Last Call For 40 Acres And A Moose Lady

Sarah Palin bravely compares the national debt to slavery because they're totally the same when your brain has frostbite.

In Iowa, Sarah Palin compared the federal debt she says shackles Americans to slavery.

The government, like a slick marketer, seductively offers “free” services, said Palin, a conservative provocateur and former vice presidential candidate who makes occasional, high-profile trips to politically-important Iowa.

“Our free stuff today is being paid for by taking money from our children and borrowing from China,” she said at the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition's fall fundraiser at the State Fairgrounds Saturday night. “When that money comes due – and this isn’t racist, but it’ll be like slavery when that note is due. We are going to beholden to the foreign master.”

Cause what's a little slavery comparison that smacks of anti-Chinese racism between friends?

She said told the Iowans, who have the ear of presidential candidates, that they reflect what’s good about America. "You’re unpretentious, hardworking, humble, very candid. You tell it like it is and you’ll tell a politician exactly what it is that you’re thinking," she said.

Conservatism, she said, is partly about “moving the poor and the underemployed out of poverty and out from the shackles of dependency on government.”

“We’re not wards of the state but free men and women who can live good and productive lives without D.C.’s appointed best and brightest telling us what to do,” she said.

To recap, long-time government employee is telling everyone that government is evil, so vote for these people who promise not to govern to run your government.  This advice coming from Gov. Quitty McHalfterm, who couldn't handle running Alaska.  Sure, you can trust her judgment!

The Next Battle For Our Veterans

Just a reminder this Veterans Day that the last decade has not been particularly kind to our men and women coming home from overseas or from stateside service, and that they face serious economic issues when transitioning back to civilian life.  Bryce Covert at Think Progress recaps the new battles our vets now face:

1. Unemployment: While all veterans currently have an unemployment rate of 6.9 percent compared to the national average of 7.3 percent, recent vets are clearly having a tough time getting a job. Those serving since September 2001 to the present have a rate of 10 percent, meaning 246,000 recent vets are out of work, a figure that has risen by 37,000 since last year. Recent female vets also have a higher rate than male ones, 11.6 percent compared to 9.6. Recent vets are also more likely to have a service-related disability than past periods — 28 percent versus 14 percent of all veterans — and of those, around 70 percent were in the workforce, compared to 87 percent of those without disabilities. While the unemployment rate for returning vets has been declining, the challenges they have faced in returning to the civilian workforce have been devastating and may be linked to higher suicide rates.

2. Poverty: In 2010, more than 986,000 veterans under age 64 had been in poverty during the previous year. Their exposure to poverty makes the safety net all the more crucial for veterans: One in five households that relies on the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) has a veteran in it, and they also rely on food stamps from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). That’s why the recent automatic SNAP cut is impacting about 900,000 veterans. LIHEAP is on the sequestration chopping block, while food stamps are likely to be cut even further during negotiations over the farm bill.

3. Homelessness: Veterans are disproportionately likely to experience homelessness. While they make up 7 percent of the general population, they are 13 percent of adults who are homeless. In a recent survey of homeless people in San Francisco, more than a quarter had served in the military, and on a given night in 2012, the Department of Housing and Urban Development estimates that over 62,000 veterans were without a home. While overall homeless vets tend to be heavily male, female veterans make up the fastest growing segment of the homeless population.

4. Mortgage problems: Foreclosure rates among members of the military have been very high since the crash in 2008, with more than 20,000 active-duty veterans and reservists with government-sponsored mortgages losing their homes in 2010. That figure was up 32 percent from 2008 and was the largest loss since 2003. Worse, up to 5,000 active members of the military may have been improperly foreclosed on thanks to robosigning and falsified paperwork and others were overcharged on their mortgages. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is on the case in protecting veterans, and President Obama announced a plan to address improper foreclosures in early 2012 that had a particular emphasis on helping military veterans.

America's veterans deserve better.  We asked them to sacrifice for our country and then we turned our backs on them.  While we're celebrating what it means to have served, let's remember that the contract with our country goes both ways, and that we as taxpayers need to return that favor.

It's Always About Power

What better way to signal you don't agree with a meeting of gun control activists in Dallas than gathering outside the meeting point, ready to ambush them with your open-carry firearms in order to terrorize the entire group?

On Saturday, nearly 40 armed men, women, and children waited outside a Dallas, Texas area restaurant to protest a membership meeting for the state chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, a gun safety advocacy group formed in the aftermath of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting.

According to a spokeswoman for Moms Demand Action (MDA), the moms were inside the Blue Mesa Grill when members of Open Carry Texas (OCT) — an open carry advocacy group — “pull[ed] up in the parking lot and start[ed] getting guns out of their trunks.” The group then waited in the parking lot for the four MDA members to come out. The spokeswoman said that the restaurant manager did not want to call 911, for fear of “inciting a riot” and waited for the gun advocates to leave. The group moved to a nearby Hooters after approximately two hours.

MDA later released a statement calling OCT “gun bullies” who “disagree[d] with our goal of changing America’s gun laws and policies to protect our children and families.” The statement added that the members and restaurant customers were “terrified by what appeared to be an armed ambush.” A member of OCT responded by tweeting, “I guess I’m a #gunbullies #Comeandtakeit.”

This is not the first time that gun advocates have rallied at MDA events. In March, a group of armed men crashed a MDA gun-control rally in Indianapolis. Other gun advocate groups will hold rallies this upcoming December 14th, the anniversary date of the Sandy Hook shooting. 

This is all about power, like most bullying stories.  The message from OCT is simple: if you dare to hold a public meeting about gun control in the state, you're going to be harassed by a platoon of armed "concerned citizens".  That's not a recipe for disaster or anything, right?




I wonder what the reaction of police would have been if all these "responsible gun owners" had been, you know, black or Latino.  Probably "Obama's Thug Army!11!!" all over Breitbart and Drudge, how there were now "roving gangs of Obama New Black Panther thugs" terrorizing the good white people of Texas, and Obama's DHS is clearly arming black people for a national uprising against Whitey.

40 white guys with guns in a parking lot?  Open carry protest because FREEDOM and who needs the government anyway?  40 black guys with guns in a parking lot?  They'd all have been killed and the government couldn't have gotten there fast enough to take care of the situation, and by "take care of" I mean shoot all the obvious dark-skinned terrorists.

So yes, this was domestic terrorism.  This was the response to say "Our second amendment right to bear arms beat your first amendment freedom of peaceful assembly rights because we have the guns, so screw you."  Also, the fact that we had multiple men with guns versus four unarmed women in a restaurant shouldn't be lost on anyone.

It's always about power with bullies.

[UPDATE]  As the Rumproast crew reminds us, Texas is NOT an open carry state for handguns, so some of these assholes were openly breaking the law on top of everything else.  So yes, everything in the above three paragraphs goes triple in that case.

StupidiNews, Veteran's Day Edition!

• US Marines are bringing in emergency aid to the Philippines to help survivors of Super Typhoon Haiyan, government officials are now saying the death toll could be 10,000 or more.
• Some 40 years after the end of the Vietnam War, some US veterans are returning to the country to volunteer or just to revisit, tourism is at an all-time high.
• Congress is moving ahead with a Senate vote to rewrite the US military's sexual assault policy as early as this week, ahead of Pentagon recommendations.
• The US Navy has turned over the nation's first supercarrier to be scrapped, the USS Forrestal was launched in 1954 and its decommissioning cost: $2 billion.
• The Navy is also looking into new coveralls that don't burn nearly as much when they catch on fire, in a relief to sailors everywhere.

Last Call For Breaking All The Rules

Can you imagine the uproar if Democrats in Virginia did this?

Already shaping up to be one of the closest races in state history, a last-minute rule change is stirring up the recount to decide who will become Virginia's next attorney general. 

The Daily Press of Newport News, Va. reported Friday that Republican candidate Mark Obenshain had an unofficial lead of just under 1,300 votes over Democratic challenger Mark Herring. That tally did not include full provisional ballot totals, and as of Saturday, a fresh rule change was complicating matters. 

According to a report by WTOP radio, the Virginia State Board Of Elections decided Friday to change rules relevant to Fairfax County, banning legal representatives from helping count votes, unless the associated voter was actually present. The board changing the rules is dominated by Republicans.

What that means is any provisional ballots in Fairfax County will only now be counted if the person who voted shows up in person to confirm they cast it.  Wonder why?  It's a county where the election board is controlled by the GOP, but the county voted 60%+ for Obama in 2012.  It's safe to say Republicans fully expect to disenfranchise more Democratic votes than Republican ones, and in a race that could be decided by a handful votes, that's all that may be necessary to give Republican Mark Obenshain the victory as the state's next Attorney General.

By the way, Mark's sister Kate is a Fox News commentator and author of Divider-in-Chief: The Fraud of Hope and Change, another fine book from the wonderful folks at wingnut crack house Regnery Publishing. Apparently she has no problem with her brother cheating to win.  Funny how that works.

But remember, eeeeeeevil Obama and his buddies are the real fascists who will do anything to gain power because ACORN.

Post-Racial America Update

Remember, the Supreme Court says that we live in a post-racial society, so legal protections based on race aren't necessary anymore.

A controversial neo-Nazi rally was held in downtown Kansas City Saturday afternoon. 

The National Socialist Movement said it was protesting America's immigration laws. 

KMBC's Matt Evans said the protest was scheduled for 3 p.m. at the Jackson County Courthouse, but the majority of the group did not show up until 4 p.m. 

The National Socialist Movement said it picked Kansas City because of what it calls strong support. 

"We're strong in the state and in the area, so naturally we go into areas where we are quite strong and have a good base of support," said Jeff Schoep, of the National Socialist Movement. "The Kansas City area has been very good to us and we have a lot of supporters and a lot of friends here. It's a good location for us and that's why we're here."

Gosh, isn't it nice that we live in a society where hardcore racists can safely and freely express their views that non-whites like me are sub-human animals that need to be driven out of America?  Should you agree with that, apparently Kansas City is the place to live.  Quite the selling point, having a "good base of support" for neo-Nazi militia types.

But hey, there's no evidence of organized efforts to go after non-whites in 2013 America, so you don't need any civil rights or voting rights legislation.  We're past that now, you see.

The New Bar For Stupidity

National Review's Andrew McCarthy lives up to his last name and calls for the impeachment of President Obama over "If you like your health plan".  Also, Benghazi!

Barack Obama is guilty of fraud — serial fraud — that is orders of magnitude more serious than frauds the Justice Department routinely prosecutes, and that courts punish harshly. The victims will be out billions of dollars, quite apart from other anxiety and disruption that will befall them. 

The president will not be prosecuted, of course, but that is immaterial. As discussed here before, the remedy for profound presidential corruption is political, not legal. It is impeachment and removal. “High crimes and misdemeanors” — the Constitution’s predicate for impeachment — need not be indictable offenses under the criminal code. “They relate chiefly,” Hamilton explained in Federalist No. 65, “to injuries done immediately to the society itself.” They involve scandalous breaches of the public trust by officials in whom solemn fiduciary duties are reposed — like a president who looks Americans in the eye and declares, repeatedly, that they can keep their health insurance plans . . . even as he studiously orchestrates the regulatory termination of those plans; even as he shifts blame to the insurance companies for his malfeasance — just as he shifted blame to a hapless video producer for his shocking dereliction of duty during the Benghazi massacre.

He then goes on to complain that cowardly Republicans don't have "the stomach" to do it, but the Democrats should still be really scared because voters will certainly remove anyone who backs the President in 2014 and 2016.

Of course McCarthy's right.  Just ask Presidents McCain and Romney.

60 Minutes Left In Your Credibility

Looks like last Sunday's 60 Minutes hatchet job on Benghazi is falling apart faster than CBS reporter Lara Logan's reputation.

CBS correspondent Lara Logan apologized to viewers Friday for a disputed "60 Minutes" report on the Benghazi attack and said the program would issue a correction. 

"Today the truth is that we made a mistake," Logan said on "CBS This Morning." 

At the center of the dispute is Dylan Davies, a British security contractor who under a pseudonym gave "60 Minutes" a heroic account of his involvement in the Sept. 11, 2012 attacks on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya. After the program aired, the Washington Postand the New York Times discovered contradictions between the account Davies gave "60 Minutes" and the descriptions of the attack the contractor gave to his employer and to the FBI. 

Those reports raised questions about whether Davies was actually present at the Benghazi compound on the night of the attack, casting doubt onto the contractor's credibility as a source. 

CBS issued a statement Thursday that said the network had learned of "new information" undercutting Davies' account and was looking into the matter. 

Logan told viewers that the program took Davies' vetting "very seriously," but that the contractor "misled" them. 

"We were wrong to put him on air," Logan said.

Of course, the real issue is that this now discredited Benghazi bombshell was cited by several Republicans as the reason they were going to filibuster judicial nominations this week, and did so, blocking nominations for one DC Circuit Court judge and threatening more.

But no big deal, right?  Media's in the tank for Obama, right?  Oh, but it gets worse for CBS.  The book that Davies wrote?  CBS owns publisher Simon and Schuster, who printed the book.

Simon & Schuster has pulled The Embassy House after author "Morgan Jones" (real name Dylan Davies) was exposed as giving contradictory statements about his whereabouts on the night of the 2012 Benghazi attacks. Earlier today, 60 Minutes reporter Lara Logan apologized for airing Davies' account in an October 27 report. 

Threshold Editions, a conservative imprint of Simon & Schuster, said in a statement from spokesperson Jennifer Robinson: "In light of information that has been brought to our attention since the initial publication of THE EMBASSY HOUSE, we have withdrawn from publication and sale all formats of this book, and are recommending that booksellers do the same. We also are notifying accounts that they may return the book to us."

Threshold Editions released The Embassy House on October 29, two days after 60 Minutes ran a segment featuring Davies and his claims about his activities on September 11, 2012. The 60 Minutes report rehashed old myths about Benghazi, including the debunked claim that there's a "lingering question" about why no U.S. military forces from outside the Libya were able to help the diplomatic facilities.

60 Minutes' report on Davies and Benghazi failed to disclose that Simon & Schuster is owned by CBS. Lara Logan later conceded to The New York Times that the program should have disclosed the financial connection.

So yes, the "exclusive interview" with the author of the book that was Logan's "Benghazi bombshell" was really CBS just hyping the book it owned the publisher for, with an imprint dedicated to putting out right-wing propaganda, and CBS then knowingly ran with a false story to attack Democrats.

The network cooked this Benghazi falsehood up from conception, published the book, then hyped the book and its garbage on 60 Minutes in order to appeal to wingers.

A former "60 Minutes" producer who was fired over a 2004 story about then-President George W. Bush's service in the Air National Guard said Friday that CBS' now retracted story about the attack in Benghazi, Libya was done to appeal to conservatives.

"My concern is that the story was done very pointedly to appeal to a more conservative audience's beliefs about what happened at Benghazi," Mary Mapes told Media Matters. "They appear to have done that story to appeal specifically to a politically conservative audience that is obsessed with Benghazi and believes that Benghazi was much more than a tragedy."

But "liberal media" and everything.

Healthcare Dot Hack

When anything and everything the government does becomes "an affront on individual freedom" to some, then the enemy becomes government itself.  That of course justifies any and every measure in response, morality be damned.

Researchers have uncovered software available on the Internet designed to overload the struggling Healthcare.gov website with more traffic than it can handle.

"ObamaCare is an affront to the Constitutional rights of the people," a screenshot from the tool, which was acquired by researchers at Arbor Networks, declares. "We HAVE the right to CIVIL disobedience!"

In a blog post published Thursday, Arbor researcher Marc Eisenbarth said there's no evidence Healthcare.gov has withstood any significant denial-of-service attacks since going live last month. He also said the limited request rate, the lack of significant distribution, and other features of the tool's underlying code made it unlikely that it could play a significant role in taking down the site. The tool is designed to put a strain on the site by repeatedly alternating requests to the https://www.healthcare.gov and https:www.healthcare.gov/contact-us addresses. If enough requests are made over a short period of time, it can overload some of the "layer 7" applications that the site relies on to make timely responses.

A relatively simple tool designed to specifically break the federal health care exchange web site.




People trying to sign up for health insurance? Who cares when you can watch the world burn and "Destroy Obama Care"?

StupidiNews, Weekend Edition!

• The Philippines are still trying to assess the massive damage from Super Typhoon Haiyan's landfall early Friday, hundreds may be dead in hardest-hit Tacloban City.
• A deadly virus has killed more than 700 bottlenosed dolphins in the Atlantic since July, and researchers are scrambling to deal with beach strandings of dead dolphins.
• October's government shutdown period job numbers were much better than expected, pushing major stock indices to new all-time highs.
• The reality of NYC Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio's new job?  Big budget holes and labor contracts with over 300,000 city employees.
• A new study from Carnegie Mellon University finds computer science students pick the safest plaintext passwords, business school students' passwords are the easiest to crack.

Last Call For Huckleberry's Sacrifice

How scared is Lindsey Graham of getting primaried?  This scared:

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) on Thursday introduced legislation that would ban abortions nationwide for women more than 20 weeks pregnant, the senator's office announced.

The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act draws on scientific evidence that says an unborn child can feel pain, according to Graham's office. The legislation would make it illegal for any person to perform or attempt to perform an abortion after 20 weeks, or six months, of pregnancy and would mandate a determination of the probable post-fertilization age of the unborn child prior to any abortion operation.

The legislation would make exceptions only in the case that an abortion is necessary to save the life of the pregnant woman, or if the pregnancy is a result of rape or incest against a minor.

See, he can't be a RINO because he wants to ban abortions nationwide and take that War on Women to blue states!  Please South Carolina teabaggers, don't primary me now!  See how much I hate women having sex and/or not being permanently pregnant like the Good Book says they should be?

Best part is Huckleberry's rape/incest exception only applies to minors, so if you're over 18 and get raped, better act fast or you get a bundle of joy from your horrible, soul-crushing violation whether you want it or not.

Because Republicans care!

Customer Service 101

When things go wrong, people don't care whose fault it is, they just want the damn thing fixed.  President Obama understands this.

President Obama said Thursday that he is "sorry" that some Americans are losing their current health insurance plans as a result of the Affordable Care Act, despite his promise that no one would have to give up a health plan they liked.

"I am sorry that they are finding themselves in this situation based on assurances they got from me," he told NBC News in an exclusive interview at the White House.

"We've got to work hard to make sure that they know we hear them and we are going to do everything we can to deal with folks who find themselves in a tough position as a consequence of this."

Meanwhile, here in Kentucky, the Affordable Care Act is working the way it was designed to work.

Jennifer Albrecht lost her job after being given a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis last year – a turn of events that her husband, Hugh, described as feeling like “a building fell on us.” She stretches out her medicine because she cannot afford the refills, suffering worse flare-ups as a result. But last month, after seeking the help of a “kynector” – one of Kentucky’s counselors certified to help people sign up for insurance under the federal health care law – Ms. Albrecht found she qualified for Medicaid. Her coverage will take effect at the beginning of 2014.

“I know that starting Jan. 1 there’s some hope, there’s some relief there,” she said.

Ms. Albrecht, 42, is among the roughly 1,000 people a day who are signing up for coverage through Kentucky’s online insurance marketplace, or exchange, a volume that state officials say has far exceeded their expectations. The success of the exchange, known as Kynect, contrasts sharply with the technical failures of the federally run exchange serving 36 states. Even some state-run exchanges, including those in Maryland and Oregon, have struggled so far.

But to watch the sign-up process last month in Louisville, a city of 600,000, was to get a glimpse of how the rollout of the exchanges was supposed to work from coast to coast. 

Kynect is how the PPACA is supposed to work, without Republican sabotage.  It proves the legislation can work, and it's signing up thousands per week.  Most are getting to take advantage of Medicaid expansion.

But in red states where Republicans have blocked expansion, blocked exchanges, blocked making the plan work, and publicly said "We want our citizens to remain without insurance because we hate the black President" it doesn't work very well.  Imagine that.

And yet in "backwater" Kentucky, the exchange is working beautifully.

Losing It All In Cincy

While Mayor-elect John Cranley is busy railing against the streetcar, maybe he should be setting up city bus service to Columbus, Louisville, Lexington, or Indianapolis for women who need to get abortions, because Cincinnati is about to become the largest metro area in the country without an abortion provider.

Abortion restrictions tucked into Ohio's budget are threatening to close facilities around the state and leave 2.1 million people in the Cincinnati metropolitan area – Ohio's most populous – without an abortion clinic. 

If the Cincinnati-area clinics were to close, the region would become the largest metropolitan area in the country without an abortion clinic, according to a Cincinnati Enquirer analysis cross-referencing U.S. Census data and abortion providers. 

Ohio had 14 abortion clinics at the start of 2013 and could soon be down to seven. Three have closed so far this year – in Toledo, Cleveland and Akron – although those closures were mostly unrelated to the new state rules. Two other clinics, one in Toledo and one in Sharonville, are seeking reprieves from the Health Department's moves to revoke their licenses. And two more, in Cincinnati and Dayton, have asked the state to give them special permission to stay open.

And while everyone is telling us how awesome John Kasich is for being all MAVERICKY and bucking the tea party and expanding Medicaid, let's remember it's Kasich's tea party budget that is about to close basically all the abortion clinics in the state, and that was the point.

"The entire western part of the state is in danger of losing access to safe, legal abortion care. And it's because of politics," said Kellie Copeland, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio. 

Without abortion clinics in Cincinnati and perhaps Dayton, Southwest Ohioans, Northern Kentuckians and even some Hoosiers would face hours of driving, days off work and gallons of gas to get an abortion – especially because Ohio law requires an appointment at a clinic at least 24 hours before an abortion, unless the woman is endangered by the pregnancy.

 The goal here is to continue to punish women for being women.  That'll teach them to vote against Republicans, right boys?

StupidiNews!

• Super Typhoon Haiyan, with wind speeds measured up to a staggering 235 MPH, has crushed the central Philippines and may be close to the strongest storm ever recorded. 
• Former President Jimmy Carter's grandson Jason has announced his intent to run for governor of the state of Georgia, an office his grandfather held before being elected to the White House.
• With a 64 to 32 vote, the Senate has passed the Employee Non-Discrimination Act protecting Americans from job discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
• Twitter's $26 IPO debut rocketed to $45 a share at closing, meaning the markets have, for now, decided the company is worth about $25 billion.
• Mark your calendars Star Wars fans, Episode VII will be hitting theaters on December 18, 2015, just in time for the holidays.

Last Call For Liberals And Chris Bag O' Donuts

Chuck Pierce tries to figure out why almost a third of liberals voted for the Jersey Devil on Tuesday.

31 percent.

That's the number of the night, people.

That's the percentage of self-identified "liberals" that voted for Chris Christie, essentially endorsing the idea that he should run for president of the United States, since that was the real purpose of the New Jersey gubernatorial election yesterday. It certainly wasn't about who's going to be the governor of New Jersey, since Big Chicken is eighty-eight-and-out-the-gate as soon as the dust clears from next autumn's midterms, if not sooner. (All that talk about "Washington" in his acceptance speech was a pretty clear indication that the man has his travelin' shoes on already.) No, as soon as it was determined by the strategic geniuses in the Democratic party that Barbara Buono would be fed to the woodchipper -- and good on her for calling the duplicitous bastards on it last night -- the only issue in the election became whether or not you think Chris Christie should run for president. And 31 percent of the liberals who voted assented to that proposition. How the hell did that happen on a night when the state also kicked him squarely in the nuts by overwhelmingly reversing his veto of an increase in the minimum wage, a veto that is the perfect expression of everything Chris Christie stands for as a politician? If you want to know why actual liberalism continues to be a dead parrot in our politics, and why the only real political dynamic in the country revolves around a choice over whether we will drift slowly to the right or stampede headlong in that direction, look to that number.

BooMan, being from Jersey, explains that no, that wasn't it at all.

I am going to get myself in trouble talking about Chris Christie and New Jersey. First, you have to understand what it was like for a New Jerseyan to see the damage caused by Hurricane Sandy, particularly down at the shore. I don't know what to compare it to, except maybe to how New Yorkers (and New Jerseyans) felt when the Twin Towers were suddenly missing from the Manhattan skyline. Maybe if Fenway Park were lifted up and thrown into Boston Harbor, then Bostonians would know how it felt. 

So, when Governor Christie started his "Stronger Than the Storm" ad campaign, it was a very feel-good moment. There he was, down at the shore, assuring us that we are going to rebuild it, that we'd get through it, that we were strong enough to overcome the devastation. It's what we wanted to hear. It's what we needed to hear. And it made everyone, including Christie's ardent political opponents, feel more favorably disposed to him. He wasn't talking about birth certificates and ACORN and Solyndra and Benghazi. He was working with the administration to get shit done.

That's what Charles Pierce doesn't get. But he'd feel the same way about Governor Mitt Romney if he was rebuilding Fenway Park. That's why so many self-described liberals voted for Christie. But it's also why the ad campaign was ethically dubious. Because it was financed with federal disaster-relief dollars. And Rand Paul is correct to raise questions about the appropriateness of a politician appearing in those kinds of ads in an election year. I think Paul opposes the ads regardless of who appears in them, because his tiny brain cannot understand the valuable role of marketing in reviving a destroyed tourism industry. But I agree with him that Christie got an unfair advantage in his reelection campaign by featuring himself and his family in feel-good advertisements that he didn't have to finance.

What I know is there's a lot of people who want to set up Chris Christie as the next McCain or Romney.  They think he can win nationally.  Of course, McCain and Romney both lost.  So the perception of Christie depends on whether or not you see him as national (as Chuck thinks there nothing local as Christie will resign to run in 2016) or local as BooMan does (and Christie knows he has no shot nationally and wants to go out on top).

Pierce has a point, but if Christie is the savior in 2016 and everyone "knew" Romney was going to lose, why didn't he "save" the party in 2012? 

What's different now?  Tea party still hates the guy.  He's still a bully and a jackass.  That'll play in New England, but not in Iowa or blood red South Carolina.

We'll see, but given where the GOP is now, Christie's heading directly for the fate of the last two Republicans who ran for President.

Mississippi To Hagel: Drop Dead

The SCOTUS decision on DOMA and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel's Pentagon directive requiring all states to issue ID cards allowing same-sex National Guard couples to claim federal marriage benefits apparently doesn't matter to Mississippi that much.  Their response to Hagel?  Begins with F, ends with "and the horse you rode in on."

“We must continue to abide by the state constitution, and we will continue to refer applicants to active duty installations in Mississippi,” Mississippi National Guard spokesman Tim Powell said. 

Mississippi and the other states won’t provide the ID cards but will refer same-sex couples to federal installations to receive the identification. 

Mick Bullock, a spokesman for Gov. Phil Bryant, said Mississippi’s position is in line with state law. 

“The Mississippi Constitution clearly defines marriage as a union between one man and one woman and expressly prohibits the recognition of same-sex marriages performed in other jurisdictions,” Bullock said.

This is a losing battle, of course.  It was 50 years ago, and 150 years ago.

But Mississippi College Law Professor Matt Steffey said, “The most basic principle of our system of constitutional government is that federal laws trump state laws whenever the two conflict. So, certainly, the federal law prevails over the Mississippi law.” 

Steffey said the text of Article VI of the U.S. Constitution requires that all state legislators and executive and judicial officers take an oath to support the Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land.

Why, it's our old friend, Mr. Supremacy Clause!  So good luck with this one, guys.  Nice way to waste taxpayer money too when you decide to take this to court and lose, too.

Enjoy the cultural inevitability, boys.

New Guy's A Bit Of A Douche

Cincinnati Mayor-elect John Cranley is wasting no time in pushing his promise to kill the city's streetcar project, twice approved by voters, and making friends with streetcar supporters.

The argument over Cincinnati’s streetcar didn’t end with mayor-elect John Cranley’s decisive victory in Tuesday’s mayoral election, but Cranley has a clear advantage in the fight.

“They should immediately stop spending,” Cranley told reporters at his first post-election news conference at his Hyde Park home. “I mean, seriously, look who got elected yesterday. This is a democracy.”

The current city administration shouldn’t be “agitating voters” by continuing the project, Cranley said, maintaining that when the costs of future streetcar operating costs are added up, the costs of stopping are far less than continuing the project.

Of course, Captain Dick Move here left out the part where "agitated voters" approved the streetcar project on ballot measures not once, but twice.  And the cost to the city to cancel the project now may far exceed the cost of finishing it.

The city has spent more than $23 million on the project to date and would have to return $44 million in federal funding if it cancels the project. Cranley said he planned to speak with White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett today about using the federal funding for something else. But $25 million of the funding, by law, must go toward public transit projects, so changing its use would take an act of Congress.

The city also said that the federal money already spent — about $2 million — would have to be paid back using city operating funds instead of capital funds set aside for the streetcar project. That would make the city’s budget deficit for next year even worse.

Before the election, Cranley dismissed that possibility.

“Who said this? Some kid? What citation did they cite to make this absurd argument?” he asked. “If the federal funds are paying for something, presumably capital-related, and we’re paying them back, in essence, buying the goods that the federal government paid for, and that good is a capital good. So of course the capital budget can be used. The city’s allowed to build a road and tear up the road. Just because we don’t end up using the road doesn’t mean we can’t consider it a capital expense.”

So not only is Cranley an asshole, he's ignorant too.  And good luck getting this past the GOP House, John Boehner representing precisely zero people in Cincinnati itself.

Of course, there's the possibility that all the contractors working on the project now, and the organizations who backed it, will simply sue the pants off the city.

The city will have spent $26 million on the project by the time new leadership takes over at City Hall on Dec. 1, according to an Enquirer analysis. It could cost the city another $5 million if it loses a lawsuit against Duke Energy over utility relocation – and more litigation could be forthcoming from contractors and streetcar supporters.

“There has definitely been a buzz in the community about litigation,” said Over-the-Rhine resident Derek Bauman, co-chairman of Cincinnatians for Progress, a streetcar advocacy group. “Whatever we would have to do. I think it would be a huge mistake to stop the project – one the city could not recover from.”

So yes, Cranley's not only wanting Mark Mallory to pronounce the project dead now (in a giant screw you to streetcar supporters) but he's picking a fight that will almost certainly drag on for years and cost taxpayers more.

And did I mention he wants to put in a downtown shuttle system instead?

"The reality is that the people behind the streetcar have great love for this city. They want what I want – a vibrant, 24/7 downtown, Over-the-Rhine, and Banks. I think Hop on Cincinnati (a proposed trackless trolley) and things of that nature like downtown Denver – no one’s accusing Denver of being behind the times. And they’ve got a similar kind of thing. I think starting to work on something that’s affordable is something that can help unite the city."

Which he would have to get approved with two new Republicans on city council.  Awesome.  This guy is a piece of work.

StupidiNews!

• A general cease-fire in Burma may mean the beginning of the end of the world's longest-running civil war.
• Police are now looking to bring charges against a Detroit man for shooting and killing a 19-year-old black woman who knocked on his door, seeking help, after an auto accident.
• A US Navy Commander is the third officer to face charges of accepting bribes and prostitutes from a Singapore-based Pentagon contractor.
• Twitter's stock offering goes public today at $26 a share, and that means many founders and employees with stock options are now millionaires on paper, at least.
• It's the end of an era as parent company Dish Network will close all remaining 300 Blockbuster Video stores by the end of next year.

Last Call For That Stopped Clock Being Right And All

Today's contestant:  Joan Walsh.

No, no link.  Not for Joan Walsh, and double not for Joan Walsh at Salon.

There are two big lessons from Virginia. Abortion matters. Twenty percent of voters said it was their top issue, and they broke overwhelmingly for McAuliffe. And African-American voters continue to be the most reliable pillar of the Democratic base.  Black voter turnout was identical to 2012, chastening people who suggest the Democrats won’t do as well without Obama’s name on the ballot. Where McAuliffe lost white voters 56-36 to Cuccinelli, he won nine of 10 black voters.

So yes, guess who once again turned out for the Democrat in the race and provided the margin of victory, despite overwhelming attempts to stop the black vote, and where only 37% of all Virginia voters turned out?  Keep in mind 80% of Virginia voters turned out in 2012, but black turnout was virtually the same.  The rest of Virginia stayed home.  Think about that when you hear reasons why Cuccinelli lost.  He lost because black voters showed up in the same numbers they did in 2012, in an off, off-year election.

The Virginia results also show why Republicans are working overtime to suppress black voters. Anyone who cares about 2014 and 2016 (are you listening, Hillary Clinton?) should be making voting rights and turnout efforts their No. 1 issue, starting today.  Virginia shows that it’s going to be tough, though not impossible, for Democrats to make 2014 the kind of “wave” election that could let them take back the House of Representatives, as they did in 2006. But it also shows that the so-called Obama coalition can survive without anyone by that name on the ballot.

Timepiece, otherwise frozen and useless, happens to have correct chronometic reading in this particular instance.  I note the occurrence for posterity and move on.  Jamelle Bouie at the Daily Beast spells it out:

Where the change from 2009 was most significant was among black voters. Then, African Americans were 16 percent were of the electorate, a significant drop from the 2008 election. This year, blacks were 20 percent of all voters, which means their turnout was exactly where it was in 2012. Put another way, for the second year in a row, African Americans turned out at a rate above their percentage of the population, and supported the Democrat by a 9-to–1 margin.

This is huge. For McAuliffe, what it meant is that—for almost every black voter who went to the polls—he could count on a vote, giving him crucial support in a tight race. To wit, more than 37 percent of his vote total came from African Americans. It’s not hard to see what the race would have looked like with 2009 numbers; a four percent drop in black turnout would have slashed roughly 80,000 votes from McAuliffe’s total, turning Ken Cuccinelli’s narrow loss into a slim victory.

Fin.  Exeunt, stage left.

The County Unfair

As far as the vanity proposition to "push for secession" in 11 Colorado counties on the ballot yesterday, six of them said yes, we want to start taking steps to secede.  The Denver Post:

Weld County Commissioner Sean Conway said the 51st state movement is halted — at least in his county — but there were positive benefits from the secession campaign.

"Weld County voters said this is an option we shouldn't pursue and we won't pursue it," Conway said Tuesday night. "But we will continue to look at the problems of the urban and rural divide in this state."

Weld County voters Tuesday soundly rejected the 51st State Initiative 58 percent to 42 percent.

But in six of the 11 counties where the secession question appeared on the ballot, the measure passed by strong margins. 

"Positive benefits" like being a laughingstock.  OK.

The ballot question, intended as a straw poll, asked residents whether their county commissioners should takes steps to secede from the Centennial State.

Fort Lupton Mayor Tommy Holton said Tuesday night that secession probably would not succeed. But he said the publicity would shed light on rural Colorado's grievances.

"We not only want to be at the table," he said, "but we want a voice at the table as well."

Proponents say they have become alienated from the more urbanized Front Range and are unhappy with laws passed during this year's legislative session, including stricter gun laws and new renewable-energy standards.

Well then, you do the adult thing and campaign to get those laws changed, not throw a temper tantrum and say "we don't have a voice" when the vote doesn't go your way.  I mean, it's not like there's rampant voter suppression of white rural voters, right?  Did anyone in Greeley Colorado have to wait 8 hours in line to vote?  No?

Suck it up, cowards.  You lost.  That happens in a representative democracy.  Voters in Colorado rejected a $950 million school reform bill that would have raised the state income tax on the wealthiest citizens.  The cry of "it'll destroy family farms and ranches" won big, despite $10 million spent by folks like Bill Gates and Mike Bloomberg to pass the measure.

So should the people who wanted the school measure passed now secede from the state?  That what you do when you lose a vote, right?

Cowards.