Think Mister Rogers is corny and auto-tune is awful? I loved this.

Open thread below....

Who knows a good song about being lonely?

Band Of Gold
	Price: $0.99 (As of 06/07/12 07:00 pm details)

The Occupy movement created a major opportunity and an imperative for progressives: Figure out what a new system, one that isn’t based solely on individual greed and a race to the bottom, might look like. In this session, we will explore how Occupy has changed the game in the fight for economic justice and how progressives might start to invest in earnest in building a real alternative economic and political system that works for us—one that is designed as a tool to help us achieve a set of societal goals including human rights and fulfillment.

Led by: Jenifer Fernandez Ancona

Panelists: Sarita Gupta, Simon Johnson, Colin Mutchler, Erica Payne

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Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney on Thursday suggested that Barack Obama had been governing as a "president of doubt and deception."

At a campaign event in Saint Louis, the former Massachusetts governor blasted Obama for not understanding the "free enterprise system."

"Sadly, it's become clear that this president simply doesn't understand or appreciate these fundamental truths of our economic system," he insisted. "Our government has a moral commitment to help every American to help himself -- him and herself. And that commitment has been broken."

"I don't believe, by the way, that it was done with evil intent or ill will," he continued. "As your president starting on day one, I will do everything in my power to end these days of drift and disappointment."

Romney noted that something was "fundamentally wrong when there over 23 million Americans who are unemployed, underemployed or have stopped looking for work."

"And yet, the president tells us he's doing a great job," the candidate pointed out. "Forward, he says. Off a cliff."

"I will not be that president of doubt and deception!"

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Fox News co-host Eric Bolling on Wednesday defended the New York Police Department's spying program that targets Muslims by claiming that "every terrorist on American soil has been a Muslim."

On Fox News' The Five, Bolling dismissed a lawsuit filed by Muslim Advocates, a legal rights group, because "the people that had their constitutional rights violated the most were the 9/11 victims, the 3,000 who were killed by 19 hijackers who happened all to be Muslims."

"It's a strange thing that a lot of groups will do if they feel they're being targeted is turn America's system of civil rights and the Constitution back on the government," co-host Dana Perino agreed. "Now that's one of the things we have to struggle against."

Fox News political analyst Juan Williams, who was dismissed from NPR in 2010 for remarks about Muslims, suggested that the group had a valid case.

"The reality is what the lawsuit says is that they are being targeted simply on the basis of their religion," Williams explained. "So, it's as if, you know, in Syria or one of these countries where all Christians are being persecuted, you said, 'I'm going to go into every Christian home of church just on that basis that I suspect that you're a terrorist.' Well, that's not fair to people in the Muslim community, most of whom are not terrorists."

"How is it every terrorist on American soil has been a Muslim?" Bolling wondered.

"Wait a second," Williams shot back. "You mean to say Oklahoma City [bombing] was conducted by a Muslim?"

"In the last 15 years," Bolling added.

"Oh, come on," Williams replied.

In the last 15 years alone, there have a number of high-profile of domestic terrorist attacks on U.S. soil that did not involve Muslims.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation suspected Dr. Bruce Ivins of being behind the 2001 anthrax attacks. Jim David Adkisson was accused of killing two people and wounding seven others at a Tennessee church in 2008 because he wanted to kill liberals and Democrats. Anti-abortion activist Scott Roeder was convicted of the 2009 murder of Dr. George Tiller. White supremacist James W. von Brunn killed a security guard at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2010. And Andrew Joseph Stack flew a plane into a Texas office building in 2010, possibly targeting the Internal Revenue Service.

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The money goes in a circle among these guys. Mitt Romney, former board member of Marriott International, recipient of gigantic donations to SuperPACs by JW Marriott, Jr, spends megabucks for his campaign to snuggle down for the night at Marriott hotels, nationwide.

Open Secrets:

When it's time for a few hours' sleep, Romney may not pull out his very own down pillow -- asGeorge W. Bush did when he was on the trail -- but he does appear to have a preference in hotel chains: Marriott International, a company with deep personal, political and financial ties to the candidate.

Romney's campaign has spent more than $475,000 in travel expenses at Marriott-owned hotels during the 2012 campaign -- more than three-and-a-half times what he's spent at second-place Hilton Hotels and 39 percent of the campaign's total lodging expenditures, according to Center for Responsive Politics research.

The money, however, doesn't flow one way: current Marriott International Chairman J.W. Marriott, Jr. and brother Richard Marriott -- the chairman of a Marriott International offshoot, Host Hotels and Resorts -- each have maxed out in contributions to Romney's campaign. More significanly, they've donated $1,000,000 apiece to pro-Romney Super PAC Restore Our Future.

It goes a little bit farther even than that. Romney's blind trust that really isn't a blind trust holds between $100,000-250,000 of JW Marriott Co common stock (see page 7). So here's a perfect example of a conflict. Donors give to Romney's campaign, including J.W. Marriott, Jr. A big chunk of that money is spent at Marriott hotels. Romney also owns Marriott stock. There is a conflict of interest there.

You'll hear about how it's not really a big deal for Mittens to have an investment in Marriott stock, or use campaign money to stay at Marriott hotels, because after all, the campaign has to stay somewhere at night, right? Wrong, because it's not just the campaign. It's organizations like CPAC, whose 2012 conference was held at a Marriott hotel, and even Bilderberg 2012. It's hard to imagine that if Mitt were President, he wouldn't confer preference on a chain like Marriott from the standpoint of personal ties as well as financial benefit.

But hey, I'm sure the politerati out there who like to call Mitt's lies something like "mistakes" or "errors", will gloss over this too, saying it's certainly not a problem that the guy sat on the board for over ten years, owns stock in the company, and is taking six-figure donations from J.W. Marriott, Jr. himself. Sure, not a problem at all. Unless one thinks that their President might be better off not having such deep ties to multinational corporations who work very hard to keep unions out of their properties and taxes out of our national treasury, of course.

This is just creepy. As Lawrence reported on The Last Word last night, Mitt Romney had a police uniform that he used to impersonate a police officer. This account has now been corroborated by another witness. Via National Memo:

Phillip Maxwell, a prep school buddy, told the New Republic in 2008 that Romney had pulled over students from a girls school next door to Cranbrook while wearing a police uniform as a prank. Other former classmates described Mitt as a “happy-go-lucky guy known less for his achievements and more for his pranks.”

In The Real Romney, a biography published by Boston Globe reporters Michael Kranish and Scott Helman this year,another former friend recalled how Romney had “put a siren on top of his car and chased two of his friends who were driving around with their dates.” The two friends were in on the scheme, but the girls were not. There was beer in the car trunk, according to a prearranged plan. Mitt told his two counterparts to get out of their vehicle and into his car. Then they drove off, leaving the girls behind.“

It was a terrible thing to do,” said one of his accomplices, a Cranbrook classmate named Graham McDonald.

To some observers, Romney’s alleged masquerading as a cop to intimidate innocent drivers shows a character defect that is also revealed by other bullying incidents during his youth. When those incidents were disclosed in the Washington Post earlier this year, Romney issued an apology of sorts, stating that he had done “stupid” things and was sorry if he had harmed anyone.

This incident is creepy, but it also points to an authoritarian and anti-woman streak in Romney. Let's not forget that Romney's religion forbids any alcoholic or caffeinated drinks. To set up two women with beer in the car, pretend to be a cop, and leave them there with it? That's not a joke. That's a disgusting, authoritarian, nasty statement about what Romney thinks of women who don't comport with his idea of what women should be.

Interestingly, it seems that Romney has given himself a bit of cover on his Wikipedia page with the claim that he worked as a security guard during his first year at Stanford to pay for his trips home to see Ann. I predict now that he will use that bit of information to counter the claim that he used a Michigan police uniform to intimidate drivers and bully women. Yet, the bullying story comports with other behavior which has been corroborated, and it points to a deep, dark lack of ethics in Mitt Romney that emerges on an almost-daily basis in his propensity to lie in order to deny true allegations.

By 1966, when Romney was at Stanford, the anti-war protest movement was underway with full-throated force. Students were not friends with police and vice versa. Yet here is Mitt Romney, who protested against the protesters and for the war playing fake cop. Power complex, much?

You know who else plays fake cop? Serial killers and criminals. That's why it's a crime.

[h/t Daily Kos]

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On its face, this would indicate that not only does Mitt Romney have no problem hiding his tax returns from voters, but he also has reasons to hide his tax returns from voters.

When is a blind trust not a blind trust?

A blind trust is not a blind trust when there is direct or indirect control over investment decisions. While Romney has nominally placed his investments in a trust which is managed by someone else, the person he has chosen to manage those investments is his close associate and personal attorney. That is not a blind trust under federal law. It is a trust managed by a close personal friend and advisor.

This is important because it means Romney can coordinate investment decisions which on their face might be potential conflicts of interests. Here's an example. In March, the Obama campaign hammered Romney about his "tough-on-China rhetoric", after Romney started criticizing the administration over it's alleged "softness" on Chinese human rights abuses.

Yet even as he was proclaiming that, he had a six-figure investment in a Bain Capital fund which owns Chinese video surveillance company.

Either way you cut it, there's a conflict. On the one hand, Romney is full of puffery over his indignation at human rights abuses in China and on the other, he's got a substantial investment in a company which enables human rights abuses.

Another example of Romney's hypocrisy with regard to China is the relationship between his investments and his policy declarations. A look at Romney's record alongside his financial disclosures indicates that he was for China before he was against them, and his investment record aligns with that. In late 2011, Romney's campaign rhetoric took a hard turn against Chinese trade practices. Just before that, he divested himself of $1.5 million in Chinese investments.

It is not a blind trust when one decides to make a policy stand but unloads one's investments just ahead of that stand. And it's here that I will note Romney's modus operandi. "I'm running for office, for Pete's sake! I can't have [illegal immigrants, Chinese investments, etc] working for me!"

When a blind trust is really a blind trust

Under federal law, Mitt Romney has two options with regard to his assets. He can either create a blind trust which actually creates a firewall between Romney and his money by putting all of his assets under the management of a completely unrelated third party with no conflict of interest or relationship with Romney, or he can liquidate all of his investments and place them in neutral investments such as Treasury notes.

Divestiture is the route President Obama appears to have taken. According to his financial disclosures at Open Secrets, the bulk of his money was invested in Treasury bonds, with some retirement funds held in index mutual funds, which are permissible because he has no control over how those mutual funds are invested. Those disclosures go all the way back to his initial candidacy filing and are consistent.

Mitt Romney, on the other hand, promises to create a federal blind trust if he is elected. Until then, he'd like for everyone to believe he is not accountable for Bain Capital's actions because, well, he had everything held in a blind trust. Right?

About that Bain Capital Relationship...

Romney's newly-released financial disclosures indicate that he received almost $2 million in income from Bain Capital which were treated as "carried interest" payments. Carried interest payments, you might recall, are taxed at a rate of 15 percent, unlike other income which has a maximum tax rate of 28 percent.

Boston.com:

In his latest federal financial disclosure, filed last week, Romney's trustee revealed that the candidate made $1.9 million from a single "Bain Capital Inc." payment as well as more than $200,000 from three other Bain entities. Although Romney's retirement agreement with Bain expired in 2009, the trustee said the income came in the form of "true-up" payments -- in essence, catch-up payments made to make up for earnings not provided to Romney before the entities ceased operation.

None of the Bain entities had previously been listed on Romney's 2011 financial disclosure.

So here's what we're being asked to believe. First, Romney's relationship with Bain ended in 1999 and there was no arrangement for any further consulting or other services with them. Second, Romney's retirement agreement expired in 2009 and with it, all preferred tax treatment on Bain Capital distributions, since Romney would ostensibly have provided no services to Bain to justify giving him a "piece of carry", which is how it's referred to. Third, suddenly two investments pop up out of nowhere with Bain which do not cause any prior year's tax returns to be amended or disclosures changed, but payments from them represent some sort of adjustment for prior services which are as yet undisclosed.

Isn't the simpler explanation that Romney still has an active, vibrant ongoing relationship with Bain Capital, and that his current investments are not being held in a trust with any sort of firewall standing between Romney and investment decisions for those trusts? And if that is the explanation, then we also have to understand that Mitt Romney has many, many conflicts of interest, that he should be accountable for Bain Capital's vulture capitalism activities, and most importantly, Mitt Romney wouldn't know the truth if it stood in front of him with a big sign painted on its chest.

This is the wonky installment of Mitt Romney's Ethics Problems. Stay tuned for the creepy installment, which will be coming shortly.

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After the disappointing and frankly frightening results in this Tuesday's Wisconsin recall elections for someone like myself who has been a decades long union member and what it might mean for the future of the union movement if this emboldens Republicans to try to get rid of every union on the country, and the real possibility of seeing them push for putting a national right to work law on the books, I was glad to see at least one person leading a discussion on what's happened where we've got the working class voting against their own economic interests, and that was Ed Schultz.

If we had a few more discussions like this in our national media, rather than the constant union bashing we see instead, maybe more voters would be aware of the fact that pitting one group of workers against another just harms all of us. Sadly as Thomas Frank pointed out, this is something that's been going on for decades. And as E.J. Dionne noted, the severe decline in union membership on the United States has made it much easier for Republicans to play this game of divide and conquer with the working class.

This segment hit home for me particularly hard because it mirrored a conversation I had with a co-worker earlier the same day, who was asking me what I thought about what happened in Wisconsin and all the money poured in there and wondering how we've got so many within our own ranks who are union members and who are happy to have the security of that union membership when it comes to everything from decent wages, to health and retirement benefits, and some recourse with safety issues on the job to not worrying about being fired if they dare to speak up about problems in the work place, and yet consider themselves part of this ridiculous AstroTurf "tea party" movement.

Sadly I didn't have any good answers for him other than to make some of the same points made by Frank and Dionne here about the propaganda those members have been exposed to and the huge uphill battle we're facing to try to overcome that and the way unions are portrayed in the media.

Here's part of the conversation from Schultz's show where he was more or less following up on a discussion he'd had on MSNBC earlier that day on Alex Wagner's show and the need for union leadership to be doing more to educate their members. I agree with the points he made. The question is how do unions use the limited resources they have to potentially follow up on them when their ranks are under assault, which means their finances are as well.

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After Stephen Colbert showed a round of video clips with the Fox talking heads among others discussing how terrible the losses in the Wisconsin recall elections were for the union movement and Colbert doing a bit of celebrating of his own, his staff, who are union members themselves, reminded him of that fact, letting their displeasure with his celebration be known.

I'd pay money to see someone on Hannity's staff do this to him for real instead of in a parody as we had here.