Akin And Pains

So the bottom line is that Rep. Todd Akin has until 5 PM central this afternoon to drop out of the Missouri Senate race under the state law.  After that, things get much more complex.  Republicans are desperately trying to get Akin to drop out of the race, but not because they think what he said was wrong, but because they'll cost the GOP a Senate seat they'll basically have to have in order to take control of the upper chamber in January.   Many in the GOP are calling for Akin to leave the race.  Nobody in the GOP is calling for him to leave the House as well, which is why I call hypocrisy on basically the entire party.  If what he said was as "indefensible" as the lip service suggests, then he shouldn't be in Congress, period, right?

Anthony Weiner was driven out for less.

But it seems there are plenty of Missourians who really don't care if Akin is an awful human being.  Republicans will vote for him anyway.  Only winning matters to them, as the latest PPP poll shows:

Missouri voters strongly disagree with the comments Todd Akin made about abortion over the weekend, but it hasn't moved the numbers a whole lot in the Senate race. Akin leads Claire McCaskill by a single point, 44-43. That's basically identical to our last poll of the contest in late May, which found Akin ahead by a 45-44 spread.

It's not that Missouri voters are ok with or supportive of Akin's comments. 75% of voters, including even 64% of Republicans, say they were inappropriate to only 9% who consider them to have been appropriate. 79% of voters say they disagree with what Akin said, including 65% who express 'strong' disagreement with him. 51% of GOP voters say they strongly disagree with him.

All of that is taking a toll on Akin's image. Only 24% of voters have a favorable opinion of him to 58% with a negative one. He's pretty universally disliked by Democrats (3/85) and independents (21/61) and even with Republicans (43/34) he's on only narrowly positive ground.

But for all of that the overall numbers in the race have moved very little. When we polled in May McCaskill was getting only 8% of the Republican vote, and even with the controversy around Akin she's only pushed up to 10% of it. GOP voters dislike McCaskill so much they're not going to vote for her no matter what their nominee does. Independent voters haven't moved at all either. In May they supported Akin 45-41, and even though they don't like him on tonight's poll we still found him leading 45-41 with them.

There's your Republican Party, folks.  Even with such awful favorability numbers, even with these massively ignorant comments, even with his long record of being a far-right lunatic...there's a good chance that Missourians are going to vote the asshole into the Senate anyhow, effectively giving him a promotion.

What could Todd Akin do to lose support of Republicans in the state?  Act like a human being with a functioning soul, I guess.  Treat women, gays, and racial minorities with respect, that would lose him plenty of support among the troglodytes.

We'll see how the day unfolds.  My guess is Akin stays, and McCaskill remains in the toughest election battle of her career.  All that motivates Republicans in 2012 is hatred of Democrats.  Akin could eat a kitten on live TV and he'd still be within the margin of polling error because he doesn't have (D) after his name.

He'd get 27% of the vote if he clubbed a baby seal.  Minimum.

StupidiNews!

• After weeks of speculation about his health, Ethiopian Prime Minister Menes Zenawi is dead at the age of 57 according to state television.
• Japan Press reporter Mika Yamamoto becomes the latest journalist killed covering the Syrian civil war, the 45-year-old was caught in the crossfire of a gun battle in Aleppo.
• At a press conference yesterday, President Obama warned the Syrian al-Assad regime that US military intervention remains very much on the table if Syria uses chemical weapons.
• Augusta National Golf Club, home of the sport's prestigious Masters Tournament, has finally offered membership to women, with former Bush Secretary of State Condi Rice among the new members.
• A proof-of-concept experiment could mean quantum computing may be able to be powered by single-molecule magnets.

Last Call

President Obama gave the correct response to Rep. Todd Akin's asinine rape comments.

Speaking to reporters during Monday’s daily press briefing, President Barack Obama admonished Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) for suggesting that women do not get pregnant in cases of “legitimate rape,” seizing on the comments as a chance to rebuke Republicans for repeatedly pursuing legislation that would ban all abortions, including in cases of rape and incest.

“The views are offensive,” he said. “Rape is rape. The idea that we should be parsing and qualifying and slicing what types of rape we’re talking about doesn’t make sense to the American people, and it certainly doesn’t make sense to me.”

The president added that Akin is an example of “why we shouldn’t have a bunch of politicians, a majority of whom are men, making health care decisions on behalf of women.”

Any questions about which party respects women and which one doesn't?

Good.

A Second Take On Todd Akin

Zandar covered it well, but there are just a couple of things I'd like to say.

Please, Missouri... please be smarter than this.  We should not consider a man who tells an outright lie in his "off-the-cuff" remark for a position of power.  Either way, he is either completely ignorant, thinks we are ignorant, or he is a liar who weasels when called on his untruths.  Some combination (or an all of the above) leads to his statement.  The man tried to say that women who are raped and become pregnant were either participating or enjoyed it.  There is no other way to read the words he used.

I do not want a man who so grossly misunderstands or is willing to lie about women's bodies to make decisions about my rights to health care, my medical rights, or my ability to make choices for myself.  His job is to represent the people, not force them to behave how he wishes.  He clearly does not understand this.

He spewed ignorance and an outright lie, and when people knew better he tried to spin it.  Don't let it work. Either he thought that was the truth or he was lying.  There is no other explanation.  Neither will suffice.  Also, his references to women

As a Missourian with a uterus, and a soul... I am disgusted.  So is his opponent, Claire McCaskill, according to the LA Times.

“Akin previously was the co-sponsor of a bill to redefine rape,” McCaskill said. “And it was recently reported that Akin opposed a state law against spousal rape because it might be used as a tool against husbands in a ‘messy divorce.’ ”

The “redefinition” of rape was contained in a federal bill co-sponsored by Akin in 2011 that would have redefined the conditions under which federal funds may be used to pay for abortion.

Currently, federal money may be used in cases of incest, rape or if the mother’s life is in danger. The “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortions Act” was co-sponsored by more than 200 Republicans, including Mitt Romney’s running mate, Rep. Paul D. Ryan. It would have changed the word “rape” to “forcible rape,” which abortion rights supporters feared would rule out paying for abortions in cases of statutory rape or when a victim is drugged or verbally coerced.

So yeah, this wasn't misspeaking.  This was getting called out on some major issues, and failing.  Victims of rape shouldn't be denied medical options because they are unable to afford them.  But oh yeah, if you get pregnant you were either willing or enjoyed it.

He promises victims of rape the justice they "deserve"... the problem is he doesn't think they deserve any.

In Which Dave Mustaine Sets Us All Straight

Before I post this, I just want to say that Barack Obama has class and grace.  Great big heaps of the stuff, because I cannot imagine how someone could ever grow to tolerate hearing such amazing lies about who they are.  To work so hard and do so much right, and have it dismissed and twisted and forgotten.

And now, the best and worst example of political ignorance I have seen in a long time, I present Dave Mustaine.

Dave Mustaine -- the lead singer of Megadeth -- believes Barack Obama"staged" the massacre in Aurora, CO in a sick, twisted plot to pass a gun ban. 

Mustaine made the comments on stage at an August 7 performance in Singapore ... when he told the crowd, "Back in my country, my president ... he's trying to pass a gun ban, so he's staging all of these murders, like the 'Fast And Furious' thing down at the border ... Aurora, Colorado, all the people that were killed there ... and now the beautiful people at the Sikh temple."

Obviously, Mustaine is not an Obama fan ... and recently bashed the President during an interview with Alex Jones ... saying, "With all of the proof about his birth certificate being fake. And you see the signs in Kenya that say 'the birthplace of Barack Obama.' Hello?! C'mon, guys. How stupid are we right now?"

Now that he's cleared that up, I feel better.  Don't you?  And if you think that's bad, take in Pat Boone's pitiful attempt at looking hip.

I understand that people are going to have different opinions.  But let's try rooting them in fact, mmkay?

How To CH_AT at Scrabble

Well, you hide blank tiles on yourself, of course.  Just like a card cheat stuffs aces... well, wherever one can stuff aces.

The young male, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was found in possession of two blank tiles, rumbled when he accidentally dropped them on the floor, at the 350-player event.

Any hardcore Scrabble player will know that a blank tile is essentially gold dust in the word-making world.

According to the report by the Daily Mail, executive director of the National Scrabble Association John D. Williams Jr said cheating is known to happen but at smaller, regional events and it has never happened at national level before.

That is a large event, and cheating in major Scrabble events has been a concern but rarely proven.  I know, because I watch it on ESPN2 (much to my husband's pain, that's the only connection I have to the network).  It would make sense for hosts to color or mark tiles to prevent such a thing, and I bet that is what they do in light of this.

Cheating at Scrabble is like cheating at golf.  There is a hidden code, a bar that has been set for players, that says they are better than the average competitor.  At times like this, we are reminded that anyone can fall from grace if they want to win too much.

LeBeouf Whines About Work

26-year-old Shia spoke with The Hollywood Reporter recently, swearing off studio flicks for the rest of his life ... in favor of a career in indie films -- saying, "I'm done ... There's no room for being a visionary in the studio system. It literally cannot exist."

Shia said, "You give Terrence Malick a movie like 'Transformers', and he's f**ked. There's no way for him to exist in that world."

Shia then gushed about the people behind his new movie "Lawless" -- saying, "These dudes are a miracle ... They give you the money, and they trust you -- [unlike the studios, which] give you the money, then get on a plane and come to the set and stick a finger up your ass and chase you around for five months."

You know, if they paid me as much as they paid him... I could put up with some aggravation.  Filming movies is hard work, but for those who haven't noticed (you listening, LeBeouf?) just about everyone has complications at work.  We just don't get paid millions for our inconvenience.

Good luck with indie films, kid.  We could use a break from you anyway.

The Mask Slips Again

..and Republicans accidentally tell the truth.  This time it's Franklin County, Ohio GOP chairman Doug Priesse, on the recent decision by Ohio's GOP Secretary of State Jon Husted to equalize early voting hours for all Ohio counties, but to eliminate early weekend voting completely:

“I guess I really actually feel we shouldn’t contort the voting process to accommodate the urban — read African-American — voter-turnout machine,” said Doug Preisse, chairman of the county Republican Party and elections board member who voted against weekend hours, in an email to The Dispatch. “Let’s be fair and reasonable.”

Black people won't vote for Republicans for any number of valid reasons.  Why should Republicans make it easier for black people to vote, right?

Still, one argument to restore early voting hours in Ohio keeps reoccurring: They worked in 2008, so what’s the rationale for removing them?

“As a result of historical discrimination against African-American voters, in addition to the recent wave of suppressive voter laws being enacted in statehouses across the country, African-American voters are skeptical of any laws aimed at limiting the opportunity to vote,” said NAACP Ohio Conference President Sybil Edwards McNabb. She and other black leaders have asked to meet with Husted.

A study by Northeast Ohio Voter Advocates says that even after Husted’s directive last week, the hours when more than 200,000 Ohioans voted in 2008 have been wiped out. The group and others such as the League of Women Voters are calling on Husted to restore voting on at least two weekends in late October.

President Obama won Ohio by 263,000 votes in 2008.  The election is expected to be somewhat closer this year.  Eliminate 200,000 voters from the turnout, well...you do the math.

Dig Him Up And Shake His Hand, Appreciate The Man

Paul Ryan, meet Paul Ryan.

Long before he became one of the right’s most vocal critics of the idea that government spending could help boost the flagging economy, Rep. Paul Ryan offered a forceful, full-throated defense of stimulus spending — when then-President George W. Bush wanted it in 2002.

Ryan has denounced the 2009 Recovery Act signed by President Obama as “a wasteful spending spree” and “failed neo-Keynesian experiment,” and – as The Huffington Post pointed out this morning — dismissed as “sugar-high economics” the idea that government spending, through measures like payroll tax cuts and unemployment benefits, can help shore up a faltering economy.

But in 2002, when then-President Bush was seeking a roughly $120 billion package of tax cuts, tax incentives for business and unemployment benefits to jump-start the economy, Ryan offered a vigorous defense of the plan. “What we're trying to accomplish today with the passage of this third stimulus package is to create jobs and help the unemployed,” Ryan said in video that aired today on Up w/ Chris Hayes. The remarks came during a House debate on the measure on Feb. 14, 2002.

Perhaps the two of you need to have a discussion. I'm sure Salt Lake City Olympics Chairman Mitt, Governor Mitt, Senate Candidate Mitt, GOP Presidential Hopeful Mitt, and current Mitt will all be of help in finding your way, Paul.

Oh, and I would have seriously considered voting for Ryan on this speech alone in 2002.  I was next door in Minnesota at the time, but still.

Remember when Republicans weren't insane?

StupidiNews!

• A Chinese court has suspended the death sentence of Gu Kailai, wife of disgraced Party official Bo Xialai, for the poisoning death of a British businessman.
• The FBI is looking into the wild behavior of GOP Rep. Kevin Yoder of Kansas during a recent trip to Israel, where Yoder apparently got naked and jumped into the Sea of Galilee.
• In a 100-6 vote, Democratic Illinois State Rep. Derrick Smith was expelled from the Illinois House for bribery, where he immediately vowed to take the issue to court to be reinstated.
• LA County law enforcement officials are treating the death of "Top Gun" director Tony Scott, brother of "Aliens" director Ridley Scott, as a suicide after he jumped from a bridge Sunday afternoon.
• A jury has awarded an openly gay University of Michigan student $4.5 million for being stalked and harassed by a former Michigan assistant attorney general.

Last Call

GOP Rep. Todd Akin, running for Senate in Missouri?  Just...I can't. 

Rep. Todd Akin, the Republican nominee for Senate in Missouri who is running against Sen. Claire McCaskill, justified his opposition to abortion rights even in case of rape with a claim that victims of “legitimate rape” have unnamed biological defenses that prevent pregnancy.

“First of all, from what I understand from doctors [pregnancy from rape] is really rare,” Akin told KTVI-TV in an interview posted Sunday. “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Akin said that even in the worst-case scenario — when the supposed natural protections against unwanted pregnancy fail — abortion should still not be a legal option for the rape victim.

“Let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work, or something,” Akin said. “I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be on the rapist and not attacking the child.”

So...women have....what down there, Todd?  Spike traps?  Nannites?  Really, really small ninjas?  They can vomit up their uteri inside out like sea cucumbers to eject rapey sperm?   I'd like to know how this works, man.

Akin is perhaps the boldest among a crop of conservative 2012 nominees who could hamper GOP efforts to take back the Senate in the fall. Akin has called for an end to the school-lunch program and a total ban on the morning-after pill.

His claim about “legitimate” types of rape is not completely foreign to the current Republican Congress, however. In 2011, the House GOP was forced to drop language from a bill that would have limited federal help to pay for an abortion to only victims of “forcible rape.” Akin was a co-sponsor on the bill.

Nor is this Akin’s first time suggesting some types of rape are more worthy of protections than others. As a state legislator, Akin voted in 1991 for an anti-marital-rape law, but only after questioning whether it might be misused “in a real messy divorce as a tool and a legal weapon to beat up on the husband,” according to a May 1 article that year in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

The PollTracker Average shows Akin leading McCaskill by a margin of 49.7 percent to 41.3 percent. 

I'm betting those poll numbers change now, but will they change enough?  Still a very good chance this moron is going to be a Senator.

Where The Real Terrorists Are

If I told you there was a terrorist group killing cops in Louisiana last week, you'd either look at me funny or call me liar.  After all, odds are you didn't hear about it.  Indeed, a group of seven people have been arrested for making threats against law enforcement and ambushing Sheriff's deputies near New Orleans in two separate incidents, killing two of them and wounding two more.

The reason you didn't hear about this story is that the shooters are white, and the group is right-wing militia.  Nick Martin is covering the story at TPM:

A year ago, he was wanted by Nebraska authorities for allegedly making “terroristic threats” to law enforcement.

By Friday, investigators said Kyle Joekel, 28, was one of seven people involved in what was being described as a pair of ambushes on sheriff’s deputies outside of New Orleans. Two deputies were killed and two others wounded before it all came to an end early Thursday morning.

According to a report by the Shreveport Times, investigators in Louisiana had Joekel on their radar for months before the shooting and believed he was part of some sort of “anti-government group.”

A spokesperson for the Louisiana State Police, which is the lead agency in the ambush investigation, declined on Friday to say whether his agency’s investigators believe anti-government views were a motive for the killings. However, Sgt. Len Marie told TPM those questions could lead to something bigger.

Just days after a white supremacist killed six in a Sikh temple in Wisconsin.  You still remember that story, right?  Our media sure doesn't.  So what group did Joekel belong to?

The details of the incident were not immediately clear on Friday afternoon, but the New Orleans Times-Picayune reported that the sheriff of Gage County believed Joekel was part of a group known as Posse Comitatus. The group, which was largely active in the 1970s and 80s, was seen as the precursor to the sovereign citizens movement.

“It just didn’t look right,” Sheriff Millard “Gus” Gustafson told the newspaper. “These guys would be driving around at night, and they’d have weapons on the front seat. If you’re doing that, something’s wrong — you’re either hunting illegally or doing something else.”

Ahh yes, Posse Comitatus, the mother of the modern militia movement in the US.  Two dead cops, but this story got swept under the rug as fast as it happened.  Our liberal media spent more time on a security guard getting shot in the arm than this story where cops were ambushed and killed by a terrorist group.

I guarantee you however if Kyle here had been black, Latino, or of middle eastern descent, it would be front page news for the third day in a row.  We'd have FOX asking if this was proof of the coming race war and if President Obama was behind it, of this being the reconquista in effect or if Mexican cartel killers had invaded New Orleans, or if deadly Taliban or AQ killers had indeed infiltrated the United States and if more shootings were imminent.

But no.  White guy.  Far-right militia group domestic terrorists.  That's not news at all in America. 

Aww, (Honey) Nuts

This is why I love The Smoking Gun.  Really, you can't make this stuff up.

The gay marriage opponent whose recent fiery, videotaped protest outside General Mills gained national attention--and triggered a criminal investigation--died over the weekend, according to police.

Michael Leisner, 65, died Saturday while running an errand near his Andover, Minnesota home. His funeral service is scheduled for Friday morning at the Emmanuel Christian Center.

Dwight Denyes, the church’s senior pastor, told TSG that Leisner (pictured at right) apparently died of a heart attack Saturday while waiting in his car for two of his children to finish playing tennis.

So, when we're told that plagues are the result of our sins, are we not to believe that this irony carries an equal but opposite message?  Don't get me wrong, I don't think God cares about torching some Honey Nut Cheerios on a corporate lawn, but perhaps... just perhaps... it makes sense that there is something wrong with the heart of a man who goes to such crazy lengths to oppose how people live in a free world.

Perhaps.

AT&T: Out To Lunch

Workers for AT&T in Indiana claim in a lawsuit that they are forced to endure odd and punitive lunch break restrictions such as a ban on napping after eating a ham sandwich.

According to a class action suit filed by 11 employees against AT&T Midwest, the telecommunications company has forced technicians to endure “heavy restrictions” on their unpaid lunch break or risk discipline.

According to the suit, employees allege the telecom company allows them to eat packed lunches in vehicles during unpaid lunch hours but not spend the remainder of the lunch break reading newspapers,  napping, or using personal computers or music players in vehicles. Workers also are barred from idling vehicles for air conditioning or heat during lunch.  Manhole workers must stay and guard the area during lunch break; they cannot go more than one-half mile from one assigned job to another for lunch or face discipline.

Of course, AT&T denies this, but they have shown quirks in the past, and the tendency to go way out of line on how their employees behave outside of work.

On an unpaid break, workers should be to do what they wish, within reason.  I do understand the manhole issue, but I would think it would be up to the company to provide the alternative, not a burden to be placed on the worker.

To tell someone they can't run their air-conditioning or heat in their car is ridiculous.  Trying to enforce such policies would be an utter waste of resources.

Ma Bell, you're killing me here.

European Bank Shots

Apparently the United States and the Obama administration have failed to make it clear to our European allies that we were rather serious about the whole "economic sanctions against Iran" thing as the cost of doing business on Wall Street, as Germany's Deustche Bank and a few other folks are finding out.

The hard way.

Deutsche Bank AG (DBK) is among four European banks being investigated by U.S. authorities for alleged violations involving oil trading and Iran, according to an attorney with knowledge of the matter.

Regulators including the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, the Federal Reserve, the Justice Department and the Manhattan district attorney’s office are all involved in the probe of Deutsche Bank and three other European banks, said the attorney, who asked not to be identified because the investigations are confidential.

“Deutsche Bank had decided by 2007 to reject any new business with Iran, Syria, Sudan and North Korea and to end existing relationships to the extent it was legally possible,” Deutsche Bank spokeswoman Friederika Borgmann said, declining to comment on the U.S. investigation.

The regulators were in advanced stages of an investigation into banking violations at Standard Chartered Plc (STAN) when the superintendent of New York’s banks, Benjamin Lawsky, moved first in that matter with an Aug. 6 order accusing the London-based lender of multiple violations of state banking laws.

Once the federal authorities resolve their probe of Standard Chartered, they will proceed against the four European banks they have been investigating, including Frankfurt-based Deutsche Bank, according to the attorney. 

It would be impossible to keep a money laundering investigation against Germany's largest bank under wraps, but the message is quite clear.  The US means business here, and Zee Germans now know it.