Must Reads

Michael Gerson: The Problem with Gingrich’s Simplistic Attack on Sharia

Robert Reich: Wall St's Latest Shameless Ploy to Fleece You

Spike Dolomite Ward: 'Obamacare' to the Rescue and A Message to 'Obamacare' Haters [The Reply]

Steve Benen: The Competition to Reward the Wealthy

Benjy Sarlin: Meet The 22-Year-Old Who’s Driving Romney Crazy

Paul Krugman: Depression and Democracy

Christina Wilkie: Mitt Romney's Slogan Used By Ku Klux Klan, Anti-Immigrant 'Know Nothing' Party

Michael Tomasky: Could Obama Be Headed for a Landslide?

Renee Dudley: SC Gov. Haley Dictated Health Panel Finding - Outcome ordered before committee met

Andy Brownfield and Julie Carr Smyth: Speaker John Boehner's Staff Influenced Ohio Redistricting, Documents Show

Linda Greenhouse: Rock Bottom

Matt Miller: What Wyden-Ryan Hath Wrought

Al Franken: Why I Voted Against the National Defense Authorization Act

Quote of the Day

"Like a drunk swearing off hooch for the hundredth time, Republicans are now trying to show they are serious about controlling the deficit by saying they won't raise the debt ceiling...

Raising the debt ceiling isn't, as the GOP tries to say, Congress giving itself permission to continue excessive spending: It's something that's necessary to pay for past congressional decisions on taxes and spending, and those decisions were made primarily when Republicans were in charge."

~Retired Republican Congressional Staffer Mike Lofgren

(H/T GottaLaff)

Lazy Journalism

You know, I don't envy journalists. If you do your job properly, it can be a difficult task between fact checking and research, multiple sources and looking for the scoop. So imagine my surprise when I saw this from the LA Times:
Mississippi officials blast BP, U.S. government as oil hits coast -
Gov. Haley Barbour condemns a lack of resources; Rep. Gene Taylor is 'dumbfounded' by 'wasted effort, wasted money and stupidity.'

Yes, Heehaw reject Haley Barbour is pointing fingers at the federal government for the lack of response and failure to capture the oil offshore before hitting Mississippi's shores. Rep. Gene Taylor, whom I've written about before regarding the BP disaster, was equally outraged:

At a news conference Monday, Barbour said that "the plan we agreed to with the unified command and BP wasn't being given the resources to be totally effective." As a result, he said, "there continues to be more oil in the [Mississippi] Sound than we have the capacity to deal with, unless we get lucky."

Speaking at the same event, Rep. Gene Taylor (D-Miss.), whose district lies on the coast, said he flew over the spill Saturday and "was dumbfounded by the amount of wasted effort, wasted money and stupidity that I saw."

I scanned the rest of the article for mention of Barbour's dismissal of the oil spill, tar balls and it's non-toxicity. I looked for quotes from Gene Taylor saying the oil would evaporate within a week. But I saw nothing. The two actors were being reported on, were shaking their fists at the evil government, but there was no perspective. There was no ironic twist being that said actors shrugged their shoulders two months ago, with Barbour especially whining about the media making such a big deal about the spill it would hurt his state's tourism.

So I e-mailed Molly Hennessy-Fiske and Richard Fausset, the authors of the article.

Subject: Re: Mississippi officials blast BP, U.S. government as oil hits coast

From: [Broadway Carl]

Date: June 29, 2010 10:31:39 AM EDT

To: richard.fausset@latimes.com, molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com

Dear Mrs. Hennessy-Fiske and Mr. Fausset,

Perhaps a little perspective on Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour and Rep. Gene Taylor would have behooved your article of June 29th, "Mississippi officials blast BP, U.S. government as oil hits coast," such as the fact that for weeks, Barbour has been downplaying the oil spill in an attempt to get tourists to go to the beaches, or that he's had 6,000 National Guard troops at his disposal to prepare for the oncoming oil slick and has only deployed 58. Or that's he's called the oil not unlike a food mousse and not poisonous. Now he's singing a different tune that the oil has reached his shores.

Or Rep. Gene Taylor, who said the oil would evaporate within a week during the first few days of the disaster, also calling it chocolate mousse in consistency.

For these men to dismiss this catastrophe weeks ago when it first began and now turn their flippancy to blaming and finger pointing is absolutely disgusting and should be called out.

[Broadway Carl]

Mr. Fausset was kind enough to respond:

From: Fausset, Richard 

Subject: RE: Mississippi officials blast BP, U.S. government as oil hits coast

Date: June 29, 2010 4:54:12 PM EDT

To: [Broadway Carl]

Mr. [Broadway Carl]:

Hi there. I agree that I should have mentioned Barber's earlier downplaying of the spill. My bad.

Richard Fausset

LA Times Atlanta bureau

That's it. No update on the web article. Sigh. At least he answered his e-mail.

LA Times Accuses Obama of "Small Donor Myth"

Andrew Malcolm of the LA Times thinks he's caught Obama in a red handed lie. I think it's an inane false argument.

Everybody knows how President-elect Barack Obama's amazing campaign money machine was dominated by several million regular folks sending in hard-earned amounts under $200, a real sign of his broadbased grassroots support.

Except, it turns out, that's not really true.

In fact, Obama's base of small donors was almost exactly the same percent as George W. Bush's in 2004 -- Obama had 26% and the great Republican Satan 25%. Obviously, this is unacceptable to current popular thinking.

The study Malcolm is referring to counts any donation under $200 as a "small donation." And of course, as per federal law you are not allowed to contribute more than $4,600 to any campaign ($2,300 each for the primary and the general elections). They are looking at total donations and not individual donations. Now I consider myself a small donor, there is no doubt about that. I did not and probably won't ever max out at $4,600. Hell, I didn't even break $500 let alone the $1,000 that would have me considered a "large" donor, but I did break the $200 mark which puts me in a second category which Malcolm doesn't characterize in his post.

Now I don't know about you, but I think the whole point of "small" donations and the organization it took the Obama campaign to fine tune the donation process was the fact that small donors can be repeat contributors over the course of the campaign without causing too much of a burden for those who chose to donate again. I was a five time donor but I most likely would have given less if required to make a one-time large payment. It was a slow bleed instead of a major bloodletting, if you will. And that was fine with me - I was in a position to do so.

But in his article, Malcolm (who I am assuming is a Republican judging solely on his sarcastic characterization of Bush as the "great Republican Satan") is mixing percentages and actual donations. That's because the study does the same:

"Obama received about 80% more money from large donors (cumulative contributions of at least $1,000) than from small donors. "

Well... yeah. Fewer large donors are going to generate more money than a larger number of small donors. So now I'm going to play semantics with their numbers and actually come out with a more truthful result.

If you take what the Obama campaign said was the average donation from a small donor (some estimates were anywhere from $92 to $103 off the top of my head) and what the study in question claims the low end of the large donor category is ($1,000) then it's a ratio of about 10 to 1 to equate the monies. Of course large donors will account for more money. But how about the donors stuck in the middle like me who donated anywhere between $200 and $999? They accounted for 27% of donors according to the study.

So 53% of all Obama donors gave $999 or less and 47% gave $1,000 or more. Compare that with McCain's numbers: under $1,000 - 41%, $1,000 or more - 59%. And now let's look at the individual contributions:
Obama: Under $1,000 - 67%. Over $1,000 - 33%
McCain: Under $1,000 - 47%. Over $1,000 - 53%

You can play with these numbers all day, but the fact remains that overall, small donations whether one time or multiple accounted for more of Obama's total campaign finances than did the large donation no matter how studies or conservatives at the LA Times try to skew the numbers in order to cast doubt on the President-elect.

And the Obama campaign agrees:

The Obama team rejects the fundamental hypothesis of the study. If you were a donor who saved up to donate $20 to the campaign every couple months over the course of two years, an aide says, and all of those contributions eventually added up to more than $200, that doesn't mean you’re not a small dollar donor.

It's time that people like Andrew Malcolm and Jake Tapper join in the discourse on how to reverse the craptacular performance of the Bush administration and stop trying to lick the wounds of a huge Republican loss with semantic numbers games. Get used to the phrase "President Obama." He won. Get over it and move on.

Jonah Goldberg Is A Moron

Does anyone know where Jonah Goldberg went to school so I can remind myself NEVER to send my kids there? This guy has to be one of the most idiotic "conservatives" to actually have a job writing for the Los Angeles Times, let alone ANY newspaper, even rivaling the likes of William Kristol.

I didn't think he could top his "Liberal Fascism" fiasco (which I'm sure you can find on the discount racks by now, and if not, for shame) but now he equates Barack Obama's proposal of volunteering service to slavery. Yeah, you heard me. Slavery.

Listen to this dolt:

There's a weird irony at work when Sen. Barack Obama, the black presidential candidate who will allegedly scrub the stain of racism from the nation, vows to run afoul of the constitutional amendment that abolished slavery.

For those who don't remember, the 13th Amendment says: "Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime ... shall exist within the United States."

I guess in Obama's mind it must be a crime to be born or to go to college. In his speech on national service Wednesday at the University of Colorado, Obama promised that as president he would "set a goal for all American middle and high school students to perform 50 hours of service a year, and for all college students to perform 100 hours of service a year."

He would see that these goals are met by, among other things, attaching strings to federal education dollars. If you don't make the kids report for duty, he's essentially telling schools and college kids, you'll lose money you can't afford to lose. In short, he'll make service compulsory by merely compelling schools to make it compulsory.

It goes on from there but I won't hurt your brain any further. You masochists can read the rest at the link above.

Apparently college didn't take for Goldberg and someone gots to learn him the definition of "slavery" and the definition of "volunteerism." Where in that tiny little brain of his does he get the idea that Obama is forcing those who would like to attend college into slavery in exchange? Fuckwad Goldeberg doesn't seem to understand that there's a difference between indentured servitude or slave labor and incentive.

There's a difference between making someone perform community service and asking them to serve 100 hours of community service per year as an incentive to receive a $4000 tax credit towards college tuition, as Goldberg so conveniently leaves out. In essence, you're paying the prospective student $40 per hour for a contribution of about 2 hours a week. I wonder how many slaves back in the day got paid and only worked two hours a week?

And guess what, Goldberg? If you're well off and don't need that $16,000 break over the average four year span that you attend college, you don't have to serve. Dipshit.

Nevermind the fact that Goldberg forgets the draft, where the "greatest generation" was forced into slavery to fight in World War II or the generation of the 60's was forced into slavery during Vietnam.

And in remembering this, Goldberg calls it a "JFK cult":




Yes, Jonah Goldberg is truly a moron of epic proportions; one who doesn't even know the definition of "volunteer" yet doesn't worry about how our all-volunteer military is to survive at its current usage rate. But I suppose proposals such as expanding AmeriCorps and the Peace Corp are just too much for a feeble mind to handle.

(H/T Booman and Cesca)

The Billing Records for Thompson Lobby

In an earlier post, I criticized Fred Thompson for denying that he lobbied for a pro-choice organization during his lobbying career. All Thompson had to do was admit that as lobbyist, sometimes you represent ideas on behalf of your client. But he didn't do that. Instead he chose to deny it and his spokesman insisted it was a smear.

Thompson spokesman Mark Corallo adamantly denied that Thompson worked for the family planning group. "Fred Thompson did not lobby for this group, period," he said in an e-mail.

In a telephone interview, he added: "There's no documents to prove it, there's no billing records, and Thompson says he has no recollection of it, says it didn't happen." In a separate interview, John H. Sununu, the White House official whom the family planning group wanted to contact, said he had no memory of the lobbying and doubted it took place.

Apparently, Republicans of a feather stink together. You want documents and billing records? Here they are.

New York Times:

According to records from Arent Fox, the law firm based in Washington where Mr. Thompson worked part-time from 1991 to 1994, he charged the organization, the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, about $5,000 for work he did in 1991 and 1992. The records show that Mr. Thompson, a probable Republican candidate for president in 2008, spent much of that time in telephone conferences with the president of the group, and on three occasions he reported lobbying administration officials on its behalf.

Mr. Thompson’s work for the family planning agency has become an issue because he is positioning himself as a faithful conservative who is opposed to abortion.

All Fred had to do was be honest and this situation would have probably gone away. Instead he chose to take the Republican road and tried lying his way out of it.

And as for my commenter, Sturm Ruger, who claimed that " it's just another drive-by media hit piece done for the Clintons against one of their political opponents", I hope Sturm has second thoughts. You wanted the billing records, Strum. You got 'em. An apology would be nice too, but I won't hold my breath.

Thompson - Swing And A Miss!

A couple of days ago, I wrote about a Los Angeles Times article accusing Fred Thompson of lobbying for a pro choice organization. One commenter suggested I disregard the LA Times piece until they produce billing records as proof. Fair enough.

So why is it that when Sean Hannity asked Thompson of the "attack" on his character, Thompson doesn't give him a direct yes or no answer? Thompson got a softball question from Hannity and whiffed at it, but the crowd roared regardless.

HANNITY: "They have attacked you, they have attacked your family, and now, they come out in the Los Angeles Times with a piece that says you lobbied for abortion rights. You say that's absolutely not true."

THOMPSON: "No... You need to separate a lawyer who is advocating a position from the position itself. They will probably come at me, in 35 years of law practice, with some people, I represented criminal defendants. I was a prosecutor. I had a general law practice. So that in and of itself doesn't mean anything anyway... I'm not gonna get down in the weeds with everything they dredge up over the next six months." Then cheers from the ignorant audience.

Sounds like a little back-peddling to me. Why not just say, "No. Absolutely not. I have never been pro-abortion." As Thoman B. Edsall reports, in the July 7 LAT story, Thompson spokesman Mark Corallo firmly rejected charges that Thompson had lobbied in support of the pro-choice group. "Fred Thompson did not lobby for this group, period," he said.

In response to a Huffington Post inquiry today [July 11] however, Corallo was more equivocal: "He said he has no recollection of doing any work and does not recall lobbying anyone on it."

From "No, period" to "I can't recall" in just four days.

"You need to separate a lawyer who is advocating a position from the position itself."
To my ears, this sounds like, "Hey, they hired me to do a job. Why should I turn it down? If I can represent criminal defendants, why not this? It doesn't mean anything anyway."

I wonder what else Mr. Thompson won't be able to recall as all this progresses. And to my commenter "Sturm", any input? What do you think the reason is that he shrugged it off instead of vehemently denying it?

Fred Thompson - Flip Flopper

So Fred Thompson was not only a mole for Nixon, but he's also a gun for hire.

We all know that Thompson was a Washington lobbyist, but we didn't know he'd lobby for anyone, regardless of ethical or moral conflict. That is, of course, if there actually is a conflict.

The LA Times reports that "Thompson, who is campaigning for president as an antiabortion Republican, accepted an assignment from a family-planning group to lobby the first Bush White House to ease a controversial abortion restriction, according to a 1991 document and several people familiar with the matter."

The abortion "gag rule" was then a major political flashpoint. Lobbying against the rule would have placed Thompson at odds with the antiabortion movement that he is now trying to rally behind his expected declaration of a presidential bid.

...Former Rep. Michael D. Barnes (D-Md.), a colleague at the lobbying and law firm where Thompson worked, said that [Judith] DeSarno, [president of the family planning association in 1991], had asked him to recommend someone for the lobbying work and that he had suggested Thompson. He said it was "absolutely bizarre" for Thompson to deny that he lobbied against the abortion counseling rule.

Susan Cohen, a member of the association's board of directors in 1991, said in reference to DeSarno and Thompson: "We were looking, of course, for a Republican who might have some inroads to the White House at that time, and so that's how she came upon contacting him."

Of course, Thompson's camp is denying that he ever lobbied for the group. Thompson spokesman Mark Corallo adamantly denied that Thompson worked for the family planning group. "Fred Thompson did not lobby for this group, period," he said in an e-mail.

In a separate interview, John H. Sununu, the White House official whom the family planning group wanted to contact, said he had no memory of the lobbying and doubted it took place. "I don't recall him ever lobbying me on that at all. I don't think that ever happened. In fact, I know that never happened."

In response to Sununu's denial, DeSarno said Thompson "owes NFPRHA a bunch of money" if he never talked to Sununu as he said he had.