February 2011 archive

They Fled To Protect Their Rights

Senate adjourns, governor calls exodus a ‘stunt’ and expects holdouts to return



Wis. union vote on hold after Democrats leave state

 

Faced with a certain Republican victory that would end a half-century of collective bargaining for public workers, Wisconsin Democrats retaliated with the only weapon they had left: They fled.

Fourteen Democratic lawmakers disappeared from the Capitol on Thursday, just as the Senate was about to begin debating the measure aimed at easing the state’s budget crunch.

By refusing to show up for a vote, the group brought the debate to a swift halt and hoped to pressure Republicans to the negotiating table.

“The plan is to try and slow this down because it’s an extreme piece of legislation that’s tearing this state apart,” Sen. Jon Erpenbach said.

The Speaker of the House John Boehner told Fox News host Sean Hannity that it was not the Republicans that were talking about shutting down the government on March 4 but the Democrats. Parroting his lying cohort, an “exasperated”, House Majority Leader, Eric Cantor (R-VA) boasted the same to Hannity.

Really?

I guess these two don’t talk to the other Republicans :

 – Rep. Steve Womack (R-AR): “Womack said he would be open to forcing a government shutdown over spending.” (The Hill, 12/12/10)

   – Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA): “If government shuts down, we want you with us. … It’s going to take some pain for us to do the things that we need to do to right the ship.” (9/10/10)

   – Rep. Tom Price (R-GA): Q: do you think shutdown should be off the table? PRICE: Everything ought to be on the table. (2/11/11)

   – Rep. Steve King (R-IA): “(King) said last week that he wants Boehner and other House leaders to sign a ‘blood oath’ that they will include a repeal of health care reform in every appropriations bill next year, even if President Barack Obama vetoes the bills and a government shutdown occurs.” (Roll Call 9/10/10)

   – Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI): If Obama…responds to the mandate from voters and understands he can’t disregard it, then he thinks Obama will do well “If he doesn’t, he will shut government down,” Walberg said. (Jackson Citizen Patriot, 11/03/10)

   – Rep. Alan Nunnelee (R-MI): Q: Are you willing to participate in what would lead to a shutdown of the federal government to stop this monstrosity from going down he tracks? NUNNELEE: I agree with Congressman Boehner. We need to do whatever is necessary to make sure this bill never goes into effect. (11/09/10)

   – Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX): “If it takes a shutdown of government to stop the runaway spending, we owe that to our children and our grandchildren.” (11/15/10)

   – Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX): “This is the way the government should adjust. If they can’t pay their bills, wait.” ()

   – Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL): “We will do what we have to do, to shut down the government if we have to, to choke Obamacare if we have to.” (2/12/11)

   – Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) when he was a candidate

Get the cotonout of your ears, guys. Ignorance is not bliss

h/t Think Progress

Crossposted at Daily Kos and Docudharma

Yes, friends, you too can start a blog (just as Art Fern would say it on the ‘Tonight Show’). Invite assorted celebrities to write for you.  For nothing.  Convince them that their brilliant ideas will be exposed to millions of readers.  Add a bit of fluff to your blog a few months later on.  Go on cable tv talk shows and make bombastic statements, preferably in a bad European accent.  Create faux controversies.  Add a few noted “journalists” to your payroll to give oneself a facade of respectability.  Then, find a corporate sucker to believe in all your hype. Walk away with millions of dollars.

Easy enough, isn’t it?  As Cartoonist Matt Bors predicted in 2009, “the future is grim”

Regular Features-

• Late Night Karaoke by mishima
• Muse in the Morning by Robyn
• Six In The Morning by mishima

Featured Essays for February 17, 2011-

• Is there one Democratic party? Or more? by plf515
• Delivering (cough) Freedom & Democracy by Edger
• Good News? by ek hornbeck
• Why Isn’t Wall Street in Jail? by Jacob Freeze
• Got A Business Idea But No Money? by Edger
• Reporting the Revolution: February 17 Up Date 1930 hrs EST by TheMomCat
• I Read The News Today, Oh Boy… by Edger

DocuDharma

Lots of premiers including the new La Femme Nikita.

I don’t understand you people! I mean all these picky little points you keep bringing up. They don’t mean nothing. You saw this kid just like I did. You’re not gonna tell me you believe that phony story about losing the knife, and that business about being at the movies. Look, you know how these people lie! It’s born in them! I mean what the heck? I don’t have to tell you. They don’t know what the truth is! And lemme tell you, they don’t need any real big reason to kill someone, either! No sir! They get drunk… oh, they’re real big drinkers, all of ’em – you know that – and bang: someone’s lyin’ in the gutter. Oh, nobody’s blaming them for it. That’s the way they are! By nature! You know what I mean? VIOLENT! Where’re you going? Human life don’t mean as much to them as it does to us! Look, they’re lushing it up and fighting all the time and if somebody gets killed, so somebody gets killed! They don’t care! Oh, sure, there are some good things about ’em, too. Look, I’m the first one to say that. I’ve known a couple who were OK, but that’s the exception, y’know what I mean? Most of ’em, it’s like they have no feelings! They can do anything! What’s goin’ on here? I’m trying to tell you… you’re makin’ a big mistake, you people! This kid is a liar! I know it. I know all about them! Listen to me! They’re no good! There’s not a one of ’em who is any good! I mean, what’s happening in here? I’m speaking my piece, and you… Listen to me. We’re… This kid on trial here… his type, well, don’t you know about them? There’s a, there’s a danger here. These people are dangerous. They’re wild. Listen to me. Listen.

I have. Now sit down and don’t open your mouth again.

• ABC Family– The Parent Trap (not the good 1961 version)
• AMC– The Shawshank Redemption x 2 (and again and again)
• Comedy– Futurama x 3
• Disney– Hannah Montana: The Movie (Billy Ray says the show destroyed his family.  Also, it sucks.), Phineas and Ferb x 2
• Discovery– Man v. Wild (premier), Out of the Wild: Venezuela (Season Premier)
• ESPN– College Hoopies, Minnesota @ Penn State, Alabama @ LSU
• ESPN2– College Hoopies, Clemson @ North Carolina State, DePaul @ Providence
• FX– Archer x 2 (with premier)
• History– Top Shot, Ax Men (this week’s)
• Lifetime– Coyote Ugly
• Sci Fi– Saw II, Saw III
• TBS– Fun with Dick & Jane (not the good 1977 version)
• Turner Classic– 12 Angry Men, Chariots of Fire
• TNT– Spurs @ Bulls, Mavs @ Suns
• Travel– Man v. Food marathon
• USA– Royal Pains, Fairly Legal x 2 (premiers + Instapeats)
• VH1– SNL marathon

Later-

• FX– Fantastic Four
• Sci Fi– Saw IV, Kill Theory
• Turner Classic– Room at the Top
• Toon– Eagleheart

Dave hosts Paris Hilton, Nathan Fillion, and Scissor Sisters.  Jon has Ed Gillespie (ugh), Stephen Eric Foner.  Conan hosts Martin Short, Chris Bosh, and Nicole Atkins.

Zap2it TV Listings, Yahoo TV Listings

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

Now with 55 Top Stories.

1 Earth dodges geomagnetic storm: scientist

by Jim Mannion, AFP

1 hr 39 mins ago

Regular Daily Features:

• News at Six in the Morning from mishima
• The Rolling Stones are in the spotlight at Late Night Karaoke, mishima DJs

Essays Featured Thursday, February 17^th:

• Thursday Open Thoughts from mplo are centered on Why is America producing such crap in music and in movies?
• Cornucopia Thursday is Ed Tracey‘s weekly foray into news items outside the headlines, in the arts and sciences; foreign news that generates little notice in the US media and ….well, just plain whimsy…..  
• Firefly Memories 1.0 is where (normally)Alma takes a look back at some of the Brilliant essays of our first years posts, highlighting those which exemplify our firefly-dreaming spirit and mission. Alma has an eye problem so Dreamer is filling until she’s better.
  
  Today:Yes You Can take on City Hall by…… Alma!!!  

come firefly-dreaming with me….

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”

Nicholas D Kristof: Tunisia. Egypt. Bahrain?

Manama, Bahrain Tunisia The gleaming banking center of Bahrain, one of those family-run autocratic Arab states that count as American allies, has become the latest reminder that authoritarian regimes are slow learners.

Bahrain is another Middle East domino wobbled by an angry youth – and it has struck back with volleys of tear gas, rubber bullets and even buckshot at completely peaceful protesters. In the early-morning hours on Thursday here in the Bahrain capital, it used deadly force to clear the throngs of pro-democracy protesters who had turned Pearl Square in the center of the city into a local version of Tahrir Square in Cairo. This was the last spasm of brutality from a regime that has handled protests with an exceptionally heavy hand – and like the previous crackdowns, this will further undermine the legitimacy of the government.

Robert Reich; Budget Baloney: Why Social Security Isn’t a Problem for 26 Years, and the Best Way to Fix It Permanently

In a former life I was a trustee of the Social Security trust fund. So let me set the record straight.

Social Security isn’t responsible for the federal deficit. Just the opposite. Until last year Social Security took in more payroll taxes than it paid out in benefits. It lent the surpluses to the rest of the government.

Now that Social Security has started to pay out more than it takes in, Social Security can simply collect what the rest of the government owes it. This will keep it fully solvent for the next 26 years. . . . . . .

Today, though, the Social Security payroll tax hits only about 84 percent of total income.

It went from 90 percent to 84 percent because a larger and larger portion of total income has gone to the top. In 1983, the richest 1 percent of Americans got 11.6 percent of total income. Today the top 1 percent takes in more than 20 percent.

If we want to go back to 90 percent, the ceiling on income subject to the Social Security tax would need to be raised to $180,000.

Presto. Social Security’s long-term (beyond 26 years from now) problem would be solved.

Yes, it is that simple

Robert Sheer: Home Sweet Wall Street

A most dastardly deed occurred last Friday when the Obama administration issued a 29-page policy statement totally abandoning the federal government’s time-honored role in helping Americans achieve the goal of homeownership. Instead of punishing the banks that sabotaged the American ideal of a nation of stakeholders by “securitizing” our homesteads into poker chips to be gambled away in the Wall Street casino, Barack Obama now proposes to turn over the entire mortgage industry to those same banks.

The proposal, originated by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, involves nothing less than a total “winding down” of the 80-year-old federal housing program, setting instead a new goal of a two-tiered America in which the masses are content to be mere renters of the American Dream. Such a deal for a country where, as the report concedes, “Half of all renters spend more than a third of their income on housing, and a quarter spend more than half.”

(h/t emptywheel)

Defector admits to WMD lies that triggered Iraq war

• Man codenamed Curveball ‘invented’ tales of bioweapons
• Iraqi told lies to try to bring down Saddam Hussein regime
• Fabrications used by US as justification for invasion

Martin Chulov and Helen Pidd in Karlsruhe, The Guardian

Tuesday 15 February 2011 12.58 GMT

The defector who convinced the White House that Iraq had a secret biological weapons programme has admitted for the first time that he lied about his story, then watched in shock as it was used to justify the war.

…

The admission comes just after the eighth anniversary of Colin Powell’s speech to the United Nations in which the then-US secretary of state relied heavily on lies that Janabi had told the German secret service, the BND. It also follows the release of former defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s memoirs, in which he admitted Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction programme.

…

Janabi claimed he was first exposed as a liar as early as mid-2000, when the BND travelled to a Gulf city, believed to be Dubai, to speak with his former boss at the Military Industries Commission in Iraq, Dr Bassil Latif.

The Guardian has learned separately that British intelligence officials were at that meeting, investigating a claim made by Janabi that Latif’s son, who was studying in Britain, was procuring weapons for Saddam.

That claim was proven false, and Latif strongly denied Janabi’s claim of mobile bioweapons trucks and another allegation that 12 people had died during an accident at a secret bioweapons facility in south-east Baghdad.

The German officials returned to confront him with Latif’s version. “He says, ‘There are no trucks,’ and I say, ‘OK, when [Latif says] there no trucks then [there are none],'” Janabi recalled.

February 5, 2003-

Parts 2 through 5 and transcript below.