All Entries in the "Politics" Category

George Lakoff: Words That Don’t Work

Progressives had some fun last week with Frank Luntz, who told the Republican Governors’ Association that he was scared to death of the Occupy movement and recommended language to combat what the movement had achieved. But the progressive critics mostly just laughed, said his language wouldn’t work, and assumed that if Luntz was scared, everything was hunky-dory. Just keep on saying the words Luntz doesn’t like: capitalism, tax the rich, etc.

It’s a trap.

When Luntz says he is “scared to death,” he means that the Republicans who hire him are scared to death and he can profit from that fear by offering them new language. Luntz is clever. Yes, Republicans are scared. But there needs to be a serious discussion of both Luntz’s remarks and the progressive non-response.

What has been learned from the brain and cognitive sciences is that words are defined by fixed frames we use in thinking, frames come in hierarchical systems, and political frames are defined in moral terms, where “morality” is very different for conservatives and progressives. What lies behind the Occupy movement is a moral view of democracy: Democracy is about citizens caring about each other and acting responsibly both socially and personally. This requires a robust public empowering and protecting everyone equally. Both private success and personal freedom depend on such a public. Every critique and proposal of the Occupy movement fits this moral view, which happens to be the progressive moral view.

Full Story Here: George Lakoff: Words That Don’t Work.

Nancy Pelosi provides Newt Gingrich ethics report

In case you haven’t been watching cable TV, two former House Speakers named Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrich are having a bit of a fracas related to all that Gingrich baggage about which GOP primary voters in Iowa appear to be blissfully ignorant.

Pelosi, the San Francisco Democrat and now House minority leader, promised to release records that are public but haven’t seen much sunshine lately about the congressional ethics investigation of Gingrich back in the day.

Gingrich said that would be foul play and promised to retaliate, claiming Pelosi was threatening to disclose non-public information. But Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said Pelosi was “clearly referring to the extensive amount of information that is in the public record, including the comprehensive committee report with which the public may not be fully aware.”

Hammill helpfully provided public links and we provide them here.

Full Story Here: Nancy Pelosi provides Newt Gingrich ethics report | Politics Blog | an SFGate.com blog.

8 reasons why Ronald Reagan was the worst President of our lifetime

If you ever happen to come across a Republican on television these days, chances are that you will hear the name Ronald Reagan. Recent Republican debates are the perfect example of the love fest that the current Republican party has for Reagan as each candidate name drops the former president at every turn. If you only listened to conservatives you would think that Jesus Christ was the only person above Reagan on the totem pole of conservative love. They talk about his love of low taxes, less government and conservative family values. The problem is that when you step out of the conservative dream and come back to reality, you find that not only was Ronald Reagan a bad president, but he was one of the worst presidents we’ve seen in modern times. Reagan’s policies have destroyed the United States for three decades, and for the eight years he was in office, here are eight reasons why Ronald Reagan was the worst president of our lifetime.

1. Reagan cut taxes for the Rich, increased taxes on the Middle Class -

Full Story Here: 8 reasons why Ronald Reagan was the worst President of our lifetime – Orlando liberal | Examiner.com.

A look at Mitt Romney’s job-creation record at Bain Capital

The Republican presidential contender says he learned about expanding employment during his time heading a private equity firm. But under his leadership, Bain Capital often maximized profits in part by firing workers.

Shortly after Mitt Romney resigned from Bain Capital in 1999 to run the Olympics in Salt Lake City, potential investors received a prospectus touting the extraordinary profits earned by the private equity firm that Romney controlled for 15 years.

During that time, Boston-based Bain acquired more than 115 companies, according to the prospectus. Bain’s estimated annual returns were more than five times that of the Dow Jones Industrial Average in the same period.

Now a front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, Romney says his Bain experience shows he knows how to create jobs. He often cites Bain’s investment in a little-known office supply store called Staples, which now employs more than 90,000 worldwide.

Full Story Here: A look at Mitt Romney’s job-creation record at Bain Capital – latimes.com.

Herman Cain Quits Race, But Can Still Spend Funds With Little Restriction

Running for president, for Fun and PROFIT

On Saturday afternoon embattled presidential candidate Herman Cain announced the suspension of his campaign amid allegations of sexual harassment, assault and adultery. The suspension raises immediate questions about what the candidate can do with the millions of dollars in campaign funds that the Cain campaign claimed to have raised in the past two months.

The Cain campaign only raised $4.6 million through the first six months of his candidacy, but as he rose in the polls in October, the campaign announced major fundraising success. The campaign claimed that it raised upwards of $9 million in October and millions more when the first allegations of sexual harassment surfaced.

Now that he is withdrawing from the race, there are few limits on what Cain can do with this money.

“There’s a couple of things [former candidates] can do with [leftover funds],” Paul S. Ryan, the FEC director for the Campaign Legal Center, told The Huffington Post. “They could refund them to contributors if they want to. They could convert their principle campaign committee into a non-standard candidate-type PAC.”

Full Story Here: Herman Cain Quit Race, But Can Still Spend Funds With Little Restriction.

Suddenly It’s Newt

Slapstick depends on repetition. The clown always slips in the pile of elephant crap, inevitably walks into the ladder. By such standards Mitt Romney is now the undisputed slapstick king of America. About every four to six weeks the pundits shout out in unison, “That’s it. Finally. It’s a wrap for Romney!” But then, a week later here’s the pile of elephant crap, there’s the ladder, and down goes Mitt.

Just when the Mormon millionaire thought he’d got the nomination sewn up, the polls showed him still stuck at about 23 per cent with huge numbers of Republicans saying they didn’t trust the former governor of Massachusetts, that Mormons are in league with Satan, that he took his dog on holiday, tied to the roof of his car, that he’s a flip flopper, that he made his money firing people, that…. On and on.

So there was the Rick Perry challenge. The governor of Texas soared in the polls. He was a cert. Romney raged. Then Perry turned out to be a moron. Romney was on his feet again. A cert. But did his polling numbers surge? Nope. Stuck at 23 per cent and then came another pile of elephant crap, in the form of Herman Cain. Yes, Republicans told pollsters they liked his style, his feistiness, his 9-9-9 tax plan, and above all his consummate skill in not being Mitt Romney.

Full Story Here: Suddenly It’s Newt » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names.

The Budget Wedge: How Republicans’ Approach To The Budget Could Split Their Party

Republicans may win the power to impose major entitlement cuts only through the support of voters who dislike the idea.

One reason that the congressional deficit-reduction committee failed is that many Republicans believe time is on their side. That optimism is rooted in the widespread conviction among the party that it has a strong chance of holding the House in 2012 while recapturing both the Senate and the White House. On paper, such unified control would give Republicans the leverage in 2013 to shrink the federal deficit solely by cutting spending without accepting the tax increases that Democrats are demanding as the price for big reductions, especially in Social Security and Medicare

As electoral analysis, that’s hardly unreasonable. But as a legislative forecast, it could prove much more problematic. Even with unified control, passing a deficit plan that relies solely on spending reductions (particularly in entitlements) while preserving tax cuts for the affluent could strain the Republican electoral coalition much more violently than most GOP leaders now assume. In fact, the GOP faces a conundrum: It may gain enough power next year to impose a just-cuts solution only by placating the voters most skeptical of that approach.

The reason is the changing nature of the Republican coalition. Over the past several decades, Republicans have run increasingly well in the overlapping circles of older and blue-collar whites. Those trends have dramatically accelerated under President Obama: In 2010, exit polls showed that GOP House candidates carried a crushing 63 percent both among white seniors and whites without a four-year college degree. Those groups are now at least as integral to Republican success as the corporate managers, small-business owners, and college-educated suburbanites who once anchored their vote.

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Full Story Here: The Budget Wedge – Ronald Brownstein – NationalJournal.com.

White House Threatens Veto Of Indefinite Detention Bill

Accusing the Senate of “political micromanagement” of national security, the White House Friday stood by its threat to veto a defense bill over controversial military detention provisions.

The National Defense Authorization Act passed Thursday by the Senate contains a section that spells out the military’s power to detain Americans indefinitely without trial and mandates military detention for some terrorism suspects.

The White House warned last month that senior advisers would recommend a veto, saying the detainee provisions could restrict the ability of law enforcement to combat terrorism and “make the job of preventing terrorist attacks more difficult.”

Full Story Here: White House Threatens Veto Of Indefinite Detention Bill.

Suskind’s Confidence Men Raises Questions About Obama’s Credibility

Barack Obama is heading back onto the campaign trail, running as a champion of the middle class and even hoping to harness the Occupy movement’s public anger at Wall Street.

But the higher he soars with his populist rhetoric, the more he calls attention to the enormous gap between the promise of hope and change that he campaigned on in 2008 and the actions he has taken as president — especially regarding the economy, which is still stagnating, and Wall Street, which remains unpunished and unbowed even after causing the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression.

As a result, voters will inevitably be asking themselves: Who is this guy, really? Does he mean what he says? Will he do what he says? And would a second-term Obama be different?

One answer to why Obama underperformed is laid out in searing detail in Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Ron Suskind’s latest book, Confidence Men: Wall Street, Washington, and the Education of a President.

Full Story Here: Dan Froomkin: Suskind’s Confidence Men Raises Questions About Obama’s Credibility.

Elizabeth Warren Is Pulling Ahead Of Scott Brown: Poll

Democrats’ bet that former consumer finance watchdog Elizabeth Warren could take down Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) appears to be paying off, as a new poll suggests she is pulling ahead.

The survey by the University of Massachusetts at Amherst finds Warren leading Brown 43 percent to 39 percent — just within the poll’s 4.4 percent margin of error.

“These numbers could mean trouble for Scott Brown,” said UMass political scientist Brian Schaffner. “The race is a dead heat and his support is well under 50 percent, which usually means difficulty for an incumbent, especially this far out from Election Day.”

Full Story Here: Elizabeth Warren Is Pulling Ahead Of Scott Brown: Poll.

Time to Retake Politics From the One Percent in Both Political Parties

Dean Baker :-:

The country is still celebrating the inability of the supercommittee to cut Social Security and Medicare, but it is important to move on from this victory to retake control of the political debate from the One Percent. As it stands, the One Percent are insisting that the country genuflect over the non-problem of the budget deficit, at a time when tens of millions of workers are unemployed or underemployed, millions of people are facing the loss of their homes and tens of millions of baby boomers are approaching retirement with little other than their Social Security to support them.

The deficit is the agenda of the One Percent. There is no reason that the rest of us should be concerned about budget deficits when the rest of the country is struggling with the economic disaster created by the greed and incompetence of the One Percent.

This is not a statement of morality; it is a statement based on economic reality. Budget deficits can be a problem when an economy is near full employment and the deficit can be pulling resources away from private investment, thereby slowing growth. However, it is not a problem with large numbers of unemployed workers and vast amounts of excess capacity.

Full Story Here: Time to Retake Politics From the One Percent in Both Political Parties | Common Dreams.

Wisconsin Recall Drive Surpasses 300,000 Signatures

The petition drive to recall and remove Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has surpassed all expectations in its first two weeks, collecting more than 300,000 signatures.

The truly remarkably thing about the total so far is not, however, that it is so large.

What is truly remarkable is where the signatures are coming from: rural and small-town Wisconsin communities are contributing disproportionally high numbers of signatures to the total.

No one, not even the most concerned critic of Governor Walker’s assault on collective bargaining rights, expected the recall campaign would move as quickly as it has.

No one expected United Wisconsin’s recall drive to gather more than half the required signatures in less than two weeks of petitioning. No one expected whole counties to reach their signature goals in the first week. No one expected conservative communities in Republican regions of the state to take the lead in collecting recall signatures against a Republican governor.

But it is happening.

Full Story Here: Wisconsin Recall Drive Surpasses 300,000 Signatures | The Nation.

DNC TV AD: “Trapped” – Mitt vs Mitt

Mitt V. Mitt: The story of two men trapped in one body. Lean more at http://www.MittvMitt.com

Full Story Here: DNC TV AD: “Trapped” – YouTube.

Bill Moyers Journal… The Conversation Continues

I’m Richard Heffner, your host on The Open Mind.

And I suspect you’ll find it passing strange for quite such an Ancient as I am still to have heroes…to have lived so long, to have seen so many saints and sinners, to have measured the fancies and foibles of so many persons in the public eye … and still to have held steady in my admiration for one or another of them.

But I very much do, do delight in having heroes, and I’ve inveigled perhaps the liveliest one of all to join me here again for this Open Mind … and to stay with me for at least another one, as well.

Bill Moyers is still a youngster at the top of his form, to be sure — which for me preeminently means as an American “Public Intellectual” and as very much an old-time, long-time preacher and teacher, if you will.

Full Story Here: Bill Moyers Journal… The Conversation Continues | Richard Heffner’s Open Mind | THIRTEEN.

The First Amendment Upside Down. Why We Must Occupy Democracy

Robert Reich :-:

You’ve been seeing this across the country … Americans assaulted, clubbed, dragged, pepper-sprayed … Why? For exercising their right to free speech and assembly — protesting the increasing concentration of income, wealth, and political power at the top.

And what’s Washington’s response? Nothing. In fact, Congress’s so-called “supercommittee” just disbanded because Republicans refuse to raise a penny of taxes on the rich.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court says money is speech and corporations are people. The Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision last year ended all limits on political spending. Millions of dollars are being funneled to politicians without a trace.

Full Story Here: Robert Reich.

The GOP’s dual-trigger nightmare

 Ezra Klein :-:

Imagine if the Democrats offered Republicans a deficit deal that had more than $3 in tax increases for every $1 in spending cuts, assigned most of those spending cuts to the Pentagon, and didn’t take a dime from Social Security, Medicaid or Medicare beneficiaries. Republicans would laugh at them. But without quite realizing it, that’s the deal Republicans have now offered to the Democrats.

In August, Republicans scored what they thought was a big win by persuading Democrats to accept a trigger that consisted only of spending cuts. The price they paid was 1) concentrating the cuts on the Pentagon while exempting Social Security, Medicaid, Medicare beneficiaries, and 2) delaying the cuts until January 1, 2013. That was, they figured, a win, as it eschewed taxes. Grover Norquist’s pledge remained unbroken.

But 12 years earlier, George W. Bush had set a trigger of his own. In order to pass his tax cuts using the 51-vote budget reconciliation process, he had agreed to let them sunset in 2010. A last-minute deal extended them until the end of 2012.

Full Story Here: Wonkbook: The GOP’s dual-trigger nightmare – The Washington Post.

Paper Ballot Election Results Flipped After ‘Recount’ Finds New Tally ‘Extremely in Favor of Opposite Candidate’

‘We’re doing recounts of recounts of recounts,’ says candidate announced as ‘loser’ on Election Night…

After the Municipal Council elections in Provo, Utah on November 8, residents had been told that Gary Winterton had narrowly defeated Bonnie Morrow for the District 1 seat — by just 9 votes.

The margin was close enough that Morrow was allowed to ask for a recount of the paper ballots which were tallied on Election Night by the city’s optical scan systems made by Diebold Election Systems, Inc. (Following years of failure of Diebold’s voting systems, the company changed their name to Premier, only to see the assets of the failing company finally purchased last year by Dominion Voting, a Canadian firm which now services the machines.) The same optical scan systems are used all over the country, and are set once again for use in the New Hampshire’s “first in the nation” GOP Presidential primary to be held in January.

The first “recount” of Provo’s Municipal Council District 1 ballots — carried out on the same op-scan systems that tallied them in the first place — was held yesterday, only to be abruptly called off

Full Story Here: The BRAD BLOG : Paper Ballot Op-Scan Election Results in Utah Flipped After ‘Recount’ Finds New Tally ‘Extremely in Favor of Opposite Candidate’.

Super Committee Fails: How Republican Tax Intransigence Killed It: A Timeline

By now we have all heard the latest in the months-long debate over reducing the nation’s deficit — barring a last-minute miracle, the congressional super committee tasked with finding at least $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction will fail to come to an agreement. Cue handwringing by pundits lamenting the inability of both Democrats and Republicans to compromise.

The notion that both sides share in the blame is an easy line for commentators to repeat, but it isn’t true. Time and time again, the only thing preventing an agreement on long-term deficit reduction has been the Republicans’ absolute refusal to consider any tax increases on high-income households as part of the solution. Michael Linden and I created a timeline of major events in the past six months of deficit talks:

Full Story Here: Super Committee Fails: How Republican Tax Intransigence Killed It: A Timeline | Truthout.

Don Young, Doug Brinkley Argue In House Natural Resources Committee Hearing

Alaska Congressman Don Young got into a heated discussion with Rice University professor Doug Brinkley at a hearing on Friday.

Young addressed Brinkley as “Dr. Rice” and called his testimony “garbage.” Brinkley replied, “Dr. Brinkley. Rice is a university. I know you went to Yuba College and you couldn’t graduate.”

“I’ll call you anything I want to call you when you sit in that chair. You just be quiet,” Young quipped.

“You don’t own me,” Brinkley shot back. “I pay your salary.”

The exchange took place at a House Natural Resources Committee hearing to discuss the possible effects of drilling in Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Full Story Here: Don Young, Doug Brinkley Argue In House Natural Resources Committee Hearing.

Recall Walker Rally at Capitol Draws 25,000 to 30,000

Huge crowds show up Saturday as recall organizers announce they’ve collected more than 100,000 signatures on petitions.

As tens of thousands of people descended upon the state Capitol Saturday, organizers of the effort to remove Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker from office announced they have collected more than 105,000 signatures on recall petitions.

“As of (Friday) night — the fourth day of signature collection, more than 105,000 Wisconsin residents have already signed their name to a petition to recall Scott Walker,” said Heather DuBois Bourenane, a volunteer with United Wisconsin, the group spearheading the recall effort. “Across the state, people are talking with their friends, family and neighbors about Walker’s destruction and are doing all they can to end his days as governor.”

Organizers need to collect 540,000 signatures by Jan. 17 to force a recall election. United Wisconsin, which is working with the Democratic Party of Wisconsin on the recall effort, says it hopes to gather between 600,000 and 700,000 signatures by that deadline.

Full Story Here: Recall Walker Rally at Capitol Draws 25,000 to 30,000 – Brookfield, WI Patch.

Finally, a Constitutional Amendment for the 99%

Today, Congressman Ted Deutch (D-FL) offered the strongest constitutional amendment introduced in either House of Congress so far to rectify the imbalance of power between the corporations and the people in our democracy.

As the struggle in the streets intensifies, and Occupy Wall Street refuses to remain silent, it’s good to know there are champions in Congress who have stepped up to the challenge of amending the US Constitution. It’s called OCCUPIED: Outlawing Corporate Cash Undermining the Public Interest in our Elections and Democracy, here.

The Supreme Court, in the 5-4 Citizens United decision of January 2010, declared that corporations have free speech rights like human beings and invalidated the ban on corporate election spending that Congress had enacted. Since then, a grassroots movement has emerged to generate popular support for a constitutional amendment to reverse that decision, including months of work by Move to Amend, Free Speech For People, Public Citizen, People For The American Way, Common Cause, and the Center for Media and Democracy.

Full Story Here: Finally, a Constitutional Amendment for the 99% | OurFuture.org.

Rep. Deutch Introduces OCCUPIED Constitutional Amendment To Ban Corporate Money In Politics

In one of the greatest signs yet that the 99 Percenters are having an impact, Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL), a member of the House Judiciary Committee, today introduced an amendment that would ban corporate money in politics and end corporate personhood once and for all.

Deutch’s amendment, called the Outlawing Corporate Cash Undermining the Public Interest in our Elections and Democracy (OCCUPIED) Amendment, would overturn the Citizens United decision, re-establishing the right of Congress and the states to regulate campaign finance laws, and to effectively outlaw the ability of for-profit corporations to contribute to campaign spending.

Full Story Here: Rep. Deutch Introduces OCCUPIED Constitutional Amendment To Ban Corporate Money In Politics | ThinkProgress.

Deja Vu All Over Again — GOP Intransigence On Taxes Edition

As the deadline nears for the Congressional super committee to finalize a deal to address the nation’s deficit, it’s becoming increasingly apparent that Republicans and Democrats on the committee will be unable to reach an accord. By now, the nature and cause of the impasse should be bitterly familiar to most Americans: Congressional Republicans refusal to consider both spending cuts and tax increases as a means to reduce the deficit. After insisting on an extension of the Bush tax rates for the wealthy — which alone will blow at least a $670 billion hole in the U.S. budget — and receiving an agreement from Democrats to cut nearly a trillion dollars in spending, Republicans have offered a paltry $300 billion in new revenue. At the same time, the top Republican on the committee has declared that every “penny” in additional revenue is a “step in the wrong direction.”

This dance should by now be familiar. This past summer, during the debt ceiling negotiations which produced the super committee, the Republicans nearly drove the country into financial default by refusing to allow tax rate increases even as they insisted that Democrats make up the difference in deficit reduction through trillions in destructive spending cuts. Indeed, Standard & Poors specifically cited the GOP’s intransigence on revenue raising when it downgraded the United States’ credit rating.

And before that, in a budget deal hammered out last December, Republicans established their ongoing theme by refusing to allow the Bush tax cuts to expire for even the top brackets — at a cost of $133 billion, and benefiting a mere 4.8 million people.

Full Story Here: VIDEO: Deja Vu All Over Again — GOP Intransigence On Taxes Edition | ThinkProgress.

Sanders Issues Campaign Warning for Obama on Entitlement Cuts

Sen. Bernie Sanders would not commit to supporting President Barrack Obama’s 2012 re-election bid today.

The liberal Vermont Independent, in an interview with CNN, criticized Obama’s stated desire to reform the Medicare and Social Security entitlement programs. Sanders warned that the president’s position could cost him the enthusiasm and votes of progressives.

“Absolutely,” Sanders answered, when asked if Obama has been too “wishy-washy” and willing to compromise with the Republicans.

Sanders indicated that he could see a scenario in which he does not back Obama’s re-election, saying he wants a firm commitment that entitlement programs will be protected from cuts.

Full Story Here: Sanders Issues Campaign Warning for Obama on Entitlement Cuts : Roll Call Politics.

DNC Sends Massive FOIA Request For Romney’s Email Records

On Thursday, November 17, 2011, the worst job in America belonged to the employees who handle Freedom of Information Act requests for the governor’s office in Massachusetts.

Hours after former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign filed a formal request to that office seeking communications between the Obama presidential campaign and current Gov. Deval Patrick’s administration, the Democratic National Committee responded in kind.

In a FOIA request sent Thursday evening to Mark Reilly, Chief Legal Counsel of the Executive Office of the Governor, the DNC asked for records pertaining to communications between Romney and his staff about their decision to wipe their electronic records clean before leaving Massachusetts statehouse. For good measure, the DNC also asked for “any and all electronic correspondence” that Romney and anyone in his administration (not just the members who erased their emails) made while in office that contain the following terms:

Full Story Here: DNC Sends Massive FOIA Request For Romney’s Email Records.

Blue Dog Democrats Endorse Balanced Budget Amendment That Would Double Unemployment, Gut Social Safety Net

Congressional Republicans are still trying to persuade Americans that they are focused on job creation, but each time they propose another piece of legislation, it is exposed as a gimmick that will do little, if anything, to create jobs. Such was the case with their anti-regulatory policies, their attempts to repeal health care reform, and virtually every other policy proposal they have brought forth.

Next up in that line, unfortunately, is a rehashed form of a radical Balanced Budget Amendment, a plan that according to recent analyses would actually cost America 15 million jobs. But thanks to the conservative wing of the Democratic Party, the Republicans won’t be alone in their chase for a radical budget amendment that could help push the country back into the throes of recession.

Despite the fact that House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said yesterday he would encourage his party to vote against the radical plan, Blue Dog Democrats endorsed the amendment on a press call today, Politico’s Marin Cogan reported on Twitter. ThinkProgress confirmed that endorsement with a spokesperson for Rep. Mike Ross (D-AR), the Blue Dog Coalition’s co-chair for communications. According to the Hill, Ross said on the call that Blue Dogs favored such an amendment “before balanced budget amendments were cool”:

Full Story Here: Blue Dog Democrats Endorse Balanced Budget Amendment That Would Double Unemployment, Gut Social Safety Net | ThinkProgress.

Scott Walker Recall Effort Begins

Jubilant opponents of Republican Gov. Scott Walker launched their effort Tuesday to try to recall him from office, starting a 60-day blitz to gather more than half a million signatures to force an election next year.

The drive to collect an average of 9,000 signatures a day, fueled by anger over Walker’s successful push to take away nearly all public worker collective bargaining rights, began with pajama parties and other events after midnight. Daytime activities included rallies, neighborhood canvasses and booths set up around the state Capitol.

A signing event was even held outside of Walker’s personal home in a Milwaukee suburb, where he stays with his family when he’s not in Madison. Walker bristled at how personal the recall had become.

“You see a total disregard for people’s families and others here,” Walker said Tuesday on WTMJ-AM in Milwaukee. “I do think that’s crossing the line and I think most people in Wisconsin would agree with that, no matter where they’re at in the spectrum.”

Full Story Here: Scott Walker Recall Effort Begins.

Scott Walker Recall Means Rebecca Kleefisch Could Be First Lieutenant Governor Ever Removed

The recall campaign launched against Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) could also make the state’s Tea Party-backed lieutenant governor the first state second-in-command to face a recall in U.S. history.

Leaders of the movement to recall Walker started circulating petitions today to recall Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch (R) from office as well, seizing upon a quirk in the state law. Kleefisch was elected to the state’s second-highest office as Walker’s running mate in 2010.

State Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen ruled this month that any movement to recall Kleefisch from office had to come separately from one to recall Walker, setting the stage for distinct elections for the two offices next year. While candidates for Wisconsin governor and lieutenant governor run in independent primaries, voters cast a vote for a single ticket in the general election.

Full Story Here: Scott Walker Recall Means Rebecca Kleefisch Could Be First Lieutenant Governor Ever Removed.

Republicans aren’t closing the deal with voters

Unemployment is at 9 percent, the housing market is moribund, “consumer confidence” is an oxymoron, and three-fourths of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track. So how is it that President Obama leads each of his likely Republican opponents in the polls? And why on earth is the gap widening rather than closing?

It’s simple: Voters are paying attention to what the GOP field is saying — not just the applause-line attacks on Obama but what the candidates propose to do about the economy. The more they talk, the more discouraged the electorate seems to become.

This should be the Republicans’ election to lose. They seem well on their way.

An NBC-Wall Street Journal poll last week showed Obama beating Mitt Romney — his most formidable opponent — 49 percent to 43 percent. That is not a huge advantage, but the trend is in Obama’s favor. Last month, the same poll had the president leading Romney by just two points; in August, Obama was only one point ahead.

Full Story Here: Republicans aren’t closing the deal with voters – The Washington Post.

Super Committee Democrats Propose Scrapping Bush Tax Cut Debate In Exchange For Billions In Revenue

Under their latest proposal to the deficit reduction super committee, Democrats would agree to undertake comprehensive tax reform that included a pledge to avoid letting Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthy expire.

According to a private document, the authenticity of which was confirmed by a leadership aide, super committee Democrats are eyeing between $950 billion and $1 trillion in revenue raisers and tax hikes as part of a $2.3 trillion deficit reduction package. Between $300 billion and $350 billion of that would come from what one congressional aide described as “low-hanging fruit” — ending tax incentives for corporate jet owners, closing loopholes for oil and gas companies, changing ethanol subsidies, and so on.

The remaining $650 billion in revenue that committee Democrats are targeting would be raised through a set of “Fast Track Procedures For Tax Reform.” As part of those procedures, Democrats would agree to three guiding principles: “(a) corporate tax reform to enhance competitiveness, (b) an individual rate no higher than 35% and (c) a distribution of changes that ensures a tax code as progressive as current law.”

Full Story Here: Super Committee Democrats Propose Scrapping Bush Tax Cut Debate In Exchange For Billions In Revenue.

OPS: Cowards!  Well, you didn’t really expect multimillionaires to scrap THEIR OWN TAX BREAKS – did you?

The GOP’s ‘Uncertainty’ Talking Point, Debunked

With the economy in a slump for nearly four years, corporate executives and conservative politicians have repeatedly invoked “uncertainty” as a major barrier to American job-creation. The “uncertainty” jab is a go-to talking point for any congressional Republican looking to tag President Barack Obama as a tax-raising, regulation-obsessed foe of American businesses.

But according to banking data compiled by economic research firm Moebs Services, the uncertainty plaguing the American economy has nothing to do with government regulations or taxes on millionaires. It’s an uncertainty driven squarely by consumers and small-businesses who are worried about their short-term financial prospects. And it’s been going on since well before Obama took up residence in the White House.

Since the end of 2007, bank customers have pulled over $900 billion out of certificates of deposits at major U.S. banks, parking their money in checking accounts and money market deposit accounts. Banks pay customers interest to park their money in CDs, but pay out next-to-nothing for money market accounts, and still less — usually nothing — for checking accounts.

Full Story Here: The GOP’s ‘Uncertainty’ Talking Point, Debunked.

Bill Maher Uses A Christmas Carol To Slam The Republican’s Holiday Hypocrisy

Maher said,

“Someone needs to explain to the Republicans that Ebenezer Scrooge is supposed to be the bad guy, and before conservatives start whining about another war on Christmas, they must admit they hate everything about Christmas, because brotherhood, goodwill toward men, and especially charity make their skin crawl. Now this week Michele Bachmann proposed cutting huge holes in the federal safety net, demonstrating a total misunderstanding of the concept of a net. Here’s what she said, ‘Self-reliance means if anyone will not work, neither should he eat.’ Merry Christmas to you too, crazy lady. Yeah, that’s the first thing I think when self-reliance comes up, punishment by starvation.

Honestly, who can hear that statement and not think of Scrooge? Who in A Christmas Carol suggested if the poor don’t want to go to workhouses, they should get on with dying as a service to population control. Now if Herman Cain said that at Republican debate, he would get a standing ovation. And say what you want about Ebenezer Scrooge, he never shoved Bob Cratchit’s head into his groin and said, ‘You want Christmas off or not?’ Newt Gingrich refers to Obama as the food stamp president, because he doesn’t want children to starve to death, f**king commie. Mitt Romney says we should let all the people about to lose their homes, lose them, and they can just become renters. Ownership society, meet no pets, no waterbeds. Mitt said the same thing a few years ago when the automobile industry was tottering. Let it die.

I find it ironic that Republicans have such disdain for the lazy, and yet their solution to every problem is do nothing. Their answer to wealth inequality, do nothing. Health care? Do nothing. Climate change? Nothing. Racism? Doesn’t exist. For a group of people so head over heels in love with self-reliance, they sure do recommend a lot of sitting on their ass.

If A Christmas Carol was performed by the Tea Party Dramatic Society, it would be a cautionary tale about how the hero, Scrooge, a blameless job creator is turned into a socialist through the corrupting influence of Tiny Tim. And the play would end with a simple plaintive question from Mr. Scrooge. Just how much of my wealth does Mr. Tim think he’s entitled to?

And that is the great Republican fallacy of this election, that our economic problems are due not to Wall Street’s gambling, but because too many Americans are lazy. But there are 16 million unemployed, and we only created 80,000 jobs last month. The problem isn’t laziness. It’s math. But this is where the Republican Party is now, in favor of people dying because they don’t have health insurance. In favor letting people go unfed if they won’t work, and if they want to work, but are Mexicans, in favor of putting up a fence that electrocutes them.

Even Scrooge is thinking, ‘Look, I hate the poor, but I’m not a f**king psychopath.’ But’s that’s where this party is, it simply has no bottom. Except Marcus Bachmann, he’s a bottom.”

Full Story Here: Bill Maher Uses A Christmas Carol To Slam The Republican’s Holiday Hypocrisy – YouTube.

Time to Take Your Civics Aptitude Test

If you have a high school junior or senior in the house, you know the drill.

SAT, ACT, testing, testing, testing.

Test for math, test for English, test for science.

Go to visit colleges.

Apply. Wait for the call. Dish out the cash.

But here’s something that’s missing from the routine – civics education.

Education about our shared civics culture, about the activists who are seeking to make our country a better place to live, about the laws and institutions that keep this country from spinning into the abyss.

Are there any universities that specialize in civics education?

Haven’t found one yet.

Are there any universities that emphasize it?

Haven’t found one yet.

Full Story Here: Time to Take Your Civics Aptitude Test | Common Dreams.

One Last Note on Mike Bloomberg

| Matt Taibbi |

I’m getting a number of letters, mainly from conservatives and libertarians, who seem to think that my response to Mike Bloomberg’s “It’s not the banks’ fault” rant means I “don’t believe in personal responsibility.”

Apparently, people feel that by explaining how the banks profited from tfhe explosion of subprime home loans, I’m somehow letting the ordinary homeowner who over-borrowed off the hook.

But the question was never, Do ordinary homeowners share any blame for the crisis? The question, as implicitly posed by Bloomberg, was, Is it true that the banks had NO blame for the crisis?

Full Story Here: One Last Note on Mike Bloomberg | Matt Taibbi | Rolling Stone.

Things Congress passed this week that had nothing to do with jobs

The House passed:

House Concurrent Resolution 13 reaffirming “In God We Trust” as the official motto of the United States;

The Wireless Tax Fairness Act of 2011;

The Kate Puzey Peace Corps Volunteer Protection Act of 2011;

The Civilian Service Recognition Act of 2011;

Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2011;

H.R. 1965, which raises the monetary threshold for banks issuing securities;

The Small Company Capital Formation Act of 2011, which exempts other securities from regulation;

Access to Capital for Job Creators Act, which exempts some security issuers from regulation;

and The Entrepreneur Access to Capital Act, which reduces regulations on yet other kinds of securities.

The Senate passed:

Appeal Time Clarification Act;

Removal Clarification Act;

Federal Courts Jurisdiction and Venue Clarification Act;

Departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development, and Related Programs Appropriations Act;

Wallowa Forest Service Compound Conveyance Act;

Sugar Loaf Fire Protection District Land Exchange Act;

Fort Pulaski National Monument Lease Authorization Act;

Box Elder Utah Land Conveyance Act;

Utah Land Conveyance Act

Uintah Water Conservancy District;

Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act;

East Bench Irrigation District Water Contract Extension Act;

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Business Travel Cards Act;

and the America’s Cup Act

Full Story Here: Things Congress passed this week that had nothing to do with jobs | The Raw Story.

OPS: There are links to detailed articles for each of the above  at the Full Story Here link

196 House Democrats Sign Letter To State Election Officals Opposing War On Voting

A massive 196 House Democrats — nearly their entire caucus — signed a letter to state election officials asking them to “put partisan considerations aside and serve as advocates for enfranchisement” during this unfortunate era of voter disenfranchising state laws:

Beginning with the passage of the Voting Rights Act, Congress and election officials across the country have worked on a bipartisan basis to open our democracy to all our citizens. Removing unnecessary barriers to voting was a cause shared across party lines. Sometimes, these efforts were directed at laws and practices that were intentionally created to deny citizens their right to vote. Other times, the laws or practices were relics of a prior era and served no continuing purpose. [...]

Full Story Here: 196 House Democrats Sign Letter To State Election Officals Opposing War On Voting | ThinkProgress.

Maddow – Republican War on Voting

New Florida voter registration laws (as well as other such laws around the country) are making it harder to register/vote.

Video belongs to MSNBC.

Full Story Here: Maddow – Republican War on Voting – YouTube.

How to Take Back Our Political System From the 1%

Ferguson outlines bold measures to stop the tsunami of money that threatens our democracy, starting with a Constitutional Amendment.

he following has been adapted from a version of a speech delivered to Occupy Boston by Thomas Ferguson, the father of the “Investment Theory of Politics.”

I’m honored to speak to you today about money and politics, but it’s not the first time I’ve been here. This is actually the third time I’ve visited your encampment. The first couple of times I walked around and looked at the signs. Many were priceless; the best tutorials I’ve ever seen on the subject of money and politics. My favorite was the one that advised that Congressmen and women should emulate NASCAR drivers and show us their sponsors. Another styled contemporary capitalism “socialism for the 1%.” And many sharply attacked the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which helped throw open the floodgates to the tidal wave of secret money that is now engulfing American elections.

I’m a social scientist, so I actually counted: about a third of all the signs that day had money and politics as their themes. It was obvious that you here at Occupy Boston and your colleagues in New York, Oakland, Chicago, and other cities have already grasped the heart of the problem of money and politics in America: that we live in a money-driven political system that works pretty well for the 1%, but no one else.

Full Story Here: Thomas Ferguson: How to Take Back Our Political System From the 1% | | AlterNet.

Obama Infrastructure Plan: Senate GOP Blocks $60 Billion Measure

Republicans in the Senate Thursday dealt President Barack Obama the third in a string of defeats on his stimulus-style jobs agenda, blocking a $60 billion measure for building and repairing infrastructure like roads and rail lines.

Supporters of the failed measure said it would have created tens of thousands of construction jobs and lifted the still-struggling economy. But Republicans unanimously opposed it for its tax surcharge on the wealthy and spending totals they said were too high.

The 51-49 vote fell well short of the 60 votes required under Senate procedures to start work on the bill. Every Republican opposed the president, as did Democrat Ben Nelson of Nebraska and former Democrat Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., who still aligns with the party.

Obama’s loss was anything but a surprise, but the White House and its Democratic allies continue to press popular ideas from Obama’s poll-tested jobs package in what Republicans say is nothing more than a bare-knuckle attempt to gain a political edge by invoking the mantra of jobs but doing little to seek compromise.

Full Story Here: Obama Infrastructure Plan: Senate GOP Blocks $60 Billion Measure.

Michael Moore to Democrats: Forget the Crazy White Guy

Liberal filmmaker Michael Moore slams the Democratic party for focusing too much attention on the demands of older, white male voters and too little attention on 18-to-29 year-olds, a critical demographic for Obama in the 2008 election. “Young people didn’t come out in 2010,” says Moore, “because they don’t take bullshit. You promise them something, you’d better do it.”

—–

Here Comes Trouble: Stories from My Life is an unflinchingly honest, take-no-prisoners ride through the life of Oscar-winning filmmaker and bestselling author Michael Moore. Moore shares far-ranging, irreverent, and stranger-than-fiction vignettes from his early life. One moment he’s an 11-year-old boy lost in the Senate and found by Bobby Kennedy; and in the next, he’s inside the Bitburg cemetery with Ronald Reagan. At 17, he goes to get a snack and ends up on the news, creating a firestorm that helps eliminate racial discrimination at private establishments across America. Funny, eye-opening, and moving, it’s the book he has been writing and living his entire life. – Sixth & I Historic Synagogue

Michael Moore is an Academy Award-winning American filmmaker, author and liberal political commentator. He is the director and producer of Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11, and Sicko, three of the top five highest-grossing documentaries of all time. In September 2008, he released his first free movie on the Internet, Slacker Uprising, documenting his personal crusade to encourage more Americans to vote in presidential elections. He has also written and starred in the TV shows “TV Nation” and “The Awful Truth.” Moore is a self-described liberal who has criticized globalization, large corporations, assault weapon ownership, the Iraq War, U.S. President George W. Bush and the American health care system in his written and cinematic works. In 2005, Time magazine named him one of the world’s 100 most influential people.

Full Story Here: Michael Moore to Democrats: Forget the Crazy White Guy – YouTube.

The Median Net Worth Of A Member Of Congress Is Five Times Higher Than The Median American Household

Part of the reason the richest 1 percent of Americans have captured our politics is because they are able to finance political races, issue campaigns, and lobbyists. But the other reason some of the richest Americans have been able to control our politics is because they themselves have gotten elected to positions of power at a much higher rate than the rest of us.

As Roll Call points out today, the estimated median net worth for a member of Congress in 2010 was $513,000 (this is strictly an estimate as assets are reported in ranges). Meanwhile, the Center for Economic and Policy Research’s David Rosnick points out that the net worth of the median household in the United States that same year was closer to $100,000:

For Congress, the median net worth in 2010 was about $513,000. For regular households, the Federal Reserve Board pegged that number at about $120,000 in 2008, and that number this year is probably around $100,000, [said economist David Rosnick]. While it is hard to make an exact comparison between Congress and the rest of the nation, what is clear is lawmakers “are all a lot richer than anything you would call a typical American,” Rosnick said.

Full Story Here: The Median Net Worth Of A Member Of Congress Is Five Times Higher Than The Median American Household | ThinkProgress.

Citizens United Going Down? Democrats Introduce Constitutional Amendment To Overturn Ruling

The Supreme Court may treat corporations like people who can spend whatever they want on elections, but the American people don’t have to accept it, said Democratic senators who proposed a constitutional amendment Tuesday to retake control of campaign spending.

The amendment, introduced by Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), doesn’t directly address the justices’ legal finding that corporations have a right to free speech that was curtailed by election law. Instead, it would add to the Constitution language that says Congress and the states can regulate campaign contributions and expenditures.

The amendment would effectively reverse two landmark Supreme Court decisions — the 1976 ruling in Buckley v. Valeo, which said spending money in elections is a form of speech, and the 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which ruled it unconstitutional to regulate the money spent to influence elections by corporations and unions.

Full Story Here: Citizens United Going Down? Democrats Introduce Constitutional Amendment To Overturn Ruling.

Maxine Waters (D-CA) has introduced a bill to repeal the supercommittee

House Democrats Upset With Supercommittee Negotiations |

As we’ve been reporting, Democrats on the supercommittee—led by Senator Max Baucus—are pursuing a “grand bargain” on deficit reduction, which would include tax increases, spending cuts, a new round of economic stimulus and steep cuts to both Medicare and Social Security. Republicans have rejected the deal in favor of their own, which basically includes all of the cuts and does not include tax increases nor stimulus spending.

But several Democratic members of the House are increasingly upset with how supercommittee Democrats are carrying out the negotiations, and are threatening to vote against a package that includes deep cuts to the safety net. Some are even planning an attempt to get rid of the supercommittee altogether.

Representative Maxine Waters of California has introduced a bill to repeal the supercommittee, and the $1.2 trillion in cuts it’s mandated to make. She believes the committee is “illegitimate” and “borders on unconstitutional.”

Full Story Here: House Democrats Upset With Supercommittee Negotiations | The Nation.

Why are Bikes Being Targeted by Congress?

How in the the world can biking and walking be controversial?

They’re good exercise, fun to do and—as an alternative to driving everywhere—help us save money and the environment. Both biking and walking are increasingly popular for transportation and recreation today, thanks in large part to a recent flowering of federally-funded trails, bikeways and pathways that make getting around on two wheels and two feet safer and more convenient.

But in these antagonistic political times, bikers and walkers are now targets of controversy for some members of Congress. In September, Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn proposed stripping all designated federal funding for bike and pedestrian projects from the pending Transportation Bill. After an outpouring of opposition from citizens coast-to-coast, Coburn withdrew his amendment.

Now bicyclists and pedestrians are under attack again, this time in an amendment from Kentucky Senator Rand Paul. He wants to redirect every last penny of money dedicated to bicycling and walking to bridge repair instead.

Full Story Here: Shareable: Why are Bikes Being Targeted by Congress?.

Elizabeth Warren Clears The Field, As Last Major Primary Competitor Drops Bid

Flush with money, media attention and national support for her Senate primary bid in Massachusetts, Elizabeth Warren had perhaps the biggest breakthrough in her campaign so far on Wednesday. She cleared the primary field.

Alan Khazei, the only major primary candidate still competing with Warren for the Democratic nomination to take on Sen. Scott Brown (R), announced that he was withdrawing from the race, according to the Boston Globe.

Khazei, a well-known social entrepreneur, had an uphill battle ahead of him. He trailed Warren in terms of campaign donations. And with the base of the party fascinated by Warren’s candidacy and national Democrats privately cheering on the longtime consumer advocate, Khazei had little to no hope of breaking through.

Full Story Here: Elizabeth Warren Clears The Field, As Last Major Primary Competitor Drops Bid.

Why OWS Is the Next Republican Boogeyman

Thom Hartmann :-:

The Boogeyman is dead, and Santa is dying.

The Republicans have been, since the 1930s, the party of the Boogeyman. They led the fear-based crusades against Communists, first with the Blacklist, then Joe McCarthy’s hearings, then the twin fears of Communist Mao and the Communist USSR. With the death of the Soviet Union, and the corporate embrace of still-Communist China, 9/11 let them turn their fears to “radical Islam.”

But when President Obama killed Bin Laden, it took the steam out of their movement. And to make matters worse, Obama had earlier gone to Egypt and said, in essence, “Tear down these dictators!” – helping spark the Arab Spring and totally deflating the Republican fear machine, which now sputters along on the fringes trembling about Bachmann’s gays, Santorum’s fertilized eggs, and Perry’s immigrants. The likelihood of Mormon Romney’s presidential candidacy means they can’t even add “God” to their traditional “Gays, Guns, and God” trinity of GOP fears.

Without something or someone to be afraid of, the Republicans are truly lost, wandering in the wilderness. And no matter how hard they try to gin up fear of the “dreaded deficit bomb,” it just doesn’t make Americans jump the way the USSR’s nukes did two generations ago, or 9/11 did a decade ago. So now they’re trying to whip up fear of the Occupy Wall Street folks, but so far OWS has the sympathy of average Americans; it’s just not working for the Republicans.

But the Democrats aren’t doing much better.

Full Story Here: Why OWS Is the Next Republican Boogeyman | Common Dreams.

Kathy Bates I Want Obama ‘To Stand Up on His Hind Legs and Fight These Rat Bastards’

Kathy Bates speaking from the heart.Who is the bank,who is behind all this?

Full Story Here: Kathy Bates I Want Obama ‘To Stand Up on His Hind Legs and Fight These Rat Bastards’ nb.org – YouTube.

Who Stole the Election?

Dominating many state legislatures, Republicans have launched a full-on assault on voting rights.

When Charles Webster was a member of the Maine House during the 1980s and 1990s, he and his Republican colleagues routinely proposed bills that would create restrictive voting laws—or, as Webster sees it, legislation to tamp down on the rampant threat of voter fraud. “Every year we tried to solve this problem,” he says, “and it was always a partisan vote,” with Democrats supporting laws intended to increase turnout. As a result, Webster says, “We have one of the most loosey-goosey, lax election laws in the country.”

Others would call Maine’s voting laws a striking success. Most states struggle to get citizens to the polls; national turnout for a presidential election hasn’t topped 60 percent since 1968, and turnout for midterm elections hovers in the 30s. That puts the United States far below the participation level in other Western democracies. Yet for the past four decades, Maine has stood apart. With an array of regulations that encourage voting—the state has allowed voters to register on Election Day since 1973—Maine consistently places among the top five states for turnout. Seventy-two percent of the eligible population voted in 2008 when Barack Obama carried the state.

Republicans like Webster, who now chairs the state GOP, argue that too many people are voting in the state—at least, too many illegal immigrants, out-of-state college students, and people who live in hotels. “What I don’t want is somebody coming in stealing elections who doesn’t live in the town,” Webster says.

Full Story Here: Who Stole the Election?.

Bring Back the Glass-Steagall Act

In the summer of 1991 I got a call from Rep. Ed Markey’s office. Markey wanted me to come back to Washington to testify at a hearing, and oppose the repeal of the Depression era Glass-Steagall Act.

The act was passed in the wake of the Wall Street and banking collapse that led to the last Great Depression, barring commercial banks from speculating in the stock markets.

In order to get people to put their money back in banks they no longer trusted, congress also established the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) insuring the safety of their deposits.

Full Story Here: Bring Back the Glass-Steagall Act | The Smirking Chimp.

Not an Employee? Herman Cain Had Mailing and Email Addresses at Koch’s Americans For Prosperity HQ

Cain’s campaign staff say he wasn’t an employee of the Tea Party group founded by David Koch. But he did have a desk and an email address at its headquarters.

As the New Yorker‘s Jane Mayer wrote earlier this week, members of Herman Cain’s campaign staff are loath to discuss his longstanding ties to Americans for Prosperity and the Americans for Prosperity Foundation, the organizing groups founded by billionaire David Koch, about whom Mayer famously wrote a comprehensive profile last year. AlterNet, which began reporting on Cain’s ties to Koch last June, has learned that Cain’s work for AFP at one time had all the appearances of a staff position.

In Mayer’s 2010 exposé, “Covert Operations,” she detailed the network of right-wing think tanks and organizations funded by David Koch and his brother Charles, principals in Koch Industries, the second-largest privately held company in the United States, according to Forbes.

Now, Mayer has turned her gaze to the ties between Koch and Cain, seeking to find out how much Cain earned from Americans for Prosperity and its foundation, and whether or not Cain has ever been considered an employee of either entity. She writes:

Full Story Here: Not an Employee? Herman Cain Had Mailing and Email Addresses at Koch’s Americans For Prosperity HQ | Tea Party and the Right | AlterNet.

Another federal judge slot opens for Obama

U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer says he will transfer to senior status with a limited caseload by the end of the year, creating another vacancy on the federal bench in San Francisco.

Breyer, 69, younger brother of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, was appointed by President Bill Clinton in 1997. A San Francisco native, he attended Lowell High, Harvard and UC Berkeley law school and was a Legal Aid lawyer and a prosecutor in San Francisco.

As a judge, he presided over the trial of prominent marijuana advocate Ed Rosenthal, barred him from using California’s medical marijuana law in his defense and then sentenced him to a day in jail after his conviction in 2003. Another ruling in 2007 blocked the Bush administration from enforcing its requirement that employers fire workers whose identification documents did not match Social Security records.

Full Story Here: Another federal judge slot opens for Obama.

BREAKING: League of Women Voters Files Suit to Block WI’s New Polling Place Photo ID Restriction

Just in from Reuters…

The League of Women Voters sued on Thursday to block a new Wisconsin law requiring voters to present identification such as a drivers license at polling places, saying it would disenfranchise eligible voters.

The lawsuit, filed in Dane County Circuit Court, argues the state constitution allows only convicted felons and the mentally incompetent to be excluded from voting.

The new law creates a third class of people, those who do not have ID, said Andrea Kaminski, Wisconsin League of Women Voters Executive Director. Critics of the law say it would mainly affect minorities and the elderly, who may not have ID.

Full Story Here: The BRAD BLOG : BREAKING: League of Women Voters Files Suit to Block WI’s New Polling Place Photo ID Restriction.

Super Committee Keeps Negotiations Under Wraps

The congressional super committee tasked with reshaping the social contract between the government and the American people has not had a public meeting since the middle of last month. The next public hearing, meanwhile, is scheduled for October 26th, more than a month after last one was held. On Wednesday, the Gang of Six, which also conducted much of its deliberation behind closed doors, met privately with the super committee members.

As the panel’s opacity becomes more conspicuous, centrist advocates have begun to defend the necessity of shielding the public from its decision-making process. “[G]reater openness by the panel, officially known as the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, would actually be harmful to the public interest. Private meetings are essential to give the committee’s six Republicans and six Democrats the freedom to step away from party orthodoxies, conduct serious negotiations and search for common ground, rather than engage in political posturing,” wrote Jordan Tama in a widely read New York Times op-ed Wednesday.

The fundamental problem that the committee faces is that it is attempting to pass legislation that is widely opposed by the American people. Large majorities are against cutting Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid or other elements of the social safety net. There is similarly little appetite for significant tax increases on the middle class. The only deficit cutting provisions that are palatable to broad swaths of the American electorate — cuts to the Pentagon and tax hikes on the wealthy — are fiercely opposed by key power centers in Washington.

Full Story Here: Super Committee Keeps Negotiations Under Wraps.

Michael P. McDonald: Ohio Democrats Move to Block Republican Congressional Gerrymander

Cincinnati.com reports that Friday evening, the Ohio Supreme Court ruled in a unanimous decision that Democrats can proceed with a petition gathering drive to place a referendum on the November 2012 ballot that would overturn the state’s Republican congressional gerrymander. (The Court is composed of 6 Republicans and 1 Democrat.) If the petition drive is successful, it would be up to a court to decide if the state government’s adopted Republican gerrymander will be used for the 2012 congressional elections.

Ohio Democratic Party actions have important consequences for the battle to control the House of Representatives in 2012. Working with Draw the Line Ohio, I enabled an analysis of the partisan consequences of the Republican map indicating that Republicans would be favored to win in 12 of the 16 congressional districts. The Ohio Republican gerrymander is of similar caliber to those adopted by Republicans who control the redistricting process in other key states by virtue of their 2010 victories in state government elections. For the most part, these Republican gerrymanders seek to lock in Republican gains in the 2012 election. Blocking the Ohio Republican gerrymander will move the needle in the Democratic direction for control of the House of Representatives, perhaps by as much as four seats if a court institutes a fair map.

Full Story Here: Michael P. McDonald: Ohio Democrats Move to Block Republican Congressional Gerrymander.

Clinton vs Obama: All About The Money

Melissa Harris-Perry says that whatever complaints progressives may have against Barack Obama, he’s certainly not a less progressive president than Bill Clinton. And yet Obama is less popular than Clinton, a situation she attributes to racial bias:

President Obama has experienced a swift and steep decline in support among white Americans—from 61 percent in 2009 to 33 percent now. I believe much of that decline can be attributed to their disappointment that choosing a black man for president did not prove to be salvific for them or the nation. His record is, at the very least, comparable to that of President Clinton, who was enthusiastically re-elected. The 2012 election is a test of whether Obama will be held to standards never before imposed on an incumbent. If he is, it may be possible to read that result as the triumph of a more subtle form of racism.

I really don’t think that’s right. The salient difference between Clinton and Obama is that the economy did much better under Bill Clinton:

Full Story Here: Clinton vs Obama: All About The Money | ThinkProgress.

The Woman Who Knew Too Much

Millions of Americans hoped President Obama would nominate Elizabeth Warren to head the consumer financial watchdog agency she had created. Instead, she was pushed aside. As Warren kicks off her run for Scott Brown’s Senate seat in Massachusetts, Suzanna Andrews charts the Harvard professor’s emergence as a champion of the beleaguered middle class, and her fight against a powerful alliance of bankers, lobbyists, and politicians.

n the afternoon of July 18, in remarks from the Rose Garden amid the bruising showdown with congressional Republicans over the debt ceiling, President Obama made what the White House billed as a simple “personnel announcement.” In a brief speech, the president announced that he was nominating Richard Cordray, the former attorney general of Ohio, to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the new government agency set up to protect consumers from abusive lending practices. In his remarks he described the agency, part of the massive 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, as creating “the strongest consumer protections in history,” set up “so ordinary people were dealt with fairly.” After which he turned to thank the woman standing to his right, Elizabeth Warren.

A Harvard law professor, one of the nation’s leading bankruptcy experts and consumer advocates, the 62-year-old Warren had come up with the idea for the agency in 2007. She had advised the Obama administration on its creation in the aftermath of the 2008 financial collapse and helped to push it through Congress. Warren had also spent the last 10 months working tirelessly to build the agency from scratch—hiring its staff of 500, including Richard Cordray, organizing its management structure, and getting the C.F.P.B. up and running for its opening on July 21.

Full Story Here: The Woman Who Knew Too Much | Politics | Vanity Fair.

Joe Miklosi Looks To Redistricting For Takeover Of Conservative Colorado District

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is banking on a mix of good recruitment and a little bit of luck to win back the House in 2012. And in the case of Joe Miklosi, they’re leaning on luck.

Miklosi, a liberal Colorado state representative in the running to unseat Tea Party-backed Rep. Mike Coffman, is anticipating a federal district court ruling in the coming weeks that will redraw his district to include more Democrats. The courts had to step in to resolve the state’s redistricting efforts after the legislature failed to reach an agreement following the 2010 census.

Under Democrats’ proposed map, Miklosi’s 6th congressional district would be nudged into a more progressive area outside of Denver. While it remains to be seen how the court will rule on a final redistricting plan, Miklosi notes the judge overseeing the case was appointed by a Democrat and many of the lead lawyers in the case are Democrats who have argued before the judge for years. And in the likely event the GOP appeals a ruling in favor of a map drawn by Democrats to the state Supreme Court, Miklosi says that court is also heavily Democratic and expected to side with the district judge.

Full Story Here: Joe Miklosi Looks To Redistricting For Takeover Of Conservative Colorado District.

Obama Has One Last Chance to Redeem Himself — Will He Sell Out to Big Oil?

To stay on top of important articles like these, sign up to receive the latest updates from TomDispatch.com here.

For connoisseurs, Barack Obama’s fundraising emails for the 2012 election campaign seem just a tad forlorn — slightly limp reminders of the last time ‘round.

Four years ago at this time, the early adopters among us were just starting to get used to the regular flow of email from the Obama campaign. The missives were actually exciting to get, because they seemed less like appeals for money than a chance to join a movement.

Sometimes they came with inspirational videos from Camp Obama, especially the volunteer training sessions staged by organizing guru Marshall Ganz. Here’s a favorite of mine, where a woman invokes Bobby Kennedy and Cesar Chavez and says that, as the weekend went on, she “felt her heart softening,” her cynicism “melting,” her determination building. I remember that feeling, and I remember clicking time and again to send another $50 off to fund that people-powered mission. (And I recall knocking on a lot of New Hampshire doors, too, with my 14-year-old daughter.)

Full Story Here: Obama Has One Last Chance to Redeem Himself — Will He Sell Out to Big Oil? | AlterNet.

Amy Goodman: A New Bush Era or a Push Era?

Amy Goodman

Back when Barack Obama was still just a U.S. senator running for president, he told a group of donors in a New Jersey suburb, “Make me do it.” He was borrowing from President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who used the same phrase (according to Harry Belafonte, who heard the story directly from Eleanor Roosevelt) when responding to legendary union organizer A. Philip Randolph’s demand for civil rights for African-Americans.

While President Obama has made concession after concession to both the corporate-funded tea party and his Wall Street donors, now that he is again in campaign mode, his progressive critics are being warned not to attack him, as that might aid and abet the Republican bid for the White House.

Enter the 99 percenters. The Occupy Wall Street ranks continue to grow, inspiring more than 1,000 solidarity protests around the country and the globe. After weeks, and one of the largest mass arrests in U.S. history, Obama finally commented: “I think people are frustrated, and the protesters are giving voice to a more broad-based frustration about how our financial system works.” But neither he nor his advisers—or the Republicans—know what to do with this burgeoning mass movement.

Full Story Here: Amy Goodman: A New Bush Era or a Push Era? – Truthdig.

Effort to recall Wis. Gov. Walker to start Nov. 15

An effort to recall Republican Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker over his contentious union rights law will begin Nov. 15, Democrats announced Monday, meaning an election could be held as early as next spring.

Wisconsin Democratic Party Chairman Mike Tate said on the party’s website that recall petitions will be circulated starting Nov. 15, giving supporters of the effort until Jan. 13 to collect 540,208 signatures.

Walker has become a national hero to many Republicans and conservatives and is a hot ticket on the fundraising and speaking circuit. But he is the top target for unions and Democrats as he became the face of the anti-union movement this year with his proposal that took away nearly all collective bargaining rights from most public workers.

Full Story Here: The Associated Press: Effort to recall Wis. Gov. Walker to start Nov. 15.

The Wall Street Occupiers and the Democratic Party

Robert Reich :-:

Will the Wall Street Occupiers morph into a movement that has as much impact on the Democratic Party as the Tea Party has had on the GOP? Maybe. But there are reasons for doubting it.

Tea Partiers have been a mixed blessing for the GOP establishment – a source of new ground troops and energy but also a pain in the assets with regard to attracting independent voters. As Rick Perry and Mitt Romney square off, that pain will become more evident.

So far the Wall Street Occupiers have helped the Democratic Party. Their inchoate demand that the rich pay their fair share is tailor-made for the Democrats’ new plan for a 5.6 percent tax on millionaires, as well as the President’s push to end the Bush tax cut for people with incomes over $250,000 and to limit deductions at the top.

Full Story Here: The Wall Street Occupiers and the Democratic Party | Common Dreams.

Don’t Mistake Occupy Wall Street for Team Obama

Occupation Up, Obama Down

The mushrooming Occupy Wall Street protests, now on the verge of spreading to more than 1,000 cities and towns across the U.S. and beyond, may have come of age this week.

But the second most interesting number (apart from the anger-tracking figures updated at OccupyTogether.org) is 38 per cent — President Barack Obama’s approval rating, according to the latest Gallup survey.

Occupation up, Obama down. It’s an equation the White House is desperate to change, as the Democratic machine grapples with how best to harness the progressive populist uprising to generate electoral energy for November 2012.

Full Story Here: Don’t Mistake Occupy Wall Street for Team Obama | Common Dreams.

State for Sale: How the GOP practices politics

The New Yorker:-:

A conservative multimillionaire has taken control in North Carolina, one of 2012’s top battlegrounds.

n the spring of 2010, the conservative political strategist Ed Gillespie flew from Washington, D.C., to Raleigh, North Carolina, to spend a day laying the groundwork for REDMAP, a new project aimed at engineering a Republican takeover of state legislatures. Gillespie hoped to help his party get control of statehouses where congressional redistricting was pending, thereby leveraging victories in cheap local races into a means of shifting the balance of power in Washington. It was an ingenious plan, and Gillespie is a skilled tactician—he once ran the Republican National Committee—but REDMAP seemed like a long shot in North Carolina. Barack Obama carried the state in 2008 and remained popular. The Republicans hadn’t controlled both houses of the North Carolina General Assembly for more than a century. (“Not since General Sherman,” a state politico joked to me.) That day in Raleigh, though, Gillespie had lunch with an ideal ally: James Arthur (Art) Pope, the chairman and C.E.O. of Variety Wholesalers, a discount-store conglomerate. The Raleigh News and Observer had called Pope, a conservative multimillionaire, the Knight of the Right. The REDMAP project offered Pope a new way to spend his money.

That fall, in the remote western corner of the state, John Snow, a retired Democratic judge who had represented the district in the State Senate for three terms, found himself subjected to one political attack after another. Snow, who often voted with the Republicans, was considered one of the most conservative Democrats in the General Assembly, and his record reflected the views of his constituents. His Republican opponent, Jim Davis—an orthodontist loosely allied with the Tea Party—had minimal political experience, and Snow, a former college football star, was expected to be reëlected easily. Yet somehow Davis seemed to have almost unlimited money with which to assail Snow.

Full Story Here: Art Pope, Citizens United, and North Carolina Politics : The New Yorker.

Democrat wins West Virginia governor’s race

Democrat Earl Ray Tomblin overcame weeks of Republican attack ads to win the West Virginia governor’s race Tuesday, successfully distancing himself from the Obama administration and the president’s health care plan.

Tomblin, who has been acting governor for the past year, will finish the final year of a term left vacant by Joe Manchin, a well-liked governor who stepped down after he won a U.S. Senate seat.

The race was fraught with negative ads from both sides and narrowed in the final weeks. The national parties spent millions of dollars on each campaign.

With 65 percent of precincts reporting, Tomblin had 50 percent of the vote compared with Maloney’s 46 percent, according to unofficial results.

Full Story Here: The Associated Press: Democrat wins West Virginia governor’s race.

Secular group: 27 secret atheists in Congress

The president of a secular group says that there are 28 members of Congress who do not believe in God, but only one of them feels comfortable revealing his lack of faith.

Secular Coalition of America (SCA) president Herb Silverman told The Guardian that his group was aware of many members of Congress who weren’t ready to make their non-beliefs known.

“Privately, we know that there are 27 other members of Congress that have no belief in God,” Silverman claimed. “But we don’t ‘out’ people.”

Full Story Here: Secular group: 27 secret atheists in Congress | The Raw Story.

Meet The 4 Democratic Senators Who Are Refusing To Raise Taxes On The Rich

Meet the four Democratic Senators who are so worried about their own reelection campaigns that they are refusing to raise taxes on the wealthy.

Yesterday, I wrote an article based on Sen. Dick Durbin telling a local Chicago radio station that some Democrats in the Senate are refusing to raise taxes on the wealthy in an election year. At the time of publication, I didn’t have the names of the Democrats who won’t raise taxes on the rich, but I do now.

Lots of commenters wanted the names and contact information for the Un-Fantastic Four, so here they are.

1). Sen. Bob Casey -Email Twitter

2). Sen. Mary Landrieu- Email

3). Sen. Kay Hagan- Email Twitter

4). Sen. Joe Manchin- Email Twitter

Full Story Here: Meet The 4 Democratic Senators Who Are Refusing To Raise Taxes On The Rich.

Christie Team Assessing How Fast a 2012 Campaign Could Be Mounted

Chris Christie’s political advisers are working to determine whether they could move fast enough to set up effective political operations in Iowa and New Hampshire in the wake of a relentless courtship aimed at persuading Mr. Christie, the governor of New Jersey, to plunge into the race for the Republican presidential nomination, according to operatives briefed on the preparations.

Mr. Christie has not yet decided whether to run and has not authorized the start of a full-fledged campaign operation. But with the governor now seriously considering getting in, his strategists — many of them veterans of Rudolph W. Giuliani’s 2008 campaign — are internally assessing the financial and logistical challenges of mounting a race with less than 100 days until voting is likely to begin.

Those challenges include not only raising money, but also spending it effectively in the crucial states with early primaries. That would mean meeting filing deadlines, hiring staff members, recruiting volunteers, putting together a travel schedule for Mr. Christie and his surrogates and devising a media campaign.

Full Story Here: Christie Team Assessing How Fast a 2012 Campaign Could Be Mounted – NYTimes.com.

OPS: And how pissed is Romney right now? LOL. And Jeb is still waiting in the wings……

Democrats Reportedly Want Tax Hikes To Be First Item Negotiated In Deficit-Reduction Discussions

Democrats want tax hikes to be the first item negotiated in “super committee” deficit-reduction talks, trying to force Republicans to confront an issue at the heart of this year’s budget fights, sources told Reuters.

The tough stance by Democratic members of the powerful 12-member congressional panel reflects the party’s wariness that Republicans might try to sideline the issue of revenue increases in the negotiations.

“They’ve raised the idea of doing taxes first,” a Republican aide involved in the discussions said Friday on condition of anonymity.

The panel has the task of finding ways of cutting the U.S. deficit by at least $1.2 trillion over 10 years. If it fails to agree on a plan by Nov. 23, automatic spending cuts will be triggered, beginning in 2013.

Full Story Here: Super Congress Talks: Democrats Reportedly Want Tax Hikes To Be First Item Negotiated In Deficit-Reduction Discussions.

Poll: Americans See Republicans As Only Interested In Helping The ‘Haves’ | ThinkProgress

Almost half of all respondents to a new Washington Post poll say Republicans in Congress are doing more to help the “haves” than “have nots,” with fewer than a third saying the GOP treats both sides equally. A tiny 7 percent say Republican lawmakers are helping the have-nots. For contrast, a plurality say President Obama treats society’s “haves” and “have-nots” about equally. The Post’s Peyton M. Craighill and Jon Cohen compiled this table:

Full Story Here: Poll: Americans See Republicans As Only Interested In Helping The ‘Haves’ | ThinkProgress.

Gov. Brown To State Lawmakers: Thanks For Mountain Lion Taxidermy Bill, Now Please Pass Clean Energy Jobs Legislation

Today, Gov. Jerry Brown (D-CA) signed a bill to allow mountain lions to be stuffed and displayed. Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle, perhaps in a celebration of this recent viral video hit, overwhelmingly supported the measure. Brown thanked the legislature for this “presumably important bill,” but asked the state Senate extend the same “energetic bipartisan spirit” to passing clean energy jobs legislation. View a copy of the statement from the governor’s office below:

Full Story Here: Gov. Brown To State Lawmakers: Thanks For Mountain Lion Taxidermy Bill, Now Please Pass Clean Energy Jobs Legislation | ThinkProgress.

Draft House Appropriations Bill Removes Planned Parenthood Funding

Earlier this week Congressman Cliff Stearns, the Florida Republican who chairs a House oversight subcommittee, announced a witch hunt on Planned Parenthood demanding reams of documents for a politically motivated fishing expedition. Now House Labor, Health, and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Rehberg has gone even further with drafted legislation that prohibits any funds going to Planned Parenthood unless they stop providing abortions entirely.

EMILY’s List alum, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (CT-3),Ranking Member on the Labor, Education, Health, and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee, blew the whistle on this sneaky tactic and issued the following response to the draft legislation.

Full Story Here: EMILY’s List: BREAKING NEWS: Draft House Appropriations Bill Removes Planned Parenthood Funding.

Red money, blue money: The making of the 2012 campaign

Two wealthy tribes will decide the political messages we hear — and the ones we won’t

The hidden infrastructure of the 2012 campaign has already been built.

A handful of so-called Super PACs, enabled to collect unlimited donations by the continued erosion of campaign finance regulations, are expected to rival the official campaign organizations in importance this election. In many cases, these groups are acting essentially as outside arms of the campaigns.

These are America’s best-funded political factions, their war chests filled by some of the richest men (and almost all are men) in the country.

More than 80 percent of giving to Super PACs so far has come from just 58 donors, according to the Center for Responsive Politics analysis of the latest data, which covers the first half of 2011. The Republican groups have raised $17.6 million and the Democratic groups $7.6 million. Those numbers will balloon, with American Crossroads, the main Republican Super PAC, aiming to raise $240 million.)

Full Story Here: Red money, blue money: The making of the 2012 campaign – 2012 Elections – Salon.com.

Walker’s Chief Of Staff Resigns

Gov. Scott Walker’s chief of staff who helped guide the administration during the tumult over public-employee unions and passage of his first state budget is stepping down.

Keith Gilkes said he’ll leave the $112,000-per-year job as of Oct. 8 to return to his one-man business as a political consultant. Gilkes, 34, hinted the timing was linked to promised efforts to recall Walker over his push for sweeping changes that stripped away almost all public union collective bargain rights.

“What my responsibility will be is dusting off the old playbook. A little less than a year ago, I was working with the campaign as a campaign manager and now it gives me an opportunity to go back there, reconfigure some things, and put the team back together and be prepared for whatever may lay ahead, whether it be a year from now or three years from now,” Gilkes told 12 News reporter Kent Wainscott Friday afternoon.

Full Story Here: Walker’s Chief Of Staff Resigns – Politics News Story – WISN Milwaukee.

Rick Perry, Conservative? or Corporatist?

Ian Fletcher :=:

 Disappointment is a bipartisan game. Most conservatives realized by the end of George W. Bush’s term that he was a political faker. Sure, he put on a nice conservative act, but his record in office –on spending, immigration, and other issues dear to the conservative heart—made clear that he was really a water boy for multinational corporate interests that care little for the United States. As Jefferson observed, “Merchants have no country. The mere spot they stand on does not constitute so strong an attachment as that from which they draw their gains.”

But that cowboy hat vaudeville act was so successful in gulling the Republican electorate that the corporate-dominated Republican establishment seems to have decided to give it another try.  They don’t seem to have quite settled on Rick Perry yet, and indeed there are reports they have serious reservations, but he’s definitely been auditioning.

Now this man must be not only conservative, but a real hard-core right wing patriot! We have photographic proof because he waved a gun over his head in public! Gosh. That proves he’s no liberal. Liberals can’t stand the man! And didn’t he even mention the word “secession” once or twice?

Sorry, folks. It’s all posturing, posturing, and more posturing.

If it makes conservative readers feel any better, liberals fell for the same trick, albeit from the other direction, when they elected President Obama.  I mean, a black person—even one who got more money from Goldman Sachs and its employees than John McCain—must be different, right? He couldn’t possibly be the same old stuff in a new package, could he?  Our rulers aren’t cynical people who would stoop to such a trick, after all.

The best way to get a handle on where Rick Perry’s real political heart lies is to look at his list of $100,000-plus donors (courtesy of the Texas Ethics Commission, collated by the liberal group Texans for Public Justice).  These are the footprints of crony capitalism, also known as corporatism.  No comment on the following list is needed; just peruse it and see what impression it leaves you with.

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…

Ian Fletcher is Senior Economist of the Coalition for a Prosperous America, a nationwide grass-roots organization dedicated to fixing America’s trade policies and comprising representatives from business, agriculture, and labor. He was previously Research Fellow at the U.S. Business and Industry Council, a Washington think tank, and before that, an economist in private practice serving mainly hedge funds and private equity firms. Educated at Columbia University and the University of Chicago, he lives in San Francisco. He is the author of Free Trade Doesn’t Work: What Should Replace It and Why.

Diebold voting machines can be hacked by remote control

Exclusive: A laboratory shows how an e-voting machine used by a third of all voters can be easily manipulated

It could be one of the most disturbing e-voting machine hacks to date.

Voting machines used by as many as a quarter of American voters heading to the polls in 2012 can be hacked with just $10.50 in parts and an 8th grade science education, according to computer science and security experts at the Vulnerability Assessment Team at Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois. The experts say the newly developed hack could change voting results while leaving absolutely no trace of the manipulation behind.

“We believe these man-in-the-middle attacks are potentially possible on a wide variety of electronic voting machines,” said Roger Johnston, leader of the assessment team “We think we can do similar things on pretty much every electronic voting machine.”

Full Story Here: Diebold voting machines can be hacked by remote control – 2012 Elections – Salon.com.

Obama must face meaningful Democratic primaries

| Ralph Nader

Only a slate of serious candidates can oblige the president to listen to his loyal Democratic base as he runs for re-election

America’s two-party dictatorship – a model unknown in any other western country – keeps reinventing the ways it closes doors not just on third party candidates but on any challenges to their incumbent presidents within the party’s primaries.

Now, it is the turn of the Democrats to make a mockery out of the first amendment rights of others to speak, assemble and petition their government by running inside the upcoming presidential primary season that runs from January to June 2012. After President Obama took his liberal/progressive base for so many one-sided corporatist rides in his administration, he and his allies are very determined to give him a free ride by having him campaign around the country on Air Force One as an unchallenged, one-man primary.

This tedious scenario would have his supporters watch President Obama repeatedly respond, on his omnipresent teleprompter, to the crazed Republicans and their issues – instead of offering a ringing affirmation for his second term of the neglected majoritarian liberal/progressive agendas.

Full Story Here: Obama must face meaningful Democratic primaries | Ralph Nader | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.

Senate agrees to deal that would avert government shutdown

Senate leaders reached an agreement Monday evening that is almost certain to avert a federal government shutdown, a prospect that had flared up as congressional leaders fought over disaster relief funds.

The new pact, which the Senate approved 79 to 12 and the House is expected to ratify next week, will keep federal agencies open until Nov. 18 at a level of spending that represents a 1.5 percent cut from this year’s levels. After days of brinkmanship with both sides blaming the other for any potential shutdown, Senate leaders agreed to a compromise that provides less money for disaster relief than Democrats sought, but also strips away spending cuts that Republicans had advanced.

“It will be a win for everyone,” Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) said.

Full Story Here: Senate agrees to deal that would avert government shutdown – The Washington Post.

Rick Perry, the Man from Huawei

Ian Fletcher :-:

I have written previously about how Mitt Romney has offered a glimmer of hope as a presidential candidate who may—if he’s serious, which is a big “if”—implement a real solution to America’s trade crisis if elected.

Translation: stand up to China, on currency manipulation, intellectual property theft, and a long list of other unfair trade practices. I’m currently talking to various people, including his campaign, in an effort to determine whether he’s sincere or not, and I’ll let you know what I find out if I discover anything.

What I have discovered so far is that, of all the Republican candidates who have a shot at winning, Rick Perry is probably the worst on trade. His enthusiasm for NAFTA is well-known already, so I’d like to talk instead about his dangerous and less well-known naiveté about China.

As documented by serious China observers like the Tokyo-based journalist Eamonn Fingleton (whose book I reviewed here), Beijing has a deliberate strategy of penetrating the U.S. political system by leveraging Chinese economic power. Resisting this is, in fact, one of America’s key foreign-policy challenges for the years ahead.

Beijing uses corporations under its control (every major company in China, given its state-capitalist economy) to indirectly grant or withhold favors to American politicians.  This can mean everything from jobs for their home states to lucrative personal investment opportunities to outright bribes.

This problem first emerged in American politics in the Clinton years (remember Al Gore’s Buddhist monks with shopping bags of cash?) and it has continued to worsen as China has become richer and more internationally aggressive.

Some politicians who play this game are outright crooks who know what’s up. (I must assume Clinton knew.) Others are merely seduced by the easy money, which often comes in forms which are at first not actually illegal.  But it’s a progressive game, and by the time they realize the game being played, it’s too late. They have become too dependent, if not too outright legally compromised, to turn back.

It is in this vein that we should look with concern at Gov. Perry’s relationship with the giant Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei (pronounced “Hwah-way”) Communications. To be fair, I have no way to know which of the above categories Gov. Perry falls into. But even if he is merely naïve and careless about expediency, this does not bode well for a Perry presidency.

Some of the payoffs from Huawei to Perry are no secret. For example, the firm decided in 2010 to put its U.S. headquarters in Plano, Texas.  Good for him: a few more jobs came to Texas, albeit partly at the expense of American telecom firms. Here’s a video of him praising the company at the opening of its new HQ; he apparently spent considerable effort cultivating a personal relationship with the firm’s management.

Here the soup starts to thicken.

First, some fairly trivial stuff: Gov. Perry has taken overseas junkets funded, by way of a non-profit called TexasOne, by Texas companies doing business in China. This is not illegal, but it risks undue influence by corporations at the mercy of, and thus doing the bidding of, Beijing. In the words of Craig McDonald, of the liberal watchdog group Texans for Public Justice,

I think it’s fraught with conflicts. Those members of TexasOne consistently want favors from Texas government and the governor’s office. … When those corporations send Perry and his family on a sweet vacation to China, it raises conflict-of-interest questions.

The more serious problem, however, is that Huawei is not just any company. According to analyses by both the Obama and Bush administrations, it is both deeply enmeshed in China’s military industrial complex and aggressive about pursuing political corruption abroad.

In 2005, a report from the respected Rand Corporation noted that  Huawei has “deep ties with the Chinese military, which serves a multi-faceted role as an important customer, as well as Huawei’s political patron and research and development partner.”

The U.S. Army’s Strategic Studies Institute documented, in a September 2007 report, how Huawei has engaged in deliberately corrupting practices in Argentina, specifically that it was  “known to bribe and trap clients.”  One favored tactic: the deliberate provision of illegal favors and gifts in order to obtain leverage for future blackmail.

The fact that Huawei is in the telecommunications business opens up a vast array of opportunities for undetectable eavesdropping on other nations’ phone calls and data. In 2009, the National Security Agency warned AT&T not to purchase Huawei equipment for a planned phone network. The NSA feared that Chinese intelligence could insert “digital trapdoors” into Huawei’s systems to secretly eavesdrop on Americans.  (AT&T ultimately chose other providers, though to this day it refuses to say why.)

Make no mistake.  This is not like partnering with a Russian caviar producer during the Cold War.  It is like letting Mikoyan Aircraft, builder of the famous Soviet MIG fighter jets, build avionics for Boeing and McDonnell Douglas.

In some ways, it is worse than during the Cold War, because China, as a state-capitalist rather than communist country, is far better equipped to wage successful economic warfare against the U.S.

Some American politicians are wising up to the threat of Huawei and companies like it.  In 2010, eight Republican senators asked the Obama administration to investigate its attempt to sell equipment for upgrading Sprint Nextel’s mobile phone and data network. The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS)—which rarely blocks foreign participation—ended up  nixing Huawei’s involvement. (CFIUS has now blocked the company in three cases.)

Huawei is not just another gang of crony-capitalist crooks. It is, because telecommunications are the nerve system of modern societies, a big part of China’s strategy to build its influence around the world.

Huawei’s global connections—including to anti-American regimes other than China—are impressive.  For example, it is reportedly aiming to take over the telecommunications system of Iran, a country with very limited digital technology of its own.  And American ally India recently accused several Huawei employees in their country of espionage and selling spy technology to the Taliban. One doesn’t have to be Tom Clancy to dream up scenarios of what kind of mischief this could lead to if the company has a tap installed on America’s phone lines.

Obviously, Rick Perry cannot be held responsible for everything Huawei does, or might do, all over the world.  But equally, his intimate involvement with them doesn’t exactly show good judgment for someone who aspires to be commander in chief of America’s national security.

We need a president who understands the dangerous new world of state capitalism, not one who offers to carry its bags.

Ian Fletcher is Senior Economist of the Coalition for a Prosperous America, a nationwide grass-roots organization dedicated to fixing America’s trade policies and comprising representatives from business, agriculture, and labor. He was previously Research Fellow at the U.S. Business and Industry Council, a Washington think tank, and before that, an economist in private practice serving mainly hedge funds and private equity firms. Educated at Columbia University and the University of Chicago, he lives in San Francisco. He is the author of Free Trade Doesn’t Work: What Should Replace It and Why.

5 Progressive Candidates To Watch As the 2012 Campaign Heats Up

Will Democrats take back Congress? Here are five candidates worth keeping an eye on as we get closer to Election 2012.

Watching the news lately, you’d think that Election 2012 was only between Republican candidates for president, each trying to outflank the next to his or her right.

The Republican primaries may be getting lots of attention, but several progressive candidates around the country are gearing up for races that could swing the Congress and put some control back in the hands of progressives.

It can be easy to despair when audiences at GOP debates cheer executions and boo gay soldiers, but the fight is far from over. With Barack Obama striking a new, more populist tone as election season nears, we should all remember that a lot can happen between now and next November. And attention early on for the good candidates can help ensure their success in primaries and general election campaigns alike.

Full Story Here: 5 Progressive Candidates To Watch As the 2012 Campaign Heats Up | | AlterNet.

Shutdown Closer as Senate Blocks Spending Bill

Washington – An impasse between the House and Senate over a bill to keep the government open after Sept. 30 and provide aid to natural disaster victims deepened Friday as the Senate easily shot down a House measure passed just hours before.

House members, considering their work done, headed home to their districts for a week’s recess, trailing uncertainty behind them since no resolution to the standoff appeared imminent. The Senate set a procedural vote for Monday evening in an effort to advance an alternative, but it was unclear whether it could draw sufficient support or whether Republican leaders would call members of the House back to consider it even if did pass the Senate.

The dispute meant that less than six months after the fiscal throwdown that left the government at the precipice of a shutdown last spring, Congress has brought the nation there again. While the government has until next Friday before it runs out of money, the $175 million in an emergency aid fund for disaster victims is set to run dry as early as Tuesday.

Full Story Here: Shutdown Closer as Senate Blocks Spending Bill | Truthout.

Reid: Obama Will Call House Back From Recess If Necessary Over Shutdown Fight

Harry Reid has an offer for John Boehner and Senate Republicans to keep FEMA’s disaster relief efforts funded and avoid a government shutdown. It goes like this: Democrats will accept the House GOP’s lower funding total disaster aid, if Republicans drop the extraordinary demand that funding recovery from natural disasters be offset with partisan budget cuts.

Republicans now say the only way to keep the entire government funded after September 30 is if Democrats agree to slash a successful manufacturing program to pay for disaster aid included in the House’s federal funding bill.

Speaking for his caucus at a Friday press conference, Reid categorically rejected the idea disaster aid should be offset. After the Senate rejected that proposal on a bipartisan basis, Reid urged Boehner to sit down with himself, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to review his offer, in the hope of avoiding a government shutdown. And he said if House Republicans continue intransigently to demand that the Senate swallow their bill, President Obama will call the House back into session from its week-long recess.

Full Story Here: Reid: Obama Will Call House Back From Recess If Necessary Over Shutdown Fight | TPMDC.

Sen: Sherrod Brown: Congress Should Have Same Retirement Age As Public In Spirit of ‘Shared Sacrifice’

Should members of Congress cut their salaries or raise the age at which they can draw a congressional pension when many Americans are making personal sacrifices during the country’s prolonged economic crisis?

Sen. Sherrod Brown thinks so.

In April, the Ohio Democrat introduced the Shared Retirement Sacrifice Act of 2011, which would require lawmakers to wait until the age of 66 to collect their pensions. Currently, lawmakers can retire as early as 50 with a full pension depending on how long they served.

“The reason I introduced my bill … on this shared sacrifice in terms of retirement age is I hear lots of members of Congress, especially, particularly conservative members of Congress, say we should raise the retirement age for Social Security,” Brown said on CNN’s “American Morning.”

Full Story Here: Sen: Sherrod Brown: Congress Should Have Same Retirement Age As Public In Spirit of ‘Shared Sacrifice’ | Crooks and Liars.

Cleaver: If Obama wasn’t president, we would be ‘marching on the White House’

Unhappy members of the Congressional Black Caucus “probably would be marching on the White House” if Obama were not president, according to CBC Chairman Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.).

“If [former President] Bill Clinton had been in the White House and had failed to address this problem, we probably would be marching on the White House,” Cleaver told “The Miami Herald” in comments published Sunday. “There is a less-volatile reaction in the CBC because nobody wants to do anything that would empower the people who hate the president.”

Full Story Here: Cleaver: If Obama wasn’t president, we would be ‘marching on the White House’ – The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room.

The Democrats’ self-defeating crybaby chorus

Robert Shrum :-:

After a special election loss in New York City, many on the Left are boneheadedly fleeing Obama — just when they should be rallying to his side

Before the month came thumping in on elephant feet, I wrote that each August since 2007 had marked a cruel passage for Barack Obama and suggested how he might turn the ides this year. It was not to be, and maybe never will be. The month actually culminated — and confirmed its unhappy course — on September 13, when a machine-ordained Democratic candidate lost the New York City congressional seat of the deflated Anthony Weiner to a Republican tea merchant.

The GOP reaction was predictable: This was a referendum on Obama and a portent of doom in 2012. After all, here was the first Republican elected from this district since 1923. (Actually, that’s a sloppy factoid, echoed in the media, to make it easy to blame Obama first; it’s a fact in the Brooklyn rump of the district, but not in Queens, the district’s predominant swath, where Forest Hills and other neighborhoods sent Republican Seymour Halpern to Congress in the 1960s and 1970s.)

Al Smith, the master of the sidewalks of New York, in a characteristic phrase, might have called the Democrat in this special election “a bum.” At the least, David Weprin was a bumbler. He confidently offered up a figure on the national debt; he was off by 10 trillion (with a ‘T’) dollars. He skipped out of a debate, citing the threat of Hurricane Irene; the storm had already passed. He didn’t go on the attack until it was too late; he never brought Gov. Andrew Cuomo into a district where he is overwhelmingly popular.

Full Story Here: The Democrats’ self-defeating crybaby chorus – The Week.

OPS: Also See: One Betrayal Too Many

Obama’s Economic Quagmire:

Frank Rich and Adam Moss Talk About What’s Really in Ron Suskind’s Revealing New Book About the White House

Adam: Hi, Frank. So there’s a little commotion about this new book Confidence Men, by Ron Suskind, which is being published on Tuesday. And as it happens, you and I have actually read it! So let’s talk about that this week. To give readers a super-fast overview, it’s a book, essentially, about Obama’s economic team during his first two years in office. The news of the book, according to some reports, is that Tim Geithner was insubordinate to the president, pursuing his own pro-banker agenda. Or, according to other reports, that Larry Summers was insubordinate to the president, pursuing his own — well, monomaniacal agenda. I’d add that it’s also about Rahm Emanuel being insubordinate to the president, just because. Basically, it’s about the presidency being hijacked by these three guys. And the guys thing is important because they’re pretty awful to women. Anyway, they’re the villains. Paul Volcker, Christina Romer, and Elizabeth Warren are the heroes. Bankers win, America loses. Did I get that right?

Frank: Hi, Adam, and yes, you did! I would point out that among the other heroes are more women (Sheila Bair, Brooksley Born, Maria Cantwell) and at least one man, the Princeton economist Alan Krueger, who also seems to be a serious Suskind source and who has now returned to the White House to succeed Austan Goolsbee and Romer as head of the Council of Economic Advisers. Not that that will do any good. I think the portrait of Geithner is devastating — his countermanding of the president’s wishes to make a Wall Street object lesson of Citigroup, his nasty “Elizabeth Warren strategy” to silence and neuter the administration’s rare genuine reformer. And yet Geithner is the only member of the original economic team still standing in the White House, poised to countermand any other rare independent voice that might yet speak up, like Krueger’s.

A: You think the portrait of Geithner is more devastating than the one of Summers? I guess. In that instance you cite, Obama asks to put the dissolving of Citibank on the table, and Geithner simply ignores him, “walking back” the decision, in political parlance. More insidiously, he creates the framework, borrowed from Hippocrates, of “first, do no harm,” which effectively cuts off any bold reforms for fear of their potential effects on the market. But Summers is portrayed as an egotistical nut job, single-mindedly determined to get Bernanke’s job; when he doesn’t get it, he goes bananas. He is supposed to be a conduit for the collective advice of the team, but undermines his colleagues, only passing along advice and information that supports his positions. I was kind of stunned how many officials were willing to go on the record against him.

Full Story Here: Obama’s Economic Quagmire: Frank Rich and Adam Moss Talk About What’s Really in Ron Suskind’s Revealing New Book About the White House — Daily Intel.

Max Keiser: Obama’s jobs bill

In this edition of On the Edge, Max Keiser interviews Danny Schechter from Newsdissector.com

He talks about the President Obama’s jobs bill, how the media is covering the domestic economic crisis and the large protests expected this weekend on Wall Street.

Full Story Here: Obama’s jobs bill-On the Edge with Max Keiser-09-16-2011 – YouTube.

After Claiming To Support Infrastructure Investments, House GOP Blocks Infrastructure Investment Plan

Despite their recent exclamations of support for improving American infrastructure, House Republicans circulated a memo this weekend informing members that the caucus would oppose the majority of President Obama’s jobs plan, particularly the proposed infrastructure bank that would make large investments into the nation’s crumbling roads, bridges, and other forms of infrastructure.

In the memo, House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) laid out opposition to Obama’s proposed $30 billion to keep teachers and law enforcement officers in their jobs, rejected money for school construction, and again claimed Republicans supported spending on infrastructure. But Boehner wrote that the GOP opposed the way Obama’s plan would make those investments, as Republicans continue to base their opposition to new stimulus plans on the misguided, false belief that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act didn’t work, as The Hill reported:

“Rather than adding more money to a broken system,” Boehner and his deputies wrote, “Congress and the president should spend the next few months working out a multi-year transportation authorization bill that fixes these problems.”

Full Story Here: After Claiming To Support Infrastructure Investments, House GOP Blocks Infrastructure Investment Plan | ThinkProgress.

House GOP: No tax cut for middle class

House Republican leaders say they are rejecting President Barack Obama’s jobs proposals to rebuild schools and blighted neighborhoods, and help keep state and local employees on the job.

In a memo to GOP lawmakers that was also issued publicly and reprinted in The New York Times, House Speaker John Boehner, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., and other Republican leaders also objected to the president’s proposal for a temporary reduction in payroll taxes, in order to boost consumer spending and increase demand.

The GOP leaders say such a temporary reduction means taxes will go up later when the reduction expires in 2013.

Full Story Here: House GOP rejects Obama jobs proposals – CBS News.

Obama Tax Plan Would Ask More of Millionaires

President Obama on Monday will call for a new minimum tax rate for individuals making more than $1 million a year to ensure that they pay at least the same percentage of their earnings as middle-income taxpayers, according to administration officials.

With a special joint Congressional committee starting work to reach a bipartisan budget deal by late November, the proposal adds a new and populist feature to Mr. Obama’s effort to raise the political pressure on Republicans to agree to higher revenues from the wealthy in return for Democrats’ support of future cuts from Medicare and Medicaid.

Mr. Obama, in a bit of political salesmanship, will call his proposal the “Buffett Rule,” in a reference to Warren E. Buffett, the billionaire investor who has complained repeatedly that the richest Americans generally pay a smaller share of their income in federal taxes than do middle-income workers, because investment gains are taxed at a lower rate than wages.

Full Story Here: Obama Tax Plan Would Ask More of Millionaires – NYTimes.com.

OPS: As we have seen so far from Obama, Talk is cheap.  Once the republican monkey in the closet points his finger and  sneers, Obama will start shaking, then capitulate.

Some frustrated Democrats want to see Obama primary challenge

Some frustrated Democrats in Congress are saying that a primary challenge to President Obama would be a good thing, but others maintain it would only help the GOP.

Rep. Peter DeFazio said a primary would “push the president and his advisers a bit … to give us back the candidate we had three years ago.”

The Oregon Democrat pointed out that some of his colleagues in the House Democratic Caucus agree with him, but he declined to name names.

“It’s a common refrain, and it’s certainly common in my district among Democrats [because] they want the guy back that they voted for,” DeFazio said.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) told The Hill a challenge “would be healthy for the party.” The two-time presidential hopeful added that he will not be running against Obama; Kucinich announced this week that he will seek reelection in 2012, setting up a showdown with Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio).

Full Story Here: Some frustrated Democrats want to see Obama primary challenge – TheHill.com.

The Election of 2012: Why the Most Important Issues May Be Off the Table (But Should Be On It)

Robert Reich :-:

We’re on the cusp of the 2012 election. What will it be about? It seems reasonably certain President Obama will be confronted by a putative Republican candidate who:

Believes corporations are people, wants to cut the top corporate rate to 25% (from the current 35%) and no longer require they pay tax on foreign income, who will eliminate capital gains and dividend taxes on anyone earning less than $250,000 a year, raise the retirement age for Social Security and turn Medicaid into block grants to states, seek a balanced-budged amendment to the Constitution, require any regulatory agency issuing a new regulation repeal another regulation of equal cost (regardless of the benefits), and seek repeal of Obama’s healthcare plan.

Or one who:

Believes the Federal Reserve is treasonous when it expands the money supply, doubts human beings evolved from more primitive forms of life, seeks to abolish the Internal Revenue Service and shift most public services to the states, thinks Social Security is a Ponzi scheme, while governor took a meat axe to public education and presided over an economy that generated large numbers of near-minimum-wage jobs, and who will shut down most federal regulatory agencies, cut corporate taxes, and seek repeal of Obama’s healthcare plan.

Full Story Here: Robert Reich (The Election of 2012: Why the Most Important Issues May Be Off the Table (But Should Be On It)).

Has American-Style Conservatism Become a Religion?

Fundamentalist religion plays a big role in today’s Republican party–but has it gone even further, spreading dangerous beliefs as articles of faith?

As the American right lurches from traditional conservatism – a go-slow approach to governing that stresses the importance of continuity and social stability – to a far more reactionary brand typified by acolytes of Ayn Rand and Tea Party extremists waving misspelled signs decrying Democrats’ “socialism,” the time has come to ask whether modern “backlash” conservatism has become a religious faith rather than a pedestrian political ideology.

Ideology is grounded in the real world. It offers us a philosophical lens through which we can efficiently process what’s happening in the world around us. Religion is different. It’s a fixed belief system, based on faith, and it is immune to – or at least highly resistant to – challenges mounted by objective reality. Which better describes the belief system of a typical Rush Limbaugh fan or Tea Party activist?

Like religious faiths, the hard-right reveres an original text – the Constitution – and, like all religious fundamentalists, conservatives claim to adhere to a literalist interpretation of it while actually picking and choosing from among its tenets. Just as the vast majority of Christian fundamentalists don’t actually stone their daughters to death when they’re obnoxious to their fathers, the Tea Partiers conveniently ignore more or less the entirety of Article 3. Also like other fundamentalist sects, most conservatives actually have a poor understanding of what the text they revere actually means.

Full Story Here: Has American-Style Conservatism Become a Religion? | | AlterNet.

One Betrayal Too Many

Robert Scheer :-:

It’s getting too late to give President Barack Obama a pass on the economy. Sure, he inherited an enormous mess from George W., who whistled “Dixie” while the banking system imploded. But it’s time for Democrats to admit that their guy bears considerable responsibility for not turning things around.

He blindly followed President Bush’s would-be remedy of throwing money at the banks and getting nothing in return for beleaguered homeowners. Sadly, Obama has proved to be nothing more than a Bill Clinton clone triangulating with the Wall Street lobbyists at the expense of ordinary folks.

That fatal arc of betrayal was captured by a headline in Tuesday’s New York Times: “Soaring Poverty Casts Spotlight on ‘Lost Decade.’ ” The Census Bureau reported that there are now 46.2 million Americans living below the official poverty line—the highest number in the 52 years since that statistic was first measured—and median household income has fallen back to the 1996 level. As Harvard economist Lawrence Katz summarized this dreary news: “This is truly a lost decade. We think of America as a place where every generation is doing better, but we’re looking at a period when the median family is in worse shape than it was in the late 1990s.”

Full Story Here: Robert Scheer: One Betrayal Too Many – Robert Scheer’s Columns – Truthdig.

The Republican Weapon of Mass Cynicism

Robert Reich:

According to the latest ABC New/Washington Post poll, 77 percent of Americans say they “feel things have gotten pretty seriously off on the wrong track” in this country. That’s the highest percentage since January, 2009.

No surprise. The economy is almost as rotten now as it was two years ago. And, yes, this poses a huge risk to President Obama’s reelection, as it does to congressional Democrats.

But the truly remarkable thing is how little faith Americans have in government to set things right. This cynicism poses an even bigger challenge to Obama and the Democrats – and perhaps to all of us.

Full Story Here: Robert Reich (The Republican Weapon of Mass Cynicism).

An Alarming Trend

Did New York Dems really stay home in this week’s elections to send the President a message? My favorite MSNBC political reporters keep repeating the notion that Dems did just that, followed by disbelief, confusion, and a lecture for those voters; why would anyone want to risk a future under Republicans to send a message to Obama? Their argument is – no matter how disappointed or frustrated one is with Obama, Democrats are the only choice. Staying home is shameful. My hunch is that something much more alarming is going on; the possibility that many of Obama’s 2008 supporters are becoming Independents.

Obama won in large part because of the youth vote. One could argue that these first-time voters became Democrats for the sole purpose of voting for Obama and/or voting against the corrupt party of Bush and Cheney. “Hope and Change” appealed to the youth vote more than any other group. They were against the wars, torture, the loss of civil liberties, the loss of our reputation in the world, and the never-ending GOP scandals. We were all against these things, but many of us are not as idealistic and impressionable as we were at around age 18. At that age, its easy to feel let-down by adults who seem to care less about a peaceful world, a clean environment, eliminating racism… you get the picture. Young voters expected a lot from this President and, early-on, Obama delivered. Unfortunately, the Obama agenda was so easily interrupted by the fake-grassroots, corporate Tea Party. And to the shock and dismay of Obama’s supporters, the President threw-in the towel, early. To continue the boxing metaphor, he showed some life after killing Bin Laden, but went back to his disappointing, pathetic calls for “bipartisanship” and “compromise” as the radical right pounded-on-him for round after round.

Full Story Here: An Alarming Trend | All Things Democrat.

Why the GOP is going after the EPA

Republican lawmakers aim to cut back or even abolish the Environmental Protection Agency, even though it pays for itself

When Richard Nixon founded the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) by executive order, politicians of all stripes agreed the US needed reforms, even if it cost a small amount of economic growth. Yet, after four decades of the EPA’s helping to improve our land, air and water quality, ask whether we need federal regulation and the answer depends on whom you question.

Ask ordinary people in the US and, according to a 2011 Pew survey (pdf), 71% respond, across the political spectrum, that they agree with the statement,”This country should do whatever it takes to protect the environment.”

Ask most Republican politicians, some Democrats and the polluting industries that provide them substantial funding, and you’ll get a very different answer. And this divergence may be ramping up in the wake of the Citizens United supreme court decision, which equated free speech and political contributions.

Full Story Here: Why the GOP is going after the EPA | Beth Wellington | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.

Congress Should Mark Anniversary of 9/11 by Deauthorizing the War on Terror

John Nichols :-:

Anniversaries offer an opportunity to assess, with the perspective afforded by the passage of time, who got things right and who did not.

Unfortunately, in an age when so much of our media bows more to power than accuracy, that does not mean that those who got things right will be turned to for advice and counsel.

In fact, quite the opposite.

So it is that, as the anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon approached, the most prominently featured 9/11 figure was former Vice President Dick Cheney.”

The term employed most frequently by commentators—aside from “Darth Vader”—to describe Cheney’s recollections of 9/11 and its aftermath has been “no apologies.” That is because Cheney has so very much to apologize for.

But not everyone got 9/11 wrong.

Full Story Here: Congress Should Mark Anniversary of 9/11 by Deauthorizing the War on Terror | The Nation.

Democrats Fret Aloud Over Obama’s Chances

Democrats are expressing growing alarm about President Obama’s re-election prospects and, in interviews, are openly acknowledging anxiety about the White House’s ability to strengthen the president’s standing over the next 14 months.

Elected officials and party leaders at all levels said their worries have intensified as the economy has displayed new signs of weakness. They said the likelihood of a highly competitive 2012 race is increasing as the Republican field, once dismissed by many Democrats as too inexperienced and conservative to pose a serious threat, has started narrowing to two leading candidates, Mitt Romney and Rick Perry, who have executive experience and messages built around job creation.

And in a campaign cycle in which Democrats had entertained hopes of reversing losses from last year’s midterm elections, some in the party fear that Mr. Obama’s troubles could reverberate down the ballot into Congressional, state and local races.

Full Story Here: Democrats Fret Aloud Over Obama’s Chances – NYTimes.com.

Perry Tales: Rick Is Not Who He Says He Is

Jim Hightower :-:

Presidential wannabe Rick Perry is flitting all around the country — hither, thither and yon — spreading little “Perry Tales” about himself and the many wonders he has worked as governor of Texas.

His top Perry Tale is a creationist story about what he has modestly branded “The Texas Miracle.” While the rest of the country is mired in joblessness, says the miracle worker, his state has added 1.2 million jobs during his 10-year tenure.

I’ve built “a job-creating machine,” the governor gushed during one of his recent flits across Iowa, and a Perry PR aide smugly added, “The governor’s job creation record speaks for itself.”

Actually, it doesn’t. Far from having the best unemployment rate in the nation, the Lone Star State ranks a middling 26th, behind New York, Massachusetts and other states whose “liberal” governments he routinely mocks.

Full Story Here: Perry Tales: Rick Is Not Who He Says He Is by Jim Hightower on Creators.com – A Syndicate Of Talent.

Obama Tax Breaks Fail to Create Jobs

If the Obama administration is going to spend the money cutting taxes and hoping that the tax cuts will create jobs it might as well spend the money directly hiring people and putting them to work on things that the free market cannot do on its own.

President Obama revealed, as part of his plan to create thousands of jobs in our dilapidated economy, a proposal of 17 individual small business tax cuts and credits. The biggest problem with the idea of cutting taxes to create jobs is the dynamic of what employment truly means. When a business hires a worker they are taking on a long-term commitment to pay a productive member of their team on a time scale that can only be conceived in years or decades.

A tax credit is simply a one-time payment. At best it is a renewable one-time payment that can be brought in again and again each year. A tax credit is not a cash flow, and it is not a revenue stream that can sustain a job. Employers who get tax credits, and wealthy business owners who get tax breaks individually, are not going to take that money and spend it on a worker. They are only going to hire a worker if that position can create enough revenue to sustain itself.

McDonald’s does not hire line workers for charity, it hires them to deal with congestion at the store front. More cooks create more sandwiches. More cashiers serve more customers. If you have no customers, you need fewer cashiers and cooks. That is the basic premise that the tax break crowd on both sides of the aisle seems to miss.

Full Story Here: Obama Tax Breaks Fail to Create Jobs | Economy In Crisis.