Mock, Paper, Scissors

Remember when Howard Dean had his 50 State Strategy? Remember when the G.W. Bush administration was stacking courts with their brand of justices? What happens when you combine the two concepts for nefarious reasons matched with massive amounts of anonymous loot?

In Michigan, where three of seven seats on the State Supreme Court were up for election, records were set for both spending and lack of accountability…Of the $15 million or so spent for TV ads in Michigan, 75 percent cannot be attributed to identifiable donors, notes Rich Robinson…

You can thank Judicial Crisis Network for leading this multi-state charge. So, you know, you got that going for you. No one has connected the dots yet why so much money was dumped into a Michigan Supreme Court race. So spin the wheel and guess which high profile case will be coming down the pipeline where someone wants their brand of judge on the bench! Don’t fret, this game will be coming to a state near you soon so you can play at home.

Meet Mish, Freedom Fighter for the Womb Warrior Resistance played by the insanely talented, Julie Goldman

If we don’t vote for Obama, Romney will wage vaginal warfare on women. Women will no longer be able to get safe and legal abortions. Women will not be allowed to use birth control. Women will not get adequate, quality healthcare.

Imagine Romney being voted into office, a terrifying notion for inumberable reasons. For me, ROMNEGGEDON is my biggest fear, a post apocalyptic world where Romney’s been voted into office and waged vaginal warfare on women

I’m sure that’s how they see their beloved Saint Breitbart, pierced by the arrows of outrageous fortune, a martyr to the cause.

“We have gone as far as we feel we can go,” Hensarling said. “We put $250 billion of what is known as static revenue on the table, but only if we can bring down rates. We believe we can bring the top individual rate down to 28, 29, maybe at most 30 percent, bring the corporate rate down to the median of the EU, 25 percent. And on balance, we think that would be pro growth. But, listen, any penny of increased static revenue is a step in the wrong direction.”–Super Committee co-chair Jeb Hensraling

I know. I’m shocked. Imagine that, Wingnuttia is not now, nor have they ever been negotiating in good faith.

So what remains to be seen is if 1) the Dims will continue to negotiate against themeselves (seems likely), or 2) if our notoriously hands-off President will insert himself into the process (seems unlikely, but you never know) or 3) if Obama will veto whatever hot mess this supercommittee is going to propose.

I’m told that the charm of Kabuki theater is that everyone already knows the stories, they just like to see them acted out.

(TPM)

You can find Candorville at GoComics.

–Tengrain

Ha-ha, the Eddie Haskell of politicians, Congressman Paul Ryan of WI, the truth-challenged author of the GOP’s budget to kill Medicare and give tax breaks to billionaires, said that some bloggers stacked his town hall meetings against him:

My town halls were phenomenally, overwhelmingly supportive. And this was after – you know, it was reported by the media that MoveOn, ThinkProgress, the labor council from Milwaukee were doing training sessions and trying to stack the crowds.

Let’s look at some of that overwhelming support, shall we, uploaded to YouTube on April 19.

Bloggers are so gross. Why can’t they see that Paul Ryan is only trying to help?

“I don’t think right after a major environmental catastrophe is a very good time to be making American domestic policy. My thought about it is, we ought not to make American and domestic policy based upon an event that happened in Japan.

–Chinless Mitch on Fox News

He’s such a troll.

(NYTimes)

…and Mother Jones has the tapes. The prankster poses as David Koch and he takes the call. And they both reveal dirty tricks that they considered performing and ethical breaches.

My favorite part: Walker agreed with “Koch” that Mika from Morning Joe is a “Real piece of ass.”

UPDATE 1: And now Governor Walker has a press meeting to discuss what he said on the prank call. It is blowing up in his face.

UPDATE 2: The presser doesn’t go well. “I take phone calls all the time.” What a stooge.

(Mother Jones)

This is too rich:

Reason.com

When the House Republican leaders arrive at the White House to meet with President Obama for lunch Wednesday, Majority Leader Eric Cantor plans to tell the president that he may still not understand how business works in America.

Noted Britney Spears enthusiast Eric Cantor’s business experience consists of nepotism: he worked for his family’s real estate development company after graduating from law school before becoming a member of Congress. “And that’s the way it is supposed to work, Obama,” Cantor did not say.

(The Daily Caller)

The pontificating poltroons in DC (Congress), rallying to not sit on opposite sides of the aisle for the State of the Union Address, are now fighting over seating arrangements.

Symbolic bipartisanship died quickly.

President Carebear, as noted in today’s News Briefs, looks to be appointing a banker to be his NEC chairman; it looks like he will be appointing yet another banker from JPMorgan Chase, Bill Daley (brother of current Chicago Mayor Richard Daley), to replace former Chief of Staff and future Mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emmanuel.

WaPo tells us…

…Daley, 62, is a political heavyweight who would command immediate respect from the Washington establishment. He led the Commerce Department during President Bill Clinton’s second term and now is the Midwest chairman of JPMorgan & Co…Still, by appointing Daley – a free-trade stalwart who helped secure passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement in 1993 – Obama could risk further aggravating liberals already wary of the president.”

Well, another Clinton retread, and the guy who helped ship our jobs overseas is about to get a key to the oval office. All I can say is at least Daley isn’t from Goldman Sachs.

Stolen from Zaius Nation

Once again, Nancy Pelosi has delivered the goods for President Carebear and has managed to get a stand-alone DADT repeal passed in the house. It is now in the tender embrace of Harry Reid, where it will no doubt be subject to his usual magic.

I’m finding my disrespect of Pelosi’s performance from the previous administration (Impeachment is off the table) to turn into begrudging admiration that she is the only Dim that is accomplishing anything progressive at all.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi will not give ground on her opposition to extending the Bush tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans, even as the White House and other Democrats have signaled that it might be time to compromise.

“It’s too costly. It’s $700 billion,” Pelos told NPR this morning. “One year would be around $70 billion. That’s a lot of money to give a tax cut at the high end. And I remind you that those tax cuts have been in effect for a very long time, they did not create jobs.”

(TPM)

She’s earning her keep to become the Minority Leader.

Regular readers know that MPS and Nancy Pelosi have a love-hate relationship. While I am button-bursting proud that the member of Congress from San Francisco broke the glass ceiling and became Speaker of the House, I was absolutely crushed that she took impeachment off the table. She will always have that on her permanent record.

That said, she has been a very effective Speaker. What few successes liberals and progressives have had these past 18 months or so are directly related to her effectiveness as a Speaker. It did not come up for a vote unless she knew she could deliver, and frankly, the drubbing congress took this time out was more due to Harry Reid’s incompetent leadership, than to Nancy’s excellent management. Pelosi delivered, Harry did not.

Lots’a luck, Weepy: you have a tough act to follow.

This little snippet of an interview with Pelosi shows us how to be gracious in defeat, and reframe the issue:

At an election night rally in downtown Washington, Steele said: “We’re about to do the one thing the American people want done and that is to fire Pelosi.”

Pelosi said she didn’t take it personally.

“They have used me as a personification of health care and the rest,” she told Sawyer. “I take that as a compliment.”

Thank you, Madam Speaker, for your hard work these past 18 months. I hope you decide to stay on in Congress.

Look, there will be no compromise on stopping runaway spending, deficits and debt. There will be no compromise on repealing Obamacare. There will be no compromise on stopping Democrats from growing government and raising taxes,” Pence told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt Thursday evening. “And if I haven’t been clear enough yet, let me say again: No compromise.”

– Mike Pence, teabagger Indiana

Weeee, that means we have a better than even chance that the Republicans will shut down the government again. How can they pass their agenda if Nobama won’t sign it?

Pathetic fellow citizens, that’s who:

BLOOMBERG NATIONAL POLL: Would it make “you more likely or less likely to support a particular candidate …. [if that] Campaign was aided by advertising paid for by anonymous business groups”? More likely: 9% … Less Likely: 47% … Would Not Matter: 41% … Not Sure: 3%.

(Politico)

America’s Virgin Teabagging Princess, the scourge of Onanists everywhere, and honorary Samantha Stevens, Christine O’Donnell is a learned woman. She has proudly posted her c.v. online (that’s how Brits spell resumé), and we use this peculiar bit of British terminology because No’Donnell is a proud alumnus of Oxford University, where she claims to have taken a class.

As Greg Sargent shows us, Chrissy claims the following as her education bonifides…

Christine O’Donnell’s Education

Fairleigh Dickinson University 1989 — 1993

Claremont Graduate University

Constitutional Government

University of Oxford

“Post Modernism in the New Millennium”

…except for one thing, the University of Oxford didn’t run the program, didn’t teach it, didn’t grade it, didn’t anything-it. They rented some space to mail-order for-profit diploma factory, Phoenix Institute. Maybe she though no one would notice?

So… did No’Donnell go to Oxford or not?

As Big Dawg once said, it depends upon what the definition of is, is.

You don’t have to speak a word of Chinese to understand this.

(Via The Awl)

The Mineral Management Service is no more. Ken Salazar has renamed it the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement. That’s the Bureau of Ocean Energy, or BOE, for short.

The Department of Justice is rumored to be changing it’s name, too: The Department of Not Prosecuting Republican Ratfinks. It’s just a rumor, of course.

We reported this unnamed comment from the White House (in regards to the Lincoln-Halter campaign) last night in the live blogging, but it is worthy of a little more exposure:

Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members’ money down the toilet on a pointless exercise,” the official said. “If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November.

–Politico

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that was Rahm Emanuel (just add in the usual expletives on your own, and you probably got the actual transcript).

OK, now I think Progressives (and dare I say Liberals, I think I do!) already know that this White House hates us as much as the Previous Seven Administrations of Saint Ronnie, but if you had any doubts, this comment should wash them from your soul.

In as much as the White House’s preferred candidate, Blanche Lincoln, the bluest of the blue dogs, won the night, this was a pure poison pen letter, and stupid to boot: our idiot President Carebear needs the base to get out the vote in November, so insulting us seems like a stupid thing to do.

Secondly, Labor has been a reliable resource for the left, Blanche Lincoln, not so much. Dissing Labor is a stupid thing to do. Say goodbye to “free” campaign workers, Rahm

Lastly, unless President Carebear’s seven-dimensional chess game is to lose the House in the fall (and it could well be), he needs all hands on deck.

I wonder how much money it will cost the DNC to keep Blanche Lincoln in her seat, because I’m betting that she is not going to get much money from the base who loathe her. And when she loses to GOP’s rising star, Senator John Boozman (and I think she will), somehow Rahm will blame the Left and Unions for the loss of that seat.

Rahm is such a dunce.

UPDATE 1: SEIU President Mary Kay Henry: ‘Sen. Lincoln won a narrow victory after a bruising runoff election … Working families all over Arkansas supported Lt. Governor Bill Halter’s bid … because he spoke up for them … The tens of thousands of volunteers and activists have made their point loud and clear: If you stop fighting for working families, working families will stop fighting for you.’

UPDATE 2: In a blast e-mail to campaign supporters, Lincoln wrote: ‘President Clinton called me tonight when it was clear we were going to win and said, ‘Blanche, you’re the new Comeback Kid!’ The campaign headlined a release, ‘Arkansas’s New Comeback Kid.’ (Jeebus, gag me with a spoon.)

The Daily Dish

Yes, that is sad blogger, Mickey Kaus, who is challenging California Senator Barbara Boxer in the primary. It seems he is debating a box, which I think tells you all you need to know about bloggers running for office.

Maybe if he (Kaus, not the box) was in South Carolina, he could at least be boinking Nikki Haley, the GOP candidate for Governor, because she seems to have a thing for playing slap ‘n’ tickle with gross bloggers.

(Hat tip: Scissorhead Wagonjak.)

And no one does the crazy like ‘Bama! “This is Alabama. We speak English,” hahahaha! That’s a good one! “If you want to live here, learn it,” heeheeeheee! As if anyone in Alabama could pass an English proficiency test. “We’re only giving that test in English if I’m governor,” stop it, you’re killing me!

I suppose the foreign car plants will be thrilled to learn that they are not welcome in that state, and yes, they have workers there who speak Japanese, Korean, and German. So, Mr. James, why don’t you tell us what you plan to do to the state’s economy after you drive out them furriners?

(Hat tip: scissorhead John Bunyan)

In a potential reversal, White House advisers are close to recommending that President Barack Obama opt for military tribunals for self-professed Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four of his alleged henchman, senior officials said.

Attorney General Eric Holder decided in November to transfer Mohammed and the four other accused terrorists from the prison at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to New York City for civilian trials. That was initially supported by city officials, but was later opposed because of costs, security and logistical concerns.

“If this stunning reversal comes to pass, President Obama will deal a death blow to his own Justice Department, not to mention American values,” said American Civil Liberties Union Anthony D. Romero. “Even with recent improvements, the military commissions system is incapable of handling complicated terrorism cases and achieving reliable results. President Obama must not cave in to political pressure and fear-mongering. He should hold firm and keep these prosecutions in federal court, where they belong.”

The Carebear has said repeatedly that he views civilian trials for terrorists shows the U.S. belief in the rule of law. We have successfully prosecuted numerous terrorism trials already in U.S. courts. So why would this trial be any different? Because the White House (as usual) is caving to political pressure from the GOP, and more likely from the DLC (same thing).

I won’t be a bit surprised if Attorney General Holder resigns over this; he’s one of the few high-level appointees that I have any confidence in, and he is being undermind by The Carebear at every turn. It would be a shame to lose him.

Remember all the news stories about how the Chinese government clamped down on the press to not report bad stuff about China during the 2008 Summer Olympics?

Well, it’s happening again in Vancouver, but because Canada is the 51st State, no one is complaining about it.

Dave Zirin tells us…

News Flash: Winter Olympic officials in tropical Vancouver have been forced to import snow – on the public dime – to make sure that the 2010 games proceed as planned. This use of tax-dollars is just the icing on the cake for increasingly angry Vancouver residents. And unlike the snow, the anger shows no signs of abating. As Olympic Resistance Network organizer Harsha Walia wrote in the Vancouver Sun, “With massive cost over-runs and Olympic project bailouts, it is not surprising that a November 2009 Angus Reid poll found that more than 30 per cent of [British Columbia] residents feel the Olympics will have a negative impact and almost 40 per cent support protesters. A January 2010 EKOS poll found that almost 70 per cent believe that too much is being spent on the Games.”

Officials are feeling the anger, and the independent media, frighteningly, is paying the price. Just as Democracy Now’s Amy Goodman was held in November for trying to cross the border for reasons that had nothing to do with the Olympic Games, Martin Macias Jr., an independent media reporter from Chicago, was detained and held for seven hours by Canada Border Services agents before being put on a plane and sent to Seattle. Macias, who is 20 years old, is a media reform activist with community radio station Radio Arte where he serves as the host/producer of First Voice, a radio news zine.

I love reading Zirin’s work: he shows the connection between sports and politics, and if you think that sports is pure, think again. He loves sports, don’t get him wrong, but his reporting goes beyond the usual great performances stories. He’s one of the best reporters working.

It’s not secret that former eBay CEO Meg Whitman is running for governor on the hackneyed campaign slogan/promise that she will run California like a business.

Yes, eMeg, she who famously bought Skype but forgot to buy the source code or intellectual property rights when she plunked down $2.5 billion for it in 2005, essentially buying, well, nothing. Later new eBay management was able to sell whatever it was that eBay owned back to the founders for $1 billion. Anyway, she wants to bring that sort of expertise to running California. Hooray!

Because it certainly must be better than her parenting skills.

(Via Gawker: read all the links. It’s appalling.)

UPDATE 1: HuffPo condenses eMeg’s book, um, for your reading pleasure. (HT: SkinnyDennis)

The Hill tells us…

A day after bashing lobbyists, President Barack Obama’s administration has invited K Street insiders to join private briefings on a range of topics addressed in Wednesday’s State of the Union.

The Treasury Department on Thursday morning invited selected individuals to “a series of conference calls with senior Obama administration officials to discuss key aspects of the State of the Union address.”

How nice of Timmy Geithner to call his friends in for coffee and pastries, and insider information. Old habits are hard to break, eh Timmy?

CQ Politics tells us…

President Obama will appear with politically embattled Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) in Las Vegas next month, according to a White House official.

While it is not clear whether the appearance will be overtly political, any appearance by the president in Reid’s home state is likely to be seen as an effort to buck up Reid’s re-election effort.

There is something so appropriate about this.

Today marks the first year anniversary of The Carebear’s inauguration. It was a year ago today that we watched — with great joy — our first black president take the oath of office from our stumbling and bumbling wingnut Chief Justice John “Liza with a Z” Roberts.

I think it is safe to say that all of us were filled with a certain amount of pride, and maybe some unreasonable amount of hope. Somehow we had survived Chimpy’s Reign of Error. I remember some earnest discussion of the fear that somehow, Blam-Blam would orchestrate a coup, but it was all unfounded (although he has not gone quietly into that good night, so to speak).

And so the Obama fan boys waited with baited breath for the unicorns to appear. They have not. Others of us waited for the indictments for crimes that the previous administration committed to appear, and they have not. Some realists with lower expectations waited for signs of incremental progress to appear, and to some degree they have. For instance, The Carebear kept his promise to send more troops to Afghanistan. And that’s about the only campaign promise (of any prominence) he has kept.

The Carebear’s actions to date have almost no relationship to his tag line of Change that you can believe in, that is, unless you are a Wall Street Banker, or some other big donor class campaign contributor and corporatist. His position during the campaign was as a corporate-friendly slightly left of center candidate, and his actions to date have been what you would expect of such a person. And he quickly ditched his base who worked so hard to get him elected.

And then last night happened…

The common inside-the-beltway wisdom and the chatter from the pundits in the media are all declaring that this is a wake-up call for the Dims (oh crap, I gotta take a shot of booze!), and that they must accept the GOP’s agenda and move to the right. Now then, no one knows what the GOP’s agenda is — none of ‘em have offered up a single concrete proposal on HCR, for instance. Just opposition. And honey, no one does oppo better than the GOP. They don’t know how to govern (and don’t seem to care much), it’s all about noise and fury. And money.

The same Chattering Classes are telling us that without the 60 Senators, HCR is dead. Well, the Dims only had the 60-seat supermajority for about 4 months: anyone remember how long it took to seat Al Franken? When did Arlen Spector switch sides? There was that whole Bloggo thing… and honestly, what good did it do the Dims to have the supermajority when Traitor Joe and Ben Nelson decided to extort the entire country? Something still came out of the end of the meat grinder, just something no one really liked.

Also, remember Chimpy McStagger? Chimpy never had the magic number of GOPers in the Senate (in fact he had 17 fewer GOPers than Obama has Dims right now), and yet he managed to wreak havoc on the country and the world for eight terrible years. The GOP used Reconciliation to cut the Dims out of the process all the time; the Dims can do this too.

So, no, the end is not neigh. It is pretty much the same as it was yesterday and the day before that. Quit your hand wringing. If you are absolutely dejected, call your representatives and tell them to buck up. Call your Senators and tell them that you are watching them, too.

And if you can stomach it, call The Carebear. Tell him to lead for once. If he wants something, he has to fight for it, because the craven and cowardly Dims are going to leave him high and dry. And frankly, he deserves it.

The US Senate (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Goldman Sachs) is lecturing the Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Goldman Sachs) about populism.

It is to laugh, if it weren’t so sad. Suggestion: pass the dutchie from the left-hand side. Alternate suggestion, if you are going to do away with the Fed (as suggested – really!) then do away with the Senate, too. Think of the savings for Goldman-Sachs!

(NY Times)