Romney criticizes big government in front of government subsidized farm

Even better, the owners of the heavily subsidized farm don't like Obama, but they can't pinpoint why. Gosh, whatever could that mean? Keep in mind that Lebanon County, Pennsylvania doesn't have the largest African-American population and is well below the statewide numbers but I'm sure that has nothing to do with their opinion.

The Romney campaign is really on a roll these days bashing Obama and Big Government and then choosing bad locations to tell their story. The Daily Beast:

Jeff and Karen Zuck, who own the 160-acre, 117-head dairy farm that was Romney’s chosen backdrop for the rare non-Fox interview, have collected $195,631 in federal subsidies since 1995. The $44,549 in grants they got in 2009, Barack Obama’s first year in office, was almost twice their previous high in 2002, and was a consequence of the heightened subsidies the Obama administration rushed to deliver as milk prices plummeted in the recession. Only 20 farms in subsidy-rich Lebanon County, Penn., received more federal aid than the Zucks in 2009, and only 30 exceeded the Zuck subsidy over the prior decade and a half. But the farm didn’t even appear on the top 50 list in George W. Bush’s final year in office, when they received a measly $1,177 in subsidies, less than three percent of what Obama gave them the next year.

Oh, and the farm across the street from the Romney interview? It received even more government subsidized money. Read the rest of this post...

Mohamed Morsi declared winner in Egyptian elections

The US-educated Morsi will not have the opportunity to make some much needed changes in Egypt. The jury is still out whether the military will allow him to succeed or if the changes will bring actual change.

What's next?

Sixteen months after the fall of his predecessor, the dictator Hosni Mubarak, official election results gave Morsi, a US-educated engineer, 51.7% of the vote against 48.3% for his rival, Ahmed Shafiq, a former prime minister under Mubarak. The turnout was reported to be 51.6%.

It is the first time that Egypt has been headed by an Islamist in the modern era, and the first time that a freely elected civilian has come to power in the country.

When the final announcement came – after a dense 45-minute preamble from the election chief, Farouk Sultan – it instantly rippled through Tahrir Square, setting off fireworks, flag-waving and chants of "God is greatest". "The revolution was victorious – this feeling cannot be described," said Mahmoud Abdallah. "If Shafiq had won, the past year would have been for nothing. Now we need to fight for the constitution and parliament. Political forces have united now against the anti-revolutionaries and we will win no matter how strong they are."

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Justice Dept. files suit against Mormons trying to tell non-Mormons how to live

Good luck with that.

The "fringe" Mormon sect is accused of "a campaign of intimidation against the unfaithful" to deprive them of their constitutional rights.

Because that's something mainstream Mormons don't do, try to intimidate the unfaithful in an effort to deprive them of their constitutional rights? Read the rest of this post...

Vatican hires Fox News Opus Dei adherent for PR help

That's one way to address the Vatican's PR problem.

Here's another: Stop raping children, and start siding with the kids and not their rapists.

(It also wouldn't hurt if the Vatican got its head out of the 15th century, but no one expects that to happen any time soon.  So perhaps in the meantime having a more enlightened perspective on the subject of child-rape might help.) Read the rest of this post...

Anthony Shadid reportedly blames his death on NYT

Wow.

Anthony Shadid, the Pulitzer prize-winning New York Times reporter who died in Syria this year, had heated arguments with his editors just prior to his final trip into the country, a cousin of Shadid's says, and told his wife that were he to die the New York Times would be to blame.

"The phone call the night before he left [Turkey for Syria], there was screaming and slamming on the phone in discussions with editors," Ed Shadid, a cousin to the late reporter, said last night at the Arab-American Anti-Discrimination Committee's convention in Washington, D.C.

"It was at this time that he called his wife and gave his last haunting directive that if anything happens to me I want the world to know the New York Times killed me," Ed Shadid said.

The salient part begins at 4:30 in the video below.

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Video: Theme to Harry Potter, played on water glasses

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Poll: GOPers approve of most key provisions of ObamaCare, except individual mandate

Even Republicans agree with most of the key provisions of the law that they demonize on a regular basis.  From Greg Sargent:

* Eighty percent of Republicans favor “creating an insurance poll where small businesses and uninsured have access to insurance exchanges to take advantage of large group pricing benefits.” That’s backed by 75 percent of independents.

* Fifty-seven percent of Republicans support “providing subsidies on a sliding scale to aid individuals and families who cannot afford health insurance.” That’s backed by 67 percent of independents.

* Fifty-four percent of Republicans favor “requiring companies with more than 50 employees to provide insurance for their employers.” That’s backed by 75 percent of independents.

* Fifty two percent of Republicans favor “allowing children to stay on parents insurance until age 26. That’s backed by 69 percent of independents.

* Seventy eight percent of Republicans support “banning insurance companies from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions; 86 percent of Republicans favor “banning insurance companies from cancelling policies because a person becomes ill.” Those are backed by 82 percent of independents and 87 percent of independents.

As I noted again this morning, it's all about messaging. Read the rest of this post...

Gov. Cuomo prefers his water aflame

Chalk it up to my living in the entertainment center of the Universe, but I can’t help feeling that documentaries, in tandem with smart social action campaigns, are one of the few vehicles these days that can actually move public policy in the right direction.

Take the issue of getting natural gas through hydraulic fracturing, known as "fracking."  The 2010 documentary Gasland grabbed people’s attention around the country – and the world – with its depiction of the natural gas industry wreaking havoc on communities across America. The scene of water from a kitchen sink exploding into flames (left) became a symbol for the process of pumping billions of gallons of polluted water into the ground to get access to natural gas.

Now Gasland 2 is slated for release later this year to keep the heat on the natural gas industry.

We have all heard about the dangers and the nightmarish existence of those who live around these drilling zones. But an op-ed in the Chicago Tribune this past week asks an excellent question: With the fracking gold rush in full effect, who is going to clean up the mess when the natural gas is gone?

The question resonated with me immediately because of something I experienced in the mid-90s when I worked for Senator Max Baucus (along with Obama’s Porsche-driving campaign director Jim Messina).

I visited the infamous Berkeley Pit in Butte, Montana, a former copper mine a half-mile deep with an alarming fluorescent-orange lake at the bottom. The pit is so infamous that it is now something of a tourist attraction (and Superfund site). It is laden with heavy metals and dangerous chemicals that leach from the rock, including arsenic, cadmium, zinc, and sulfuric acid. Not great for, say, drinking water.

I can’t help thinking that similar horrors will be left behind long after the natural gas companies have abandoned their fracking sites, in the same way Anaconda Copper and, later, ARCO abandoned the mine in Butte.

It would be helpful if the powers that be were thinking ahead to such environmental disasters. But if they are, it is only up to a point.

David Dana, the law professor at Northwestern University, who wrote the Tribune op-ed, points out that responsibility for the clean-up is far from clear:

The fracking operators almost certainly will cease to exist as legal entities after the fracking is done. American law makes it almost impossible to pierce the corporate veil and seek money from the individuals and corporations who invested in and owned defunct or dissolved corporate entities. The farmers and others who own the land where fracking occurred will lack the resources needed for remediation, and they will have a good argument that in fairness they should not have to pay for remediation. Of course the federal and state governments could pay, but, with massive deficits and massive public needs, that seems very unlikely.

The good professor has the answer:

[A] requirement that operators buy adequate remediation insurance as a condition of receiving a drilling permit. Operators will oppose being asked to bear the cost of insurance, but there is no reason to think they could not absorb this cost. Federal and state regulators have not pushed hard for insurance requirements because their focus has been on the technical issues of how to regulate fracking right now — issues like how thick the well pad should be.

Illinois is considering legislation to hold energy companies accountable for future clean-up costs through an insurance program, but for the moment it stands alone. In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo is making plans to open the door to fracking in the Empire State. Gasland’s writer-director Josh Fox recently dinged the Governor in an 18-minute video, asking what color we can all expect the sky to be over the Manhattan skyline if his plans come to fruition.

How many times will we allow energy companies to despoil the land, while leaving someone else to deal with the blight they leave behind? It’s clear that we should heed Professor Dana's advice, and it’s time to hold those in public office accountable so it actually happens. Read the rest of this post...

Supreme Ct leaves Arizona "papers please" provision, strikes down other sections of Immigration Law

Early news in what promises to be a supremely courtly week.

Arizona's immigration law has been struck down, but the provision that allows a check of citizenship at roadside police stops has been left standing (for now).

Early report from USA Today:

The Supreme Court today struck down most of Arizona's controversial law aimed at cracking down on illegal immigrants.

The court left standing only the "check your papers" part of the law that requires state and local police to perform roadside immigration checks of people they've stopped or detained if a "reasonable suspicion" exists that they are in the country illegally.

The court indicated, however, that even that section could face further legal challenges.

The parts of the law that were reversed are those that:

Make it a state crime for illegal immigrants not to possess their federal registration cards;

Make it a crime for illegal imigrants to work, apply for work or solicit work;

Allow state and local police to arrest illegal immigrants without a warrant when probable cause exists that they committed "any public offense that makes the person removable from the United States."

Justice Kagan did not take part in the ruling.

CBS News offers this comment:

Rather than focusing on the law's potential to create racial discrimination, the U.S. government challenged the law in court based on the concept of federal supremacy. Immigration regulation, the federal government argued, should be in the hands of the federal government, not the states.

More as it develops. Get ready.

GP

To follow or send links: @Gaius_Publius
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Send a good writer to Congress—Alan Grayson

This is not your ordinary candidate appeal. I'm asking on behalf of my own profession — writers.

There's a dearth of good writers in Congress. It's "Dearth City" in DC as far as writers are concerned. Time to change that.

So I appeal to you, writer to reader. Let's get a good writer into the halls of power. God knows what he'll do, but it can't be worse than what the bad writers have done.

My writerly candidate — Alan Grayson. I have it on personal authority he writes his own material (I'm serious; I asked).

A sample of his work, so you can judge his qualifications:

Dear Friend—

I’m asking you to contribute to our campaign today for a reason that you might not . . . expect. It’s to keep Mitt Romney’s dog safe.

Unless you have been visiting relatives in Atlantis for the last few months, you may have heard about Mitt Romney’s Irish setter Seamus.

Mitt Romney caged Seamus, strapped the cage to the roof of his car, and then drove Seamus 650 miles, from Massachusetts to Ontario. During the ride, Seamus developed diarrhea. Romney calmly drove into a gas station, hosed off Seamus, the cage and the car windows, and continued his trek. Even though Romney’s dog was as sick as a dog.

It’s good to know that if America ever has a dog-on-the-roof-plus-excrement crisis, at least one person will know how to deal with it.

I have been reminded of this Romney escapade many times recently, because virtually every time that I go to any website, I see an ad for “Pet Lovers for Obama.” And I don’t even have a dog. (Note to White House: check ad targeting parameters.)

The President’s outreach to dog-lovers notwithstanding, we nevertheless must face the possibility that Mitt Romney may become President. I ask you not to think about what that means for America. I ask you to think about what that means for Mitt Romney’s dog.

He’ll be tied to the trunk of the limousine that carries Mitt Romney down Pennsylvania Avenue to his inauguration. (Romney’s inauguration, not the dog’s.)

He’ll be tied to the roof of the helicopter that carries Romney to Camp David. Just under the blades [my favorite line].

He’ll be tied to the top of Air Force One, as it hurtles through the air at 600 miles an hour, six miles above the ground. That would be enough to give anyone the runs.

In fact, as I said on MSNBC a few weeks ago, I don’t think that Mitt Romney will be happy until Romney has America strapped to the top of his car.

These are all terrible thoughts, I know. But you can help make sure that none of this ever comes to be – by contributing to our campaign.

Why our campaign? Because our district is: (a) in Florida, and (b) on the I-4 corridor in Central Florida. If President Obama wins Florida, then Romney loses the race. And if President Obama wins the I-4 corridor, then President Obama wins Florida.

Every single day, including Saturdays and Sundays, we have dozens of canvassers going door to door. They are encouraging unregistered Democrats to register, encouraging Democrats who have changed addresses to re-register, signing up Democrats to vote by mail if they want to, and spreading the word about what the Republicans will do to our Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Explaining that with Romney as top dog, America will become a dog’s breakfast, a dog-eat-dog world.

America will go to the dogs.

Will the Obama campaign be doing this here as well? I don’t know. I haven’t seen it yet, as I told Vice President Biden a few days ago. But I do know that we are signing up a lot of Grayson voters. They will not only help to win our race, but also will help to keep the White House and the Senate.

And help keep Mitt Romney’s dog safe.

So if you care about Mitt Romney’s dog, if you care about puppies and kittens and little babies and cotton candy, you really have no choice. You have to contribute to our campaign. And you have to do it today. So click on that button below.

Courage,

Alan Grayson

No animals were harmed in the making of this e-mail.

I care about puppies and kittens. See; look at the nice kitty I showed you.

Mr. Grayson has a good-writer Moneybomb going. This is an excellent time to tell him you like his prose.

Won't you send a good writer to Congress? If you send Mr. Grayson, perhaps there's a path for the rest of us.

Yours in good prose,

GP

To follow or send links: @Gaius_Publius
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Is health care reform unpopular because people think it's welfare?

I have a hunch that one of the reasons health care reform polls so badly is because far too many people think ObamaCare is little more than a new welfare program. And Democrats have only themselves to blame for that one.

It's just my gut, but from the beginning of the debate on health care reform I never really understood why so many on the left kept talking about how the bill would help millions and millions of uninsured finally get insurance.  Note that I did not just say that the bill should not have helped the uninsured.  Instead, I'm talking about messaging.

50 million Americans were without health insurance when ObamaCare became law. That's around 16% of the US population.

So Democrats who kept making "the uninsured" the lynchpin of the new health care law were basically telling the other 84% of the American people that this law wasn't about them (even if it really was).

In the best of times, I think Americans are open to charity, to a degree. But 2009-2010 was hardly the most charitable of times. The last thing the American people were looking for in the first two years of the Obama administration was charity for others. They were looking for a lifesaver for themselves and their own family.

Add in the fact that most of health care reform's provisions don't seem to kick in for another few years, and that the new insurance exchanges only help a small minority of Americans, and it's understandable that most Americans end up thinking health care reform is no great shakes for them.

This is a larger problem that Democrats have.  While Republicans do a bang up job of looking out for the rich, the Democrats seem to do the same for the poor.  But what if you're not rich or poor?  What if you're middle class, or even - God forbid - upper middle class?  The past few years haven't exactly been easy on the rest of us either.  But to hear Democrats, far too often their solutions to problems - the mortgage crisis, health care reform - are solutions that seem geared only to the poorest among us.

And while that's all well and good, unless the poor make up 51% of the vote (and some day, they just might), it feels like a lot of the talk, and a lot of the programs, just aren't directed at most of us who could really use the help as well.

E.g., Try asking for help refinancing your mortgage.  If you're like me, and my salary sucked the last few years compared to what it was before the crisis, you're doing "too well" to get help under all the recent federal mortgage modification programs (my mortgage was "too good" or something).  I certainly don't feel like I'm doing too well, and it's kind of insulting to be told that I am.

But just as importantly, it kind of ticks me off that people like me seem to have been forgotten by both parties.  And I suspect lots of others feel the same.

I'm not suggesting that Democrats stop helping the poor.  I am suggesting that Democrats do more to help, and a better job highlighting the help they're already giving, the rest of us.

More on this week's expected health care reform Supreme Court decision here. Read the rest of this post...

Cameron continues assault on the poor

As we've seen many times, there most definitely is a lot of class warfare going on but it's always the rich against the poor. In the case of the UK, it's bad enough that the Tories are rolling out strict austerity, hurting everyone other than the 1%, but now this.

The worst part about it is that Cameron is citing the tough times of austerity as one of the reasons why everyone - including those most disadvantaged - needs to toughen up and play their part. What's curious to note is that much like in America, those who caused the problem are never asked to sacrifice in a way that reflects their responsibility in this crisis. Why is that?

It's a disturbing story though sadly, not that different from anything we will read or hear in the US. Still, it's worth reading it all to see how far the silver-spoon-in-mouth Cameron is ready to wage war against the poor. The Guardian:

David Cameron will on Monday launch a scathing attack on what he calls the "culture of entitlement" in the welfare system, as he warns that claimants with three or more children may start to lose access to benefits, and almost everyone aged under 25 will lose housing benefit.

The prime minister will claim there is now a damaging and divisive gap in Britain between those enjoying privileges inside the welfare system and those resentfully struggling outside. It is likely to be seen on the left as the death knell for Cameron's brand of compassionate conservatism.

He will also single out lone parents of multiple children as a focus for cuts and insist the welfare system should be a safety net available only to those with no independent means of support. The reforms could see a range of benefits targeted, including income support payments.

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