Must Reads

HuffPo: Warren Buffett Derides Chris Christie For 'Write A Check And Shut Up' Comment

John Heilemann: The Lost Party

Arthur Delaney: Drug Testing Bill Targets Florida State Workers, Excludes Lawmakers

P. Scott Russell: Rick Santorum On Religious Freedom: What He Has Forgotten Since Law School

Dana Milbank: Mitt Romney’s acceptance speech, in (mostly) his own words

Jim Wright: The Perversity of Extremism Tends Toward The Maximum

Steve Benen: A 'Eh, who cares' style of leadership

Jim Hightower: The Keystone XL Flim-flam

Matt Taibbi: Bank of America In Trouble?

Must Reads

Frank Schaeffer: President Obama Will Be Vindicated

E.J. Dionne: Clint, Rick and the limits of pessimism

Sahil Kapur: GOP Ripe For Splits In Assault On Birth Control Rule

NY Times Editorial: A Terrible Transportation Bill

Greg Hanscom: Non-starter: Republican transportation bill is dead on arrival

HuffPo: Cal Thomas Apologizes To Rachel Maddow For Contraception Comment

Rachel Maddow: War on Birth Control

Roger Bybee: Obama/Catholic Contraception Controversy Boils Down to Workers’ Rights

Mark Morford: How to be Outraged in America

Steve Benen: Chronicling Mitt's mendacity

Early Entry for Headline of the Year

Must Reads

Extreme Liberal: The Truth About ObamaCare!

Stephanie Cutter: Romney's Economic Record: Profit at Any Cost

John Cook: Fake Economist Ben Stein Sues Company for Discriminating Against Global Warming Deniers

Catharine Smith, HuffPo: White House Will Not Support SOPA, PIPA

Matt Taibbi: Everything You Need to Know About Wall Street, in One Brief Tale

Casual Observation

I'm sorry, Huffington Post. You can't use the headline, "Snowpocalypse" for every snow storm.



Yes, I know this is a bad storm, but you blew your wad last season with a "Snowpocalypse" headline, so it kind of defeats the purpose of what your definition of "Snowpocalypse" is.

a·poc·a·lypse   [uh-pok-uh-lips] –noun
1. ( initial capital letter ) revelation ( def. 4 ) .
2. any of a class of Jewish or Christian writings that appeared from about 200 b.c. to a.d. 350 and were assumed to make revelations of the ultimate divine purpose.
3. a prophetic revelation, esp. concerning a cataclysm in which the forces of good permanently triumph over the forces of evil.
4. any revelation or prophecy.
5. any universal or widespread destruction or disaster: the apocalypse of nuclear war.

You see, the definition of "apocalypse" in comparison with a snowstorm is dubious at best. And being that this snowstorm is not even countrywide let alone universal, kind of makes the headline a little overblown. But ultimately, using the phrase "Snowpocalypse" for EVERY snowstorm is a bit "been here, done that"; soooo 2009.  Go with "Snowmageddon" next time.

Talk About Misleading Headlines!

Here's the content:

[Speaking of the stoppage of foreclosures:] "It is a serious problem," said David Axelrod, who contended that the flawed paperwork is hurting the nation's housing market as well as lending institutions. But he added, "I'm not sure about a national moratorium because there are in fact valid foreclosures that probably should go forward" because their documents are accurate.

Axelrod said the administration is pressing lenders to accelerate their reviews of foreclosures to determine which ones have flawed documentation.

"Our hope is this moves rapidly and that this gets unwound very, very quickly," he said.

...President Barack Obama vetoed a bill last week that would have made it easier for banks to approve foreclosure documents, which the White House said could hurt consumers.

So what was the Huffington Post headline linking to that article?

Since when does "I'm not sure" equal "NO NEED"?

Shirley Sherrod

POSTED BY JHW22

I am livid. So livid I can't possibly formulate a proper post. So instead I will write free-form and hope it all makes sense when I am finished -- even to me.

Breitbart uses film editing as his weapon.
Fox News uses distortion as their weapon.

The left-wing media like the Huffington Post and groups like the NAACP see the weapon and throw their hands up.
The Department of Agriculture and the White House throw their hands up.

We are at the mercy of the right-wing media when they can use their constant hate, lies and fear-mongering to extort the citizens, the media and the government to do dance as if bullets are being fired at our feet.

Shirley Sherrod is the personal victim of the right-wing's lies and the left-wing's capitulation.
We are all victims of the aftermath.

I want Shirley Sherrod reinstated by President Obama and apologized to by ANYONE who perpetuated the lie about her. Yet, even when the truth is out, people will believe the lie and think the truth is the lie. It will be too late. And the people who will hold on to the lie are dangerous people. They are the ones who thrive on right-wing weaponry and chaos.

Now Fox is acting as if they had nothing to do with this and are going to pull the wool over their own viewers' eyes. And people will believe that lie, too.

Part of me keeps saying, please let this be a Rosa Parks moment. Please tell me that we will all learn from this and stop the cycle of destructive rhetoric and fear-based reaction. Please tell me that this honorable woman will be an example of how we should ALL learn from our personal struggles and see people as people. Let the destruction of her reputation result in a phoenix moment for her. Let her rise from the damage as the person we refer to when we say, "I beat back my personal '-isms' and rose above them." Let Shirley Sherrod be the person who forces us to beat back the cowardice and discuss racism in America.

And let's beg of our friends and family to THINK before they allow thirty-eight seconds to define a person or a story.

Here's Shirley Sherrod's entire speech.
Here is Rachel Maddow's thorough take on the chaos.
Here is the story unfolding on CNN.


EDITOR'S UPDATE (7/21/10, 2:45pm): ColorOfChange.org is petitioning President Obama to reinstate Shirley Sherrod. It only takes a minute to fill out a form and do the right thing.

Rather Explains His Watermelon Comment

...in a column at The Huffington Post.

"...I was talking about Obama and health care and I used the analogy of selling watermelons by the side of the road. It's an expression that stretches to my boyhood roots in Southeast Texas, when country highways were lined with stands manned by sellers of all races. Now of course watermelons have become a stereotype for African Americans and so my analogy entered a charged environment. I'm sorry people took offense.

But anyone who knows me personally or knows my professional career would know that race was not on my mind...

...I can understand why someone who just happened upon my comments could take offense or want clarification. But what has caused this comment to "go viral" is the trumpeting of an online and cable echo chamber that claims the banner of news but trades in gossip, gotcha, and innuendo. Furthermore, even for those who brook no prejudice, when everything is condensed to 140 characters or a small YouTube clip, many people who got this "news" did so without any context, just a headline that popped up on their phone or inbox."

Sorry Dan, but this isn't the 60's, you've been on the national scene for 50 years now, and times have changed. I'm not calling you a racist, but was you said was perceived as such, as you well know. Your comment going viral was not the fault of an "online and cable echo chamber." Had you chosen your words more carefully, you wouldn't be explaining yourself.

Still, I can't help but wonder if the "selling watermelons" analogy would have been used had the President been, you know, white.

Froomkin Hired by HuffPo

According to Glenn Greenwald:

...[Dan] Froomkin to be [Huffington Post's] Washington Bureau Chief and regular columnist/blogger. Froomkin will oversee a staff of five reporters and an Assistant Editor, guide The Huffington Post's Washington reporting, and write at least two posts per week to be featured on its main page and Politics page. I learned last night of the hiring and spoke to both Arianna Huffington and Froomkin this morning.

...Froomkin was fired by The Washington Post a little more than two weeks ago after writing an online column for almost six years that was one of that newspaper's most popular.

The old media establishment keeps having heart palpitations every time another newspaper goes down failing to realize that boneheaded moves like these are causing their demise.

Mukasey Collapses...

...in the middle of a speech.

Huffington Post: Mukasey's was noticeably shaking during his speech before he collapsed shortly before 10:20 p.m. EST. His security detail called 911. Mukasey was on the stage for 10 minutes being attended to by his FBI detail before medics arrived, according to a Justice Department official who was there. Mukasey was still breathing at the time, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because she was not authorized to talk to the media.

An FBI official said Mukasey got stuck on a word during his speech to the conservative legal group, repeated it several times and then "went down hard."

I hope he's okay and I don't mean to be flippant here, but I wonder if the word was "waterboarding"?


UPDATE (11am):

TPM: A spokeswoman says that Attorney General Michael Mukasey is doing better and that he apparently fainted during a speech, with no signs of a stroke or heart problem.

Maybe he was just drunk?

Palin's Speech - Some Thoughts

[Updated below...]

I was holding off in judgment of someone I'd never heard speak publicly, except for the video bits here and there about Hillary Clinton whining or asking what a vice president does. Here's my analysis: Same shit, different mouth.

Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska pulled no punches, was sarcastic, snarky and spewed the usual lies and smears regarding Barack Obama. But if you think about it, that was her job, to deliver a speech written by the McCain flunkies and solidify the base. Job well done.

I was hoping to hear some substance, some policy ideas or initiatives that this campaign plans to instill (if they happen to win the White House) on Day One, but got nothing. And maybe that's the job of John McCain tomorrow night, although I think I've heard his ideas of "drill here - drill now" and "I'm going to win this war by winning it," so I'm not expecting too much tomorrow night.

The "blame the media" card was pathetic as well. It seems that it's sexist for the media to try and find out what Sarah Palin's qualifications are for the vice presidency and actually vet the candidate in a proper fashion, something the McCain campaign didn't do. At least, the McCain campaign is calling it sexist... I guess I missed McCain coming to Hillary Clinton's defense when the media was scrutinizing her.

Hopefully, the media will remain the media and not revert to the McCainstream Media that we've seen this long campaign season. I'm optimistic because it looks like they're not too happy about McCain crying about the media. Joe Klein isn't having any of it:

There is a tendency in the media to kick ourselves, cringe and withdraw, when we are criticized. But I hope my colleagues stand strong in this case: it is important for the public to know that Palin raised taxes as governor, supported the Bridge to Nowhere before she opposed it, pursued pork-barrel projects as mayor, tried to ban books at the local library and thinks the war in Iraq is "a task from God." The attempts by the McCain campaign to bully us into not reporting such things are not only stupidly aggressive, but unprofessional in the extreme.

We'll see what transpires over the next couple of weeks. Biden had better unload and pull no punches because Sarah Palin won't.

More later...

UPDATE (9:40am):

Will Bunch - Attytood: Palin's Speech To Nowhere

HuffPo - AP: Attacks, Praise Stretch Truth At GOP Convention

Crooks & Liars - Attn: Media: Earmark-loving Sarah Palin is not a reformer

Top GOP Pundits Peggy Noonan, Mike Murphy Caught On Tape Disparaging Palin Choice: "Political Bullshit," "Gimmicky"


UPDATE II (2:25pm):

GOP Blocks Tax On Big Oil

Does this really come as a shock to anyone? Really?

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans blocked a proposal Tuesday to tax the windfall profits of the largest oil companies, despite pleas by Democratic leaders to use the measure to address America's anger over $4 a gallon gasoline.
The Democratic energy package would have imposed a tax on any "unreasonable" profits of the five largest U.S. oil companies and given the federal government more power to address oil market speculation that the bill's supporters argue has added to the crude oil price surge.

The only Republicans voting in favor of the bill:

Bob Corker (R-TN)
Gordon Smith (R-OR)
Olympia Snowe (R-ME)

Enjoy it while you can, Rethuglicans.

Where Were You...

...on the night that history was made in American Presidential politics on June 3rd, 2008?













Barack Obama has clinched the Democratic nomination this evening, the first African-American Democratic nominee for President of the United States.

I was working and didn't get to hear the full speeches, just snippets. Of course, the snippets I heard were Obama praising Hillary Clinton on a hard fought campaign, and being a better candidate for having run against her. And what I heard from Clinton was more of the same: how she has won the important swing states and how she won states equalling 270 electoral votes, as if this were a general election. What I didn't hear was a concession speech or even a congratulatory gesture to Obama for a "win", just a "run" of a good campaign.

I was just listening to Dan Abrams on the late night primary coverage on MSNBC asking why Clinton not conceding tonight was a big deal. She's lost. What's the difference if she conceded tonight or if she does so tomorrow or later in the week?

Here's why, Dan. For as much as Barack Obama was praising Hillary Clinton and showing her respect with his kind words, her non-concession speech was a slap in the face, in my opinion, to Obama. For as much as Hillary Clinton wanted "the nearly 18 million Americans who voted for me to be respected,” she was disrespecting the nearly 18 million voters who voted for Barack Obama in denying them the celebration they deserved after winning the Democratic nomination.

It seems to me that for all of Hillary's bluster these past weeks of having every vote count, she really means every one of her votes. Continuing to claim that she has won the popular vote, all the while discounting the caucus states she lost and the 45% of uncommitted voters in Michigan is proof of that.

That is what's wrong, Dan. It's time to face reality. And the "conference call" earlier today in which she was asked a planted question on whether she would be interested in the VP slot and answered, "I'd be open to that" reads as completely disingenuous. Painting Obama in a corner and putting him in the awkward position of having to offer Hillary the running mate position in public is not at all a classy move - just as the non-concession was not. I say this because now if Obama asks her, then he compromises his true change message and if he doesn't offer it to her, party unity will be compromised with all those hurt Hillary supporters who feel they've been cheated out of something.

That brings me to another topic: Clinton supporters need to stop the whining. There is nothing that Obama did that would cause you, supposedly Democrats, to vote for John McCain in the general election. If you think Hillary was treated poorly by the media, or perceived misogyny or sexism during the campaign, that's your prerogative, but that wasn't Barack Obama. No matter how many times Bill Clinton accuses Obama of smear by proxy, it doesn't make it true.

From Bob Cesca's live blog:

10:18
Extended tribute to Senator Clinton...

**********************
OBAMA: That is particularly true for the candidate who has traveled further on this journey than anyone else. Senator Hillary Clinton has made history in this campaign not just because she's a woman who has done what no woman has done before, but because she's a leader who inspires millions of Americans with her strength, her courage, and her commitment to the causes that brought us here tonight.

We've certainly had our differences over the last sixteen months. But as someone who's shared a stage with her many times, I can tell you that what gets Hillary Clinton up in the morning - even in the face of tough odds - is exactly what sent her and Bill Clinton to sign up for their first campaign in Texas all those years ago; what sent her to work at the Children's Defense Fund and made her fight for health care as First Lady; what led her to the United States Senate and fueled her barrier-breaking campaign for the presidency - an unyielding desire to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, no matter how difficult the fight may be.

And you can rest assured that when we finally win the battle for universal health care in this country, she will be central to that victory. When we transform our energy policy and lift our children out of poverty, it will be because she worked to help make it happen. Our party and our country are better off because of her, and I am a better candidate for having had the honor to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton.
**************************

Woman hater.

Woman hater, indeed. So please, think of the big picture. Don't vote against the Democratic nominee for spite. What a tremendous mistake that would be.

On a lighter note, after watching a bit of what John McCain calls a speech, it made me feel a little better looking forward to the upcoming contest. There he was, standing in front of a green background with "A Leader You Can Believe In" plastered behind him and his fake grin, and as Jason Linkins, who was liveblogging for the Huffington Post noted, "when you Google McCain's "'A Leader You Can Believe In,' this happens.

Time to kick some McAss!

Appeasement - Part Two

George W. Bush, in probably his most outrageous comments since stealing the Presidency, compared sitting down to negotiate with an elected party leader of another country to the "appeasement" of the Nazis in 1938, when British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain gave Hitler half of Czechoslovakia in the hopes that it would deter Hitler and his Nazi Party from further invasion. Not only did he say it, but he said it to the Isreali governing body as a diplomat representing the United States.

If Bush actually knows any history at all, then this is where he would be an expert as his family was involved with the rise of Nazi Germany through Bush's grandfather, Prescott Bush. But I digress.

The backlash of negative responses that this idiotic statement has garnered would make one realize that the Emperor with no Clothes had really stepped in it big time, don't you think? Well... if you think. John McCain, however, does not think.

Asked if he thought Mr. Obama was an appeaser, Mr. McCain sidestepped the question and said: “I think that Barack Obama needs to explain why he wants to sit down and talk with a man who is the head of a government that is a state sponsor of terrorism, that is responsible for the killing of brave young Americans, that wants to wipe Israel off the map, who denies the Holocaust. That’s what I think Senator Obama ought to explain to the American people.”

Well, if McCain wants an answer, Mr. Obama will be happy to oblige, and he didn't waste much time responding to Bush and McSame at a gathering in Watertown, South Dakota this morning:




It's funny how McCain would be "Hamas' worst nightmare" in 2008 while running for the Republican nomination, yet he sang a remarkably different tune in 2006:

RUBIN: "Do you think that American diplomats should be operating the way they have in the past, working with the Palestinian government if Hamas is now in charge?"

McCAIN: "They're the government; sooner or later we are going to have to deal with them, one way or another, and I understand why this administration and previous administrations had such antipathy towards Hamas because of their dedication to violence and the things that they not only espouse but practice, so . . . but it's a new reality in the Middle East. I think the lesson is people want security and a decent life and decent future, that they want democracy. Fatah was not giving them that."

Sounds like another flip-flop flim-flam from the Double Talk Express that the McCainstream Media probably wouldn't have reported a few months back. But what has happened over the last twenty-four hours seems to be a watershed moment for politics at present, for although Hillary Clinton has stated her objections to Bush's inane comments, the talk has been Bush-McCain-Obama pretty much nonstop since this story broke, leaving Clinton in the dust. And now that the conversation has shifted to a two person race, perhaps there'll be a little more scrutiny from the McCainstream Media toward its Maverick. One can only hope.


The talk has finally evolved to Obama and McCain in the general election, and who Obama would choose as his VP running mate (no talk of Clinton's VP pick) and if the conversation remains there, it's probably the only good to come out of the latest embarrassment from our president while on the world stage.


UPDATE (5/17/08 , 9am): Mark Green: "Appeasement": Guilt-By-Analogy... When Guilt-By-Association Isn't Enough

"...It was bad enough when McCain tried to link Hamas and Obama because Hamas said it preferred Obama. And if the Klan endorsed McCain because he wasn't the black guy, would McCain have a problem if someone said that McCain and the Klan are one and the same?

...We've seen this movie before. Whenever conservatives can't win an argument on the merits, they attack some real or perceived enemy as Hitler. So Ho Chi Mihn was Hitler. bin Ladin was Hitler. Ahmadinejad was Hitler. Of course Hussein was Hitler. And anyone who does something to try to resolve conflict short of more war is Neville Chamberlain.

...Was Israel -- with far more experience and its survival at stake in dealing with war and terrorism -- wrong to neogtiate with former enemy Egypt, with successful result...wrong to negotiate with former enemy Jordan, with successful result...

...Take Iran and Ahmadinejad, the newest "Hitler." Iran can't stop laughing at Bush's foreign policy. He attacks its long-time enemy Iraq, allowing Iran's Shia majority to have far more influence in a Shia-majority Iraqi government. And Bush at the same time provides an unpopular Iranian government with a convenient outside enemy to rally nationalistic support to its side. Which is why Secretary Robert Gates himself has advocated talking more to Iran. What an appeaser!"

Brock & Waldman- Free Ride: John McCain & The Media

A new book by David Brock and Paul Waldman.

Over the course of a career, most nationally prominent politicians, particularly those who choose to seek the White House, can expect ups and downs in their treatment by the press. While some are looked on more favorably than others, most of the key figures in national politics will see times when they are hailed as victors and praised for their strengths, and times when they are derided as losers and pilloried for their weaknesses. But in recent years, there has been one exception to this rule: John McCain. While other politicians are examined with a cynical eye, McCain and his admirers in the media have cooperated to construct a shimmering image of the senator from Arizona, one that has propelled him to the heights of American politics. McCain, as he has been presented to the public, is a straight-talking maverick, a war hero standing astride the parties and untroubled by political calculations.

...But calling McCain's coverage positive does not begin to convey the complexity of his singular status in the media. In a hundred ways, the rules are simply different for McCain. Indeed, when writing about McCain, journalists offer a unique brand of praise.

Continue reading excerpts at Huffington Post. Or go to McCainsFreeRide.com

Wright's Tuskegee Claim; David Mills Is An Idiot

There's a shithead over at the Huffington Post named David Mills, an "Emmy-Award-winning TV writer and a former journalist," who has a problem with Rev. Jeremiah Wright's claim that "The government lied about the Tuskegee experiment! They purposely infected African-American men with syphilis!" in one of the soundbites that have been repeated ad nauseam (I refuse to say "one of Wright's sermons" because we haven't actually heard a sermon, just a couple of incendiary soundbites).

Mills writes, "Wright is wrong. That's not what the Tuskegee experiment was. In the "Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male," federal researchers refused to treat a group of black men who already had syphilis, long after a cure had been found. "

Ohhhh!! Well, fuck, I guess that's a horse of a different color. I can't imagine why people aren't up in arms like David Mills is over semantics. So just to get this straight, according to Mr. Mills, we need to clarify that the experiment that went on for FORTY YEARS wasn't about the government injecting African-Americans with syphilis to research the results, these men were already infected and even though we had a cure, we didn't administer it so we could see and document what the long term results of having syphilis would do. Well in that case, how could the government be considered sinister in that scenario? We didn't infect them, we just didn't treat them.

Mills goes on to cite pundits and talk show hosts who, in their ignorance of black history, are perpetuating the "myth" that the US government infected African-Americans with syphilis. Although he does admit that the "Tuskegee experiment was the most shameful episode in the history of the U.S. Public Health Service," he can't get over the fact that people are misunderstanding what the experiment actually was.

Mills: To invoke the Tuskegee experiment to suggest that the government invented AIDS to kill black people, as Rev. Wright did... that dishonors the truth. There is no excuse for it. It must stop.

Okay Mills, we get your point. Now I'd like to make a little suggestion that you should think about.

I have heard the "government invented AIDS to kill black people" theory long before I ever heard it come up in a Wright soundbite. We know the first documented case of AIDS in the US was in 1981 although some could have been infected as early as 1978; but we also know that the earliest known case was of AIDS was found in a blood sample from 1959. So we're now talking about a disease that's been around between 30 and 50 years. (I could go on with a timeline of what happened when in the AIDS crisis, but you can see for yourself here.)

My point is this: if the US government made an experiment of denying treatment to African-Americans in order to study the effects of syphilis in Tuskegee, why would it be far fetched for people to believe that the US government initially dragged its feet when it came to the treatment or even a possible cure for AIDS?

When you consider the lack of funding for AIDS research (until a big jump in 1994 under a Democratic administration) coupled with the incredibly expensive drugs for AIDS treatment that most poorer Americans can't afford, people begin to connect the dots, whether rightly or wrongly, and pile it in with their inherent mistrust of the government (for good reason as history has shown).

Did the US government invent the AIDS virus to infect black Americans? Maybe not. Did the US government initially ignore the problem because it was only affecting homosexuals and the lower class? I would tend to think yes before dismissing it.

Perhaps Mills should try researching and reading a full sermon of Rev. Wright's before making a judgment or parsing the difference between active participation or complicit inaction.

Lawrence O'Donnell Is An Idiot

I just read a post by Lawrence O'Donnell (at Huffington Post no less!) calling John Edwards a loser and that he should get out of the way for the "black man."

Read these words of pundit wisdom:

If John Edwards stays in the race, he might, in the end, become nothing other than the Southern white man who stood in the way of the black man. And for that, he would deserve a lifetime of liberal condemnation.
Maybe Edwards is already not a factor in the campaign because Edwards voters would split evenly between Senators Obama and Clinton if Edwards dropped out. But we'll never know unless Edwards does the right thing and gets out of the way of the only two candidates who have a chance to get the nomination.

I'm wondering if Lawrence O'Donnell was asking Hillary Clinton to make way for the Obama train after Iowa. What a schmuck.

It looks like the readers are fighting back in the comment section.

"best thing to happen is more and more establishment commenters and pundits telling americans that can't handle having a choice, ordaining the frontrunners. inciting backlash.this is a brilliant reverse psychology ploy to catapult edwards to the nomination. well played o'donnell"

"I think it's worth examining Mr. O'Donnell's personal motivations in writing this piece, as his conclusions do not follow from the current facts."

Jane Smiley, also writing for HuffPo has a bit of a rebuttal: Shut Up, Larry

(H/T to Bob Cesca for bringing attention to the O'Donnell post.)

MItt Romney on Drugs and Racism

Chris Kelly over at Huffington Post skewers the Romney Unit on equal rights and drug prevention. I guess Mitt was putting out some "questionable" information on his record.

I find his writing laugh-out-loud funny and suggest you add him to your list of favorite bloggers at HuffPo.

Here's his take on Romney's equal rights stance.

Here's his take on Romney's "tough on drugs" stance.

UPDATE: Another laughable moron.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has said he watched his father, the late Michigan Gov. George Romney, in a 1960s civil rights march in Michigan with Martin Luther King Jr.
On Wednesday, Romney's campaign said his recollections of watching his father, an ardent civil rights supporter, march with King were meant to be figurative.
"He was speaking figuratively, not literally," Eric Fehrnstrom, spokesman for the Romney campaign, said of the candidate.

Bob Cesca on Torture

Great new post by Bob Cesca on Huffington Post:

...given our extraordinarily enormous and expensive military-industrial and intelligence establishment, the ultimate safety of our citizens and cities is coming down to... what? Torture? Sorry, no. If the shopping list for preventing a terrorist attack is a wooden plank, a hanky and a jug of water, I want my goddamn money back.

The reality is that the cost of doing business as a democracy is a certain level of danger. Freedom and liberty are, by their very nature, porous.

That's why, in the face of terrorism, we can't allow ourselves to acquiesce to unchecked executive power; invasions of privacy; torture; illegal searches; or warrantless eavesdropping in order to ameliorate the inherent dangers of a free and open society. This is non-negotiable and it's disgraceful that these authoritarian policies of the Bush administration have become, as John Kiriakou said, a matter of "national debate."

Nora Ephron: It's Hard to be a Democrat

It's especially hard to remember that the real enemies are the Republicans, when the Democrats tend to break your heart and the Republicans are just the boys you'd never go out with anyway.

Read the enitre post here.