I'd like more contacts for Intuit/TurboTax, Toyota and Verizon

Gang, I'd like to up the pressure on these three Hardball advertisers on Friday. Please take a look at the site and see the contact info we already have for these companies (in the left-hand column), and can anyone do a bit of research and see who else they can turn up at the top levels of the company - phone, fax, and email? A number of you have already given us a goldmine of info on all of his advertisers' inside contacts, but I'd like to get more on these three right now so we have fresh high-level contacts for Friday.

Thanks, JOHN Read the rest of this post...

Congress catching up on the importance of blogs

Interesting article from CNet about how members of Congress are using blogs. Read the rest of this post...

Thursday Evening Open Thread

At dinner with John and Rob...doing some scheming....always scheming. Read the rest of this post...

Bush still at 41

Can anyone explain why the Democrats and traditional media are intimidated by this failed presidency? Atrios has the new numbers from Fox, yup, Fox, with Bush's approval rating at 41. Read the rest of this post...

Kerry wants a filibuster

From CNN:

Kerry said he told a group of Democratic senators Wednesday, and urged that they join him. Kerry said he has the support of fellow Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy.

Some senior Democrats told CNN they are worried that the move could backfire.

Of course "senior Democrats" are worried the move could backfire...and then they go out and add fuel to that fire. God forbid the Democrats stand for something.

Make the GOP say what they want: a justice who will overturn Roe v. Wade. Make them defend it. They never say it. Make them.

And I love Mary Landrieu's concern:

"Because we have such a full plate of pressing issues before Congress, a filibuster at this time would be, in my view, very counterproductive," said Landrieu, who is pushing the Senate to focus on the rebuilding of the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Landrieu's constituents have been completely screwed over by Bush and the GOP since Katrina struck. If she had a spine, she'd be filibustering everything til Congress paid attention to the mess that still exists in Lousiana. She's pathetic. Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Keep it coming... Read the rest of this post...

Hey Verizon! Can you hear us now? Good.

New senior Verizon contacts. Please ask them how they feel about associating their brand with "fag jokes" and people who compare more than half the country to Osama bin Laden?

Ivan Seidenberg, Chmn & CEO, Verizon Corp. Branding
ivan.g.seidenberg@verizon.com

Robert Engalls Jr, President of Retail Marketing
bob.ingalls@verizon.com

Robert Varetonni, Executive Director of External Communications robert.a.varettoni@verizon.com

Eric Rabe, Vice President of External Communications
eric.rabe@verizon.com

Verizon has a very open "diversity" policy, and even has a "Diversity Council" in each business unit. I'm told they have a zero-tolerance policy on discrimination, and that is great news and is to be lauded. Please ask Verizon to continue to take a stand for tolerance by pulling its ad from Hardball. Read the rest of this post...

The Bush/Abramoff Photo cover-up continues -- and, oh, they're relevant

The talking point of the day is that the Bush/Abramoff photos are not relevant -- which, of course, means they are. What Bush said today:

President Bush deflected questions today about photographs of him with Jack Abramoff, the disgraced Republican lobbyist, saying the photos are irrelevant.

"I mean, there's thousands of people that come through and get their pictures taken," Mr. Bush said. "I'm also mindful that we live in a world in which those pictures will be used for pure political purposes, and they're not relevant to the investigation."

Okay, well, someone thinks they're relevant enough to hide -- even though they are "not relevant." Josh Marshall unraveled that development that over at TPM. It's worth a read:

But early this afternoon, I decided to take one more go at Reflections. I talked to company president Joanne Amos. We went back and forth over various questions about whether photographs at the site were available to the public and why some had been removed. When she, at length, asked me who it was in the picture with the president. I told her we believed it was Jack Abramoff.

Amos very straightforwardly told me that the photographs had been removed and that they had been removed because they showed Abramoff and the president in the same picture. The photos were, she told me, "not relevant."

When I asked her who had instructed her to remove the photos, she told me she was the president of the company. She did it. It was "her business decision" to remove the photographs. She told me she had done so within the last month.

For something so "not relevant," there are an awful lot of people giving them relevance. Read the rest of this post...

Bush still maintains he's not a crook

Bush can say he didn't break the law all he wants -- and the more he says it, the more he sounds like Nixon:

President Bush again defended his program of warrantless surveillance Thursday, saying "there's no doubt in my mind it is legal." He suggested that he might resist congressional efforts to change or expressly endorse it.

"The program's legal, it's designed to protect civil liberties, and it's necessary," Bush told a White House news conference.

Remember, just because he says it, doesn't make it true.

UPDATE: Almost forgot....Crooks and Liars has the video of Nixon delivering Bush's message back in 1977:

"When the President does it, that means that it is not illegal"

Read the rest of this post...

Ask Toyota, Verizon and Turbo-Tax how they feel about "Fag jokes"

Because they're advertising on the show of Chris Matthews who makes fag jokes. Matthews had a heck of a time last week making gay jokes with his pal, Imus. But, Matthews and MSNBC don't think they have to apologize for making derogatory jokes like that:

In response to the uproar over Matthews' gay-bashing comments, and the fact that they were broadcast live on MSNBC, MSNBC responded with a simple "apology" that they broadcast the remarks. There was no apology from MSNBC about Matthews, about his comments, nor was there an apology from Matthews himself. In fact, three days later, Matthews gave a speech on his TV show about how famous people should NOT apologize for controversial things they say publicly, calling into question whether Matthews was now repudiating MSNBC's weak non-apology and whether Matthews was implying that he was not sorry for his gay-bashing joke.

MSNBC never apologized for Matthews' role in the fag jokes. Media Matters posted their purported apology which was nothing more than boilerplate language:

"Imus" is produced by WFAN radio and is simulcast by MSNBC. The views expressed on the program are not those of MSNBC. Having said that, it was unfortunate that these remarks were telecast on MSNBC. We sincerely apologize to anyone who was offended by these remarks.

That's classic...it's not our fault, sorry you were offended that our "talent" mocks the gays.

So, now we know that Chris Matthews thinks fag jokes are okay. Ask his advertisers how they feel about that.

Contact "Hardball's" Advertisers

MESSAGE: Please stop associating your product with TV shows like "Hardball" where the host, Chris Matthews, makes derogatory gay jokes.

Intuit/TurboTax
- Steve Bennett, Pres.
tel. 650-944-6000
fax 650-944-5295

- Scott Gulbransen, Comm.
858-525-7594
scott_gulbransen@intuit.com

Verizon
- Robert Ingalls, President
tel. 212-395-1944
fax 212-597-2982

- Jerri DeVard, Sr. VP Mktg.
tel. 212-395-1470
fax 212-597-2982
jerri.devard@verizon.com

- John Bonomo, PR
212-395-7756
john.j.bonomo@verizon.com

- Sharon Cohen-Hagar, PR
972-718-6205
sharon.cohen-hagar@verizon.com

Toyota
- Don Esmond, Senior VP
tel. 310-468-5212
fax 310-468-7846
don_esmond@toyota.com

- Dennis Cuneo, Senior VP
tel. 212-223-0303
fax 212-750-3564
dennis_cuneo@tma.toyota.com

- Ms Pat Pineda, VP Ext. Affairs
pat_pineda@tma.toyota.com

- Main #: 800-331-4331
Comment form

Read the rest of this post...

Chimpy's Press Conf. Open Thread

The Bush/GOP SOTU spin begins. If you're watching, comment away. Read the rest of this post...

Open Thread

Let's do our spinning. Read the rest of this post...

For Bush White House, the GOP comes first in the SOTU

Okay, we know the State of the Union is a political event. Still, it shows how the Bush White House is all politics all the time when they admit their top priority for the State of the Union is politics:

"The state of the union address will be directional for our party and our country, and visionary," Ms. Wallace said. "That is not code for it lacking substance."

Ms. Wallace isn't even talking in code. She's upfront. The top priority for Bush's State of the Union isn't the state of the union, it is to set the direction for the GOP. Party for Bush and the GOP comes before country. Read the rest of this post...

Bush says now he takes Bin Laden "seriously" -- imagine if he had in 2001

What a fraud. Never forget that Bush was warned on August 6, 2001 that Bin Laden was determined to attack in the U.S. He ignored that warning. He stayed on vacation -- just like he did when Katrina was destroying the Gulf Coast.

Now, after Bin Laden killed 3,000 Americans and got us in to one war and was used by Bush as one of the lies for a second war, Bush says he is a real threat:

"When he says he's going to hurt the American people again, or try to, he means it," Bush told reporters after visiting the top-secret National Security Agency where the surveillance program is based. "I take it seriously, and the people of NSA take it seriously."

Bin Laden meant it in 2001, but Bush didn't take him seriously. That's why 3,000 Americans died. Bush failed to protect America in the summer of 2001. Since then, Bush has used Bin Laden as a political weapon. But, Bin Laden is still alive...still threatening us...so Bush is still failing us. Read the rest of this post...

Hamas wins majority in election

The reports out now say they have won around 70 seats out of 132. It's going to be interesting to see how their rhetoric matches their actual policy because being in opposition is so different than being in power. Read the rest of this post...

36,000 people stopped and searched in UK last year

Hooray for freedom and democracy! One hundred people per day being stopped under the UK Terrorism Act. Blair and Bush have absolutely no regard for civil liberties and are turning once strong democracies into police states. Among the targets is 81 year old anti-war campaigner John Catt. This reminds me of the ugly incident at the Labour Party conference last year when Blair had his thugs rough up a Labour MP who yelled out "rubbish" when Jack Straw was blabbing on about why the war was so necessary. If you give people like Bush and Blair unrestricted power, they will abuse it as we see time and time again.

Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, is facing an onslaught over the Government's anti-terror laws after figures showed nearly 36,000 people were stopped and searched under the emergency powers last year. The number of people stopped and searched each year has soared since the Act came into force in 2001, when 10,200 people were stopped. It rose to 33,800 in 2003-04.

Figures in a Home Office report showed that 35,776 searches of vehicles and people were recorded under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act, which was passed six years ago. Despite the high number of people stopped, only 455 were arrested. The newest statistics, which cover the 2004-05 financial year and do not include the aftermath of the July bomb attacks on London, represent a record use of the powers since the Act came into force.

Dominic Grieve, the shadow Attorney General, said: "These figures speak for themselves. The powers are being used as a blunt instrument and it is far from clear if those arrested are being done so for terrorism. "While we accept such powers may be necessary to protect the public from terrorism, it is vital these powers are not abused."

Read the rest of this post...