Last Call For Wesley Clark's Mind

General Wesley Clark at one time was on the short list of veeps for President Obama and ran in 2004 for a short while, he won the Oklahoma Democratic primary even, and he has been a voice of sanity on US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.

That reign of sanity apparently ended on Friday as his interview with MSNBC's Thomas Roberts was shocking.

We have got to identify the people who are most likely to be radicalized. We've got to cut this off at the beginning. There are always a certain number of young people who are alienated. They don't get a job, they lost a girlfriend, their family doesn't feel happy here and we can watch the signs of that. And there are members of the community who can reach out to those people and bring them back in and encourage them to look at their blessings here.

But I do think on a national policy level we need to look at what self-radicalization means because we are at war with this group of terrorists. They do have an ideology. In World War II if someone supported Nazi Germany at the expense of the United States, we didn't say that was freedom of speech, we put him in a camp, they were prisoners of war.

So, if these people are radicalized and they don't support the United States and they are disloyal to the United States, as a matter of principle fine. It's their right and it's our right and obligation to segregate them from the normal community for the duration of the conflict. And I think we're going to have to increasingly get tough on this, not only in the United States but our allied nations like Britain, Germany and France are going to have to look at their domestic law procedures. 

To be frank here, Gen. Clark is, at minimum, saying we need to round up "radical Muslims" who disagree with the US government and put them in a place like Gitmo.  At worst case, he is openly calling for Muslim internment camps.

This is insanity, and this is verbatim what Gen. Clark has said after Thursday's awful shooting in Chattanooga, that we need to start rounding up Muslims wholesale.

Get this asshole over to the Republican side where he belongs.  This is deep into Malkinvania and for a Democrat to go there is unacceptable.

Driving Away The Madness

Before self-driving cars become a commercial reality, automakers and tech companies are going to have to prove to lawmakers at the state level that these vehicles can handle all kinds of conditions while ruthlessly obeying traffic laws and speed limits all the time, every time.  But the unintended consequences of that on cities and local governments is that excellent drivers don't get tickets needed to fill city fund coffers.

Once the car’s in charge, it’s a safe bet we won’t do things like speed, run reds, park illegally, or drive drunk. And that means we won’t be fined for doing those things. That’s going to put the squeeze on city budgets, according to a Brookings Institution report.

“Local governments have viewed their sources of revenue and planned around revenue from the perspective of, ‘We can tax people in a very structured and predictable manner,'” says Kevin Desouza, an Arizona State University and one of the report’s authors. They can count on catching us breaking the law often enough to keep the money flowing. But once that’s passed, “they’re going to lose out in the long run.”

There are no national numbers indicating how much American drivers shell out in traffic violation fines, but the report puts the total in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Los Angeles, for example, collected $161 million from parking tickets in 2014. Twenty cities in California take in $40 million every year from towing cars, splitting that money with the tow companies.

On top of that, if the theory that self-driving cars will lead people to own fewer cars holds up, revenue from registration fees will drop as well.

Again, great news for people who don’t like, or can’t afford, paying fines and fees. But that money finances things like transportation infrastructure and maintenance, public schools, judicial salaries, domestic violence advocacy, conservation, and many other public services, the report notes.

Meanwhile, we’ll still expect our cities to pay to keep the roads in good shape, since no matter who’s driving, potholes stink.

And that's actually a big issue.  We've critically underfunded road infrastructure for years, and with Republicans in charge of Congress and many state legislatures, there's no way that will ever get fixed.  Without revenue for roads, there may not be anything for self-driving cars to drive on.

Remember President Obama coming to Cincy for his infrastructure bill four years ago?  That bill died pretty quickly and our bridges and roads are in even worse shape now.

Eventually taxpayers will end up paying for them, one way or another.

The Fix Is In, The Jig Is Up

That badly edited hit job video on Planned Parenthood has had its intended effect, raising massive outrage among the anti-choice goons and providing easy political points for "deeply concerned" Republicans like Bobby Jindal, who ordered a state investigation into Planned Parenthood earlier this week.

But Jindal isn't the only GOP governor looking to score some easy points on a fake story, Georgia's GOP Gov. Nathan Deal wants a piece of this action too.

Gov. Nathan Deal ordered a review of Planned Parenthood and its five clinics in Georgia on Thursday after an undercover video by an anti-abortion group accused the group of illegally selling body parts of aborted fetuses. 

Deal’s office said in a statement that the Department of Community Health and the Department of Public Health will jointly review the clinics in Georgia to “ensure the horrific practice is not occurring here.” He was quickly seconded by Attorney General Sam Olens, who also offered to probe the “alarming allegations of horrendous practices.” 

It’s the latest aftershock of a secretly-recorded video that shows an executive working for the reproductive health group discussing harvesting body parts from aborted fetuses. Republican-run committees in the U.S. House and Senate have vowed to investigate the issue as well, and hearings are likely soon. 

Staci Fox, the chief executive of Planned Parenthood Southeast, said the regional organization doesn’t provide tissue donation services. But she said it’s standard practice in the medical community to donate tissue for scientific research and receive reimbursement for expenses such as transportation costs. 

“These charges are completely false, and they are based on politics,” said Fox, who said she will cooperate fully with the inquest. “These medical issues shouldn’t be politicized in this way. Georgians want our elected officials focused on solutions, not making more problems.”

So yes, this is a deliberate effort to drown Planned Parenthood and "defund" the organization.  It failed a few years ago when James O' Keefe tried it, but apparently this attempt may be somewhat more successful.

By the way, if you're wondering how the Republicans jumped on this so quickly, it's because this entire screw job was planned well in advance.

Republican lawmakers knew about a viral Planned Parenthood "sting video" well before it was released Tuesday, CQ Roll Call is reporting.

Since the video -- which appears to show a Planned Parenthood medical official discussing how abortion providers typically go about procuring fetal tissue for researchers -- was released, congressional leaders have called for an investigation into the claims raised by the group behind the video. Abortion foes say the video reveals that Planned Parenthood is selling the organs of aborted fetuses.

At least two members of the Congressional Pro-Life Caucus admitted to CQ Roll Call that they had seen the video before its public release. Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ), pictured above, said he saw the video a month ago but didn't act on its supposed revelations immediately because "the hope was to have as much information as possible so that the authorities could be notified effectively before the media."

And of course the plan was always to use the "shocking video" as a catalyst for the GOP War on Women.

“The gravity of the situation most definitely” changes things, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) told POLITICO Thursday. “This is not just Republicans. It’s independents. It’s Democrats…. Americans don’t want their tax dollars spent doing what they’re doing.”

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and his two top deputies — McCarthy and Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) — called for investigations almost immediately after the controversial video was made public, including whether it profits off fetal body parts. And within 24 hours, at least two powerful committees had announced probes on the issue. 

McCarthy is already talking about defunding the organization through the appropriations process. And in the Senate, GOP leaders who have been eyeing a vote on legislation banning abortions after 20 weeks of gestation say this will give them momentum to clear the bill later this session. 

“I think it really probably enhances the prospects of something like that passing right now,” South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the third-ranking Senate Republican, said Thursday. “I think that’s such an egregious, awful, horrible example out there, which I think just elevates the importance of addressing it. So I think it probably helps the bill.”

Why, one would be forgiven for believing that this was an organized attempt to destroy Planned Parenthood and pass a national abortion ban with a veto-proof majority by generating outrage on purpose.

Hell, my own jackass of a senator Rand Paul is now using this drummed-up outrage to block the federal highway bill.

Sen. Rand Paul is the latest lawmaker to throw a wrench into delicate transportation bill negotiations, suggesting he might hold up the legislation over the controversial Planned Parenthood video that surfaced this week.

The Kentucky Republican and presidential candidate released multiple statements Friday promising to use “all legislative vehicles” to “defeat and defund Planned Parenthood” next week. The statements on his Senate and campaign websites don’t directly mention the pending highway and transit legislation, but it is the next big-ticket item on the Senate’s to-do list, with a procedural vote set for Tuesday.

“The recent revelation that this taxpayer-funded organization is selling body parts of the unborn further proves that this agency deserves our scorn not our tax dollars,” he said in a statement. “I plan to do whatever I can to stop them and will introduce an amendment to pending Senate legislation to immediately strip every dollar of Planned Parenthood funding.”

We'll see.  Again, if safe, legal abortions are simply unavailable, then abortions are still going to happen, the difference is a lot more women will die in the process.  But this has all the hallmarks of revenge against a President and the people who voted for them.  Republicans lost huge issues in the last 30 days on Obamacare, same-sex marriage, the Confederate flag and now Iran, and now they want to make sure liberals lose big too.  The goal now is to punish the Obama coalition, starting with women (who just happen to be the most important part of the Hillary coalition, pure coincidence I'm sure.)

And that's the point.

Last Call For Exceptionally Stupid

Republicans want to codify into law the ability to claim religious exceptions to marrying same-sex couples, but as usual they're so awful at legislating that the bill would allow people to claim religious exceptions to break a multitude of laws, including existing protections for pregnant women in the workplace.

In wake of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in favor of same-sex marriage, Republicans are pushing legislation that aims to protect Americans who oppose these unions on religious grounds. But critics say the language is so broad, the bill creates a license to discriminate that would let employers fire women for getting pregnant outside of wedlock.

The First Amendment Defense Act prohibits the federal government from taking discriminatory action against a person -- which is defined to include for-profit corporations -- acting in accordance with a religious belief that favors so-called traditional marriage. This means the feds can't revoke a nonprofit's tax-exempt status or end a company's federal contract over this issue.

The bill specifically protects those who believe that marriage is between "one man and one woman" or that "sexual relations are properly reserved to such a marriage." Ian Thompson, a legislative representative at the American Civil Liberties Union, said that in addition to targeting lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, the bill "clearly encompasses discrimination against single mothers" and would hobble the ability of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal body that protects women from sex-based discrimination, to act.

This scenario isn't merely hypothetical. There are a number of recent cases where religious schools have fired unwed teachers for becoming pregnant. A Montana Catholic school teacher who was fired for having a baby out of wedlock, for example, filed a discrimination charge last year with the EEOC. While the U.S. Supreme Court has recognized a ministerial exception to employment discrimination laws, that exception is somewhat limited, not necessarily covering educators employed by Catholic schools who teach about exclusively secular subjects.

James Ryan, a spokesman for the EEOC, said the commission could not comment on pending legislation in Congress.

Nice folks, the party of  "we want you to have the ability to fire people because they had sex without being married."

Keep it up, GOP.

Reality Trumps Fantasy Once Again

Why no, Donald Trump isn't going to "win the Hispanic vote" any more than he's going to be our next President.

Hispanic voters overwhelmingly disapprove of Donald Trump’s controversial comments on illegal immigration, according to a new Univision poll. 

Seventy nine percent of Hispanic voters polled find Trump’s comments offensive, and 71 percent hold an unfavorable view of Trump.

While a majority of those polled say they don’t think Trump’s comments represent his party, Trump and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush trail Hillary Clinton badly among Hispanic voters. 

Clinton would win 64 percent of Hispanic voters over Bush in a hypothetical matchup. That includes a five point lead in Bush’s home state of Florida, a 42-point lead in Nevada, a 14-point lead in North Carolina, and a 46-point lead in Colorado—all swing states. 

She’d fare even better in a matchup against Trump, where she wins the Hispanic vote by a 70 to 16 percentage point margin.

So the real news isn't that Trump will lost the Hispanic vote by 54 points to Hillary, it's that Jeb! Bush would lose to Hillary by nearly 40 points too. Trump is nowhere near alone at completely losing the Hispanic vote. She demolished Ted Cruz by 47 points, Marco Rubio by 41 points, Rand Paul by 47 points, and Scott Walker by 49 points.

President Obama beat Mitt by 42 points in 2012, and I expect the GOP will fare even worse this time around.

Post-Racial America Update

Oklahomans showed President Obama this week precisely what they thought of him when he came to visit the state to talk about federal prison reform.

Supporters of the confederate flag have their own message to send to President Obama.
In Durant this morning, trucks lined up awaiting his arrival, and now supporters are in Bricktown. 

Supporters want to let the President know the Confederate flag, they say, stands for heritage, not hate. The organizer of the event is someone you might not expect to see standing behind this cause. 

Its a red, white and blue that, for many, carries a message of hate… but that’s not the point these folks want to get across. 

“We don’t believe it’s a symbol of racism,” Andrew Duncomb, an organizer who calls himself “the Black Rebel” says. 

“Hell, I’m just out here supporting my flag, not racists, I don’t want no problems with anybody,” a supporter said. 

A message contrary to the thousands gathering weeks earlier in South Carolina to remove the very same flag. 

“They’re blaming the racist problems on the flag and not on the real problems of America. Through the race lies the people who carry and harbor the hate inside,” Duncomb says.

Yeah, showing up to greet this president with Confederate flags waving high.  Classy move, Sooners. Next time get hoods, yes?

Also points for finding that one black guy that thinks the flag is okay, so that it somehow obliterates the value of the tens of millions of Americans who are embarrassed and upset at what that flag of actual, literal traitors to our country means.

Good think racism is over, right?

StupidiNews!

• Aurora, Colorado theater shooter James Holmes has been found guilty on 135 counts as a jury returned the verdict after just 13 hours of deliberation.
• Typhoon Nangka is on a collision course with the Japanese mainland as authorities are urging as many as 350,000 residents to evacuate from the storm's path.
• Federal investigators are looking for motive behind yesterday's shootings in Chattanooga that killed four Marines at a recruitment center and wounded another Marine and a police officer.
• International Monetary Fund head Christine Lagarde is warning European leaders that Greece will need more debt relief in order to keep the eurozone intact.
• An Ohio man has been arrested after filming the fatal auto accident scene of two teens from inside the vehicle and posting the footage to Facebook.

Last Call For The Republican Legal Rump

A new USA TODAY poll shows that most Americans believe that June's Supreme Court decisions have put an end to the Obamacare and marriage equality fights.

Well, I take that back.  Republicans are going to fight for bigotry and being uninsured forever.

By 52%-36%, those polled say officials who oppose the Affordable Care Act should take steps to improve the law but end efforts to repeal it, given the high court's decision rejecting its most serious legal challenge. But Republicans by more than 2-1, 63%-27%, say the campaign to overturn the law should continue. 

On same-sex marriage, Americans by 51%-33% say local and state officials now should allow gay couples to wed in their jurisdictions even if they oppose gay marriage. On that, Republicans also tend to disagree: 49% say officials who oppose same-sex unions should take steps to resist the court's ruling and block them while 38% say they should allow them to take place. 

The issue of gay marriage in particular seems to have lost some of its potential to affect next year's presidential election. Four in 10 say the issue will have no impact on their vote.

So yeah, half of Republicans want to show their "civil disobedience" bigoted intolerance towards same-sex marriage, and two-thirds want to take health insurance away from millions of people.

Please make overturning marriage equality and Obamacare the central theme of the GOP in 2016, guys.  Democrats are begging you to try that. Please remaind everyone how mean-spirited and awful Republicans really are, and do it as often as possible between now and November 2016.

Just begging you.

Tragedy In Chattanooga

A pretty horrific event in Chattanooga, Tennessee this afternoon as a gunman opened fire on a series of military recruitment centers in the city.  The gunman is dead, as are four Marines, and a police officer has also been injured.

Four people plus a gunman were killed in shootings at multiple military sites in Chattanooga, Tennessee, the city's mayor announced at a Thursday afternoon press conference.

A police officer who was shot in the leg remained in stable condition at a local hospital, according to NBC’s Chattanooga affiliate WRBC. 

The attacks took place at the Naval and Marine Reserve Center on Amnicola highway and the Army Recruiting Center on Lee highway. 

Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke announced earlier today that there had been a “horrific incident in our community."

The fact that the gunman went to multiple recruitment centers for different branches of the US military doesn't really leave any room for doubt that these recruitment centers, and the personnel inside them, were being targeted deliberately.  Somebody had a definite problem with our men and women in uniform, enough to open fire on multiple recruitment centers over it.  This was a planned, domestic terrorist attack in my eyes, and the FBI is treating it as such until they otherwise have reason not to do so, according to the news conference.

JUST IN: Chattanooga, TN shooting suspect identified as Muhammad Youssef Abdulazeez, law enforcement sources tell @CBSNews.

— CBSN (@CBSNLive) July 16, 2015

More on this as it comes in.

Bobbying For Crapples

So on Tuesday, a heavily edited hit video was posted to YouTube, purported to show a Planned Parenthood employee discuss using late-term abortions to harvest baby parts.  Which is kind of odd, since 1) Planned Parenthood doesn't do late-term abortions (only 4 clinics in the US do period) and 2) the video is a screaming fake from the James O'Keefe School Of Complete Horsecrap.

But that's not stopping Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal from using the fake video as an excuse to harass Planned Parenthood and score cheap points.

Gov. Bobby Jindal on Tuesday announced he's directed the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals to investigate Planned Parenthood activities in the state after a video surfaced that claims the organization is selling fetal body parts. 

The video, which was posted to YouTube by the Center for Medical Progress, shows a woman discussing the harvest of fetal organs and body parts from partial-birth abortions. The Center for Medical Progress identifies the woman as Dr. Deborah Nucatola, who is Planned Parenthood Federation of America's national medical director. 

There was no indication that the video or the activities described in it had ties to Louisiana. But Jindal said he was ordering an investigation in part because Planned Parenthood is planning to open a clinic in New Orleans.

But here's the kicker (and the real reason why Jindal is pretending to believe this nonsense):

The investigation means the $4 million clinic planned for New Orleans will not be able to open because Jindal's order includes suspending the issuance of new licenses by DHH.

So yes, Jindal is a manipulative slimy bastard.  Oh, and where is he getting the money to investigate Planned Parenthood when the state is running a $1.6 billion deficit under his budget?

And he's running for President!?!?

My guess is he won't be for much longer when this blows up in his face.

StupidiNews!

• Swiss officials say that they will extradite a FIFA official to the US, the unnamed official of soccer's governing body is cooperating with law enforcement and agreed to be extradited.
• Congressional Democrats are coming out in support of the Iranian nuclear deal as Republicans continue to vow to destroy the accord.
• Former President George HW Bush is in stable condition after fracturing a bone in his neck in a fall, he is expected to recover and be in a neck brace for some time.
• Greek lawmakers have voted to accept the EU bailout deal imposing harsh austerity measures, the first 7 billion euro installment to be announced today.
• Netflix says it will support the proposed Charter/Time Warner Cable merger after the cable giants offered the streaming movie service a free network connection to its customers.

Last Call For One If By Land, Two If By Crazy

Operation Jade Helm '15 is here! Protect your precious bodily fluids from the government!

Just in time for the Wednesday kickoff of "Jade Helm 15," a YouTube user under the handle Get Right America posted an amazing parody of the breathless, Humvee-tracking conspiracy theorists who are suspicious of the U.S. military training exercise.

The videographer filmed himself driving around the parking lot of a Sam's Club in San Angelo, Texas in a nod to one of the wilder "Jade Helm 15" conspiracy theories about its parent company, Wal-Mart. There, he found a potential hiding spot for "ninjas that can take our guns" and trucks that obviously must belong to the Knights Templar.

It's hysterical stuff.



And yes, this is what the Jade Helm "truthers" sound like to the rest of us: complete nutjobs.

The Freedom To Hate

I figure one of the first things the Supreme Court will have to deal in a couple of years (with a new President in the White House) is a case defining whether or not "religious freedom" allows you to nullify anti-discrimination laws. It might even be this case.

A Christian engineer who was fired for violating Ford Motor Company’s policy against harassment based on sexual orientation is suing the company, claiming his religious rights were violated. 

In a federal lawsuit obtained by The Huffington Post, Thomas Banks explains that he was fired after posting a comment in response to an internal Ford intranet article that celebrated the 20th anniversary of the LGBT workers rights group GLOBE. 

“For this the Ford Motor should be thoroughly ashamed,” Banks wrote. “Endorsing and promoting sodomy is of benefit to no one. This topic is disruptive to the workplace and is an assault on Christians and morality, as well as antithetical to our design and our survival.” 

“Immoral sexual conduct should not be a topic for an automotive manufacturer to endorse or promote,” he continued. “And yes — this is historic — but not in a good way. Never in the history of mankind has a culture survived that promotes sodomy. Heterosexual behavior creates life — homosexual behavior leads to death.” 

Banks was fired two weeks later on the grounds that he violated the company’s policy against harassment. 

“I was stunned to realize that I was fired over expressing my faith in a single comment,” a statement from Banks said. 

The lawsuit alleges that Ford Motor Company and Rapid Global Business Solutions “acted intentionally out of malice or reckless disregard of Banks’ federally protected rights.”

So, can you claim anti-harassment policies and laws are impinging on your freedom of religion? We've already seen the Supreme Court say that your employer's religious freedom trumps federal health care law in the Hobby Lobby case.  Where does the Supreme Court draw the line, if at all?

I'm pretty sure we're going to get an answer from SCOTUS on this, so one would hope that the next President nominating justices would be a Democrat.

If not, well...

I Think He's Taking This Rather Well, Yes?

In non-breaking non-news that will not come as a shock to anyone, Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu is not a fan of the new Iran deal.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Tuesday after world powers reached a historic nuclear deal with Iran that Israel was not bound by it and signalled he remained ready to order military action. 

Netanyahu’s harsh criticism of the agreement came after he warned for months that the deal being negotiated would not prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. 

While analysts say unilateral military action by Israel seems unlikely for now, Netanyahu and other officials have kept the option on the table. 

“Israel is not bound by this deal with Iran, and Israel is not bound by this deal with Iran because Iran continues to seek our destruction,” Netanyahu told reporters before a meeting of his security cabinet. 

“We will always defend ourselves.”

Not without US weapons and billions in US taxpayer dollars, you won't.  Might want to keep that in mind.

Netanyahu called the nuclear deal a “historic mistake”, and the accord drew strong criticism from across the Israeli political spectrum. 

“We did commit to preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, and this commitment still stands,” Netanyahu said earlier on Tuesday, even before the agreement was officially announced. 

He has taken his campaign to the US Congress and the UN General Assembly, but ultimately failed to block the agreement.

Once again, in order to accept Netanyahu's bluster as truth, you have to believe that only Israel correct, and that the entire UN Security Council is colluding on Israel's destruction, including the five permanent members of the US, France, the UK, China and Russia.

It's ridiculous theater, and he knows it.  Israel doesn't have a friend in the world on this.

Wait, I take that back.  They have the Republican Party here in the US.

That should tell you everything.

StupidiNews!

• A stampede at a Hindu river festival in the Indian city of Rajahmundry has killed at least 27 as crowds surged to wash in the sacred Godavari river.
• President Obama will hold a press conference today answering questions about yesterday's announced Iran nuclear deal before heading to Oklahoma for a Choctaw Nation event.
• A scheduled vote today by Greek lawmakers on a new bailout is facing stiff opposition from PM Alexis Tsipras's own Syriza party, a failed vote could collapse his government coalition.
• A new International Monetary Fund report blasts the Greek deal, saying that Europe will have to consider far more debt relief in order to prevent Greek debt from piling up for decades.
• One thing that wasn't at last night's AL 6-3 win at the All-Star Game here in Cincinnati: recreational drones, which the league told fans to leave at home.