July 24, 2012

BWHAHAHAHAHAHA:Tea Party Congressman CALLS McCain ‘NUMB NUTS’ For Criticizing Bachmann’s Anti-Muslim

"..Tea Party Congressman Louie Gohmert (R-TX) lashed out at Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) for criticizing him and his fellow conservative members for suggesting that a senior aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood. Gohmert is part of a small group of five Republican members, led by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN), who are demanding an investigation into whether Clinton deputy chief of staff Huma Abedin is connected to the group.


“Normally you don’t go blast somebody on the floor who is a colleague on the same side of the aisle unless you touch base with them,” Gohmert complained during an appearance on the Dennis Miller Show on Tuesday, referring to McCain’s denunciation of the group’s allegations as “nothing less than an unwarranted and unfounded attack.” The fiery Texan then launched into a personal attack against McCain, calling him “numb nuts”:








listen to audio at approximately 1:18


http://thinkprogress.org/security/2012/07/24/576071/tea-party-congressman-calls-mccain-numb-nuts-for-criticizing-bachmanns-anti-muslim-witch-hunt/

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July 24, 2012

Jack Gilchrist OWES President Obama and TAX PAYERS An Apology

Star of Romney Ad Did Receive Government Assistance


In a Mitt Romney ad last week, a stern Jack Gilchrist of Gilchrist Metal Fabricating tells President Obama that his family -- and not the government -- built his company.





But John DiStaso reports Gilchrist "did receive some government help:

July 24, 2012

LOL - The Romney BADGER

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July 23, 2012

Masked Men Carve ‘DYKE’ INTO Lesbian Woman, Then Set House On FIRE

"..The recent home invasion and vicious attack on a lesbian woman in Lincoln, Nebraska is being described by the Human Rights Campaign as “truly horrific.” The LBGT rights organization is calling on federal authorities to investigate the alleged hate crime. CNN reported that three masked men allegedly broke into the 33-year-old woman’s home early Sunday morning, tied her up, and carved words into her arms and stomach with a knife. One of the words included the derogatory slur “dyke.”



The men also spray-painted anti-gay graffiti inside the home and set the house on fire. Police said the fire did little damage. The woman fled bound, naked and bleeding to her neighbor’s house. “I was in shock,” the woman’s neighbor told CNN. “She was naked, her hands were tied with zip ties. All I could see was a cut across her forehead and blood running down.” She was taken to a local hospital, where she was treated for her injuries.



“We have confidence that the Lincoln Police Department will thoroughly investigate this crime and take swift and appropriate action to bring the perpetrators to justice,” said HRC Vice President of Communications Fred Sainz. “No one should ever have to live in fear simply because of who they are. Our thoughts are with the victim and we wish her a full recovery. This act of violence is a jarring reminder that we have much work to do in creating environments where all members of our community feel safe living honestly and openly, and where crimes motivated by one’s sexual orientation or gender identity are never tolerated.”



Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, which was enacted in October 2009, gives federal authorities jurisdiction over some hate crimes. Local police have not made any arrests in connection with the incident, but said they have “multiple detectives” working on the case.




http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/07/23/masked-men-carve-dyke-into-lesbian-woman-with-knife/


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July 23, 2012

FRENCH Romney's First Foreign STUMBLE?

OUI, OUI MONSIEUR ROMNEY!

Foreign Affairs is a bitch!






"..It’s treacherous for a US presidential candidate to travel overseas — lots of opportunities for mis-chosen words and getting drawn into other countries’ domestic politics. With Mitt Romney about to leave on his big trip abroad he may already have had his first big foreign stumble. At a GOP fundraiser in San Francisco last night, Romney said that Australia’s foreign minister had warned him that foreign leaders see the US in decline and — at least in Romney’s telling — was hoping for Romney-like policies to make things right.



That at least was the version of the comments that appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald. A similar version, but without the full quotes, appeared in the AP. Quoting Romney: ”And this idea of America in decline, it was interesting [Carr] said that, he led the talk of America being in decline. See that’s not talk we hear about here as much as they’re hearing there. And if they’re thinking about investing in America, entrepreneurs putting their future in America, if they think America’s in decline they’re not gonna do it.”



Whether or not the SMH got it right is one question. The Hill notes that the pool reports did not have Romney clearly characterizing the comments as a warning. And now, Australia’s Foreign Minister’s office has come forward to shoot down Romney’s characterization of the discussion, calling Romney’s interpretation “not correct.”



You cannot take a shoot down like this at face value in any case. Whatever Carr said, he almost certainly didn’t expect Romney to turn around and use it as ammo in a political speech. Allies don’t want to get publicly embroiled in a US election — especially on the wrong side of an incumbent who they believe is more likely than not to get reelected. So he’d be under a lot of pressure to walk away from Romney’s comments, even if Romney was accurately characterizing them. On the other hand, maybe Mitt just made it up or gave it — probably the most likely option — a negative spin the retelling. One way or another, it will be interesting to see how Romney navigates this sort of stuff when he’s overseas.






http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2012/07/mitts_first_foreign_stumble.php?ref=fpblg


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July 23, 2012

California’s GOP Is Near COLLAPSE

"..According to a report in the New York Times, California’s Republican Party is on its way to becoming a minor party. Only 30% of the State’s electorate is Republican, compared to 43% who are Democrats and 21% who are independents. A consultant to the GOP, Allan Hoffenblum, pointed out that the 30% figure means Republicans can’t win a statewide election. “You just can’t get enough crossover voters. They have alienated large swaths of voters. They have become too doctrinaire on the social issues. It’s become a cult.? Wow! And this is a guy who works for the party!




In spite of the fact that the state is embroiled in economic turmoil while all three branches of its government are controlled by Democrats, not a single Republican holds statewide office. The prognosis for change isn’t good, either. Another Republican consultant, Steve Schmidt, said, “The institution of the California Republican Party, I would argue, has effectively collapsed. It doesn’t do any of the things that a political party should do. It doesn’t register voters. It doesn’t recruit candidates. It doesn’t raise money. The Republican Party in the state institutionally has become a small ideological club that is basically in the business of hunting out heretics…When you look at the population growth, the actual party is shrinking. It’s becoming more white. It’s becoming older.”




On Sunday, the GOP’s presumptive presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, told a crowd at a San Francisco fundraiser that, “Boy, somebody’s got to do something for California…the right leadership would make a difference here.” Not only doesn’t the ‘right’ Republican leadership exist in the state, but 30% of the electorate can’t even come close to delivering the California vote to Romney.




Instead of indulging in pipe dreams, Romney and his GOP boosters ought to be worried about this old saying: “As California goes, so goes the nation.” Hunting out heretics…shrinking…becoming more white…aging? Could California be signaling not only the demise of the Republican Party in the state but also (gulp) sounding its death knell nationwide?




http://www.addictinginfo.org/2012/07/23/californias-gop-is-near-collapse/

July 20, 2012

Team Romneymobile Tracks TRICKY MITT to Pittsburgh!

July 19, 2012

Republicans LINE UP TO RIP Michele Bachmann

"..They were long afraid to do it, but now conservatives have their knives out for Rep. Michele Bachmann. Senators in her own party, congressional candidates, a lawmaker in her state’s delegation and leaders of the House Republican Conference are all lambasting the Minnesota Republican for saying the wife of former Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.



Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said merely floating the idea that Huma Abedin — a top aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton — has family ties to the radical Middle East group is “pretty dangerous.” “I don’t know Huma, but from everything I do know of her, she has a sterling character,” Boehner told reporters Thursday. “And I think accusations like this being thrown around are pretty dangerous.” Later on CNN, Boehner said he expects to speak to Bachmann soon.



Bachmann’s accusation came in a handful of letters to intelligence and national security agencies raising questions about the Muslim Brotherhood. The letters, also signed by four other Republicans, specifically mentioned Abedin, accusing her late father of having ties to the Brotherhood. Boehner declined to entertain a reporter’s question about whether he would toss Bachmann off the Intelligence Committee, where she’s privy to highly classified information. Behind the scenes, leadership aides said they were shaken by the comments from someone as prominent as Bachmann.



And Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, was described by several sources as incredibly angry when he heard of the incident. The Republican backlash against Bachmann started with Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) statement on the Senate floor Wednesday, saying she had made “sinister accusations.” Rep. Jeff Flake, a conservative Arizona lawmaker running for Senate, tweeted “Kudos to @SenJohnMcCain for his statement on Senate floor yesterday defending Clinton aide. Well said.” Sen. Scott Brown (R-Mass.) added: “Rep. Bachmann’s accusations about Sec. Clinton aide Huma Abedin are out-of-line. This kind of rhetoric has no place in our public discourse.”






cont'


http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0712/78741.html

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July 19, 2012

The BAIN Truth: Staples DIDN'T CREATE JOBS

"....writers Dave Johnson and Isaiah J. Poole discuss Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's claim that the office supply chain Staples is an example of the work he did creating jobs as the head of Bain Capital. Not so, Johnson says: At best, it shifted jobs from smaller competitors Staples put out of business, and in many cases it replaced living wage jobs with jobs barely above minimum wage. Staples may be a good place to buy pens and paper, but it's not a good model for how we should rebuild a middle-class economy. Johnson talks about the policies that we really need for good jobs and a strong middle class...."


http://ourfuture.org


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July 19, 2012

The GOP RIGHT WING Brings Out the LONG KNIVES …for Mitt Romney

- "..But I put to you a different case. While the demands for Mr. Romney’s tax returns are coming from various quarters, it’s coming very stridently from the right. Indeed, I believe that if this were coming mostly from the left, the right would be united in condemning this effort as a liberal witch hunt and distraction to draw attention away from Mr. Obama’s failed stewardship of the economy. Instead, the story remains alive, because the right wants it alive. Why would conservatives want this? I suspect the reasons have nothing to do with principles of public disclosure — after all, this is the party that just voted unanimously against even debating the popular DISCLOSE Act to make public the rich donors who secretly give to political SuperPacs — or giving the candidate time to get his story straight. That’s not the timing that matters.



I think this is the conservatives’ latest and most virulent effort at “extreme vetting,” in which the candidate either survives the right’s gauntlet with a disclosure that turns out to be a non-event (and thus potentially harmful to Democrats for hinting it would be otherwise), or — and this may be the preferred outcome — he’s further damaged and wiped out quickly, before the convention. Doing this now, before the convention, would allow the conservatives to replace Romney safely and victoriously with whatever “first team” conservatives the GOP claimed they had that did not run in the primaries. Several facts support this theory. First, it’s always been true that the so-called party leaders viewed Mitt Romney as an empty suit, an insincere usurper who could win the nomination only because he could bury his lesser known opponents with money. And that was possible only because the real “first team” of natural conservative leaders chose not to run.



However, those first teamers’ choices can now be questioned because of the second fact: despite all the claims that Mr Romney has suffered a very bad, no good, horrible week or two of adverse publicity and distractions, while Mr. Obama has been on relentless attack, the race remains effectively tied. The Obama campaign appears to be having some success in painting Mitt Romney as a greedy, out-of-touch, even heartless corporate looter who enriched himself by putting people out of work while businesses failed, and thus the wrong man to fix the economy, but even that image is not enough to allow Mr. Obama to sustain any significant lead over such a villain. If that is true against a damaged, exposed and highly unattractive Mitt Romney as the opponent, then every one of the so-called “first team” wannabes must be telling themselves, “damn, I guessed wrong; I could have won this.”




- It may be that some of the conservatives’ calls for vetting Mr. Romney’s tax returns are influenced by some now quaint notions of traditional fair disclosure. But I think it more likely that what we’re watching now is a major play to take down Romney and replace him at the convention, to allow the demolition — only slightly set back by Justice Roberts — to continue. After all, none of them believes Mitt’s one of them, and if they succeed, they’ll just claim they did it for the country.






http://elections.firedoglake.com/2012/07/17/the-gop-right-wing-brings-out-the-long-knives-for-mitt-romney/