Catholic professors slam Boehner for "anti-life" policies

Yesterday, in his first post at Crooks and Liars, Murshed Zaheed asked: Economic Fantasy, Confusion & Lies Result In A Horrible Week For Boehner, Can It Get Worse?

It did.

Today, the NY Times reports that Boehner, who is giving the commencement address at Catholic University this weekend, got slammed by a large group of Catholic professors for his "anti-life" policies:

More than 75 professors at Catholic University and other prominent Catholic colleges have written a pointed letter to Mr. Boehner saying that the Republican-supported budget he shepherded through the House will hurt the poor, the elderly and the vulnerable, and that he therefore has failed to uphold basic Catholic moral teachings.

“Mr. Speaker, your voting record is at variance from one of the church’s most ancient moral teachings,” the letter says. “From the apostles to the present, the magisterium of the church has insisted that those in power are morally obliged to preference the needs of the poor. Your record in support of legislation to address the desperate needs of the poor is among the worst in Congress. This fundamental concern should have great urgency for Catholic policy makers. Yet, even now, you work in opposition to it.”

The letter writers criticize Mr. Boehner’s support for a budget that cut financing for Medicare, Medicaid and the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program, while granting tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations. They call such policies “anti-life,” a particularly biting reference because the phrase is usually applied to politicians and others who support the right to abortion.

Most American Catholics know that Cardinals and Bishops will sidle up to any GOPer who stands with them on choice and gay-bashing. And, most American Catholics ignore the admonitions from the hierarchy.

Catholic leaders have largely given Republicans a free pass on issues that affect those in most need, the sick, the poor, the homeless, the unemployed -- because abortion and gay-bashing trump everything else for those Catholic leaders. And, we all know, the Republicans are obsessed with abortion and the gays and sure love wailing on the sick, the poor, the homeless and the unemployed.

This was a letter from Catholic professors, not Catholic Bishops. But, it was something. Expect the Bishops and Cardinals to continue their sick love affair with GOPers. As long as they've got gays to bash, they'll have each other. Read the rest of this post...

Catholic professors slam Boehner for "anti-life" policies

Yesterday, in his first post at Crooks and Liars, Murshed Zaheed asked: Economic Fantasy, Confusion & Lies Result In A Horrible Week For Boehner, Can It Get Worse?

It did.

Today, the NY Times reports that Boehner, who is giving the commencement address at Catholic University this weekend, got slammed by a large group of Catholic professors for his "anti-life" policies:

More than 75 professors at Catholic University and other prominent Catholic colleges have written a pointed letter to Mr. Boehner saying that the Republican-supported budget he shepherded through the House will hurt the poor, the elderly and the vulnerable, and that he therefore has failed to uphold basic Catholic moral teachings.

“Mr. Speaker, your voting record is at variance from one of the church’s most ancient moral teachings,” the letter says. “From the apostles to the present, the magisterium of the church has insisted that those in power are morally obliged to preference the needs of the poor. Your record in support of legislation to address the desperate needs of the poor is among the worst in Congress. This fundamental concern should have great urgency for Catholic policy makers. Yet, even now, you work in opposition to it.”

The letter writers criticize Mr. Boehner’s support for a budget that cut financing for Medicare, Medicaid and the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program, while granting tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations. They call such policies “anti-life,” a particularly biting reference because the phrase is usually applied to politicians and others who support the right to abortion.

Most American Catholics know that Cardinals and Bishops will sidle up to any GOPer who stands with them on choice and gay-bashing. And, most American Catholics ignore the admonitions from the hierarchy.

Catholic leaders have largely given Republicans a free pass on issues that affect those in most need, the sick, the poor, the homeless, the unemployed -- because abortion and gay-bashing trump everything else for those Catholic leaders. And, we all know, the Republicans are obsessed with abortion and the gays and sure love wailing on the sick, the poor, the homeless and the unemployed.

This was a letter from Catholic professors, not Catholic Bishops. But, it was something. Expect the Bishops and Cardinals to continue their sick love affair with GOPers. As long as they've got gays to bash, they'll have each other. Read the rest of this post...

How lots of social media is stealing the rights to your photos

An excellent summary of how far too many social media services and sites are basically stealing the rights to your photos without you even realizing it. I'm a lawyer, and I can't even understand some of these privacy policies.  More atBoing Boing. Read the rest of this post...

Boehner struck a nerve when his party called for ending Medicare, bankrupted the govt, and melted down the economy

I love when and how Republicans lie.  Boehner thinks he "struck a nerve" calling for trillions in spending cuts to pay for multi-trillion dollar tax cuts for the rich.  And he's right.  It does strike a nerve when you cut taxes to the tune of a few trillion dollars, adding an equal amount to the deficit, then suggest that someone else is somehow responsible for the deficit.

Let's revisit yesterday's post about how the Republicans, under John Boehner and George Bush, are responsible for most of the deficit.

The five main causes of the budget deficit are the economic downturn (tax revenues go down), the Bush tax cuts (which quickly become the largest part of the deficit), the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the stimulus plan (which was necessary because of the Bush economic meltdown), though that becomes meaningless in less than two years, as it's being phased out.

So for the rest of this decade, the biggest single factor contributing to the deficit are the Bush era tax cuts that the Republicans say are off the table (meaning, they won't discuss getting rid of them). But just as importantly - guess what? - Obama isn't responsible for the deficit. The GOP is, along with whoever got us into those wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (oh right, that would be the GOP), and whoever was in charge of the government when the economy tanked (right again, George Bush). Oh, and a little of the deficit was caused by TARP (Bush again).

Read the rest of this post...

So Gingrich has announced his candidacy for president in 2012

Interesting, the pundit reaction to this. Some are drooling (h/t Matt Taibbi):

11 Reasons Newt Gingrich Will be the 2012 GOP Nominee for President

1. Ideas and solutions: ... Policy is Newt's strength. He is well known for his constant generation of ideas and solutions. ...

11. Callista, his third wife: She keeps him grounded, shows that he's settled very well into marriage.

"Grounded"? Is that what the kids are calling it these days?

That was U.S. News. Here's Matt Taibbi; he's also drooling (my emphasis):

I literally cannot wait to get back to covering the insane reality show that is the presidential race, especially since the Republicans seem determined to run the most entertaining collection of mutants seen on earth since Tod Browning’s classic Freaks.

Purely from a political-theater standpoint, Gingrich brings several really outstanding qualities to this race. ... Gingrich [is] a relentless mirror-gazer and attention-seeker with a wandering pee-pee and a talent for pseudo-intellectualism. Gingrich, hilariously, is the right’s idea of a “thinker,” which is to say he’s a pompous mispronouncer and Thesaurus-raider who lards up same-old/same-old right-wing rhetoric with quotations from obscure academic texts and inane historical references, so that friendly pundits can later describe the resultant utterances as “fresh new ideas.”

And for good measure, here's Rachel Maddow, who has taken his measure many times. For Maddow, the news is that he has to appear to run to keep his money-making schemes alive.



You can't sell a product forever without producing at least one of them. This is the one of them: Gingrich in 2012.

It will be interesting to see how long this lasts. After all, if he really does run, he's going to get creamed, and not in that "wandering pee-pee" way that Taibbi talks about.

Enjoy it while it lasts.

GP Read the rest of this post...

Obama urges corporate America to hire workers

Of course it's a good idea, but unless they're forced into doing something, they won't do it. Start cutting off their corporate welfare and see how quickly they move. Also, don't ask the CEO of one of the biggest offshoring companies to join the presidential committees on jobs. Just a thought to consider.

He said businesses and banks that reaped the rewards of extraordinary measures to pull the country out of a deep recession had a responsibility now to invest hordes of cash into U.S. jobs.

"It is time for companies to step up," Obama said.

"American taxpayers contributed to that process of stabilizing the economy. Companies havebenefited from that, and they're making a lot of money, and now's the time for them to start betting on American workers and American products."

Read the rest of this post...

The financial cost of hunting bin Laden: $2 trillion

And the costs will keep coming for a while. Bloomberg:

The U.S. government spent $2 trillion combating bin Laden over the past decade, more than 20 percent of the nation’s $9.68 trillion public debt. That money paid for wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as additional military, intelligence and homeland security spending above pre-Sept. 11 trends, according to a Bloomberg analysis.

This year alone, taxpayers are spending more than $45 billion in interest on the money borrowed to battle al-Qaeda, the analysis shows.

The financial bleeding won’t stop with bin Laden’s demise. One of every four dollars in red ink the U.S. expects to incur in the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1 will result from $285 billion in annual spending triggered by the terrorist scion of a wealthy Saudi family.

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Even fellow traders have unfavorable view of Goldman

They're legends in their own minds.

Fifty-four percent of respondents to the global poll of traders, investors and analysts conducted May 9-10 have an unfavorable opinion of the New York-based bank, more than double the negative rating for JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) Yet a month after a U.S. Senate report said Goldman Sachs misled clients, 78 percent of those surveyed said the accusations will either have no effect on the firm or will harm its reputation without driving away customers.

Read the rest of this post...

Google just animated their logo to honor Martha Graham

It seems to be an homage to women.  Am I missing something newsy related to this?  It's cool, regardless. (Oh, and it's animated, so check it out in person, well, virtually in person.)

Aha!  It's dancer/choreographer Martha Graham's birthday. Read the rest of this post...

Citing modesty concerns, Web site removes men from sit room photo

Funny as hell.  (It's in response to this.) Read the rest of this post...

Nothing says "family values" like not knowing your wife’s name

Gingrich caught repeatedly misspelling his wife’s name on his campaign Web site.  Then again, he's had three wives and a few mistresses too, so it must get confusing after a while. Read the rest of this post...

Assad's military shells cities using tanks

War crimes, anyone?

Nineteen people have reportedly been killed in shelling by tanks in residential areas in Syria as president Bashar al-Assad attempts to crush anti-government protests, defying calls for an end to the brutal crackdown.

Ammar Qurabi, head of the National Organisation for Human Rights in Syria, said 13 people were killed in the southern village of al-Harah on Wednesday.

Tanks also shelled a residential district in Syria's third largest city Homs and at least five people were killed, a rights campaigner in the city said. A sixth person was killed by a sniper shot to the head as he stood in front of his house.

Most were killed in shelling, but gunfire killed several of the victims, Qurabi said.

Read the rest of this post...

GOP regulator approved Comcast deal, then joins Comcast

It's the typical Washington revolving door. Why does everyone else have to keep funding job advancements for these people? Both parties are just as guilty as the other.

A top telecommunications regulator who voted to approve Comcast Corp.'s takeover of NBCUniversal in January is leaving to join the company as a lobbyist.

Meredith Attwell Baker, one of two Republicans on the five-member Federal Communications Commission, will become senior vice president of government affairs for NBCUniversal.

Comcast said it did not begin discussions with Baker about a possible job until after the transaction had closed. Baker will leave the FCC on June 3, less than a month before her term was set to expire. She joined the agency in July 2009.

Read the rest of this post...

RomneyCare = ObamaCare

Romney can run, but he can't hide. He was a big ole lib until he decided he wanted to run for President.  Pro-gay, pro-socialist medicine.  His words are one thing, but his record speaks for itself. Read the rest of this post...

5.2 earthquake hits Spain, 10 dead

Natural disasters are not nearly as common in Europe as they are in the US, so this is really big news. BBC:

Hundreds of people have spent the night outdoors in the southern Spanish town of Lorca after an earthquake which killed at least 10 people.

The magnitude-5.2 tremor toppled several buildings after striking at a depth of just 1km (0.6 miles), 120km south-west of Alicante.

Lines of cars lay crushed under tonnes of rubble and a hospital was evacuated as a precaution.

Read the rest of this post...

More rumblings of trouble in UK coalition government

After the election defeat, this was bound to occur and yesterday the divisions between the Lib Dems and Tories was evident. It's only the House of Lords, but it will not be a surprise when the same comes to the House of Commons. The Guardian:

The government suffered a major defeat in the Lords when a rebellion by Liberal Democrat peers helped carry an amendment that could bury the government's central policy of elected police and crime commissioners.

In an apparent show of the "muscular liberalism" Nick Clegg had promised would mark a new phase in the coalition as it enters its second year, Lib Dem peers threw out the plans to introduce American-style elected commissioners.

It marks a serious defeat on the coalition's first anniversary, including for Clegg, who at the last minute sent whips round to convince his party's members to back the bill. Some 188 peers voted for the amendment, which knocked out plans for elected commissioners, with 176 opposing it. The vote carried with backing from 13 Liberal Democrat peers including Lord Oakeshott; some also defied the government by abstaining and allowing the amendment to squeak through.

Read the rest of this post...

Top causes of the long-term deficit: Economic downturn and Bush tax cuts

Via Ezra Klein.  The five main causes of the budget deficit are the economic downturn (tax revenues go down), the Bush tax cuts (which quickly become the largest part of the deficit), the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the stimulus plan (which was necessary because of the Bush economic meltdown), though that becomes meaningless in less than two years, as it's being phased out.

So for the rest of this decade, the biggest single factor contributing to the deficit are the Bush era tax cuts that the Republicans say are off the table (meaning, they won't discuss getting rid of them).  But just as importantly - guess what? - Obama isn't responsible for the deficit.  The GOP is, along with whoever got us into those wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (oh right, that would be the GOP), and whoever was in charge of the government when the economy tanked (right again, George Bush). Oh, and a little of the deficit was caused by TARP (Bush again). Read the rest of this post...

How lots of social media is stealing the rights to your photos

An excellent summary of how far too many social media services and sites are basically stealing the rights to your photos without you even realizing it. I'm a lawyer, and I can't even understand some of these privacy policies.  More atBoing Boing. Read the rest of this post...

Senate Ethics Committee finds evidence that Ensign broke the law, refers case to DOJ

The usually useless Senate Ethics Committee whacked John Ensign today and is referring his case to the Department of Justice:

The Senate Ethics Committee on Thursday declared that it has “substantial and credible evidence” that former senator John Ensign broke federal laws in his effort to cover up an extramarital affair he had with a political aide, referring its case to the Justice Department and Federal Election Commission.

In a highly unusual public rebuke, the bipartisan committee presented its case on the Senate floor, announcing it had voted unanimously to release its findings and request the Justice Department re-start a criminal investigation into the Nevada Republican’s actions.

A pdf of the Ethics Committee report is here. It's got some fun parts. I'm posting an excerpt from the section titled, Mr. Hampton Seeks Assistance to End the Affair and an Intervention Is Held. The "intervention" features Senator Tom "higher authority" Coburn. (Sounds like these guys were amateurs. They should have brought in Candy Finnigan from the show "Intervention.") And, Spoiler Alert: Within days, there's a relapse. I suspect Ensign isn't the first Senator to be told "put your pants and go home," but you don't see it in official reports very often:

When Mr. Hampton returned from the CODEL trip, he immediately sought the assistance of Tim Coe, Senator Ensign s long-time spiritual advisor, to assist with ending the affair. Mr. Coe recommended that they bring in a “higher authority, someone much bigger than me,” and approached Senator Tom Coburn. Senator Coburn was also a resident of the C Street Center, and was a close spiritual and personal confidant to Tim Coe and to Senator Ensign.

Senator Coburn, Mr. Coe, David Coe (Tim Coe s brother and fellow spiritual advisor to the International Foundation), Mr. Hampton, and Marty Sherman decided to confront Senator Ensign about the affair and did so as soon as he returned to Washington, D.C. from the CODEL on Valentine s Day, February 14, 2008. They confronted Senator Ensign at the C Street House. Senator Ensign “started to lie,” but he was told that “we know the truth, “ and then Senator Ensign confessed to the affair. Senator Ensign was told that the affair had to stop. Mr. Hampton was very emotional during the meeting, and at one point got very close to a physical confrontation with Senator Ensign. Senator Coburn asked Mr. Hampton to leave, stating “we’ll take it from here. We’ll take care of this.”

At that confrontation, Senator Ensign agreed to write what appeared to be a sincerely apologetic letter to Ms. Hampton ending the affair. Senator Ensign wrote the letter, and Mr. Sherman mailed it from a Federal Express mailing facility. After it was mailed, Senator Ensign immediately called Ms. Hampton to alert her about the confrontation and to tell her to disregard the letter, which he had written only for the benefit of the men who were confronting him.

On February 16, 2008, two days after the intervention, Tim Coe received a call from Doug Hampton. Mr. Hampton was looking for the Senator to have him sign some documents for the NRSC, and saw his car and Ms. Hampton s car parked in a parking lot of a hotel close to their Summerlin neighborhood. Mr. Coe “pleaded with him [Hampton] to go home.” Mr. Coe called Senator Ensign and stated “I know exactly where you are. I know exactly what you are doing. Put your pants on and go home.” Senator Ensign initially said he would not leave the hotel room, telling Mr. Coe “I can’t, I love her [Ms. Hampton].” Senator Ensign ultimately agreed to leave the hotel. After he left the hotel, Senator Ensign told Mr. Coe that he wanted to marry Ms. Hampton.

What drama. When did these people find time to work? Read the rest of this post...

Guilty charges in Wall Street insider trading deal

It's a success but as I've said before, this is a drop in the bucket compared to the big money lost by the Wall Street old boy network. The fact that Rajaratnam is not white and not part of one of the big firms should not be overlooked. He cheated and deserves to pay the price but how is it possible that the trillions lost by Goldman, Citi, JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley get a pass? Wall Street continues to evade real justice.

Hedge fund founder Raj Rajaratnam was found guilty on all 14 counts in a sweeping insider trading verdict Wednesday that vindicated the government's aggressive use of phone taps to prosecute Wall Street figures.

Rajaratnam, founder of the Galleon Group and the central figure in the broadest Wall Street insider trading probe in decades, will appeal the use of the secret recordings, tactics historically deployed in organized crime and drug trafficking cases, not white-collar probes.

Read the rest of this post...