Friday, May 27, 2011

Headlines - Friday May 27

 
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Time Magazine reports:
The latest sex-abuse case to rock the Catholic Church is unfolding in the archdiocese of an influential Italian Cardinal who has been working with Pope Benedict XVI on reforms to respond to prior scandals of pedophile priests. Father Riccardo Seppia, a 51-year-old parish priest in the village of Sastri Ponente, near Genoa, was arrested last Friday, May 13, on pedophilia and drug charges. Investigators say that in tapped mobile-phone conversations, Seppia asked a Moroccan drug dealer to arrange sexual encounters with young and vulnerable boys. "I do not want 16-year-old boys but younger. Fourteen-year-olds are O.K. Look for needy boys who have family issues," he allegedly said. Genoa Archbishop Angelo Bagnasco, who is the head of the Italian Bishops Conference, had been working with Benedict to establish a tough new worldwide policy, released this week, on how bishops should handle accusations of priestly sex abuse.
As always, you can't make it up.
 
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"We don't need to rewrite the Constitution of the United States of America, we need to reread the Constitution and enforce the Constitution," Cain said. "And I know that there are some people that are not going to do that, so for the benefit of those that are not going to read it because they don't want us to go by the Constitution, there's a little section in there that talks about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Herman Cain, (R-Extra Cheese) mixing up the Constitution with the Declaration of Independence.

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U.S. House Votes To Defund Medical Schools That Teach Abortion

 
The U.S. House has approved an amendment defunding medical schools that teach doctors how to perform abortions. The measure was sponsored by GOP Rep. Virginia Foxx (NC), whom you may recall for claiming that the murder of Matthew Shepard was a hoax.
The North Carolina Republican's proposal was offered as an amendment to a bill that puts funding restrictions on a teaching program in President Barack Obama's health care act. The amendment passed 234-182, over the objections of some Democrats who said it would prevent medical residents from learning a basic procedure in women's health care. The bill must still be considered by the Senate.

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Huh. Healthcare reform is working the way it was supposed to, too. "Provisions in the new U.S. healthcare reform law meant to add people to insurance rolls appear to be working, figures from companies and a recent study show. ... One of the provisions in the Affordable Care Act allowed young adults who are not full-time students to remain on their parents' insurance plans until they are 26 years old. This has resulted in a pick-up of 600,000 additional people with coverage in the first quarter of the year, Forbes Magazine reported Monday. ... The figure comes from insurance companies. Wellpoint, which has 34 million customers, covered 280,000 additional people at the end of the first quarter, while Aetna added almost 100,000. ... Among companies that gained in the number of people they insured, Kaiser Permanente added 90,000, while Highmark added 72,000. ... Adding young people to the number of insured customers is a big benefit to everyone else, because young people do not get sick as often or for as long a period as older customers. As a result, insurance companies made record profits in the first quarter."
 
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Get a crucifix or something!
 
Screwing the poor is a religion with these assholes, it really is. 

Former Vice President Dick Cheney has apparently revised his previous viewpoint that "deficits don't matter," as he is now saying it's "time to get serious" about the nation's fiscal problems.

Following his keynote address at the KPMG Global Energy Institute conference in Houston, Cheney issued a resounding endorsement of Republican budget-wizard Paul Ryan and his plans to kill Medicare.

"I worship the ground the Paul Ryan walks on," Cheney said Wednesday at a Houston event hosted by the KPMG Global Energy Institute. "I think he's an enormously talented individual and he's trying to do the right thing. And he deserves the support, all the support we can provide him."

"We need to get serious about dealing with [our] debt problem," the former vice president explained.

Video here 

Short of being endorsed by the Four Horsemen, an endorsement from Dick Cheney is the next best thing.

While an endorsement by the Fifth Horsemen himself may shore up support among longtime, self-identified Republicans, I can't see it helping among the rest of the voting population. And if I'm Paul Ryan right now, I have to be questioning whether or not I should welcome the kiss of death.

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With friends "like" these... Rep. Patrick McHenry may be regretting calling Elizabeth Warren a liar -- and that open Facebook posting policy he has. About 15,000 people have "liked" him on his fan page to post angry demands that he apologize.

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House passes disgraceful defense bill.

Oh, and we'll have our rights curtailed for another 4 years

'Hi there, I wrote the Constitution!'

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I loathe this woman.

RIP America.

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Paul Krugman believes that this recession is so deep and will last so long that it will be another depression. He wonders why nobody in the Congress or the Administration seems to give a shit about it.

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Atheist shadenfreude of the year

Have I mentioned lately that electing freakazoids to public office is not just evil but stupid?

And really, really expensive?

Media Czech nails it:

What happens when two Kentucky counties fight a 12-year battle to save souls by posting Jesus Rules and wind up owing $456,881 to the Godless ACLU when they fail?

Well, they fight over who's going to pay the bill, that's what.

SNIP

I love it when fundies fight among themselves about who's going to get the bill for their ridiculous and unnecessary PR scam.

Ken Ham and Steve Beshear, this is the Ghost of Christmas Future!


I don't expect the Flintstone Truther Park to ever actually get built, but that doesn't mean there's not a huge opportunity here for the first atheist organization with some volunteer lawyers on its board.  

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You know your party has gone off the rails on the crazy train when an Alabama republican switches parties because he's put off by making teachers into villains and the cause of all societies ills. "Chalk up another Democratic win this week: Alabama State Rep. Daniel Boman, who entered the legislature as a Republican in November, is switching parties to become a Democrat after he says the GOP went too far in attacking teachers in the state. ... It's just the latest example of mainline Republicans turning on their party following the November sweep which put them in control of the House. "

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Eric Cantor - American sociopath
 
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Oh for god's sake, can you even imagine?
 
Arnold Schwarzenegger didn't just bang his housekeepers all the time, while he was married to a woman apparently living in the same house. Arnold also had "CHP Dignitary Protection Services" officers deliver hot young club girls to the Hyatt in Sacramento where he lived while governatin' and fornicatin'.
 
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Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) defended his involvement in the cover up of disgraced former Sen. John Ensign's (R-NV) affair, telling CSPAN yesterday that he was "proud" of the way he handled the situation. Coburn's name was mentioned repeatedly in the Senate Ethics Committee's damning 75-page report on the scandal, saying Coburn acted as a go-between to try to keep Ensign's mistress quiet.

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Senate Republicans are using a procedural move to prevent Obama from being able to make recess appointments next week when the chamber is out for Memorial Day recess. The Senate will be in a "pro forma session" during which no business will be conducted, but it blocks Obama from appointing Elizabeth Warren to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

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It may seem like Sarah Palin's suddenly resurrected candidacy is catching the fancy of Republican voters again, since the latest Gallup poll shows her only a couple of percentage points behind the clear leader, Mitt Romney -- but well ahead of everyone else.

Or at least, everyone else except the clear leader -- Anybody Else?

Mitt Romney (17%) and Sarah Palin (15%) now lead a smaller field of potential Republican presidential candidates in rank-and-file Republicans' preferences for the party's 2012 nominee. Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich, and Herman Cain essentially tie for third, with Cain registering 8% support in his initial inclusion in Gallup "trial heat" polling. Notably, 22% of Republicans do not have a preference at this point.

That's right, the clear leader in the Republican race, with 22 percent of the vote, is "None/No opinion."

Somewhere out there is a handsome young Reagan-in-waiting who just needs to be found, no doubt. That seems to be what Republicans are waiting for, anyway.

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As reported earlier, Ed Schultz found himself in some hot water for calling right wing radio host and Fox pundit Laura Ingraham a "right wing slut" on his radio show this Tuesday. Schultz apologized tonight during the intro to his nightly television show on MSNBC.

MSNBC has suspended Schultz for one week without pay for the incident.

While I cannot and do not condone the kind of sexist remark made by Schultz and there is no excuse for what he said, someone let me know when anyone on right wing radio or over at Fox ever gets some time off or apologizes for the kind of sexist or racist remarks we hear out of their mouths on a weekly basis, will you?

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h/t Dick:
China's Interest in Farmland Makes Brazil Uneasy
Efforts to undermine new consumer agency amateurish, dangerous
 

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