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09.20.10 -- 9:55AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (5)

To Nationalize Or Not

I don't agree with TPM Reader JB, but wanted to share JB's take with all our readers:

I am writing about the post titled "Inspires Confidence" on the TPM Editors Blog.

--David Kurtz

09.20.10 -- 9:06AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (5)

Inspires Confidence

White House strenuously denies NYT report that it is considering getting aggressive about winning the midterm elections.

--David Kurtz

09.20.10 -- 8:58AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (3)

What Is Going On In Connecticut?

If Linda McMahon (R-WWE) can close the gap against Attorney General Richard Blumenthal (D), Dems should just run for the hills.

--David Kurtz

09.20.10 -- 8:36AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (6)

It's a sign of something, though what I'm not entirely sure, that of all the endearingly nutty things that have come out about Christine O'Donnell over the last week, the one that seems to be causing her some genuine grief on the right is the news that she "dabbled into witchcraft" before making her hard right turn into evangelical Christianity and the sexual purity movement. There's even some chatter that the witchcraft revelations may have been the trigger to her decision to cancel on the weekend shows, though there doesn't seem to be any hard evidence for this or way to distinguish this possibility from all the other reasons she had to back out of the appearances.

Michelle Malkin counters attacks from the right by noting that O'Donnell's admission of dabbling in witchcraft was part of her explanation for her opposition to Halloween, making her into a sort of Whitaker Chambers of the Occult. "She responds by explaining that she opposes witchcraft because she has had first-hand experience with what they do. So, she tried it. She rejected it. And she learned from it."

Far from being a political liability, O'Donnell's own experience of witchcraft makes her anti-Halloween advocacy more urgent, informed and compelling.

--Josh Marshall

09.20.10 -- 1:08AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (35)

Disaggregating the Parties?

An interesting speculation from TPM Reader MH, building on Christina's article on Jim Demint ...

Re Jim DeMint vs the GOP establishment: what DeMint is doing now may be pointing the way to our congress's future-- 18th-century British-style factionalism, something you're familiar with academically.
Look at the relatively new elements coming into play: the rise of PACs, 529s, and other conduits that have no necessary connection to a major-party structure, together with the unshackling of really big-time money thanks to our supreme court, and the perfecting and spread of astroturf organizing practices. This can tremendously empower the kind of factional or regional differences that have always existed within the parties-- it potentially brings in rafts of new money and makes it available to individual empire-builders like DeMint, who can use it to cultivate their own circles of adherents, clients, connections, or whatever you want to call them.

--Josh Marshall

09.19.10 -- 7:37PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (82)

NR Hits the Books

Should calm a lot of nerves. From TPM Reader NR ...

I know it's obscure and hidden in the voluminous federal law and Supreme Court Decisions so possibly Newt would have missed it, but there is already fairly well established federal law making it illegal to impose Sharia law on the United States. After an exhaustive search, I found this:
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

--Josh Marshall

09.19.10 -- 6:45PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (10)

From the Vault ...

Al Franken vs Christine O'Donnell on the Maher show.

--Josh Marshall

09.19.10 -- 5:37PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (49)

They Walk Among Us

Newt Gingrich got a lot of deserved grief last week for his race-baiting rant about President Obama's "anti-colonial Kenyan" world view. I'm sure he'll get much less for his call this weekend for federal legislation banning the imposition of Sharia Law in the United States. As we've already seen, Gingrich has seized on Islamophobia as his ticket to power or perhaps just relevance in this latest round of hypomania. But it's worth setting back for a moment and considering just how out of it and paranoid you have to be to believe or perhaps just how big of a charlatan you have to be to say that we're close in anything but the geological timescale to seeing Sharia law imposed in this country.

--Josh Marshall

09.19.10 -- 5:33PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (5)

DeMint Nation?

How one senator's quest to build a far-right caucus of his own will likely shape the next Congress.

--Josh Marshall

09.19.10 -- 2:29PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (29)

Where We're Going

In a telling sign about Lisa Murkowski's write-in campaign and that of other Republicans now forced into independent runs for office, note her line attacking Tea Partier and official Alaska GOP standard bearer Joe Miller.

On CNN she said: "Joe Miller simply does not represent that. He is suggesting to us, in my opinion, and in the opinion of many, many Alaskans, some pretty radical things. You know, we dump Social Security. No more Medicare. Let's get rid of the Department of Education. Elimination of all earmarks."

Sounds about right to me. But note that these are garden variety Democratic attacks on all but the most liberal Republicans.

--Josh Marshall

09.18.10 -- 6:35PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (18)

SLIDESHOW: Values Overload

More photos from the Values Voter Summit:

--David Kurtz

09.18.10 -- 3:21PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (10)

And The 2010 Values Voter Summit Straw Poll Winner Is...

Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) won both the presidential and vice-presidential straw poll at the Values Voter Summit in Washington this afternoon. The second-place finisher in the VP contest, Sarah Palin, was promoted to winner, leaving the VVS choice Pence/Palin 2012.

"What a dream ticket," Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council and host of the VVS, said to applause from the crowd.

Last year's VVS presidential straw poll winner, Mike Huckabee, came in second this time around.

Full results here.

--Evan McMorris-Santoro

09.18.10 -- 1:44PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (66)

A Proud Tradition

It's become a staple of the tea party candidacy. You make a big splash onto the national stage then quickly retreat from any press scrutiny because you are so unprepared and ill-equipped for the rigors of the job that tough questions will expose you as the charlatan you are.

Sarah Palin, a lot of people forget, ducked the national press for days after she was picked for vice president by John McCain. Only after careful scripting and staging, did Palin finally do interviews with the national press -- only to get ground to bits by Katie Couric no less. Rand Paul is the exception that proves the rule: after capturing the GOP nomination for U.S. Senate from Kentucky, he made disastrous TV appearances first and then vanished from the scene. Taking that lesson to heart, Senate GOP nominee Sharron Angle declined any national TV appearances after her primary win in Nevada.

And now comes Christine O'Donnell, who has long experience doing TV -- 22 appearances on Bill Maher's old show alone -- but who is so not ready for prime time, or Sunday morning, that she's canceled her appearances tomorrow on CBS' Face The Nation and Fox News Sunday.

She can't even handle Fox.

--David Kurtz

09.18.10 -- 12:44PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (18)

No Shame

Newt Gingrich, in full Islamophobe mode at the Values Voter Summit this morning, warns against the infiltration of shariah law into U.S. courtrooms.

--David Kurtz

09.18.10 -- 10:00AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (25)

O'Donnell Cancels TV Appearances

GOP Senate nominee Christine O'Donnell (DE) cancels her scheduled appearance tomorrow on CBS's Face the Nation. She is apparently still planning on doing Fox News Sunday.

Late Update: O'Donnell is dodging Fox News Sunday, too.

--David Kurtz

09.18.10 -- 8:59AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (5)

Into The Belly Of The Beast

Evan McMorris-Santoro is at Day 2 of the Values Voter Summit. He's tweeting it here. Among today's highlights: Bill Bennett, Newt Gingrich, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell.

--David Kurtz

09.18.10 -- 8:17AM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (36)

Crack Open The Video Vault!

Last night on the season premiere of his HBO show, Bill Maher started going through the 22 appearances that Christine O'Donnell made on his old show, Politically Incorrect. First up, O'Donnell in 1999 describing dabbling in witchcraft and a date that included blood on a "satanic altar."

Maher threatened to play a clip a show until Senate candidate O'Donnell agrees to re-appear on his show. She is, Maher said, "an unemployed, anti-masturbation activist and a close friend of mine."

--David Kurtz

09.17.10 -- 10:59PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (21)

The Iditarod Of Senate Campaigns

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) announces her write-in campaign to win re-election despite losing the Republican Party nomination to Joe Miller.

RNC Chairman Michael Steele reiterates the party's support for Miller:

Alaskans selected Joe Miller as the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate and he has the full support of the Republican National Committee. I am confident that he will win in November and will work to restore conservative, principled and fiscally responsible leadership in Washington.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell announces that Murkowski is no longer welcome in the Senate Republican leadership, and he accepted her resignation as Republican Conference Secretary. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), who chairs the National Republican Senatorial Committee, recommits to supporting Miller and describes himself as "deeply disappointed" with Murkowski's decision.

--David Kurtz

09.17.10 -- 6:16PM // RECOMMEND RECOMMEND (15)