Perry’s ‘Favorite Paper’ Slams His Refusal To Debate In An Above-The-Fold, Above-The-Nameplate Editorial
Perry’s ‘Favorite Paper’ Slams His Refusal To Debate In An Above-The-Fold, Above-The-Nameplate Editorial
Picking up the GOP’s new strategy, Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) has refused to debate his Democratic opponent Bill White because White would not release his personal income tax returns for three years in the 1990s. Despite the fact that White paid no personal income taxes in 1995 and did release some tax returns, Perry still refused unless White released additional returns by September 15. Because of this impasse, Texas may not see a general election gubernatorial debate “for the first time since 1990.”
To the consternation of newspapers across the state, Perry has also refused to meet with newspaper editorial boards, where political candidates answer questions from Texas editorial writers and editors in an effort to win the newspaper’s endorsement and inform voters of their positions. Yesterday, Texas newspaper Tyler Morning Telegraph — the paper he once described as his “favorite” in the state and “the most conservative” — lambasted Perry for his “unacceptable and undeserved” position of “silence.” In an unprecedented above-the-fold, above-the-nameplate editorial with an all caps headline, “TIME FOR RESPECT –GOVERNOR PERRY SHOULD END SILENCE,” the paper called on the Texas governor to meet with its board and debate White:
Your position to not visit with the editorial boards of Texas newspapers may be astute politically, but it demonstrates a disregard for newspaper readers and voters across the state, who deserve to hear substance rather than silence.
It is therefore with the greatest concern that we offer not only an editorial board meeting with us, but also an opportunity for a face-to-face debate between you and your opponent, former Houston Mayor Bill White, for the purposes of illustrating to Texas voters your positions on key issues.[...]
We are facing what’s rumored to be the largest budget deficit and crisis in the history of our state – informed estimates of the budget shortfall range from $18 billion to $20 billion. Newspaper readers, whether Republicans, Democrats or Independents – deserve to hear your solutions to the staggering problems we will be facing as the legislative session begins.
Instead, we’re confronted with an unacceptable and undeserved silence.
This newspaper, which you have repeatedly called “your favorite paper in the state,” has given you support in previous elections in the form of endorsements.[...]You also have characterized this as one of the most conservative newspapers in the state. We guarantee a level playing field.
As the Texas paper Austin American-Statesman’s Jason Embry noted this morning, it is “very rare to see a newspaper put an editorial on the front page. (I can’t remember any paper I’ve worked for in my 12 years doing that.) Even more rare to put it above the fold. But above the paper’s nameplate?”
Trying to shift blame, Perry insisted in an August press release that it was White who was refusing to debate. But, as the White campaign pointed out, White had accepted five televised debates (six now) and called on the governor to join him in those debates, which Perry has refused to do. Perry’s debate defense was not only false, but made such a “ridiculous claim” that it earned Perry the “pants-on-fire” ruling from nonpartisan fact-checking organization Politifact.
The San Antonio Express-News and the Houston Chronicle, along with three other newspapers, have said they will host a debate on October 19 “even if White is the only one who shows up.” (HT: Burnt Orange)
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As More Bullying Victims Commit Suicide, Right-Wing Groups Decry Anti-Bullying Policies As ‘Gay Agenda’ Ploy
As More Bullying Victims Commit Suicide, Right-Wing Groups Decry Anti-Bullying Policies As ‘Gay Agenda’ Ploy
Last week, Rutgers University freshman Tyler Clementi jumped to his death after two classmates secretly recorded his sexual relationship with a man and broadcasted it over the internet. Tragically, Clementi marks the fourth gay student to commit suicide in three weeks because of anti-gay harassment from fellow students. Seth Walsh, 13, Asher Brown, 13, and Billy Lucas, 15, also took their own lives last month because fellow students bullied them in school.
The growing number of suicides reveal the “unique set of safety concerns” that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students face both in secondary school and college. According to a National Education Policy Center study released yesterday, “over 85% report being harassed because of their sexual or gender identity, and over 20% report being physically attacked.” The “highly troubling pattern of mistreatment, negative consequences” and “the dramatic failure” of educational institutions to “adequately address” LGBT students’ concerns has contributed to a suicide rate among LGBT students that is “3-4 times higher than that of their straight counterparts.”
Many states across the country are taking laudable steps to enact measures that bolster administrators’ ability to protect students who face such harassment. However, despite the evidence supporting the need, right-wing lawmakers and activists insist that anti-bullying measures are nothing more than insidious tools of the “homosexual agenda”:
– The American Family Association of Michigan has spent years decrying a proposed anti-bullying measure as “a Trojan Horse to sneak [homosexual activists'] special rights agenda into law” and to “legitimize homosexual behavior” which is “a practice scientifically proven to result in a dramatically higher incidence of domestic violence, mental illness, illegal drug use, promiscuity, life-threatening disease, and premature death.” The bill “died in 2008 in the state Senate because senators could not agree” on whether to address bullying based on sexual orientation and gender identity in the measure.
– In Minnesota, Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Emmer said he would not sign the anti-bullying Safe Schools For All bill because “I don’t want the government” instead of parents to be on “the front line of defense of our children.” Indeed, Emmer voted against and Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R) vetoed the same bill in 2009 after the right-wing Minnesota Family Council pushed legislators to reject the bill in 2009 because it would “promote acceptance of homosexuality.”
– The right-wing Christian media ministry Focus on the Family is attacking an anti-bullying standard on the federal level. Insisting that bullying prevention is being “hijacked by activists” who are “politicizing or sexualizing the issue,” Focus on the Family’s Candi Cushman claims that the anti-bullying bill currently before Congress “cater[s] to a narrow political agenda” that “becomes a gateway for homosexuality promotion in school.” In their current back-to-school guide “equipping” parents with tools against the “sneaky” gay agenda, Cushman told parents to look out for bullying seminars, diversity lessons, and “cute little pictures of furry animals” as “red flags” signaling the “gay agenda.”
Currently, only eight of the 44 states that have laws to address bullying specifically reference bullying based on sexual orientation and gender identity as prohibited conduct. Sen. Robert Casey, Jr. (D-PA) introduced a bill in August, the Safe Schools Improvement Act, that would require any public schools receiving federal funding to develop race, sex, and gender-specific anti-bullying policies and teach harassment prevention strategies.
“These tragedies underscore the need for a federal law that comprehensively addresses bullying and harassment in schools,” Casey’s spokeswoman told ThinkProgress. In response to Focus on the Family’s charges, she noted that, along with educators, administrations, and civil rights groups, the legislation has been endorsed by the National PTA. When announcing the bill in August, Casey asserted that the harassment of a student “to the point of suicide or where he can’t function or is subject to violence” is “just wrong.” Failure to address “the horror so many kids go through every single day” amounts to “one word: betrayal.”
McMahon Unsure What The Minimum Wage Is, But Sure That It Should Be Lower
McMahon Unsure What The Minimum Wage Is, But Sure That It Should Be Lower
At a press conference today, Republican Senate candidate and World Wrestling Entertainment CEO Linda McMahon (CT) celebrated the endorsement of the National Federation of Independent Businesses, a “prominent business interest lobby” that finds fault with unemployment insurance, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Family Medical Leave Act.
But “staff abruptly shut down” the conference when McMahon began endorsing the NFIB’s more controversial opposition to increasing the federal minimum wage. When pressed by reporters on whether she supported reducing wages, McMahon said “Congress should consider lowering” such a “mandate” that businesses cannot afford:
Most notably, McMahon said she believed Congress should consider lowering the federal minimum wage in times of economic distress for small businesses, such as the current recession.
“The minimum wage now in our country, I think we’ve set that and a lot of people have benefited from it in our country, but I think we ought to review how much it ought to be, and whether or not we ought to have increases in the minimum wage,” McMahon said.[...]
When reporters asked McMahon to clarify whether she would support reducing the wage, which is currently $7.25 per hour, the candidate replied, “We should always review the policy that is put in place.”
“I think we ought to look at all of those issues in terms of what mandates are being placed on businesses and can they afford them?” McMahon said. “I think we should get input from our business community. We should listen to our small business operators, and we should hear what it is they have to say and how it’s impacting their businesses and make some of those decisions.”
McMahon insisted that she was not advocating an elimination of the minimum wage altogether, but when pressed on whether the state’s minimum wage “was too high, or onerous on state businesses,” she “admitted that she did not know what the current minimum wage is” and decided she was “just not going to comment anymore.”
Six hundred and fifty economists, however, were quite clear in 2007 that an increase in minimum wage not only “would improve the well-being of low-wage workers” but would have “very little or no effect on employment” as critics suggest. In fact, the Economic Policy Institute found last year that the minimum wage acted as a “stealth stimulus” during the current economic crisis by boosting consumer spending by $4.9 billion.
But McMahon has no interest in delving into the actual impact of her policies. Indeed, McMahon admitted that she didn’t even know “if any of her employees at World Wrestling Entertainment are paid” a minimum wage. But if her treatment of her employees is any indication, Connecticut constituents shouldn’t expect even a health or pension benefit from her. That’s just how she does business.
Ted Mann, The Day: Should it be reduced now? Since businesses are struggling, as you all described? Would you argue for reducing the minimum wage now?
McMahon: "We have got minimum wages in states, we have got minimum wages in the (federal) government, and I think we ought to look at all of those issues in terms of what mandates are being placed on businesses and can they afford them. I think we should get input from our business community. We should listen to our small business operators and we should hear what it is they have to say and how it's impacting their businesses and make some of those decisions."
Coburn, DeMint Block National Women’s History Museum Because ‘Quilters’ And ‘Cowgirl’ Museums Already Exist
Coburn, DeMint Block National Women’s History Museum Because ‘Quilters’ And ‘Cowgirl’ Museums Already Exist
This week, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) made the “unilateral decision to end legislative activity in the Senate.” In co-opting complete control of Senate business, DeMint has picked up the mantle of veteran obstructionist Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) in blocking any bill that does not meet his personal “parameters.” Now, both Coburn and DeMint have joined forces to target a bill celebrating women’s history.
In a letter to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Coburn and DeMint decided to place a “hold” on a bill “that would sell land near the Smithsonian Institution for the National Women’s History Museum.” The bill, which would allow a private group to use private funds to purchase the land, passed the House last year and has bipartisan support in the Senate. However, the two senators cite three objections to this “laudable undertaking”: taxpayer burden, abortion politics, and redundancy:
The senators say their concerns are financial: Though the museum would pay fair market value for the land, the group has raised little money. And they said the new institution would duplicate more than 100 similar museums — some of which already get taxpayer subsidies.
Abortion politics are also in play: The senators’ action came two days after the Concerned Women for America, a conservative group, wrote DeMint asking for a hold. The group’s CEO, Penny Nance, wrote in July that the museum would “focus on abortion rights without featuring any of the many contributions of the pro-life movement in America.”[...]
In their hold letter to Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, the GOP senators said the museum was “a laudable undertaking.” But while the museum isn’t asking for a subsidy now, Coburn and DeMint said “taxpayers simply cannot be guaranteed of this in the future.”
The reasons behind the hold “just don’t hold water.” First, as stated on the National Women’s History Museum organization’s (NWHM) website, the federal government “is not underwriting the cost of this museum with taxpayer dollars. It rests upon NWHM “to raise no less than $150 million to build this museum privately.” Secondly, according to NWHM CEO Joan Wages, there will be no reproductive rights exhibit because “we have to raise $400 million. We cannot afford, literally, to focus on issues that are divisive.”
And, as the New York Times’s Gail Collins revealed Sunday, the redundancy argument completely dries out under scrutiny. When asked what entities the new museum would duplicate, Coburn suggested that quilters and cowgirls were sufficient to tell the entire story of American women:
The office sent me a list of the entities in question. They include the Quilters Hall of Fame in Indiana, the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in Texas and the Hulda Klager Lilac Gardens in Washington.
There also were a number of homes of famous women and some fine small collections of exhibits about a particular locality or subject. But, really, Senator Coburn’s list pretty much proved the point that this country really needs one great museum that can chart the whole, big amazing story.
Both Coburn and DeMint are notoriously and predictably anti-women’s rights. Both voted against an amendment allowing justice for sexual assault victims and opposed a rape victim’s right to seek an abortion. In fact, Coburn has registered his belief that health coverage for mammograms is purely “political” and abortion is part of the “gay agenda” whose practitioners deserve the “death penalty.” It is unfortunately predictable that such contempt for the health and security of American women would translate into contempt for the history.
Having sufficiently relegated women’s history to blankets and lilacs, Coburn selected animals as a new target today. On the Senate floor this morning, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) asked unanimous consent to pass the Crane Conservation Act, the Marine Mammal Rescue Assistance amendments, the Great Cats and Rare Canids Act, the Shark Conservation Act, and the Southern Sea Otter Recovery and Research Act. Coburn objected to each request.
Ohio Business Drops State Chamber Of Commerce For Unprecedented Endorsement Of GOP Candidates
Ohio Business Drops State Chamber Of Commerce For Unprecedented Endorsement Of GOP Candidates
Last Thursday, the Ohio Chamber of Commerce deserted its 117-year tradition of neutrality in statewide campaigns by endorsing former Lehman Brothers executive and Republican candidate John Kasich in Ohio’s gubernatorial race. Despite standing behind current Gov. Ted Strickland (D) on certain issues during his first term, the Chamber decided to overturn its policy because “it detected an anti-business message” in Strickland’s campaign commercials “attacking Kasich and his ties to Wall Street.”
But not all businesses see the unprecedented step as a pro-business move. A day after the endorsement, one of Ohio’s largest electric utilities American Electric Power (AEP) decided to drop its membership because the Chamber’s break with its long-held tradition “creates division” among member businesses and “pits candidates potentially against businesses”:
American Electric Power isn’t taking the action because the chamber endorsed Kasich over Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland, but because it broke a 117-year tradition of not endorsing anyone in the race, spokeswoman Melissa McHenry said.
“We think it creates division within the chamber among different businesses,” McHenry said.
The company will no longer pay its chamber dues to remain a member, and Joe Hamrock, president and chief operating officer of AEP Ohio, is resigning from the chamber board, McHenry said.
She said AEP leaders told chamber officials before the endorsement that they thought it was not appropriate for the chamber to endorse in the race.
“We said that we didn’t think it was a good idea,” she said. “It would create division, it pits businesses against one another, it pits candidates potentially against businesses.”
The chamber also endorsed two other statewide Republican candidates this year, state Sen. John Husted for secretary of state and former U.S. Sen. Mike DeWine for attorney general. While the chamber changed its bylaws in 1998 to allow its PAC to endorse candidates, it has only endorsed Republican supreme court candidates until now.
Other state chambers including Michigan, Illinois, and Florida have also fortified their political ties to the GOP by endorsing Republican candidates. The California chamber’s endorsement of gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman (R) spurred similar rebukes from California community college system Chancellor Jack Scott and University of California President Mark G. Yudof earlier this month.
Quitting the chamber’s board of directors, Scott berated the chamber’s judgment in “catapulting the California Chamber of Commerce into the center of a fierce political contest.” “It is destructive to the chamber’s core mission and the businesses it represents when it becomes a partisan operation,” he said.
GOP Lawmakers Say Oklahoma Ban On Sharia Law Is Not Xenophobic Because ‘We’ Are ‘At War’ With ‘Them’
GOP Lawmakers Say Oklahoma Ban On Sharia Law Is Not Xenophobic Because ‘We’ Are ‘At War’ With ‘Them’
On November 2, Oklahoma residents will vote on State Question 755, the “Save Our State” constitutional amendment that would prohibit state courts from considering Islamic Sharia law in making rulings. Passed by the legislature in May, Oklahoma voters are expected to approve the measure and make Oklahoma “the first state in the nation” to impose such a ban.
While the measure passed with an overwhelming majority, religious groups and dissenting lawmakers insist that “xenophobia is at the root” of the amendment. One Oklahoma resident said “supporters of the issue are using scare tactics” to “make Islam objectionable.” Rep. Cory Williams (D-OK), who was one of the 12 lawmakers to oppose the measure, said, “If I was a Muslim Oklahoman, I would be offended by my religion being singled out.” Ironically, to defend against such claims, Republican lawmakers insist that the bill protects the courts from being “hijacked” by the people we are “at war” with:
Rep. Rex Duncan, R-Sand Springs, said he authored the legislation that spurred the ballot measure because he argues Sharia law provisions that are practiced in some countries — such as the unequal treatment of women — run in contrast with American principles. Although he is not aware of any Oklahoma courts making decisions based on Sharia law, he said actions by other countries and isolated events in the United States show this is a growing threat and action needs to be taken before it reaches Oklahoma.
“This effort is all about protecting our court system from being hijacked by an ideology that does not have America’s long-term future in mind,” he said. “Our courts ought to follow American federal and state law, and there is no logical reason why a court would look to the law of France or Saudi Arabia.”[...]
Rep. Lewis Moore, R-Arcadia, said he views the criticism against the state questions as unfounded. He said Sharia law is a threat to the country that needs to be addressed.
“Are we not at war with this ideology?” he asked. “Are we not at war with them? Then why would we give in to this?”
Duncan claims that if you’re not for his amendment, then you must be for Sharia law. “The only entities that could oppose this measure are those that admittedly support applying international law and sharia law in American courts,” he said. “If that’s what they think they need to be bold enough to say so.”
Reps. Duncan and Moore’s “us vs. them” mentality exemplifies the mainstreaming of extreme right-wing Islamophobia. Once hawked by fringe figures, the “creeping Sharia” delusion is finding champions among staunch conservative leaders like former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, whose crusade against all-things-Islamic culminated in his call for “a federal law that says sharia law cannot be recognized by any court in the United States” at the Value Voters Summit this month.
Many Republican candidates have also adopted anti-Sharia fear-mongering as a campaign tool, including Tennessee’s Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey (R), Tennessee House candidate Vijay Kumar (R), and Minnesota House candidate Lynne Torgerson (I).
Boehner: The ‘Pledge’ Is Just To ‘Lay Out The Size Of The Problem,’ Americans Aren’t Ready For Solutions
Boehner: The ‘Pledge’ Is Just To ‘Lay Out The Size Of The Problem,’ Americans Aren’t Ready For Solutions
Since its release last week, House Republicans have been touting their “Pledge To America” as a bold policy vision to solve the nation’s problems, which they would enact if they gain a majority after the November elections. However, revealing the pledge to be nothing more than regurgitated rhetoric that ignores critical issues, even conservative critics have slammed it as “meaningless stuff” that fails on “advocacy of long term sound public policy.”
Today on Fox News Sunday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) seemed to concede this point. When host Chris Wallace noted that the Pledge does not even address entitlement spending such as Social Security and Medicare, Boehner countered by saying that its purpose is only to “lay out the size of the problem,” rather than “to get to potential solutions.” This, of course, flies in the face of GOP branding of the proposal, but Boehner explained that he doesn’t think the American people can handle his ideas right now, saying, “Once Americans understand how big the problem is, then we can begin to talk about potential solutions”:
WALLACE: Congressman Boehner, as Willie Sutton said about banks, entitlements are where the money is. More than 40% of the budget. Yet, I’ve looked through this pledge and there is not one single proposal to cut social security, medicare, medicaid.
BOEHNER: Chris, we make it clear in there that we’re going to lay out a plan to work toward a balanced budget and deal with the entitlement crisis. Chris, it’s time for us as americans to have an adult conversation with each other about the serious challenges our country faces. And we can’t have that serious conversation until we lay out the size of the problem. Once Americans understand how big the problem is, then we can begin to talk about potential solutions. [...]
WALLACE: Forgive me, sir, isn’t the right time to have the adult conversation now before the election when you have this document? Why not make a single proposal to cut social security, medicare and medicaid?
BOEHNER: Chris, this is what happens here in washington. When you start down that path, you just invite all kind of problems. I know. I’ve been there. I think we need to do this in a more systemic way and have this conversation first. Let’s not get to the potential solutions. Let’s make sure americans understand how big the problem is. Then we can talk about possible solutions and then work ourselves into those solutions that are doable.
Watch it:
Indeed, Boehner was more than a little off message in saying “let’s not get to the potential solutions.” As his own Pledge states, surveying the proposals laid out in its pages, “We recognize that these solutions are ambitious.” It concludes by affirming that Republicans will fight to “promote and advance solutions.”
But numerous Republicans, including Boehner, have proposed plans to deal with Social Security and Medicare: cut benefits. All of their proposals — from raising the retirement age, to privatization, to declaring the entire social safety net unconstitutional — are deeply unpopular with the American people, hence Boehner’s apprehension to delve into the issue.
Conservatives continually fear monger about the sustainability of these vital social programs, falsely insisting they are “bankrupt” or a “Ponzi scheme.” So Boehner seems to be saying that he won’t lay out his plan to deal with this supposedly imminent danger until he’s had enough time to deceive the American people into thinking his “solutions” are needed.
In A ‘Shot-By-Shot’ Comparison, Jon Stewart Reveals The GOP’s Pledge Is ‘Exactly Like’ Its ‘Old Ideas’
In A ‘Shot-By-Shot’ Comparison, Jon Stewart Reveals The GOP’s Pledge Is ‘Exactly Like’ Its ‘Old Ideas’
Amidst the great fanfare surrounding the “Pledge to America” unveiling yesterday, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) admitted that the GOP is recycling failed policies in its new document. “We’re not going to be any different than what we’ve been,” he said.
Last night, the Daily Show’s Jon Stewart offered proof of this “self-reflection” in a video comparing quotes from Contract With America-era Republicans with Republicans at yesterday’s press conference. The compilation spans more than a decade and shows an almost identical repetition of the old Republican talking points:
REP. PETER ROSKAM (R-IL): Reign in the Washington, DC red tape.. [9/23/10]
FORMER REP. DENNIS HASTERT (R-IL): Cut Washington red tape.. [1/3/01]
REP. JEB HANSERLING (R-TX): Act immediately to reduce spending.. [9/23/10]
FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER NEWT GINGRICH (R-GA): Have real reforms to reduce spending.. [6/5/98]
REP. JASON CHAFFETZ (R-UT): Change the way we do business in Washington..[9/23/10]
REP. JIM NUSSLE (R-IA): Change business as usual in Washington..[11/19/94]
ROSKAM: Make the tax cuts permanent.. [9/23/10]
FORMER MAJORITY LEADER DICK ARMEY (R-TX): Make the existing tax cuts permanent [9/15/02]
REP. BILL CASSIDY (R-LA): ..health savings accounts that puts the patient firmly in control…[9/23/10]
HASTERT: Health savings accounts which will give families more control.. [8/30/04]
HANSERLING: Reduce the size of our government..[9/23/10]
GINGRICH: ..reducing the size of government.. [9/18/03]
BOEHNER: A smaller, less costly, and more accountable government in our nation’s capital. [9/23/10]
BOEHNER: A smaller, less costly, and more accountable government in Washington. [4/3/98]
Watch it:
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Postcards From the Pledge | ||||
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Indeed, the agenda promises nothing more than a return to the Bush Administration’s failed economic policies and the big business agenda. Even right-wing pundit Erick Erickson notes the agenda’s content proves “that the House GOP has not learned much of anything from 2006.” In responding to Boehner’s “we’re not any different” comment, Stewart said “I believe that’s a promise you can keep.”
Read more about the Pledge To America in today’s Progress Report.
Joining A Growing Number Of Incumbents, Rep. Issa Refuses To Debate His Opponent This Year
Joining A Growing Number Of Incumbents, Rep. Issa Refuses To Debate His Opponent This Year
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) is fully embracing his role as the Ranking Member of the House Oversight Committee, eager to “subpoena the rats and cockroaches” in his crusade to impeach President Obama. While relishing his “duties” as a Oversight Committee member, there is one civic responsibility the five-term incumbent is dodging: the duty to debate.
According to the North County Times, Issa is now “refusing to debate his Democratic opponent” Howard Katz (D-CA), after personally agreeing to do so “when the two chatted at a July 3 parade” in Oceanside, CA. Katz contends that Issa said he’d “certainly” debate him “on a date that works with my schedule so I can come.” But now, Issa’s spokesman Kurt Bardella insists that “the topic of debate never came up” and, “because the economy is a free fall,” his job in “continuing the process of oversight” outweighs is responsibility to participate in a debate:
“I was asking him about a debate and he said, ‘Certainly, just make it on a date that works with my schedule so I can come,’” said Katz, a Temecula resident.
Bardella denied that Issa, R-Vista, ever agreed to debate whether he should continue to represent the district that includes much of North County and Southwest Riverside County.
“The topic of a debate never came up,” Bardella said Tuesday. “He (Issa) has never made any kind of promise or commitment to debate.”[...]
Bardella said Issa is concentrating on his role as the ranking Republican on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, a powerful panel he will lead if the GOP wins enough seats on Nov. 2 to wrest control of the House from the Democrats.
“This is a situation where the economy is in a free fall and the people are in a free fall,” Bardella said. “The congressman is focused on doing his job and continuing the process of conducting oversight.”
Katz insists that Bardella is telling a “fib” and even released a picture of the two talking at the parade “where he swears the promise was made.” Katz needed the debate because he is in a “‘David versus Goliath’ matchup” against “one of the wealthiest members of Congress.” Libertarian candidate Mike Paster (CA) shares Katz’s debate frustrations after “he was unsuccessful in repeated efforts to get someone from Issa’s office to respond to his call for a debate” last week.
While Issa may have specific reasons to be wary of public scrutiny, his debate denial reflects a growing number of House candidates “who are flat-out refusing” to debate challengers. Rep. Steve King (R-IA), who has never formally debated a Democratic challenger, told his opponent that he hadn’t “earned” the right to debate him. And while Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO) is willing to debate his opponent, he is backing out of all but two of the debates he originally proposed.
Sharron Angle Touts Fox News And Right Wing Pundits As Best Tools For Campaign Cash
Sharron Angle Touts Fox News And Right Wing Pundits As Best Tools For Campaign Cash
Last week, Tea Party doyenne Sarah Palin counseled her newest protégé, Delaware GOP Senate nominee Christine O’Donnell, to “speak through Fox News.” While O’Donnell is quickly heeding the lesson, Tea Party maven Sharron Angle is a veteran practitioner. Skittish around reporters at her own press conferences, Angle often runs to Fox News, the “safe haven” of conservative candidates in need of “softball questions or nationwide fundraising appeals.”
Angle told Fox News as much when she instructed anchor Carl Cameron on his role as a PR agent. “We needed to have the press be our friends,” she said, because “when I get on a show, and I say, ’send money to SharronAngle.Com,’ so that your listeners” will know where to go “if they want to support me.” While Cameron laughed, audio obtained by Las Vegas Sun’s Jon Ralston of Angle at a house party this month prove “she wasn’t kidding.” According to Angle, Fox News pundits and “friendly press” — like hate radio host Rush Limbaugh — help her rake in the campaign cash:
Here’s some audio of Angle at a house party this month, bragging about how profitable FOX can be:
Guest: Sharron, how are you doing as far as the fundraising?
Sharron Angle: It’s going really well. If you’re interested in just the Internet part of that — and of course I’ve been criticized for saying that I like to be friends with the [press] — but here’s the deal: when I get a friendly press outlet — not so much the guy that’s interviewing me — it’s their audience that I’m trying to reach. So, if I can get on Rush Limbaugh, and I can say, “Harry Reid needs $25 million. I need a million people to send twenty five dollars to SharronAngle.com.” The day I was able to say that [even], he made $236,000 dollars. That’s why it’s so important. Somebody…I’m going on Bill O’Reilly the 16th. They say, “Bill O’Reilly, you better watch out for that guy, he’s not necessarily a friendly”…Doesn’t matter, his audience is friendly, and if I can get an opportunity to say that at least once on his show — when I said it on Sean Hannity’s television show we made $40,000 before we even got out of the studio in New York. It was just [great]. So that’s what I’m really reaching out to is that audience that’s had it with Harry, and you can watch that happen when I go on those shows. Go on my website, it starts coming in. We have an automatic…when you put your name in there and it doesn’t tell how much you gave, but it tells your name and where you’re from. And so you can just watch it; it just rolls like this. In fact, with Rush Limbaugh we put it all down. We couldn’t take the ticker going fast enough. And we’ve pulled in over [3,000,000] dollars just from that kind of a message going out.
The fact that Fox News permits fundraising appeals on air isn’t just a bonus for Angle, it appears to be her primary criteria. In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network, correspondent David Brody noted that Angle’s preference for “more conservative outlets” over “Meet the Press” or “This Week” conveys that she is “avoiding those mainstream media outlets.” To which Angle replied, “Well, in that audience, will they let me say I need $25 dollars from a million people go to SharronAngle.com send money?”
Angle’s preference for friendly outlets (and friendly audiences) has irked local news affiliates because she has “steadfastly refused to talk to reporters” in Nevada. Her refusal of “an interview request — or 10 requests, or 20″ has local news stations taking the “unprecedented step” of “publicly call[ing] on Ms. Angle to explain her positions to Nevada voters.” But if voters and the press are “tired of playing” the game “Where’s Sharron Angle,” they now know where to look.
In Its Party Platform, Montana GOP Swears To Uphold Constitution And Then Directly Undermines It
In Its Party Platform, Montana GOP Swears To Uphold Constitution And Then Directly Undermines It
As the Wonk Room reported in June, the Montana GOP adopted an anti-gay platform that referenced the Constitution at least 10 times to herald the preeminence of it as the sole source of law. While much of the media has discussed the Montana GOP’s anti-gay platform, few have noted the inherent contradiction within the document itself on its beliefs about the Constitution.
In their platform, Montana Republicans declared that the Constitution “be upheld in all of its entirety” and that all state and federal policies be “Constitutional in their effects, laws and practices.” But while they “adamantly oppose any attempts, whether direct or indirect, to destroy and/or undermine the Constitution,” the Montana Republicans criminalize homosexuality and call for more drastic “policies” and “practices” that directly conflict with the Constitution:
– We support the clear will of the people of Montana expressed by legislation to keep homosexual acts illegal.
– We support the repeal of the 16th amendment of the U.S. Constitution which authorizes a national income tax.
– We agree with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, who stated that the U.S. Supreme Court does not have the sole authority to judge the constitutionality of federal laws. We hold with these men that the States not only have the right, but also the duty to nullify unconstitutional laws in order to protect their citizens.
As the Wonk Room’s Igor Volsky noted, both the Montana Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court found such a law unconstitutional as it violates the State’s constitutional right to privacy and the Constitution’s Due Process clause. But in calling to repeal the 16th amendment, the GOP flouts Article VI of the Constitution stating that Acts of Congress “shall be the supreme law of the land…anything in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding,” thus expressly establishing that states do not have a veto power over federal laws. Article III and the Marbury v. Madison decision of 1803 established that the independent judiciary has “the last word on the law and the Constitution.”
The Montana GOP is not alone in its constitutional hypocrisy. As the GOP shifts further to the right, many state GOP platforms are redefining Constitutional authority to validate more extreme agendas. While the Texas GOP similarly sought to outlaw homosexuality, the Iowa GOP platform sought to reintroduce and ratify the “original 13th Amendment” to strip President Obama’s citizenship because he won the Nobel Peace Prize. In May, the Maine GOP adopted a “Tea Party” platform asserting “10th amendment sovereignty rights over unconstitutional government intrusions” like health care reform. And in Washington, GOP candidates who view the platform, which calls to reject health care reform and the United Nations, as “incredibly intrusive” and hostile to “moderate stances” risk losing the GOP’s endorsement.
Citizens United Decision Allows Corporations To Make 2010 A Record-Breaking Year In Campaign Spending
Citizens United Decision Allows Corporations To Make 2010 A Record-Breaking Year In Campaign Spending
The 2008 presidential election ushered in an unprecedented amount of campaign spending, with the presidential candidates taking in over $1.7 billion in donations. But, according to new research, corporations and their allies will trounce 2008’s “political spend-a-thon” in the 2010 midterm election season. “Liberated” by the Supreme Court’s recent Citizens United decision, corporations and “well-established political players” will pump in 10 to 15 percent more cash in 2010 to “disrupt” races with more negative ads:
After the astronomical sums of cash thrown into the 2008 campaign, everyone’s pumping in even more — about 10 to 15 percent more— according to Kip Cassino, vice president of research at the media analysis firm Borrell Associates.
“Unlike a lot of industries in the United States right now, which are seeing some downturns, political spending is absolutely a growth industry,” Cassino says.
Fueling it, he says, is corporate money — dollars liberated by the Supreme Court when it ruled that corporations and unions can be unrestrained in their campaign spending.
Cassino says corporate funds probably account for a 10 percent jump in advertising.
And of course, those advertisements are almost always negative.
“The unwritten charter of these groups is to really be disruptive and try to go in there and turn a race on its head — or put a candidate on the defense,” says Evan Tracey, president of the Campaign Media Analysis Group, which tracks political advertising. “And by that nature, most of those ads that they’re gonna run this fall are gonna be negative ads.“
The political players looking to up the ante include “big budget groups” like GOP operative Karl Rove’s American Crossroads and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is “the biggest collection point for corporate contributions.” American Crossroads “committed to raising tens of millions of dollars” while the Chamber will spend $40 million more than 2008 this year and “may go higher.” Along with a 2007 decision backing the Federal Election Commission’s drastic undercutting of disclosure rules, “business and its allies” can continue to support right-wing candidates and “wildly misleading” ads without anyone knowing who is pulling the purse strings.
Texas Republican House Candidate Caught Padding Resume And Plagiarizing An Obama Speech
Texas Republican House Candidate Caught Padding Resume And Plagiarizing An Obama Speech
Stefani Carter is a Republican House candidate in Texas’s 102nd District who rejected “the liberal line” to become a “proud conservative.” Boasting of her credentials as a “contributing editorial writer for USA Today and a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, one of the most well known conservative think tanks in Washington, D.C,” Carter is well-versed in the party line. She tells supporters she’s “no” on “more government debt” and that she “will fight any attempts” by President Obama “to force feed socialized medicine to Texas families.”
But, while proudly rejecting the Obama’s progressive policies in Washington, Carter plagiarized a few of Obama’s “liberal lines” in her pursuit to get there. A video released by Lone Star Project this summer revealed Carter “reciting almost identical passages” from Obama’s 2004 keynote address “that many contend powered his campaign for president”:
The video compares the two speeches as follows:
Obama: “…Let’s face it, my presence on this stage is pretty unlikely. …”
Carter: “My presence here tonight, for those who know my background, is unlikely. …”
Obama: “They imagined me going to the best schools in the land, even though they weren’t rich, because in a generous America, you don’t have to be rich to achieve your potential.”
Carter: “They imagined their kids going to any schools in the land, even though they weren’t rich, because in America you don’t have to be rich to achieve your dreams.”
Watch it:
The Carter campaign said plagiarism cannot be charged from “just snippets” of a speech that was “entirely different” from Obama’s address. But Lone Star Project pointed out that both speeches were intended to provide personal background and “you don’t have to copy an entire speech or even cover the same subject matter to be guilty of plagiarism. In taking a closer look at Carter’s credentials, Lone Star Project also discovered that Carter padded her resume by implying an internship made her a senior fellow at Heritage Foundation and “three guest pieces during her collegiate career” made her a USA today columnist.
While the Dallas County GOP Chairman dismissed her plagiarism as “petty” and “small ball,” he may have a harder time defending the more “hostile” and “absurd” tactics of Carter’s “amateur campaign.” According to counterfeitcarter.com, Carter recently sent a campaign staffer “with a camera to stalk” her opponent incumbent Rep. Carol Kent. He “was caught in a parking lot hiding between cars.” Carter also made “bizarre accusations” that “she had to call 911 twice because of suspicious vehicles parked at her campaign headquarters.”
Unsurprisingly, Carter’s dubious antics failed to win over her employers at Sayles Werbner law firm in Dallas, who endorsed and donated to Kent’s campaign. But Carter shouldn’t worry about the bosses she dismissed as “liberal Democrats,” because if acts of plagiarism and paranoid accusations guarantee anything, it’s a natural home with the GOP. (HT: Burnt Orange)
Texas Board of Education: History Textbooks ‘Tainted’ With ‘Gross Pro-Islamic, Anti-Christian Distortions’
Texas Board of Education: History Textbooks ‘Tainted’ With ‘Gross Pro-Islamic, Anti-Christian Distortions’
In its battle against historical accuracy, the right-wing Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) decided to revamp the state’s social studies curriculum earlier this year, exchanging emphasis on the historical roles of Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln with the roles of confederate leader Jefferson Davis and paranoid right-wing pundit Phyllis Schlafly. But “just when it appeared the State Board of Education was done with the culture wars,” SBOE is now deciding to dictate what students should learn about Islam.
SBOE’s “seven-member social conservative bloc” will bring up a resolution next week that “would warn publishers not to push a pro-Islamic, anti-Christian viewpoint in world history textbooks.” The resolution demands textbook publishers no longer “taint” Texas textbooks with “gross pro-Islamic, anti-Christian distortions” and “false editorial stereotypes” that “still roil” certain textbooks used across the U.S.:
A preliminary draft of the resolution states that “diverse reviewers have repeatedly documented gross pro-Islamic, anti-Christian distortions in social studies texts” across the U.S. and that past social studies textbooks in Texas also have been “tainted” with pro-Islamic, anti-Christian views.
The resolution cites examples in past world history books – no longer used in Texas schools – that devoted far more lines of text to Islamic beliefs and practices than to Christian beliefs and practices.[...]
The resolution states that pro-Islamic, anti-Christian half-truths, selective disinformation and false editorial stereotypes “still roil” some social studies textbooks nationwide, including “sanitized definitions of ‘jihad’ that exclude religious intolerance or military aggression against non-Muslims … which undergirds worldwide Muslim terrorism.” [...]
The resolution concludes with the warning to publishers that the “State Board of Education will look to reject future prejudicial social studies submissions that continue to offend Texas law with respect to treatment of the world’s major religious groups by significant inequalities of coverage space-wise and by demonizing or lionizing one or more of them over others.”
SBOE member Ken Mercer, who leads the conservative bloc, pushed to consider the resolution because he found that the textbooks’ “Islamic references are very positive to the point that it is whitewashed, while the references to Christianity are very negative.” Other board members charge that the resolution combats a sinister plot by “Middle Easterners” who “are investing in U.S. textbook companies to push their views.”
Some parents worry that the resolution will “prevent their kids from learning the facts.” Board member Pat Hardy, however, suggests that “the issue may be moot because none of the world history books cited by [the resolution] are still in use in Texas, having been replaced in 2003.”
And even if the resolution is adopted, “it would not bind future boards, which will choose the next generation of social studies textbooks within a few years.” SBOE’s conservative bloc also lost two of their own, including the resolution’s author, in March’s Republican primary and thus will be diminished when new members are seated next year. Still, the anti-Islam resolution may sway publishers as “Texas is one of the largest markets for school textbooks in the country,” and so “many publishers write the books using Texas standards, and then sell the same books to public schools in dozens of other states.”
O’Donnell On Creationism: ‘Too Many People Are Blindly Accepting Evolution As Fact’
O’Donnell On Creationism: ‘Too Many People Are Blindly Accepting Evolution As Fact’
The Tea Party’s victorious upstart Christine O’Donnell has paraded some “biblical” viewpoints in her pursuit of public office, equating a lack of school prayer with weekly school shootings and masturbation with adultery. Her extreme stances, along with her bizarre and unfounded attacks against the GOP’s mainstream candidate Rep. Mike Castle (R-DE), have alienated traditional GOP operatives and conservative activists and pundits alike.
Today, New York Magazine dug up another of O’Donnell’s right-wing positions. Back on March 30, 1996 in her role as spokeswoman for the conservative Christian policy organization Concerned Women of America, O’Donnell “squared off” on CNN against a University professor to advocate for teaching creationism in the classroom. In trying to debunk “every legitimate scientist in the world,” O’Donnell insisted “hard evidence” proves evolution is “merely a theory” and God’s creation of the world in “six 24-hour periods” is fact:
O’DONNELL: Well, as the senator from Tennessee mentioned, evolution is a theory and it’s exactly that. There is not enough evidence, consistent evidence to make it as fact, and I say that because for theory to become a fact, it needs to consistently have the same results after it goes through a series of tests. The tests that they put — that they use to support evolution do not have consistent results. Now too many people are blindly accepting evolution as fact. But when you get down to the hard evidence, it’s merely a theory. [...]
Now, he said that it’s based on fact. I just want to point out a couple things. First of all, they use carbon dating, as an example, to prove that something was millions of years old. Well, we have the eruption of Mt. Saint Helens and the carbon dating test that they used then would have to then prove that these were hundreds of millions of years younger, when what happened was they had the exact same results on the fossils and canyons that they did the tests on that were supposedly 100 millions of years old. And it’s the kind of inconsistent tests like this that they’re basing their ‘facts’ on. [...]
Well, creationism, in essence, is believing that the world began as the Bible in Genesis says, that God created the Earth in six days, six 24-hour periods. And there is just as much, if not more, evidence supporting that.
As New York Magazine points out, her “scientific takedown” of carbon dating is solely based on tests run by one “young earth creationist” at the Institute for Creation Research. The “biblically-inspired” young earth creationists are “at the hard core end of the creationist spectrum” who believe that “humans coexisted with dinosaurs.”
Her wholesale belief in “hard core” creationism even pushes her to the right of her personal champion, Sarah Palin. While Palin shares O’Donnell’s “creationist leanings,” she believes there is “evidence of microevolution” in which “God created us” but also “create[d] an evolutionary process that allows species to change and adapt.” While McCain staffers “winced” at this position in 2008, Palin — like O’Donnell — strongly felt she was “standing on solid factual ground” and agrees that it should be taught in schools.
Rove Hypocritically Slams O’Donnell’s ‘Serious Character Problems’ For Using Anti-Gay Slurs
Rove Hypocritically Slams O’Donnell’s ‘Serious Character Problems’ For Using Anti-Gay Slurs
Echoing general Republican dismay over Tea Party devotee Christine O’Donnell’s extreme views, GOP operative Karl Rove unloaded his contempt for O’Donnell on Sean Hannity’s show yesterday. Bemoaning O’Donnell’s win as a loss of a Senate seat, Rove said “it does conservatives little good to support candidates” who “do not evince the characteristics” that “the voters are looking for.”
In rebuffing Hannity’s defense of O’Donnell, Rove launched into a list of “the nutty things she’s been saying,” like her claim that Castle supporters would “follow me home” and “hid[e] in the bushes” outside her home. To punctuate his point, Rove slammed her “serious character problems” for saying Castle “had a homosexual relationship with a young aide with not a bit of evidence to prove it”:
ROVE: It does conservatives little good to support candidates who at the end of the day while they may be conservative in their public statements do not event the characteristics of rectitude, truthfulness and sincerity and character that the voters are looking for. [...]
But we also can’t make progress if we have candidates who got serious character problems, who cause ordinary voters who are not philosophically aligned with us to not vote for our candidates out of concern of what they said and what they do. … But look, she attacked him by saying he had a homosexual relationship with a young aide with not a bit of evidence to prove it.
HANNITY: She said in that interview she was not making that accusation.
ROVE: That was the second interview. She had already previously spread the rumor. Come on! Look, she’s got a chance now. Let’s you and I have a private side bet on this one. I think at the end of the day she has to answer these questions in a way that people of Delaware find convincing or we are going to find ourselves with somebody who says conservative things, but doesn’t have the character that the people of Delaware want to have.
Watch it:
Rove’s disgust with O’Donnell’s irresponsible tactics is ironic. In a 2004 Rove profile, one of Rove’s campaign staffers revealed that making sexual innuendos was a “standard practice” of the GOP strategist. In his 1994 campaign against Democratic judge and former president of the National Committee to Prevent Child Abuse and Neglect Mark Kennedy (AL), Rove’s operatives initiated a baseless “whisper campaign” to smear Kennedy as a “homosexual pedophile” in order to “counter the positives” of Kennedy’s volunteer work with children.
Like O’Donnell, Rove regularly repeats falsehoods to discredit those who oppose his agenda. But the success Rove’s agenda sometimes requires even the denial of personal facts. As the Atlantic’s Andrew Sullivan notes, in order to guide the GOP “into anti-gay wedge politics in the last decade,” Rove had to “den[y] that he was aware his own father was gay” despite being “comfortable with” his father’s sexual orientation.”
O’Donnell dismissed Rove’s attack today, calling him a “so-called expert” whose “credibility was hurt last night.” Flaunting her win on Good Morning America, she mused that this “unfactual” “so-called political guru” should be “restoring his reputation” today by “eating some humble pie.”
Limbaugh Condones Sexual Harrassment Of Sports Reporter: She Has ‘Bootylicious’ ‘ASS-ets’
Limbaugh Condones Sexual Harrassment Of Sports Reporter: She Has ‘Bootylicious’ ‘ASS-ets’
While waiting for an interview with New York Jets Quarterback Mark Sanchez last Saturday, TV Azteca reporter Ines Sainz was harrassed with “catcalls, whistling, extended stares by the players” and was subjected to “grotesque” locker room antics. While the sexual harassment spurred Jets owner Woody Johnson to offer an immediate “open apology” and the NFL to investigate the charges, Sainz’s situation motivated failed NFL-commentator and hate radio host Rush Limbaugh to launch into a sexist rant today against “bootylicious” Sainz for “doing what she was born knowing to do” to “get access for her job”:
She knows she has ass-ets. (Rush really stretched out that first syllable.) . . . Boob-alicious, booty-licious, whatever you want to call it, she’s got it.”
Referencing celebrating “Love Your Body Day,” he said: “As far as I can tell, Ines celebrates her body daily, not just once a year . . . The team was celebrating her body.”
Trying to connect the dots between Sainz’s interview with Mark Sanchez and the Jets QB’s horrific game last night: “You remember what Delilah did to Sampson.”
Looking ahead: “Now, are we going to force Ines to put on a burka?”
And finally: “We’re looking for an example of a male reporter in a female locker room, and we can’t find one.”
Listen to it:
Like Limbaugh, Glenn Beck “had a tough time containing the giggles” over Sainz’s humiliation, noting he’d “never seen someone wear a shirt that ‘covered less.’” Both Limbaugh and Beck revel in sexist contempt for women in the public eye, with Limbaugh dubbing Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as”sex-retary” and Beck calling former Secretary of State Madeleline Albright “a turkey” that “burns your eyes out.” It appears that Limbaugh may need another women’s summit to learn “what it is [he's] done that has caused the gender gap” in his listening audience.
Civil Rights Leader Dismisses The Conservative US Commission on Civil Rights’ Conference As ‘A Sham’
Civil Rights Leader Dismisses The Conservative US Commission on Civil Rights’ Conference As ‘A Sham’
Today, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will hold a government-funded “one-day national conference” called “A New Era: Defining Civil Rights in the 21st Century.” Created by the Civil Rights Act of1957, the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is a “bipartisan, independent commission of the U.S. federal government” intended to serve as a bastion against discrimination based on “race, color, religion, sex, age, disability, or national origin.”
The final panel of the conference, titled “The Future of the Civil Rights Commission,” will debate whether the Commission “has outlived its usefulness.” Panelists will discuss whether “it is appropriate for the federal government to take the lead” on certain civil rights issues.
During the Bush administration, conservatives “who had long opposed the commission’s work” used “a controversial maneuver” to stack the commission with six “like-minded commissioners.” This conservative majority lambasted the health care reform bill for supporting minority doctors and urged Congress to vote down the Matthew Shepherd Hate Crimes Prevention Act, steering the commission’s work towards a path that, as one of the two Democratic commissioners put it, “aims to ‘dismantle the civil rights program that exists throughout this country.’”
Leading civil rights organizations have rebuked the Commission as “a political arm of the conservative movement in America.” Yesterday, president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights Wade Henderson told Talking Points Memo that he refuses to attend the conference because “it’s a sham”:
“I’m not attending the conference. I think it’s a sham,” Wade Henderson, president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, told TPM. [...]
Henderson said that as the period of conservative control over the commission is set to end this year, some of the conservative commissioners — including Chairman Gerald Reynolds — are grasping at straws.
“This is Gerald Reynolds’ last ditch effort to give legitimacy and luster to his failed tenure,” Henderson said.
Reynold’s “failed tenure” results from his diametric opposition to the purpose of the Commission. The original, temporary Commission fought for its permanency because “no where in the federal government [is] there an agency charged” with the “invaluable function” of “the continuous appraisal of the status of civil rights.” However, Reynolds told the Washington Times that “in a lot of areas, it’s not the proper role for the federal government to take care of” disadvantaged groups “but instead for local governments, churches and other community organizations.” Reynold’s sentiment echoes that of several Republican candidates who, as ThinkProgress’s Scott Keyes notes, are “eager to denigrate the federal government’s role in protecting civil rights.”
Further highlighting the dominance of the Commission’s conservative viewpoint, five of the conservative-leaning commissioners will be hosting panels at today’s conference. The two Democrats and the sole Republican who criticized the Commission’s attention to the manufactured right-wing New Black Panthers “scandal” are not moderating any panels. And two of the three panelists debating the future of the Commission believe that the Commission is “a complete waste of resources” that “should be disbanded.” The conference also features Roger Clegg, a former DOJ’s General Civil Rights Division attorney under Presidents Reagan and Bush who supports racial profiling and now works for a “small vehemently anti-affirmative action group.”
Study: ‘People Who Matter’ To Sunday Talk Shows Are ‘White, Male, Senior, and Republican’
Study: ‘People Who Matter’ To Sunday Talk Shows Are ‘White, Male, Senior, and Republican’
NBC’s Meet the Press, CBS’s Face the Nation, Fox News Sunday, CNN’s State of the Union, and ABC’s This Week are the five major Sunday talk shows that aim to bring “a diverse group of voices” that “reflect the cultural, economic, and political landscape” of the U.S. However, according to a new study published by George Mason University School of Law this month, the Congressional guests featured in 2009 were anything but diverse, failing not only to represent the demographics of the American population but also the diversity of Congress. In fact, according to the study, the congressional voice was disproportionately represented by one type of guest in 2009: “white, male, senior, and Republican”:
“In 2009 the talk shows told us (by their selection of Congressional guests) that the people who matter are disproportionately white, male, senior and Republican — disproportionate not just when compared to the American population overall, but also when compared to the population of Congress itself,” concluded a study published this month in The Green Bag, a quarterly journal supported by the George Mason University School of Law.
The study, of the five network Sunday shows from February to December 2009, found that while 14.6 percent of members of Congress were minorities, just 2.5 percent of the Congressional TV guests were minorities; and that while 16.9 percent of members were female, 13.5 percent of the guests were female.
The study also singled out “the 49 white, male U.S. senators in office six-plus years” who represented 9.2 percent of the Congressional populace, but 61.4 percent of the TV guests.
This Week’s executive producer Ian Cameron explains that “bookings are dictated by the news and newsmakers” and “few of those newsmakers in top leadership positions are women or members of minorities.” In reviewing 2009, he noted that the guests relevant to the most prevalent issues were “white and mostly men.” According to the study, the top guests were Republican Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), John McCain (R-AZ), and Jon Kyl (R-AZ). The Republican leadership “appeared on these shows a total of 43 times” while Democratic Leadership, including the first female Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), “appeared only 11 times.” And 2010 is shaping up to be more of the same, with McConnell “again leading the pack – appearing 10 times on Sunday shows – a rate even higher than he achieved in 2009.” (HT: Media Decoder)
Self-Described ‘Christian Counterpart To Osama Bin Laden’ Arrested In Plot To Bomb Abortion Clinic
Self-Described ‘Christian Counterpart To Osama Bin Laden’ Arrested In Plot To Bomb Abortion Clinic
A study released today by former leaders of the 9/11 Commission finds that “terrorism is increasingly taking on an American cast.” Warning of “a much more diverse threat,” the report urges the U.S. government to prepare for “the radicalization and recruitment of Americans to terrorist ranks.” While the report rightly warns of threats from radical Muslim extremists, law enforcement officials should also be concerned about right-wing zealots, as a 2009 Homeland Security report warned.
For instance, this past Tuesday, the FBI arrested 26-year old Christian radical Justin Carl Moose in Concord, NC for “providing information to create explosives” to “blow up a North Carolina abortion clinic.” Through his conversations with an FBI informant and his Facebook page, Moose expressed virulent “anger at abortion doctors, President Barack Obama’s health care plan, and plans to build a mosque near ground zero in New York city.” He goes on to describe himself as “the Christian counterpart to Osama bin Laden” who “has learned a lot from the muslim terrorists and have no problem using their tactics”:
Justin Carl Moose, 26, is a self-described “extremist, radical” and the “Christian counterpart of Osama bin Laden,” according to an affidavit filed by FBI agents. [...]
“Whatever you may think about me, you’re probably right,” he wrote on his Facebook page, according to the affidavit.
“Extremist, Radical, Fundamentalist…? Yep! Terrorist…? Well, I prefer the term ‘freedom Fighter.’” [...]
Status updates posted beginning in January urge violence, FBI agents said in their affidavit.
“The Death Care Bill passed last night,” he wrote when Obama’s health care plan was approved in March. “Keep your phone and rifle close and wait.”[...]
“If a mosque is built on ground zero, it will be removed. Oklahoma City style. Tim’s not the only man out there that knows how to do it,” the affidavit says he wrote in July, in a reference to Timothy McVeigh, who bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City.[...]
FBI agents obtained search warrants and started reading his private messages. In one sent to a fellow abortion opponent, agents say Moose wrote: “I have learned a lot from the muslim terrorists and have no problem using their tactics.”
According to WCNC-TV, a yellow “don’t tread on me” flag – the anthem of the Tea Party movement – hangs over the door to Moose’s family home. Watch it here:
Moose is self-attested member of “Army of God,” an “underground network of domestic terrorists who believe that the use of violence is appropriate and accetable as a means to end abortion.” According to its manual, the group’s purpose is to “officially declare war on the entire child killing industry.” Believing that “Our Most Dread Sovereign Lord God requires” bloodshed, members “are forced to take arms against” abortion clinics in which “execution is rarely gentile [sic].”
Arrested Tuesday, Moose will appear in federal court Monday. If convicted on all counts, he faces up to 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000. Despite his arrest, Moose has no intention of surrending peacefully. In a post taunting the federal authorities monitoring him, he told “all the feds watching me: You can’t stop what is in motion. Even if you bring me in, my men will continue their mission. Furthermore, I will not go peacefully. Do you really want another Waco?”
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