2 Political Junkies

More On Rick Saccone, R-Elizabeth

2012-01-28T13:01:00.001-05:00

An astute reader drew my attention this morning to some recently introduced business of super-duper-uber imporance to the Commonwealth, a Resolution declaring 2012 as the "Year of the Bible" in Pennsylvania.

This hypocritical and unconstitutional resolution is from the legislative desk of State Representative Rick Saccone (R-Elizabeth). Who's a very interesting fellow, indeed.

Here's the text:

A RESOLUTION

Declaring 2012 as the "Year of the Bible" in Pennsylvania.

WHEREAS, The Bible, the word of God, has made a unique contribution in shaping the United States as a distinctive and blessed nation and people; and

WHEREAS, Deeply held religious convictions springing from the holy scriptures led to the early settlement of our country; and

WHEREAS, Biblical teachings inspired concepts of civil government that are contained in our Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States; and

WHEREAS, Many of our great national leaders, among them President Washington, President Jackson, President Lincoln, President Wilson and President Reagan, paid tribute to the influence of the Bible in our country's development, as exemplified by the words of President Jackson that the Bible is "the rock on which our Republic rests"; and

WHEREAS, The history of our country clearly illustrates the value of voluntarily applying the teachings of the scriptures in the lives of individuals, families and societies; and

WHEREAS, This nation now faces great challenges that will test it as it has never been tested before; and

WHEREAS, Renewing our knowledge of and faith in God through holy scripture can strengthen us as a nation and a people; therefore be it

RESOLVED, That the House of Representatives declare 2012 as the "Year of the Bible" in Pennsylvania in recognition of both the formative influence of the Bible on our Commonwealth and nation and our national need to study and apply the teachings of the holy scriptures.

By the way, it passed unanimously with a vote of 193-0.

As a reminder, let's take a look at that section of the Pennsylvania Constitution that guarantees religious freedom:

All men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own consciences; no man can of right be compelled to attend, erect or support any place of worship or to maintain any ministry against his consent; no human authority can, in any case whatever, control or interfere with the rights of conscience, and no preference shall ever be given by law to any religious establishments or modes of worship.

I wonder if Representative Saccone can explain to us how simply asserting that The Bible is "the word of God" doesn't conflict with the State Constitution barring "any human authority" from preferring one religious establishment or "mode of worship" over another. Aren't there other Pennsylvanians who are just as theistically inclined as brother Rick but who don't accept The Bible's unique supremacy?

Yes, there are and I believe some of those citizens they may be called "muslims".

Or how, by the same argument, a resolution calling for "[r]enewing our knowledge of and faith in God through holy scripture" or "our national need to study and apply the teachings of the holy scriptures." isn't similarly unconstitutional as well.

Interesting, Saccone's position on faith, considering how he's also a co sponsor of House Bill 2029 the so-called "Sharia Law".

I guess this means that faith written into legislation is acceptable if it's the good faith, unacceptable if it's the bad faith.

Interesting guy, Rick Saccone.

Favors the use of waterboarding, did you know that? Doesn't think waterboarding is torture, did you know that?

And how do I know that? Because he said so:

Basically, torture is an act intentionally intended to inflict severe and long-lasting physical and mental pain, including amputation, scarring, burning, maiming, mutilation. Coercion means a much lower threshold of pain or discomfort such as stress positions, pushing, temperature change, meal manipulation, loud music, exploiting phobias, trickery, yelling, etc.If done skillfully and in the right circumstances, water-boarding or WB is very effective and causes no long-lasting damage. It is used to train our special forces so I don't consider it torture.

WWJT - Who Would Jesus Torture?

More On Rick Santorum's Birther Flirtations

2012-01-27T08:01:00.000-05:00

In case you missed it, here's Lil Ricky at a recent event in Florida:

The woman's voice in the clip says a number of things, among them:

I never refer to Obama as President Obama, because, legally, he is not.

And:

And my question is: why isn’t something being done to get him out of our government? He has no legal right to be calling himself President.

Two obvious birther references. Neither of which Rick refutes.

And here's how he explained himself to CNN's John King:

KING: But do you feel any sense of responsibility to say, whoa? Senator McCain repeatedly in 2008 would stop people who went down that line, saying, look, let's fight him on policy, let's not go there.

SANTORUM: I have repeatedly done that.

I don't feel it's my obligation every time someone says something I don't agree with to contradict them. And the president's a big boy. He can defend himself and his record. And I'm going to go out and talk about the issues that the president and I disagree on and try to defeat him, because I think that's the best thing we can do for the future of our country.

KING: I understand on every point, but something like that, standing up and saying he's an avowed Muslim, you don't feel any obligation to say, ma'am, let's fight him on taxes, let's fight him on spending, let's fight him on size of government, but let's not do that?

SANTORUM: I think I have repeated that many, many times throughout the course of this campaign.

I don't really feel an obligation to go out and repeat it over and over again as people bring that up. My position's clear. The president's position is clear. I don't think the president's a Muslim, but I don't think it's my obligation to go out and repeat that every time someone who feels that way says something.

KING: Senator Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, former senator, Senator, good luck in Florida. Appreciate your time today.

While Rick goes out of his way to point out that he doesn't think President Obama's a Muslim, there's no discussion of Obama's legitimacy as president. To put it another way, Rick counters the Muslim charge but is absolutely silent on the birther charge - on CNN.

At that rally, he was silent on both.

Then there's this from The Nation:

On Friday night the Santorum campaign sent out a press release boasting that “OVER 30 NATIONAL CONSERVATIVE LEADERS ENDORSE SANTORUM.” Just who were these leaders? Some were utterly obscure figures who do not actually qualify as national conservative leaders. (For example, “Ken Campbell, California Conservative Leader” does not appear anywhere on the Google search results for “Ken Campbell.”)

A few were legitimate, if polarizing, national conservative leaders, such as Gary Bauer, Richard Viguerie and James Dobson. (All are more precisely described as social conservatives rather than just conservatives generally.)

But one name in particular stood out: Joseph Farah, editor and chief executive officer of WND.com and WND Books. If you don’t know about Farah, you should. He edits World Net Daily, an extremely nasty, conspiracy-minded cesspool of far-right fear-mongering. It may sound marginal, but it has a surprisingly large reach and readership.

What has made Farah more widely known outside the margins of the conservative movement is his relentless advocacy of “birtherism,” the racist lie that President Obama was not actually born in Hawaii.

The whistle's been blown. Rick Santorum is a secret birther.

Obama Admin: Immunity for Torturers, Prosecution for Torture Whistleblowers

2012-01-26T07:56:00.003-05:00

As I've written elsewhere, my profoundest disappointment with the Obama Administration revolves around its refusal to prosecute the war crimes of the Bush Administration.

Two days after his inauguration, the President signed Executive Order 13491 - ordering the US back into compliance with US and International Law regarding the use of torture - and that's a good thing, of course.

Torture is bad. Torture is illegal. The torture should be prosecuted.

But the Obama administration isn't prosecuting the torturers.

Instead:

The Justice Department on Monday charged a former Central Intelligence Agency officer with disclosing classified information to journalists about the capture and brutal interrogation of a suspected member of Al Qaeda, Abu Zubaydah — adding another chapter to the Obama administration’s crackdown on leaks.

In a criminal complaint filed on Monday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation accused John Kiriakou, the former C.I.A. officer, of disclosing the identity of a C.I.A. analyst who worked on a 2002 operation that located and interrogated Abu Zubaydah. The journalists included a New York Times reporter, it alleged.

“Safeguarding classified information, including the identities of C.I.A. officers involved in sensitive operations, is critical to keeping our intelligence officers safe and protecting our national security,” said Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., in a statement.

Now, don't get me wrong. Leaking the name of a CIA operative is a very serious charge - one that should be investigated and, if necessary prosecuted.

Although I doubt my Bush Administration admiring friends would agree completely with that last bit (cough Valerie Plame cough).

But letting the CIA (current or retired) torturers go unpunished while prosecuting a retired CIA officer for bringing the story to the public?

How does that mesh with claiming the "moral high ground" for reiterating that torture is illegal?

It simply doesn't.

The Trib, ACORN and Reality

2012-01-25T21:55:00.001-05:00

Yawn. The Trib's up in arms about ACORN. Again. And they're spinning reality so madly that one fears for their sanity. Again.

Specifically I want you to look at the end of the second paragraph:

Corrupt ACORN affiliate Project Vote -- former employer of President Obama -- is pulling Justice Department and White House strings to register more voters on public assistance, documents newly obtained by Judicial Watch show.

It's happening despite voter-registration fraud convictions of at least 70 ACORN/Project Vote employees in 12 states since 2006. And even though more than a third of the 1.3 million registrations ACORN/Project Vote submitted during the 2008 election cycle proved invalid, according to a 2009 House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform report.

Are you sitting down? The spin involved in that last sentence will simply amaze.
Remember, the paragraph is about registration fraud. The implication is that all those registrations ("more than a third of the 1.3 million") are fraudulent. And that ACORN committed the fraud.

Note, however, that the whole thing begins to unravel when you see that the braintrust does not use the word "fraudulent" when describing those registrations but "invalid". Gotta wonder why the shift, right?

The first thing we have to do is to track down that House Committee report.

Here it is. And here's what the report had to say about all those registrations:

One-third of the 1.3 million voter registration cards turned in by ACORN in 2008 were invalid.3

That "3" in there is a foot note. And where does that foot note lead?

Here.It's a column from the Wall Street Journal by John Fund - from 2008. And he wrote:

The FBI is investigating its voter registration efforts in several states, amid allegations that almost a third of the 1.3 million cards it turned in are invalid.

It's a start, but it really doesn't get us anywhere, does it?. Eventually, if you dig around enough, you'll find this piece at the New York Times - also from 2008:

On Oct. 6, the community organizing group Acorn and an affiliated charity called Project Vote announced with jubilation that they had registered 1.3 million new voters. But it turns out the claim was a wild exaggeration, and the real number of newly registered voters nationwide is closer to 450,000, Project Vote’s executive director, Michael Slater, said in an interview.

The remainder are registered voters who were changing their address and roughly 400,000 that were rejected by election officials for a variety of reasons, including duplicate registrations, incomplete forms and fraudulent submissions from low-paid field workers trying to please their supervisors, Mr. Slater acknowledged.

So those rejected registrations were certainly invalid - but not all of them were fraudulent. You see the difference, right? And you see why the braintrust had to shift adjectives on you, right?

Also from 2008, an ACORN spokesperson had a few things to say about this:

“In most states, ACORN is required by law to turn in every voter registration card — even in cases where the cards are not valid,” the organization insists, adding that ACORN “has reported almost all of the issues regarding voter registration cards.”

And then as an after thought, we should add:

Invalid voter registration cards do NOT constitute voter fraud. Even RNC General Counsel Sean Cairncross has recently acknowledged he is not aware of a single improper vote cast as a result of bad cards submitted in the course of an organized voter registration effort.

So ACORN is the one who flagged the invalid registrations as fraudulent and ACORN turned them in because they were required to do so.

And yet, when you go back to the braintrust's description, you get an entirely different picture, don't you?

The whole editorial is about an improper collusion between the DOJ and Project Vote. Regarding that, do I need to point out how much money Richard Mellon Scaife's given to Judicial Watch, the initial source of this editorial?

$8.74 million, according to MediaMatters - more than all the other foundations listed combined.

Interesting, don't you think?

Fairness 4 WTAE: Real Life & Virtual Rallies on Thursday

2012-01-25T00:45:00.001-05:00

Perhaps you've heard -- there's something ugly going on at Pittsburgh's WTAE-TV. Way back in July of 2010 the on-air staff at WTAE voted to be represented by the AFTRA union. But all this time later, they are still without a contract. In the meantime, according to the Fairness 4 WTAE Facebook page, staff have had long-scheduled, pre-approved vacations denied at the last minute; have had to work two weeks straight without a day off; have been threatened with losing company pensions and retirement benefits for supporting the union -- basically, everything out of the union-busting playbook.

What can you do to help?

1) Add your name to the petition to tell Hearst to "play fair in Pittsburgh." (Hearst already bargins fairly in Baltimore, Cincinnati, Kansas City, Boston, New Orleans, and Omaha -- why not Pittsburgh?)

2) Like their Facebook page here.

3) Attend the Community Labor Support Rally this Thursday:
WHEN: Thursday January 26, 11 a.m.
WHERE: St James Church (marching to WTAE), 718 Franklin Ave, Wilkinsburg, PA
WHAT: Rally to present deliver nearly 2,000 postcards and petition signatures from viewers. Delivered by a delegation including Allegheny County Labor Council President Jack Shea; State Senator Jim Ferlo; State Rep, Joe Preston; Joyce Rothermel, from the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank (retired): Fr. Jack O’Malley; Marty O’Malley, Mayor of Forest Hills; Fred Redmond, VP of United Steelworkers; and Rev. John Welch from PA Interfaith Impact Network.
or

4) Attend the Virtual Rally for Fairness for WTAE
WHEN: Thursday, from 11am to 1pm.
WHAT: -Call the Station: 412-242-4300. Tell the receptionist you wish to speak with General Manager Mike Hayes. If not available, ask for voice mail. Give your name and phone number and tell him you support Fairness for WTAE On-air Staff.
And/or
-Email the Station: Go to Station Website, www.wtae.com, at the bottom of the home page, under “Station”, choose “Contact Us”. Under “Contact Us”, choose “News Feedback”, then fill out your name and email and write the message: I support Fairness for WTAE On-air Staff.”

Do it for Bob! Do it for Wendy! Do it for Kelly! Do it for Jim! Do it for Demetrius!

Do it for Fairness!

Full Text of President Obama's State of the Union Address

2012-01-24T21:31:00.005-05:00

Remarks of President Barack Obama – As Prepared for Delivery
State of the Union Address
“An America Built to Last”
Tuesday, January 24th, 2012
Washington, DC

As Prepared for Delivery –

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Vice President, members of Congress, distinguished guests, and fellow Americans:

Last month, I went to Andrews Air Force Base and welcomed home some of our last troops to serve in Iraq. Together, we offered a final, proud salute to the colors under which more than a million of our fellow citizens fought – and several thousand gave their lives.

We gather tonight knowing that this generation of heroes has made the United States safer and more respected around the world. For the first time in nine years, there are no Americans fighting in Iraq. For the first time in two decades, Osama bin Laden is not a threat to this country. Most of al Qaeda’s top lieutenants have been defeated. The Taliban’s momentum has been broken, and some troops in Afghanistan have begun to come home.

These achievements are a testament to the courage, selflessness, and teamwork of America’s Armed Forces. At a time when too many of our institutions have let us down, they exceed all expectations. They’re not consumed with personal ambition. They don’t obsess over their differences. They focus on the mission at hand. They work together.

Imagine what we could accomplish if we followed their example. Think about the America within our reach: A country that leads the world in educating its people. An America that attracts a new generation of high-tech manufacturing and high-paying jobs. A future where we’re in control of our own energy, and our security and prosperity aren’t so tied to unstable parts of the world. An economy built to last, where hard work pays off, and responsibility is rewarded.

We can do this. I know we can, because we’ve done it before. At the end of World War II, when another generation of heroes returned home from combat, they built the strongest economy and middle class the world has ever known. My grandfather, a veteran of Patton’s Army, got the chance to go to college on the GI Bill. My grandmother, who worked on a bomber assembly line, was part of a workforce that turned out the best products on Earth.

The two of them shared the optimism of a Nation that had triumphed over a depression and fascism. They understood they were part of something larger; that they were contributing to a story of success that every American had a chance to share – the basic American promise that if you worked hard, you could do well enough to raise a family, own a home, send your kids to college, and put a little away for retirement.

The defining issue of our time is how to keep that promise alive. No challenge is more urgent. No debate is more important. We can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well, while a growing number of Americans barely get by. Or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules. What’s at stake are not Democratic values or Republican values, but American values. We have to reclaim them.

Let’s remember how we got here. Long before the recession, jobs and manufacturing began leaving our shores. Technology made businesses more efficient, but also made some jobs obsolete. Folks at the top saw their incomes rise like never before, but most hardworking Americans struggled with costs that were growing, paychecks that weren’t, and personal debt that kept piling up.

In 2008, the house of cards collapsed. We learned that mortgages had been sold to people who couldn’t afford or understand them. Banks had made huge bets and bonuses with other people’s money. Regulators had looked the other way, or didn’t have the authority to stop the bad behavior.

It was wrong. It was irresponsible. And it plunged our economy into a crisis that put millions out of work, saddled us with more debt, and left innocent, hard-working Americans holding the bag. In the six months before I took office, we lost nearly four million jobs. And we lost another four million before our policies were in full effect.

Those are the facts. But so are these. In the last 22 months, businesses have created more than three million jobs. Last year, they created the most jobs since 2005. American manufacturers are hiring again, creating jobs for the first time since the late 1990s. Together, we’ve agreed to cut the deficit by more than $2 trillion. And we’ve put in place new rules to hold Wall Street accountable, so a crisis like that never happens again.

The state of our Union is getting stronger. And we’ve come too far to turn back now. As long as I’m President, I will work with anyone in this chamber to build on this momentum. But I intend to fight obstruction with action, and I will oppose any effort to return to the very same policies that brought on this economic crisis in the first place.

No, we will not go back to an economy weakened by outsourcing, bad debt, and phony financial profits. Tonight, I want to speak about how we move forward, and lay out a blueprint for an economy that’s built to last – an economy built on American manufacturing, American energy, skills for American workers, and a renewal of American values.

This blueprint begins with American manufacturing.

On the day I took office, our auto industry was on the verge of collapse. Some even said we should let it die. With a million jobs at stake, I refused to let that happen. In exchange for help, we demanded responsibility. We got workers and automakers to settle their differences. We got the industry to retool and restructure. Today, General Motors is back on top as the world’s number one automaker. Chrysler has grown faster in the U.S. than any major car company. Ford is investing billions in U.S. plants and factories. And together, the entire industry added nearly 160,000 jobs.

We bet on American workers. We bet on American ingenuity. And tonight, the American auto industry is back.

What’s happening in Detroit can happen in other industries. It can happen in Cleveland and Pittsburgh and Raleigh. We can’t bring back every job that’s left our shores. But right now, it’s getting more expensive to do business in places like China. Meanwhile, America is more productive. A few weeks ago, the CEO of Master Lock told me that it now makes business sense for him to bring jobs back home. Today, for the first time in fifteen years, Master Lock’s unionized plant in Milwaukee is running at full capacity.

So we have a huge opportunity, at this moment, to bring manufacturing back. But we have to seize it. Tonight, my message to business leaders is simple: Ask yourselves what you can do to bring jobs back to your country, and your country will do everything we can to help you succeed.

We should start with our tax code. Right now, companies get tax breaks for moving jobs and profits overseas. Meanwhile, companies that choose to stay in America get hit with one of the highest tax rates in the world. It makes no sense, and everyone knows it.

So let’s change it. First, if you’re a business that wants to outsource jobs, you shouldn’t get a tax deduction for doing it. That money should be used to cover moving expenses for companies like Master Lock that decide to bring jobs home.

Second, no American company should be able to avoid paying its fair share of taxes by moving jobs and profits overseas. From now on, every multinational company should have to pay a basic minimum tax. And every penny should go towards lowering taxes for companies that choose to stay here and hire here.

Third, if you’re an American manufacturer, you should get a bigger tax cut. If you’re a high-tech manufacturer, we should double the tax deduction you get for making products here. And if you want to relocate in a community that was hit hard when a factory left town, you should get help financing a new plant, equipment, or training for new workers.

My message is simple. It’s time to stop rewarding businesses that ship jobs overseas, and start rewarding companies that create jobs right here in America. Send me these tax reforms, and I’ll sign them right away.

We’re also making it easier for American businesses to sell products all over the world. Two years ago, I set a goal of doubling U.S. exports over five years. With the bipartisan trade agreements I signed into law, we are on track to meet that goal – ahead of schedule. Soon, there will be millions of new customers for American goods in Panama, Colombia, and South Korea. Soon, there will be new cars on the streets of Seoul imported from Detroit, and Toledo, and Chicago.

I will go anywhere in the world to open new markets for American products. And I will not stand by when our competitors don’t play by the rules. We’ve brought trade cases against China at nearly twice the rate as the last administration – and it’s made a difference. Over a thousand Americans are working today because we stopped a surge in Chinese tires. But we need to do more. It’s not right when another country lets our movies, music, and software be pirated. It’s not fair when foreign manufacturers have a leg up on ours only because they’re heavily subsidized.

Tonight, I’m announcing the creation of a Trade Enforcement Unit that will be charged with investigating unfair trade practices in countries like China. There will be more inspections to prevent counterfeit or unsafe goods from crossing our borders. And this Congress should make sure that no foreign company has an advantage over American manufacturing when it comes to accessing finance or new markets like Russia. Our workers are the most productive on Earth, and if the playing field is level, I promise you – America will always win.

I also hear from many business leaders who want to hire in the United States but can’t find workers with the right skills. Growing industries in science and technology have twice as many openings as we have workers who can do the job. Think about that – openings at a time when millions of Americans are looking for work.

That’s inexcusable. And we know how to fix it.

Jackie Bray is a single mom from North Carolina who was laid off from her job as a mechanic. Then Siemens opened a gas turbine factory in Charlotte, and formed a partnership with Central Piedmont Community College. The company helped the college design courses in laser and robotics training. It paid Jackie’s tuition, then hired her to help operate their plant.

I want every American looking for work to have the same opportunity as Jackie did. Join me in a national commitment to train two million Americans with skills that will lead directly to a job. My Administration has already lined up more companies that want to help. Model partnerships between businesses like Siemens and community colleges in places like Charlotte, Orlando, and Louisville are up and running. Now you need to give more community colleges the resources they need to become community career centers – places that teach people skills that local businesses are looking for right now, from data management to high-tech manufacturing.

And I want to cut through the maze of confusing training programs, so that from now on, people like Jackie have one program, one website, and one place to go for all the information and help they need. It’s time to turn our unemployment system into a reemployment system that puts people to work.

These reforms will help people get jobs that are open today. But to prepare for the jobs of tomorrow, our commitment to skills and education has to start earlier.

For less than one percent of what our Nation spends on education each year, we’ve convinced nearly every State in the country to raise their standards for teaching and learning – the first time that’s happened in a generation.

But challenges remain. And we know how to solve them.

At a time when other countries are doubling down on education, tight budgets have forced States to lay off thousands of teachers. We know a good teacher can increase the lifetime income of a classroom by over $250,000. A great teacher can offer an escape from poverty to the child who dreams beyond his circumstance. Every person in this chamber can point to a teacher who changed the trajectory of their lives. Most teachers work tirelessly, with modest pay, sometimes digging into their own pocket for school supplies – just to make a difference.

Teachers matter. So instead of bashing them, or defending the status quo, let’s offer schools a deal. Give them the resources to keep good teachers on the job, and reward the best ones. In return, grant schools flexibility: To teach with creativity and passion; to stop teaching to the test; and to replace teachers who just aren’t helping kids learn.

We also know that when students aren’t allowed to walk away from their education, more of them walk the stage to get their diploma. So tonight, I call on every State to require that all students stay in high school until they graduate or turn eighteen.

When kids do graduate, the most daunting challenge can be the cost of college. At a time when Americans owe more in tuition debt than credit card debt, this Congress needs to stop the interest rates on student loans from doubling in July. Extend the tuition tax credit we started that saves middle-class families thousands of dollars. And give more young people the chance to earn their way through college by doubling the number of work-study jobs in the next five years.

Of course, it’s not enough for us to increase student aid. We can’t just keep subsidizing skyrocketing tuition; we’ll run out of money. States also need to do their part, by making higher education a higher priority in their budgets. And colleges and universities have to do their part by working to keep costs down. Recently, I spoke with a group of college presidents who’ve done just that. Some schools re-design courses to help students finish more quickly. Some use better technology. The point is, it’s possible. So let me put colleges and universities on notice: If you can’t stop tuition from going up, the funding you get from taxpayers will go down. Higher education can’t be a luxury – it’s an economic imperative that every family in America should be able to afford.

Let’s also remember that hundreds of thousands of talented, hardworking students in this country face another challenge: The fact that they aren’t yet American citizens. Many were brought here as small children, are American through and through, yet they live every day with the threat of deportation. Others came more recently, to study business and science and engineering, but as soon as they get their degree, we send them home to invent new products and create new jobs somewhere else.

That doesn’t make sense.

I believe as strongly as ever that we should take on illegal immigration. That’s why my Administration has put more boots on the border than ever before. That’s why there are fewer illegal crossings than when I took office.

The opponents of action are out of excuses. We should be working on comprehensive immigration reform right now. But if election-year politics keeps Congress from acting on a comprehensive plan, let’s at least agree to stop expelling responsible young people who want to staff our labs, start new businesses, and defend this country. Send me a law that gives them the chance to earn their citizenship. I will sign it right away.

You see, an economy built to last is one where we encourage the talent and ingenuity of every person in this country. That means women should earn equal pay for equal work. It means we should support everyone who’s willing to work; and every risk-taker and entrepreneur who aspires to become the next Steve Jobs.

After all, innovation is what America has always been about. Most new jobs are created in start-ups and small businesses. So let’s pass an agenda that helps them succeed. Tear down regulations that prevent aspiring entrepreneurs from getting the financing to grow. Expand tax relief to small businesses that are raising wages and creating good jobs. Both parties agree on these ideas. So put them in a bill, and get it on my desk this year.

Innovation also demands basic research. Today, the discoveries taking place in our federally-financed labs and universities could lead to new treatments that kill cancer cells but leave healthy ones untouched. New lightweight vests for cops and soldiers that can stop any bullet. Don’t gut these investments in our budget. Don’t let other countries win the race for the future. Support the same kind of research and innovation that led to the computer chip and the Internet; to new American jobs and new American industries.

Nowhere is the promise of innovation greater than in American-made energy. Over the last three years, we’ve opened millions of new acres for oil and gas exploration, and tonight, I’m directing my Administration to open more than 75 percent of our potential offshore oil and gas resources. Right now, American oil production is the highest that it’s been in eight years. That’s right – eight years. Not only that – last year, we relied less on foreign oil than in any of the past sixteen years.

But with only 2 percent of the world’s oil reserves, oil isn’t enough. This country needs an all-out, all-of-the-above strategy that develops every available source of American energy – a strategy that’s cleaner, cheaper, and full of new jobs.

We have a supply of natural gas that can last America nearly one hundred years, and my Administration will take every possible action to safely develop this energy. Experts believe this will support more than 600,000 jobs by the end of the decade. And I’m requiring all companies that drill for gas on public lands to disclose the chemicals they use. America will develop this resource without putting the health and safety of our citizens at risk.

The development of natural gas will create jobs and power trucks and factories that are cleaner and cheaper, proving that we don’t have to choose between our environment and our economy. And by the way, it was public research dollars, over the course of thirty years, that helped develop the technologies to extract all this natural gas out of shale rock – reminding us that Government support is critical in helping businesses get new energy ideas off the ground.

What’s true for natural gas is true for clean energy. In three years, our partnership with the private sector has already positioned America to be the world’s leading manufacturer of high-tech batteries. Because of federal investments, renewable energy use has nearly doubled. And thousands of Americans have jobs because of it.

When Bryan Ritterby was laid off from his job making furniture, he said he worried that at 55, no one would give him a second chance. But he found work at Energetx, a wind turbine manufacturer in Michigan. Before the recession, the factory only made luxury yachts. Today, it’s hiring workers like Bryan, who said, “I’m proud to be working in the industry of the future.”

Our experience with shale gas shows us that the payoffs on these public investments don’t always come right away. Some technologies don’t pan out; some companies fail. But I will not walk away from the promise of clean energy. I will not walk away from workers like Bryan. I will not cede the wind or solar or battery industry to China or Germany because we refuse to make the same commitment here. We have subsidized oil companies for a century. That’s long enough. It’s time to end the taxpayer giveaways to an industry that’s rarely been more profitable, and double-down on a clean energy industry that’s never been more promising. Pass clean energy tax credits and create these jobs.

We can also spur energy innovation with new incentives. The differences in this chamber may be too deep right now to pass a comprehensive plan to fight climate change. But there’s no reason why Congress shouldn’t at least set a clean energy standard that creates a market for innovation. So far, you haven’t acted. Well tonight, I will. I’m directing my Administration to allow the development of clean energy on enough public land to power three million homes. And I’m proud to announce that the Department of Defense, the world’s largest consumer of energy, will make one of the largest commitments to clean energy in history – with the Navy purchasing enough capacity to power a quarter of a million homes a year.

Of course, the easiest way to save money is to waste less energy. So here’s another proposal: Help manufacturers eliminate energy waste in their factories and give businesses incentives to upgrade their buildings. Their energy bills will be $100 billion lower over the next decade, and America will have less pollution, more manufacturing, and more jobs for construction workers who need them. Send me a bill that creates these jobs.

Building this new energy future should be just one part of a broader agenda to repair America’s infrastructure. So much of America needs to be rebuilt. We’ve got crumbling roads and bridges. A power grid that wastes too much energy. An incomplete high-speed broadband network that prevents a small business owner in rural America from selling her products all over the world.

During the Great Depression, America built the Hoover Dam and the Golden Gate Bridge. After World War II, we connected our States with a system of highways. Democratic and Republican administrations invested in great projects that benefited everybody, from the workers who built them to the businesses that still use them today.

In the next few weeks, I will sign an Executive Order clearing away the red tape that slows down too many construction projects. But you need to fund these projects. Take the money we’re no longer spending at war, use half of it to pay down our debt, and use the rest to do some nation-building right here at home.

There’s never been a better time to build, especially since the construction industry was one of the hardest-hit when the housing bubble burst. Of course, construction workers weren’t the only ones hurt. So were millions of innocent Americans who’ve seen their home values decline. And while Government can’t fix the problem on its own, responsible homeowners shouldn’t have to sit and wait for the housing market to hit bottom to get some relief.

That’s why I’m sending this Congress a plan that gives every responsible homeowner the chance to save about $3,000 a year on their mortgage, by refinancing at historically low interest rates. No more red tape. No more runaround from the banks. A small fee on the largest financial institutions will ensure that it won’t add to the deficit, and will give banks that were rescued by taxpayers a chance to repay a deficit of trust.

Let’s never forget: Millions of Americans who work hard and play by the rules every day deserve a Government and a financial system that do the same. It’s time to apply the same rules from top to bottom: No bailouts, no handouts, and no copouts. An America built to last insists on responsibility from everybody.

We’ve all paid the price for lenders who sold mortgages to people who couldn’t afford them, and buyers who knew they couldn’t afford them. That’s why we need smart regulations to prevent irresponsible behavior. Rules to prevent financial fraud, or toxic dumping, or faulty medical devices, don’t destroy the free market. They make the free market work better.

There is no question that some regulations are outdated, unnecessary, or too costly. In fact, I’ve approved fewer regulations in the first three years of my presidency than my Republican predecessor did in his. I’ve ordered every federal agency to eliminate rules that don’t make sense. We’ve already announced over 500 reforms, and just a fraction of them will save business and citizens more than $10 billion over the next five years. We got rid of one rule from 40 years ago that could have forced some dairy farmers to spend $10,000 a year proving that they could contain a spill – because milk was somehow classified as an oil. With a rule like that, I guess it was worth crying over spilled milk.

I’m confident a farmer can contain a milk spill without a federal agency looking over his shoulder. But I will not back down from making sure an oil company can contain the kind of oil spill we saw in the Gulf two years ago. I will not back down from protecting our kids from mercury pollution, or making sure that our food is safe and our water is clean. I will not go back to the days when health insurance companies had unchecked power to cancel your policy, deny you coverage, or charge women differently from men.

And I will not go back to the days when Wall Street was allowed to play by its own set of rules. The new rules we passed restore what should be any financial system’s core purpose: Getting funding to entrepreneurs with the best ideas, and getting loans to responsible families who want to buy a home, start a business, or send a kid to college.

So if you’re a big bank or financial institution, you are no longer allowed to make risky bets with your customers’ deposits. You’re required to write out a “living will” that details exactly how you’ll pay the bills if you fail – because the rest of us aren’t bailing you out ever again. And if you’re a mortgage lender or a payday lender or a credit card company, the days of signing people up for products they can’t afford with confusing forms and deceptive practices are over. Today, American consumers finally have a watchdog in Richard Cordray with one job: To look out for them.

We will also establish a Financial Crimes Unit of highly trained investigators to crack down on large-scale fraud and protect people’s investments. Some financial firms violate major anti-fraud laws because there’s no real penalty for being a repeat offender. That’s bad for consumers, and it’s bad for the vast majority of bankers and financial service professionals who do the right thing. So pass legislation that makes the penalties for fraud count.

And tonight, I am asking my Attorney General to create a special unit of federal prosecutors and leading state attorneys general to expand our investigations into the abusive lending and packaging of risky mortgages that led to the housing crisis. This new unit will hold accountable those who broke the law, speed assistance to homeowners, and help turn the page on an era of recklessness that hurt so many Americans.

A return to the American values of fair play and shared responsibility will help us protect our people and our economy. But it should also guide us as we look to pay down our debt and invest in our future.

Right now, our most immediate priority is stopping a tax hike on 160 million working Americans while the recovery is still fragile. People cannot afford losing $40 out of each paycheck this year. There are plenty of ways to get this done. So let’s agree right here, right now: No side issues. No drama. Pass the payroll tax cut without delay.

When it comes to the deficit, we’ve already agreed to more than $2 trillion in cuts and savings. But we need to do more, and that means making choices. Right now, we’re poised to spend nearly $1 trillion more on what was supposed to be a temporary tax break for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans. Right now, because of loopholes and shelters in the tax code, a quarter of all millionaires pay lower tax rates than millions of middle-class households. Right now, Warren Buffett pays a lower tax rate than his secretary.

Do we want to keep these tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans? Or do we want to keep our investments in everything else – like education and medical research; a strong military and care for our veterans? Because if we’re serious about paying down our debt, we can’t do both.

The American people know what the right choice is. So do I. As I told the Speaker this summer, I’m prepared to make more reforms that rein in the long term costs of Medicare and Medicaid, and strengthen Social Security, so long as those programs remain a guarantee of security for seniors.

But in return, we need to change our tax code so that people like me, and an awful lot of Members of Congress, pay our fair share of taxes. Tax reform should follow the Buffett rule: If you make more than $1 million a year, you should not pay less than 30 percent in taxes. And my Republican friend Tom Coburn is right: Washington should stop subsidizing millionaires. In fact, if you’re earning a million dollars a year, you shouldn’t get special tax subsidies or deductions. On the other hand, if you make under $250,000 a year, like 98 percent of American families, your taxes shouldn’t go up. You’re the ones struggling with rising costs and stagnant wages. You’re the ones who need relief.

Now, you can call this class warfare all you want. But asking a billionaire to pay at least as much as his secretary in taxes? Most Americans would call that common sense.

We don’t begrudge financial success in this country. We admire it. When Americans talk about folks like me paying my fair share of taxes, it’s not because they envy the rich. It’s because they understand that when I get tax breaks I don’t need and the country can’t afford, it either adds to the deficit, or somebody else has to make up the difference – like a senior on a fixed income; or a student trying to get through school; or a family trying to make ends meet. That’s not right. Americans know it’s not right. They know that this generation’s success is only possible because past generations felt a responsibility to each other, and to their country’s future, and they know our way of life will only endure if we feel that same sense of shared responsibility. That’s how we’ll reduce our deficit. That’s an America built to last.

I recognize that people watching tonight have differing views about taxes and debt; energy and health care. But no matter what party they belong to, I bet most Americans are thinking the same thing right now: Nothing will get done this year, or next year, or maybe even the year after that, because Washington is broken.

Can you blame them for feeling a little cynical?

The greatest blow to confidence in our economy last year didn’t come from events beyond our control. It came from a debate in Washington over whether the United States would pay its bills or not. Who benefited from that fiasco?

I’ve talked tonight about the deficit of trust between Main Street and Wall Street. But the divide between this city and the rest of the country is at least as bad – and it seems to get worse every year.

Some of this has to do with the corrosive influence of money in politics. So together, let’s take some steps to fix that. Send me a bill that bans insider trading by Members of Congress, and I will sign it tomorrow. Let’s limit any elected official from owning stocks in industries they impact. Let’s make sure people who bundle campaign contributions for Congress can’t lobby Congress, and vice versa – an idea that has bipartisan support, at least outside of Washington.

Some of what’s broken has to do with the way Congress does its business these days. A simple majority is no longer enough to get anything – even routine business – passed through the Senate. Neither party has been blameless in these tactics. Now both parties should put an end to it. For starters, I ask the Senate to pass a rule that all judicial and public service nominations receive a simple up or down vote within 90 days.

The executive branch also needs to change. Too often, it’s inefficient, outdated and remote. That’s why I’ve asked this Congress to grant me the authority to consolidate the federal bureaucracy so that our Government is leaner, quicker, and more responsive to the needs of the American people.

Finally, none of these reforms can happen unless we also lower the temperature in this town. We need to end the notion that the two parties must be locked in a perpetual campaign of mutual destruction; that politics is about clinging to rigid ideologies instead of building consensus around common sense ideas.

I’m a Democrat. But I believe what Republican Abraham Lincoln believed: That Government should do for people only what they cannot do better by themselves, and no more. That’s why my education reform offers more competition, and more control for schools and States. That’s why we’re getting rid of regulations that don’t work. That’s why our health care law relies on a reformed private market, not a Government program.

On the other hand, even my Republican friends who complain the most about Government spending have supported federally-financed roads, and clean energy projects, and federal offices for the folks back home.

The point is, we should all want a smarter, more effective Government. And while we may not be able to bridge our biggest philosophical differences this year, we can make real progress. With or without this Congress, I will keep taking actions that help the economy grow. But I can do a whole lot more with your help. Because when we act together, there is nothing the United States of America can’t achieve.

That is the lesson we’ve learned from our actions abroad over the last few years.

Ending the Iraq war has allowed us to strike decisive blows against our enemies. From Pakistan to Yemen, the al Qaeda operatives who remain are scrambling, knowing that they can’t escape the reach of the United States of America.

From this position of strength, we’ve begun to wind down the war in Afghanistan. Ten thousand of our troops have come home. Twenty-three thousand more will leave by the end of this summer. This transition to Afghan lead will continue, and we will build an enduring partnership with Afghanistan, so that it is never again a source of attacks against America.

As the tide of war recedes, a wave of change has washed across the Middle East and North Africa, from Tunis to Cairo; from Sana’a to Tripoli. A year ago, Qadhafi was one of the world’s longest-serving dictators – a murderer with American blood on his hands. Today, he is gone. And in Syria, I have no doubt that the Assad regime will soon discover that the forces of change can’t be reversed, and that human dignity can’t be denied.

How this incredible transformation will end remains uncertain. But we have a huge stake in the outcome. And while it is ultimately up to the people of the region to decide their fate, we will advocate for those values that have served our own country so well. We will stand against violence and intimidation. We will stand for the rights and dignity of all human beings – men and women; Christians, Muslims, and Jews. We will support policies that lead to strong and stable democracies and open markets, because tyranny is no match for liberty.

And we will safeguard America’s own security against those who threaten our citizens, our friends, and our interests. Look at Iran. Through the power of our diplomacy, a world that was once divided about how to deal with Iran’s nuclear program now stands as one. The regime is more isolated than ever before; its leaders are faced with crippling sanctions, and as long as they shirk their responsibilities, this pressure will not relent. Let there be no doubt: America is determined to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, and I will take no options off the table to achieve that goal. But a peaceful resolution of this issue is still possible, and far better, and if Iran changes course and meets its obligations, it can rejoin the community of nations.

The renewal of American leadership can be felt across the globe. Our oldest alliances in Europe and Asia are stronger than ever. Our ties to the Americas are deeper. Our iron-clad commitment to Israel’s security has meant the closest military cooperation between our two countries in history. We’ve made it clear that America is a Pacific power, and a new beginning in Burma has lit a new hope. From the coalitions we’ve built to secure nuclear materials, to the missions we’ve led against hunger and disease; from the blows we’ve dealt to our enemies; to the enduring power of our moral example, America is back.

Anyone who tells you otherwise, anyone who tells you that America is in decline or that our influence has waned, doesn’t know what they’re talking about. That’s not the message we get from leaders around the world, all of whom are eager to work with us. That’s not how people feel from Tokyo to Berlin; from Cape Town to Rio; where opinions of America are higher than they’ve been in years. Yes, the world is changing; no, we can’t control every event. But America remains the one indispensable nation in world affairs – and as long as I’m President, I intend to keep it that way.

That’s why, working with our military leaders, I have proposed a new defense strategy that ensures we maintain the finest military in the world, while saving nearly half a trillion dollars in our budget. To stay one step ahead of our adversaries, I have already sent this Congress legislation that will secure our country from the growing danger of cyber-threats.

Above all, our freedom endures because of the men and women in uniform who defend it. As they come home, we must serve them as well as they served us. That includes giving them the care and benefits they have earned – which is why we’ve increased annual VA spending every year I’ve been President. And it means enlisting our veterans in the work of rebuilding our Nation.

With the bipartisan support of this Congress, we are providing new tax credits to companies that hire vets. Michelle and Jill Biden have worked with American businesses to secure a pledge of 135,000 jobs for veterans and their families. And tonight, I’m proposing a Veterans Job Corps that will help our communities hire veterans as cops and firefighters, so that America is as strong as those who defend her.

Which brings me back to where I began. Those of us who’ve been sent here to serve can learn from the service of our troops. When you put on that uniform, it doesn’t matter if you’re black or white; Asian or Latino; conservative or liberal; rich or poor; gay or straight. When you’re marching into battle, you look out for the person next to you, or the mission fails. When you’re in the thick of the fight, you rise or fall as one unit, serving one Nation, leaving no one behind.

One of my proudest possessions is the flag that the SEAL Team took with them on the mission to get bin Laden. On it are each of their names. Some may be Democrats. Some may be Republicans. But that doesn’t matter. Just like it didn’t matter that day in the Situation Room, when I sat next to Bob Gates – a man who was George Bush’s defense secretary; and Hillary Clinton, a woman who ran against me for president.

All that mattered that day was the mission. No one thought about politics. No one thought about themselves. One of the young men involved in the raid later told me that he didn’t deserve credit for the mission. It only succeeded, he said, because every single member of that unit did their job – the pilot who landed the helicopter that spun out of control; the translator who kept others from entering the compound; the troops who separated the women and children from the fight; the SEALs who charged up the stairs. More than that, the mission only succeeded because every member of that unit trusted each other – because you can’t charge up those stairs, into darkness and danger, unless you know that there’s someone behind you, watching your back.

So it is with America. Each time I look at that flag, I’m reminded that our destiny is stitched together like those fifty stars and those thirteen stripes. No one built this country on their own. This Nation is great because we built it together. This Nation is great because we worked as a team. This Nation is great because we get each other’s backs. And if we hold fast to that truth, in this moment of trial, there is no challenge too great; no mission too hard. As long as we’re joined in common purpose, as long as we maintain our common resolve, our journey moves forward, our future is hopeful, and the state of our Union will always be strong.

Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Why?!?

2012-01-24T08:28:00.000-05:00

"Paterno honored with Pa. flags at half-staff"

Rick Santorum and Rape (Again)

2012-01-24T07:58:00.003-05:00

When I was younger (so much younger than today), living in Southern Connecticut in the early days of cable TV there, we were able to watch the local evening news from New York City along with the local evening news from New Haven or Hartford.

I got to Roger Grimsby and Bill Buetel do the "Eyewitness" news on Channel 7. For a while, their weather guy was a man named "Tex" Antoine. I don't recall much about Antoine nor do I recall seeing his last broadcast but I take it he was a bit of a character and that his last broadcast went something like this:

The colorful Antoine was with WABC for a decade. A diabetic and creature of habit, Antoine would go to the same German restaurant every night.

Primo says his weatherman would have a glass of wine during the dinner break prior to the 11 p.m. newscast. Occasionally, someone would buy him an additional glass.

The diabetes caused his sugar levels to rise, which led Antoine to slur his words on the air “every once in a while.”

Finally, Primo scared him straight, bringing Antoine into his office and making him watch one of those slurred weather reports.

An issue of larger magnitude happened in November 1976, when his weather segment followed a horrific rape story of a young girl.

Antoine infamously said, “With rape so predominant in the news lately, it is well to remember the words of Confucius: ‘If rape is inevitable, lie back and enjoy it.’”

“[It] was just too much,” Primo admits. “Between those couple of instances and that, we had to let him go.”

Ha. Funny. A 5 year old girl should recognize the inevitability of her rape and just "lie back and enjoy it."

Make the best of a horrible situation, in other words. Which brings me to Rick Santorum. Recently on CNN he was asked about rape and abortion:

MORGAN: But do you really -- do you really -- let me ask you this. Do you really believe, in every case, it should be totally wrong, in the sense that -- I know that you believe, even in cases of rape and incest -- and you've got two daughters. You know, if you have a daughter that came to you who had been raped.

SANTORUM: Yes.

MORGAN: And was pregnant and was begging you to let her have an abortion, would you really be able to look her in the eye and say, no, as her father?

SANTORUM: I would do what every father must do, is to try to counsel your daughter to do the right thing.

(CROSSTALK)

MORGAN: It's an almost impossibly hypothetical thing to ask you, but there will be people in that position, and they will share your religious values.

SANTORUM: It's not a matter of religious values.

MORGAN: And they are looking at their daughter ,saying, how can I deal with this, because if I make her have this baby, isn't it going to just ruin her life?

SANTORUM: Well, you can make the argument that if she doesn't have this baby, if she kills her child, that that, too, could ruin her life. And this is not an easy choice. I understand that. As horrible as the way that that son or daughter and son was created, it still is her child. And whether she has that child or doesn't, it will always be her child. And she will always know that. And so to embrace her and to love her and to support her and get her through this very difficult time, I've always, you know, I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created -- in the sense of rape -- but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.

As you know, we have to, in lots of different aspects of our life. We have horrible things happen. I can't think of anything more horrible. But, nevertheless, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.

Let me just say that on top of everything else, Rick's wrong in saying that it's not a matter of religious values. Once he asserts that a rape victim "accept what God has given" to her, he's making it about religion. What if she's not religious? What if she is, but she's not a theist? What if she is but she's not a theist within the so-called "Judeo-Christian" tradition? Why should she be forced to make a decision according to Rick Santorum's faith and not her own?

See? It is about religious values.

But let's put all that aside and think about what Rick's saying - that his God would allow such a horrible situation to occur in the first place in order for one more baby to be born. Given all His omnipotence, you'd think He'd have come up with a better way of procreation than allowing all that damage to all those women.

But what do I know? I'm an agnostic. I don't believe any of that.

Rape: Just sit back and enjoy it.
Rape: Just make the best out of a difficult situation.

Yea, right.

Voter Fraud! Or Maybe Not

2012-01-23T08:00:00.002-05:00

Loyal wingnuts that they are, the Tribune-Review's editorial board warns us, yet again, about the rampant voter fraud:

Among the Obama administration's re-election cheerleaders, none is more duplicitous than Attorney General Eric Holder, whose sis-boom-ba on "voter rights" is sorely out of sync with factual accounts of fraud.

Last month the Justice Department blocked a South Carolina photo-identification law, insisting it makes voting more difficult for minorities. At a rally in Columbia, S.C., last week, Mr. Holder said defending that cause is "a moral imperative," The Washington Post reported.

But Holder's presumptuous intervention in South Carolina backfired. In response, that state's attorney general, Alan Wilson, did some digging and found that at least 900 dead people voted in South Carolina's 2010 election, writes Peter Hannaford for The American Spectator. Mr. Wilson is going to court to restore the law.

Here's Hannaford's piece - and it's interesting to note the unquestioned frames: It's voter fraud and if it's voter fraud, then it's voter fraud in favor of the Democrats.

Too bad the data isn't so clear cut.
Hannaford frames:

Years ago the Democrats learned that the surest way to win a tight election was to have just the right number of dead people ready to vote. It worked in Texas in 1948 and Illinois in 1960 and may have worked in South Carolina in 2010 if Attorney General Eric Holder hadn't left well enough alone.

Here's some local reporting on the South Carolinian fraud (oops - I mean "fraud"):

It's the one right all Americans hold dear: the right to vote. But, according to an investigation from the Department of Motor Vehicles, 957 South Carolinian exercised that right from the grave.

"In my opinion, and I'm not an expert in this area, dead guys shouldn't be allowed to vote," said DMV director Kevin Shwedo.

Shwedo had his staff look at the list of people who cast a vote in 2010 then compared that list to the Social Security Administration's list of death certificates. The evidence showed, once again, 957 dead voters voted.

Now let's all take a deep breath and look again at what DMV Director Shwedo (who admitted he's not an expert on this issue - in fact he was only appointed to head the DMV by Governor Nikki Haley last January) found. He found 957 names on both lists; the list of people who voted in 2010 and the list of people who died before hand. No mention of who they voted for, is there? It could easily be 950 examples of bad record keeping (this is the DMV, we're talking here)

But let's assume for the sake of argument it is voter fraud - what's the evidence that it's Democratic voter fraud?

There is none.

And even if it is exactly what Scaife's braintrust says it is - how big of a problem is it, really?

Let's run the numbers. 957 fraudulent voters vs the 1.27 million cast in the Senate campaign (and it's pretty safe to assume that's close to the total number of votes cast in South Carolina in 2010) we're talking about .07% of the total votes cast - if my math is correct.

Even if all the allegations are true - that's the extent of the voter fraud - .07%.

Tell me again how it's damaging enough to threaten the voting rights of tens of thousands of registered voters? To make it harder for tens of thousands of people to vote?

Salena Zito and The Dixiecrats

2012-01-22T13:15:00.002-05:00

Let's start, without comment, with something the Salena Zito of the Tribune-Review wrote. Give her the first word, as it were, and then fill in the blanks:

Grantham, 47, reflects the once-proud Southern white Democrats that the party began bleeding in 1948 during a convention battle between civil-righters and Dixiecrat states'-righters. The Republican Party really didn't capitalize on that until 1952, when Dwight Eisenhower won some Southern states.

Richard Nixon developed the strategy of competing in the Deep South -- then, typically barren land for Republicans. While his results were mixed, his brilliant move marked the start of the South turning on Democrats.

Now, let's take a look at the Dixiecrat's party platform in 1948 - if only to see just what flavor of "states'-rights" it was. There certainly won't be much controversy with how the platform begins:

- 1 -

We believe that the Constitution of the United States is the greatest charter of human liberty ever conceived by the mind of man.

- 2 -

We oppose all efforts to invade or destroy the rights guaranteed by it to every citizen of this republic.

- 3 -

We stand for social and economic justice, which, we believe can be guaranteed to all citizens only by a strict adherence to our Constitution and the avoidance of any invasion or destruction of the constitutional rights of the states and individuals. We oppose the totallitaran, centralized bureaucratic government and the police nation called for by the platforms adopted by the Democratic and Republican Conventions.

Ok, maybe that last paragraph has a bit more of an edge to it than we're used to seeing, but on the other hand, who would have been in favor of a "totalitarian, centralized bureaucratic government" then? Or now, for that matter? I think that's what you'd call a "straw man" argument.

It's in the next three sections where the Dixiecrat reality becomes strikingly obvious:

- 4 -

We stand for the segregation of the races and the racial integrity of each race; the constitutional right to choose one's associates; to accept private employment without governmental interference, and to learn one's living in any lawful way. We oppose the elimination of segregation, the repeal of miscegenation statutes, the control of private employment by Federal bureaucrats called for by the misnamed civil rights program. We favor home-rule, local self-government and a minimum interference with individual rights.

- 5 -

We oppose and condemn the action of the Democratic Convention in sponsoring a civil rights program calling for the elimination of segregation, social equality by Federal fiatt, regulations of private employment practices, voting, and local law enforcement.

- 6 -

We affirm that the effective enforcement of such a program would be utterly destructive of the social, economic and political life of the Southern people, and of other localities in which there may be differences in race, creed or national orgin in appreciable numbers.

This is what Salena Zito boiled down into the simple and yet oh so misleading phrase "states'-righters." Take a look again at what those Dixiecrats were against:

Desegregation
Interracial marriage
Race-neutral employment and voting opportunities

In short, basic civil rights for African-Americans. That's the tradition of "the once-proud Southern white Democrats that the party began bleeding in 1948" to the Republican Party. And this isn't me saying it, it's an expert Zito herself quotes:

"As a new generation developed, the people who were conservative Democrats and Dixiecrats mostly became Republicans," explained Bert Rockman, Purdue University political science professor.

It wasn't until after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that the South turned solidly against the Democratic Party - at a moment, as we're told:

When Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, he told aide Bill Moyers that Democrats would face a backlash from the white Southerners who had been part of the Democratic coalition Franklin Roosevelt forged. "We have lost the South for a generation," he warned.

Now go back to what Zito wrote, think about all that you read above. Who left the Democratic Party? And where did they go? Now imagine what Zito wanted you to think.

Now ask yourself: How different are those two ideas?

Song of the Day

2012-01-20T09:58:00.002-05:00

Obama Plays the Apollo

Mitt Romney: Man of the People!

2012-01-19T08:54:00.006-05:00

Mitt Romeny is a true "Man of the People." He has not only feared getting a pink slip, he's actually unemployed! Mitt knows that people are people and corporations are people too and that when people get you miffed it's A-OK to enjoy firing them. He's had to admit publicly that his earnings are not very much". In fact, the man is so in need, he only had to pay a 15% tax rate. And, like most hard working Americans, when faced with economic challenges he did the only thing a true American could do: he parked his earnings in the Cayman Islands.

Admit it, folks -- Mitt's just like you and me!

UPDATE: Mitt doubles down! He know that "America's right and you're wrong" and he's the only candidate who's lived on the "real streets of America."

More Anti-Science At The Tribune-Review

2012-01-19T07:55:00.000-05:00

From today's Thursday Takes:

The National Center for Science Education says it has begun an effort to defend the teaching of man-made climate change in America's schools. Should any school district allow such blatant propaganda to be introduced into its curriculum -- without balancing it with the ample credible scientific evidence to the contrary -- those responsible should be fired.

On the one hand, Scaife's braintrust is absolutely right. Anyone caught teaching blatant propaganda as science should be fired.

The main problem here is that the Trib, yet again, is on the wrong side of the science.

There's a good intro to this at Forbes.com:

The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) will begin offering support to public school teachers and schools on the contentious topic of climate change.

Eugenie Scott, the executive director of the organization, based in Oakland, California, has been for years an outspoken defender of the teaching of evolution in U.S. classrooms. The NCSE provides resources to teachers, schools and school boards, and has challenged the efforts of creationists to undermine the teaching of evolution in various states.

As colleagues and textbook authors around the country began sharing their personal experiences and concerns about the teaching of climate science, Scott realized she needed to expand NCSE’s mandate to include the politically charged issue as well.

So they're usually going after the anti-science creationists/intelligent designers and now they've shifted over to going after the anti-science climate deniers. Why? What do the two have in common?

From the NCSE:

Although both evolution and climate change are accepted by the scientific community, both topics remain controversial among the public. As a result, teachers trying to teach evolution and/or climate change too often face opposition in their communities. Such opposition is based on ideology, not science, although the ideologies differ: religious ideologies in the case of evolution, economic and political ideologies in the case of climate change. In both cases, the result is that teachers are pressured to downplay these topics, misrepresent them as scientifically controversial, and air supposedly scientifically credible alternatives to them.

"Pressure" here might as well mean being fired (or threatened with termination) for teaching climate science.

The NCSE has some artwork to illustrate climate denial:

The Trib's take on the science fits very neatly into the NCSE's description of climate denial. The Doric: (undermine the science), the Ionic (claim the result is evil) and then today's Corinthian (demand equal time).

The Trib's threat today of firing any school teacher who doesn't give equal time to the anti-science in a science class should be chilling.

And STILL no mention at the Trib of NOAA's assessment that the Earth is warming. Using ten indicators each supported by multiple independently analyzed data sets NOAA says it's undeniable:

Indicators like:

Air Temperature Near Surface (Troposphere).
Humidity.
Temperature Over Oceans.
Sea Surface Temperatures.
Sea Level.
Ocean Heat Content.
Temperature Over Land.
Sea Ice.
Glaciers.
Snow Cover.

Each indicator has multiple data sets and each points in one direction: The Earth is warming and the junk we've poured into the air is a leading cause.

By all means let's fire any public school teacher that quotes from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.

SOPA and PIPA

2012-01-18T07:51:00.001-05:00

If you try to search Wikipedia today, you'll get this:

The text reads:

Imagine a WorldWithout Free Knowledge

For over a decade, we have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopedia in human history. Right now, the U.S. Congress is considering legislation that could fatally damage the free and open Internet. For 24 hours, to raise awareness, we are blacking out Wikipedia. Learn more.

And that "learn more" link leads to a FAQ of sorts that offers Wikipedia's explanation of the legislation:

SOPA and PIPA represent two bills in the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate respectively. SOPA is short for the "Stop Online Piracy Act," and PIPA is an acronym for the "Protect IP Act." ("IP" stands for "intellectual property.") In short, these bills are efforts to stop copyright infringement committed by foreign web sites, but, in our opinion, they do so in a way that actually infringes free expression while harming the Internet. Detailed information about these bills can be found in the Stop Online Piracy Act and PROTECT IP Act articles on Wikipedia, which are available during the blackout. GovTrack lets you follow both bills through the legislative process: SOPA on this page, and PIPA on this one. The EFF has summarized why these bills are simply unacceptable in a world that values an open, secure, and free Internet.

You can also, if you're so inclined, track the legislation via the Library of Congress:

As a general principle, I'd say that censorship is a bad thing. Censorship to protect profit, even worse.

Another Reason Torture's Immoral

2012-01-17T07:52:00.000-05:00

I start today with the P-G's Tony Norman:

Last week, video footage of four U.S. Marines urinating on the bodies of three dead Taliban fighters went viral. With the exception of a handful of morally dead ideologues on the right, the reaction to the video was one of revulsion at home and fury abroad.

As Americans, we were reminded that just because we choose not to pay attention to the war in Afghanistan, we share moral complicity for wars fought in our name. The callousness of the four Marines wasn't unprecedented. Relative to the toll on civilian lives in three countries because of American drone attacks, public urination on enemy corpses pales in comparison as a war crime.

In a widely read essay in The Washington Post, war correspondent Sebastian Junger astutely pointed out that a "19-year-old Marine has a very hard time reconciling the fact that it's OK to waterboard a live Taliban fighter but not OK to urinate on a dead one."

While Tony spends more time pointing out this nation's faith-based hypocrisy:

It is a sign of how decadent much of American Christianity has become: A candidate who enthusiastically condones assassination is the same man who 150 "Christian" leaders have decided best exemplifies the Christian values they want to see at work in the White House. Where does Jesus Christ fit in this scenario?

Sebastian Junger, in that essay Tony referenced, touches more on the sociological impacts of two administrations accommodation of torture:

When the war on terror started, the Marines in that video were probably 9 or 10 years old. As children they heard adults — and political leaders — talk about our enemies in the most inhuman terms. The Internet and the news media are filled with self-important men and women referring to our enemies as animals that deserve little legal or moral consideration. We have sent enemy fighters to countries like Syria and Libya to be tortured by the very regimes that we have recently condemned for engaging in war crimes and torture. They have been tortured into confessing their crimes and then locked up indefinitely without trial because their confessions — achieved through torture — will not stand up in court.

For the past 10 years, American children have absorbed these moral contradictions, and now they are fighting our wars. The video doesn’t surprise me, but it makes me incredibly sad — not just for them, but also for us. We may prosecute these men for desecrating the dead while maintaining that it is okay to torture the living.

From The Geneva Conventions, Chapter 2 Article 15 on the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field:

At all times, and particularly after an engagement, Parties to the conflict shall, without delay, take all possible measures to search for and collect the wounded and sick, to protect them against pillage and ill-treatment, to ensure their adequate care, and to search for the dead and prevent their being despoiled.

I'd say pissing on some dead enemy combatants certainly qualifies as "despoiled."

Legality aside (as if that's possible here) I want to emphasize another downside of allowing the Bush-endorsed waterboarding to go unpunished or even unprosecuted (as the Obama Administration is doing): it desensitizes us to all other "paler" war crimes. War crimes done in our name. Some with our grudging acquiescence.

To feel like we're protecting our safety, we despoil ourselves.

No longer the city on the hill. No longer on the high moral ground. Look at us. Look at what they make you give.

Of Course The Trib's Politics NEVER Skews It's Reporting!

2012-01-14T09:36:00.000-05:00

Never? Well, hardly ever.

Take a look at this short blurb from today's Tribune-Review:

Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pennsylvania are receiving a $3.5 million federal grant to collaborate on transportation research for the U.S. Department of Transportation, school officials said.

The grant will establish CMU and Penn as a University Transportation Center, with its research focusing on identifying ways that technology can improve transportation safety and efficiency. Most of the work will be done on CMU's Oakland campus, school officials said.

U.S. Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Forest Hills, said CMU, as one of the nation's leading computer science and engineering schools, was "an obvious choice for research on ways to use computers linked to sensors to improve transportation safety, identify infrastructure that needs repairs and reduce congestion."

Looks rather mundane, doesn't it? No loose ends to the story, right? Until you Google Doyle's remarks. Once you do that, you'll see what the news division of the Tribune-Review did.

They left out (omitted, expurgated, skipped over, voided) Congressman Jason Altmire.

Take a look. Here's the announcement at Almire's Congressional website. It begins:

U.S. Congressmen Jason Altmire (PA-04) and Mike Doyle (PA-14) today announced that Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pennsylvania would receive a $3.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) for the University Transportation Center (UTC) proposal, titled "Technologies for Safe and Efficient Transportation (T-SET)."

And here's Doyle's remarks one paragraph later

"Carnegie Mellon University is one of the nation's leaders in computers and engineering, so CMU's an obvious choice for research on ways to use computers linked to sensors to improve transportation safety, identify infrastructure that needs repairs, and reduce traffic congestion," Congressman Doyle observed. "I was pleased to join my colleagues in the Pennsylvania delegation in supporting the CMU-Penn intelligent transportation proposal." [Emphasis added.]

Googling those words as of this writing (9:20am on January 14) leads to only 5 hits - 4 lead back to the reporting in the Trib and one back to Altmire's webpage.

So how do you think the Trib got that quote? However it was, they had to know it came attached to the Altmire office.

I am sure there's a very good reason why they expunged Altmire's name from the story. Just as I am sure that whatever the reason, it has nothing whatsoever to do with any upcoming election. I mean, the Trib's news division would never do anything so obvious to undermine a political candidate, right? The editorial board would of course, but never the news division, right?

Never? Well, hardly ever.

VOTERFRAUDVOTERFRAUD!! VOTER FRAUD!

2012-01-13T07:31:00.000-05:00

So voter fraud does exist!

James O'Keefe and his Project Veritas proved it.

By committing it.

The story starts here:

A mystery man trying to vote in the New Hampshire primary using a dead man’s name got caught by an eagle-eyed voting supervisor in Manchester, then disappeared before police could corral him.

“We take a lot of pride in this primary,” Gloria Pilotte, the Ward 9 supervisor who stopped the voter fraud, told the Herald.

And:

The man, who admitted being from Texas, almost got away with the fraud. He came in to the polling place and gave election officials the name of a man who was still on the voter list. Voters here don’t have to present ID if they are registered.

But Pilotte recognized the name and knew the man had died within the past 10 days. Pilotte said the voter list wasn’t updated because the man had died so recently.

That turned into this:

Another time, the would-be voter left after poll workers started asking question about the name he gave, Manchester City Clerk Matt Normand said.

“It just so happens the ward moderator recognized the name as not being that person,” Normand said.

The moderator, Gloria Pilotte, asked to speak to the undercover voter to see if there was some mistake.

He left before they had a chance to speak.

“He never got a ballot,” Normand said.

That article, from the Union Leader, begins with:

The New Hampshire Attorney General has launched a comprehensive review of state voting procedures, after people obtained ballots of dead voters during the presidential primary on Tuesday.

No fraudulent votes were actually cast. But in nine instances, clerks readily handed over ballots after a would-be voter implied he was the city resident, recently deceased, still listed on the voter checklist, according to a video posted on the Internet.

And how do we know it was O'Keefe and his Project Veritas? He said so. From the Boston Herald:

The guerrilla gotcha artist who punked New Hampshire says his latest ploy — using dead people’s identities to get ballots in the Granite State primary — is no different than what any hard-hitting network news operation does.

It’s just another kind of investigative journalism, insists conservative video activist James O’Keefe, who is now facing a state investigation.

And why a state investigation? The U-L explains:

State law makes it a crime to use a false name to obtain a ballot. State law also prohibits the audio-recording of a person without consent.

Talkingpointsmemo goes further and states that it's against Federal Law even to procure a ballot under false pretenses. Title 42 of the US Code:

A person, including an election official, who in any election for Federal office...knowingly and willfully deprives, defrauds, or attempts to deprive or defraud the residents of a State of a fair and impartially conducted election process, by...the procurement or submission of voter registration applications that are known by the person to be materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent under the laws of the State in which the election is held...shall be fined in accordance with title 18 (which fines shall be paid into the general fund of the Treasury, miscellaneous receipts (pursuant to section 3302 of title 31), notwithstanding any other law), or imprisoned not more than 5 years, or both.

And that's what they did - on numerous occasions. They got it on tape and everything.

Arrest and prosecute James O'Keefe and all the other members of Project Veritas for violating the law in New Hampshire.

On The Dignity Of The Family

2012-01-12T07:56:00.000-05:00

From the NY Daily News:

Pope Benedict XVI denounced gay marriage in his annual “State of the World” address Monday, going so far as to say the same-sex nuptials threaten the future of humanity.

In the speech, the pope, 84, unleashed what some consider being his strongest tirade against gay marriage, saying it is among conventions that “undermine the family” and “threaten human dignity and the future of humanity itself,” Reuters reported.

“Pride of place goes to the family, based on the marriage of a man and woman,” the pontiff said.

“This is not a simple convention, but rather the fundamental cell of every society,” he continued. “Consequently, policies which undermine the family threaten human dignity and the future of humanity itself.”

You can read the entire document here.

It's curious to me how he can, on the one hand, defend the "pride of place" for "the family" and condemn "policies which undermine the family" while at the same time undermine the criminal investigations into the rape and torture of children.

For background on that, I turn to Christopher Hitchens:

In 2002, I happened to be on Hardball With Chris Matthews, discussing what the then attorney general of Massachusetts, Thomas Reilly, had termed a massive cover-up by the church of crimes against children by more than a thousand priests. I asked, why is the man who is prima facie responsible, Cardinal Bernard Law, not being questioned by the forces of law and order? Why is the church allowed to be judge in its own case and enabled in effect to run private courts where gross and evil offenders end up being "forgiven"? This point must have hung in the air a bit, and perhaps lodged in Cardinal Law's own mind, because in December of that year he left Boston just hours before state troopers arrived with a subpoena seeking his grand-jury testimony. Where did he go? To Rome, where he later voted in the election of Pope Benedict XVI and now presides over the beautiful church of Santa Maria Maggiore, as well as several Vatican subcommittees.

In my submission, the current scandal passed the point of no return when the Vatican officially became a hideout for a man who was little better than a fugitive from justice. By sheltering such a salient offender at its very heart, the Vatican had invited the metastasis of the horror into its bosom and thence to its very head. It is obvious that Cardinal Law could not have made his escape or been given asylum without the approval of the then pontiff and of his most trusted deputy in the matter of child-rape damage control, then cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.

Developments since that time have appalled even the most diehard papal apologists by their rapidity and scale. Not only do we have the letter that Cardinal Ratzinger sent to all Catholic bishops, enjoining them sternly to refer rape and molestation cases exclusively to his office. That would be bad enough in itself, since any person having knowledge of such a crime is legally obliged to report it to the police.

I will say it again. Given the atrocious behavior over the past few decades of the Vatican regarding its own sexually abusive priests, why should anyone treat any statement of sexual morality coming out of the Vatican with any credibility whatsoever?

I would think not raping the young boys and not sheltering those who looked the other way should be a bigger concern for the self appointed guardians of the family.

Well, we knew he couldn't impersonate 'The Thinker'

2012-01-11T10:31:00.002-05:00

Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Tebowstahl pays off a bet.

How Different The GOP Is!

2012-01-11T07:56:00.002-05:00

I wanted to follow-up on this post from a few days ago.

As you will no doubt recall, Ronald Reagan was on record as saying:

We establish no religion in this country, we command no worship, we mandate no belief, nor will we ever. Church and state are, and must remain, separate.

Owing to the date of that speech (October 24, 1984) and to the fact that he takes a political swipe or two:

And there's something else. The ideals of our country leave no room whatsoever for intolerance, for anti-Semitism, or for bigotry of any kind—none. In Dallas, we acted on this conviction. We passed a resolution concerning anti-Semitism and disassociating the Republic[an] Party from all people and groups who practice bigotry in any form. But in San Francisco this year, the Democratic Party couldn't find the moral courage or leadership to pass a similar resolution. And, forgive me, but I think they owe you an explanation. [Applause] Thank you.

What has happened to them? Why, after the issue became so prominent during the primaries, did the Democratic leadership walk away from their convention without a resolution condemning this insidious cancer? Why didn't they turn their backs on special interests and stand shoulder to shoulder with us in support of tolerance and in unequivocal opposition to prejudice and bigotry?

We must never remain silent in the face of bigotry. We must condemn those who seek to divide us. In all quarters and at all times, we must teach tolerance and denounce racism, anti-Semitism, and all ethnic or religious bigotry wherever they exist as unacceptable evils. We have no place for haters in America—none, whatsoever.

We can assume this is speech is more of a campaign speech than a policy speech. It was only a few weeks before the '84 elections. For example, what did he mean by "In Dallas"?

That would be the GOP party platform from the Party Convention in Dallas:

The Republican Party reaffirms its support of the pluralism and freedom that have been part and parcel of this great country. In so doing, it repudiates and completely disassociates itself from people, organizations, publications, and entities which promulgate the practice of any form of bigotry, racism, anti-semitism, or religious intolerance.

It's interesting to ponder that, faced with an upcoming election, Reagan decided to campaign on the idea that the church and state are separate and that in matters of faith the government must remain neutral.

How does that stand up to the current GOP in the current election season?

Let's start with tepid front-runner Mitt Romney:

We separate church and state affairs in this country, and for good reason. No religion should dictate to the state nor should the state interfere with the free practice of religion. But in recent years, the notion of the separation of church and state has been taken by some well beyond its original meaning. They seek to remove from the public domain any acknowledgment of God. Religion is seen as merely a private affair with no place in public life. It is as if they are intent on establishing a new religion in America – the religion of secularism. They are wrong.

The founders proscribed the establishment of a state religion, but they did not countenance the elimination of religion from the public square. We are a nation 'Under God' and in God, we do indeed trust.

So he's looking for a separation that's not so separate and a neutrality that's not so neutral. He's also being slammed by his political rivals for not being conservative enough.

So what do the conservatives have to say about the Reagan endorsed idea of a wall separating church and state? For that we have to go to Rick Santorum. As reported by the Boston Globe last March, the former Senator said went full radical:

In remarks to about 50 members of the group Catholic Citizenship -- which encourages parishioners to speak out on issues of public policy --- Santorum decried what he called the growing secularization of American public life.

He traced the problem to Kennedy's 1960 speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, in which Kennedy – then a candidate for president - sought to allay concerns about his Catholicism by declaring, "I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute."

Santorum, who is Catholic, said he was "frankly appalled" by Kennedy's remark.

"That was a radical statement," Santorum said, and it did "great damage."

Then there's Newt Gingrich. From The Hill:

Newt Gingrich is giving fair warning to judges and courts across the country: If he becomes president, the judiciary won’t reign supreme.

The former House Speaker and current Republican presidential front-runner convened a conference call with reporters on Saturday to expand on his call for Congress to subpoena judges or even abolish courts altogether if they make wrong-headed decisions. Those arguments from Gingrich at Thursday's debate in Iowa drew scrutiny and criticism from his rivals.

And what brought this on:

He said he developed his proposals after the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in 2002 ruled that reciting phrase “one nation, under God” in the Pledge of Alliance in public schools infringed on the separation of church and state.

“I was frankly just fed up with elitist judges imposing secularism on the country and basically fundamentally changing the American Constitution,” Gingrich said. “The more it was clear to me that you have a judicial psychology run amok, and there has to be some method of bringing balance back to the three branches.”

Imposing secularism - that is what maintaining the separation of church and state really means to Newt Gingrich. And, by gum, he'll abolish any court that even tries.

How far they've come. How utterly different from the ideological source they revere.

Go read Tony

2012-01-10T09:30:00.004-05:00

Tony Norman on Rick Santorum and "Blah" people:

Strip away the guile and the populist facade, and it won't be long until the pink chewy nougat of intolerance at his center erupts in your face.

LOL!

Go read the whole thing here.

Occupy Pittsburgh Calls for a Day of Solidarity Today

2012-01-10T08:59:00.003-05:00

(click to enlarge)
Occupy Pittsburgh has called for a Day of Solidarity, today, January 10, 2012 against BNY Mellon for their attempts to evict them from the People’s Park (Mellon Green). Occupy Pittsburgh will go to court today to defend themselves against a lawsuit from BNY Mellon.

Via Occupy Pittsburgh:

The preliminary injunction hearing will begin at 9:00 am on Tuesday, January 10th in room 800 of the City-County Building in Downtown Pittsburgh. At 3:30 pm, Occupy Pittsburgh will begin demonstrating outside of the City-County Building. When Court lets out, there will be a brief Press Conference including an opportunity for Q & A with a member of the Occupy Pittsburgh legal team. Occupiers will then march from the City County Building to BNY Mellon for a demonstration followed by a rally at People’s Park and a musical performance by Jasiri X.

In addition to asking the public to attend the rally and march, Occupy Pittsburgh is asking the public to do the following to show their support:

• Hold non-violent demonstrations against BNY Mellon around the world (the bank’s corporate headquarters is One Wall Street, New York City). As a multinational banking institution BNY Mellon has offices around the globe including offices in; Boston, London, Moscow, Sydney, Cairo, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and many other population centers around the world

• Wear bandannas, Guy Fawkes masks, or similar coverings to express solidarity with the anonymous and amorphous “99%” in general and the 50 Jane Does and 50 John Does named in the lawsuit in particular. This, of course, is merely a suggestion subject to the comfort level of those involved;

• Engage in autonomous direct actions ***;

• Send mail supporting Occupy Pittsburgh to BNY Mellon’s Pittsburgh office (500 Grant Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15258) with the return address of #1 People’s Park, Pittsburgh PA 15219; and

• Temporarily change your addresses on Facebook and other web sites to #1 People’s Park, Pittsburgh PA 15219

***Occupy Pittsburgh and our allies will not endorse, plan, or coordinate any unlawful or violent actions.

According to Occupy Pittsburgh, Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Oakland, Occupy Cleveland, Occupy Philadelphia and other Occupy groups across the U.S. will take action in support of Occupy Pittsburgh today. This includes a demonstration by Occupy Wall Street in front of One Wall Street, the New York headquarters of BNY Mellon.

UPDATE: Potter provides "A sneak preview of today's Occupy Pittsburgh hearing"

Huh. Go Figure.

2012-01-09T07:49:00.003-05:00

An interesting stream of words came to me this weekend via a facebook status update. The text read:

We in the United States, above all, must remember that lesson, for we were founded as a nation of openness to people of all beliefs. And so we must remain. Our very unity has been strengthened by our pluralism. We establish no religion in this country, we command no worship, we mandate no belief, nor will we ever. Church and state are, and must remain, separate.

It's that last part that fumes our friends, the social/religious conservatives. It's not in the Constitution, they say. It's not what the founders or the framers intended, they say. Our greatness as a culture depends on our reliance on our shared Judeo/Christian heritage, they say. Erasing it will only undermine that greatness, they say.

Only a traitorous lib'rul could say what I read on facebook. The thing is my loyal facebook friend asserted that it was Ronald Reagan who spewed forth such malicious ideas.

But, o gentle reader, if you've learned anything whilst perusing this blog, you will have learned by now that just because it says so on the internet does not mean it's true. I mean there's no evidence Thomas Jefferson ever said or wrote:

No nation has ever existed or been governed without religion, nor can be.

Or:

The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man, and I, as Chief Magistrate of this nation, am bound to give it the sanction of my example.

And yet Jack Kelly, P-G columnist went on record and said he did. See what I mean?

So we're left with the question. Did Ronald Wilson Reagan, secular saint of the GOP and its Tea Party zealots actually say that "Church and state are, and must remain, separate"?

Why yes, yes he did. The date was October 24, 1984 and he was speaking before members of the Congregation of Temple Hillel and Jewish Community Leaders in Valley Stream, New York.

He also said:

At the same time that our Constitution prohibits state establishment of religion, it protects the free exercise of all religions. And walking this fine line requires government to be strictly neutral.

And just six weeks earlier, on September 6 at the International Convention of the B'nai B'rith, Ronald Reagan said:

Well, let me speak plainly: The United States of America is and must remain a nation of openness to people of all beliefs. Our very unity has been strengthened by this pluralism. That's how we began; this is how we must always be. The ideals of our country leave no room whatsoever for intolerance, anti-Semitism, or bigotry of any kind -- none. The unique thing about America is a wall in our Constitution separating church and state. It guarantees there will never be a state religion in this land, but at the same time it makes sure that every single American is free to choose and practice his or her religious beliefs or to choose no religion at all. Their rights shall not be questioned or violated by the state."

Ronald Wilson Reagan, 40th President of these United States of America thought that there was a wall separating Church and State.

Yea. Go figure.

Sue Gets Some National Recognition!

2012-01-07T11:52:00.001-05:00

Congratulations to Sue Kerr (she of Pittsburgh Lesbian Correspondents) for getting some big time recognition!

By Michelangelo Signorile at Huffingtonpost. Signorile is writing about our favorite ex-Senator Rick Santorum and his former spokesman, Robert Traynhan:

At the same time that Rick Santorum's 19-year-old daughter Elizabeth emerged on the campaign trail talking about "gay friends" who support her father, Santorum's former Senate communications director, a gay man named Robert Traynham, popped up on "Hardball" defending Santorum. All this while Santorum continues to get booed and jeered at campaign appearances all over New Hampshire for his stance on marriage equality.

More interesting is how Traynham, now a political analyst with a show on the Comcast Network in DC, seems to have previously purged his former boss from his past, perhaps seeing him as radioactive to a career in media. Pittsburgh blogger Sue Kerr had written a blog post just a week ago (before Traynham surfaced in the media) titled, "What Ever Happened to the Gay Guy Who Worked for Santorum?" in which she noted that Traynham has gone on to an illustrious career but doesn't mention anywhere in his bio on his website that he worked for Santorum

Sue, I love you to pieces but I am so envious right now I will be grumpily sulking over this for months - MONTHS I TELL YOU!!

Just kidding. Congratulations, Sue!!

Because This Is All They Got...

2012-01-07T10:22:00.000-05:00

The Tribune-Review's editorial board is back, yet again, on the "Climategate" story. If nothing else, it shows how weak a position Scaife's braintrust is in. They have nothing about the science, of course, as they're back to talking East Anglia emails.

From today's editorial page:

It's not just the far-reaching claims from the world's leading climate cluckers about "man-made global warming" that demand further inquiry -- it's what they continually attempt to hide.

Phil Jones, the former (and still controversial) lead climate researcher at the University of East Anglia, refused to share U.S.-funded climate data with skeptical scientists. As reported by Forbes, among e-mails made public recently is this explanation from Professor Jones in 2009:

"I've been told that the (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) is above national FOI (Freedom of Information) Acts." Additionally, "Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we get -- and has to be well hidden. I've discussed this with the main funder (the U.S. Department of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data."

Fire up the Keurig, this'll take some time.

Here's the initial reporting from Forbes.com. By the way, this is all from late November. Doesn't Scaife's braintrust have anything, oh I dunno, more recent to harp on? I hear Rick Santorum (who the braintrust seems to detest) is running for President. [Link corrected]

Anyway, back to Forbes. If you took a look at the article, you'd see that while it was posted at Forbes.com it was written by James Taylor of the Heartland Institute.

Not exactly bias-free, but given that it's from about six weeks ago, we have access to some very interesting responses to the second set of hacked emails. Namely this from Nature.com:

In an interview with Nature about 12 months ago, to mark the first anniversary of the release of hacked e-mails in an incident now widely referred to as Climategate, climate scientist Phil Jones said he feared that the anonymous hackers were sitting on more material, and that they would release it. He also said, having been through the experience already, that if there were to be a repeat then he was confident he would deal with it much better second time around. Last week he was proved correct, on both counts.

In marked contrast to the original 2009 release, Jones and his employer, the University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK, this time responded rapidly and with a keen sense of what the media were going to be interested in. This was never a story about the integrity of climate science, but rather about the behaviour of those scientists whose e-mails painted an incomplete but troubling self-portrait. The absence of the chief protagonist last time around only fuelled the flames.

Within 24 hours of the second batch of e-mails being handed to climate-sceptic websites, Jones was in central London answering questions at a press conference. And the university made widely available its explanations of some of the excerpted messages doing the rounds on the blogosphere.

And this from the American Association for the Advancement of Science, where Jones responded to the part about the IPCC being above FOI:

Asked about that, Jones said someone had told him that IPCC was immune to FOI rules but he now acknowledges that as "wrong" (as in incorrect). He said he was just "sending concerns I had with FOI." He added that outsiders didn't need to see the excruciating detail that goes into writing a multiauthor report, arguing that skeptics of climate science could misuse the back-and-forth. "Why do they need to know who wrote each sentence in each paragraph?" he said. "They're scientific discussions."

Although the various investigations after the 2009 leak cleared Jones and UEA of wrongdoing, Acton admitted that "our knuckles were collectively rapped over FOI." The university has since addressed the recommendations made by multiple inquiries, and turned over data to requesters.

Interesting that the braintrust never got around to saying any of this.

But let's get back to Forbes. Since the braintrust validated its reporting, we can trust what it says there, right?

Well, 5 days after Taylor's piece at Forbes, this was published. The writer, Steve Zwick points out that FOI doesn't have much to say about private emails (of which these no doubtedly were) and the IPCC has already toughened the transparency standards for its scientists - in response to the release of the first set of hacked emails.

And so on.

But do you notice anything? How much discussion is about the science and how much is about the emails?

Scaife's braintrust can't find fault (and you know that if they could, they wouldn't be bothering with fluff like this) with the science so they pound away at the emails.

And still no mention of NOAA calling climate change undeniable.

But yea, let's discuss yet again the stolen East Anglia emails.

One Wonders...

2012-01-06T07:35:00.001-05:00

It's undeniable that the Tribune-Review's not a fan of Occupy Pittsburgh. For example, there was this hit piece from a few months ago - something Chris Potter described as:

...a daily newspaper using its resources to bully people around, embarrassing them with personal information the paper can't even claim any public interest in -- simply for availing themselves of their First Amendment freedoms.

And then there was this editorial cartoon today:

You'd think that Scaife's braintrust would actually, you know, learn something about what they're writing about. But take a look at this from today's Laurels and Lances:

On the "Watch List": BNY Mellon. The commonwealth of Pennsylvania is reviewing whether Bank of New York Mellon overcharged the state and its pension funds on foreign currency transactions over the last 14 years. Three other states already have filed lawsuits to that effect. BNY Mellon denies any wrongdoing. But the allegations are a black mark that the banking giant will find difficult to erase.

Sound familiar?

It should. Occupy Pittsburgh has been protesting BNY Mellon for precisely that reason since the occupation began.

From the AP October 19, 2011:

About 75 members of the Occupy Pittsburgh group protested against corporations and the financial system in front of the BNY Mellon regional office in downtown Pittsburgh.

The protesters gathered at noon Wednesday for less than an hour to demand that Pennsylvania Attorney General Linda Kelly investigate whether the banking giant overcharged pension funds in the state.

BNY Mellon says the allegations are baseless. The Occupy Pittsburgh group was formed about two weeks ago, in response to the Occupy Wall Street protests.

And from Occupy Pittsburgh itself:

As we pointed out on October 19, BNY Mellon is being sued by the attorneys general of three states for ripping off $2 billion from public pension funds by overcharging them for foreign currency trades. It is also being sued for $1 billion by the Retirement System of the City of Detroit for keeping the pension funds’ money in Lehman Brothers even after it became apparent that that bank was in trouble.

Doesn't Scaife's braintrust already know this? If they do, then why did they fail to inform its readership of it? And if they don't, then why do they call themselves a newspaper?

Happy Friday, Pittsburgh.

Mitt Romney Wins Iowa Caucus by 8 Votes Over Rick Santorum

2012-01-04T02:35:00.003-05:00

Just announced by Iowa GOP Chairman:

Mitt Romney: 30,015 Votes

Rick Santorum: 30,007 Votes

Pittsburgh City Council: The Worm Turns

2012-01-03T11:44:00.003-05:00

Via the P-G:

Darlene Harris was reelected Pittsburgh City Council president this morning in a vote that pit her against her one-time political teammates

Voting for Mrs. Harris were herself, Ricky Burgess, Patrick Dowd, Theresa Kail-Smith, R. Daniel Lavelle and newcomer Corey O'Connor.

Voting against her were Bruce Kraus, Bill Peduto and Natalia Rudiak, her teammates the past two years.

Here's all the new positions:

Council President: Darlene Harris (nominated by Dowd)

President Pro Tempore: Theresa Kail-Smith (nominated by Burgess)

Finance Chair: Rev. Ricky Burgess

Public Safety Chair: Theresa Kail-Smith

Public Works Chair: Bruce Kraus

Human Resources Chair: Bill Peduto

Land Use & Economic Development Chair: R. Daniel Lavelle

Urban Recreation Chair: Corey O'Connor

Performance and Assessment Management Chair: Natalia Rudiak

Intergovernmental Affairs Chair: Patrick Dowd

Hearings Chair: Darlene Harris

Also see Infy here.

UPDATE: And, Early Returns here. (Yes, O'Connor chose the occasion to announce his engagement...)

Make your own joke

2012-01-03T09:44:00.002-05:00

Santorum Salad: Iowa Pizza Ranch Names Signature Dish After Rick Santorum

Good People of Iowa...

2012-01-03T09:25:00.002-05:00

Good People of Iowa,

If you are even considering caucusing for Rick Santorum, just keep this one word in mind:

Sincerely,
Your Friends in Pennsylvania

Follow The Money...Again (A Short Note)

2012-01-03T08:31:00.001-05:00

On the editorial pages of today's Tribune-Review we find two (2) columns, each Scaife Foundation connected, each Foundation connection unmentioned.

Imagine that.

Here's the first. It's written by David Rivkin and it's about the Obama Administration's pushback against Arizona's Immigration Law. But that's beside the point. Here's how Rivkin is described at the foot of the piece:

David Rivkin served in the Justice Department during the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations. Joe Jacquot is a former deputy attorney general of Florida and former chief counsel of the Senate Judiciary Committee's subcommittee on immigration.

HOWEVER, when you do a little digging, you'll find that David Rivkin is also "Senior Fellow and Co-Chair, Center for Law and Counterterrorism" at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies.

The Foundation for the Defense of Democracies has been the beneficiary of some serious Scaife Foundation money:

$200,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2010.
$150,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2009.
$250,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2008.
$250,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2007.
$200,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2006.
$275,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2005.
$125,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2004 .

By my count that's $1.45 million in Scaife money and not a peep about any of it from Scaife's paper.

Then there's the second column. It's written by Grace-Marie Turner and she's described at the foot of the column this way:

Grace-Marie Turner is president and founder of the Galen Institute, which is funded in part by the pharmaceutical and medical industries.

Wanna know who else funds the Galen Institute (in part)?

You guessed it:

$35,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2010.
$35,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2009.
$50,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2008.
$50,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2007.
$35,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2006.
$35,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2005.
$35,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2004.

By my count, that's $275,000 in Scaife money and not a peep about any of it from Scaife's paper.

This is how the Right Wing Noise machine works.

Jack Kelly Sunday

2012-01-01T12:28:00.002-05:00

Ed's right.

There's not much to fact-check in this week's Jack Kelly column though that doesn't mean there's nothing worth writing about in it.

What I find interesting is who's in it, who gets criticized and who's left out of it. The title of the column tells you what you need to know about this week's topic:

The search for 'Not Romney' goes on
Santorum is the best of the Iowa bunch

He starts by pointing out who he thinks will win/place/show in the Iowa horserace, Romney, Gingrich and Paul. Then he opts out of supporting each:

Rep. Paul has zero chance to win the nomination. His libertarian positions on economic issues are popular, but his anti-military, anti-Israel foreign policy views appeal mostly to crackpots.

And:

Conservatives fret that Romneycare in Massachusetts was the model for Obamacare, and we're uncomfortable with a candidate who seems to change his positions nearly as often as he changes his underwear.

And finally:

So we've searched desperately for someone else. One Not Romney after another has rocketed up in the polls, then plummeted when their flaws were exposed. First was Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota; then Texas Gov. Rick Perry; then businessman Herman Cain.

Mr. Gingrich seems to be on the same trajectory. He had a big lead a month ago. Then he got hammered by negative ads, and by vitriolic criticism from prominent conservative pundits. His lead in Iowa is gone.

I am curious if the "underwear" metaphor is an anti-LDS dog-whistle. Might be, might not be, though Jack's usually not that subtle. Let me explain. Jack could have written, "...change his positions nearly as often as he changes his socks." but he didn't he mentioned Romney's underwear. Given the hullabaloo over LDS "Temple Garments" Jack might be blowing a dog whistle by subtly reminding his readership of Romney's membership in the LDS Church. Or not.

Back to Jack. He says the interesting result would be who comes in fourth; Bachman, Perry or Santorum. Whoever comes in fourth, he writes, survives. The other two won't make it to New Hampshire.

This part I found most enlightening:

Gov. Perry had a big lead in national polls ... until he opened his mouth in debates. If he finishes close behind the top three, or breaks into it, Republicans may give him a second look. But once you've convinced so many that you're a moron, it's hard to come back.

See that? Jack Kelly just called Texas governor Rick Perry a moron. Now take a look at what he wrote waay back in September:

Liberals often say Republicans are stupid, but they really believe it with regard to Gov. Perry. For liberals, credentials and holding fashionable opinions are more important markers of intelligence than knowledge or accomplishment.

"Liberals revere high SAT scores," Mr. Shapiro wrote.

Gov. Perry scorns their opinions, and he went to Texas A&M, not Harvard or Yale. So when a new book said his is "the brainiest political operation in America," liberals were shocked.

And then:

So expect lots of name calling. That may not work either. The "Texas cowboy" frightens Eastern liberals, but other Americans may find Gov. Perry's decisiveness a refreshing change from the wuss in the White House who's been described -- cruelly but accurately -- by New Hampshire's Manchester Union Leader as "the Last Responder."

Isn't calling someone "a moron." some sort of name-calling? Just askin'.

At the time, we wrote that that column marked some sort of change for Jack:

In his column this week, the P-G's Jack Kelly has officially switched his support from the Sarracuda to Governor Secession and in doing so whines about how unfair the media's been to his newest BFF, Rick Perry.

Which leads to the question, In his own search for the great "Not Romney" Republican, why no mention of Sarah Palin? His search for the great Not Romney leads him past Santorum:

I'm not for any of them, but I object least to Mr. Santorum. He's intelligent, articulate, a solid conservative. He has plenty of experience in government; his personal life is unsullied by scandal. The knock on Rick is that he got drubbed when he ran for re-election in 2006. That's not a small thing, but it seems trivial when compared to the flaws of the others.

I'm not alone in wanting another candidate. Quoting Thomas Paine about "summer soldiers and sunshine patriots," Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol again this week begged an A list conservative to enter the race. National Review editor Rich Lowry reported Monday on a conversation he'd had with "a pretty prominent conservative officeholder who's constantly been discussing with people around the country the possibility of a new entrant or a push to draft someone."

The candidate that "pretty prominent conservative officeholder" has in mind is Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal. The prospect thrills Quin Hillyer of the American Spectator, who's been beating that drum for months.

Trouble is, Gov. Jindal endorsed Gov. Perry early on, and is too honorable to become a candidate while Mr. Perry is still in the race. Gov. Jindal campaigned in Iowa with Gov. Perry, where he had to correct Gov. Perry on the details of Gov. Perry's tax plan.

So according to Jack, Jindal's too honorable to run against the moron he's already endorsed.

Jack's not happy. So it's a pretty good day for me.

Thanks for working for the 99%, Councilman Doug Shields!

2011-12-30T11:06:00.005-05:00

(Click to enlarge)
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Straight-talking, passionate Shields leaves council

Essential Public Radio: Shields Leaves City Council

Frankly...

2011-12-30T07:53:00.002-05:00

As far as I can tell, it started here, with Mark Tapscott at the Washington Examiner:

Looks like the PC police have threatened members of the House of Representatives against wishing constituents a "Merry Christmas," if they want to do so in a mailing paid for with tax dollars.

Members who submit official mailings for review by the congressional franking commission that reviews all congressional mail to determine if it can be "franked," or paid for with tax dollars, are being told that no holiday greetings, including "Merry Christmas," can be sent in official mail.

Another example on the PC "War on Christmas" I guess.

Except, it's not. Not after you take a deeper look.

From Tapscott:

Members of Congress send millions of dollars worth of mail to constituents every year but there are official rules that govern what can and cannot be said in those mailings. Members are barred, for example, from saying anything that might be construed as advocating their re-election.

But saying "Merry Christmas" is also not permitted, according to a Dec. 12 memo from the "Franking Commission Staff" concerning "Holiday Messaging."

And he goes on to quote the memo:

Members are unable at the current time to use official resources to record holiday greetings, post on social media/website, or send to constituents in franked mail or e-communications.

Member’s Congressional Handbook: GREETINGS-

Expenses related to the purchase or distribution of greetings, including holiday celebrations, condolences, and congratulations for personal distinctions (wedding anniversaries, birthdays, etc.), are not reimbursable.”

Franking Manual:

4(a). Example of Nonfrankable Items-Birthday, anniversary, wedding, birth, retirement or condolence messages and holiday greetings are prohibited.”

You may make reference to the season as a whole using language along the lines of 'Have a safe and happy holiday season.' It may only be incidental to the piece rather than the primary purpose of the communication."

Two things here. It's not that saying "Merry Christmas" is not permitted. Rather, members of the House can send every one of their constituents a Christmas card if they wanted to. They just can't ask the taxpayers to pay for it.

And second - there's a Franking Manual?

But this must be a new thing, right? A newly imposed PC rule from the Pelosi/Obama crowd now controlling the House of Representatives, right??

Ha. That was a funny.

Ok, so despite the fact that the House is now controlled by the GOP, this offensive PC rule must be a holdover from when the socialists who control the Democrat party controlled the House, right?

Um, no. Here's the manual.

The date on the front page reads:

June 1998

And who was Speaker of the House in June of 1998?

That would be Newt Gingrich. Remember the late 90s? The GOP gained control of the House after the 94 elections.

But what about that Franking Commission? Who were they? More precisely, who's responsible for this offensive PC fiat stomping the religious freedoms of our God fearing House members?

From the manual:

BILL THOMAS, California, Chairman

JOHN BOEHNER, Ohio

ROBERT W. NEY, Ohio

STENY HOYER, Maryland

WILLIAM CLAY, Missouri

MARTIN FROST, Texas

Would you look at that. Current Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner was on the Committee that released the Franking manual in June of 1998. As well as Bob "They're not French Fries, they're Freedom Fries" Ney. House controlled by Newt, Franking Committee controlled by Republican Bill Thomas, committee members include Boehner and Ney and still they banned Christmas from the House mailings!!

They ought to be ashamed. Really.

Every dog has its day: Rick Santorum polling third in Iowa

2011-12-29T09:10:00.006-05:00

We give this one a "shazam!", "g-o-l-l-y", and "sur-prise, sur-prise, sur-prise!":

Lil Ricky placed third in a CNN poll for next week's Iowa's caucuses.

The Trib Misleads. On CFLs. AGAIN

2011-12-29T07:53:00.004-05:00

From today's New Year's wrap:

More bad news for the crowd that believes government should determine what light bulbs you can buy. London's Daily Mail reports that when compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) can no longer produce light, "the electronics in the base will still try to function, sometimes leading to overheating, smoke and fire." How comforting. [Bolding in original.]

And yet again, when you start to dig into the story you find the piles of facts that Scaife's braintrust casually omits.

Let's start digging.

From that Daily Mail article:

Compact fluorescent lamps, which will gradually replace traditional incandescent bulbs, are a fire hazard that could burn down your home, experts have warned.

The lamps (CFLs) use electricity to heat an element in the lamp’s base that leads the mercury vapor gas in the coils to emit light.

But when a CFL can no longer produce light, the electronics in its base will still try to function, sometimes leading to overheating, smoke and fire.

Good to know the braintrust read the first three paragraphs. But the next paragraph leads us to the Daily Mail's source:

Fires from the old incandescent bulbs, on the other hand, are virtually nonexistent, masslive.com reports.

Masslive.com is the online presence of a newspaper in Springfield Massachusetts called The Republican. So the Daily Mail wasn't really reporting on the CFLs, it was re-reporting what Masslive.com was reporting. Now why would a British newspaper re-report something negative about CFLs from central Massachusetts?

Do I need to tell you that the Daily Mail is a conservative paper?

Anyway, here's what Masslive had to say:

Compact fluorescent lamps, or CFLs, have been counted on to light the way to a more energy-efficient future.

Compared to traditional incandescent bulbs, which will gradually be phased out starting in January, CFLs use about a fifth the power and have a life six to 10 times as great.

However, since the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission launched its online safety complaints database in March, there have been 34 reports made by people about CFLs that emitted smoke or a burning odor and four reports of the devices catching fire.

As perspective, though, 272 million CFLs were sold in 2009 in the United States

Wow 4 bulbs out of 272,000,000. That's 0.00000147058824%, I think. And that's assuming those 4 bulbs were from only those millions of bulbs sold in 2009.

Not something the Braintrust bothered to tell you, is it?

Or how about this from the same masslive article?

Consumer Reports magazine, in its August issue, addressed the CFL burnout issue. “In our labs, we’ve tested 77 models of compact fluorescent lightbulbs over the last five years, for a combined 2,680,000 hours of light,” the article said.

“We’ve never seen a bulb create smoke or overheat enough at the end of its life to cause any noticeable physical damage to itself. But we’ve heard from readers about bulbs smoking and their plastic base or glass tube melting and discoloring,” the article said.

In 2009, after reports of end-of-life smoke and fire in CFLs, standards were revised for CFLs sold in North America that set new minimum requirements for the materials used in the plastic housing of the base.

Again, not something the braintrust bothered to tell you.

Oh, and the end-of-life smoke and fire issue has already been addressed?

Yet another thing the Braintrust didn't bother to tell you.

Interesting to see how the facts are shed when an article in a regional (though award winning) newspaper in central Massachusetts gets amplified up to a larger conservative paper in England and then that amplification gets echoed in Scaife's Über-conservative editorial page.

That's how the right wing noise machine works, my friends.

Happy Thursday.

oh fudge

2011-12-28T20:10:00.002-05:00

I got my letter from the City and my home has been reassessed at nearly triple its previous value.

oh fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck

Tracking Teh Crazie - Victoria Jackson

2011-12-28T07:54:00.000-05:00

Via Huffingtonpost:

Former "Saturday Night Live" actress Victoria Jackson, working on confidential information she as a web talk show host has special clearance to obtain, has claimed that the United States is being overtaken by radical Muslims bent on bringing the nation under Sharia law.

"I just went to a briefing in Washington DC, across the street from the Capitol, at the Longworth building at 8:30 am two days ago and it changed my life," Jackson said last week on her web show, "Politichicks." "For six hours, I saw pictures and names and dates and facts and Islamic law books and Korans, Surahs for six hours and they proved to me... that the Muslim Brotherhood has infiltrated our highest positions in government and this is serious."

You can watch it here, if you like. It's episode 10.

Huffpost points out that Jackson blogged on the meeting earlier in December:

I went to a six hour briefing in Washington D.C. last week. Thirty eight government representatives were invited. Fifteen showed up. Slides, photos, names, dates and documents were shown overhead proving that the Muslim Brotherhood, not only planned the “Arab Spring” and Libyan take over, but has infiltrated our highest government positions, schools, courts and military and is even making policy.

And then:

During this briefing, I saw many documents that had been confiscated from F.B.I. raids on Muslim cells. One document from 30 years ago outlined their “phased plan” to overtake America/the West; 1) Phase of discreet and secret establishment of leadership 2) Phase of gradual appearance on the public scene. Gaining public support and sympathy. Establishing a shadow government (secret) within the Government 3) Escalation phase, prior to conflict and confrontation with the rulers, through utilizing mass media. 4) Open public confrontation with the Government through exercising the political pressure approach. Training on use of weapons domestically and overseas. 5) Seizing power to establish the Islamic Nation under which all parties and Islamic groups are united.

John Guandolo and Steve Coughlin spoke, “…The Elbarasse archives and close observation revealed these techniques employed by the Ikhwan to achieve civilization jihad in America; expand Muslim presence by birth rate, immigration and refusal to assimilate; occupy and expand domination of physical spaces; ensure the Muslim community knows and follows MB doctrine; control the language we use in describing the enemy; ensure we do not study their doctrine; force compliance with shariah at local levels; fight all counter-terrorism efforts; employ ‘lawfare’ – the offensive use of lawsuits and threats of lawsuits; claim victimization/demand accommodations; condemn “slander” against Islam; subvert the U.S. education system – infiltrate and dominate U.S. Middle East and religious studies programs; demand the right to practice shariah in segregated Muslim enclaves; demand recognition of sharia in non-Muslim spheres; confront and denounce Western society, laws, traditions; demand that shariah replace Western law.

John Guandolo and Steve Coughlin are both VPs at the Stategic Engagement Group and evidently they were reading from this report by the Center for Security Policy (page 74):

The Elbarasse archives and close observation of the Brotherhood’s operations reveal the following as the most important of the techniques employed by the Ikhwan in America to achieve the seditious goals of its civilization jihad:

• Expanding the Muslim presence by birth rate, immigration, and refusal to assimilate;
• Occupying and expanding domination of physical spaces;
• Ensuring the “Muslim Community” knows and follows MB doctrine;
• Controlling the language we use in describing the enemy;
• Ensuring we do not study their doctrine (shariah);
• Co-opting key leadership;
• Forcing compliance with shariah at local levels;
• Fighting all counterterrorism efforts;
• Subverting religious organizations;
• Employing lawfare - the offensive use of lawsuits and threats of lawsuits;
• Claiming victimization / demanding accommodations;
• Condemning “slander” against Islam;

By the way, The CSP is Frank Gaffney's group.

Hmm...warnings from the Center for Security Policy. Yea, we can trust that intel. Sure we can.

Jack Kelly Sunday

2011-12-26T12:51:00.001-05:00

It's Christmas week and in his column, the P-G's Jack Kelly disappointingly plays the Christian Martyr card. Mydisappointment here is two fold. Not only does he not play it well, but it's a disappointment that he tries to play it at all.

Oh, well. He's forgiven, I guess.

He also confuses a couple of things; a people's embrace of faith and it's government's assumed support (or lack of assumed support) for it.

But before we discuss faith's place in the public sphere, let's start where we should always start - The Bill of Rights, specifically, the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Remember that one? It guarantees that everyone's conscience is free and that the guv'ment has no authority to impose any sort of religious orthodoxy. Jack says it only prohibits the establishment of a state church. But the Supreme Court, however, sees it differently. As they stated in 1943:

If there is any fixed star in our constitutional constellation, it is that no official, high or petty, can prescribe what shall be orthodox in politics, nationalism, religion, or other matters of opinion or force citizens to confess by word or act their faith therein.

The case was West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette and it protected school students from being forced to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in public school.

The question is (and this is an important one): Which students was it initially protecting?

Glad you asked that. The students protected were Jehovah's Witnesses. And why, you may further ask, did those students need to be protected from being forced to recite the pledge?

It is because, according to their faith, they can't recite such a pledge. From Watchtower.org:

There is no need to guess at the matter, for the Bible clearly shows that an intelligent, unseen person has been controlling both men and nations. It says: "The whole world is lying in the power of the wicked one." And the Bible identifies him, saying: "The one called Devil and Satan . . . is misleading the entire inhabited earth."

And so forcing school children to pledge allegiance to one of these nations is, in a very real sense to these believers, forcing them to pledge allegiance to the Devil.

Whether the nations of the Earth are controlled by the Devil (or indeed whether the Devil even exists) is a separate question - one that the First Amendment prohibits the government from deciding for its citizens.

And that's the point. In a free society, each of us gets to make our own decisions on matters of faith (which one? Or none at all? In your own personal sphere, you decide. In the public sphere, the government cannot decide for any of us. On this, majority definitely does not rule.

The lesson is, as it always shall be, that the Bill or Rights "hands off" policy regarding religion is not evidence of hostility to religion but a protection of the religions liberty of all US citizens.

Now, let's get back to Jack:

Christianity may be declining in the United States. The percentage of Americans who say they're Christians dropped from 86 percent in 1990 to 75 percent in 2008, according to researchers at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn.

Or maybe not. In July, pollster George Barna found that 84 percent of Americans call themselves Christians. That number's held pretty steady for the last 20 years, he said.

Here's the research from Trinity College, by the way. And here's the report from Barna. One's a poll of 50,000+ people and the other's a poll of about 1,000 people. One polling source is academic, the other for profit. You can decide which numbers you like better. Note that Jack gives some references in the above paragraphs. Note, as well, that he gives no references to the following:

It's certainly declined in Europe. There are now more Christians in China than there are in the entire continent which less than a century ago was Christianity's heartland.

The CIA Factbook says that estimates that as of July 2010 there are 1,336,718,015 people in China and says that 3% - 4% are Christian. 4% of 1,336,718,015 is about 53,468,721. Is Jack really saying that Europe, a continent that has a population of somewhere around 730,000,000 people has a Christian population of less than 53 million? Again, according to the CIA France has an estimated population of 65,312,249 of which at least 83% are Roman Catholic and 2% are Protestant. If we assume about 85% are Christian, then that means there are about 55,515,412 Christians in France alone.

The only way Jack is right is if the CIA is wrong. Could no one at the P-G have checked this before publication?

The big error of Jack's however, occurs at the end when he "quotes" Thomas Jefferson:

"No nation has ever existed or been governed without religion, nor can be," Jefferson wrote to a friend. "The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man, and I, as Chief Magistrate of this nation, am bound to give it the sanction of my example."

Jefferson wrote that??

Um, no. Sorry Jack, but you got this one wronger than your usual pile of sweaty wronginess.

According to Monticello.org, the home of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, that quote they found to be "questionable." They consulted:

Papers of Thomas Jefferson Digital Edition
Thomas Jefferson retirement papers
Thomas Jefferson: Papers and Biographies collections in Hathi Trust Digital Library
America's Historical Newspapers
America's Historical Imprints
19th Century U.S. Newspapers
American Periodicals Series

And could find no reference to it. What they did find was this:

This quotation appeared in a handwritten manuscript by the Reverend Ethan Allen (1796-1879). The story was related to Allen by a Mr. Ingle, who claimed to have been told a story that Jefferson was walking to church services one Sunday.
"...with his large red prayer book under his arm when a friend querying him after their mutual good morning said which way are you walking Mr. Jefferson. To which he replied to Church Sir. You going to church Mr. J. You do not believe a word in it. Sir said Mr. J. No nation has ever yet existed or been governed without religion. Nor can be. The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man and I as chief Magistrate of this nation am bound to give it the sanction of my example. Good morning Sir."

And they concluded:

The story comes to us third-hand, and has not been confirmed by any references in Jefferson's papers or any other known sources. Its authenticity is questionable.

How much more wrong could it get for Jack's religious martyrdom? If he can't even get this stuff right...

I used to ask this question alot a few years ago. Now, it seems, I have to resurrect it:

Doesn't ANYONE Fact-Check Jack Kelly at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette?

Daryl Metcalfe's Zombie Lie

2011-12-23T07:36:00.000-05:00

Today, we start with this from the Tribune-Review's op-ed page:

Naughty: The contention of the Pittsburgh chapter of the NAACP that requiring voter identification at the polls will disenfranchise black voters is a red herring. Protecting the integrity of the franchise should be everyone's goal.

And that led us back to this Trib article:

The NAACP's Pittsburgh branch is mobilizing to oppose a bill that would require Pennsylvanians to show identification before voting.

The organization on Wednesday likened the importance of the effort to ones that resulted in the abolishment of poll taxes. Members called on city residents to sign and help circulate petitions. They called on ministers to shout it down from their pulpits.

"The African-American community across the country fought long and hard to be able to vote," said NAACP President M. Gayle Moss. "This is a tactic to reduce the number of senior citizen voters, African-American voters, who do not have cars or drive, and young voters."

And this one in the P-G:

Decades after the African-American community fought for the right to vote, a voter identification bill proposed for Pennsylvania could again disenfranchise black voters, members of the NAACP said Wednesday.

"We cannot let that happen," said M. Gayle Moss, president of the Pittsburgh branch of the NAACP.

Ms. Moss, joined by NAACP members and religious leaders, held a news conference in the Freedom Unlimited building in the Hill District Wednesday morning. Speakers urged the state Senate to halt progress of a voter identification bill and called the legislation a tactic to disenfranchise African-American, Latino, young and elderly voters.

Each points out that the legislation is from our good friend Daryl Metcalfe (R-Cranberry) and each offers up his defense. First the merely condescending response from the P-G:

In a phone interview Wednesday, Mr. Metcalfe called it a "laughable position" that people should not have to show identification before they vote. Showing a photo ID is already required for everything from getting a library card to flying on a plane, he said.

And he said it should be required to vote to prevent fraud, which he said does happen.

"It's really outrageous that anyone would claim that it is about anything but ensuring that we have integrity in our election process," he said.

To his far more insulting response in the Trib:

The legislation, he said, will protect those voters and ensure honest balloting. The Cranberry Republican said he was surprised at the NAACP's response.

"You have to question whether they want fair elections or want to have fraud continued to be perpetrated," he said.

There it is! According to him, the NAACP does NOT want fair elections and they DO want continued voter fraud. Tucked in at the end of the Trib piece are the usual right wing suspects:

Metcalfe cited voter fraud arrests of ACORN workers in Pittsburgh and the submission by ACORN workers of 8,000 fraudulent voter registration forms in Philadelphia several years ago as evidence that the law is needed.

Too bad those arrests were not voter fraud - here's the Trib's own reporting of the Pittsburgh arrests:

A worker for a grassroots organization was so eager to fulfill a voter registration quota during the presidential campaign that she filed a fraudulent application in the name of a county elections employee, but got the Social Security number wrong, prosecutors said Thursday.

In all, seven canvassers for ACORN in Allegheny County are accused of forging 51 signatures and violating election laws in connection with last year's registration efforts, said District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr.

Zappala said a six-month investigation by county police and the Pittsburgh FBI office found clear evidence of an illegal quota system in use by ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. The investigation continues, and the arrests mark the end of only one phase, he said.

See that? Nothing about voting. And all about voter registration. How would a photo ID at a polling place have stopped those ACORN canvassers?

It wouldn't. And it's frankly dishonest of Metcalfe to use that evidence to support his legislation.

Hardly surprising, but only the P-G even gets close to calling Metcalfe out for his lie:

Although tales of voter fraud -- such as people voting more than once by impersonating others -- are common, verified instances of fraud are rare, Allegheny County Elections Division Manager Mark Wolosik said Wednesday.

But just how bad is this problem? Well, there's this from State Representative Margo Davidson (D-Delaware):

In the 2008 presidential election, 5,995,137 Pennsylvanians cast ballots. Just four people have been prosecuted for voter fraud since the 2008 and subsequent Pennsylvania elections.

We saw this zombie lie bubble up last June. Still a zombie, still no voter fraud.

This is Ron Paul -- Deal with it!

2011-12-22T07:57:00.003-05:00

For all those who over the years have told me how stupid and moronic I am for not understanding that Libertarian Ron Paul is more pro state rights than anti choice or that he isn't explicitly pro Christian, please view the following ad. Please note that the ad is called "Staying on the Right Path" which is identified in the ad as being Christian and anti choice. Also note that this ad was created by his campaign and approved by Ron Paul and not just some surrogate or PAC.

Yep, just another anti choice, Christian, male Republican -- deal with it.

(h/t to Shakesville)

Tea-Party Democracy

2011-12-22T07:50:00.000-05:00

From an editorial in today's P-G:

For lack of congressional compromise, payroll taxes are going to rise from 4.2 percent to 6.2 percent and long-term unemployment benefits are going to run out -- this in the worst economic times since the Great Depression. As a result, some 160 million Americans are going to have to pay the price of freshmen Republicans who don't give a damn unless they get their own way.

The Senate did its part, with Democrats and Republicans agreeing on a two-month extension of the payroll tax cut. The Republicans succeeded in including language requiring President Barack Obama to make up his mind within 60 days on the Keystone XL pipeline project, which environmentalists oppose. The bill passed 89-10, with 39 of 46 Republicans voting for it.

Including, we must add, Senator Toomey.

He even explained his vote on his website, saying that, while flawed, the legislation was "worthy of support."

The P-G goes on:

Then it came to the House of Representatives, with holdouts giving the excuse that they wanted a one-year tax cut extension or none at all. Would one year be better? Of course. Are the Democrats also playing politics, with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid refusing to negotiate further? Of course.

But can the blame be shared equally? Of course not. The House Democrats unanimously voted against rejecting the compromise bill. So in approving the rejection bill 229-193 and repudiating the efforts of adults in their own party, the House Republican majority owns this Christmas tax hike.

Even The Wall Street Journal editorial page, the daily bible of conservatives, was aghast at how badly Republican leaders such as House Speaker John Boehner had handled this "fiasco." It wrote, "At this stage, Republicans would do best to cut their losses and find a way to extend the payroll holiday quickly."

Yes, but how? Republican leaders now find themselves in the same position that Dr. Frankenstein was in -- unable to control the monster of his own creation. After all, the tea-party types who now inhabit Congress did what their electorates voted them in to do -- reject compromise and bipartisanship. All other Americans should note how this is working out.

That WSJ editorial is brutal in its assessment of the state of the House GOP. Go read it. But the P-G got it right. How many years did the far right wing of the far right wing GOP complain about RINOs? Those "Republicans In Name Only"? They gain some control over the GOP, get some tea partiers elected to the House this is what happens.

This is what happens:

From Thinkprogress:

During a quick pro-forma session of the House this morning, Republicans rebuffed a Democratic attempt to force an up-or-down vote on the Senate-passed payroll tax holiday extension, which Republicans have thus far refused to allow. Rep. Michael Fitzpatrick (R-PA), who was serving as the speaker pro-temp, ignored shouts of “Mr. Speaker!” from Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) and Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), quickly adjourning the House.

Hoyer continued talking undeterred, saying, “You’re walking away, just as so many Republicans have walked away from middle-class taxpayers [and] the unemployed.” “We regret, Mr. Speaker, that you have walked off the platform without addressing this issue of critical importance to this country,” Hoyer added.

Moments later, the mic appeared to cut out. A few seconds after that, the video feed switched away from the House floor to a still image of the Capitol Dome. It appears someone in House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) office cut the feed, as C-SPAN tweeted afterwards: “C-SPAN has no control over the U.S. House TV cameras – the Speaker of the House does.”

Doncha Just LOVE Tea Party Democracy?

Today...

2011-12-21T07:51:00.000-05:00

This, being the 25th day of Kislev, is the first day of Hanukkah.

So here's some Chanukah music for you!

Part 1:

And an update:

Happy Chanukkah everyone!

Vaclav Havel On Climate Change

2011-12-20T07:59:00.000-05:00

As yinz probably already know, Vaclav Havel passed away on December 18.

Coincidentally, he and I were born on the same day - but that, is neither here nor there.

I wanted to point to something he wrote in 2007:

OVER the past few years the questions have been asked ever more forcefully whether global climate changes occur in natural cycles or not, to what degree we humans contribute to them, what threats stem from them and what can be done to prevent them. Scientific studies demonstrate that any changes in temperature and energy cycles on a planetary scale could mean danger for all people on all continents.

It is also obvious from published research that human activity is a cause of change; we just don’t know how big its contribution is. Is it necessary to know that to the last percentage point, though? By waiting for incontrovertible precision, aren’t we simply wasting time when we could be taking measures that are relatively painless compared to those we would have to adopt after further delays?

And:

We can’t endlessly fool ourselves that nothing is wrong and that we can go on cheerfully pursuing our wasteful lifestyles, ignoring the climate threats and postponing a solution.

And finally:

We must analyze everything open-mindedly, soberly, unideologically and unobsessively, and project our knowledge into practical policies.

I wonder if, in writing this editorial comparing and contrasting Vaclav Havel with Kim Jong Il, if they knew that he wrote all that. I mean they do end the editorial with this:

Mr. Havel rose to prominence after the Soviet-led invasion of 1968. The communists sought to silence Havel by jailing him numerous times. But it only drew more attention to his works and led to some of Havel's most insightful essays.

As Soviet dominance waned, Havel was the right man at the right time to help free Czechoslovakia.

We mourn the passing of Vaclav Havel. But we celebrate the beacon he powered.

Considering how little of the news (the actual news - not the right wing noise that passes for news in the right wing press) they seem to understand, I would doubt it.

Now THIS Is Embarrassing - Even For The Trib

2011-12-20T07:33:00.000-05:00

From today's Christmas Takes:

Wow if a eco-wacko as devout as Prince Charles says all that about wind power, it must be true, right? I mean the words are coming from Prince Charles, devout eco-wacko, right?

Um, no.

From the DailyMail:

Prince Philip has launched an outspoken attack on wind farms, branding them ‘absolutely useless’.

In comments that put him sharply at odds with the Government, the Prince reportedly said the farms were a ‘disgrace’ and they would never work.

He also described people who backed them as believing in a ‘fairy tale’.

And so on...

Hey, braintrust! This is Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales:

And the guy on the left (that is to say, the old guy on the Queen's right) is Prince Philip Duke of Edinburgh, the prince's father:

If you can't even get such a simple fact like that right, how can we trust you on more complicated stuff like climate change?

Ha. I made a funny.

It's Monday, So The Braintrust Is Misleading...

2011-12-19T07:57:00.000-05:00

Take a look at this pile of braintrust droppings from today's Trib:

The White House says National Guard troops, assigned to beef up security along the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexico border, will be cut by at least half next year and the remainder will be reassigned, Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter tells The Washington Times. The administration blames budget cuts.

That's a pathetically lame excuse when the 1,200 guard troops deployed in 2010 have demonstrated their effectiveness.

Homeland Security officials report that since the arrival of the National Guard, border arrests have dropped considerably, from 447,731 in fiscal year 2010 to 327,577 in 2011.

I'm glad they mentioned the Washington Times.

Know what else the Washington Times says about the National Guard troops? Take a look:

Mr. Obama deployed 1,200 guard troops to the border in June 2010 in an effort to bolster the U.S. Border Patrol and try to prevent the growing drug violence in Mexico from spilling into the U.S.

He charged the guard with aiding in intelligence gathering and other backup duties, though troops have not been actually enforcing immigration laws.

The troops were scheduled to be drawn down this June, but Mr. Obama extended their deployment, saying there was still work to be done.

The troops were meant to be a bridge to beef up support staffing while the Border Patrol hired more agents under a bill Congress passed early in his term.

A Homeland Security Department official said they have made progress in hiring and training new agents.

There were supposed to be nearly 21,500 agents in the Border Patrol as of Oct. 1, which represents an increase of 1,300 since Mr. Obama took control of the budgeting process in 2009. [Emphasis added.]

So he extended their deployment? Wow, the braintrust didn't say that!

And it was temporary support while the Border Patrol hired more agents??? The Braintrust didn't say that, either!

But what's really what's going on here? There's this from the White House itself, announcing the plan:

And as part of his comprehensive plan to secure the Southwest border, President Obama will request $500 million in supplemental funds for enhanced border protection and law enforcement activities. The President will also deploy up to an additional, requirements-based 1,200 National Guard troops to the border to provide intelligence; surveillance and reconnaissance support; intelligence analysis; immediate support to counternarcotics enforcement; and training capacity until Customs and Border Patrol can recruit and train additional officers and agents to serve on the border. Funds will be utilized to enhance technology at the border, share information and support with State, Local, and Tribal law enforcement, and increase DoJ and DHS presence and law enforcement activities at the border, to include increased agents, investigators, and prosecutors, as part of a multi-layered effort to target illicit networks trafficking in people, drugs, illegal weapons, and money. [Emphasis added.]

Now we go back to the Washington Post:

Mr. Hunter said the pending cuts are another reason Congress and President Obama should revisit the automatic defense spending reductions that kicked in with the failure last month of the deficit supercommittee.

That's what this is about. The automatic cuts that are triggered by the failure of that supercommittee to reach a budget agreement are now getting too close for the Defense hawks' comfort.

So Scaife's braintrust spins the reduction of the Guard's presence on the border into something it's not.

It's Monday so the Braintrust is misleading you. Get used to it.

The 1% Already Responded (in 1992)

2011-12-18T12:10:00.000-05:00

In our ongoing meta-debate about OWS, I posted a pro-occupation clip from Garfunkel and Oates a few days ago.

Proving yet again that our corporate overlords (i.e. the 1%) are so far ahead of the 99% that they responded to the occupation in 1992.

Take a look:

Lyrics from the first song, "I'm a Bleeding Heart" go something like this:

I'm a bleeding heart
Let's give money away
To lazy people in the slums

I'm a bleeding heart
Let's eliminate our nuclear bombs
Arabs can be our friends (Right!)
Don't vote if you believe in that
We'll be fine without you

It's plain to see what you believe
Will lead to anarchy

And the second "Complain" go something like this:

Some people must have.
Some people have not.
But they’ll complain and complain and complain and complain and complain.

Some people will work.
Some simply will not.
But they’ll complain and complain and complain and complain and complain.

Like this: It’s society’s fault I don’t have a job.
It’s society’s fault I am a slob.
I have potential no one can see.
Give me welfare. Let me be me!

Hey, Bud, you’re livin’ in the Land of the Free.
No one’s gonna hand you opportunity!

Some people must have.
Some never will.
But they’ll complain and complain and complain and complain and complain.

I don’t have a house. I don’t have a car.
I spend all my money getting’ drunk in a bar.
I wanna be rich. I don’t have a brain.
Just give me a handout while I complain.

Or this: I wanna stay in bed and watch TV.
Go out weekends in a limousine
And dance all night takin’ lots of drugs
And wake up when I wanna.

Hey, Bud, you’re livin’ in the Land of the Free.
No one’s gonna hand you opportunity!

Some people will learn.
Some never do.
But they’ll complain and complain and complain and complain and complain.
Yeah, they’ll complain and complain and complain and complain and complain.

Amazing how the 1% knew (THEY KNEW) how bereft of ideas the OWS is now that they planted the seeds of it's dialectical demise almost two frickin decades ago.

1 in 2 in US are poor or low-income

2011-12-16T08:18:00.005-05:00

The next time some moron asks what the Occupy movement is about, give them these stats:

Census Data Shows 1 In 2 People Are Poor Or Low-Income

U.S. CEO Pay Jumps Minimum Of 27 Percent Last Year, Survey Finds

Christopher Hitchens (1949-2011)

2011-12-16T08:00:00.000-05:00

From Vanity Fair:

Christopher Hitchens—the incomparable critic, masterful rhetorician, fiery wit, and fearless bon vivant—died today at the age of 62. Hitchens was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in the spring of 2010, just after the publication of his memoir, Hitch-22, and began chemotherapy soon after. His matchless prose has appeared in Vanity Fair since 1992, when he was named contributing editor.

From the New York Times:

Christopher Hitchens, a slashing polemicist in the tradition of Thomas Paine and George Orwell who trained his sights on targets as various as Henry Kissinger, the British monarchy and Mother Teresa, wrote a best-seller attacking religious belief, and dismayed his former comrades on the left by enthusiastically supporting the American-led war in Iraq, died Thursday at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. He was 62.

I had lunch with him once kinda.

His takedowns of his intellectual (or maybe even not so intellectual) opponents were so sharp they spawned a new word - the "hitchslap."

Like this one:

Or this one:

Or these:

The world is a little darker today.

Again With The East Anglia "Scandal" - SHEESH!

2011-12-15T07:51:00.004-05:00

They have to know that this is a tired old resolved argument. But they continue to use it anyway.

From today's Trib, there's yet another skewed editorial about climate change. Tucked in at the end, there's this:

But this latest push to save the planet -- and thoroughly fleece the U.S. -- is premised on climate "conclusions" that are challenged by dissenting scientists and hamstrung by allegations of improprieties. To wit, leaked e-mails from the University of East Anglia's climate researchers reveal "conspiracy, exaggerated warming data (and) possibly illegal destruction and manipulation of data," writes Heritage Foundation analyst Nick Loris.

I'm not sure the braintrust is completely correct in using the present tense in quoting Loris as it comes from an article published more than a year ago on October 26, 2010.

This is what Loris wrote then:

Despite vigorous dissention among the scientific community concerning the effects of anthropogenic warming, the climatologists who believe the warming to be a serious problem controlled the message for years. Simply put, they convinced the general public that global warming posed an imminent threat and drastic cuts in greenhouse gas emissions were necessary to prevent a catastrophe. Recent flaws discovered in the scientific assessment of climate change have shown that the scientific consensus is not as settled as the public had been led to believe. Leaked e-mails from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit in the U.K. revealed conspiracy, exaggerated warming data, possibly illegal destruction and manipulation of data, and attempts to freeze out dissenting scientists from publishing their work in reputable journals. Furthermore, gaffes exposed in the IPCC report have only increased skepticism among businesses and the public, and raised serious questions about sacrificing economic activity to reduce CO2 emissions.

Have not yet I mentioned how despite the millions of dollars of Scaife money that's supported the Heritage Foundation over the years, there's no mention of that support by Scaife's braintrust when it so loyally uses a year old quote from one of its analysts? What an oversight on my part! Apologies all around.

Bygones.

Unfortunately for Loris' credibility, there've been many exonerations the science. Some before like this one from the EPA written before Loris wrote his blog post:

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today denied 10 petitions challenging its 2009 determination that climate change is real, is occurring due to emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities, and threatens human health and the environment.

And here's the first petition:

Claim: Petitioners say that emails disclosed from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit provide evidence of a conspiracy to manipulate global temperature data.

Response: EPA reviewed every e-mail and found this was simply a candid discussion of scientists working through issues that arise in compiling and presenting large complex data sets. Four other independent reviews came to similar conclusions.

And some after, like this one from The Hill:

A Commerce Department inspector general investigation into the “Climategate” controversy finds that government scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration did not manipulate climate change data.

It’s the latest investigation to clear scientists of manipulating climate data after thousands of e-mails from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit were leaked in 2009.

“Climategate” has become something of a rallying call for climate skeptics, who have pointed to the e-mails to suggest there is a conspiracy among the world’s scientists. But a slew of investigations into the e-mails have cleared scientists of any wrongdoing.

“In our review of the CRU emails, we did not find any evidence that NOAA inappropriately manipulated data comprising the [Global Historical Climatology Network] dataset or failed to adhere to appropriate peer review procedures,” said the report, which was authored by Commerce Department Inspector General Todd Zinser at the request of Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.).

And so on...

Repeat after me. Climate change is real. Even The Pentagon says so:

The changing global climate will pose profound strategic challenges to the United States in coming decades, raising the prospect of military intervention to deal with the effects of violent storms, drought, mass migration and pandemics, military and intelligence analysts say.

Such climate-induced crises could topple governments, feed terrorist movements or destabilize entire regions, say the analysts, experts at the Pentagon and intelligence agencies who for the first time are taking a serious look at the national security implications of climate change.

Did I mention where Loris worked before working for the Scaife-funded Heritage Foundation? I didn't? Well here's his bio from Heritage:

Before joining Heritage in June 2007, Loris was an associate at the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation, immersing himself for a year in a market-based management program. His first media experience was as an editorial intern for Townhall.com.

So I don't think we can expect any sort of fair and balanced look at climate science. Or from the anti-science braintrust on Richard Mellon Scaife's payroll.

Adopt an Atheist!

2011-12-14T08:40:00.000-05:00

The Catholic League has launched an “Adopt An Atheist” campaign just in time for Christmas. They're encouraging people to target American Atheists state directors, so one can assume this is all a bit tongue-in-cheek.

However, what isn't tongue-in-cheek is this statement on their site:

If we hurry, these closeted Christians can celebrate Christmas like the rest of us. As an added bonus, they will no longer be looked upon as people who “believe in nothing, stand for nothing and are good for nothing.”

Charming!

Well, here's one thing that the American Atheists' leadership doesn't believe in or stand for: The systematic cover-up of the sexual abuse and rape of children by their representatives.

Nor does the president of American Atheists -- to my knowledge -- make excuses for child rape or take out a full page ad in The New York Times claiming that it doesn't exist (unlike Catholic League President, Bill Donohue).

Maybe, just maybe, there are some things one shouldn't believe in -- you know -- as a matter of MORALITY.

Tomorrow Is December 15

2011-12-14T07:39:00.000-05:00

While December 15th is special for me personally (it's my mom's birthday) it's also special for everyone else too. Here's why:

On December 15, 1791, the new United States of America ratified the Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution, confirming the fundamental rights of its citizens. The First Amendment guarantees freedom of religion, speech, and the press, and the rights of peaceful assembly and petition. Other amendments guarantee the rights of the people to form a "well-regulated militia," to keep and bear arms, the rights to private property, fair treatment for accused criminals, protection from unreasonable search and seizure, freedom from self-incrimination, a speedy and impartial jury trial, and representation by counsel.

The Bill of Rights draws influence and inspiration from the Magna Carta (1215), the English Bill of Rights (1689), and various later efforts in England and America to expand fundamental rights. George Mason's Virginia Declaration of Rights formed the basis of the amendments that comprise the Bill of Rights.

Yay, us!

And here they are:

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Amendment II

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Amendment III

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Amendment V

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Amendment VI

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

Amendment VII

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

Amendment VIII

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Amendment IX

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Amendment X

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Again, yay us!

For My Friends On Mellon Green

2011-12-13T07:36:00.002-05:00

Ladies and Gentlemen, Garfunkel and Oates and Al:

The lyrics, (in the event you're keeping score at home):

Everyone knows these times are really tough
And we need to band together say we've had enough.
All the jobless people need to learn to be content
Cause what we need to do is protect our one percent.

Save the rich.
Let them know you care.
Don't them leave to languish
In their penthouse of despair.

Save the rich.
Let their bonuses be swollen
And let them keep it all tax free
Even if it's stolen.

Save the rich.
Let's give our job creators
More than their fare share
So they can go to Asia
And create jobs over there.

There's loopholes and exemptions
And children to exploit.
So give them special tax breaks
Who cares about Detroit?

And those who don't create jobs
Really need help, too.
Cause without their 7th home
How will they make it through?

It's not time for complaining
Not the time for class war.
It's time sacrifice yourself
To give them more and more and more
And more and more and more.

Save the rich.
America's built on corporate greed.
It's not Wall Street's fault
If you can't get what you need.

Save the rich.
Don't go crying to mommy
Cause if you don't agree
Then you're socialist commie.

Save the rich.
Blame yourself for your problems
Not the bad economy.
So what if those who have the most
Are the ones who put it in jeopardy?

Forget your student loans.
Screw your kids and their health care.
It'll only take 10,000 of your jobs
To put another private jet in the air.

Save the rich.
It's so easy to do.
Just let yourself be ignorant
To what's been done to you.

Save the rich.
By doing nothing at all.
Deny all sense and logic
And just think really small.
You should think really small
Or just don't think at all.

Save the rich.

Occupy.

State of the Nation

2011-12-13T07:35:00.000-05:00

"Tulsa Woman, Accused Of Trying To Cook Meth -- In Walmart"

American Idiot

2011-12-13T07:26:00.002-05:00

It doesn't take much to make fun of Perry, but this parody is hilarious:

(Original "Strong" ad here.)

Depressing

2011-12-13T07:23:00.001-05:00

Paul Krugman on the economy and the 'sharp drop in public support for democracy in the “new E.U.” countries.'

Wow, Grover Gets It Wrong

2011-12-12T07:49:00.002-05:00

I found this Americans for Tax Reform piece via Scaife's own Newsmax.

For those of you who don't yet know Grover Norquist is quite important in Republican circles where his anti-tax pledge, is quite popular. According to the Washington Times:

All but four of the 242 House Republicans, and 41 out of the 47 Senate Republicans, have signed Mr. Norquist's "Taxpayer Protection Pledge."

That somewhere around 96% of all Congressional Republicans. That's alot of Elephant!

So it's pretty amazing when he gets something really, really terribly wrong. Take a look at his first two paragraphs of his ATR piece, published Friday, December 9:

The holidays are a season for giving and spending time with loved ones. However, this year taxpayers will be adding Uncle Sam to their Christmas list. Of an identified $10.72 billion of holiday spending, 43.36 percent of the price Americans pay to celebrate Christmas is due to government taxes, fees and other costs.

This season, not even Christmas trees are safe from the government grinch. The Obama Administration has applied a 15 cent tax on each Christmas tree sold, meaning government now composes 31.19 percent of the price of an average 40 dollar Christmas tree. While implementation of the tax has been delayed, this is a particularly naughty idea to fuel increased government spending. For the $1.15 billion in sales generated by the Christmas tree industry employing over 100,000 workers, the Christmas tax is another measure threatening Americans jobs—so much for yuletide cheer. [emphasis added]

And when did this delay occur? At least a month ago. Take a look at what we wrote on November 12. In that post we linked to this piece by Jake Tapper from November 9::

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is going to delay implementation and revisit a proposed new 15 cent fee on fresh-cut Christmas trees, sources tell ABC News. The fee, requested by the National Christmas Tree Association in 2009, was first announced in the Federal Registry yesterday and has generated criticism of President Obama from conservative media outlets.

So Norquist knew it was delayed but he seems to have missed all the other details revolving around the fee - like how it was requested by the NCTA or how the fee is generated by the growers and won't impact the cost of the trees or how the money won't go into any guv'ment coffers as it'll be used by the association to promote fresh cut Christmas trees.

For someone supposed to be real smart on tax policy (or at least well informed) he simply failed on this one.

All this was in the news a month ago. Why doesn't Grover Norquist know about it? Or perhaps he does and he doesn't want you to know about it. Nothing like letting the facts get in the way of a good "Obama Hates Christmas" smear.

You decide.

Jack Kelly Sunday

2011-12-11T09:28:00.001-05:00

In his column in this week's Post-Gazette, Jack Kelly tries yet again to undermine the undeniable (as per NOAA) science of Climate Change.

Let's fact check a little. Jack starts with:

Unseasonable cold greeted delegates to the U.N. conference on climate change in Durban, South Africa, Nov. 28. They were chilled more by the impending collapse of one of the most brazen scams in the history of the world.

Even though localized weather data (it was cold yesterday in Des Moines so where's that global warming, huh??) should not be used to validate/invalidate global climate data, I have to ask if this sentence is even true.

Let's go see. The conference was from November 28 to December 11 of this year. According to Weather.com, the average high - low temperatures for Durban is 76F - 67F for November and 79F - 70F for December. So for a day's temperature to be, as Jack put it, "unseasonably cold" it would have to be significantly below 67F in November and 70F in December, right?

Take a look.

Here weatherunderground.com's daily average temperatures for those days in La Mercy, South Africa (only 20 miles away):

November 28 - 72F
November 29 - 68F
November 30 - 80F
December 1 - 75F
December 2 - 72F
December 3 - 68F
December 4 - 66F
December 5 - 70F
December 6 - 72F
December 7 - 72F
December 8 - 66F
December 9 - 64F
December 10 - 68F
December 11- 73F

So of the 14 days of the conference only 5 (December 3-4, 8-10) were below average in temperature and even then only between 2 and 6 degrees below. Everything else is in the "average" range. Can someone tell me how that's "unseasonably" cold??

It's not a good thing for Jack when his beginning is so easily fact-checked. But let's move on:

The warnings of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that the world faced doom from anthropogenic (man-made) global warming were based on peer-reviewed scientific literature, the IPCC chairman claimed. But when Canadian writer Donna LaFramboise checked the 18,531 references in the 2007 report, she found 5,587 were newspaper and magazine articles written by non-experts, unpublished theses and pamphlets produced by environmental groups.

Actually, Framboise didn't herself check the references. She asked for help online. Let's start at the reliability of these auditors. Since she solicited the help by way of her own science skeptic website, the pool of available reviewers is already skewed well into the anti-science crowd - hardly a group to be unbiased doncha think? These are the folks who were instructed to give the IPCC the benefit of the doubt when grading the science they did. A was a good grade, F was a bad one. An F meant that there were too many non peer-reviewed references in the list of references.

But besides that, take a look at her list of auditors. How many are actually climate scientists?

But besides that, take a look at their findings. Of the three "working groups" of the IPCC that are being graded (or were being graded - this is done early 2010, by the way) one, Working Group I gets consistent "A" grades for the suitability of the references. And what chapters of the IPCC 2007 report did Working Group I work on?

Climate Change 2007: Working Group I: The Physical Science Basis

That's right. The Working Group that reviewed THE SCIENCE in the IPCC report received passing grades from even Laframboise's skewed group of auditors.

Check Jack's column again. Does he point that out? I don't think so.

And this is just the first two paragraphs.

Here's Jack's third:

IPCC reports supposedly were written by leading scientists. Ms. LaFromboise found many authors were graduate students selected more for political connections and "diversity" than for expertise. This explains, in part, why these reports contain so many factual errors.

Has already been debunked by mediamatters:

Citing what it calls "a scathing new expose on the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change," Fox News is trumpeting claims that IPCC reports "have often been written by graduate students with little or no experience in their field of study." Fox's article, titled "U.N. Hires Grad Students to Author Key Climate Report," comes as the IPCC prepares to issue a new report on weather extremes.

Fox's "expose" is an e-book by Canadian writer Donna Laframboise, who recruited "a team of citizen auditors" to pore over IPCC reports from the past two decades. Drawing from the book, Fox identifies four IPCC authors since 1994 who were in, or had recently completed, grad school.

Here are the facts Fox characteristically avoided: There were over 450 lead authors for the 2007 assessment report, plus 800 contributing authors and more than 2,500 reviewers. Fox identified only one graduate student who worked on the 2007 report. 1 out of over 1250 authors.

The IPCC does not conduct climate research, it reviews and summarizes scientists' studies of climate change. The assessment reports have three volumes consisting of 10-20 chapters. Each chapter has around 7-10 lead authors and 2 coordinating lead authors and goes through two rounds of scientific review. Four of the lead authors could have been chimpanzees and it wouldn't have made a dent in the scientific heft of these massive reports.

When there's this much non-factiness masquerading as skepticism, I think it safe to say that the rest of Jack's column deserves giant fail all on its own.

Go read Ed.

Occupy Pittsburgh - The City Council Supports

2011-12-09T20:45:00.001-05:00

WHEREAS, the Occupy Wall Street movement is a non-violent, people powered movement for direct democracy that began in the United States on September 17, 2011 with an encampment in the financial district of New York City; and

WHEREAS. the Occupy Wall Street movement and its offshoot movements around the world, including here in Pittsburgh, exemplify a new and exciting surge of popular resistance to the dominance of multi-national banks and corporations over the lives of millions of working families,

WHEREAS, solidified by a march and rally on October 15, 2011, from Freedom Corner to Market Square, and continuing through the ongoing encampment at Grant Street and Sixth Avenue, Occupy Pittsburgh represents our local contribution, and has become one of the more sophisticated organizations in this worldwide movement; and

WHEREAS, the Allegheny County Labor Council, AFL-CIO, and other organizations, in addition to many cities and other municipalities, have gone on record in support of the Occupy movement;

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Council of the City of Pittsburgh does support and declare solidarity with Occupy Pittsburgh and the Occupy Wall Street movement, exercising First Amendment rights in a free, open, peaceful, and productive manner, toward the better condition of our citizens and of these United States.

SPONSORED BY COUNCIL PRESIDENT DARLENE M. HARRIS

CO-SPONSORED BY COUNCIL MEMBERS:
RICKY V. BURGESS, PATRICK DOWD, THERESA KAIL-SMITH, BRUCE A.
KRAUS, R. DANIEL LAVELLE, WILLIAM PEDUTO, NATALIA RUDIAK, AND
DOUGLAS SHIELDS

Good for them.

You can find it here.

Occupy Pittsburgh Evicted

2011-12-09T19:04:00.000-05:00

Occupy Scenes

2011-12-09T07:25:00.001-05:00

DC:

Several dozen Occupy DC protesters rolled out the human red carpet for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s holiday party at their Washington, DC headquarters this evening. The Chamber is the nation’s largest corporate lobby group. As guests entered, protesters shouted, “You walk on our rights, now walk on us!” encouraging attendees to trample on the activists laying underneath the red carpet painted with “99%.” No one did, sadly, at least while ThinkProgress was in attendance.

By the way, Thinkprogress is also reporting that:

[T]he Republican National Committee will hold its annual holiday party at the supposedly non-partisan U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Though the Chamber of Commerce has tried to assert its independence, events like this reinforce the notion that, as Politico’s Ken Vogel notes, the corporate trade association might “be thought of as a GOP arm.” In 2010, the Chamber was the top outside spending group, buying over $32 million worth of advertising, almost exclusively backing Republicans.

As an aside, I have to point out what one of the commenters at thinkprogress noted before I did:

Wait a minute, wait a minute! This is a "Holiday Party", not a "Christmas Party"? What will the "War on Christmas" crowd think of THAT?

I wonder now if the good Christians at the American Family Association will include either the RNC or the Chamber of Commerce on their "Naughty or Nice" list.

Then there's this from LA:

My name is Patrick Meighan, and I’m a husband, a father, a writer on the Fox animated sitcom “Family Guy”, and a member of the Unitarian Universalist Community Church of Santa Monica.

I was arrested at about 1 a.m. Wednesday morning with 291 other people at Occupy LA. I was sitting in City Hall Park with a pillow, a blanket, and a copy of Thich Nhat Hanh’s “Being Peace” when 1,400 heavily-armed LAPD officers in paramilitary SWAT gear streamed in. I was in a group of about 50 peaceful protestors who sat Indian-style, arms interlocked, around a tent (the symbolic image of the Occupy movement). The LAPD officers encircled us, weapons drawn, while we chanted “We Are Peaceful” and “We Are Nonviolent” and “Join Us.”

As we sat there, encircled, a separate team of LAPD officers used knives to slice open every personal tent in the park. They forcibly removed anyone sleeping inside, and then yanked out and destroyed any personal property inside those tents, scattering the contents across the park. They then did the same with the communal property of the Occupy LA movement. For example, I watched as the LAPD destroyed a pop-up canopy tent that, until that moment, had been serving as Occupy LA’s First Aid and Wellness tent, in which volunteer health professionals gave free medical care to absolutely anyone who requested it. As it happens, my family had personally contributed that exact canopy tent to Occupy LA, at a cost of several hundred of my family’s dollars. As I watched, the LAPD sliced that canopy tent to shreds, broke the telescoping poles into pieces and scattered the detritus across the park. Note that these were the objects described in subsequent mainstream press reports as “30 tons of garbage” that was “abandoned” by Occupy LA: personal property forcibly stolen from us, destroyed in front of our eyes and then left for maintenance workers to dispose of while we were sent to prison.

By the way, Occupy LA is where the LAPD went undercover:

Los Angeles police used nearly a dozen undercover detectives to infiltrate the Occupy LA encampment before this week's raid to gather information on the anti-Wall Street protesters' intentions, according to media reports Friday.

None of the officers slept at the camp, but they tried to blend in during the weeks leading up to the raid to learn about plans to resist or use weapons against police, a police source told the Los Angeles Times. The source spoke on the condition of anonymity because the case is ongoing.

The undercover work yielded information that some protesters were preparing bamboo spears and other potentially dangerous weapons in advance of an expected eviction, none of which were used, according to the City News Service, which first reported the story.

So their HUMINT was wrong, I guess.

Meighan goes on to describe, in detail, the treatment he received at the hands of LA's finest. You really should read it. And then, as a foil, he points out:

Now let’s talk about a man who was not arrested last Wednesday. He is former Citigroup CEO Charles Prince. Under Charles Prince, Citigroup was guilty of massive, coordinated securities fraud.

Citigroup spent years intentionally buying up every bad mortgage loan it could find, creating bad securities out of those bad loans and then selling shares in those bad securities to duped investors. And then they sometimes secretly bet *against* their *own* bad securities to make even more money. For one such bad Citigroup security, Citigroup executives were internally calling it, quote, “a collection of dogshit”. To investors, however, they called it, quote, “an attractive investment rigorously selected by an independent investment adviser”.

This is fraud, and it’s a felony, and the Charles Princes of the world spent several years doing it again and again: knowingly writing bad mortgages, and then packaging them into fraudulent securities which they then sold to suckers and then repeating the process. This is a big part of why your property values went up so fast. But then the bubble burst, and that’s why our economy is now shattered for a generation, and it’s also why your home is now underwater. Or at least mine is.

Anyway, if your retirement fund lost a decade’s-worth of gains overnight, this is why.

And then:

For his four years of in charge of massive, repeated fraud at Citigroup, he received fifty-three million dollars in salary and also received another ninety-four million dollars in stock holdings

In case you're keeping score:

Patrick Meighan (and many many others) arrested for participating in various Occupy protests around the country.
Charles Prince (and many many others) NOT arrested for the fraud that led to the economic collapse in the first place - in fact they walked away with millions!

Occupy.

Song of the Day

2011-12-09T07:05:00.001-05:00

With A Little Plagiarism Comes Some Dishonesty

2011-12-08T07:06:00.001-05:00

Look at this paragraph from today's Tribune-Review:

By the EPA's own estimates, the benefit of mandated mercury reductions from power plants is $6.1 million, total. But the rule creates annual compliance costs of $11 billion. Quite the cost-benefit analysis, eh? Other than that, and creating a climate for serious disruptions to the nation's power grid, hey, it's a great idea, right?

Now look at this paragraph this WSJ Editorial from December 6:

Keep in mind that the EPA estimates that the benefits to society from the mercury reductions in the utility rule max out at $6.1 million, total, while imposing $11 billion in compliance costs annually. That is a crazy tradeoff even if it didn't endanger the electric grid.

Any closer and they'd need quotation marks but close enough that Scaife's braintrust should have done the right thing and simply added "According to our friends at the Wall Street Journal..." instead of trying to pass it off as an original thought.

Lazy, lazy, lazy. Embarrassing, even for the Trib.

It's also incorrect - this is what the EPA said (it's from the "Executive Summary" from the March 2001 report):

This proposed rule will reduce emissions of Hazardous Air Pollutants (HAP) including mercury from the electric power industry. As a co-benefit, the emissions of certain PM2.5 precursors such as SO2 will also decline. EPA estimates that this proposed rule will yield annual monetized benefits (in 2007$) of between $59 to $140 billion using a 3% discount rate and $53 and $130 billion using a 7% discount rate. The great majority of the estimates are attributable to co-benefits from reductions in PM2.5-related mortality. The annual social costs are $10.9 billion (2007$) and the annual quantified net benefits are $48 to $130 billion using 3% discount rate or $42 to $120 billion using a 7% discount rate. The benefits outweigh costs by between 5 to 1 or 13 to 1 depending on the benefit estimate and discount rate used.

And so where, might you ask, did the $6.1 million number come from?

Scott Segal, director of the Electric Reliability Coordinating Council. Segal calls the ERCC:

[A] group of power-generating companies that provide reliable and affordable power to millions of American households, small businesses, industrial facilities, schools and hospitals.

It's an industry trade group. He's the director of an industry trade group and this is what he said:

It stands to reason that the vast majority of benefits claimed by EPA to justify the proposed rule must be the result of reductions in mercury emissions. But the Agency’s cost-benefit analysis tells a very different story. According to EPA, the benefits to society of the mercury-reduction requirements are in the range of $500,000 to a maximum of $6.1 million in total (i.e. not even annual) benefits. In other words, in a rule estimated by EPA to cost $11 billion annually, the maximum total benefit of reducing emissions of mercury—the emissions of which serve as the primary basis for the rule—is $6.1 million.

That's where the number comes from.

And what does the EPA have to say about all this? From way back in July, 2011:

In response, EPA officials reiterated their estimate that the total annual cost of the rule would be $10.9 billion in 2015 and would yield up to $140 billion in health benefits annually.

The agency also rebuffed Segal's argument that EPA figures showed the maximum benefit to society of mercury-reduction requirements is valued at only $6.1 million. That figure applies only to recreational fishers, and represents on a small portion of overall health benefits, the unnamed officials said. [emphasis added]

So when the WSJ editorialists (and their too close for comfort copyists on Scaife's payroll) say that the EPA says it's a total of $6.1 million in benefits that would be completely and utterly wrong.

And since passing off a falsehood as the truth is, by definition, lying...

Well you get the picture.

Religion Poisons Everything (Again)

2011-12-07T07:10:00.001-05:00

Hitchens was right - here's another example.

Yesterday, President Obama issued this memorandum regarding LGBT rights across the planet and of course religious conservatives gagged on it.

Here's how the memo opens:

The struggle to end discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) persons is a global challenge, and one that is central to the United States commitment to promoting human rights. I am deeply concerned by the violence and discrimination targeting LGBT persons around the world whether it is passing laws that criminalize LGBT status, beating citizens simply for joining peaceful LGBT pride celebrations, or killing men, women, and children for their perceived sexual orientation. That is why I declared before heads of state gathered at the United Nations, "no country should deny people their rights because of who they love, which is why we must stand up for the rights of gays and lesbians everywhere." Under my Administration, agencies engaged abroad have already begun taking action to promote the fundamental human rights of LGBT persons everywhere. Our deep commitment to advancing the human rights of all people is strengthened when we as the United States bring our tools to bear to vigorously advance this goal.

By this memorandum I am directing all agencies engaged abroad to ensure that U.S. diplomacy and foreign assistance promote and protect the human rights of LGBT persons.

What follows is a seven point plan.

The AP (by way of the Washington Post) notes:

In his presidential memo, Obama directed the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development and other agencies to make sure U.S. diplomacy and foreign assistance helps gays and lesbians who are facing human rights violations. He also ordered U.S. agencies to protect vulnerable gay and lesbian refugees and asylum seekers.

But the directive does not make foreign aid contingent on a nation’s gay rights record or include specific sanctions for poor performers, making the policy more of a moral challenge to other governments than a threat.

Of course the nation's conservative "faith community" is outraged.

OUTRAGED!

First our friends at the Family Research Council:

Family Research Council criticized President Obama's memorandum today instructing federal agencies to promote the acceptance of homosexuality and gender identity disorder through its foreign policy.

FRC Senior Fellow Peter Sprigg made the following comments:

It is startling that President Obama is prepared to throw the full weight and reputation of the United States behind the promotion overseas of the radical ideology of the sexual revolution. If he did the same on other issues, his own liberal allies would undoubtedly accuse him of cultural imperialism. Threats to withhold foreign aid from poor countries unless they conform their laws to the views of Western radicals are unconscionable.

Except we already know that there is no "treat to withhold foreign aid" in the memo. In fact, the section of the memo dealing with "Foreign Assistance" reads:

Agencies involved with foreign aid, assistance, and development shall enhance their ongoing efforts to ensure regular Federal Government engagement with governments, citizens, civil society, and the private sector in order to build respect for the human rights of LGBT persons.

What's unconscionable is Sprigg's statement, a year or so ago on Hardball, that gay behavior should be criminalized.

Then there's Governor Rick Perry:

Just when you thought Barack Obama couldn’t get any more out of touch with America’s values, AP reports his administration wants to make foreign aid decisions based on gay rights.

This administration’s war on traditional American values must stop.

And then:

Investing tax dollars promoting a lifestyle many Americas of faith find so deeply objectionable is wrong.

The president is talking about building respect for LGBT human beings, and the conservatively faithful find that deeply offensive. It's a war on traditional values, they say.

It's a faith based bigotry, to be sure. Killing/maiming/jailing people across the planet merely for being gay should be allowed to continue because their "behavior" offends people claiming to speak for an omnipotent Supreme Being..

Hitchens was right, you can get away with the most extraordinary offenses to morality and to truth in this country if you just say it's your faith speaking.

Teh Birther Returns

2011-12-06T07:17:00.001-05:00

In case you missed it, here's the official announcement:

Newsmax Media and ION Television, one of the nation's largest broadcast networks, will collaborate to host a Republican presidential debate on Tuesday, Dec. 27, moderated by businessman Donald J. Trump.

The Newsmax ION Television Debate will be held at the Hoyt Sherman Theater in Des Moines, Iowa, from 8:00 to 9:30 p.m. ET – and will be the last forum of major Republican presidential candidates a week before the Jan. 3, 2012 Iowa caucus.

Let's just review some of the players here, shall we?

First there's Newsmax - 40% owned by local media mogul Richard Mellon Scaife.
Second, there's Donald Trump - Birther.

A splendid time is guaranteed for all.

I just wonder how Scaife's paper will be covering it.

With A Little Digging...

2011-12-05T07:17:00.001-05:00

From today's Trib:

Uncritical mainstream media, ill-informed about genuine research, too often amplify poorly done "science."

A study published in July by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory suggested that consumption of canned food raised levels of supposedly harmful bisphenol A (BPA) in human urine.

But active levels of BPA could not be detected in blood. A top endocrinologist said that effectively made rodent studies showing adverse BPA effects irrelevant for humans, Trevor Butterworth writes for Forbes.

And then:

Partially funding the Harvard study, Mr. Butterworth notes, was "the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, which has a truly remarkable track record of funding almost all the scare studies on BPA ... ."

Hey, Scaife's braintrust brought up the issue of funding, I didn't. I'm just following their lead.

So let's go find out who butters Trevor's bread. There's this from the Forbes.com article the braintrust cites:

I'm a Brooklyn-based writer, a weekly columnist at The Daily (The Information Society), a contributor to the Financial Times and Wall Street Journal, and editor-at-large of STATS.org, a super-geeky non-partisan, non-profit project affiliated with George Mason University in Virginia that examines the way statistics and science are used in public policy and the media.

Ah...STATS.org. And what's STATS.org? From their "about" page:

Since its founding in 1994, the non-profit, non-partisan Statistical Assessment Service - STATS - has become a much-valued resource on the use and abuse of science and statistics in the media. Our goals are to correct scientific misinformation in the media and in public policy resulting from bad science, politics, or a simple lack of information or knowledge; and to act as a resource for journalists and policy makers on major scientific issues and controversies.

As a mark of our success, STATS’ work has been featured on NBC’s “Nightly News,” “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer” and ABC’s “20/20?- and in print by The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, US News and World Report, New Scientist, New England Journal of Medicine, and many other publications.

In 2004, we became an affiliate of George Mason University in Virginia.

So it's the Statistical Assessment Service! We've seen that before, haven't we?

Scaife's a big funder of STATS.org. Big to the tune of $1.15 million over the years.

Now as there was no for way Butterworth to know that his Forbes.com piece would be so dutifully referenced on Scaife's editorial page, he's not the issue here. Though, unfortunately, his inclusion into this frothy mix discredits whatever worthy points he may have made.

The issue, as always, is Scaife's money and how it quietly funds the right wing noise machine. Scaife's funds have supported STATS.org (a hundred grand a year for the past few years, it looks like) and a writer for STATS.org writes something for Forbes that Scaife's paper lovingly recommends to you, his faithful reading audience - all without telling you about all his quiet support in the first place.

Without knowing any of this, you'd think that Butterworth's research was sturdy enough to stand on its own - it made it onto the editorial page of a major metropolitan newspaper, right? But now with his knowledge, you're not quite sure whether it's just being amplified by Scaife's noise machine.

See how that works? Somedays, these things just write themselves.

We Must Give Credit Where Credit Is Due

2011-12-04T10:21:00.001-05:00

Over the last few years, I'd leveled some (well-deserved) criticisms of P-G columnist Jack Kelly - though in recent years, Ed Heath over at Cognitive Dissonance has done such a good job of it, I've moved on to other newer Sunday morning blog pursuits.

Every now and then, though, I feel the need to blog on his latest conservative spiel. Most often, I don't. There are times where I might disagree with Jack's opinions but can't find fault with his facts. As everyone IS entitled to their own opinions, those are the days I find myself feeling less guilty about giving him a pass. When his facts are, shall we say, in conflict with reality that's when find myself wanting to blog on that conflict.

Today, however, is not one of those days. I have no disagreement with either Jack's opinions or his facts this week at all.

Neither does Ed.

Jack's talking about moral courage in light of some recent rape scandals at some very important university sports programs:

The foremost responsibility of the powerful is to protect the weak, But at Penn State and Syracuse, the powerful protected each other -- not the vulnerable, at-risk children.

Can't say I can disagree much with this one, Jack.

Tracking Teh Crazie - Michele Bachmann on Evolution

2011-12-02T07:07:00.001-05:00

Well here's a new argument (new to me, at least) from the anti-science crazies. By insisting that science teachers teach science the guv'ment is again eroding some on our God-given liberties.

From the Des Moines Register:

Bachmann’s position on intelligent design was tested in a series of questions from the audience.

While emphasizing that she didn’t have a platform position on the issue – since she believed it wasn’t something the federal government and president should be involved in – Bachmann said her religious beliefs informed her scientific views and that sufficient questions have been raised concerning evolution to justify alternative theories to be discussed in science classes.

“I do believe that God created the earth and I believe that there are issues that need to be addressed – the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the issue of irreducible complexity, the dearth of fossil record,” she said. “Those are all very real issues that should be addressed in science classes.”

Not allowing ideas like intelligent design to be discussed in science classes amounted to government censorship, she said.

“I think the one thing we do not want to have is censorship by government,” she said. “Government shouldn’t be dictating what information goes on the table.” [emphasis added.]

Crooks and Liars has some more:

Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann says schools should teach children about evolution and intelligent design because "the best thing to do is to allow all scientific facts on the table."

During a question-and-answer session at the University of Northern Iowa Wednesday, Bachmann was asked if intelligent design should be taught as science in public schools.

"I think that all science should be on the table," the candidate explained. "I think the one thing we do not want to have is censorship by government."

"I do believe that God created the Earth," she continued. "And I believe there are issues that need to be addressed -- the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the issue of irreducible complexity, the dearth of fossil record."

Couple problems with this argument.

First it assumes that there are indeed facts swirling within the intelligent design "theory" so therefore it is somehow a "science." And second, all three reasons Bachmann listed to doubt evolution (Second Law of Thermodynamics, irreducible complexity and the fossil record) in no way conflict with evolution.

Let's take a look at the most general outline of ID (Intelligent Design). It asserts that an intelligent designer designed the universe - a designer, by definition, who is outside of the universe. But science can only deal with the stuff inside the universe. Once one has injected an intelligent designer into the argument one has effectively left science.

On Bachmann's other arguments, Crooks and Liars has some science/rational thinking in response:

According to many scientists, all three issues Bachmann mentioned do not discount the theory of evolution.

Scientific American's Steve Mirsky wrote in 2005 that arguing irreducible complexity as evidence against evolution was a "full-blown intellectual surrender strategy."

While Charles Darwin cited a lack of fossil records as "the most obvious and serious objection that can be urged against the theory," University of Chicago professor Jerry Coyne believes the objection is no longer valid.

"Since 1859, paleontologists have turned up Darwin's missing evidence: fossils in profusion, with many sequences showing evolutionary change," Coyne explained in a 2005 article.

And University of Minnesota, Morris associate professor PZ Myers says the claim that the Second Law of Thermodynamics makes evolution false is "one of the oldest canards in the creationists' book."

None of this, of course, will matter to the anti-science crowd.

Teh Crazie - evolutionary style.

As Long As They Keep Doing It...

2011-12-01T07:08:00.001-05:00

I'll have to keep pointing it out, I guess.

From today's Trib:

NEW BOOK RANKLES KERRY. Bet this book isn't in John Kerry's personal library.

The Democrat U.S. senator from Massachusetts is furious over a new expose that suggests he and his wife, Pittsburgh ketchup heiress Teresa Heinz, might have made money in the stock market because Kerry had inside information he learned on the job.

"Throw Them All Out" (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) by Peter Schweizer, a research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, suggests many Capitol Hill politicians benefit financially from insider stock tips and cronyism.

Schweizer said certain Kerry stock transactions, though handled by independent trustees, often correlated with his Senate committee activities.

First off, let me bring up the obvious. This is from Newsweek's review of Schweitzer's book:

“Senator Kerry does not buy, sell, or trade stocks,” says Jodi Seth, Kerry’s spokeswoman. She notes that Kerry’s holdings are in family trusts and managed by independent trustees with whom he does not communicate. Further, Seth says, Kerry is not a beneficiary of Teresa Heinz Kerry’s trusts, which were established before they were married.

So if I am reading this correctly, Senator Kerry's money is in a blind trust that he doesn't control and he has no contact with the money in his wife's trusts. And the Heinz trusts that were established before they were married? There's a prenup that keeps his money separate from hers.

Schweitzer even admits:

“It’s not that I think John Kerry is calling up his broker, on health care, and saying, ‘Buy this company, sell that company,’?” Schweizer says. “The issue is one of a double standard.” He notes that if the executive of a health-care company were in discussions with the White House over pending legislation that would affect his industry, and then made a series of unusual stock transactions related to the industry, the SEC might well open an insider-trading investigation. “The only group in America that we exempt is politicians, who are probably the last people about whom we should be saying, ‘Oh, we’ll take their word for it,’?” he says. “That’s what’s so amazing to me.”

Except when by law their money's not controlled by them. But why should such pesky facts get in the way of yet another Scaife smear?

But of course, that's not what I wanted you to look at. Take a look at Schweizer's description above. He's the "William J Casey Research Fellow" over at something called the Hoover Institution.

Elsewhere in today's Trib we find:

Speaking of quackery, Hoover Institution fellow Victor Davis Hanson says President Obama's economic policies are a tutorial in turning "a natural recovery from a near-record recession into a serial slowdown." Adds Mr. Hanson, writing in National Review Online, Obama "came in with an agenda to redistribute income, expand government, raise taxes, emphasize class divisions and deflate the American profile abroad -- and he quickly turned petulant when all that worsened an economy that was never to be his main interest but was necessary to fund his fantasies." That, class, is what's known as a damning indictment.

Victor Davis Hanson is the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at Hoover.

Hmm...two two TWO Hoover fellows mentioned in the same Scaife owned paper. You know where I'm going with this, don't you?

So how much money has Richard Mellon Scaife funnelled to the Hoover Institution over the years?

$11,044,000

And yet, even with two fellows quoted in Scaife's paper, there's not one mention of all that Scaife support.

The circle jerk continues.

How Can There Be A "Climategate II" When There Was No Climagegate I?

2011-11-30T08:50:00.001-05:00

It took some time, but Scaife's braintrust over at the Tribune-Review finally caught up to the rest of the anti-science crowd and commented on the latest batch of hacked emails from East Anglia.

For some reality-based background, we turn to the Guardian:

A fresh tranche of private emails exchanged between leading climate scientists throughout the last decade was released online on Tuesday. The unauthorised publication is an apparent attempt to repeat the impact of a similar release of emails on the eve of the Copenhagen climate summit in late 2009.

The initial email dump was apparently timed to disrupt the Copenhagen climate talks. It prompted three official inquiries in the UK and two in the US into the working practices of climate scientists. Although these were critical of the scientists' handling of Freedom of Information Act requests and lack of openness they did not find fault with the climate change science they had produced.

Keep that last sentence in mind.

But let's get back to what Scaife's braintrust really wants to discuss:

Among the correspondence, as reported by author James Delingpole in The Wall Street Journal, is an e-mail from Penn State global-warming guru Michael Mann: "I've been talking w/ folks in the states about finding an investigative journalist to investigate and expose (Steve) McIntyre and his thus far unexplored connections with fossil fuel interests."

That would be the Canadian ex-mining engineer who exposed Mr. Mann's flawed "hockey stick" graph of global temperatures. Rather than "prove" Mr. McIntyre wrong, Mann preferred to go dirt-digging.

Here's the WSJ article the braintrust references. And this is what he wrote about Professor Mann:

Consider an email written by Mr. Mann in August 2007. "I have been talking w/ folks in the states about finding an investigative journalist to investigate and expose McIntyre, and his thus far unexplored connections with fossil fuel interests. Perhaps the same needs to be done w/ this Keenan guy." Doug Keenan is a skeptic and gadfly of the climate-change establishment. Steve McIntyre is the tenacious Canadian ex-mining engineer whose dogged research helped expose flaws in Mr. Mann's "hockey stick" graph of global temperatures.

One can understand Mr. Mann's irritation. His hockey stick, which purported to demonstrate the link between man-made carbon emissions and catastrophic global warming, was the central pillar of the IPCC's 2001 Third Assessment Report, and it brought him near-legendary status in his community. Naturally he wanted to put Mr. McIntyre in his place.

The sensible way to do so is to prove Mr. McIntyre wrong using facts and evidence and improved data. Instead the email reveals Mr. Mann casting about for a way to smear him. If the case for man-made global warming is really as strong as the so-called consensus claims it is, why do the climategate emails show scientists attempting to stamp out dissenting points of view? Why must they manipulate data, such as Mr. Jones's infamous effort (revealed in the first batch of climategate emails) to "hide the decline," deliberately concealing an inconvenient divergence, post-1960, between real-world, observed temperature data and scientists' preferred proxies derived from analyzing tree rings?

The part left out by Delinpole (and subsequently by the braintrust) is that Mcintyre had, by 2007 was already being challenged. Like this from 2005:

Ammann and Eugene Wahl of Alfred University have analyzed the Mann-Bradley-Hughes (MBH) climate field reconstruction and reproduced the MBH results using their own computer code. They found the MBH method is robust even when numerous modifications are employed. Their results appear in two new research papers submitted for review to the journals Geophysical Research Letters and Climatic Change. The authors invite researchers and others to use the code for their own evaluation of the method.

Ammann and Wahl’s findings contradict an assertion by McIntyre and McKitrick that 15th century global temperatures rival those of the late 20th century and therefore make the hockey stick-shaped graph inaccurate. They also dispute McIntyre and McKitrick’s alleged identification of a fundamental flaw that would significantly bias the MBH climate reconstruction toward a hockey stick shape. Ammann and Wahl conclude that the highly publicized criticisms of the MBH graph are unfounded. They first presented their detailed analyses at the American Geophysical Union’s Fall Meeting in San Francisco last December and at the American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting in Denver this year.

The main thrust of the brainstrust's argument is that the "hockey stick" is wrong and therefore climate science is wrong.

But it isn't and the science is still undeniable.

Funny how the braintrust never seems to get around to that NOAA report.

Siri pulls a HAL

2011-11-30T07:57:00.004-05:00

Remember in 2001: A Space Odyssey when HAL refused to provide assistance? Looks like Siri has a similar problem when it comes to helping women who need emergency health services.

Via Think Progress:

“What may I help you with?” So begins Siri — the unique voice-activated assistant of the iPhone 4s that promises to deliver accurate and tailored answers for your every need. Unless you’re a woman in search of health services like birth control, emergency contraception, abortion, or even mammogram tests. Then the interactive search wizard draws a blank.

[snip]

More disturbingly, Siri would not respond to pleas for help for sexual assault or rape clinics, and services for emergency contraception.

Apparently, however, it's quite adept at locating escort services...

Progress!

CHS: Cookies and Cards for a Cause!

2011-11-30T07:38:00.004-05:00

Community Human Services (CHS) is a non-profit which provides homeless assistance programs, mental health residential programs, health programs and family assistance programs in South Oakland and the greater Pittsburgh area. They're conducting their holiday gift card drive again this year with the goal of providing one $25 gift card for every person who lives in a CHS supported housing program. You can help make the holidays brighter for 550 very low income people facing poverty and homelessness this season by participating in their drive.

CHS Holiday Gift Project Cookies and Cards Reception
WHEN: December 5 - between 5 PM and 8 PM
WHERE: Shiloh Inn in Mt. Washington (123 Shiloh Ave., Pittsburgh)
WHAT: Bring a gift card or make a donation

It's that time of year again!

2011-11-29T09:41:00.005-05:00

You can get all the details here.

(And, yes, I work for People for Peduto.)

Occupy

2011-11-27T08:52:00.001-05:00

From Jim Morin at the Miami Herald:

Occupy.

A Thanksgiving Gift From The Trib

2011-11-25T06:48:00.001-05:00

As long as they keep doing this, I'll keep pointing it out.

Take a look at this blurb from today's Laurels & Lances:

Laurel: To Jake Haulk. The president of the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy continues to do what he does best -- slay shibboleths. His latest effort calls into serious question the conclusion of an American Public Transportation Association "study" that says Pittsburgh motorists could save $9,201 a year by taking Port Authority Transit. As per usual, the facts show the APTA hyped the numbers. Thanks for the reality check, Dr. Haulk.

We've run the numbers before, but let's get a more recent picture, alright?

According to mediamatters, the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy has received $3,421,000 from the Richard Mellon Scaife controlled Allegheny, Carthage, and Sarah Scaife Foundations and $4,039,200 in total foundation support. After a few seconds with my trusty calculator I now know that that of all the foundation support received by the Allegheny Institute, about 84.7 % came directly from the foundations controlled by the owner of the paper that lavished such praise Jake Haulk, president of the Allegheny Institute.

Heck, the Washington Post reported in 1999 that:

Scaife has been donating to big think thanks for four decades, but he recently launched a new kind of policy group in Pittsburgh, the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy, which describes itself as "devoted exclusively to the study of local issues" in western Pennsylvania.

So not only is Scaife the main source of foundation money for the institute, he founded the darn thing in the first place!

And yet no mention of any of that information is to be found on the pages of the Tribune-Review.

I find that interesting, don't you?

Happy Thanksgiving! (from U.C. Davis police officer John Pike)

2011-11-24T04:44:00.005-05:00

(Click to enlarge. Based on this Photoshop.)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

2011-11-24T00:01:00.000-05:00

When I was a boy in New England (where you can find the best pizza on the planet) every year on Thanksgiving day it was a tradition for at least one New York radio station to play one particular 18 minute piece of music - some time around noon.

This piece of music.

Lyrics are here.

You can buy a copy here.

You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant
Walk right in it's around the back
Just a half a mile from the railroad track
You can get anything you want, at Alice's Restaurant

Happy Thanksgiving!

The problem with this country is that there aren't enough nine year-old janitors

2011-11-22T10:04:00.004-05:00

That's according to current Republican presidential front-runner Newt Gingrich who thinks that child labor laws are "truly stupid." Via MEDIAite:

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich told a crowd on Friday that the solution to income inequality is to fire school janitors, and replace them with children. I am not making this up, and it gets worse. He’s not talking about junior high or high school kids, he’s talking about “9 to 14 year-olds.”

He suggests that these nine year-olds replace “union janitors” in poor neighborhoods, and that the kids work under a single “master janitor.”

You just can't make this stuff up...

Ron Paul's Libertarian Patriarchy

2011-11-22T08:40:00.001-05:00

Back in 2007 when I wrote in a post titled "Ron Paul Sucks" that "[T]oo often I find that the same Libertarian males who kick and scream and cry and rend their garments over the thought of the government taking one thin dime of their money have no problem whatsoever with the thought of that very same government crawling up into a woman's womb," I got (and am still getting) clobbered in the comments section. I admit now that I was wrong. But, only in the scope of my comment. It isn't just that Ron Paul is against abortion -- he's full on pro patriarchy. If he's the standard bearer, then libertarianism is truly only a philosophy for white, straight, Christian males who don't like paying taxes (and their delusional allies).

Via Digby:

Ron Paul (at 15:22): “Matter of fact, when the people came to Samuel and said, “Look, we need more rules and more laws. We want more government to tell us what to do and we — we need more of this.” And Samuel was old and ready to retire and he says, “No, that’s a bad mistake. You don’t need more rules and more government. You don’t need this — the government will overreact.”

And today this is what I think has happened to us. We have deferred to.. to the federal government. We have weighed too much government. We should go in other directions. Before you know it the next step — what if the next step is, “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the United Nations defined marriage?”

I don’t want to go that way, I want to go back down… all the way to the family and the Church — believe me it would be a happier and more peaceful world if we went in that direction, rather than asking the government and asking the King to solve all these problems… we need the family to deal with it.

And we can take our message and learn something from the Old Testament, how there was such a strong emphasis on the Patriarchal society and the disputes settled by judges rather than looking for Big Government.”

What Tony Wrote.

2011-11-22T06:59:00.001-05:00

From Tony Norman's column today:

When the late Gil Scott-Heron said that "the revolution would not be televised," he spoke too soon. There was no way that the performance poet could conceive of the era of the viral video or know that it was just around the corner.

In the event you haven't heard it, here's what Tony was writing about:

And when he wrote:

Last Friday, a cop at the University of California, Davis forgot the cardinal rule every officer should have internalized since the Rodney King debacle -- if there's a camera around, then police brutality will be televised. There are too many witnesses and too many cameras in the environment to ever give another officer the benefit of the doubt when it comes to violence on civilians. We know from painful experience that there are too many liars wearing badges to pretend otherwise.

This is what he was writing about:

(If it looks familiar to you, it's because the OPJ posted the video yesterday)

But UCDavis ain't the only place the pepper's been sprayed. 84 year old Dorli Rainey was sprayed in Seattle:

5 foot tall, 20 year old Elisabeth Nichols was sprayed in Oregon:

And that's just two.

And so when Tony wrote:

Much has been said about the militarization of the police in this country and how the "war on drugs" mentality has trickled down into society and college policing.

It also doesn't help that the Bush administration considered torture and sadism legitimate tools of coercion and social control. The cops at the bottom always take their cues from the cops at the top. When administration and military officials are amoral, then it is too much to expect men and women many levels below their pay grade to respect the constitutional rights of their fellow citizens.

The police claim that they're not choosing sides in the dispute but are simply enforcing the law. Former Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu had a great response to such moral evasiveness: "If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor."

I'd always wondered whether the phrase "The revolution will not be televised" had any deeper meaning. With the lyrics that open with:

You will not be able to stay home, brother.
You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out.
You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip,
Skip out for beer during commercials,
Because the revolution will not be televised.

It points to a revolution that will not be a media event. But Scott-Heron points to something deeper:

The first change takes place in your mind, he said. He said that it'll be something that can't be captured on film you'll just realize one day you're on the wrong page - that the change has already taken place everywhere around you.

The revolution will be live.

Tracing The Cash

2011-11-21T07:13:00.001-05:00

This Saturday, the Trib published another one of Craig Smith's interviews with famous conservatives who have unnamed ties to Scaife Foundation money.

This time it's Richard Perle.

This is how Smith describes Perle:

Richard Perle is a political adviser and lobbyist who served as an assistant secretary of Defense in the Reagan administration. He worked on the Defense Policy Board Advisory Committee from 1987 to 2004, serving as its chairman from 2001 to 2003.

Which is accurate, but incomplete. Some of his other affiliations:

The American Enterprise Institute, Resident Fellow ($8.361 million in Scaife Foundation money)
Hudson Institute, Board of Trustees, 2008 ($3.85 million in Scaife Foundation money)
Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Board of Advisors ($600 thousand in Scaife Money from 2010, 2009, 2008 alone)

Interesting, isn't it, how he's attached to some major conservative think tanks that have received some major Scaife money and when Scaife's paper interviews him, there's no mention of any of it.

Happy Monday, Pittsburgh!

There are more of us

2011-11-21T05:39:00.004-05:00

While you may have seen the first few seconds or so of this video on the news, I implore you to watch the entire thing (8:34):

This to me sums up the Occupy Movement in a nutshell. The forces in control (with the might) -- whether that be Wall Street or the police who do their bidding, and whether that be a rigged economic game or pepper spray, swat down the rest of us -- but, there are more of us than them. That's the whole idea of the Occupy Movement. We are the 99% and we've woken to the injustice and we're not shutting up or going away.

Every time the powers that be tried to overreact and squash the protestors in NYC, the movement -- and outrage -- only got bigger and eventually spread all over the country. And, while no one seems to have figured out yet what the next step should be, the vast overreach by those in power have woken a sleeping giant and the Masters of the Universe are frightened (as they should be). They're frightened because there are more of us than them.

(Also, read this to be reminded, if you need to, the larger implications of the police actions in this video.)

Atheism Update

2011-11-18T07:00:00.001-05:00

Duquesne University's Student Government Association's decision barring the official creation of a "secular society" there is getting some local press.

From Kaitlynn Riely and Ann Rodgers, of the P-G:

Holding signs that said "We don't bite" and "Support reason," about 20 students from three universities gathered Thursday in Uptown to protest Duquesne University's refusal to recognize a proposed secular student group.

Carnegie Mellon University and University of Pittsburgh have secular, or atheist, student organizations. Last month, Duquesne senior Nick Shadowen petitioned his student government to create a similar society.

"I think it's important to have a secular group at any university, religious or not," he said. "Anyone who has been paying attention to current events or the news recognizes that religion is a serious topic, and I think it's the job of any university to allow open debate about serious issues, and to have a real debate you need two sides."

Rick Wills of the Trib goes a bit broader:

An atheist student at Catholic-run Duquesne University is upset the school won't recognize the Duquesne Secular Society, a group for nonbelievers he helped form.

"I know Duquesne is a Catholic school," said Nick Shadowen, 21, a senior philosophy major who grew up in Harrisburg. "I did not think that meant my opinions, my lack of belief in God, would be censored. They advertise the fact that they are a diverse and international university with all kinds of people studying and working there."

Duquesne's student government oversight committee this month rejected Shadowen's request for the school to give formal recognition to the atheist group, and university officials backed that decision. Shadowen and other nonreligious students from area universities protested outside Duquesne on Thursday.

Looks like the good folks at Duquense see the DSS differently from how the DSS sees itself. From the Trib:

Shadowen insists the secular society's mission is not contrary to the school's.

"Our group is not meant to spread atheist propaganda or undermine the mission of the school," he said.

One purpose of the group would be to dispel stereotypes about atheists, said society member Colin Stragar-Rice, 20, of New Castle, a junior at Duquesne.

"The group would allow a lot of students to come into contact with a different point of view. We also want to remove the stigma nontheistic people face," he said.

This seems to be somewhat in conflict from what Duquesne spokeswoman, Bridget Fare:

"All students are certainly welcome here. But formally recognizing a student group whose main purpose is opposition to belief in God is not aligned with our mission. The purpose of those other groups is not in direct opposition to belief in God," Fare said.

I guess that all depends on how you define the word "welcome."

As I wrote a few days ago, you'd would think that a religious university would want to encourage dialog between the believers and non-believers in its community - if only to give the believers ample opportunity to convince the sad, naive apostates of the error of their atheistic ways. You'd think that a University founded by the Spiritans, a religious organization that was itself founded according to the Catholic Enclopedia:

...for the purpose of preparing missionaries for the most abandoned souls, whether in Christian or pagan countries.

...would jump at the opportunity for that sort of dialog.

Night Talk

2011-11-17T20:48:00.001-05:00

I'll be on NightTalk: Get To The Point tomorrow night on PCNC.

The invited panelists are (now see if you can guess which one is ME):

J. Bracken Burns, Sr. (D) Commissioner, Washington County
Melissa Haluszczak (R) 2011 Congressional Candidate
David DeAngelo “2 Political Junkies” Blogger

The program is telecast LIVE on Friday, 11/18 from 8:00-9:00 PM; in addition there are encores that Friday late night 2:00AM and on Monday, 11/21 from 5:00 - 6:00PM.

Additionally, Friday’s show may be telecast as the “Best of NightTalk” on Sunday, 11/20 at 10:00PM.