How's that "Convention Reset" going, Governor Romney?? (VIDEO)

Oh. That bad.

Capping off a busy week in GOP racism: Ron Paul. Willing AND Stupid?

Here we go...again.  First Jenny Sanford, then Rick Santorum, Chris Christie, Jan Brewer, and certainly not forgetting Newt "Food Stamps" Gingrich...

Thus, I give you...today's Washington Post:

Ron Paul, well known as a physician, congressman and libertarian , has also been a businessman who pursued a marketing strategy that included publishing provocative, racially charged newsletters to make money and spread his ideas, according to three people with direct knowledge of Paul’s businesses.

The Republican presidential candidate has denied writing inflammatory passages in the pamphlets from the 1990s and said recently that he did not read them at the time or for years afterward. Numerous colleagues said he does not hold racist views.

But people close to Paul’s operations said he was deeply involved in the company that produced the newsletters, Ron Paul & Associates, and closely monitored its operations, signing off on articles and speaking to staff members virtually every day.

“It was his newsletter, and it was under his name, so he always got to see the final product. . . . He would proof it,’’ said Renae Hathway, a former secretary in Paul’s company and a supporter of the Texas congressman.

And...

In the past, Paul has taken responsibility for the passages because they were published under his name. But last month, he told CNN that he was unaware at the time of the controversial passages. “I’ve never read that stuff. I’ve never read — I came — was probably aware of it 10 years after it was written.’’ Paul said.

A person involved in Paul’s businesses, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid criticizing a former employer, said Paul and his associates decided in the late 1980s to try to increase sales by making the newsletters more provocative. They discussed adding controversial material, including racial statements, to help the business, the person said.

“It was playing on a growing racial tension, economic tension, fear of government,’’ said the person, who supports Paul’s economic policies but is not backing him for president. “I’m not saying Ron believed this stuff. It was good copy. Ron Paul is a shrewd businessman.’’

The articles included racial, anti-Semitic and anti-gay content. They claimed, for example, that the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. “seduced underage girls and boys’’; they ridiculed black activists by suggesting that New York be named “Zooville” or “Lazyopolis”; and they said the 1992 Los Angeles riots ended “when it came time for the blacks to pick up their welfare checks.’’ The June 1990 edition of the Ron Paul Political Report included the statement: “Homosexuals, not to speak of the rest of society, were far better off when social pressure forced them to hide their activities.”

It is unclear precisely how much money Paul made from his newsletters, but during the years he was publishing them, he reduced his debts and substantially increased his net worth, according to his congressional and presidential disclosure reports. In 1984, he reported debt of up to $765,000, most of which was gone by 1995, when he reported a net worth of up to $3.3 million. Last year, he reported a net worth up to $5.2 million.

The newsletters bore his name in large print and featured articles on topics ranging from investment advice to political commentary. Frequently written in first person, they contained personalized notes, such as holiday greetings from Paul and his wife, Carol.

And...

Hathway, the former Ron Paul & Associates secretary, said: “We had tons of subscribers, from all over the world. . . . I never had one complaint’’ about the content.

No, I suppose you wouldn't.

Andrew Sullivan, in serious slinging bullshit mode:

I cannot and will not defend the newsletters. And Paul's apparent lies about his involvement make the matter worse. And I don't think Paul is the "best vehicle" for advancing the ideas TNC cites. He's a very flawed vehicle, like most politicians and human beings. And I corrected immediately the record on the MLK holiday.

But when Paul has said what he has said in these debates, when he has walked into the lion's den of a GOP primary and attacked the criminal justice system for racial bias, lacerated the war on drugs, and cut to the core of the delusions behind American global aggression, he deserves to be judged on his recent history as well as his increasingly distant past. His message that more liberty makes diversity more possible is a vital one.

Would TNC have excoriated Robert F Kennedy in 1968 as someone who could not possibly channel progressive ideas because he was once a hatchetman for Joe McCarthy?

I acknowledge this newsletter incident is ugly, indefensible and, above all, cynical. I don't think it is all that matters in the remarkable late career of congressman Paul. And that hunting for heretics rather than celebrating converts is a losing political strategy.

Ta-Neishi Coates (written before Sullivan):

If you believe that a character who would conspire to profit off of white supremacy, anti-gay bigotry, and anti-Semitism is the best vehicle for convincing the country to end the drug war, to end our romance with interventionism, to encourage serious scrutiny of state violence, at every level, then you should be honest enough to defend that proposition.

What you should not do is claim that Ron Paul "legislated" for Martin Luther King Day, or claim to have intricate knowledge of Ron Paul's heart, and thus by the harsh accumulation of evidence, be made to look ridiculous.

Let me provide answer Mr. Sullivan's "question":

Would TNC have excoriated Robert F Kennedy in 1968 as someone who could not possibly channel progressive ideas because he was once a hatchetman for Joe McCarthy?

Now, Mr. Coates, can write his own response, but the answer is yes, provided Mr. Coates, me and rest of the black community were convinced RFK had not changed, that he was, deep down, hostile to African-Americans (or in the parlance of the time: Negroes). When RFK emerged from McCarthy's shadow, blacks were wary of him, but he eventually came out from under that cloud through good works, and more to the point, good deeds.  He came out of that cloud enough so that Mother to the day she died, would almost burst into tears just thinking about 1968.

Ron Paul, through his own actions, and the actions and statements of his son Rand, remains racially hostile (at the very least racially suspect) to African-Americans, with their combined statements against the Civil Rights Act, and Lunch-Counters being a matter of "defending property", and not as a matter of Human Rights, etc.

Simply put, yes, Ron Paul is saying some stuff in front of GOP Debate Audiences, and that seems to be the limit of what he's willing to do. He's said some equally onerous things about race in recent memory that make us believe that the Ron Paul from the 1990s has not changed one damn bit.

Chris Christie seems to be a willing racist (VIDEO)

I'll listen to Christie the moment he explains how my Father (who would've been alive at the time of this bull@#$% idea) would have been allowed to vote in said referendum.

Oh, that's right.  The white people of the South would've had to grant him his rights, voluntarily.

Assembly Speaker Sheila Y. Oliver of New Jersey crushed the Governor better than I could:

In a comment related to his call for a voter referendum on the proposal to legalize gay marriage in New Jersey, Gov. Chris Christie said Wednesday, “People would have been happy to have referendum on civil rights rather than fighting and dying in the streets in the South.”

The governor, who on Tuesday called for a referendum on the Nov. 6 ballot that would ask voters to decide if the state should legalize same-sex marriage, also said he will veto the Democratic legislation to allow it when the proposal reaches his desk.

The comment that the civil rights movement of the 1960s could have been settled through a national or southern states voter referendum stunned Assembly Speaker Sheila Y. Oliver (D-Essex), who became the first African-American woman to head the lower house in 2010.

“Gov. Christie better sit down with some of New Jersey’s great teachers for a history lesson, because his puzzling comment shows a complete misunderstanding about the civil rights movement,” Oliver said. “It’s impossible to ever conceive that a referendum on civil rights in the South would have been successful and brought justice to minorities. It’s unfathomable to even suggest a referendum would have been the better course.

“Governor – people were fighting and dying in the streets of the South for a reason,” the Assemblywoman said. “They were fighting and dying in the streets of the South because the majority refused to grant minorities equal rights by any method. It look legislative action to bring justice to all Americans, just as legislative action is the right way to bring marriage equality to all New Jerseyans.

Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey. Homophobe...and willing to be a racist piece of @#$%.

Sen. Lautenberg and Rep. McCarthy write a really dumb-ass column together...

Here is the actual headline in the piece o' crap Huffington Post today. Mind you, not the headline that makes you click on the story, but the actual headline:

Tell President Obama: Stop the NRA From Making Our Laws.

And the gist of the piece is?

The National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act (H.R. 822) would allow gun owners to carry a concealed firearm across state lines even if they weren't issued a permit by that state. That means Texas Governor Rick Perry could decide who can carry a concealed weapon in your state -- even if they have a criminal record that your state would consider a barrier to owning a gun.

This gun industry bill recently passed the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, with a little bit of Democratic help as well.

Americans of conscience who believe in protecting public safety should join us in asking President Obama to issue a veto threat to this ridiculous bill now, before it goes even further in Congress.

We have a petition, at www.StopHR822.com, to send President Obama a strong message from regular Americans across the nation that we will not let the gun manufacturers make laws that benefit them at the risk of public safety.

Click here immediately to call on President Obama to veto H.R. 822 -- we can't let this bill go any further.

Uhhh, excuse me Senator Lautenberg, Democrat of New Jersey...and Congresswoman McCarthy, Democrat of New York.

It strikes me you really should be going after to the people who would actually helped pass (and thus stop) said legislation.

Oh yeah...THEY WOULD BE CALLED SENATORS AND REPRESENTATIVES!!!

Look, these are two of the good guys when it comes to Gun Control. But it strikes me that people who are in a position to actually do something about bad legislation in its tracks have real nerve demanding President Obama do their damn job for them.


McCarthy is outnumbered.  She's got an excuse.  But in case you've forgotten, Senator...this hasn't passed the Senate yet, and there are things you yourself can do to stop this thing from happening.  You work within the single most dysfunctional branch of Government.  A Single Senator has the ability to grind any piece of legislation to a halt.  So how about putting a hold on the legislation?  How about organizing a filibuster?


How about you do your damn job before you go bitching to President Obama.

Did the President just say "Bite me" to Eric Cantor?

Granted, he said it in a very Presidential way, but still...



Key graph:

The main message that I have for all the residents not only of New Jersey but all those communities that have been affected by flooding, by the destruction that occurred as a consequence of Hurricane Irene is that the entire country is behind you and we are going to make sure that we provide all the resources that are necessary in order to help these communities rebuild.

And I know that there's been some talk about whether there's going to be a slowdown in getting funding out here, emergency relief. As President of the United States, I want to make it very clear that we are going to meet our federal obligations -- because we're one country, and when one part of the country gets affected, whether it's a tornado in Joplin, Missouri, or a hurricane that affects the Eastern Seaboard, then we come together as one country and we make sure that everybody gets the help that they need. And the last thing that the residents here of Paterson or the residents of Vermont or the residents of upstate New York need is Washington politics getting in the way of us making sure that we are doing what we can to help communities that have been badly affected.

And you watch Gov. Christie. He doesn't nod, but deep down (given his recent statements along the same lines) you know he does.

Chris Christie has a Murdoch Problem...

When Michael Isikoff broke the story about the FBI's beginning to zero in on a bit of American Phone-hacking by Murdoch and Corp., I wondered if this was going to get to Christie:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

And now it looks like it could, courtesy Eric Boehlert:

The background: A New Jersey start-up company, Floorgraphics (FGI), was created to sell large advertising decals placed on the floors of grocery stores. In 1999, FGI's founders, Richard and George Rebh, met with Carlucci who at the time was CEO of News America Marketing, an in-store advertising division of News Corp. (In 2005, Carlucci added the title of Post publisher to his resume.) At the lunch, after the Rebhs rebuffed Carlucci's offer to buy the company, he allegedly threatened to destroy FGI.

Years later company executives discovered FGI's secure website had been broken into nearly a dozen times and confidential information had been obtained. They alleged Murdoch's company was spreading lies about FGI and using its proprietary information to steal away clients.

At the time, FGI urged authorities to pursue criminal charges, but the case was not prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney General's office in New Jersey, run at the time by Chris Christie. (Now governor of New Jersey, Christie has struck up a close working relationship with Roger Ailes, chief of Murdoch's Fox News.)

A FGI civil suit, claiming a series of anti-competitive practices, was filed against News Corp.'s News America. In 2009, after only a couple of days of testimony, the case was abruptly settled with Murdoch's company agreeing to purchase FGI for $30 million, but not before News America conceded that someone using its computers had hacked FGI's website. (News America claimed it did not know who the culprit was.)

Now, in light of the UK phone-hacking fiasco, NBC's Michael Isikoff reports Department of Justice prosecutors "are reviewing allegations that News Corp.'s advertising arm repeatedly hacked into the computers of a competitor in the United States as part of an effort to steal the rival firm's business, according to a lawyer for the company."

Just what Mr. Unpleasant needs, in the middle of falling ratings, to be deposed by a U.S. Attorney (his old job!)

This is not to say that Governor Christie is guilty of any criminal wrongdoing. I doubt he did anything as unethical as taking a bribe (though it would be in character). But his hot seat is going to get a whole lot hotter.

The President Obama Urges Support for Small Business in Edison, N.J. (VIDEO)

The President urges Congress to pass legislation that will help remove obstacles to small business after meeting with small business owners at the Tastee Sub Shop in Edison, NJ. July 28, 2010.



In case you didn't already know, the GOP later went on to shoot down this bill.

I agree...

...with Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) when he cracked on the President:

"Telling people we're not going to get a legislative solution this year, or to suggest maybe that it's not possible this year, is not in the best interests of the nation."

Never let a good ego get in the way of the facts...

It's hard not to respect Daily Kos for starting a Liberal Revolution on the Internet, and for that, he has my thanks and respect.

But it's also hard to ignore when he lets his ego get in the way of the facts, which in my mind, he has a tendency to do:

Thus, I offer Kos's take on last night's elections:

This is a base problem, and this is what Democrats better take from tonight:

1. If you abandon Democratic principles in a bid for unnecessary "bipartisanship", you will lose votes.

2. If you water down reform in favor of Blue Dogs and their corporate benefactors, you will lose votes.

3. If you forget why you were elected -- health care, financial services, energy policy and immigration reform -- you will lose votes.

Wow. While there's something to that in general, in reality, for this particular election...ehhhh, not so much.

1. Despite the "Republican Wave", and Democrats "abandoning their principles", the night wasn't a total disaster for Democrats. Besides the House victories (see below), we held onto Mayorships in the South that were supposed to go to Republicans in Charlotte and Chapel Hill, North Carolina. Washington State passed Marriage Equality for Gay-Americans. Washington State and Maine both THUMPED Tea-Bagger favored Tax Resolutions, and the New Jersey Legislature managed to stay Democratic despite the Christie win.

Granted, these are small wins, but considering how animated the Glenn Beck crowd was, particularly in the "Obama-ain't-from-here" South, these wins shouldn't be discounted.

And you'll note the source for No. 1. Yeah, it was the Daily Kos.

2. And somehow in this "Republican Wave", the House Democrats snared themselves two more votes for Health Care, as both new Congressmen favor the House Legislation.

3. And sorry, Kos...I know you got a line to push, but exit polls are showing that Obama (of whom you were clearly speaking) was not a factor in either of the Virginia or New Jersey races.

One-hundred egos...

Once again, a scumbag Senator is holding up not just one, but two of the President's nominees, this time in the field of science: John Holdren, who is in line to lead the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Oregon State University marine biologist Jane Lubchenco, Obama's nominee to head the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

We should rise up, tar and feather the dirtbag Republican Senator who--

Excuse me, what was that?

It's a Democrat who's holding up the nominations?

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) has placed a "hold" that blocks votes on confirming Harvard University physicist John Holdren, who is in line to lead the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Oregon State University marine biologist Jane Lubchenco, Obama's nominee to head the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. According to sources who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the matter, Menendez is using the holds as leverage to get Senate leaders' attention for a matter related to Cuba rather than questioning the nominees' credentials.

Jim Manley, spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), said of Menendez's objections, "We will work to try to address any concerns that he may have."

This is a slightly personal matter to me, as I met Dr. Holdren when he presented an award to my dear old Dad in 2007.

Needless to say, despite the fact that this situation is being driven by an allegedly fellow Democrat, my assessment of the situation is no less harsh.

Mr. Menendez:

You barely won re-election, and maybe the reason it was so close because of narrow-ass bull@$# thinking like this.  So shut up, drop the hold or get nothing from this President ever again in the future, because Obama's carrying New Jersey in 2012 with or without you.

An old-fashioned kind of racism...

Imagine the surprise of a family of Obama supporters from Hardwick, New Jersey when they woke up this morning and found a six-foot cross burning on their lawn.