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Mitch McConnell autotunes Alison Lundergan Grimes

Tue, 02 Jul 2013 19:47:00 +0000

A bizarre new campaign video put out by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's staff autotunes his new Dem opponent in 2014, Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes, asking: "What Rhymes with Alison Lundergan Grimes?"

Some of the answers, according to the video: "Sticks to party line," "not ready for prime time" and "left wing mime."

As Judd Legum of ThinkProgress points out:

[embedtweet id="352138499597692930"]

Watch:

Chris Christie isn’t “post-partisan” on LGBT rights

Tue, 02 Jul 2013 17:47:00 +0000

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie may be lauded in the national press as being more concerned with results than politics, but right now he's locked in a highly divisive, partisan battle in his home state. While Christie has cultivated the image of being “post-partisan” through strategic embraces of President Obama, he draws the line on conservative social values, like opposition to abortion and gay marriage. And right now he's locked in a bitter debate in New Jersey on the latter issue, and it could have national implications.

Christie, of course, governs a state that, polls indicate, supports establishing same-sex marriage and protecting a woman’s reproductive rights. So how does he walk the fine line, governing effectively in a state whose constituents have progressive social values, without disqualifying himself from the 2016 Republican primaries in which conservative Tea Party activists are the gatekeepers to the nomination?

In 2003, New Jersey was one of the first states to pass “domestic partnerships,” but the state’s Supreme Court struck them down. In 2006, the New Jersey Legislature voted to permit “civil unions.” In 2009, Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine committed to sign a marriage equality bill if the Democratic Legislature sent one to his desk. They weren’t able to make it happen in the few remaining months of Corzine’s term.

How epic GOP bumbling could inadvertently save food stamps

Tue, 02 Jul 2013 15:05:00 +0000

There are lawmakers in the Republican Party who really hate the idea of the government helping poor people stay alive via eating. This disdain is severe enough that 62 Republican members of Congress voted down last month’s Farm Bill -- with several specifically citing the proposed $20 billion cut to food stamps (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP) as deplorably insufficient. (Deplorably insufficient as an amount to be cut, that is -- not deplorably insufficient for feeding the needy.)

The political ramifications of the party failing to pass the Farm Bill have been thoroughly analyzed, but less discussed has been the life-or-death implications of what will happen to the program now. And on that score, there’s a strong chance that Republicans’ unholy combination of malice and dimwittedness might actually yield the reverse of its desired effect: fewer cuts than they sought, not more.

First, some background. The Democratic-controlled Senate passed its own Farm Bill that would cut SNAP by some $4 billion, an amount already troubling to people concerned about hunger in America. The House then took that $4 billion cut and multiplied it by five, calling for a $20.5 billion reduction.

Romney voted against presidential run in family poll

Tue, 02 Jul 2013 13:23:00 +0000

In a new book due out in August, the Washington Post's Dan Balz reports that Mitt Romney voted against his own 2012 presidential bid in an internal family poll leading up to the decision.

From Sam Stein at the Huffington Post, who obtained an early copy of the book:

Over the Christmas break of 2010, Mitt Romney and his family took an internal poll on whether he should run for president once more. Twelve family members cast ballots. Ten said no. One of the 10 was Mitt Romney himself.

The doubts that the former Massachusetts governor harbored before ultimately launching his second unsuccessful bid for the presidency are one of several attention-grabbing details in "Collision 2012," the newest book on the 2012 campaign.

In an interview with Balz, Romney said that he changed his mind when he realized how weak the other candidates were in the Republican primary field. "I didn't think that any one of them had a good chance of defeating the president," Romney said, "and in some cases I thought that they lacked the experience and perspective necessary to do what was essential to get the country on track."

Where are the young Democrats?

Tue, 02 Jul 2013 11:45:00 +0000

With Hillary Clinton the runaway favorite as the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee (should she run), Republicans are already making clear that they will focus attention on her age, reports Jonathan Martin of the New York Times. Clinton will be nearly 70 if she runs in three years, "a generation removed from most of the possible Republican candidates." As Mike Tomasky and Alec MacGillis wrote Monday, the attacks could backfire -- and Karl Rove's notion that the GOP will capture a large portion of the youth vote because of Clinton's age is laughable.

But the attack does reveal a key weakness in today's Democratic Party that could haunt it for the next decade or more -- it has a relatively barren farm system of young up-and-comers. The party could easily survive 2016 with Clinton at the top of the ticket, but what about subsequent cycles?

Hey, GOP: Mexican immigrants aren’t necessarily Democrats

Mon, 01 Jul 2013 20:30:00 +0000

Once you get past all of the posturing, opposition to immigration reform among congressional Republicans is at least partially based on self-preservation. There is a widespread belief that Mexican immigrants who become citizens are overwhelmingly disposed to vote Democratic.

Newly published research suggests that’s a complete misreading of the facts. According to this analysis, politically engaged Mexicans who move to the U.S. fall all over the ideological spectrum, very much like native-born Americans.

What’s more, according to University of Nebraska-Lincoln political scientist Sergio Wals, those on the right are more inclined to participate in the American electoral process than those on the left.

Pelosi: GOP needs immigration reform to win the presidency again

Sun, 30 Jun 2013 17:10:00 +0000

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi urged the House to pass immigration reform, saying that it's "right for our country," but also right for Republicans if they ever hope to win another presidential race.

"I believe that the members of Congress, many more than are directly affected themselves by the number of Hispanics in their district, will do what is right for our country,” Pelosi, D-Calif., said on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday. “And it’s certainly right, for the Republicans, if they ever want to win a presidential race.”

The immigration reform measure that passed out of the Senate last week is currently under consideration by the House, where it is unpopular among conservative Republicans. Republican leadership has indicated that they may not pass the full Senate version, but could pass legislation piecemeal instead.

RNC Chair: GOP has been “lousy” at outreach to Latinos

Sun, 30 Jun 2013 14:32:00 +0000

RNC Chair Reince Priebus acknowledged that Republicans have been "lousy" at reaching out to Latino voters, telling a group of Latino elected officials that that's "going to change."

“I’ll be honest here. In the past two years, we’ve done a pretty lousy job of connecting in the Latino community," Priebus said, speaking at an event in Chicago for the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, the Chicago Tribune reports. "We’ve missed out on opportunities to build better relationships. But that’s going to change."

“I didn’t come here to convert you,” he added. “I hope that it’s clear that we want to earn your trust and your vote.”

GOP and the Voting Rights Act: Can these Republicans do the right thing?

Sat, 29 Jun 2013 13:00:00 +0000

Now that the Supreme Court has severely weakened the Voting Rights Act, the president and Senate Democrats must revise it to restore its power to protect minority voters. The critical question is: What will the Republicans do?

As the Republican House leaders consider the way forward, they would do well to consider the decisions of the past two generations of top Republican legislators, without whom the Voting Rights Act would never have existed.

Most students of history know that President Lyndon Johnson’s mastery of the legislative process – and his huge Democratic majorities – were key to the bill’s original passage. But few know that the final bill was written in the office of the Republican minority leader, Everett McKinley Dirksen of Illinois.

President Lyndon Johnson feared a Southern filibuster might defeat the bill. To prevent a filibuster, two-thirds of the Senate would have to move to the bill to a final vote, and achieving this would require Republican votes. So Johnson turned to Dirksen. “…[ Y]ou come with me on this bill,” Johnson told him, “and two hundred years from now school children will know only two names: Abraham Lincoln and Everett Dirksen.”

New Jersey will face legal battle over same-sex marriage

Fri, 28 Jun 2013 16:48:00 +0000

Following the Supreme Court's decision to overturn the Defense of Marriage Act, not much has changed for couples in states where same-sex marriage is not yet legal. In New Jersey, legislation to do so looks dead in the water under threat of a Chris Christie veto, so gay rights advocates are hoping that they can mount a legal challenge to accomplish the same thing.

Lambda Legal is planning to file a motion, in a case currently before the New Jersey Superior Court, that argues that current New Jersey law is at odds with the state Supreme Court's 2006 holding that gay couples are required to get the same benefits as straight couples.

From The Washington Post:

In response to the 2006 ruling, the legislature passed a bill establishing civil unions in the state. Since civil unions were adopted in the state, marriage advocates have argued that they are not equal to marriage. The DOMA ruling bolsters that claim. While couples in civil unions may get some federal benefits after the ruling — it’s a legal gray area — they will not get the automatic benefits enjoyed by spouses in states where gay marriage is legal.

McDonnell won’t answer questions about Rolex watch

Fri, 28 Jun 2013 13:44:00 +0000

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, a Republican, refused to answer questions about a Rolex watch that was reportedly a gift from a donor who is currently under investigation by federal officials, and which McDonnell did not disclose in his financial filings.

The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports that McDonnell was asked whether he knew that the watch, worth $6500, had come from Star Scientific CEO Jonnie Williams Sr. “I’m not going to comment any further on that,” McDonnell replied.

From the Washington Post's initial report on the watch:

Phyllis Schlafly: Latino voters “don’t understand” the Bill of Rights “at all”

Thu, 27 Jun 2013 20:19:00 +0000

Conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly is still telling anyone who will listen that the Republican Party should only pay attention to white voters (something that it is already pretty good at doing, according to recent data).

This is a popular refrain for Schlafy, even though, as Jordan Fabian at ABC News notes, this is precisely the strategy that lost Republicans the popular vote in five of the last six presidential elections, to say nothing of how offensive it is to suggest the GOP disregard entire segments of the voting population based on race and ethnicity.

Schlafly was a guest on a conservative California radio show when she fired off her latest proclamation about the future of the GOP, announcing that courting Latino voters is a waste of the grand ol' party's time because they "don’t have any Republican inclinations at all,” and are "running an illegitimacy rate that’s just about the same as the blacks are.”

GOP senator “cannot imagine” Congress passing Voting Rights fix

Wed, 26 Jun 2013 13:16:00 +0000

Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., says that he "cannot imagine" Congress coming together to pass legislation that would counter the Supreme Court's decision to strike down a key part of the Voting Rights Act.

"In fairness, I doubt that will ever happen," Corker told the Huffington Post. "I just cannot imagine -- I'm just being honest -- Congress ever coming to terms with what they could agree on."

"In essence, what I guess would be occurring ... [would be] one group of folks would have to be saying another group of folks have some tendencies in a direction that are not good," Corker continued. "I don't know that in 2013 I see that happening."

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court ruled that Section 4 of the VRA is unconstitutional. This part of the law creates a formula to determine which areas of the country, with a history of racial discrimination at the polls, are subject to Section 5 of the law, which requires those areas to get pre-clearance from the Department of Justice before making changes to their voting laws. In its decision, the Supreme Court said that Congress could come up with a new formula to determine which areas need to get pre-clearance, but until then Section 5 is inoperable.

The ugly SCOTUS voting rights flim-flam

Tue, 25 Jun 2013 20:07:00 +0000

No good deed goes unpunished, I like to say. In striking down a key enforcement provision of the Voting Rights Act, Chief Justice John Roberts noted that African-American voter turnout in 2012 either exceeded or essentially matched white turnout in five of six Southern states governed by the act’s tough and controversial Section 5.

Ironically, as anyone paying attention knows, that turnout surge was driven by anger over a wave of GOP efforts to suppress black votes in those and other states – and it was helped along by Section 5, which requires states with a history of voting rights suppression to pre-clear any voting changes with the Justice Department (Justice struck down 21 such proposals since 2006). Still, despite new voter identification laws, restrictions on early voting and Sunday voting and other barriers, African-Americans voted at unprecedented rates in 2012 – and that helped give Roberts an excuse to strike down a section key to enforcing the law.

Actually, even the Flat Earth Society believes in climate change

Tue, 25 Jun 2013 19:40:00 +0000

In his big speech on climate change today, President Obama mocked Republicans who deny the existence of man-made global warming by derisively referring to them as members of "the Flat Earth Society."

"We don't have time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society," Obama said. "Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it's not going to protect you from the coming storm."

As it turns out, there is a real Flat Earth Society and its president thinks that anthropogenic climate change is real. In an email to Salon, president Daniel Shenton said that while he "can't speak for the Society as a whole regarding climate change," he personally thinks the evidence suggests fossil fuel usage is contributing to global warming.

Darrell Issa’s credibility is over

Tue, 25 Jun 2013 16:36:00 +0000

Liberals have naturally never much cared for Darrell Issa, but after he seized on a Treasury Department inspector general report that appeared to show the agency had improperly singled out Tea Party tax-exempt groups for extra scrutiny, even we thought he might be on to something. Jon Stewart practically disowned the president. After a long string of failures, it looked like Issa had finally found something real, even if he was a bit overeager in hyping it.

How wrong we were. Now it's clear Issa played us this whole time, thanks to new documents that show the IRS also targeted "progressive" and "Occupy" groups, in addition to Tea Party ones. And if it targeted groups on both sides, it wasn't really singling anyone out (the only group actually denied tax-exempt status was a progressive one, after all) and the whole scandal falls apart.

GOP’s dumb new Obama scandal: He’s destroying NFL!

Tue, 25 Jun 2013 12:30:00 +0000

It's just one scandal after another with this administration. Did you see that it is now trying to destroy the NFL? This is what's happening, according to certain quarters of the Internet. Here's the skinny: The Health and Human Services department is "in talks with the National Football League to promote [Obamacare]’s insurance marketplaces that begin enrolling people Oct 1." Who knows how deep this corruption goes -- HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius also "said the administration is also talking to other major sports franchises about improving public awareness of the Obamacare online insurance exchanges."

Kaiser Health's story also notes that during the media push for Massachusetts' similar healthcare law, "the campaign was advertised during Red Sox games at Fenway Park. That marketing is widely credited with helping build public acceptance." Once again in the healthcare field, the federal government is just following Mitt Romney's lead.

Rick Santorum is the new CEO of a Christian film company

Mon, 24 Jun 2013 20:54:00 +0000

Social conservative, columnist at mainstay birther website World Net Daily, and failed presidential candidate Rick Santorum has announced that he's got a new title to add to the list: Movie mogul.

Santorum announced over the weekend that he's been named the new CEO of the Dallas-based EchoLight Studios, "the first movie company to produce, finance, market and distribute faith-based, family films across all releasing platforms," according to a press release.

"This is the right place and right time, and I've jumped in with both feet," Santorum said on Fox News's "Huckabee". "I often say that culture is upstream from politics, and I know entertainment also can be strength and light for people who want to be uplifted and reinforced in their values." He continued: "Dallas can become the Hollywood of the faith-and-family movie market. And the keys are great content and economic success using money from all over to build out the industry and distribute an authentic product truthful to the faith in people's lives."

Palin slams Rubio as an “amnesty supporter”

Mon, 24 Jun 2013 17:19:00 +0000

Sarah Palin spoke out against Sen. Marco Rubio for his role in pushing the Senate's immigration reform bill, calling the Florida Republican an "amnesty supporter," and saying that the legislation will serve as a "rallying cry" in the 2014 elections.

“It’s beyond disingenuous for anyone to claim that a vote for this bill is a vote for security,” she wrote on her Facebook page. “Look no further than the fact that Senator Rubio and amnesty supporters nixed Senator [John] Thune’s amendment that required the feds to finally build part of a needed security fence before moving forward on the status of illegal immigrants who’ve already broken the law to be here.” She added: "There are plenty of other commonsense solutions, but this bill isn’t about fixing problems; it’s about amnesty at all costs."

"As the Senate moves to pass amnesty, the only bright spot in this travesty is the rallying revolution we can look forward to," Palin continued. "For just as opposition to Obamacare became a rallying cry for the 2010 midterm elections, opposition to this fundamentally transforming amnesty bill will galvanize the grassroots in next year’s elections. And 2014 is just around the corner."

Donald Trump is heading to Iowa

Mon, 24 Jun 2013 13:10:00 +0000

Donald Trump will make his first-ever trip to Iowa this August to speak to religious conservative activists, according to the Des Moines Register.

From the Register:

Trump accepted an invitation to the Family Leader’s second-annual leadership summit, an event the organizer says he hopes will help Iowa conservatives coalesce early on in the next presidential nominating cycle.

Speakers will be asked to talk about threats facing the country and families.

Though the Register says that Trump's trip "is bound to incite 2016 speculation," it also reports that Iowa Republicans aren't taking a potential Trump run seriously -- especially since he stirred up speculation about a run in both 2000 and 2011, before ultimately deciding against it.