Hendrik Hertzberg: The 'mini coup d'état' that gave us Clarence Thomas

Citizen's United, the gift that keeps on taking, and its true fathers, Clarence Thomas & Antonin Scalia, can't stay out of the news. (Seems that this child has two daddies; who'da thought?) It will be interesting to see where all this ends up.

Yesterday I asked if one of those daddies had something he needed to confess. Since then, the calls for a reckoning have been a lot more numerous (I'll let you search them out for yourself). And Article III of the Constitution does allow for the impeachment of Supreme Court Justices:

Article III, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution explicitly states that a Supreme Court Justice that “lacks good behavior” can be impeached. This is not an ambiguous, subjective term. It has been interpreted by the courts to equate to the same level of seriousness as the ‘high crimes and misdemeanors” clause that unequivocally mandates that the House of Representatives initiate impeachment proceedings against any public official, or federal judge in violation of that provision.

In the process of that search, I ran across this excellent piece on Justice Thomas and Ms. Hill by Hendrik Herzberg in the New Yorker — from 2007, on the occasion of the publication of Thomas's book, My Grandfather's Son. Hertzberg's title is appropriate: "A Cold Case". It starts (my emphasis, but Hertzberg's excellent prose):

Jeffrey Toobin has read Clarence Thomas’s memoir so you don’t have to. Not that you were going to read the book, but if you haven’t yet read Jeff’s sharp, lively, and deeply knowledgeable New Yorker review, you should—preferably in the printed magazine but, if you insist on digitally freeloading, here. You won’t come away from it any happier that Thomas—this strange, sad, humorless man, driven half-mad by a frightening combination of rage and self-pity—will probably be inflicting himself and his neurosis-based views on our national life into the 2040s.

It was obvious to me at the time of Thomas’s confirmation hearings in October of 1991 that Anita Hill was telling the truth about the nominee’s crude behavior during his time as her boss at the E.E.O.C.—Long Dong Silver, the pubic hair on the Coke can, and so on. A made-up story would have been both less weird and more damaging—instead of bizarre remarks, it would have featured wandering hands or worse.

"Half-mad [with] rage and self-pity." Nice qualities in a judge. After telling the story of the committee hearings, and telling it well, Hertzberg closes:

Thus ended the mini-coup d’état of 1991, and thus was made possible a more audacious coup nine winters later, when Associate Justice Clarence Thomas cast the deciding vote in Bush v. Gore.

Spot on, Mr. Hertzberg. Couldn't have said it better myself. Add one more coup to the list.

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The unasked question—Did Clarence Thomas perjure himself in his confirmation hearing?

With all the Clarence Thomas news and counter-news, there's an unasked question in the air. Did Clarence Thomas perjure himself at his congressional confirmation hearing?

I'm not asking this to be provocative, though provocative it is. And I know the question is not new; it was asked at the time of his confirmation. But in light of new revelations, the question at least has to be acknowledged.

To review:

First, Movement Conservative activist Virginia Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, calls Anita Hill to ask for Hill to apologize for, and explain, "why you did what you did with [sic] my husband." The request is left on Hill's answering machine.

To clarify, what Anita Hill did was accuse Clarence Thomas, under oath at his 1991 judicial confirmation hearing, of sexual harassment, and then offer specifics. Thomas, also under oath, denied the charges. What Virginia Thomas must then mean is that Anita Hill lied — perjured herself before Congress. No less provocative term fits.

Second, the voicemail makes a splash in the press, presumably for its OMG factor. It's being handled like other "weird news from Conservatives" — like Sarah Palin's latest doings, Joe Miller's hired thugs, and Christine O'Donnell's fresh-faced bigotry.

Third, the world responds, as it often does, in the form of stories about Clarence Thomas from people who knew him "back in the day." In particular, Lillian McEwen, in several stories in the Washington Post and another in the New York Times, alleges that Hill's story is 'totally consistent with the way he lived' and that 'he was obsessed with porn'.

She later said, “The kind of Clarence I knew at the time that these events occurred is the kind of Clarence that did not emerge from the hearings, I’ll say that. It was not him, and he probably would not have been on the court if the real Clarence had actually been revealed.”

It seems only reasonable, therefore, given Mrs. Thomas's implied accusation of perjury against Anita Hill, that the same question be asked of her husband. Did Clarence Thomas commit perjury to acquire his seat on the Court?

The question is hanging in the air, just waiting for a response, whether anyone "important" is asking it or not.

By the way, while researching a separate article, I came across this from David Brock, in an interview with CNN:

CARVILLE: Clarence Thomas, you wrote a book about Anita Hill. Did Clarence Thomas tell the truth under oath?

BROCK: No. When I found out two years later that he had done many of the things that Anita alleged...

CARVILLE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE) children. We have a man on the Supreme Court that lied under oath?

BROCK: That's right.

Brock is a former Movement Conservative activist himself, one who had a central role in both the Bill Clinton Troopergate story and the Anita Hill story. He's extremely well-positioned to know what he's talking about. There's more from David Brock here, just one place of many. And much more in Brock's 2002 book, Blinded by the Right, still a great read.

Someone's lied. It was either Hill or Thomas, each under oath at the time. It could be Hill. But if the liar is Thomas, we are truly facing a "revolutionary force" — one capable of a stunning degree of hypocrisy.

GP

UPDATE: It seems that Robert Parry of Iran-Contra fame has many of the same questions. Read More......

More on Clarence Thomas from Lillian McEwen, who dated him for 'six or seven years'

As you no doubt know, Virginia Thomas, wife of ultra–right-wing Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, recently left a voice mail for Anita Hill, asking that she apologize for "what you did with [sic] my husband."

Since Hill did nothing "with" Clarence Thomas, Mrs. Thomas most likely meant "what you did to my husband" — and in fact, what Hill did was accuse Thomas, under oath, of sexual harassment at his 1991 Supreme Court congressional confirmation hearing.

Lillian McEwen, who had a late-80s "six or seven year" relationship with Thomas, has recently come forward in the Washington Post to back up Hill's side of the story, saying Hill's testimony is "totally consistent with the way he [Thomas] lived" and that "he [Thomas] was obsessed with porn".

McEwen just gave another, longer interview to the New York Times, and several things emerged. The wide-ranging article is an excellent read. About Thomas:

Ms. McEwen said that pornography for Justice Thomas was “just a part of his personality structure.” She said he kept a stack of pornographic magazines, “frequented a store on Dupont Circle that catered to his needs,” and allowed his interest in pornography to bleed into his professional relationships.

“It starts inside,” she said, tapping her head during a 30-minute interview inside her three-story condominium in Southwest Washington. “And then your behavior flows from what it is that’s important to you. That’s what happened with him, certainly.”

She said she ended the relationship, in part because Thomas was "changing" — becoming "obsessed with campaigning for the president," for example. She describes this later Thomas as "obsessed, ambitious, irritable and bullying." Not the best combo for a happy life together, so she left the relationship.

This certainly sounds like the Thomas of Anita Hill's testimony at the hearings.

About the hearings themselves, she says she was surprised she wasn't called, since she had written to the man running the hearings, Sen. Joseph Biden, with whom she had worked, saying she knew Thomas well:

She said she never received a response from a note she wrote to Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., who was running the hearings and with whom she had worked as a lawyer for the Judiciary Committee. ... “The hearings themselves were so constrained — the questioning, the subject matter — the scope of the hearings didn’t really allow for any kind of treatment of the issues that had been raised,” she said. “The kind of Clarence I knew at the time that these events occurred is the kind of Clarence that did not emerge from the hearings, I’ll say that. It was not him, and he probably would not have been on the court if the real Clarence had actually been revealed.”

Seems like a bad decision; the Dems may have blown their chances by not calling McEwen when her testimony was current.

Ms. McEwen has a book in the works, the writing of which she describes as "therapeutic." Surprisingly, however, she's having a hard time getting it published. I guess in a tell-all world, some things still can't be told (or maybe, some people may still not be told about).

Stay tuned; this may not be the end of this hard story.

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Olbermann on Mrs. Clarence Thomas and the Anita Hill voicemail

Following up on the Mrs. Clarence Thomas apology request — see here and here for Joe's good coverage — comes Keith Olbermann and Countdown with a nice summary of the news plus some needed background for those born later than, say, 1980.

Then he launches a nice set of similar "apology requests" which are only marginally more risible than the real Ginny Thomas one. All in all, a very good segment:



First, enjoy Olbermann's review of the context, Thomas's judicial confirmation hearings in 1991 (1:40 in the clip). The clips from that hearing are another reminder that Movement Conservatives (which Clarence Thomas undeniably is and was) will do anything, at any time, to win. In the clip, he almost certainly commits perjury to gain a lifetime Court seat for his cadre. This should never have been allowed. (It's an added insult that Thomas replaced Thurgood Marshall.)

Second, that's then-Senators Alan Simpson and Arlen Specter going ugly on Ms. Hill in the hearings. (You can donate to Joe Sestak, who defeated Specter in the Dem primary, here. He could use your help.)

Third, the string of comic "apologies" is priceless (4:00 in the clip). Ken Mehlman — great choice, though he asks for the wrong apology. And the Bush II request for an apology from the U.S. economy for not having the decency to collapse after he "skipped town" is nicely done.

And finally, if you know the sordid details of Thomas's harrassment of Hill, Olbermann's comment that Mrs. Thomas maybe wanted to meet Ms. Hill "for a Coke somewhere" is nicely understated (1:30 in the clip).

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Tom Emmer's family's family values

Via Phoenix Woman ("I really can't believe this") comes this tale from Minneapolis City Pages about the family values of Tom Emmer's family.

Tom Emmer is the Republican candidate for Minnesota governor. I called him a "troglodyte" for his backward views on, oh, everything. As I wrote here:

Emmer is also anti-tax, anti-union, anti-minimum wage, anti-abortion, anti-contraception, pro-"pharmacy conscience" . . . and pro-"more rights for DUI arrestees" (yep, he's got two convictions for DUI-related offenses).

He's such a Family Guy that he's featured his family in his ads.

Turns out DWI-guy's apple hasn't fallen far from the tree. City Pages obtained Facebook photos (since scrubbed) of underage Tripp Emmer, son of Tom, doing the frat-boy thing.


Stylin'.

While it certainly suggests a family tone, it's probably not the end of the world. It's this, however, that caught Phoenix Woman's eye (and mine):


Those would be body parts, and that would seem to be a passed-out girl, age unknown. Phoenix Woman:

[I]f this had been a Democrat’s son who had done this to an unconscious woman, it would be nationwide by now. Drudge would have picked it up from any one of the local conservative blogs, it would be on Morning Joe, FOX and Friends would be on Red Alert, and Luke Hellier would be flogging it as assiduously as he’s doing this current ginned-up non-scandal involving [Democratic gubernatorial candidate] Mark Dayton.

Indeed. And I'd join them. I'd call that "abuse"; and depending on how those photos were used — for example, if they were widely published on ... well, Facebook ... to embarrass the girl — I'd call it "sexual harassment". But you can call it "Family Guy's family's family values".

But let's give young Tripp the last word. Under Favorite Quotations, this has pride of place:

"Don't blow your wad in the first period!" -- Thomas Emmer Jr

In light of that photo, I'm speechless. Thanks, Tom, for leading the way. Next stop, the governor's mansion.

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State GOP lawmakers who are trying to overturn health care reform are also taking its funds

From Huff Post, via Huff Post Hill:

Conservative legislators appear conflicted by the same, uneasy mix of death wishing and wallet-pilfering as Anna Nicole Smith did with wealthy octogenarians. "More than half a dozen states suing to overturn President Barack Obama's health care law are also claiming its subsidies for covering retired state government employees, according to a list released Tuesday by the administration. About 2,000 employers have been approved for the extra help to cover early retirees, mainly private businesses. But the list also includes seven states suing to overturn the health care overhaul as an unconstitutional power grab by the federal government. The seven are Arizona, Idaho, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska and Nevada."

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Seems some Republicans have problems with Gingrich's whole three wives, two divorces, and a bit of adultery thing

From MSNBC's First Read:

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich is enjoying a new round of perennial presidential candidacy buzz – he came in a surprisingly strong third in a recent 2012 preference poll among Iowa Republicans - but his personal life continues to dog him.

Conservative Republican Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma bluntly stated his concern about the twice-divorced, thrice-married Gingrich during a Friday town hall.

"He's the last person I'd vote for for president of the United States,” Coburn said, per the Tulsa World. “His life indicates he does not have a commitment to the character traits necessary to be a great president."

Coburn said that Gingrich’s personal history indicates that he “doesn't know anything about commitment to marriage.”

No, he doesn't. But, Gingrich was one of the first right wingers to issue a statement condemning the Prop. 8 decision. And, according to one of his ex-wives, Marianne, Newt thinks his actions don't matter, only his words:

"It doesn't matter what I do," he answered. "People need to hear what I have to say. There's no one else who can say what I can say. It doesn't matter what I live."

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Savage and Signorile talk Mehlman and the GOP's campaign of hate and homophobia

Two of the greats were on cable news last night to talk about Ken Mehlman.

Savage was on Olbermann:

Signorile was on CNN:
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How Missouri's Roy Blunt became a fixture on the DC party scene (by dumping his first wife)

You have to know that a post titled, "Women for Blunt rally for guy who dumped his wife for something more glamorous," is probably going to be a good read. Yeah, it's good:

Roy Blunt stopped in Columbia on Monday to visit with women who support his candidacy in spite of the fact he tossed aside the mother of his children for a Washington glamor lady.

"Women for Blunt" gathered at Moresource, a woman-owned business, to meet with the U.S. Senate hopeful, who left his wife of 35 years to be with a tobacco lobbyist. Blunt and Wife No. 2, the former Abigail Perlman, are regulars on the D.C. party scene.

The relationship between Blunt and Perlman got off to an appalling start. In 2003, The Washington Post reported that Blunt tried to package a gift for Philip Morris inside the bill creating the Department of Homeland Security. Perlman worked for Altria, P.M.'s parent company.

​At the time, the two lovebirds were not public about their relationship, which The Post delicately described as a "close personal" one. Blunt married Perlman later that year, a mere six months after his divorce became final.

The post includes a photo of the Blunts with the White House party crashers.

Yes, Roy Blunt is just a shining example of the GOP and its hypocrisy. Read More......

Senate GOPers block vote on campaign finance reform

First, a win for corporate interests in the Supreme Court with the Citizens United decision. Now, a follow-up victory in the U.S. Senate.

The Senate Republicans, voting as a bloc, just sustained their filibuster of campaign finance reform. The vote was 57 - 41. All the Democrats present, even Ben Nelson, voted to end the filibuster. (Reid voted no for procedural reasons.) Remember when John McCain used to be an advocate for campaign finance reform, before he flipped on that issue like every other? What a fraud. And, Maine has a Clean Elections law, which passed as a citizen initiative back in 1996. So, this should have been an easy vote for Snowe and Collins, but they must show fealty to Mitch McConnell and the GOP funders, not Mainers.

During the floor debate, Chuck Schumer, who is the sponsor of the DISCLOSE Act, said:

This is a sad day for our democracy. Not only does the Supreme Court give those special interests a huge advantage, but this body says they should do it all in secret without any disclosure. That, my colleagues, transcends this election, transcends Democrat or Republican. It eats at the very fabric of our democracy. It makes our people feel powerless and angry.

It is another sad day for our democracy. And, while Schumer thinks this might transcend Democrat or Republican, the GOPers sure benefit from it. Read More......

John Ensign's 'self-immolation' abetted by Tom Coburn

Jon Ralston is THE political pundit for Nevada. He's become a must-read for developments in the Reid-Angle race. But, he's also got the Ensign scandal in his sights. The first line of yesterday's column kinda gives it away:

John Ensign is dead, one in an occasional series:

Just in case anyone thought the most stunning public crime occurring in Nevada these days was GOP Senate nominee Sharron Angle’s slow-motion suicide since June 8, Politico reminded us last week that Nevada’s junior senator’s self-immolation is even longer and more painful to watch. (http://tinyurl.com/23u2oba)

The Washington publication reported Friday that Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn has turned over e-mails to the Justice Department and has agreed to be interviewed by the feds or the Senate ethics panel probing Ensign’s conduct that sprung from an affair he had with a former staffer, Cynthia Hampton, who was married to the senator’s best friend (who also worked for him).

Coburn was involved in some kind of intervention at the infamous “C Street” House of Ill Repute in February 2008 with Ensign and Doug Hampton, who subsequently asserted on “Face to Face” in July 2009 that Coburn tried to negotiate a deal for “restitution” from Nevada’s junior senator.

That John Ensign is still a United States Senator is just wrong. And, it's just great to know that Tom Coburn's involvement, via the C Street House, is now helping with Ensign's destruction. Read More......

More on MSNBC's hypocrisy and that Scarborough 'scandal'

As John noted today, MSNBC has banned Markos for being mean to Joe Scarborough. Good lord, those conservatives are thin-skinned and they're coddled.

Since MSNBC and Scarborough escalated this thing, we'll help pile on. First, Greg Sargent notes that Liz Cheney has run ads attacking MSNBC talent, but there have been no repercussions:

It's funny. I don't recall the chief of MSNBC publicly banning Liz Cheney from appearing on the network when she cut an entire Web video "publicly antagonizing" Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews for allegedly being too frightened to debate her about terrorism.

Nope.

And, Digby has more background on the scandal that Joe Scarborough didn't want anyone to talk about. It was the summer of 2001 when the traditional media was in a frenzy over the Chandra Levy-Gary Condit story. And, a frenzy it was. Condit lived up the street from me and the t.v. trucks were parked in front of his building 24/7. But, another intern died that summer and it barely made the news. The young woman died in the office of Rep. Joe Scarborough:

Meanwhile, that same summer, star up-and-coming Republican Congressman Joe Scarborough, recently divorced under charges of infidelity, had unexpectedly decided to resign from office six months after being re-elected. Shortly thereafter an intern on his Florida staff was found dead -- in the office -- under mysterious circumstances with allegations of cover-ups by the local authorities and the quack medical examiner. And nobody in DC even raised an eyebrow. The story went largely unremarked upon and he soon found himself a lucrative perch as a highly paid celebrity gasbag.

Now I have to assume that Scarborough is either brain damaged or must want people to look at that story again because otherwise he would have let some innocuous, snarky tweet pass by. Now we all have no choice but to rehash the whole thing in order to explain why Markos has been banned from the network.

I'm guessing he's running for office again. After all, in today's GOP if you aren't picking up men in bathrooms, harassing pages by the dozen or hiking the Appalachian trail, you just aren't worth the teabag you're steeping in.

I'm not sure this is the kind of attention MSNBC and Joe Scarborough were expecting to garner after Scarborough had his hissy fit. But, again, they're the ones who decided to turn a couple of tweets into a major battle.

And, you know, tomorrow morning -- and every morning, Scarborough and his fellow pundits can commiserate about how mean everyone is to him. Read More......

Pay-for-Play, the (Right-Wing) Non-Profit Way

In Washington lines are never clear. As we all know, the town constantly moves in the gray.

And that continues to be the case with the ongoing controversy over the Joint Strike Fighter jet engine - a battle that has taken on epic proportions for years.

As ABC News reports in its story A $3 Billion Government Boondoggle?

At issue is the engine for the aircraft known as the Joint Strike Fighter, an all-purpose military jet that is expected to become the backbone of American air supremacy for a generation. The fighter already has an engine – built by Pratt & Whitney and in use as the jet is being tested. Some members of Congress want to pay General Electric and Rolls-Royce to develop a second one….The money involved is not insubstantial. By some estimates, Congress has paid $3 billion to GE and Rolls-Royce since first setting aside money for a second engine in the mid-1990s, and it will take close to $3 billion more to have the engines tested, proven and in full production.

Congressional members are fighting tooth and nail on both sides, depending on their state’s economic dependency on the project, but there is also strong disagreement between non-profit organizations, Defense Secretary Gates and the Government Accountability Office (GAO), about which direction to take.

While Secretary Gates believes it is a colossal waste of money to continue down the current path spending billions more, the GAO -- which exists as a congressional watchdog to investigate how the federal government spends taxpayer dollars -- at a congressional hearing a year ago, testified that according to its analysis, “we remain confident that competitive pressures could yield enough savings to offset the costs of competition over the JSF program’s life.”

And that brings us to the non-profit organizations. Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), a “good government” organization generally considered on the conservative end of the spectrum, is supposedly fighting for taxpayers like you and me. But, it has been working overtime against the second engine with all its might and resources.

If you live in DC, you may remember CAGW ads plastered in every metro car you could find denigrating the possible GE project as wasteful.

Turns out, as Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington helpfully points out, CAGW had an incentive to get the word out.

The conservative blog RedState.com has revealed that CAGW, which was apparently the source of information for ABC’s piece – secretly has been paid by Pratt & Whitney for its efforts. This certainly calls both CAGW’s credibility and the reliability of the ABC story into question.

Harper’s Ken Silverstein and former Congressman Bob Barr have both reported on another organization’s pay-for-play on the issue, this time it’s the Lexington Institute.

Barr explains the non-profit’s role in the debate in the Politico this week.

…The Lexington Institute’s chief operating officer, Loren Thompson, cites as proof that his company’s advocacy supporting certain weapons systems (in this case, Pratt & Whitney’s single-engine proposal) is fair and honest the fact that it “received money from donors on both sides of the issue…”

The Project on Government Oversight reported this in a July 2009 article. Specifically, as reported in 2006, Thompson expressed concerns about Pratt & Whitney’s “monopoly” position as the developer of the only engine to be used in the multibillion-dollar F-35 program.

But now, Lexington vocally opposes Congress’s awarding funding for the development of a competing engine for the multirole fighter to Rolls-Royce and General Electric.

Thompson (incredulously) told Silverstein, "I'm not going to work on a project unless somebody, somewhere, is willing to pay. This is a business." Wow, so much for an independent voice.

The Lexington Institute’s mission, according to its website, reads “We believe a dynamic private sector is the greatest engine for social progress and economic prosperity.”

Well, you most certainly do, especially if that economic prosperity is your own. Read More......

Jindal declares day of prayer over spill, but hasn't called up the Natl Guard

Hmmm. Seems to be one of these could have tangible results and one might not.

First, the Day Prayer:

On Thursday, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R) issued an order designating June 27 a "Statewide Day of Prayer" for perseverance through the BP oil spill that continues to devastate the country's Gulf Coast region.

That's one "solution" proferred by the Governor of Louisiana. He's also been screaming that the federal government hasn't been doing enough. But, Jindal has one major resource at this disposal -- the National Guard -- and as John noted below, he's not using it. More from CBS News:

Gov. Bobby Jindal's message has been loud and clear, using language such as "We will only be winning this war when we're actually deploying every resource," "They (the federal government) can provide more resources" and "It's clear the resources needed to protect our coast are still not here."

But nearly two months after the governor requested - and the Department of Defense approved the use of 6,000 Louisiana National Guard troops - only a fraction - 1,053 - have actually been deployed by Jindal to fight the spill.

"If you ask any Louisianan, if you said 'If you had those troops, do you think they could be put to good use? Is there anything they can do in your parish?' I think they'd all tell you 'Absolutely,'" Louisiana state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson, D-New Orleans, said.

By all the bitching Jindal's been doing -- and the fact that he's got time to declare days of prayer, one would think that he's done everything he could. Not true at all.

And, now about this:

It's believed officials in Alabama, Florida and Mississippi and are reluctant to use more troops because their presence could hurt tourism. In hardest-hit Louisiana, however, Jindal is pointing fingers.

Stunning. Commander Allen pointed out that Jindal's finger pointing is "just flat wrong." Read More......

Paul Ryan mourns. When it's politically convenient.

Thought for the day:

Paul Ryan, the lead Republican on the House budget committee, couldn't attend the President's debt commission meeting today due to a death in the family. But it hasn't stopped him from twittering budget policy barbs for the last hour.

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Former Sanford staffer/blogger had affair with GOP governor candidate in SC

A rather juicy story. Outgoing governor had an affair, wife divorces him. Former wife now supports new GOP gubernatorial candidate, who we now know also had an affair - with a staffer of the adulterous governor - and who distanced herself from the governor because of HIS affair. Oh, and it even involves Sarah Palin too!

Haley, who is married and has two children, has yet to comment on Folks' announcement. About an hour after Folks announced the affair, Rep. Haley canceled an interview with WIS News 10 that had been previously scheduled for Monday morning and had been confirmed by the campaign before the FITSNews page went live.

Haley recently rocketed to the front of the polls in the Republican race for governor after being publicly endorsed by Republican icon Sarah Palin and former first lady Jenny Sanford. Ms. Sanford, who divorced her husband after the governor announced an extramarital affair of his own, has not commented on the news of Haley's alleged affair.

Haley was once a close political ally of Governor Sanford, but somewhat distanced herself from him after Sanford's affair came to light, saying the governor had "fallen short" in his behavior.

Here's the blogger's admission of the affair. Read More......

'Family Values' GOP Rep. Souder did abstinence video with his mistress

And the question on everybody's mind after watching this video: WHAT was she THINKING? Read More......

'Family Values' GOP Rep. Mark Souder to resign over affair with staffer

I don't link to FOX News very often, but sometimes it's worth it:

Eight-term Rep. Mark Souder will announce his resignation Tuesday after it came to light that he was conducting an affair with a female aide who worked in his district office, Fox News has learned.

Multiple senior House sources indicated that the extent of the affair with the 45-year-old staffer would have landed Souder before the House Ethics Committee.

Elected as a family values conservative as part of the Republican revolution in 1994, Souder survived a tough re-election challenge in 2008 and survived a contested primary two weeks ago.

Souder, as you can imagine, has long been an outspoken critic of same-sex marriage. This year, he signed an amicus brief in a case against D.C.'s new marriage law. Read More......

Boehner now taking partial credit for health care reform

Steve Benen:

INSKEEP: As you know, Democrats are already pointing to things that are changing in America because of this bill. They will point to the fact that college seniors, who would have been kicked off their families' insurance plans when they graduated, will get to stay on. Insurance companies are now saying they're going to end the practice of "rescission," where they take, or at least modify...

BOEHNER: Both of those ideas, by the way, came from Republicans, and are part of the common sense ideas that we ought to have in the law.

INSKEEP: Well, are you going to repeal those two specific things?

BOEHNER Uh, what I want to repeal are the other 158 mandates, commissions, boards that set up all the infrastructure for the government to take control of our health care system. [emphasis added]

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Senator John Ensign: 'narcissistic and reckless — a detached, self-righteous figure'

John Ensign is still a United States Senator. He's still a reliable vote for obstruction in the GOP Caucus. In DC, he's one of the elite. Back home in Nevada, he's getting pummeled in the press. Yesterday, we had Jon Ralston's column about a potential indictment. Today, we've got this brutal, just brutal, article from the Las Vegas Sun:

In interviews with the Las Vegas Sun, more than a dozen friends, associates and Republican allies, some of whom have known Ensign for years, describe him as a politician who has grown narcissistic and reckless — a detached, self-righteous figure with almost no regard for those who helped send him to Washington or keep him there.

Ensign’s actions in the wake of the affair, and the resulting investigations by the Justice Department and the Senate Ethics Committee have bled into the lives of his once-closest aides, associates and friends, as well as largely innocent bystanders and his family.

The sources, most of whom spoke to the Sun on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigations, said what rankles so many in Republican circles is that Ensign seems oblivious to the collateral damage caused by his actions, and unwilling to make the matter disappear by resigning.

Capitol Hill is filled with narcissists. But, Ensign really has taken it to a new plane. He's probably on the verge of an indictment, yet keeps plugging along, seemingly unfazed. We'll never hear a peep from any of his GOP Senate colleagues. Members on the Hill protect each other (although the GOPers did try to throw Larry Craig under the bus, but his scandal was gay-themed.)

One of the best lines from the article:

Ensign was active in Promise Keepers and openly evangelical, gushing with pious intonations.

And, still a Senator. Read More......