You pay while they party

While right wingers bitch about deficits and demand that the sick, the poor and the working class pay for them, Texas Republicans pass a bill giving a tax break to people who buy big yachts costing $250,000 or more.

Republican compares unemployed Americans to "alcoholics and drug users"

Can Republicans get any nicer at a time when unemployment is so high? Aren't these the guys that promised "jobs, jobs, jobs"? But instead of jobs bills, we get Republican lawmakers calling unemployed Americans "alcoholics and drug users."

Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-TX) held a “listening session” at Burns Elementary School on Tuesday where he discussed a variety of issues with a crowd of nearly two dozen constituents. One of the attendees uploaded video of the session on YouTube.

At one point during the session, a man asked about drug testing for “welfare recipients.” Farenthold said that this is an idea worth considering, and then went on to complain that unemployment insurance is too generous. He then compared Americans on unemployment insurance to alcoholics and drug addicts.

Obama visits KSC

The shuttle launch today was scrubbed, but President Obama and his family were on hand and visited with the astronauts afterward, and also met with Gabrielle Giffords.

Somehow, some way, right wing media will find a way to blame Obama for the launch being canceled.

Fox launches vicious new attack on Obama

I guess this means they're also going to cover Prescott Bush and his ties to Nazi Germany, right?

Oh, and Fox Nation neglects to note that the certificate Obama released in 2008 also listed his father's name, so who knows where they got this idea that Obama was "hiding" his father. But Fox and the rabid teabaggers never, ever let facts get in the way.

Fox Nation: 'A Slippery Character': New Details Emerge About Obama's Father

With a father like this, it is little wonder President Obama did not want to release his full birth certificate.

Though the proof that he was actually born in Hawaii may silence some critics, a new, rather more interesting side of his life has emerged - that his father Barack Obama senior was a serial womaniser and polygamist who government and university officials were trying to force out of the country.

Obama senior married Stanley Ann Dunham, a white student from Kansas, not only when he was said to have already been married to a woman in Kenya, but at a time when interracial marriages were still illegal in many parts of the U.S.

Obama is a dictator?

And they called Obama a dictator? Turns out they were just projecting what they want to do.

Mayor Virg Bernero of Lansing, MI, former 2010 gubernatorial candidate, talks with Rachel Maddow about the systematic privatization of Michigan public schools and the disbanding of local, democratically elected governments.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

NBC already knows if Trump is running or not

MSNBC host Lawrence O'Donnell says that NBC already knows if Donald Trump is really planning to run for president or not. If Trump has committed to another season of his TV show Celebrity Apprentice, that obviously means Trump isn't planning to run and his recent publicity tour has been a complete sham, a total hoax. So O'Donnell is asking NBC to come right out and tell us if Trump's committed to another season or not.

NBC is staying silent. That may not be the wise choice, since Trump's birther insanity is causing ratings for his show to plummet.

The birther silver lining

There is one silver lining in the national embarrassment of birtherism that Donald Trump has wrought on America -- it's KILLING ratings for his little reality TV show.

The fall-off has been especially pronounced over the last few weeks, a period that coincides with Trump's emphasis on Obama's birth certificate. "Something is definitely going on there," another media buyer told me. "He's dropped -- and that's a big fucking dip." Given the liberal skew of Trump's viewership, that dip might not be surprising.

Feltus agreed that Trump's ratings woes might stem from his sharp turn to the right, although he pointed out that this could be intentional. "Given the downward trend of Trump's ratings among his current, liberal audience, maybe he's running as a Republican to add a little bipartisan diversity to his viewership," he said.

And then he noted one other possibility. "For all we know," Feltus said, "Trump may have a new 'Celebrity Birth Certificate' pilot in development."

Corporations have far more rights and power than you do.

The corporations already control most of our nation. The Supreme Court has taken another step in solidifying corporate power over the individual.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday limited the ability of people to combine forces and fight corporations together when they want to dispute contracts for cell phones, cable television and other services, a move consumer advocates called a crushing blow.

In a 5-4 ideological split, the high court's conservatives said businesses can block their customers from using class actions. The court said the federal arbitration law trumps state laws that invalidate contracts banning class actions.

The decision came in a dispute between AT&T Mobility and a California couple who objected to being charged around $30 in sales tax for what they were told was a free cell phone.

Businesses commonly require arbitration clauses in consumer contracts to protect them from facing their customers in court. The Supreme Court's decision means that corporations now won't need to worry about consumers, shareholders or even employees banding together and fighting them using lawsuits or arbitration, consumer groups said.

I have some questions for Donald Trump

Now that the birth certificate has been released, I have some questions for Donald Trump.

Why didn't your "investigators" in Hawaii give you a heads up about the birth certificate first?

You claimed someone told you that the birth certificate was missing. Was that one of your mysterious "investigators," and if so, have you fired him/her yet?

You claimed that what your "investigators" were finding in Hawaii was incredible. Will you tell us what it is you found so incredible about what they were finding?

And since you blamed the media for keeping the birth certificate issue going, why are you now taking credit for it? Would you make up your mind, please?

Nicole Sandler arrested at Florida town hall for asking Allen West a question

Liberal talk show host (and usual Randi Rhodes fill-in) Nicole Sandler was arrested at a town hall meeting hosted by teabagger Allen West. See video of the arrest here.

The lesson here is that teabaggers, who cheered the abusive behavior of protesters at health care town halls, are now arresting anyone who dares ask them a question.

Allen West's "town hall" has him only answering written questions that he chooses in advance. Wait a minute, isn’t that something else the teabaggers accuse the President of doing?

STFU about the birth certificate already

Republicans want to keep people from voting

There’s a huge effort underway by the Republican legislature in Florida to make it nearly impossible to mount a community-led voter registration drive, the kind of drives that usually sign up lots of ethnic minority and lower income voters.

Hmmmmmm…. Now why would the Republicans be targeting THOSE groups to keep them from voting… I wonder…

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Paul Ryan is a coward

Congressman Paul Ryan is a coward. He can't face his constituents when they question him about his Medicare-killing budget plan.

Congressman Ryan changed the door where he planned to exit a crowd listening session and left in a different vehicle than the one than he arrived in.

Protesters waited for Congressman Paul Ryan outside a listening session at Gateway Technical College in Kenosha, many of them were seniors holding preprinted signs that read ‘Hands Off My Medicare.’

They chanted, “Ryan stop lying!” There was capacity crowd inside the school’s Madrigrana Auditorium. “Do not renew the Bush tax credit for the wealthy,” one man said during the public comment period, even giving out his phone number in front of everyone. “I’ll debate these issues with you anytime, just call me.”

What Boehner and the Republicans are praying for

John Boehner and the Republicans know that as the economy continues to improve, Obama's chances for reelection in 2012 solidify. And here's why they're praying so hard for gas prices to keep climbing:

The American economy is now strong enough to withstand Middle East turmoil and the Japanese nuclear crisis. Only a big rise in the price of oil could stop it now.

Those are the findings of an Associated Press survey of leading economists, who are increasingly confident in a recovery that is nearly two years old. They expect the economy to grow faster every quarter this year.

In part, that's because the economists think Americans will spend more freely in the coming months. Higher stock prices have made people wealthier. And a cut in the Social Security payroll tax is giving most households an extra $1,000 to $2,000 this year.

American exports and corporate spending, which have helped drive the recovery, are also expected to remain strong, according to the quarterly AP Economy Survey.

The one factor that could make a second recession a possibility would be a jump in oil prices to $150 a barrel, economists say. Oil trades at about $112 a barrel now. The record high, set in the summer of 2008, is about $147 a barrel.

The right wing’s Easter bashing of Obama

Even though President Obama celebrated Easter by hosting an Easter prayer breakfast that included giving a speech about the alleged Resurrection of Jesus and what it means to him as a Christian, right wing media is blasting him for "not making an Easter proclamation."

Of course, Obama's predecessor also did not issue an Easter proclamation. His name was Bush, I think. But who remembers that anymore?

About Trump’s lead in the polls…

Indecision 2012 - Premature Ecalculation. Donald Trump may be leading the GOP field in the polls, but early numbers are completely and totally meaningless. The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart shows us why.

Big Oil laughs while you cry

Big Oil laughs while you cry at the pump. Soaring pump prices are causing their profits to soar too -- right now, because of the higher prices you’re paying, they're making about 390 Million dollars in profit... a day.

Exxon's earnings alone are being increased by 50% because of the gouging that's happening at your neighborhood gas station.

So just remember, while you’re skimping on groceries so you can fill up your tank, Big Oil is laugh its collective ass off at your pain. And they know there's not a goddamn thing you can do about it.

So are we just supposed to roll over and take it?

Trump has a new conspiracy theory to spout

Reality TV and combover star Donald Trump has a new conspiracy theory to spout on his tour to promote the season finale of Celebrity Apprentice: That Obama wasn’t a good enough student to get into the Ivy League schools.

I guess graduating magna cum laude and being president of the Harvard Law Review is all part of that super secret sinister plan hatched before his birth to make sure a guy named Barack Hussein Obama could be President of the United States.

Barbour is out

Haley Barbour is out. He's just released a statement saying he will not be a candidate for president next year.

"I will not be a candidate for president next year. This has been a difficult, personal decision, and I am very grateful to my family for their total support of my going forward, had that been what I decided.

"Hundreds of people have encouraged me to run and offered both to give and raise money for a presidential campaign. Many volunteers have organized events in support of my pursuing the race. Some have dedicated virtually full time to setting up preliminary organizations in critical, early states and to helping plan what has been several months of intensive activity.

"I greatly appreciate each and every one of them and all their outstanding efforts. If I have disappointed any of them in this decision, I sincerely regret it.

"A candidate for president today is embracing a ten-year commitment to an all-consuming effort, to the virtual exclusion of all else. His (or her) supporters expect and deserve no less than absolute fire in the belly from their candidate. I cannot offer that with certainty, and total certainty is required.

"This decision means I will continue my job as Governor Mississippi, my role in the Republican Governors Association and my efforts to elect a new Republican president in 2012, as the stakes for the nation require that effort to be successful."

Like us on Facebook

This blog has a page on Facebook. It's here. So if you're on Facebook stop by and "Like" us.

Privacy? What privacy?

There's an update in the iPhone "tracking" story. Now it appears the iPhone continues to track you even after you turn off location services.

But it should be noted that this isn't just the iPhone, it's any phone that has GPS or any kind of location services. And your location can be tracked even if your phone doesn't have GPS, simply by using triangulation from cell towers. (Many crimes and missing persons cases have been solved just this way.)

I have an iPhone... so does a friend of mine, who is complaining loudly about being tracked -- but he also logs in to Foursquare everywhere he goes, publicly tweeting out his location all day.

The pace of technology itself is going to force us to change our ideas of privacy. You don't have very much now to begin with... if you use a credit card, an ATM card, have OnStar or similar service in your car, watch cable or satellite TV, use a DVR, etc. Where you go and what you're doing, watching, listening to, can easily be tracked and/or recorded by the technology you're using every day.

Do you worry about privacy even as you use any of the services above? If you want complete privacy, does this mean you'd have to give up all technology? Would you be willing to do that?

Will the Republicans destroy America?

Will Republicans destroy America just because they hate Obama?

The United States has never defaulted on its debt and Democrats and Republicans say they don't want it to happen now. But with partisan acrimony running at fever pitch, and Democrats and Republicans so far apart on how to tame the deficit, the unthinkable is suddenly being pondered.

The government now borrows about 42 cents of every dollar it spends. Imagine that one day soon, the borrowing slams up against the current debt limit ceiling of $14.3 trillion and Congress fails to raise it. The damage would ripple across the entire economy, eventually affecting nearly every American, and rocking global markets in the process.

A default would come if the government actually failed to fulfill a financial obligation, including repaying a loan or interest on that loan. The government borrows mostly by selling bonds to individuals and governments, with a promise to pay back the amount of the bond in a certain time period and agreeing to pay regular interest on that bond in the meantime.

Presidential wannabe Rick Santorum says he certainly would place the good of the country under his own extremist politics. This is just further proof that Republicans love their party far more than they love their country.

Trump is the new Palin

Trump most definitely is the male Sarah Palin. Just like Sarah, he's engaged in a new nonstop media campaign to play the victim card. He is, like her, a professional victim. His latest whine is that the media is being unfair to him... Just like sister Sarah!

Undocumented workers paid more taxes than GE

GE, which earned 14.2 Billion dollars last year, paid zero in taxes and received a 4.1 million-dollar tax refund while America's undocumented workers paid $11.2 billion in taxes.

And yet, right wingers say undocumented workers are "destroying" the country, and they want even lower tax rates for big corporations.

Radical cleric Terry Jones jailed

Florida radical Christian cleric Terry Jones, his mustache, and Jones’ cohort, Wayne Sapp, were sent to jail in Detroit by Judge Mark Somers for refusing to pay a $1 bond each because of a judge’s ruling that they would breach the peace.

The stunning development came after a Dearborn jury sided with prosecutors, ruling that Terry Jones and Wayne Sapp would breach the peace if they rallied at the Islamic Center of America in Dearborn.

Prosecutors asked Judge Mark Somers for $45,000 bond. Somers then set bond at $1 each for the two pastors.

They refused to pay. And Somers ordered them remanded to jail.

The teabags are shrinking

Originally submitted by volunteer editor Carole S. Found on ThinkProgress.

Fox News lies about gas prices

Why is Fox News lying about gas prices, trying to make them seem higher than they actually are? Oh wait, it's because bad news for Americans makes them happy, because they only care about being able to blame Obama for them.

The difference between Democrats and Republicans

Republicans seem to have this idea that if they make government as disgusting as they can it'll make people disdainful of both factions equally, and to an extent it appears to be working. I constantly hear comments like, "I hate both Republicans and Democrats! Both sides are fucking us over!"

Yes, it's true. Both Republicans and Democrats are fucking us. But there is a difference between them.

Democrats wine and dine us, take us home and fuck us. Then they leave early in the morning without saying goodbye, leaving a fifty dollar bill on the dresser making us feel like cheap, dirty whores.

Republicans take us to a fast food dive, spike our sodas with roofies, then take us home and fuck us while we're passed out. They leave a counterfeit twenty on the dresser, and then call the cops and have us arrested for prostitution. They've bought off the judge so we get sent to jail. Then they visit us in our cell to tell us they've infected us with herpes. Then they laugh and say, "And tonight we're fucking your mom!"

Workers Compensation next on the chopping block

After a full scale assault on the right of workers to unionize and collectively bargain to protect their rights, the next target on the corporatists’ radar is apparently worker’s compensation insurance.

The Republican Party, with its volume knob controlled by teabaggers and its purse strings controlled by Big Corporate, really wants to take us back to an age where the rich businessmen control everything and the workers must live in squalor with no benefits, no rights and no legal protection.

Former cop Bill Fournier told the Maine state legislature last week about the time he responded to a crime scene and found a 4-year-old girl burned alive in an oven. The grisly 1984 murder sent his life off the rails, Fournier said, to the point where he once put a revolver in his mouth and cocked the hammer.

It isn’t something Fournier would like to revisit, but a subject dear to him was on the table: Reform of workers compensation laws.

Joined by other police officers, firefighters and paramedics, Fournier testified against a Maine bill that would diminish the role of psychiatric and emotional damage in determining a worker’s right to compensation after an injury. The hotly debated measure, sponsored by state Rep. Kerri Prescott (R), has drawn support from the Maine Chamber of Commerce and insurance interests and opposition from labor groups. Many workers, particularly first responders, have argued that mental and emotional injuries should carry no less weight than physical ones when it comes to compensation.

Bad news for Palin

Bad news for Sarah Palin. Her approval ratings have dropped like a stone in her home state of Alaska.

A new Alaska Poll released today shows 61% of Alaskans have a "very unfavorable" or "somewhat unfavorable" opinion of Palin, a former governor and the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee.

Thirty-six percent view Palin positively, according to the survey by Dittman Research & Communications.

Breitbart lies about lying

This is a follow up to my earlier post about Andrew Breitbart having a meltdown on camera.

His excuse of his initial attack on Shirley Sherrod is also a lie. It seems Breitbart can’t open his mouth without lies oozing out.

As a refresher, the video Breitbart posted was deceptively edited to suggest that Sherrod, an African American, did not do all she could to help a white farmer stave off foreclosure on his farm when in fact, Sherrod went to great lengths to help the white farmer. But today, Breitbart suggested in an interview with David Shuster that he did not misrepresent Sherrod's comments because he said in his initial post that "[e]ventually, her basic humanity informs her to help the white farmer."

He said the same thing today to MSNBC's Martin Bashir during a combative interview in which Bashir repeatedly challenged Breitbart regarding his attacks on Sherrod and other topics. In response to Bashir's insistence that Breitbart answer the simple questions Bashir posed, Breitbart grew increasingly agitated and made several flailing attempts to cast blame on others.

Breitbart's defense suffers from two major problems:

First, it's flat-out untrue. Breitbart did not say in his initial post that "eventually, her basic humanity informs her to help the white farmer."

The second problem is at least as serious. Breitbart is falsely suggesting that he did in fact provide the context of Sherrod's tale of redemption and racial understanding when, in reality, someone who read Breitbart's initial blog post would come away thinking that Sherrod had ended up treating the white farmer in a racist, unfair way. In reality, she did nothing of the sort.

Read the rest.

Jesus opposes net neutrality

Jesus really wants the big corporations to decide what you can see, hear and read on the Internet.

The idea that all Internet traffic should be treated equally is against the teachings of the Bible and America's Founding Fathers, according to evangelical Christian minister and political activist David Barton.

During his radio show on Tuesday, he said that net neutrality violated the Biblical principle of free markets, a principle upheld by Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington.

Michele Bachmann needs to get to a hospital

Someone needs to get Michele Bachmann to a hospital immediately -- she's obviously suffering some kind of traumatic short-term memory loss.

In her numerous media appearances, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) usually walks a fine line on birtherism, claiming that she takes President Obama at his word but suggesting that he ought to release his birth certificate.

This morning, when Good Morning America host George Stephanopoulos showed her a copy of the president's short-form birth certificate — readily available on the internet — the surprised Tea Party darling said "that should settle it," stating, "I guess it's over."

But an hour later on Fox & Friends, Bachmann seemed to have forgotten the evidence she'd just seen, telling co-host Gretchen Carlson the president needs to "solve it, be forthcoming and get it over with."

Andrew Breitbart melts down on camera

I don't see how anyone recovers from this... Andrew Breitbart having a complete meltdown on camera. I'm trying to figure out if he was drunk or drugged.

America Shrugged (at the GOP)

A new poll shows that most Americans can't name a single GOP candidate for president.

Meet David Barton

The winning issue for Democrats in 2012

This is THE big winner for Democrats in 2012.

Most Americans oppose cutting so-called entitlement programs to deal with the debt, and would much rather have taxes raised on the wealthy. An astounding 84% of Americans opposed the GOP's plan to do away with Medicare and turn it into a voucher program.

Even 70% of teabaggers oppose the Republican scheme to gut Medicare.

The top lines of the WaPo/ABC Poll show a big problem for Republicans and their plan to gut Medicare. It's hugely unpopular. The vast majority want Medicare preserved as is, along with Medicaid, with (once again) tax increases on the wealthy the heavily preferred choice for addressing debt. Asked the basic question of what should be cut, 78% oppose cutting Medicare, 69% opposed cutting Medicaid, while 72% say tax the rich.

But drill down on the internals for the Medicare questions, and you find that when the Republican plan is spelled out, and respondents are told that beneficiaries would "receive a check or voucher from the government each year for a fixed amount they can use to shop for their own private health insurance policy," and that—as the CBO projects—the cost of private insurance will likely outpace the cost of Medicare, opposition to the plan soars to 84%.

Bachmann’s new campaign slogan should be

Michele Bachmann: Not as crazy as Donald Trump.

Jan Brewer's moment of sanity is over

Governor Jan Brewer had a moment of sanity when she vetoed both the birther and the guns on campus bills. But her moment is over. She's signed into law a bill giving the teabagger flag the same status as the American flag.

Here's what their flag should be (via OToolefan):

What birthers believe

Just as I predicted

Just as I predicted – the reason Donald Trump jumped so vociferously on the birther bandwagon is because he needed an excuse to not release his tax returns or financial statements. The release of those documents would show us that all his claims of business savvy and success are only so much hot air. He’s better at bragging than he is at business – all hat, no cattle, as they say.

So surely enough he’s now saying he won’t release his tax returns until Obama releases his birth certificate. Even though Obama has.

Sarah Palin is a victim yet again

Poor Sarah Palin! The perpetual victim, usually angry, upset and wounded that the media dares to cover her and report the stupid things she says and does, is now angry, upset and wounded that the media is NOT covering her. She and her handlers are outraged that the national news media did not give wall-to-wall coverage of her speech in Madison, Wisconsin yesterday.

Slate's Dave Weigel has a fun catch this morning documenting Sarah Palin aide Rebecca Mansour's Twitter crusade against various mainstream media outlets that, in Mansour's estimation, didn't pay enough attention to Palin's speech this weekend at a Wisconsin tea party rally. Weigel asks: "[I]s it a mystery or sign of bias when an author and former vice presidential candidate gives a speech at a rally and it doesn't get national news coverage?"

No, but it's death for the Palin brand, which relies on relentless attention from the media apparatus it claims to despise. If that coverage is critical or not sufficiently deferent, so much the better -- grievance is a powerful ally for the good ex-governor.

But that all falls apart when the media stop paying attention or are otherwise distracted, leaving Palin acolytes with little to occupy their time. As a result, you see this bizarre scenario in which a member of Team Palin demands a media outlet cover Palin, while simultaneously attacking that outlet for being biased against Palin.

Tea Party fizzle

The Tea Party movement just might be dead. Practically every teabagger tax day rally today, even the ones attended by their celebrity superstars, FIZZLED with anemic attendance.

South Carolina: Politicians, political operatives and members of the media came close to outnumbering attendees at a much-hyped Columbia, S.C. Tea Party rally starring U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley on Monday.

Nevada: The police estimate of 250 attendees in Carson City was far short of the record 2,000 who attended a similar, but much more rowdy rally in front of the Legislative Building on Tax Day in 2009.

Compared to those events, today's tea party rally in Chicago was a smashing success: "several hundred" showed up according to the Chicago Tribune. But even there, turnout was abysmal relative to expectations and past performance.

Birther bill vetoed

Governor Jan Brewer has vetoed the Arizona “birther” bill.

Most likely because the bill was blatantly unconstitutional, would most certainly have been immediately challenged, and she didn’t want to spend the money defending it.

Michele Bachmann bombs

Looks like Sarah Palin's not the only one having problems drawing a crowd these days. Michele Bachmann, the teabagger queen, threw a tax day rally in Columbia, South Carolina.

Only 300 people showed up.

The rally's sparse attendance is attracting  nearly as much attention as Bachmann's remarks.

Will Folks, a widely read blogger in South Carolina political circles, termed the rally a “dud” in a post Monday afternoon.

“Politicians, political operatives and members of the media came close to outnumbering attendees at a much-hyped Columbia, S.C., tea party rally starring U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and S.C. Gov. Nikki Haley on Monday,” Folks wrote.

“Only 300 people (including a horde of Palmetto political operatives) attended the event in downtown Columbia, S.C. — which is a generous estimate in our book. That attendance figure — confirmed by other media outlets — amounts to less than one-tenth the size of multiple crowds that have gathered at the S.C. State House in recent years in support of parental choice.”

Sharron Angle sings!

Our Father, who art in heaven, please let this woman run again.

Who is Ayn Rand?

Teabaggers and conservatives love to pay tribute to Ayn Rand. A new crop of teabagger Republicans in Congress praise and worship her, and seek to legislate based on her ideals.

But who is Ayn Rand?

She is notorious for saying that the "weak" do not deserve to be loved. She declared altruism to be "evil," advocated the "virtue of selfishness," and condemned Christianity for advocating love and compassion for the less fortunate.

Teabaggers hoping to elevate Michele Bachmann or Sarah Palin into the Oval Office might want to take note that Rand believed a female president of the United States would be "unspeakable." And Sarah Palin herself might want to take note that Rand called government efforts to educate "subnormal children" an attempt to "bring everybody to the level of the handicapped."

So this is who the teabaggers and right wingers praise, worship, and wish to emulate in government. And make no mistake, we are seeing the fruit of her philosophy in today's crop of GOP legislators and governors.

Did you pay your taxes?

Did you pay your taxes? These 10 companies didn't.

Walker's next power grab

Governor Walker is prepping his next Nazi-like power grab, aiming to take unfettered, unlimited power in Wisconsin.

Following the lead of Michigan GOP Governor Rick Snyder, Walker is said to be preparing a plan that would allow him to force local governments to submit to a financial stress test with an eye towards permitting the governor to take over municipalities that fail to meet with Walker’s approval.

According to the reports, should a locality’s financial position come up short, the Walker legislation would empower the governor to insert a financial manager of his choosing into local government with the ability to cancel union contracts, push aside duly elected local government officials and school board members and take control of Wisconsin cities and towns whenever he sees fit to do so.

Such a law would additionally give Walker unchallenged power to end municipal services of which he disapproves, including safety net assistance to those in need.

Tax cuts for the rich exceed budget cuts

The cost of tax cuts for the rich exceeds the proposed cuts to the budget.

As part of a law passed late last year, the Bush-era tax cuts for the richest Americans were extended for two years. The estimated cost to the government of that portion of the tax deal, $42 billion this fiscal year, exceeds the stated $38 billion value of the savings from the federal budget cuts lawmakers approved last week.

Those budget cuts, which will affect many services for poor Americans, add more strain to a still weak economy, leading some economists to lament that this allocation of federal resources is not the most efficient way to promote economic growth.

"I don't think it's a good time to be trimming federal outlays if you're interested in the vulnerability of the economy," said economist Gary Burtless, formerly with the Labor Department and now at the Brookings Institution. "I'm not quite sure where the theories come from that this is going to strengthen economic growth over the next 12 to 18 months. It's going to have the reverse effect. It's going to slow it down."

Quotation marks are LIBERAL!

Apparently, using proper punctuation is now evidence of liberal bias.

Well, we already know the teabaggers look suspiciously on anyone with a properly-spelled sign.

GOP official refuses to resign over her racist email

The racist teabagger and GOP official is refusing to resign.

A tea party activist and elected member of the county Republican central committee said she will not heed calls to resign because she emailed a picture of President Barack Obama's face on the body of a chimpanzee.

Marilyn Davenport of Fullerton recently emailed a picture of Obama's face superimposed over a baby chimp's face with the caption, "Now you know why -- No birth certificate!"

O.C. Weekly political blogger R. Scott Moxley reported on the email, causing civil rights activists and some Republicans, including county GOP Chairman Scott Baugh, to call for her to resign from the county central committee.

Baugh told the Los Angeles Times he received the email Friday afternoon and sent a reply email telling Davenport it was "dripping with racism and is in very poor taste."

Taxes are at a historic low

Despite all the bloodthirsty screaming by the old white people wearing the teabags, federal taxes are at a historic low.

For the past two years, a family of four earning the median income has paid less in federal income taxes than at any time since at least 1955, according to the Tax Policy Center. All federal, state and local taxes combined are a lower percentage of per-capita income than at any time since the 1960s, according to the Tax Foundation. The highest income-tax bracket is its lowest since 1992. At 35 percent, it's well below the 50 percent mark of much of the 1980s and the 70 percent bracket of the 1970s.

Even the combined California state and local taxes, while tied for fourth highest in the nation, aren't particularly high for the state. In 2009 – the most recent year for which data are available – they accounted for 10.6 percent of Californians' per-capita income, just slightly above the 25-year average of 10.3 percent.

The recession contributes to lower taxes because many incomes have stagnated or fallen, and fewer retail sales mean less sales tax. But low tax brackets and a series of special deductions are primary factors in the reduced tax burden.

Atlas bombed

If the free market is god, and the movie Atlas Shrugged Part 1 bombs at the theaters, what will the teabaggers blame it on?

Rick Perry goes begging

Governor Rick Perry of Texas hates Obama and even flirted with the idea of Texas seceding from the union. But now he's asking Obama for money -- he's asked the president to declare Texas a disaster area so he can get federal funds to help with their out of control wildfires.

Hypocrite.

Obama stays on the attack

President Obama presses his attack on the GOP budget plan he began in his fiscal policy speech last week with this morning’s weekly media address.

No, teabaggers aren’t racist at all!

A California teabagger has been caught circulating a racist email targeting Obama’s family.

She even uses the tired old cliché, “Some of my friends are black!” Yeah, right.

This week Marilyn Davenport, a Southern California Tea Party activist and member of the central committee of the Orange County Republican Party circulated what some are calling hate e-mail to an unknown number of her fellow conservatives.

Written under the words, “Now you know why — No birth certificate!”, is an Obama family portrait depicting his parents as chimpanzees.

When asked if she thought the email was appropriate, Davenport is quoted as saying, “Oh, come on! Everybody who knows me knows that I am not a racist. It was a joke. I have friends who are black. Besides, I only sent it to a few people–mostly people I didn’t think would be upset by it.”

Florida gov’s bid to take over the court system

Florida’s teabagger governor Rick Scott wants to make Florida's Supreme Court do his bidding. His scheme is this: split the high court into two divisions, one for civil cases, one for criminal. He'd move the Democratic-appointed judges to the criminal court, then appoint his own replacements to the civil, thereby ensuring that in all government matters they'd rule his way.

Reminds me of how the Nazis began removing judges from Germany's court system, replacing them with their own hand-picked judges.

Limbaugh goes off the deep end

Rush Limbaugh's hate has finally driven him insane.

Limbaugh said that the president was attempting to placate his base during his deficit reduction speech, and he used a panoply of epithets to describe the base.

"His base is made up of people even more vile than he is," he said. "You've got...a lot of it is just walking human debris on the Democrat base side." He noted that many on the left have been unhappy with Obama.

"That bunch of people, those savages that make up the Obama base, are fit to be tied," he said. He had to get them back, and the one way to do it was to go out and savage us. That's what they love. That's what they get off on. That's their orgasm. 'Cause these people can't find willing mates."

Poor Republicans!

It looks like the crazy teabaggers, the ones they co-opted, are now threatening to burn them all at the stake for not being as crazy as they are.

That's what happens when you take crazy people to bed with you.

Terror in the air

If Senator Inhofe is flying -- get the hell out of the way!

In another FAA recording, airport manager Marshall Reece can be heard saying he has "got over 50 years flying, three tours of Vietnam, and I can assure you I have never seen such a reckless disregard for human life in my life."

Bachmann tries to out Trump Trump

Michele Bachmann, realizing that Trump is stealing her thunder, has decided to echo him on the birther nonsense. She's demanding that President Obama "put his birth certificate on the table." Never mind that it's been released, it's been examined, the theories have been debunked time and time again.

But I'd bet if Obama demanded that she and all other candidates release their certificates, she'd be blasting him for "big brother government intrusion!"

FactCheck.org reported in 2008 that they had "seen, touched, examined and photographed the original birth certificate."

Ban assault clips

Bryan Fischer says you shouldn't be allowed to enter America unless you become a Christian

The American Family Association's Bryan Fischer says that only Christians should be allowed to enter America. It's not a surprise that a nutty right wing idiot would say something like this -- but it should be noted that allegedly "mainstream" Republican presidential candidates (or flirting-with-running candidates) regularly appear on his show. Candidates like Tim Pawlenty and Mike Huckabee.

"Immigration is a privilege, not a right, and our policy should be to admit to our shores only those with a commitment to a full assimilation to American culture, adopting our faith, our heroes, and our history. Someone with a Muslim background who wants to become an American had best be prepared to drop his Islam and his Qur’an at Ellis Island."

[...] "So ancient Israel offers a paradigm of what a sensible and sane immigration policy looks like. It’s simple: don’t break the law (that is, come in through the front door instead of breaking in through a window), convert to Christianity, fully assimilate (become an authentic American, not a hyphenated American), and support yourself. If you commit to those things, you are welcome here. If you don’t or won’t, perhaps it’s best for you to stay home."

No second term for Bachmann

Michele Bachmann promises if she were ever elected president she wouldn't subject America to a second term. Because, you know, she's so wonderful and principled.

"I'm a principled reformer, and my goal is to see the country turn around," she said. "I'm also committed to being a one-term president if that's what it takes in order to turn things around, because this is not about a personal ambition."

Hey, Michele, if you not serving a second term is great for America, why not take the extra step and not serve a first?

What makes conservatives happy?

Just heard a right winger on TV laughing - laughing - about high gas prices during a discussion about how hard this is hitting middle class American families, and he was saying, "That's why we're (Republicans) on a winning streak!"

So we see what makes Republicans happy: the suffering of the middle class.

Military expenditures hit a new record

Worldwide military spending edged up in 2010 to a record $1.6 trillion. The United States alone spends more on military than China, Britain, France and Russia combined.

World Net Daily caught in Photoshop lie

World Net Daily has been caught embarrassingly red-handed in a Photoshop lie involving the pictures below. They claimed the first photo had to be Photoshopped because Obama was never, according to them, in New York at the time, because according to their conspiracy theory, he was supposed to be in Pakistan or something. So they posted what they claimed was the “real photo.”

Except that their “real photo” is the one that's Photoshopped. And Photoshopped BADLY. Notice they forgot to remove Obama's leg!

Deal reached

A budget deal has been reached, almost literally at the last minute. And apparently Democrats stood their ground on Planned Parenthood and the GOP's attempt to hold the country hostage in order to defund them has been thwarted. But the Dems had to give up some more painful budget cuts, up to 40 billion dollars.

An amusing turn: teabaggers are breathing fire. I've seen some VICIOUS tweets threatening "vengeance" on John Boehner, promising to primary him out next year. Heh heh. You lie down with teabaggers, you get up with fleas.

The rich get richer, the poor get poorer

And the middle class disappears. This is what sparks revolutions.

Votes "found" on a PERSONAL COMPUTER

So those missing votes that miraculously turned up just in the nick of time for Prosser were found on a personal computer.

No, that's not fishy at all!

Fishy

Something smells mighty fishy about this.

A conservative-leaning Wisconsin county on Thursday corrected its count and gave an unofficial 7,500-vote lead to the incumbent in the hotly contested state Supreme Court race seen as a referendum on Republican Gov. Scott Walker's divisive union rights law.

Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus said the votes weren't reported to The Associated Press on Tuesday due to "human error."

Off the cliff

Harry Reid just now on television, being very clear about why the government's going to shut down -- the teabaggers are pushing their radical Christianist agenda against women's reproductive choice, pollution, and climate change. Boehner is beholden to the radical fringe, and that's why our government is going over the cliff.

Harry Reid pointed out that teabaggers are actually cheering a shutdown, even though, despite all their “spending” talk, a shutdown will cost taxpayers and could possibly derail our economic recovery.

But I’ve been pointing out that this is precisely their plan. They WANT a shutdown because they WANT economic recovery derailed. This is their political strategy: derail the economy and blame the bad economy on Obama.

Obama friend arrested for soliciting

This story kind of amuses me. I'll tell you why.

Birthers love intoning their conspiracy theory that "no one remembers" Obama from his school or college days. Imagine their difficulty with the following story. They're going to LOVE that a friend of Obama's was arrested for soliciting, but they're going to hate that it's Obama's friend.... from school!

Oops.

One of President Barack Obama's close friends has been arrested in Honolulu on suspicion of soliciting a prostitute.

Robert "Bobby" Titcomb was one of four men arrested in an undercover sting operation late Monday and later released on $500 bail, according to Honolulu police.

Titcomb, 49, attended Punahou School in Honolulu with Obama in the 1970s. The president graduated in 1979, a year before Titcomb. The two often golf, play basketball, go to the beach and dine together when the president returns home to Hawaii for vacation.

So what do you think the birthers will do with this one? I predict that while the regular Obama haters will go to town with it (because this must, after all, mean that Obama must be a-whorin' too), the birthers might actually claim this is just part of the conspiracy to trick America into thinking people knew him in school.

No deal

Unfortunately, as I predicted, no deal on the budget tonight.

A deal after Obama called a meeting would have made the president look good. Boehner absolutely cannot have that.

Government shutdown

My prediction: There won't be a deal and we're headed for a federal government shutdown. The teabaggers have the GOP hamstrung and won't allow any compromise.

Plus, now that Obama has called them in for a meeting, if there's a last minute deal, Obama will look good and Boehner absolutely CANNOT have that.

Republicans say, "Shutdown? What's not to like?"

The Obama administration issued a warning today that a federal shutdown would undermine the economic recovery, delay pay to U.S. troops fighting in three wars, slow the processing of tax returns and limit small business loans and government-backed mortgages during peak home buying season.

All of the above, of course, gives Republicans a collective woody.

Maybe he was looking for votes?

A staffer on Tim Pawlenty's campaign has been arrested for trespassing and public intoxication.

Benjamin Foster, a staff member for Tim Pawlenty's presidential exploratory committee, was arrested and charged with public intoxication and trespassing early Wednesday morning in Iowa, KCCI reports.

15-year-old Chloe Steward, of Ankeny, Iowa, told KCCI she found a man at the back door of her family's home at 3 a.m. Wednesday morning.

"His arm was in my back door, trying to get in and I screamed and went upstairs to my parents room and I continued screaming," Steward said.

The family then called the police, who arrived and arrested Foster, 24.

The radiation conspiracy

Some surprising facts: You get more radiation if you're on a mountaintop than if you live in a valley. You get more radiation sleeping next to someone than you do sleeping alone. You get more radiation living within 50 miles of a coal plant than you get living within 50 miles of a nuke plant. You get more radiation inside a cement structure than outside.

Because I've reported these facts, some have gone on a campaign to attack me personally, as if I'm part of some conspiracy to irradiate and kill everyone. You can rest easy because such is not the case. I'm not telling anyone, nor have I ever, that radiation is "good for you," nor do I dismiss it when levels of radiation increase to dangerous and even life-threatening levels, such as we're seeing in Japan.

I've actually been accused of "cheering" the nuclear disaster in Japan.
But if anyone says that "any level of radiation will kill you," they're not telling you the truth. They're fear mongering. You get radiation every single day. If you live on the earth, you're getting radiation. If you want to be completely free of radiation, there is literally no place in the universe for you to go.

Check out the following link, to see different levels of radiation you get every single day. There are lots more than just the single graphic below.

And don't believe the lies. I'm not part of some sinister conspiracy to convince you to go irradiate yourself. I'm sinister, but not that sinister.

xkcd radiates

Not fired, but “transitioned”

Glenn Beck is leaving Fox News. Fox News and Glenn Beck announced today that Beck will "transition off of his daily program" later this year.

The chasm widens

Seems like we see this story year after year: CEO pay soars even as worker raises stall. The chasm between the few rich at the top and the rest of us grows wider.

CEOs are getting even richer while workers are hit with stagnate pay and even layoffs.

A recent USA Today analysis of data from GovernanceMetrics International showed that CEO pay jumped 27 percent last year, nearly reaching pre-recession levels.

Workers, however, saw their pay rise at a paltry 2.1 percent in 2010, according the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data from the bureau also showed that the overall inflation rate was 1.64 percent during the same period.

That means working people in America barely kept on level with the rate of inflation, while their employers saw their pay soar.

Poor baby

Now he’s only making about 20K more a year than the average teacher, the ones who Walker says are “living lavish lifestyles high on the hog,” etc.

The 27-year-old son of a major supporter of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has been demoted after critical media reports revealed that the embattled Republican had given the young man an $81,000-a-year job in his administration, even over more qualified candidates.

Walker's office told area media that Brian Deschane would be moved back to bureau director at the state Department of Regulation and Licensing, where he will again be making $64,728.

When Brian first held the job, he landed a 26 percent pay raise within the first two months, according to The Milwaukee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel. It's a very generous percentage too -- unlike Wisconsin teachers, who typically make about half of Deschane's salary and see their pay increase only 21 percent every 10 years.

The Sentinel also noted that two other candidates who were considered for the $81,000-a-year job were immensely qualified for the position, whereas Deschane only had a high school diploma and a history of drunk driving. Neither other man was even interviewed for the job, whereas the son of a lobbyist with a trade group that gave over $121,000 to the governor was an apparent shoo-in.

262K for "Do as I say, not as I do"

How'd you like to have a kid out of wedlock, and then make 262,000 dollars for talking about how you should never, ever have sex out of wedlock? Good work if you can get it.

Tax documents show unwed mother Bristol Palin earned more than $262,000 for her role in helping raise awareness for teen pregnancy prevention in 2009.

The most recent data for The Candie's Foundation that's posted online by research firm GuideStar shows compensation at $262,500 for the now-20-year-old daughter of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee.

Bristol Palin was 18 when she was appointed as a teen ambassador for the New York-based foundation in 2009, months after giving birth to son, Tripp. She and the 2-year-old boy's father, Levi Johnston, are no longer together.

Government shutdown

With a government shutdown looking all but assured this afternoon, here's a quick thumbnail sketch of how it came about:

BOEHNER: We demand 32 billion in cuts or we shut the government down!

OBAMA & DEMOCRATS: Okay. Tell you what. We'll give you 32 billion in cuts, and we'll add another 1 billion in cuts. So we're giving you 33 billion in cuts. Deal?

BOEHNER (strings pulled by TEABAGGERS) : HELL NO, YOU F-CKIN SOCIALIST KENYAN! HOW DARE YOU OFFER US ONLY 33 BILLION! SHUT IT DOWN! SHUT IT DOWN!

Government shutdown, here we come

Looks like there's an impasse, and a government shutdown cannot be avoided.

Even after Obama gave in to the original number in cuts the Republicans demanded, they moved the goalposts. And now there's no way to agree in time, so it appears that a government shutdown is now assured.

Thanks, Republicans.

Republican full flop on Medicare

Will right wingers offer up an excuse for the Republicans flip flopping so blatantly on Medicare?

Before 2010, they were attacking Democrats for allegedly "cutting Medicare" (Democrats weren't cutting Medicare, of course, but facts don't matter). Now, they've flip flopped and are actually talking about getting rid of Medicare, not just cutting it.

Before unveiling his fiscal plan that would phase out Medicare (and make big cuts to much of the rest of the budget), Budget Committee Chairman Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) said this on Sunday of Democrats:

“They are going to demagogue us, and it's that demagoguery that has always prevented political leaders in the past from actually trying to fix the problem. We can't keep kicking this can down the road. The president has punted. We're not going to follow suit. And, yes, we will be giving our political adversaries things to use against us in the next election, and shame on them if they do that.”

But in American politics, there’s usually enough shame to go around.

Before the 2010 elections, it was Republicans doing the demagogue-ing -- so to speak. The GOP -- as well as outside conservative groups (like Crossroads GPS and 60 Plus, the conservative alternative to AARP) -- criticized the proposed cuts to Medicare in the health-care overhaul.

The Democratic National Committee attempted to play defense, but Republicans blitzed the airwaves grabbing onto the Medicare issue. (At First Read, we wrote about the GOP’s 180 -- and now apparent 360 -- on Medicare here, here, and here.)

The right wing political strategy for 2012

No, I don’t think Republicans are stupid.

Not all of them, anyway.

They know what the game for 2012 is. They NEED the American economy to be as bad as possible because that increases their chances of beating Obama in 2012. So all this talk of budget cutting in order to “create jobs” is nonsense, and they know it. They know it won’t create jobs, it won’t help the economy, it won’t make things better.

That’s why John Boehner and other Republican politicians are speaking and tweeting incessantly about high gas prices. They’re GIDDY about them. Because they know high fuel prices hurt the economic recovery, and hurting the economic recovery hurts Obama’s chances.

Country first? Hardly.

2012

Dirty tricks and false flag operations

Bookmark this and save this. I have a feeling it will come up again and again in the months to come.

Former Tea Party Express spokesman Mark Williams, who stepped down from the group after making a series of racist remarks, has a plan to "infiltrate and sabotage" the Obama campaign by volunteering as a campaign worker.

In an interview with TPM, Williams could not specify what exactly his subterfuge would entail, but said it would probably "come under the general heading of 'not exactly representing him in a fine light.'"

In a blog post called "Take Down Obama from the Inside" , Williams compared his plan to everything from the Trojan Horse, to a prankster's "Crash The Tea Party" campaign (which he falsely attributed to the SEIU), to a storyline on 1980s TV show Dallas. "While many variations have evolved," he wrote, "the basic idea remains the same; infiltrate and sabotage."

Mike Huckabee destroyed hard drives to erase records

Mike Huckabee destroyed computer hard drives to erase computer records when he left office. Why?

Send a public records request seeking documents from his 12-year stint as Arkansas governor, as Mother Jones did recently, and an eyebrow-raising reply will come back: The records are unavailable, and the computer hard drives that once contained them were erased and physically destroyed by the Huckabee administration as the governor prepared to leave office and launch a presidential bid.

In 2007, during Huckabee's campaign for the GOP presidential nomination, the issue of the eradicated hard drives surfaced briefly, but it was never fully examined, and key questions remain. Why had Huckabee gone to such great lengths to wipe out his own records? What ever happened to a backup collection that was provided to a Huckabee aide?

Another fun fact about Mike Huckabee: He set a rapist free who went on to rape and kill two more women.

Military tribunals to resume at Gitmo

The White House has had to reverse itself on civilian trials for terrorism suspects. And you can thank Congress and Republicans for that.

Attorney General Eric Holder announced Monday that his department was scrapping its November 2009 decision to hold Mohammed’s high-profile trial just blocks from the World Trade Center. Instead, they were moving the venue to Guantanamo Bay. Holder and other administration officials said the policy reversal was due to congressional interference in executive counterterrorism efforts and “needless” drumming-up of controversy.

“The reality is, I know this case in ways that members of Congress do not,” Attorney General Eric Holder said during a press conference. “I have looked at the files. I have spoken to the prosecutors. I know the tactical concerns that have to go into this decision. So do I know better than them? Yes.”

The attorney general said had not arrived at the decision comfortably. Had he had his druthers, Holder claimed, he would have kept the trial in its original setting, but the legislative branch controls the money for transferring the prisoners and securing the site.

Critics’ review of research on climate change finds surprising (to them) results

Conservative scientists had set out to disprove global climate change. There's only one small problem: Their research turns up nearly identical results as the scientific consensus on climate change -- their research supports the consensus that climate change is indeed happening.

A team of UC Berkeley physicists and statisticians that set out to challenge the scientific consensus on global warming is finding that its data-crunching effort is producing results nearly identical to those underlying the prevailing view.

The Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project was launched by physics professor Richard Muller, a longtime critic of government-led climate studies, to address what he called "the legitimate concerns" of skeptics who believe that global warming is exaggerated.

But Muller unexpectedly told a congressional hearing last week that the work of the three principal groups that have analyzed the temperature trends underlying climate science is "excellent.... We see a global warming trend that is very similar to that previously reported by the other groups."

The hearing was called by GOP leaders of the House Science & Technology committee, who have expressed doubts about the integrity of climate science. It was one of several inquiries in recent weeks as the Environmental Protection Agency's efforts to curb planet-heating emissions from industrial plants and motor vehicles have come under strenuous attack in Congress.