WEINER!

Rep. Anthony Weiner to GOP: Did you get your feelings hurt? Get over it.

Via Crooks and Liars:

But It's Not About Racism (The Orange County Edition)

I'm truly speechless.

The Weekly has obtained a copy of an email sent to fellow conservatives this week by Marilyn Davenport, a Southern California Tea Party activist and member of the central committee of the Orange County Republican Party.

Under the words, "Now you know why no birth certificate," there's an Obama family portrait showing them as apes.

This is coming from the same county where a mayor sent out an email of the White House with a photoshopped watermelon patch on the lawn. What's truly amazing is that Davenport didn't see anything wrong with forwarding this email. It's just a joke after all.

"You're not going to make a big deal about this are you?... It's just an Internet joke."

...KCAL and KCBS reported during their respective 10 and 11 p.m. broadcasts that in a telephone interview Davenport blamed the media for this controversy and slammed down the phone.

Yes, it's the media's fault that Marilyn Davenport is a racist pig.

Trump and "Serious" Republicans

What does it say about the state of the Republican Party that the crazy conspiracy theories being touted by Donald Trump are propelling him into the lead in poll after poll? Is the current crop of potential GOP presidential candidates that pathetic that they are gravitating to Trump? Don't answer that.

And now Trump is going with the Bill Ayers ghostwriting conspiracy? And what's going to happen when The Donald announces that he will not run? Instead of admitting they were conned, what new excuse will the wingnuts come up with? Perhaps they'll start a new conspiracy that since Trump was the only viable candidate to have a chance at beating Obama, his life or fortune was threatened by the government and he was forced to bow out.

This is shaping up to be one of the craziest campaign seasons in a long time.

Must Reads

Deaniac83: Paul Krugman's Pre-emptive War on Obama

AP: Obama prevents budget cuts to favorite programs

John Cook: More Pentagon Papers Donald Rumsfeld Doesn't Want You to See

James R. Horney: Ryan Budget Plan Produces Far Less Real Deficit Cutting than Reported

Paul Krugman: Who's Serious Now?

Eugene Robinson: The Selfish Budget? Or the Selfless One?

David Corn: Ryan Budget: GOP Death Wish?

Charles M. Blow: The Pirates of Capitol Hill

Obama's Open Mic

Here's a fuller version of the audio that was captured in which President Obama explained what was going on behind closed door negotiations.



Again, I don't know why the meme has become that the President's message was something different than what he's said in public. Just because it's not his demeanor to be openly rude doesn't mean the message was different. The tone was, but not the content.

I still don't know if this is the full audio, so if anyone comes up with another version, please let me know.

President Obama's Weekly Address - April 16, 2011

America’s Fiscal Future

My Twitter with @JakeTapper

The cool thing about Twitter, for those who don't participate in it, is that if you treat people with respect, people that you would probably have virtually no chance of communicating with in "real life," they will most likely respond to you.

That was the case with ABC White House Correspondent Jake Tapper today after I read his story on President Obama being caught by a live microphone at a fundraiser in Chicago. Actually, I read his initial tweet first.



Well, I had to respond to that... didn't I?



And here was Tapper's response.



Fair enough. I thought maybe I should have read the link Tapper was referring to in his post before judging his tweet. Did I make a fool of myself? Maybe I misunderstood the intention of the Tapper tweet.

Speaking before the House GOP retreat in January 2010, the president suggested Ryan was a "pretty sincere guy" who "has looked at the budget and has made a serious proposal."

...Right. The link leads to a White House webpage of the transcript of said retreat in which the President indeed admitted that Ryan made a serious proposal... in 2010. Tapper certainly wasn't referring to the ridiculousness of Ryan's 2012 proposal. Was this what he thought was deserving of praise? Was he equating what Ryan said in 2010 compared to the mountain of crazy proposed in his 2012 budget? And should the President think likewise? Maybe so, in order to make a mountain out of a molehill. Obviously, I couldn't let it go at this point, so here's the rest of the tweet to and fro.



That was it. "Indeed, indeed." So I take it Tapper agrees with my assessment, yet this was a big story according to the MSM and Tapper. Oh, well.

I do give kudos to Jake Tapper for taking the time to respond to the possibly hundreds of tweets he must receive on a daily basis. Having access to someone who sits daily in the White House Press Room is something that probably wasn't feasible just even a few years ago, and I'm grateful for him taking the time to respond to me. If you go to his post, you'll be able to read a more detailed transcript of President Obama's "private" remarks that I've yet to see on MSM television. It's a fun read.

And if you're a tweeter, follow @jaketapper. Follow me too! (@broadwaycarl)

Joe Crowley: Speechless

Rep. Joe Crowley (D-NY) used to be my Congressman before I moved to New Jersey last year.
This is some pretty good stuff.

Colbert: Easter Under Attack

Hysterical!

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President Obama Caught on Open Mic

So... what's all the hubbub, bub?

President Obama was at a campaign fundraiser in Chicago last night and an open microphone caught a private conversation with a donor. What did he say? That his budget address was a sham and he's secretly going to kill Medicare himself? That Paul Ryan's got the right idea? That John Boehner is a great leader? That he really was born in Kenya?

None of the above. President Obama spoke candidly on the issues, just as I hoped he would speak if I had the opportunity to ask the same questions when no one was "listening."

On the Ryan plan: "When Paul Ryan says his priority is to make sure, he's just being America's accountant ... This is the same guy that voted for two wars that were unpaid for, voted for the Bush tax cuts that were unpaid for, voted for the prescription drug bill that cost as much as my health care bill -- but wasn't paid for. So it's not on the level."

On Boehner meetings: "I said, 'You want to repeal health care? Go at it. We'll have that debate. You're not going to be able to do that by nickel-and-diming me in the budget. You think we're stupid?'"

On defunding Planned Parenthood: "Put it in a separate bill. We'll call it up. And if you think you can overturn my veto, try it. But don't try to sneak this through."

Is this newsworthy? Maybe to show the fact that Obama isn't two-faced or "just like Bush." At least we didn't catch him calling a reporter a "major league asshole."

President Obama's Budget Address

The Country We Believe In

Shared Sacrifice, Huh?

This caught my eye on the way to work and I had to share it.

Fukushima Level 7

NY Times: Japan has raised its assessment of the accident at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to the worst rating on an international scale, putting the disaster on par with the 1986 Chernobyl explosion, in an acknowledgement that the human and environmental consequences of the nuclear crisis could be dire and long-lasting.

...“The radiation leak has not stopped completely, and our concern is that it could eventually exceed Chernobyl,” said Junichi Matsumoto, a nuclear executive for the company.

...“This is an admission by the Japanese government that the amount of radiation released into the environment has reached a new order of magnitude,” said Tetsuo Iguchi, a professor in the department of quantum engineering at Nagoya University. “The fact that we have now confirmed the world’s second-ever Level 7 accident will have huge consequences for the global nuclear industry. It shows that current safety standards are woefully inadequate.”

Is This Really Necessary?

Look, I get that we're all giving up out liberties to be "safer" in the skies because we are a fearful nation led by fear mongers. We can't let the terrorists win. Thank Jebus we all get scanned and groped in endless TSA lines so we can be assured that there are no jihadists on our flights while sections of fuselage get ripped off airplanes at 37,000 feet and planes collide on the tarmac.

But is it really necessary for the TSA to pull a 6-year old girl aside for their enhanced pat downs?



To the TSA officer's credit, she sounded very friendly and explained exactly what she was doing to the girl so as to not alarm her. But why do it in the first place? What supervisor told her to pull the child aside for the pat down? Is she trying to smuggle a Tickle Me Elmo doll on the fight? Was their something amiss with her juice box? This is the kind of incident that shows the ineptitude and utter waste of time the current TSA practices are as they stand.

I have no problem walking through metal detectors or having trained officers keeping an eye out for what they may deem legitimate threats - terrorist, drug smuggler, or otherwise. But a 6-year old kid? Really?

Intentions of Factual/Non-Factual Statements and Pap Smears at Walgreens

The assault on Planned Parenthood during the government shutdown threat was pretty appalling. Senator Jon Kyl spoke on the Senate floor extolling the virtues of defunding Planned Parenthood as over 90% of their services are abortions. They are not, of course. The number is 3%. But what does an 87% difference matter when you're trying to make a point? What difference does it make that the Hyde Amendment prevents federal funding to be used for abortions when you're trying to demonize yet another institution that provides sorely needed services for the poor and lower income among us?

When asked about his statement, the Kyl office offered this response:

CNN, to its credit, sought an explanation from the senator about the glaring error. CNN anchor TJ Holmes told viewers:

"We did call [Kyl's] office trying to ask what he was talking about there. And I just want to give it you verbatim here. It says, 'his remark was not intended to be a factual statement, but rather to illustrate that Planned Parenthood, a organization that receives millions of dollars in taxpayer funding, does subsidize abortions.'"

Oh, well in that case, say whatever you want on the floor of the Senate from now on, Mr. Kyl. We'll just assume that any noise coming from your cake hole from now on is a blatant lie.

Here's Stephen Colbert having fun at the expense of Kyl as well as Fox & Friends who think, why should you get health care screenings at Planned Parenthood when you can get pap smears and breast examinations at you local Walgreens? No. You can't make this shit up.

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UPDATE (7:30pm): Jon Stewart's take:

The Daily Show - Countdown to the Next Countdown - Jon Kyl's Planned Parenthood Statistics
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Quote of the Day

People like me don’t say that the Ryan plan is too radical; we say that it’s a fraud. The spending cuts are largely fake, either because they’re just magic asterisks or because they wouldn’t survive politically; the revenue estimates are fake, because they combine huge tax cuts with vague assurances that extra revenue will be found by closing loopholes. There’s no there there — except for big tax cuts for the rich and pain for the poor.

All I can think here is that reporters are so deep into the Beltway conventional wisdom that this is a Bold, Serious Plan that they just tune out the people saying that no, it’s not.

~Paul Krugman on non-serious reporting on the Paul Ryan budget plan