Dr. King’s SCLC moves to oust L.A. chapter president over his support for gay rights.
Dr. King’s SCLC moves to oust L.A. chapter president over his support for gay rights.
The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) — the civil rights group founded by Dr. Martin Luther King — is “seeking to remove the president of its Los Angeles chapter,” Rev. Eric P. Lee, in response to his role in organizing opposition to California’s same-sex marriage ban, Prop. 8, last fall. Lee believed his public opposition to Prop. 8 would acceptable because the SCLC informed him that the organization was taking a publicly neutral position on the measure. The New York Times explains:
In April, Mr. Lee attended a board meeting of the civil rights organization in Kansas City, Mo., and found himself once again in the minority position among his colleagues on the issue of same-sex marriage, but was told, he said, by the interim president of the civil rights organization, Byron Clay, that the group publicly had a neutral position on the issue.
Explaining that he was unable to come to Atlanta on such short notice, Mr. Lee then received two letters from the organization’s lawyer, Dexter M. Wimbish, threatening him with suspension or removal as president of the Los Angeles chapter if he did not come soon to explain himself.
Lee explained that his opposition to Prop. 8 “created tension in my life I had never experienced with black clergy. But it was clear to me that any time you deny one group of people the same right that other groups have that is a clear violation of civil rights and I have to speak up on that.” The SCLC refused to comment on the matter.
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Jeb Bush: ‘I don’t know’ if Obama is a socialist.
Jeb Bush: ‘I don’t know’ if Obama is a socialist.
When asked by Tucker Carlson in an interview for Esquire magazine if he considered President Obama a socialist, former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-FL) said, “I don’t know. Define socialism for me.” But then, after calling Obama a “collectivist” — a common synonym for socialist or communist — Bush said the he believed the word “‘socialism’ was a pejorative, and ‘didn’t help’ the GOP make its case.” Bush said further that he didn’t think that Obama would have been elected had he “been honest with Americans about his agenda”:
Bush would not answer the question of whether he agreed with the assessment of some congressional Republicans that the president is a socialist. “I don’t know. Define socialism for me,” he told Esquire magazine. “It’s a word… I believe he’s a collectivist. He believes that through collective action, through government, you can solve more problems.” He added that he believed the word “socialism” was a pejorative, and “didn’t help” the GOP make its case. [...]
“….He made it appear like McCain was going to raise taxes, which was unfair, but there was no response back. When there was an ideological component, it was generally centrist or even center-right. Had he said what he was going to do as a candidate, (Obama) would have lost.”
Bush’s response appears to follow the lead of other prominent Republicans, like his brother former President Bush and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). In May, the former president declared that “the verdict is out” on whether Obama’s a socialist. And while RNC Chairman Michael Steele has refrained from labeling Obama a socialist, he — like Jeb — said that he viewed Obama as a “collectivist.”
Torture By Mexican Government In Drug War Highlights U.S. Loss of Credibility On Human Rights
Torture By Mexican Government In Drug War Highlights U.S. Loss of Credibility On Human Rights
The Washington Post reports today that the Mexican government has employed numerous torture techniques to extract confessions from suspected drug traffickers. The techniques included beatings, suffocation with plastic bags, electric shocks, the insertion of needles under suspects’ finger nails, water torture, and other abuses.
Under what’s known as the Mérida Initiative, the U.S. government agreed in 2007 to provide Mexico with $1.4 billion in funding to fight the war on drugs, but 15 percent (or $90.7 million) of the original funding and $24 million authorized under the Obama administration will be released only after the “secretary of state reports that Mexico has made progress on human rights.”
The reports of torture put that money’s release in jeopardy. As a result, Mexican human rights workers are accusing the U.S. of hypocrisy when it comes to human rights abuses, citing the mistreatment of suspected terrorists under President Bush. The Post explains:
Many Mexican human rights activists do not support the [human rights] conditions, noting that they were imposed by a U.S government widely accused of torturing prisoners in Iraq, Afghanistan and at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
“It really takes a lot of cynicism, a lot of hypocrisy, for the United States to say, ‘We will give you money to fight drug trafficking as long as you respect human rights,’” said José Raymundo Díaz Taboada, director of the Acapulco office of the Collective Against Torture and Impunity, which documents abuses in Guerrero.
The accusations of hypocrisy highlight one of the hard-to-quantify costs of the Bush administration’s use of torture against suspected terrorists to extract unreliable intelligence: the loss of credibility as a champion of human rights. In recent months and years, in fact, a growing number of nations have rejected calls from the U.S. to end human rights abuses, citing the Bush administration’s actions:
China: In response to the State Department’s annual human rights report critical of the Chinese government, a government spokesman said the report “exposed the double standards and downright hypocrisy of the United States on the human rights issue, and inevitably impaired its international image.” [3/12/2008]
Iran: The L.A. Times reported on Iran’s latest response to the State Department’s latest human rights report, writing, “Iranian officials regularly accuse the West of hypocrisy in zeroing in on Iran’s human rights record, citing prisoner abuse allegations in the prison facility at Guantanamo Bay. [3/11/09]
Russia: In response to criticism from former Vice President Dick Cheney regarding Russia’s human rights abuses, then-Russian President Vladimir Putin asked, “Where is all this pathos about protecting human rights and democracy when it comes to the need to pursue their own interests?” [5/11/06. Similar remarks: 3/27/08]
Venezuela: The Venezuelan government responded to a recent State Department report on Human Trafficking, saying, “It is scandalous that a country…where torture has been practiced and terrorists are protected, pretends to prop itself up as a judge of human rights in the world.” [6/19/09]
As Matt Yglesias recently explained, the abuses that go on in Iran, China, North Korea, and other nations are perpetrated on a much wider scale and have gone on far longer than those that occurred in U.S. detention centers in Iraq, Afghanistan and Cuba. But the fact remains that “whenever you read about these kind of techniques being applied in Iran or North Korea, it’s immediately apparent to everyone that it’s torture, it’s cruel, it’s inhumane, and it’s wrong.” Indeed, it was immediately apparent to the world that the U.S. abuses were torture as well. Now, Obama must work to rebuild the credibility that his predecessor squandered.
Issa removes partisan video from Republican Oversight Committee YouTube channel.
Issa removes partisan video from Republican Oversight Committee YouTube channel.
As ThinkProgress reported earlier today, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) posted a video of an RNC event on the official YouTube channel of the Republicans on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The political nature of the video appeared to make its publication on the committee’s official channel a violation of House rules. Now, just two hours after our post, the video is gone — replaced with an error message reading, “This video has been removed by the user.” A screen shot of the original video:
The Oversight Committee’s minority press office has not yet responded requests for comment from ThinkProgress.
Rep. Issa Posts RNC Video On Oversight Committee YouTube Channel In Violation Of House Rules
Rep. Issa Posts RNC Video On Oversight Committee YouTube Channel In Violation Of House Rules
Yesterday, the Republican National Committee awarded Matthias Shapiro the “first-ever” Grassroots Logic award for a YouTube video he made that purports to put the cost of health care reform in perspective. After the event, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, congratulated Shapiro on Twitter, writing, “Kudos again to [Shapiro] for receiving RNC award this AM for excellent grassroots web work.” Issa linked to a video of the award ceremony which had been posted on the official YouTube channel of the Republicans on the Oversight Committee, adding, “My staff made video”:
While the event itself was fairly unremarkable, it featured RNC chairman Michael Steele speaking behind a large RNC logo, clearly branding it as a political event. The use of the committee’s official YouTube channel to distribute political communications is a clear violation of House rules. As the House’s policy for use of web videos explains:
The official content of any material posted by the Member on any Web site must be in compliance with Federal law and House Rules and Regulations applicable to official communications and germane to the conduct of the Member’s official and representational duties.
More specifically, House rules stipulate that “materials (ie. photos, logos, or graphics) used in campaign literature” cannot be distributed using government resources.
Issa’s use of the committee YouTube channel to distribute a political video becomes almost laughable when considered in light of the fact that the jurisdiction of his committee includes investigating abuse of government resources. As the about section of the channel explains:
As the minority on the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, we will work with our colleagues in the majority to exercise effective oversight over the federal government and will work proactively to investigate and expose waste, fraud, and abuse.
Perhaps Issa’s committee can begin by investigating themselves.
Reid to Baucus: Stop chasing Republican support for health care reform.
Reid to Baucus: Stop chasing Republican support for health care reform.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has “ordered Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) to drop a proposal to tax health benefits and stop chasing Republican votes on a massive health care reform bill.” Roll Call reports:
According to Democratic sources, Reid told Baucus that taxing health benefits and failing to include a strong government-run insurance option of some sort in his bill would cost 10 to 15 Democratic votes; Reid told Baucus it wasn’t worth securing the support of Grassley and at best a few additional Republicans. …
“This was discussed in the weekly Democratic leadership meeting,” one Democratic source confirmed Tuesday afternoon. “These concerns were relayed to [Baucus] later on.” … “The longer Baucus takes, the trickier it gets,” the senior Democratic Senate aide said.
If Baucus’s attempts to secure Republican support delay the process any further, the “planned merger” of the Finance Committee’s health reform proposal with that of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee could be “scrapped in favor of allowing each one to move to the floor on its own.” The lack of a public option is a deal-killer for some Democratic Senators because, as Igor Volsky explains, it is perhaps the most effective way to reduce the cost of health care, while ensuring affordable coverage for all.
Kyl: Obama Wants To ‘Make A Deal’ With Russia More Than He Wants To ‘Ensure The Protection’ Of The U.S.
Kyl: Obama Wants To ‘Make A Deal’ With Russia More Than He Wants To ‘Ensure The Protection’ Of The U.S.
Yesterday, President Obama and Russian President Dmitri Medvedev signed an agreement to negotiate a successor to the soon-to-expire START treaty that would “cut American and Russian strategic nuclear arsenals by at least one-quarter.” Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) — “seasoned killer of past arms control treaties” — responded to news of the agreement on Bill Bennett’s radio show this morning by claiming that the Obama administration is “more anxious to make a deal than it is to ensure the protection of the United States.” Bennett told Kyl that he “didn’t think the reductions in missiles by the amount they were doing it was that serious,” but asked him to elaborate:
KYL: In the past, our assessment of what we need to protect our interests as well as the allies that rely on our nuclear umbrella put the number of weapons as a certain level. And the administration is planning to go far below that. … I’m very concerned that the administration is more anxious to make a deal than it is to ensure the protection of the United States.
Kyl’s remarks today demonstrate further that Obama’s right-wing critics are more interested in accusing the President of not wanting to protect the nation than they are in offering substantive critiques of his policy proposals. Last week, Kyl made similar arguments alongside Iraq war architect Richard Perle in the Wall Street Journal. The two wrote that Obama’s widely-praised plans to work toward the elimination of all nuclear weapons were “dangerous, wishful thinking.”
On the specifics of the agreement Obama reached yesterday, Kyl appears to be nearly alone in objecting to it. Even the traditionally-partisan Newt Gingrich endorsed the goals that Obama laid out in a speech yesterday in Moscow. “There is much in it to support,” Gingrich wrote on Twitter. And despite Kyl’s attempts to portray Obama’s commitment yesterday to eliminate just a portion of the U.S. nuclear arsenal as detrimental to U.S. national security, James Collins and Jack Matlock remind us that former President Ronald Reagan and Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev “came within a hair’s breadth of agreeing to the complete elimination of nuclear weapons within 10 years” during their 1986 summit.
Sen. Cornyn called ‘traitor,’ Gov. Perry booed at July 4 Tea Party protest in Texas.
Sen. Cornyn called ‘traitor,’ Gov. Perry booed at July 4 Tea Party protest in Texas.
On Saturday, right-wing astroturf organizers held a number of sparsely-attended anti-tax protests in several locations across the country. At one such event outside the Texas Capitol, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) was labeled a “traitor” and was “booed at the start and close of his remarks.” Later at the same event, Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) “drew scattered boos, notably from crowd members aware of his advocacy of toll roads to relieve traffic congestion.” Watch Cornyn’s hecklers:
Last week, Cornyn expressed a bit of anxiety about how he would be received by the crowd, saying, “I don’t yet know exactly what it’s going to be like.” He asked a reporter, “What do you think? You think it’s going to be OK? I’m waiting to see. I didn’t want to come some place that I wasn’t wanted.”
The ‘Kristol Ball’ plots Palin’s long-shot path to the White House.
The ‘Kristol Ball’ plots Palin’s long-shot path to the White House.
This morning on Fox News Sunday, Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol reaffirmed his “contrarian” take on Gov. Sarah Palin’s (R-AK) recent decision to quit. The “Kristol Ball” argued that Palin is now “all in” for a “high risk” presidential run. Depending on her “talents and abilities” Kristol used a strained comparison to President Obama to lay out Palin’s winding road to the White House:
KRISTOL: Everyone said [Obama couldn't] compete with people with these long records. … He seems to have gotten President. I don’t think it is foolish for Palin to think, “You know what, if that’s the world we live in now where people don’t value — maybe correctly — experience in years of experience in Washington, or two terms counts more than two and half years as Governor of Alaska. Maybe she thinks she gets out there and becomes a leader of the conservative movement, and then a leader of the Republican Party, and then conceivably a nominee of the Republican Party, and then conceivably a president just as Obama did.
Watch it:
Kristol has been particularly unreliable as of late, and has been extremely poor in predicting the likely success of would-be presidential candidates. In 2006, he declared that “Barack Obama is not going to beat Hillary Clinton in a single democratic primary.” Earlier in the program, Karl Rove expressed a less charitable view than that of Kristol, saying, “[E]ffective strategies in politics are ones that are so clear and obvious that people can grasp it. It is not clear what her strategy is.”
Palin threatens to sue media outlets for publication of investigation rumors.
Palin threatens to sue media outlets for publication of investigation rumors.
In the wake of her resignation speech on Friday, Max Blumenthal reported for The Daily Beast that Sarah Palin may have quit her job in order to avert a major, yet-to-be-disclosed corruption scandal. Blumenthal explained that “political observers in Alaska are fixated on rumors that federal investigators…[are] searching for evidence that Palin and her husband Todd steered lucrative contracts to the well-connected company in exchange for gifts like the construction of their home.” In response, Palin’s attorney sent a letter to several major news outlets threatening to sue for republishing rumors of any federal investigation:
Gov. Sarah Palin’s attorney threatened Saturday to sue mainstream news organizations if they publish “defamatory” stories relating to whether Palin is under federal investigation.
This is to provide notice to Ms. Moore, and those who re-publish the defamation, such as Huffington Post, MSNBC, the New York Times and The Washington Post, that the Palins will not allow them to propagate defamatory material without answering to this in a court of law,” Van Flein warned, citing Alaska liberal blogger Shannyn Moore.
The LA Times reports today that “the FBI’s Alaska spokesman said the bureau had no investigation into Palin for her activities as governor, as mayor or in any other capacity.” “There is absolutely no truth to those rumors that we’re investigating her or getting ready to indict her,” Special Agent Eric Gonzalez told the Times. It is not clear if this also applies to rumored IRS investigations.
DeMint Inadvertently Concedes That Public Health Insurance Option Won’t Take Over The Market
DeMint Inadvertently Concedes That Public Health Insurance Option Won’t Take Over The Market
A leading right-wing argument against offering a public health insurance option as part of any health reform initiative is that such a plan would drive private health insurance companies out of the market. The health insurance lobby group AHIP called a public option “potentially lethal” to their industry. Similarly, Republican Conference Chairman Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) said in May that adding a public plan would be akin to asking mice to compete against an elephant. “There wouldn’t be any mice left after a while,” he insisted.
Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) recently used this talking point himself in arguing against a public option for the National Review. Yesterday, however, DeMint appeared to inadvertently offer an example that demonstrates that the notion that the public plan would drive out competition is false. On Bill Bennett’s radio show, DeMint called blocking health care reform the top Republican priority, arguing that of all the items on President Obama’s legislative agenda, it would be the hardest to reverse. To support his point, he offered “government schools” — public education — as an example. “You can never, with another piece of legislation, change it,” DeMint said:
DEMINT: I think the biggest issue is health care. I think if they succeed in a government take over of health care the situation may be irreversible. It will be like government schools. I mean you can never just, with another piece of legislation, change it.
Listen here:
DeMint’s example of education is instructive, not because it is hard to repeal, but because it’s a prime example of successful public-private competition. Indeed, while state and local governments own and run the public education system — to a much greater extent than either Obama or members of Congress are suggesting with a public health insurance option — private schools are competing against the government and thriving in this country. Further, such competition actually improves outcomes. As the conservative Hoover Institution found, competition between public and private schools “improves achievement for both public and private school students and decreases the amount spent per pupil.”
As Joseph Hacker explains, such public-private competition works well not just in education, but in many other sectors of the U.S. economy:
In many areas of American commerce, private and government programs comfortably co-exist. FHA insured loans and non-FHA loans, Social Security and private pensions, public and private universities–all have long thrived side by side. Each side of the divide has strengths and weaknesses, but in every case the public sector is providing something the private sector cannot: A backup that’s there if and when you need it; a benchmark for private providers; and a backstop to make sure costs don’t spin out of control.
Igor Volsky recently explained the actual impact of having a competing public plan, writing, “In an environment where private plans are forced to compete with a new efficient public program, inefficient, over-bloated insurers will go out of business, but private plans with good networks of providers or better services will continue attracting new enrollees.” Jonathan Cohn has more on the effects of public-private competition.
Michael Scheuer: Obama Doesn’t Care ‘About Protecting This Country’
Michael Scheuer: Obama Doesn’t Care ‘About Protecting This Country’
Earlier this week, former CIA operative and torture apologist Michael Scheuer appeared on Fox News, where he told Glenn Beck (who nodded in agreement), “The only chance we have” to repair our national security apparatus “is for Osama bin Laden to deploy and detonate a major weapon in the United States.” Yesterday, on Alan Colmes’ radio show, Scheuer made similar comments about the national security stance of the U.S., saying that he doesn’t believe that President Obama wants to protect the country “if it costs him votes”:
COLMES: You don’t think the President of the United States, Barack Obama, cares about protecting this country.
SCHEUER: No, I don’t. Because I don’t think he realizes what the world is like outside the United States. [...]
COLMES: You don’t think he wants to protect the country?
SCHEUER: I don’t think he can, sir. [...]
COLMES: He doesn’t want to protect the country?
SCHEUER: Not if it costs votes.
Listen here:
A number of progressive bloggers castigated Scheuer for his remarks on Beck’s show. The Washington Independent’s Spencer Ackerman, however, expressed disappointment in Scheuer’s comments and hoped that he was “being taken out of context,” citing his respect for Scheuer’s previous national security work. Unfortunately, it appears that Scheuer meant what he said.
Dick Armey: Obama ‘May Be The Greatest Economic Illiterate’ Of Any Modern President
Dick Armey: Obama ‘May Be The Greatest Economic Illiterate’ Of Any Modern President
In this month’s episode of Rep. Walter Jones’s (R-NC) TV show, Washington Watch, Jones hosted Dick Armey, former House Majority Leader and current chairman of the right-wing astroturf group FreedomWorks. About halfway through their conversation, Jones suggests that President Obama could have benefited from taking several months off in the beginning of his presidency to study public policy with “experts.” Armey disagrees, saying that Obama has no interest in “understanding of how the world really works” and warning that Obama “may be the greatest economic illiterate of any president of modern time”:
JONES: I was hoping that Mr. Obama…would say to the American people, “You know, these problems…are so complex that I’m going to take the first two or three months, I’m going to bring in certain people from different parts of the country who are experts with this and this and that. And then I’m going to try to come back to you the American people the first of April with some ideas and plans for this country.” … I wish he had just maybe taken a little bit of time and try to analyze some of these deep seeded problems. [...]
ARMEY: I think with this president its even worse than that. He is more interested in income redistribution than he is in prosperity. … He’s got a whimsical notion of how things ought to turn out. Without any understanding. Economics is a very deep and complex discipline of understanding and I’m afraid we have a president right now who may be the greatest economic illiterate of any president of modern time. Not that he’s not capable of understanding. But I don’t believe he cares to understand.
Watch it:
Armey’s own views on the economic crisis are often dictated by his lobbying interests. He has been a vocal critic of the Bush administration’s creation of the toxic asset relief program (TARP) in his capacity at FreedomWorks. But despite that, Armey’s lobbying firm DLA Piper has represented several of the greatest beneficiaries of TARP and other government interventions in the last year: AIG and Merrill Lynch. As Pat Garofalo writes, “it’s a safe bet that DLA Piper wasn’t enlisted to push for tougher regulations or more stringent capital requirements.”
As the Obama administration works to devise effective and nuanced regulations to prevent a financial crisis like that of last fall’s from recurring, Armey is advocating more of the same tired deregulation ideas that set the American economy up for failure in the first place. “We want to end burdensome government regulation and rely on the marketplace as an efficient regulator of business activity,” Armey’s FreedomWorks website states.
In coup aftermath, Hugo Chavez seen as the ‘George Bush of Latin America.’
In coup aftermath, Hugo Chavez seen as the ‘George Bush of Latin America.’
The New York Times reports today that, despite Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez’s attempts to portray the U.S. as the instigators of last weekend’s coup in Honduras, the Obama administration appears to have out-maneuvered him. Obama “firmly condemned the coup, defusing Mr. Chávez’s charges,” and leaders of other Latin American countries and media outlets seemed unwilling to accept Chávez’s portrayal of “Washington as the coup’s possible orchestrator.” Chávez’s unpopular and belligerent rhetoric inspired Venezualan opposition party Acción Democrática to dub him the “George Bush of Latin America“:
Mr. Obama’s nonconfrontational diplomacy seems to have caught Mr. Chávez off balance. “Chávez is beginning to understand that he’s dealing with someone with a very different approach than his predecessor,” said Michael Shifter, vice president of the Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington policy research group. …
Mr. Chávez’s threats of belligerence in Central America led one opposition party here, Acción Democrática, to issue a statement on Monday that was full of irony: “Hugo Chávez has become the George Bush of Latin America.”
After Campaigning For Climate Change Legislation, McCain Now Derides It As ‘Cap-And-Tax’
After Campaigning For Climate Change Legislation, McCain Now Derides It As ‘Cap-And-Tax’
On Friday, the House passed the American Clean Energy and Security (ACES) Act which, among other things, would institute a cap-and-trade system to curb U.S. carbon emissions that contribute to man-made climate change. The Senate is set to consider the legislation in the fall, but a number of Republican senators have declared the legislation dead on arrival. In an interview this morning with conservative talker Mike Broomhead on Pheonix, AZ’s Newstalk 550 KFYI, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) echoed their sentiments. He smeared the ACES legislation as a “cap-and-tax” program motivated by the Obama administration’s desire to pay for things like “banks and the world’s largest insurance company”:
MCCAIN: In its present form, which is cap-and-tax. … It’s really terrible, because I believe that climate change is real, I believe it is something that we need to address, and I’m sure that a lot of Americans do, but to do so with a bill like this? … What [the Obama administration is] doing is using cap-and-trade…to raise billions of dollars so they can spend money on Cash for Clunkers, you know, buying General Motors and Banks and the world’s largest insurance company. … So it started on the wrong path and now it’s just turned into, you know, it’s laws and sausages at its worst in my view.
Asked whether he thought ACES would get through the Senate and the U.S. would “end up with cap-and-trade,” McCain lamented, “Look, elections have consequences.” McCain said further that Americans didn’t support ACES, calling it a “far-left” agenda item. Listen here:
While resistance to ACES among Senate Republicans isn’t surprising, McCain’s apparent disdain for the legislation certainly is. During the campaign, McCain laid out a plan to reduce U.S. carbon emissions that included a cap-and-trade component. Describing his plan in May 2008, McCain said, “A cap-and-trade policy will send a signal that will be heard and welcomed all across the American economy.” In June 2008, he said, “I have proposed a new system of cap-and-trade that over time will change the dynamic of our energy economy.” What was that McCain said about elections having consequences? It seems Congress would likely be considering a cap-and-trade system today even if McCain had won the election last fall.
More to the point, however, McCain’s principle substantive objection to early versions of ACES — that it would have auctioned 100 percent of the initial emission permits — has been addressed. The version that passed the House on Friday allows for 85 percent of the emission permits to be distributed free of charge for a “prolonged transition period.”
Finally, McCain is simply wrong to claim that the American people are not supportive of legislation like ACES. According to a Washington Post-ABC Poll, 75 percent of respondents said they supported government regulation of green house gas emissions, and 80 percent of those respondents said the government should do so even if it raised the cost of goods. As for their support for a cap-and-trade system, in particular, 52 percent of respondents favored it while just 42 percent said they opposed it.
Boehner: American Clean Energy and Security Act is a ‘pile of sh*t.’
Boehner: American Clean Energy and Security Act is a ‘pile of sh*t.’
On Friday, the House passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act which will, in part, regulate carbon emissions in the U.S. House Minority Leader John Beohner, a vocal critic of the legislation, delayed Friday evening’s vote for nearly an hour by taking advantage his “privilege as leader to speak for an unlimited time on the House floor.” After the House finally voted on and passed the legislation, the Hill asked Boehner to comment on what he had hoped to gain through his “filibuster-like” delay. “Hey, people deserve to know what’s in this pile of sh*t,” Boehner replied.
Limbaugh: Obama is ‘behaving like an African colonial despot.’
Limbaugh: Obama is ‘behaving like an African colonial despot.’
On his radio show today, conservative talker Rush Limbaugh quoted at length from a new article in the American Thinker entitled, “Obama, the African Colonial” by L.E. Ikenga who identifies herself as a “first generation born West African-American woman.” In the article Ikenga argues that Obama is best understood through his “identification with his father” and his adoption of a “political mindset rooted in post colonial Africa”:
Like many educated intellectuals in post colonial Africa, Barack Hussein Obama, Sr. was enraged at the transformation of his native land by its colonial conqueror. But instead of embracing the traditional values of his own tribal cultural past, he embraced an imported Western ideology, Marxism. I call such frustrated and angry modern Africans who embrace various foreign “isms”, instead of looking homeward for repair of societies that are broken, African Colonials. They are Africans who serve foreign ideas.
Ikenga concludes, “[U]nderstand this: the African colonial who is given too much political power can only become one thing: a despot.” Limbaugh took Ikenga’s argument and ran with it, declaring that Ikenga “nailed who the guy is.” “We’ve elected somebody who’s more African in his roots than he is American…and is behaving like an African colonial despot,” Limbaugh said. Listen here:
House Democratic Fundraising Committee To Attack Patriotism Of GOP Members Over July 4 Weekend
House Democratic Fundraising Committee To Attack Patriotism Of GOP Members Over July 4 Weekend
Last week, Congress passed the “$106 billion military supplemental to fund the U.S. military’s efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.” In the House, 170 Republicans and 32 Democrats voted against final passage of the supplemental citing various reasons, including opposition to a measure from the Senate version of the bill which would make a new line of credit available to the IMF at a cost of $5 billion. (CAPAF Senior Fellow Nina Hachigian explained the need for the IMF measure.)
Now, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) plans to run ads on the July 4 holiday criticizing several vulnerable Republican members for their votes against the supplemental last week. As Glenn Thrush reports, “A series of 60-second radio ads will run during drive time from July 1 through July 8, according to a script provided to POLITICO — and they have the support-our-troops ring of GOP spots.” Thrush provides the script:
Around here, we recognize Independence Day with parades … and picnics … maybe a few fireworks. But July Fourth is about more than that.
It’s about remembering those who fought for our freedoms. And those still fighting today. Congressman Lee Terry used to understand that.
When George Bush asked, Congressman Terry voted to fully fund our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. And, last year he said, quote, “We must give our military every resource it needs.”
Seems like Congressman Terry is playing politics now … Last month Congressman Terry voted AGAINST funding for those same troops. It’s true: vote No. 348 – you can look it up.
Versions of the ads are reportedly going to be run against seven Republican members: Reps. Ken Calvert (R-CA), Charlie Dent (R-PA), Jim Gerlach (R-PA), Dan Lungren (R-CA), Mike McCaul (R-TX), Lee Terry (R-NE) and Joe Wilson (R-SC). The DCCC insists that it is simply pointing out that “[w]hen George Bush was president, Republicans were quick to criticize anyone who voted against the supplemental bills that fund the troops as against the troops. But now that Republicans are trying to score political points, they have flip flopped on troop funding.”
This, however, is not really the case. On May 14, when the House voted on its version of the supplemental — which did not include the IMF funding and a number of other changes to which many Republicans ultimately objected — 168 Republicans voted in favor of the bill. In fact, every single member whom the DCCC is targeting with its patriotism-themed ads voted for initial passage of the war funding.
Steve Benen writes, “As a substantive, policy matter, lawmakers can have completely legitimate reasons for voting against military spending measures, and opposition to these expenditures does not make one an unpatriotic terrorist sympathizer.”
On multiple occasions, ThinkProgress has criticized Republicans and conservatives for questioning the patriotism of those who were critical of the Bush administration’s policies — it’s not any more acceptable when Democrats question Republicans’ patriotism in a similar fashion.
In reversal, Specter announces support for public health insurance option.
In reversal, Specter announces support for public health insurance option.
At a union rally in Washington, DC yesterday with Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) declared his support for a public health insurance option. Further, Specter said that Americans have a “right” to health care, and predicted that health care reform will happen this year. “I think Senator Schumer has the right idea about having a public component,” Specter said:
I compliment you on your tenacity and your determination and your passion. I agree with you that health care is a right. … I do believe that there will be health care legislation. I know you are very interested in the public component and I think Senator Schumer has the right idea about having a public component which is to have a level playing field with the private sector, but the public component can be in place. [...]
Your enthusiasm has a big effect on what goes on three blocks away on the Congress of the United States. And you will get health care.
Previously, Specter opposed the creation of a public option. In May, NBC’s David Gregory asked Specter if he would support health care reform that included a public component. “No,” Specter replied.
Cornyn Cites Inaccurate Powerline Blog Post To Claim That The Public Health Insurance Isn’t Popular
Cornyn Cites Inaccurate Powerline Blog Post To Claim That The Public Health Insurance Isn’t Popular
Yesterday, the New York Times and CBS News (NYT/CBS) released a new poll showing broad support for health care reform, with 72 percent of respondents favoring the creation of a publicly-funded health insurance option. The conservative blog Powerline immediately took issue with the poll, arguing (wrongly) that the sample was skewed because 48 percent of respondents reported voting for President Obama last fall, while just 25 percent of respondents reported voting for Sen. John McCain (R-AZ). Powerline compared the NYT/CBS figures to the actual election results in which Obama won 53 percent of the vote and McCain won 46 percent.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), apparently convinced by Powerline’s argument, cited the blog in two cable news appearances this afternoon to deny that there was any significant public support for the creation of a public health insurance option. “With all due respect to the New York Times and CBS, this polling sample was skewed,” he told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell. Similarly, on Fox News Cornyn said, “I think there’s been some particularly good blog coverage like Powerline blog talking how that sample was so skewed as to be meaningless.” Watch it:
Unfortunately for Cornyn, Powerline is wrong to conclude the sample is skewed based on the data they cited. As Slate’s Christopher Beam explained last week, the disparity between last fall’s actual vote tallies and the results reported by NYT/CBS yesterday comes down to respondents being too embarrassed to admit that they didn’t vote:
The main explanation for the gap, say pollsters, is people who didn’t vote at all saying they did. These people tend to say they picked the winning candidate. Just look at the Times and Journal polls, where about 80 percent of respondents said they voted in the 2008 election. In fact, turnout was about 61 percent. (A 20 percent gap is pretty standard.) Pollsters attribute the disparity to the social discomfort of having to admit, even to a stranger on the phone, that you didn’t vote.
Further as Beam explains, “Retroactive vote reporting tends to be a proxy for popularity. … In a 2006 NYT poll, more people said they voted for John Kerry in 2004 than voted for Bush.” If Powerline wanted a more reliable indicator of who was in the NYT/CBS sample, they could have looked at the proportion of respondents that identified themselves as liberal (27 percent) and compared that to the proportion that identified themselves as conservative (29 percent). Likewise, Powerline could have noted that the sample was 24 percent Republican and 38 percent Democrat — a fairly normal party identification advantage for Democrats at the moment.
To buttress their claim that the NYT/CBS poll was inaccurate, Powerline linked to a recent Rasmussen poll that found comparatively little support for the creation of a public health insurance option, with just 41 percent of Americans supporting such a move. But as Nate Silver documented last week, it is the Rasmussen poll — not the NYT/CBS poll — that falls outside typical levels of support for a public health insurance found in other recent surveys:
Powerline’s concerns about the accuracy of the latest NYT/CBS poll are unfounded, but that likely won’t keep Cornyn from continuing to refer to Powerline’s discussion as “particularly good blog coverage.”
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