Like every Democratic president since John F. Kennedy, President Obama is battling the perception that he's a wimp on national security.Keep reading: http://griperblade.blogspot.com/2010/01/americans-confident-in-obama-on.htmlIt's not just coming from Republicans (for example, Dick Cheney's accusation that Mr. Obama is trying to pretend that the country isn't at war). Now barbs are coming from the center too. This week's Foreign Policy magazine has a provocative cover: Mr. Obama next to Jimmy Carter with — gasp — an "equals" sign in the middle. New York Times/CBS polling shows that public approval of Mr. Obama's foreign policy dropped 9 points to 50 percent between last April and November. Leslie H. Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, wrote on the Daily Beast blog two weeks ago that Mr. Obama needs to toughen up with his adversaries. "He puts far too much store on being the smartest guy in the room," Mr. Gelb wrote. "He'd do well to remember that Jimmy Carter also rang all the I.Q. bells."
Geez, it is getting to the point that you cannot go to any movie without putting your ever-lasting soul in jeopardy. After giving a thumbs-down to the movie New Moon, the Vatican is now panning Avatar as a threat to the true faith. Joining the Pontiff is a Chicago Alderman who opposes the movie for making Marines look like wimps, here:
http://jonathanturley.org/2010/01/12/pope-pans-avatar/
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Heterosexual Pastor Matt Baker Goes To Trial For Murdering His Wife
In a case that is pulling back the curtain on the violence of the heterosexual lifestyle, a prosecutor today revealed that the lividity in the corpse of Pastor Matt Baker's wife showed that she was long dead before the 45-minute window during which Baker claims she committed suicide while he was at the store. Investigators believe Baker poisoned his wife and then smothered her as their two children slept peacefully in an adjoining room. One week after the murder, witnesses reported seeing Baker shopping for engagement rings with a tall blond woman known to be his mistress.Other "religious" leaders such as "pro-family" heterosexual activists Joseph Farah, Peter LaBarbera, and Matt Barber have remained typically silent on this gruesome example of the depraved chosen lifestyle of Pastor Matt Baker. The women in their homes should sleep lightly, one never knows when the murderous rage inherent to the deviant lives of heterosexual "religious" men will surface.
Divorce Rises In States With Same-Sex Marriage Ban
What a sport. Too bad he never reaches out to the other side of the aisle, huh?
President Obama will address the House Republican Conference later this month during their retreat in Baltimore, being held Jan. 28th to 30th.Obama was invited by the elected GOP Leadership to speak a few weeks ago and will take them up on their offer.
Mike Pence said a few nice words about being grateful, blahblahblah, presenting GOP proposals, blahblah...
But House Minority Whip Eric Cantor said this:
"Though it's welcome news that President Obama will speak with House Republicans later this month, it is important to point out that true bipartisanship requires working together on common-sense solutions and a mainstream agenda to help Americans facing difficult challenges.
Eric is so wise. He's should be Obama's go-to guy for bipartisanship and common-sense solutions. Please do go on, Mr. Can't We All Just Get Along:
It is important to ask whether the President plans to meet WITH Republicans, or speak TO them.
Is that anything like laughing WITH someone and not AT them? Or does Eric just like to condescend TO the president OF the United States.
In 2009, on the rare occasion when we were invited to the White House, the President paid Republican proposals lip service while the cameras were on, only to completely rebuff those ideas afterward.
If that is true-- and that's a big IF-- that's a whole lot more than the Rushpublics ever did for the president.
The problems faced by our country have grown too large for the President to respond to Republican and Independent views and solutions with indifference, like in 2009. I hope this is a sign that a new year will bring change."
Tell ya what, Eric: You stop obstructing, Obama will stop indifferenting... if indeed, he ever did do that.
And don't forget to "pay lip service" and applaud after the president, your guest speaker, speaks. Anything short of that could be looked on as, you know, not truly bipartisan.
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North Korea's Kim: "I don't understand why there's a Sarah Palin"
"I thought a 'civilized' country like the U.S. wasn't supposed to have ignorant paranoid psychopaths running for office."
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Privacy? Turns out airport scanners can store, send images
Imagine that! First of all, who can believe that they'd lie to us about just how much they can see with these airport scanners? (That was irony, folks.) And not only that, they have the capability to take, say, celebrity scans and email them to the National Enquirer. Who'd a thunk it? http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/it-all-depends-what-you-mean-privacy
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JPMorgan's Dimon 'Tired' of Attacks Over Bonuses.
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A man inside a pizza shop where the elder Bush stopped for a piece of pizza instead got a piece of a customers mind, and the man filmed it and youtubed it. "Murderous, Zionist piece of shit. You won't get your new world order, guys. Are you happy for the millions of deaths you're part of?" the man continued. "People know. People are waking up to the reality of this, Mr. Bush." One of the elder Bush's security detail got a talking-to as well when he told the man his actions were "Unnecessary." That didn't go over well. "No, it isn't unnecessary," the cameraman replied. "The guy is responsible for killing millions. If you knew anything about real history ..." and the clip ends.
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My God- the earthquake in Haiti is looking to be another disaster of epic proportions. Those poor folks simply can not catch a break, can they? Now would be a good time to do a google search of Unicef or the Red Cross and open your wallet. Haiti is already the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, and this is going to make the situation much worse. A lot of people are dead and everyone else is suffering.
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Imagine a company like, say, Procter & Gamble telling the government of an entire country of billions of people that if it doesn't clean up its act, it can go "f" itself: http://brilliantatbreakfast.blogspot.com/2010/01/imagine-thata-corporation-willing-to.html
"Dumb it down", what a novel idea! So colleges effectively become the new high schools and so on.
I fail to see how cheapening whatever remains of the value of a high school diploma serves anyone.
Before the first juror is selected or witness called, a decision allowing a confessed killer to argue he believes the slaying of one of the nation's few late-term abortion providers was a justified act aimed at saving unborn children has upended what most expected to be an open-and-shut case.Some abortion opponents are pleasantly stunned and eager to watch Scott Roeder tell a jury his slaying of Wichita doctor George Tiller was voluntary manslaughter. Tiller's colleagues and abortion rights advocates are outraged and fear the court's actions give a more than tacit approval to further acts of violence.
''This judge has basically announced a death sentence for all of us who help women,'' said Dr. Warren Hern of Boulder, Colo., a longtime friend of Tiller who also performs late-term abortions. ''That is the effect of the ruling.''
[...]
Will the judge's decision embolden militant anti-abortion activists and lead to open season on abortion providers? Does the Justice Department plan to file charges against Roeder under federal statutes guaranteeing access to clinics? And what does it portend for the unfolding case itself and the inevitable legal challenges to the nation's abortion laws?
Hern, of Boulder, Colo., said it's irrelevant that Wilbert won't decide until after the defense presents its evidence whether to allow jurors to actually consider a conviction on the lesser charge.
''The damage is done: The judge has agreed to give him a platform,'' Hern said. ''It is an act of incomprehensible stupidity on the part of the judge, but he is carrying out the will of the people of Kansas who are trying to get out of the 19th century.''
The Feminist Majority Foundation also denounced the ruling, saying Wilbert essentially was allowing a justifiable homicide defense. The group, which supports abortion rights, urged the Justice Department to file federal charges under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act.
Justice Department spokesman Alejandro Miyar declined to comment, citing an ongoing [...]
A man who runs a Web site supporting violence against abortion providers said in the wake of the judge's decision that he has changed his mind about attending Roeder's trial. The Rev. Don Spitz of Chesapeake, Va., said he and other activists from the Army of God plan to observe the court proceedings quietly next week.
''I am flabbergasted, but in a good way,'' Spitz said of the judge's decision.
Spitz acknowledged that the possibility that Wilbert's decision may influence some people who in the past wouldn't kill abortion providers because they risked a sentence of death or life imprisonment. ''It may increase the number of people who may be willing to take that risk,'' he said.
In Des Moines, Iowa, militant anti-abortion activist Dave Leach agreed the decision opens the door to presenting the same evidence as in a case of justifiable homicide. It was Leach who wrote the 104-page legal brief that Roeder signed and submitted to the court in which he admitted killing Tiller.
''The closer we come to a court actually addressing these issues, the less danger abortionists are going to be in,'' Leach said.
Nice little clinic you have there. Be a shame if anything happened to it...
Anybody in Kansas think a judge publicly inciting murder is cause for removal from the bench?
Since the Obama administration came into being, it has seemed unthinkable to me that the people in charge went into this monumental undertaking without a plan, as keeps appearing to be the case. So we've had the whole DWT research staff knocking on doors and combing through records in the Village of Washington, and sure enough, it turns out that the Obama strategists came in with a sheafload of plans, which they've been carefully executing. The research is still preliminary, but as of the present state of our knowledge, here are --
WHEN HARRY MET NEGROES: "Republicans are very angry with Reid this week, and not just because he's a powerful Democrat in Washington about to pass the thing Republicans hate more than Islam, which is affordable health care for Americans." [Las Vegas Weekly]
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Mentally disturbed airhead joins braindead compatriots
Ending all hope of one day being taken seriously as a legitimate news channel, Faux Nooze hires world-renowned stupe.
"It's wonderful to be part of a place that so values fair and balanced news."First of all, anyone who could say that with a straight face deserves to be carted off to a maximum-security nut-hatch, pronto. Secondly, this:
Mooselini would have 'wild mood swings and would shut down in a catatonic stupor ahead of interviews,' a new book reveals:
This is Fux Noise's new contributor. Well, until the inevitable day…Palin's behaviour was so erratic that at one point senior figures in the McCain campaign began to seriously discuss the possibility that she was mentally unstable.
The embarrassing claims come as it was revealed that Palin is set to take her conservative message to the right wing US cable news channel Fox. While being drilled for upcoming interviews, 'she would routinely shut down - chin on her chest, arms folded, eyes cast to the floor, speechless and motionless, lost in what those around her described as a kind of catatonic stupor'.
The morning of her ill-fated CBS interview with Katie Couric, Ms Palin - 'her eyes glassy and dead' - was unresponsive to attempts to prep her as she was being made up.
'As they were about to set off to meet Couric, Palin announced "I hate this makeup" -smearing it off her face, messing up her hair, complaining she looked fat,' the book says.
According to the book, Mr Schmidt and Rick Davis, McCain's campaign manager, arrived at Ms Palin's hotel room in Philadelphia and 'were appalled by the scene they found'.
'The room was hot and claustrophobic; the shades were drawn. The place was full of half-eaten hotel food and stank of mouldering french fries.'Palin, looking dazed, was surrounded, as usual, by stacks and stacks of index cards.'
Sarah Palin today: "I am thrilled to be joining the great talent and management team at Fox News."
Sarah Palin next month: "It's time for me to quit and spend more time with my inanity."
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h/t Dick:
Prevarication, historical distortions and a boundless capacity for intolerance and hate have become universal hallmarks of conservative Republicans across the nation, whether they are self-styled pundits, media associates, politicians, or your next door neighbor. An interesting latter-day phenomenon for a major political party in the US (with the possible exception of the mid nineteenth century), although many European, Asian, African, and South American nations have experienced the inevitable and unfortunate results of this aberration throughout history.
Perhaps the time has come for our universities to conduct a thoroughgoing and professional study to determine the specific root cause(s) and the nature of this critical issue, and its short and longer term effects on the individual and collective psyche.
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In recent days, conservatives have seized on the cold snap gripping the southeast region of the country to cast doubt on global warming. "Hey Al Gore: we want our global warming, and we want it now," said Newsbusters' Mark Finkelstein. In his newsletter today, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich wondered about "Al Gore's explanation for this miserable, persistent chill," and the National Review's Mona Charen claimed that the "cold snap has spurred the 'warmists' to spin control."
For the past week, Fox News host Neil Cavuto has been giving a daily "Fox News global warming alert," which consists of him telling viewers how cold it is. "It is still cold," Cavuto said yesterday, adding that it's "not your recent garden variety global warming." "It's freezing across the entire globe," Cavuto shouted on Saturday. Former Nixon speechwriter and actor Ben Stein responded, "Maybe somebody in the government will wake up and say, 'Hey, it's colder. It's not hotter.' Maybe all this talk about global warming needs to be rethought." Watch a compilation: http://thinkprogress.org/2010/01/12/cold-snap-global-warming/
