Judge orders Bush administration to release five Gitmo detainees.
Judge orders Bush administration to release five Gitmo detainees.
A federal judge ordered today that five Algerian nationals detained at Guantanamo Bay should be released. The court found that the government had “provided insufficient evidence to continue their detentions.” The Washington Post reports:
The decision came in the case of six Algerians who were detained in Bosnia after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and have been held at the military prison in Cuba for nearly seven years. U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon, a Bush appointee, ruled that five of the men must be released “forthwith” and ordered the government to engage in diplomatic efforts to find them new homes. […]
In the case of the sixth Algerian, Belkacem Bensayah, Leon found that the government had met its evidentiary burden and could continue to hold him. … The landmark ruling is the first by a federal judge who has weighed the government’s evidence in lawsuits brought by scores of detainees who are challenging their detentions.
The New York Times notes that in 2002, “President Bush made the government’s allegations against the men a showcase of his administration’s approach to dealing with terrorists. He said in his State of the Union address that the six men had been planning a bomb attack on the United States Embassy in Sarajevo, Bosnia.” Glenn Greenwald writes that the ruling demonstrates the “grotesque injustices we have wrought with Guantanamo and our denial of basic due process to detainees.”
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Perino: The Endangered Species Act ‘Doesn’t Help Support Any Species, Including Our Own’
Perino: The Endangered Species Act ‘Doesn’t Help Support Any Species, Including Our Own’
The Associated Press reports today that, as part of its long-fought campaign to gut the Endangered Species Act (ESA), the Bush administration is pushing a last-minute regulatory change that would significantly weaken the ESA:
The rules would eliminate the input of federal wildlife scientists in some endangered species cases, [by allowing] the federal agency in charge of building, authorizing or funding a project to determine for itself whether a project would be likely to harm endangered wildlife and plants.
At today’s White House press conference, a reporter asked if the Associated Press had accurately described the proposed regulatory change. Perino responded first by saying she didn’t have the documentation with her, but suggested that the rule change would have little effect because the ESA doesn’t help protect “any species, including ours” anyway:
PERINO: I don’t have [the documentation] with me. I know conceptually what we support. And I know that the Endangered Species Act is a tangled web that doesn’t actually help support any species, including our own. …
Q: (Laughter) So you’re proposing eliminating it?
PERINO: No.
Watch it:
Perino’s wholesale dismissal of the ESA could not be more inaccurate. Indeed, the law is responsible for saving, among other species, the Grey Wolf, the Grizzly Bear, and perhaps most notably our national bird, the American Bald Eagle. While Perino dismissed the rule change as insignificant, a spokesperson for the National Wildlife Federation explained, “These changes take unbiased, professional wildlife biologists out of the equation and put decisions in the hands of political appointees.”
More disturbing, however, is how widespread the last-minute assault on the federal government’s environmental regulatory structure has become. The White House’s other last minute initiatives include:
– Eliminating environmental reviews of fishing regulations. A rule change proposed by National Marine Fisheries Service would repeal a requirement that “environmental impact statements be prepared for certain fisheries-management decisions.” Instead, the government would “give review authority to regional councils dominated by commercial and recreational fishing interests.”
– Allowing more emissions from power plants. Over the objections of half of its 10 regional administrators, the Environmental Protection Agency is “finalizing new air-quality rules that would make it easier to build coal-fired power plants, oil refineries and other major polluters near national parks and wilderness areas” by weakening the Clean Air Act.
– Opening protected wilderness areas to energy development. Despite being blocked by “federal court and administrative rulings,” the Bureau of Land Management is “reviving plans to sell oil and gas leases in pristine wilderness areas in eastern Utah that have long been protected from development.”
As Rep. Nick Rahall (D-WV), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, told the Wall Street Journal, “This administration will stop at nothing to jam through as many reckless proposals as they can before the clock runs out.”
World leaders refuse to shake Bush’s hand during G20 photo-op.
World leaders refuse to shake Bush’s hand during G20 photo-op.
CNN’s Rick Sanchez highlighted yesterday that during last weekend’s G20 Economic Summit, leaders from around the world refused to acknowledge or shake hands with President Bush as they walked on stage for a photo-op. As Sanchez explained, everyone was “greeting each other and shaking hands, but Bush walks with his head down like the dejected most unpopular kid in high school.” Watch it:
Huckabee: Prop. 8 Did Not ‘Prohibit’ Same-Sex Marriage
Huckabee: Prop. 8 Did Not ‘Prohibit’ Same-Sex Marriage
Conservative talker Bill Bennett interviewed Mike Huckabee on his radio show this morning. In the course of their interview, Huckabee falsely claimed that in approving Prop. 8, California did not “ban” or “prohibit” marriage equality, but rather simply affirmed the definition of marriage as between one man and one woman:
HUCKABEE: The very people who voted for Barack Obama in California…also voted to sustain traditional marriage. I refuse to use the term, “ban same-sex marriage.” That’s not what those efforts did. They affirmed what is. They did not prohibit something. They simply affirmed that which already has and forever has existed.
Listen here:
Huckabee, who seems to see himself as a bit of an expert on LGBT rights, ought to do a little research before issuing his next bigoted proclamation. In approving Prop. 8, California — by definition — “banned same-sex marriage.” Prior to November 4, same-sex couples in California could marry. Afterward, they were banned from doing so.
As the ballot read, Prop. 8 “eliminates the right of same-sex couples to marry”:
In addition, as Nate Silver recently documented, Huckabee’s claim that “the very people that voted for Barack Obama” also voted to ban same-sex marriage is false.
Eric Holder: A Rebuke Of Bush-League Justice
Eric Holder: A Rebuke Of Bush-League Justice
The New York Times reports today that President-elect Barack Obama’s transition team “signaled to Eric H. Holder Jr., a senior official in the Justice Department in the Clinton administration, that he will be chosen as attorney general.” While the Obama transition team denied that Holder has been selected, many progressives see Holder as a strong rebuke of the Bush Justice Department.
Glenn Greenwald — a consistent and vocal critic of the Bush Justice Department — writes that Holder’s views seem “rather unconstrained for Washington, suggestive of actual passion and conviction on these matters.” Digby writes similarly, “If [Holder] follows through…it would be good news.”
ThinkProgress has compiled Holder’s stated views on critical issues confronting the next Attorney General, including the Bush administration’s politicization of the Justice Department and the War on Terror:
On Role Of Attorney General: “The attorney general is the one Cabinet member who’s different from all the rest. The attorney general serves first the people, but also serves the president. There has to be a closeness at the same time there needs to be distance.” [National Journal, 3/3/06]
On Torture: “The notion that the Department of Justice would in essence sanction the use of torture as part of the President’s plenary power over military operations is as wrong as it is shortsighted. This position flies in the face of the entire history of American law, helping to create a climate in which unnecessarily abusive conduct can somehow be considered legitimate.” [Remarks to ACS Conference, 6/19/04]
“We must declare without qualification that it is the law, policy, and practice of the United States government that we do not torture people and we do not subject people to cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment.” [ACS Conference, 6/14/08]
On Closing Guantanamo: “Guantanamo Bay is an international embarassment. Some of our closest allies see this prison as a symbol of what America has become. We should close Guantanamo Bay, transfer the remaining prisoners to military prisons in the United States.” [ACS Conference, 6/14/08]
On Extraordinary Rendition: “We must end all U.S. government practice and programs, covert or otherwise, that transfer individuals involuntarily to other countries that are known to engage in torture.” [ACS Conference, 6/14/08]
New ethics complaint filed against Palin.
New ethics complaint filed against Palin.
A resident of Gov. Sarah Palin’s (R-AK) hometown of Wasilla filed a new ethics complaint against the governor, arguing that her recent media blitz broke state ethics rules because portions of the interviews took place in the governor’s office. The Anchorage Daily News reports:
Jane Henning, a North Slope worker from Wasilla, said he filed the complaint with the attorney general. He says Palin is promoting her future political career on state property, pointing in particular to the governor’s Nov. 10 interview with Fox News Channel host Greta Van Susteren. […]
“The governor is using her official position and office in an attempt to repair her damaged political image on the national scene,” Henning wrote.
The state executive branch ethics rules say officials can’t use state resources to help or hurt a political candidate. Or a potential candidate.
Palin Is First Confirmed Guest Speaker At CPAC 2009
Palin Is First Confirmed Guest Speaker At CPAC 2009
In an apparent attempt to maintain her national profile following her defeat on November 4, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) scheduled a marathon of high-profile interviews with local and national media. Her media blitz concluded with an awkward press conference and a speech to the the Republican Governors Association last week.
Now, it appears that Palin’s post-election comeback tour will extend into next year. ThinkProgress spoke with Joseph Logue of the American Conservative Union who said that Palin is the first confirmed speaker for the 2009 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC):
Palin was scheduled to speak at CPAC 2008, but she canceled at the last moment. Other conservatives who have reportedly been invited to speak include Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA), former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, and Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX).
Her former running-mate, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) was booed at last year’s event and was left off the initial invite list for CPAC 2009 entirely.
White House Falsely Claims Iraq Security Agreement Establishes Only ‘Aspirational’ Withdrawal Deadline
White House Falsely Claims Iraq Security Agreement Establishes Only ‘Aspirational’ Withdrawal Deadline
Over the weekend, Iraq’s cabinet “overwhelmingly approved a proposed security agreement that calls for a full withdrawal of American forces from the country by the end of 2011.” Noting President Bush’s long-held opposition to “artificial timetables,” one reporter asked at today’s White House press conference if the inclusion of a deadline in the security agreement was a “departure” from or “repudiation” of Bush’s views on Iraq.
Press Secretary Dana Perino demurred, claiming that the security agreement is, in fact, in line with Bush’s views on Iraq because it included only an “aspirational” deadline for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq:
QUESTION: The President has said for months that he opposes any timetable and that any decision should be based on the conditions on the ground. How much is the latest agreement a departure, if not a repudiation — ?
PERINO: [W]hen you work with a partner on a negotiation, you have to concede some points. One of the points that we conceded was that we would establish these aspirational dates.
Watch it:
In reality, there is nothing “aspirational” about the security agreement’s withdrawal deadline. Members of the Iraqi government are referring to the pact as a “withdrawal agreement” and the Washington Post reported just how firm the deadline is:
“The total withdrawal will be completed by December 31, 2011. This is not governed by circumstances on the ground,” the [Iraqi government] spokesman, Ali al-Dabbagh, told Iraqi reporters, pointedly rejecting the more conditional language that the U.S. government had sought in the accord.
In addition, the “Iraqi spokesman noted that his government could cancel the agreement if its own forces became capable of controlling security at an earlier time.”
The agreement guarantees a more complete withdrawal from Iraq than even President-elect Barack Obama proposed. As Spencer Ackerman noted, “Obama’s plan for a 30,000-troop residual force? Officially overtaken by events.” The agreement also prohibits the U.S. military from conducting raids on Iraqi homes “without an order from an Iraqi judge and permission of the government,” and requires U.S. forces to “leave the streets of Iraq’s towns and villages by the middle of 2009.”
Cantor: Republicans lack ‘the ability to be relevant to people’s lives.’
Cantor: Republicans lack ‘the ability to be relevant to people’s lives.’
In a new interview with the Washington Times, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) says that he believes the Republican Party has failed to respond to issues that are “relevant” to Americans including health care, education, and infrastructure:
“Where we have really fallen down is, we have lacked the ability to be relevant to people’s lives. Let’s set aside the last eight years, and our falling down in living up to expectations of what we said we were going to do,” Mr. Cantor told The Washington Times in his district office outside of Richmond. “It’s the relevancy question.” […]
“It’s the roads, it’s going to the gas station, that’s still there when the price will bump back up. It’s education, it’s health care. These are the issues, frankly, that we have not been on offense with,” he said.
Cantor is expected to join the House Republican Leadership as Minority Whip.
Palin Trashes Media, Moments After Proclaiming Her ‘Respect’ For ‘The Profession’
Palin Trashes Media, Moments After Proclaiming Her ‘Respect’ For ‘The Profession’
Katie Couric told Page Six recently that Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) “should keep her head down, work really hard and learn about governing.” On Larry King Live last night, Palin responded to Couric’s remark by thanking her for the advice, claiming she wouldn’t offer Couric any advice in return because of her “respect” for the media. However, she then proceeded to trash the media as biased and unfair:
PALIN: Well, thank you, Katie Couric, for your advice. And I won’t reciprocate in giving her any advice, that’s for sure, because I have respect for her and the profession that she is in. I would have greater respect though for the entire profession called mainstream media if we could have great assurance that there is fairness, that there is objectivity throughout the reporting world.
Watch it:
If Palin has respect for the media, she has a funny way of showing it. As she introduced herself to the nation at the Republican National Convention, Palin made the media the target of several of her most popular applause lines. As the campaign progressed, Palin said the media, in asking substantive questions about policy, were engaging in “gotcha journalism.” She also accused reporters of failing to adhere to “journalistic ethics.”
Late last month, Palin went so far as to claim the media was trampling her right to free speech. As ABC News reported:
“If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations,” Palin told host Chris Plante, “then I don’t know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media.”
Transcript: More »
Gun Industry Profits Off NRA’s Fearmongering About Obama Gun Policies
Gun Industry Profits Off NRA’s Fearmongering About Obama Gun Policies
Gun stores across the nation are reporting a surge in gun sales since the election of Barack Obama. Customers are convinced that Obama either seeks to limit or revoke entirely Americans’ rights to bear arms. As the Chicago Tribune reports today:
Some say they are worried that the incoming Obama administration will attempt to reimpose the ban on assault weapons that expired in 2004. Others fear the loss of their right to own handguns. A few say they are preparing to protect themselves in the event of a race war.
Some gun sellers like Wild West Guns in Anchorage, AK are holding “Obama Sale” events to take advantage of their customers’ misinformed fears and news outlets from NPR to Fox News have produced reports documenting the gun buying binge:
The FBI reported that from November 3-9, they “received over three hundred and seventy thousand requests for background checks on gun buyers” — a 49 percent increase since last year. Moreover, “reports from around the nation suggest the sudden surge of November gun-buying is far surpassing the normal hunting-season spike that often occurs this time of year.”
What the major media outlets overlook is that the Obama gun sale boom appears to be the result of a multimillion dollar effort launched by the National Rifle Association last summer to misinform voters about Obama’s gun policy proposals. As Politico reported in June:
The National Rifle Association plans to spend about $40 million on this year’s campaign, with $15 million of that devoted to portraying Barack Obama as a threat to the Second Amendment rights. … This fall, NRA members will get automated phone calls, mail pieces and pre-election editions of the group’s three magazines making the case against Obama.
The NRA claimed of Obama, “[N]ever in NRA’s history have we faced a presidential candidate … with such a deep-rooted hatred of firearm freedoms.” As FactCheck notes, however, the NRA’s campaign is based almost entirely on falsehoods. Indeed, FactCheck writes, much of the NRA’s campaign “dismisses Obama’s stated position [on gun rights] as ‘rhetoric’ and substitutes its own interpretation of his record as a secret ‘plan.’”
The “political uncertainty” created by the NRA’s misinformation campaign may have more to do with making a sale than it does with shaping gun policy. The New York Times explained last week:
What is clear is that every gun seller — not to mention every advocacy group for gun ownership that depends on dues-paying members — has an incentive to stoke the concern that can prompt a gun sale. Political uncertainty, gun dealers say, is great for business. … “Clinton was the best gun salesman the gun manufacturers ever had,” said Rick Gray, owner of the Accuracy Gun Shop in Las Vegas. “Obama’s going to be right up there with him.”
Podesta: Obama Given ‘Real Mandate For Change’
Podesta: Obama Given ‘Real Mandate For Change’
John Podesta, President and CEO of the Center for American Progress (currently on leave to head the Obama transition), explained this morning on Fox News Sunday that President-Elect Barack Obama’s victory last week constituted a strong endorsement by the American people of a “progressive philosophy” and has given progressives a “real mandate for change.”
Later in the program, however, Reps. Eric Cantor (R-VA) and Mike Pence (R-IN) argued that last week’s election was not a mandate. Despite the decisive election of Obama and other progressive candidates across the country, Cantor and Pence maintained that Americans were not endorsing the progressive platform:
CANTOR: This was not some kind of realignment of the electorate, not some kind of shift toward some style of European social, big government type of philosophy. […]
PENCE: I don’t think this was a victory for a progressive, or a liberal victory, I think this was a victory for Barack Obama.
Watch a compilation:
Pence and Cantor are wrong. Last week Americans decisively elected a progressive president and gave progressives a majority in both houses of congress. Exit polls from last Tuesday show that “51 percent said government should do more to solve problems, the first time even a narrow majority said so since exit pollsters started asking the question in 1994.”
Indeed, while America remains a centrist nation, last week’s election demonstrates that the center is moving to the left. Polling shows that a majority of Americans favor progressive solutions to our nation’s problems including, instituting universal health care, expanding environmental protections, rebuilding the middle class, and ending the Iraq war.
White House: We Never ‘Cheerlead’ On The Economy, Admitting It Is In A ‘Recession’ Is ‘Irrelevant’
White House: We Never ‘Cheerlead’ On The Economy, Admitting It Is In A ‘Recession’ Is ‘Irrelevant’
In yesterday’s White House Press conference, spokesperson Tony Fratto responded to a question about whether or not the economy is currently in recession by saying, “We don’t make determinations or predictions on…the bottom of the business cycle.”
Noting the obvious euphemism, one reporter observed, “I may be wrong, but I’ve never heard anyone ever say the word recession from the podium.” The reporter asked, “Is that word radioactive or why isn’t it said?” Fratto responded:
[We] think its relatively irrelevant to the primary focus that we have which is dealing with implementing policy. I mean, I don’t think the American people sit around and say, “Boy, why won’t they say it?” … I don’t think anyone who has stood at this podium could be accused of cheerleading the economy or looking through rose colored glasses. We try to be very, very transparent.
Watch it:
The White House has yet to admit what a majority of Americans and economists now agree on: The U.S. economy is in recession. Just yesterday, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce declared, “We are currently in…a recession.” Last month, former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker said, “[T]he economy, I believe, is in recession,” and Steve Forbes said similarly that “we’re in a recession, a very serious recession.”
Despite Fratto’s claims to the contrary, the White House has been anything but “transparent” with regard to the condition of the economy. Indeed, while the economy edged closer and closer to crisis this year, the Bush White House put on their pom poms and engaged in economic happy talk:
– “I don’t know of anyone predicting a recession.” [Fratto, 1/7/08]
– “I think when people take a look back at this moment in our economic history, they’ll recognize tax cuts work.” [President Bush, 3/12/08]
– “First of all, we’re not in a recession” [President Bush, 4/22/08]
– “The data are pretty clear that we are not in a recession” [Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Edward Lazear, 5/7/08]
– “I think we have avoided a recession.” [White House Budget Director Jim Nussle, 7/31/08]
– “I don’t think anybody could tell you right now if we’re in a recession or not” [Dana Perino, 10/7/08]
As Dan Froomkin wrote in April — and the current economic crisis demonstrates — the Bush administration’s rhetoric on the economy amounted to nothing more than “tone-deaf cheerleading.”
Rove: Obama Hoodwinked America Into Electing A Progressive President
Rove: Obama Hoodwinked America Into Electing A Progressive President
Last night on Fox’s Hannity and Colmes, Karl Rove argued that President-Elect Barack Obama ran a “center-right” campaign, but that if you “dig in” you can uncover the radical socialist that the right-wing warned the country about during the campaign:
ROVE: Let’s make it clear: He ran a center-right campaign. He said –
COLMES: Center-right? He was accused of being a radical socialist.
ROVE: Well, if you dug in.
Watch it:
In today’s Wall Street Journal, Rove argued similarly that Obama ran a center-right campaign that fooled a center-right electorate into supporting him:
It is a tribute to his skills that Mr. Obama, the most liberal member of the U.S. Senate, won in a country that remains center-right.
Despite Rove’s claims, Americans were not somehow hoodwinked by the Obama campaign; they knew Obama was a progressive — and they supported him for it. In fact, internal McCain polling showed that a vast majority of Americans knew exactly what Obama’s agenda was, as Mark Salter told Politico:
Our polling showed that more than 60 percent of voters identified Obama as a liberal. Typically, a candidate is not going to win the presidency with those figures. But I think the country just disregarded it. People didn’t care. They just wanted the biggest change they could get.
Indeed, Obama and other progressive candidates were elected this week not in spite of their progressive stances on key policy issues, but because of them. As The Progress Report observed yesterday, “Obama ran on the most progressive platform of any presidential candidate in at least 15 years, including a promise of universal health care coverage, a dramatic transformation to a low-carbon economy, and a historic investment in education.”
UPDATE: Fox News’s Brit Hume, speaking with Laura Ingraham today, repeated the claim that Tuesday’s vote actually proved America is still a “center-right” country. He claimed that Obama didn’t “break the lock” that Republicans have had on the presidency but merely “picked the lock.” Listen here:
From Center-Right…To Center-Left
From Center-Right…To Center-Left
On October 18, Newsweek ran a cover story entitled, “America the Conservative” by Jon Meacham. Meacham argued:
Should Obama win, he will have to govern a nation that is more instinctively conservative than it is liberal–a perennial reality that past Democratic presidents have ignored at their peril.
Meacham admitted that his argument was “probably going to look dumb, or at least out of step, for many months to come.” Yes, it does.
As ThinkProgress has noted again and again, the American people are moving left. The last three presidential elections show that movement very clearly:
After Lobbying To Select Palin, Top McCain Adviser Can’t Bring Himself To Say She Was A Good Pick
After Lobbying To Select Palin, Top McCain Adviser Can’t Bring Himself To Say She Was A Good Pick
In his recent New York Times Magazine piece on the McCain campaign, Robert Draper reveled that Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) pick of Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) “may have been even more impulsive than initially thought.”
Draper explained that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) was strongly urging McCain to pick Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT). At the “last minute,” however, McCain strategist Steve Schmidt and campaign manager Rick Davis convinced McCain to pick Palin:
The evening of Aug. 24, Schmidt and Davis, after leaving the Ritz-Carlton meeting, showed up at McCain’s condominium in Phoenix. They informed McCain that in their view, Palin would be the best pick. “You never know where his head is,” Davis told me three weeks later. “He doesn’t betray a lot. He’s a great poker player. But he picked up the phone.” Reached at the Alaska State Fair, Palin listened as McCain for the first time discussed the possibility of selecting her as his running mate.
Schmidt’s enthusiasm for Palin seems to have waned significantly in the last days of the election. Yesterday, reporters on the McCain campaign plane asked Schmidt if the campaign was “happy” with the Palin pick. Schmidt couldn’t bring himself to say “yes“:
Q: And the pick of Palin for you guys? Are you happy with that?
SCHMIDT: You know, we’ll uh, I’m not going to do, there’ll be time for all the postmortems in the race.
Q: But are you happy with what she’s done for the ticket?
SCHMIDT: I think that, you know, I think we’ll know in a few hours what the results are, you know and I, there’ll be a time for all the postmortem parts of it. That’s not this afternoon before the polls close.
Schmidt went so far last night as to “veto” Palin’s request to offer a few words to the crowd after McCain conceded the election. Politco’s Mike Allen reports on a forthcoming Newsweek article, “Palin asked to speak along with McCain at his Arizona concession speech Tuesday night, but campaign strategist Steve Schmidt vetoed the request.”
Kristol: Palin ‘reminds me a lot of FDR.’
Kristol: Palin ‘reminds me a lot of FDR.’
Yesterday on Fox News Channel, Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol predicted that Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) has a bright future in American politics even if her ticket does not win today’s election. Kristol noted that Franklin Delano Roosevelt lost his bid for vice president in 1920 only to be elected president twelve years later:
KRISTOL: She has a future, she may not run in four years if McCain loses. Franklin Roosevelt, as a 38 year old, lost the vice presidential race. He became governor of New York and then was elected twelve years from [then]. … She reminds me a lot of FDR. I just said that so that can go — so the left wing blogs can go crazy.
Former IRI President: McCain personally supported grants for mainstream Khalidi group.
Former IRI President: McCain personally supported grants for mainstream Khalidi group.
Harper’s Ken Silverstein reports today that former International Republican Institute (IRI) President Bruce McColm revealed to him that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), as chairman of the IRI board, directly supported funding for Professor Rashid Khalidi’s Center for Palestine Research and Studies in the early 1990s. McColm explained to Silverstein:
All our [grant] proposals had to be approved at board meetings with John McCain in attendance and in agreement. John did think highly of these grants. … Ironically, it was Khalidi’s academic background and his known coolness to the PLO that attracted our interest. How strange to see the McCain campaign use Khalidi as a “type of terrorist” with whom Obama hangs around.
Over the last week, the McCain campaign has attempted to smear Khalidi as a radical and link him to Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL).
Chambliss: The rush of African-Americans to the polls has ‘got our side energized.’
Chambliss: The rush of African-Americans to the polls has ‘got our side energized.’
On Wednesday, the chairman of the Hillsborough County, Florida Republican party forwarded an e-mail to several hundred party members that warned of “‘the threat’ of ‘carloads of black Obama supporters coming from the inner city to cast their votes.’” While the McCain campaign condemned the email, the sentiment does not appear to be isolated. As Tapped notes, earlier this week, Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) proclaimed that the the “rush” of African-Americans to the polls has “got our side energized“:
“There has always been a rush to the polls by African-Americans early,” he said at the square in Covington, a quick stop on a bus tour as the campaign entered its final week. He predicted the crowds of early voters would motivate Republicans to turn out. “It has also got our side energized, they see what is happening,” he said.
Similarly, Chambliss has been warning his “predominantly white base” in North Georgia, “The other folks are voting.”
By The McCain Campaign’s Own Definition, Palin Is A ‘Wealth Spreader’
By The McCain Campaign’s Own Definition, Palin Is A ‘Wealth Spreader’
In recent days, both Fox News and the Associated Press have called out the McCain campaign for its hypocritical criticism of Sen Barack Obama’s (D-IL) tax plan. Both Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) have referred to Obama as the “Redistributor in Chief” or “Barack the Wealth Spreader.” Back in Alaska, however, Palin strengthened the state’s redistributive policies, instituting a windfall profits tax to ensure that Alaskans got their “equitable” share of oil companies’ profits.
Despite this, McCain campaign blogger Michael Goldfarb, maintains that Alaska does not redistribute wealth. Echoing McCain spokesperson Tucker Bounds’s recent claim, Goldfarb told Fox News yesterday:
“This is not redistribution in the sense of you take money away from one guy who’s working real hard, and give it away to someone who’s not working at all.”
In fact, that is exactly what Alaska’s Permanent Fund dividend payments do. Each year since 1976, “[a]t least 25 percent of all mineral lease rentals, royalties, royalty sales proceeds, federal mineral revenue-sharing payments and bonuses” taken in by the state — predominantly from the oil industry — are “placed in a permanent fund.” A portion of that fund’s annual earnings are “transferred to the State’s dividend fund,” which is then divided among Alaskans in the form of yearly dividend checks.
As Sandy Parr at the Alaska Department of Revenue confirmed to ThinkProgress, every resident of Alaska, even “someone who’s not working at all,” is eligible for a dividend payment — this year totaling $3,269.
Palin herself recently explained the dividend program to the New Yorker, saying:
And Alaska—we’re set up, unlike other states in the union, where it’s collectively Alaskans own the resources. So we share in the wealth when the development of these resources occurs. … It’s to maximize benefits for Alaskans, not an individual company, not some multinational somewhere, but for Alaskans.
By Goldfarb’s own definition, Palin is a “Wealth Spreader.”
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