office, Cunningham said: “[November 2nd, 2010] will be the date that normal Americans like you and I take back our country from the fraud and the charade which has been Barack Hussein Obama.”
Apparently, these are the types of statements that Boehner is willing to endorse in his effort to become Speaker of the House (via Media Matters):
– “Barack Hussein Obama, that’s the racist — obviously.” [8/24/09]
– Cunningham alleged that “Obama wants to gas the Jews.” [10/31/08]
– Cunningham invoked “[s]ix-six-six” and “the beast” in discussing “Barack Hussein Obama” [10/14/08]
– Cunningham highlights fake Kenyan birth certificate, says “maybe it is accurate,” but later adds “move on.” [08/03/08]
– Cunningham on Obama Sr.: “That’s what black fathers do. They simply leave.” [10/30/08]
– Cunningham on the poor: “They’re poor because they lack values, ethics, and morals.” [01/05/09]
– Bill Cunningham advocates “beat[ing] the hell outta” homeless people with “a big old cane, Singapore-style.” [07/14/09]
When contacted by ThinkProgress to confirm Cunningham’s appearance, Boehner’s office said only that the Congressman “has not made his plans for election night and will not for some time.” ThinkProgress contacted Cunningham’s producers, who said Boehner indeed promised to have Cunningham broadcast from his office, but they were not sure when it would happen.
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