Monday, January 16, 2012

Headlines - Monday January 16

Al Jazeera: Iran says it has evidence the US was behind the killing of one of its nuclear scientists, according to Iranian state television. US officials last week denied any role in the killing of Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, and condemned the bomb attack which claimed his life in Tehran on Wednesday. However, Iran's state TV reported that the Iranian foreign ministry had, in a letter handed to the Swiss ambassador in Tehran, said : "We have reliable documents and evidence that this terrorist act was planned, guided and supported by the CIA."
 
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Here comes the Jesus brigade

All around scumbag Tony Perkins and his assorted "Christian" organizations are now going all in for little Ricky:

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council says conservatives are looking for a candidate who will repeal the nation's health care law, fight for pro family values and address the national debt.

"Not a lot of time was spent talking about Mitt Romney" Perkins says. He added, "it's not news" that there's not a lot of support among conservatives for Romney. Perkins says Romney's Mormon religion was not discussed among those participating in the meeting.

So what does this mean? Expect conservative groups to start individually motivating their constituents to work for Santorum. Also look for more money and resources to start pouring into Santorum's campaign. No question about it, this is excellent news for Santorum's camp and a major blow to the Gingrich and Perry camps.

Who knew God was all worked up about the healthcare bill and the national debt. And when they say "pro family," they mean gay bashing.

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The company that Mitt Romney ran for so long is one of the "big bosses" over virtually all conservative talk radio in America. 

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In honor of MLK Day, Lyndon B. Johnson's speech to Congress urging—almost ordering—the legislators before him to pass the Voting Rights Act. 

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A Georgia Republican who wants all welfare reciepients subject to drug tests failed one himself after he ran a red light on Friday morning. The Atlanta Journal Constiution has the story on State Rep. Kip Smith (R):

Smith, whose given name is John Andrew Smith, first told the officer he had not consumed any alcoholic beverages.

"I asked him again, and he stated he had consumed a single beer at Hal's. …"

Smith is a sponsor of Georgia House Bill 464, which would "require random drug testing" for citizens on public assistance. In response to Smith's legislation, State Rep. Scott Holcomb introduced a bill last month that would require all state lawmakers to be subject to random drug testing.

Random drug tests for reciepents of public assistance are very likely to be found unconsitutional.

 

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'Anonymous' posts media moguls' information online

Fantastic news!

The White House on Saturday officially responded to two online petitions, "Stop the E-PARASITE Act" and "Veto the SOPA bill and any other future bills that threaten to diminish the free flow of information," urging the President to reject SOPA and PIPA.

The statement was drawn up by Victoria Espinel, Intellectual Property Enforcement Coordinator at Office of Management and Budget, Aneesh Chopra, U.S. Chief Technology Officer, and Howard Schmidt, Special Assistant to the President and Cybersecurity Coordinator for National Security Staff. They made clear that the White House will not support legislation that disrupts the open standards of the Internet.

"While we believe that online piracy by foreign websites is a serious problem that requires a serious legislative response, we will not support legislation that reduces freedom of expression, increases cybersecurity risk, or undermines the dynamic, innovative global Internet," the statement read in part.

Yeah. The best news of the week.

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Every time voter-suppression enthusiasts shriek about dead people voting, their examples turn out to be very much alive. "Robert William Beaulieu is 23-years-old, lives in Nashua, New Hampshire, and is a registered Democrat. He's also very much not dead. ... But you wouldn't have known that if you watched the lastest undercover sting video from James O'Keefe's Project Veritas, which featured a man with an Irish accent attempting to obtain a ballot on behalf of a Robert Beaulieu who lives on Cassandra Lane. ... That's the home University of New Hampshire graduate Robert W. Beaulieu, pictured above, shares with his parents. Robert P. Beaulieu, unrelated, died a few months back at the age of 84, and is apparently the man Project Vertitas' investigator intended to impersonate. By all appearances, they got the wrong guy. ... "I found out they were actually talking about me and not the man who passed away in October," Robert W. Beaulieu told TPM. "The funny thing is, if they'd done any research, they would have found out the guy's middle name is Paul and the guy specifically goes looking for William.""

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Huntsman is out

And he's made an endorsement.

"The governor and his family, at this point in the race, decided it was time for Republicans to rally around a candidate who could beat Barack Obama and turn around the economy," Huntsman adviser Matt David said in a statement. "That candidate is Gov. Mitt Romney."

ThinkProgress notes that Huntsman once said Romney was "unelectable."

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That's a lot of spare change. "Airline passengers left more than $400,000 at airport security checkpoints operated by the Transportation Security Administration in 2011. ... TSA found $409,085.56 in spare change last year that was unclaimed by passengers, according to figures released by the agency. Historically, if no one comes back to get the leftover money, it stays with the TSA. ... A Florida lawmaker is trying to change that, however: Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.) filed a bill in April of 2009 that would require TSA to transfer money that is not claimed by passengers when they leave airport security checkpoints to United Service Organizations. ... Miller said Thursday in a statement provided to The Hill that the amount of change left at airport security checkpoints in 2011 could be put to better uses than the TSA's operating budget."

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Heartwarming. "Last week, a man threw a 20-pound rock through a window of an Iraqi restaurant in Lowell, Massachussetts -- with the motivation behind the act of vandalism still remaining unclear. The Lowell Sun reports that the owner of the restaurant, Leyla Al-Zubaydi, was driven "to tears, and [it] prompted her to question whether the family should close the restaurant." ... But this week, a group of military veterans changed her mind with an act of solidarity. Patrick Scanlon, a Vietnam veteran and a coordinator for Veterans for Peace, organized so many veterans and other supporters to come and patronize the restaurant that they ended up filling every seat -- twice. "For someone to come and throw a rock through this window, in what we consider a hate crime, is totally unacceptable," said veteran Pat Scanlon."
 
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At the behest of Florida Governor Rick Scott, the Republican-controlled state legislature will soon be considering a bill to mandate the privatization of all correctional facilities in 18 counties even though their last attempt to do so was ruled unconstitutional.

The Florida Senate Rules Committee has proposed a bill that would require the state's Department of Corrections to privatize all prisons and other correctional facilities in 18 counties, according to the News Service of Florida.

The state legislature passed nearly the same measure last year, but the law was ruled unconstitutional in court because it didn't go through the committee process, violating the Florida Constitution.

The second largest private prison company in the world, GEO Group, has donated $822,000 to political campaigns in Florida, according to the nonpartisan National Institute on Money in Politics. The company also spent $25,000 for Florida Gov. Rick Scott's (R) inauguration party.

This has nothing to do with saving the state or the taxpayer money and everything to do with further enriching the already rich.

Privatizing prisons does nothing to lower costs because of corporate overhead, and incarceration rates increase in the presence of private prisons because there is a financial incentive to fill them up. Anyone who has been in a private prison, known someone locked up in one, or worked at one can tell you that.

This would also mean replacing the employees at each correctional facility in each of the 18 counties with cheaper, non-union, unsympathetic zombies.

Rick Scott's secret plan to personally deliver Florida to President Obama in November is going well.

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How's that fallout bunker coming? Via Reuters:
Russia would regard any military intervention linked to Iran's nuclear programme as a threat to its own security, Moscow's departing ambassador to NATO warned on Friday. "Iran is our neighbour," Dmitry Rogozin told reporters in Brussels. "And if Iran is involved in any military action, it's a direct threat to our security." Rogozin was speaking two days after the killing of a nuclear scientist in Tehran by a hitman on a motorcycle. Kremlin Security Council head Nikolai Patrushev, who is close to Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, said Israel was pushing the United States towards war with Iran, according to the Interfax news agency. Russia, however, opposes a boycott of Iranian oil. "We are definitely interested in the non-proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," Rogozin said on Friday. "But at the same time, we believe that any country has the right to have what it needs to feel comfortable, including Iran."
That Doomsday Clock is ticking forward...
 
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They should repeat this poll in light of last night's result.
The Jan. 8 survey involved 756 people who were up to date on Tebow. The youthful 18-to-29-year-old demographic was the one most apt to believe that it isn't just the football gods who are smiling on Tebow, with 52.3% saying yes to the Divine Intervention theory. Among ethnic groups, the Hispanic/Latino demographic was the biggest believer, with 81.3% saying yes. Among African-Americans, 59.5% said yes, and for whites it was 38.3%. Politcally speaking, 54.2% of Republicans said yes, as did 38.2% of Democrats and 35.1% of independent voters.
God cares about football but doesn't care, apparently, about disease, starvation, war, murder, etc etc etc. Praise! Glory! Donate!
 
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Rep. Allen West (R-Crazy Caucus) has something to say about critics of the Marines who pissed on the corpses of Taliban soldiers.

"As for everyone else, unless you have been shot at by the Taliban, shut your mouth, war is hell."

These idiots gave the Taliban a free and valuable propaganda tool for activating other extremists to kill people, including Americans. And Allen West is defending them. Good job.

Also, we should be forever diligent about calling out members of Congress who tell us to "shut our mouths." There's a constitutional amendment that allows us to not shut our mouths, and it specifically prevents wackaloons like Allen West from making us do so.

 

 

 

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