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Future Journalism Project reveals that Rupert Murdoch has invested $4,200 per reader on his iPad paper, "The Daily."

Open Thread below...

The bees have been buzzing about the Alabama Shakes lately, and rightly so. Singer Brittany Howell has the good pipes and the band lays it down greasy. Check it.

WARNING: May cause some viewers to spit coffee through their nose.

Republican presidential hopeful Rick Perry shares a few poignant thoughts via some very Bad Lip Reading.

As you may have noticed, the tea party led GOP has targeted the pro-choice movement intensely as they assumed their new positions in government following the 2010 midterm elections. Were these deficit fetishists - concerned about job creation and reducing the federal deficit? Nope. Did you believe they would? Nope. Did the media dismiss the extreme religious right's influence on the tea party coalition when it formed? Yes. Make no mistake about it. The vast majority of self-identified tea partiers check the box marked "social conservative," which means anti-abortion zealots. C&L and many other sites have been highlighting the rash of anti-choice legislation that has either already been passed or is being shopped as we speak. The latest wave that's beginning to gather steam is the Personhood amendments which Susie wrote about earlier this month. You've heard the pre-born meme and as Susie wrote

Don't kid yourself that this is "just" Mississippi. The Christian right is going after birth control in every state:

Mississippi voters will be allowed to decide on a ballot measure that defines "personhood" from the moment of fertilization, the Mississippi Supreme Court ruled last week. The measure could potentially outlaw abortions, birth control, in vitro fertilization and stem cell research across the state.

Measure 26, which will bypass the legislature and go straight to a popular ballot vote, redefines the term "person" as it appears throughout Mississippi's Bill of Rights to include "all human beings from the moment of fertilization, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof." The American Civil Liberties Union of Mississippi, Planned Parenthood and the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit against the proposal earlier this year, not based on its content or constitutionality, but because Mississippi state law says a ballot initiative cannot be used to change the Bill of Rights.

The Mississippi Supreme Court rejected the lawsuit in a 7-2 ruling, saying that it had no power to review any ballot initiative before the actual vote takes place.

Let's look at some of the interesting legal ramifications. If you go through in vitro fertilization, and it doesn't work, you'd have to report that as a death. Same thing would go for very early miscarriages. How do we know you didn't try to abort your pregnancy? Women would have to prove they didn't murder their blastocyst/zygote/embryo/fetus.

It's now on the ballot in Mississippi so I think it's time the WaPo/Bloomberg Televison moderators of the upcoming GOP debate in New Hampshire on October 11th step up to the plate and ask them if they support rape induced pregnancies and all the caveats of the Personhood amendment. We know how Rick Santorum and Michele Bachmann will answer so they wouldn't even have to respond, just a nod will do, but let's hear from everyone else that has a chance to win the nomination.

And they can Skype in Chris Christie and get his response too since conservatives are still begging him to run.

Digby has more on the lunacy surrounding "Conceived in rape" forced pregnancy tour.

Fact or fiction? Tell me what you think.

As voting officials readied Diebold machines in their precinct, a few machines received a small modification. A $10 part plugged directly into their logic board, tucked inside the machine, and the machine locked up. Everything was done according to routine, down to verifying the locks on the machines were engaged. Only one key was needed to verify, leaving a single official to oversee the final setup.

Election Day dawned, and long lines formed early. After showing the correct identification to enter the voting booth, citizens cast their votes for President, Congress, and assorted local offices.

In the next room, the official overseeing results held a small remote device. Periodically, he pulls out the remote and pushes the right button. Activation complete.

Whatever votes were actually cast are now irrelevant. The voter's choices have been intercepted and changed to the new slate before they're recorded in device memory.

Voters were shocked to discover a Republican landslide in 2012. The House ,Senate, and Presidency had been won by a handful of votes in key districts expected to vote solidly Democratic.

If you think it's fiction, watch the video at the top.

Brad Friedman reports for Salon:

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Palisades nuclear plant on Lake Michigan.

I don't know why we're not seeing much about this on the news, but I'm sure they would tell us if there was anything to worry about, right?

Entergy’s Palisades nuclear plant near South Haven on Lake Michigan is venting radioactive steam into the environment as part of an unplanned shutdown triggered by an electrical accident.

This shutdown, which began Sunday evening, came just five days after the plant restarted from a shutdown that was caused by a leak in the plant’s cooling system.

Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokeswoman Prema Chandrithal said that the current shutdown happened because an object slipped during work on a circuit breaker and caused an arc that took out power for one of two DC electrical systems that power safety valves and other devices.

According to a notice filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the plant is stable and “controlling temperature using Atmospheric Dump Valves.”

“The steam that would normally go to the generators, that steam is now going into the environment … through the steam stack,” said Chandrithal. “This would have very low levels of tritium.”

Tritium is a radioactive isotope of hydrogen.

The plant is monitoring the levels and will report them to the NRC, Chandrithal said.

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Former Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin hinted Tuesday that she might not run in 2012 because the presidency could be "too shackling."

"For logistical reasons, though, yes, certainly, decisions have to be made," she told Fox News' Greta Van Susteren.

"I'm going to keep repeating, though, Greta, through my process of decision-making with my family and with my close friends as to whether I should throw my name in the hat for the GOP nomination or not for 2012 -- is a title worth it? Does a title shackle a person? Are they -- someone like me, who's a maverick -- you know, I do go rogue and I call it like I see it."

She added: "Somebody like me -- is a title and is a campaign too shackling? Does that prohibit me from being out there, out of a box, not allowing handlers to shape me and to force my message to be what donors or what contributors or what political pundits want it to be? Does a title take away my freedom to call it like I see it and to affect positive change that we need in this country? That's the biggest contemplation piece in my process."

The former Alaska governor also had words of praise for Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain, who she called "Herb."

"Take Herb Cain," she said "Look at why he's doing so well right now. He's, I guess you could say, with all due respect, the flavor of the week because Herb Cain is the one up there who doesn't look like he's part of that permanent political class."

Palin has about a month to make up her mind before Florida's Oct. 31 filing deadline for the Republican primary.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Herb Caen - pronounced the same - was a Pulitzer-winning San Francisco newspaper columnist who died in 1997. Palin probably confused Herman Cain with Herb because she reads all newspapers with a great appreciation.

Whether he's issuing Fatwahs on South American leaders, blaming natural disasters on reproductive rights, or claiming he can leg press 2,000 pounds with the aid of his eponymous "age-defying" protein shake, Pat Robertson never makes sense.

Well, with a big h/t to Right Wing Watch, I've learned to never say never:

Answering a 700 Club caller's question, Robertson says, “Halloween is Satan’s night, it’s the night for the devil. It’s All Hallow’s Eve but it's time when witches and goblins--”

Preach, Brother! Preach! Halloween has its roots in pagan traditions predating Christianity. Just like Easter. It's, therefor, under the sway of dark and nougaty forces. Just like Easter.

Robertson's Christian Broadcasting Network has warned us about the evils of Halloween before. In a now-expunged article from '09, writer Kimberly Daniels reported that “most of the candy sold during this season has been dedicated and prayed over by witches.”

Of course! How else do you explain those talking M&Ms? I pretended to email Mars, Incorporated about this, and I pretended they answered by sending me a shrunken head in the mail. And all this time, you thought Mars, Inc. was only evil because they use child labor in Africa.

Wait a minute...Côte d'Ivoire produces roughly 43 percent of the world's cocoa; 95 percent of people in that Sub-Saharan Republic personally believe in witchcraft; Robertson staunchly defended their illegitimate, Christian President/Thug Laurent Gbagbo...this is all making a lot of sense, in a very convoluted Da Vinci Code sort of way.

According to Daniels, "Curses are sent through the tricks and treats of the innocent whether they get it by going door to door or by purchasing it from the local grocery store. The demons cannot tell the difference.” That's why I make my own chocolate with my own African kids.

In CBN's most recent spiritual assault on Satan's Night Halloween, Robertson adds, “It's skeletons and all this, like the dead rising. Churches shouldn’t do that, you should do something else besides having a haunted house.”

He's so right; the only haunted houses churches should be involved with are hell houses – the often graphic and horrifying vignettes depicting the sins of abortion, alcohol and drug use, suicide, and teh gay. You know, for the kids.

And churches should definitely have nothing to do with walking skeletons. There's simply nothing less Christian than the risen dead.

Murphy is the evil editor of The BEAST. If you follow him on Twitter, he might start using it.

From Democracy Now -- Shock Doctrine at U.S. Postal Service: Is a Manufactured Crisis Behind Push Toward Privatization?:

Today, postal workers and their supporters are holding events across the country to press their demand for repealing the benefit-funding mandate and push back against calls for their workplace to be privatized. For months, Americans have heard dire warnings about the impending collapse of the United States Postal Service due to fiscal insolvency and a drop in the use of mail service. In early September, the U.S. Postmaster General told Congress that the USPS is close to default and unveiled a series of radical proposals to cut costs by firing up to 120,000 workers, closing several thousand facilities, scaling back deliveries, and reducing benefits for retirees. But many postal workers say the much-touted crisis facing the U.S. Postal Service is not what it seems. They argue the greatest volume of mail handled in the 236-year history of the postal service was 2006. They also point to a 2006 law that forced the USPS to become the only agency required to fund 75 years of retiree health benefits over just a 10-year span, and say the law’s requirements account for 100 percent of the service’s $20 billion in losses over the previous four years, without which the service would have turned a profit. Last week, Republicans introduced legislation to overhaul the USPS in response to a bill proposed by Democrats that would refund a reported $6.9 billion in over-payments to the USPS retirement plan, offer early retirement and voluntary separation incentives, adjust retiree benefits prepayment requirements, and preserve employee protections set out in collective bargaining agreements. We host a debate between Chuck Zlatkin, the legislative and political director of the New York Metro Area Postal Union, and Gene Del Polito, president of the Association for Postal Commerce in Washington, D.C.

And from Dave Dayden at FDL -- Postal Service “Crisis” Comes Entirely From Unorthodox Pre-Funding Mandate.

We’ve been discussing the imminent demise of the US Postal Service, and the potential loss of 120,000 good-paying jobs. But most of the near-term funding “crisis” for the USPS comes from an unusual pre-funding mandate for retiree benefits. James Parks explains:

And from Dave's post here's a new ad from the National Association of Letter Carriers, the American Postal Workers Union and the National Postal Mail Handlers Union, explaining the cause of the "crisis."

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Looks like unions have found the silver lining in the Citizens United ruling - namely, Super PACs and the ability to go after non-union voters:

But the ruling also changed the rules for unions, effectively ending a prohibition on outreach to nonunion households. Now, unions can use their formidable numbers to reach out to sympathetic nonunion voters by knocking on doors, calling them at home and trying to get them to polling places. They can also create their own Super PACs to underwrite bigger voter identification and get-out-the-vote operations than ever before.

As part of this overhaul, Richard L. Trumka, president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., has said organized labor will be more independent of the Democratic Party, sitting out races where unions are disappointed with the Democratic candidate’s positions on issues important to them and occasionally financing primary challengers to Democratic incumbents.

The unions said they even intended to back a few Republicans they judge to have been generally supportive of their agenda, like Representative Steven C. LaTourette of Ohio.

Mr. Trumka said unions were tired of Democratic politicians taking them for granted after labor shoveled millions of dollars into Democratic campaigns. In distancing themselves, at least a bit, from the Democrats, unions are becoming part of a trend in which newly empowered outside groups build what are essentially party structures of their own — in this case, to somewhat offset the money flowing into conservative groups that are doing the same thing.

What do you think? Good idea or not?