US POLITICS: AMERICANS, PLEASE WELCOME YOUR NEW PRESIDENT... SCOTT BROWN!

reading about Gillibrand & Harold Ford auctioning themselves off to the Tisches etc has steeled my resolve to skip that primary. Let me know when campaign financing is unfixed.

http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/03/fords-challenge-to-gillibrand-splits-donors/

i'm having a hard believing anyone is taking harold ford seriously. wtf ny

i think its a combination of big wall street type donors + bored newspapers + no one gives a shit about gillibrand?

can't you just find someone named cuomo or something? what the hell, how can your bench be this weak

That SOB Mini-Mario is in a different tournament. I think I'm going to re-register as an independent and stay that way.

why is al franken questioning j0hn d

From the youtube comments, forthcoming "GOP 2k10 Cliff Notes":

"Left as in Liberal as in clueless as in pseudo intellectual as in bought and paid for by ACORN and the Unions as in murdering unwanted or inconvienient humans as in supporters of the joke that currently occupies the White House as in thiose whose thoughts are created by socialist educators and are too foolish to think for themselves as in demanding that government controls all as in supporters of a "nanny" state as in lies and deception as in Socialized healthcare as in..... "

Oh that Tea Party article made me smile:

Organizers said some 600 attendees have paid $549 for access to two full days of events that culminate Saturday evening in a keynote speech by former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin at a banquet that reportedly will feature a lobster-and-steak dinner.
...
The high price of entry to an event that celebrates grass roots, open-air activism has offended many in the Tea Party tent.

In fact, some tea party factions are furious.

"When somebody steps up and says their purpose in putting on a convention like this is to make a profit, that's really the antithesis of a grass roots movement," said Mark Meckler, of the Tea Party Patriots faction.

In a mid-January post on his blog, "Riehl World View," Riehl questioned whether Phillips "wants to be a tea party millionaire."

"[Tea party activists] generally are not the type of people who would gravitate to some very expensive hotel to dine on lobster and steak and listen to someone speak," Riehl said in an interview Wednesday.

Convention spokesman Mark Skoda acknowledged Wednesday that Phillips and his wife, Sherry Phillips, founders of the for-profit Tea Party Nation Inc., will "make a few bucks" on the event. But Skoda questioned why that should be anyone's concern.

"Have we gone so far in the Obama-socialist view of the nation that 'profit' is a bad word -- in particular, if we're using it to advance the conservative cause?" Skoda asked.

I saw footage of the attendees, everyone was 50+.

it's like a pluggers cartoon come to life

I know you think I'm rough on you guys, but everytime I hear one of these droolers call Prez Capital a "socialist" I feel the need to swing a baseball bat with Emma Goldman's picture carved into it at their pumpkinheads.

Oh gee: Todd Palin really did run Alaska.

The highlights:

The governor coached her staff on how to disguise the amount of electrical work needed at the mansion to hook up her new tanning bed.
Palin and her staff stewed over the refusal of the state Public Safety Department to provide a plane so the children could fly to Todd's family's home in Dillingham; after all, they were going to attend a bill signing, so the travel requests could be justified. Sarah Palin called the decision "outrageous," and an aide said it provides "a great excuse to privatize" the governor's jet service.

The manager of the Palins' travel schedule searched for a public event to use as justification ("I just need one") to charge the state for an airplane flight for Palin's daughter, Willow, who made the trip but had missed the event given as its justification.

When Sarah Palin complained that the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner wrote a critical editorial after she did them the favor of meeting with the editorial board, Todd Palin advised the press chief to "take the news miner off the press release address list for a few days, see how long it takes them to realize their not on the list."

"Man, that gossip crap bugs me," Sarah Palin wrote after the Anchorage Daily News wrote about mansion repairs in its Alaska Ear political column. "Any time it has anything to do with home or family, it's irritating." A press aide apologized, saying the columnist did not to call check out stories before publishing. The residence director added, "Reminds me of junior high school, where hormonal teenagers are always looking for the drama. ... I'll do my best to avoid giving them any news nuggets."

Oh Democrats, you dont seem to learn

The senator who is shepherding the Obama administration’s package of Wall Street reforms through Congress said on Friday morning that talks with his Republican counterpart had broken down.

The senator, Christopher J. Dodd, indicated that Democrats would forge ahead with their own bill, following months of talks that had been aimed at reaching a bipartisan consensus.

just pass some shit jesus christ

We can all be assured that not regulating the banking sector is one of the few policies that one can count on for overwhelming bipartisan support.

just pass some shit jesus christ

― The Tommy Westphall Universe Hypothesis (Shakey Mo Collier), Friday, February 5, 2010 12:17 PM (1 hour ago)

seriously, fuck a bipartisan consensus

And do it in a reconciliation bill that just takes 51 votes

I'm pretty sure some shit is all that will pass

http://rds.yahoo.com/_ylt=A0WTb_5jhGxLcg4Au4qjzbkF/SIG=12vkbi8qq/EXP=1265489379/**http%3a//miahmariah.blogg.se/images/2009/acc-toilet-paper-holder_30533509.jpg

also, the Best Picture race is now the most prominent instant-runoff election in America:

http://www.fairvote.org/oscar-blog-focuses-on-new-instant-runoff-voting-system

Max, one of my friends is on the Shelby block list (he is one of the National Council on Disability appts) and what should be a slam-dunk confirmation is now at the mercy of old-school DC feudalism because they're relying on a single GOP senator to shift this. The GOPer in question is, of course, an old family friend of the appointee (and no, I haven't found out which senator).

The full Stewart-O'Reilly interview. He comes off very, very well.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2010/02/the-propaganda-that-is-fox-news.html#more

Sarah Palin brings the house down at Tea Party Convention

When Andrew Breitbart, the founder of BigGovernment.com, introduced Ms. Palin by describing her as “the first person to tell us about the death panel,” the crowd cheered.

siiigh

it's like a pluggers cartoon come to life

^^^

Palin disses teleprompters, repeatedly checks notecards.

I just have to believe that most people are not falling for this

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/02/07/us/07teaparty03/07teaparty03-popup.jpg

I was weirded out by the BBC coverage of this: bulletins made it seem like some HUGE event with an unquestioned leader and we had to wait for proper news items for context like 'in front of 1000'. They ran a few seconds of word salad. I'm eager to see 'writes crib notes on her hand' and how everything she says can be boiled down to Kinder, Kirche, Kultur. I'm sorry, but this woman and her supporters are a 21st-century Bund.

Anyone who chances on Sullivan's blog today will note he is having a total hernia over this speech! We should be afraid because she thinks she's Queen Esther!

Note the Christianist earrings, people:

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/gen/139125/thumbs/s-PALIN-large.jpg

"i believe i can fly..."

she is going to make an awesome ross perot in 2012

OTM Tracer.

oh so you're MY bitch now, eh??

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stefan-sirucek/did-palin-use-crib-notes_b_452458.html

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2010-02-07-palinhandclose.jpg

rrrreally hope there's a lefty indie prez run in the midst of the 2012 depression so we have a 35-35-15-15 pop vote. I will laugh and laugh...

(I know, it won't happen -- 95% of libs will never abandon the Dems unto death)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v228/sonaboy/junkforsale/palinteabag.jpg

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2010-02-07-palincrib.jpg

^^^ craigslist spammers branch out into new venues

she is unbelievable

lol @ "loft apartment santa"

<3 you all but making fun of her for writing on her hand isn't any better than t-baggers calling obama the teleprompter president - take it to crooks & liars

I think the idea is that Obama doesn't appear at events that decry Palin as the teleprompter rabble-rouser whatever. It's a gotcha, and maybe its pleasures are thin, but it's about the hypocrisy of the "just a regular folkperson speakin' from the heart" posture, not the act of writing down notes.

Although I really don't get the idea of writing notes on your hand instead of, yknow, on note cards.

<3 you all but making fun of her for writing on her hand isn't any better than t-baggers calling obama the teleprompter president - take it to crooks & liars

lol--you can't see the difference between using the teleprompter to give a speech and writing on a hand like you're in 9th grade civics class

yeah the teleprompter is for prepared remarks. obama does q&a's all the time without peeking at his hand.

(and in palin's case, it's like, does she really need prompting to think of energy and taxes? really?)

also i have never, ever understood the teleprompter slam, since every politician since moses has used prepared remarks. i guess it's just a way to try to blunt one of his obvious strengths -- "sure, he can give a good speech, but it's all written down" -- but it's always been nonsensical.

whatever i like to spend my time worrying about how people are paying for the healthcare they can't afford and if we're torturing suspected criminals, not the logistics of speech-giving

but i'm a popist

xp

i like that she has literally drawn a line through 'budget'

when i once told a palinite "you can't deny dude gives a good speech" the retort was "you don't think he has speechwriters?"

that was shortly followed by "you know bill ayers wrote dreams from my father, right?"

it's just one more indication that she can't think for herself. if you have to write "energy" and "tax" on your hand to remind you how to speak correctly, and what things are important. . . what are the chances you can put together solutions and fix problems? not very likely

it's not like she wrote down a complicated answer. she wrote down the word ENERGY. do you see?