Category: Politics

Draft Warren Throws in the Towel

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The group “Run Warren Run” has shut its doors:

After a half year of circulating petitions, staging rallies, opening offices in states with early presidential contests and gathering 365,000 signatures, Run Warren Run is acknowledging what’s been clear to others for a while: Elizabeth Warren isn’t running for president.

And now, it’s closing up shop.

Run Warren Run, the effort jointly operated by the liberal groups Democracy for America and MoveOn, will shut down Monday after delivering its final petition to Warren’s Senate office. Warren, the bank antagonist and liberal hero who has said from the start that she has no plans to run for president in a field that now includes Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley, hasn’t budged.

The organization’s recognition that the Massachusetts senator truly won’t run is a significant shift in the Democratic presidential contest, in which Warren has been a shadow candidate even as she has repeatedly insisted she would not pursue the White House. But the prime driver of pro-Warren enthusiasm is acknowledging that its time and resources would be better spent influencing the national discussion in another way entirely, while Sanders builds grass-roots momentum and O’Malley ratchets up his campaign by targeting liberals.

This has been clear to all but the dead enders since at least the new year, but it’s nice that they are joining the reality based community.

As an aside this does clear the decks for Bernie Sanders, which is also a good thing.

Another Reason not to Support DINOs

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Because even if you get Democrats in Name Only into office, it turns out that it takes a lot more money to do so:

Writing for Stars and Stripes and the Washington Post Sunday, Anne Kim, an operative for Wall Street’s deceptively named Progressive Policy Institute (a pro-corporate/anti-worker New Dem outfit that was founded by the DLC to promote neoliberal ideas like NAFTA and the TPP), decries how much more it costs reactionary Democrats– New Dems and Blue Dogs– to run for election than it costs real Democrats. It costs the Democrats who support the Republican/Wall Street agenda double what it costs actual Democrats to run for office. Kim’s research finds that the fake Dems “spent roughly twice as much as their liberal counterparts to win or defend their seats.” That trend is getting more pronounced and she pointed out that for every dollar that the average Progressive Caucus member directly spent to defend his or her seat in 2014, the average right-wing Democrat spent $1.93. By comparison, right-wing Democrats shelled out $1.54 for every campaign dollar spent by liberals by 2012 and $1.65 in 2010.

She doesn’t get into it, but these figures include the way Wall Street-backed conservaDems gigantically outspend progressives in primaries, often with the help of the Democratic Beltway Establishment which has now entirely abandoned its pretense of being neutral in primaries. Let’s look at a few of the most recent examples from the last cycle. Here are 4 notable races that pitted New Dem types who back cutting Social Security benefits against progressives who favor expanding Social Security. In each case, the corporate-backed right-winger seriously outspent the progressive:

  • CA-17- Ro Khanna- $4,427,701, Mike Honda- $3,447,979
  • CA-31- Pete Aguilar- $2,246,265, Eloise Reyes- $1,029,617
  • IL-13- Ann Callis- $1,936,927, George Gollin- $522,126
  • VA-08- Don Beyer- $2,688,020, Patrick Hope- $307,599

The New Dem analysis for why they have to spend more than real Democrats never touches on the fact that the New Dems’ conservative policy agenda turns off Democratic primary voters. Instead they claim that “moderate districts are by definition competitive… In 2014, outside groups spent an average of $2.2 million per race in New Democrat and Blue Dog districts, compared with an average of $299,339 in Progressive Caucus districts. All told, outside groups spent $121 million on moderate districts, vs. $20.4 million in liberal ones.” [Keep in mind that New Dems and Blue Dogs and their propagandists like Kim, always refer to them as “moderate” rather than as the conservatives that they are.]

What a surprise.  People require a lot more money to vote for a phony Democrat as they do  to vote for a real Democrat.

Bloated Billionaire Bellyaching Bitch Bleats Bogus Beef*

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It appears that yet another hedge fund billionaire is upset that politicians don’t fawn over him like the people he employs:

“I don’t need anybody crapping all over what I do for a living,” Cooperman told CNNMoney’s Cristina Alesci Monday.

Cooperman is the founder of hedge fund Omega Advisors, which has about $9 billion in assets.

He thinks Clinton is a hypocrite for painting a nasty picture of hedge fund managers and then asking them for money and trying to befriend them.

“[She] hangs out with all these people in Martha’s Vineyard and in the Hamptons and then the very first thing she has to say is to criticize hedge funds,” Cooperman, said.

Cooperman, 72, said he isn’t looking for praise, but declares he’s the living embodiment of the American Dream.

“I have nothing to apologize for. I’ve made a lot of money. I’m giving it all back to society,” he says, emphasizing his large donations to places such as Hunter College in New York, Columbia University and Saint Barnabas Medical Center in New Jersey.

You are not the embodiment of the American dream, motherf%$#er, you are a parasite who got particularly lucky.

You poor delicate little flower.

How about you take your billions of dollars and a nice warm warm cup of shut the f%$# up.

*Yes, the fact that I could use this amusingly alliterative title was one of the reasons that I Posted this.†
†Yes, I did spend more time on the hed than I did on the article. I’m kind of lame that way.

O’Malley is In

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Martin O’Malley has officially announced that he is running for President:

Former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley blasted social injustice and Wall Street excesses as he launched a White House bid on Saturday, casting himself as a younger, more liberal alternative to Democratic Party frontrunner Hillary Clinton.

“Powerful, wealthy special interests here at home have used our government to create, in our own country, an economy that is leaving a majority of our people behind,” said O’Malley, opening his 2016 presidential campaign with a rally at a waterfront park in downtown Baltimore.

O’Malley, who has aggressively courted his party’s liberal wing, began his political career in Baltimore, first as a member of city council and then as mayor.

Decrying big banks as having been behind the financial crisis of 2008, O’Malley singled out Goldman Sachs for particular criticism. He said Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein recently told his employees that “he’d be just fine” with either Republican Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton as president after the November 2016 election.

“Well, I’ve got news for the bullies of Wall Street,” O’Malley said. “The presidency is not a crown to be passed back and forth by you between two royal families.”

Hillary Clinton is the wife of former President Bill Clinton while Jeb Bush, who has not yet formally announced his candidacy but is already considered a leading contender among Republican hopefuls, is son and brother of former Presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush.

Signs at O’Malley’s rally promised he would provide “new leadership,” but in fact he faces an uphill battle against former secretary of state Clinton, who consistently tops opinion polls to be the party’s nominee, and who enjoys national name recognition.

The nickel tour of Martin O’Malley:

  • I met him once, and he is VERY charismatic.
  • He has never really run on ideology, instead presenting himself as a pragmatist.
  • As chief executive, both as Mayor of Baltimore and as Governor of Maryland, he got high marks as a manager.
  • He abolished the death penalty, got gay marriage passed, and he has been strong on protecting the Chesapeake Bay.
  • He’s the youngest Democrat in the race by at least 15 years
  • He is less tightly tied to Wall Street than Clinton (not hard)

I think that the biggest impact on the Democratic nomination processes will be to give the press to further curtail their already meager (and dismissive) coverage of Bernie Sanders.

I prefer him to Clinton, but I prefer Sanders to O’Malley.

This is So Unsurprising

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So, the other shoe has dropped on the former speaker, and we learn that Denny Hastert sexually abused a student:

J. Dennis Hastert stumbled into political power amid a Republican sex scandal in 1998 that unexpectedly elevated the husky Illinoisan to a position just two heartbeats away from the presidency.

He became the longest-serving Republican House speaker in U.S. history, but remained so proud of his days as a small-town high school teacher and wrestling coach that he relished the Capitol Hill nickname “Coach.”

But this week those once-idolized small-town roots caught up with the 73-year-old Hastert, who in recent years has worked behind the scenes as a Washington power broker.
Former House Speaker Dennis Hastert indicted

Federal prosecutors have announced bank-related charges against former U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert.

On Friday, federal law enforcement officials said Hastert had paid $1.7 million over the last four years to conceal sexual abuse against a former male student he knew during his days as a teacher in Yorkville, Ill., where Hastert worked until 1981.

A top federal law enforcement official, who would not be identified speaking about the ongoing federal case, said investigators also spoke with a second man who raised similar allegations that corroborated what the former student said. The second person was not being paid by Hastert, the official said.

The disclosures followed Thursday’s federal indictment against Hastert on charges of lying to the FBI about the reasons for large cash withdrawals he is accused of making to buy the man’s silence.

Currently, the age of consent in Illinois 17, but it is 18 if the person is in a position of authority, for example, being a teacher and coach. (Link)

This law appears to me to be something relatively recent, the whole “position of authority” thing really started in the 1990s, and I know that the age of consent in the 1920s was 16, so it is entirely likely that this did not constitute statutory rape.

Still, it is remarkable that the best Republicans could find for Speaker after Gingrich and Livingston had been driven from office at least in part for adultery.

I’m hoping that Larry Flynt offers another bounty on wandering Republican penises running for President..

And the Veto is Overridden………

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The Nebraska legislature just overrode the Governor’s veto, so the state has abolished the death penalty:

Nebraska on Wednesday became the seventh state since 2007 to scrap the death penalty, the latest sign of weakening support for capital punishment in statehouses across the country.

The move was driven by a bipartisan group of legislators, who argued that the death penalty had grown inefficient and ineffective. Nebraska hadn’t executed anyone since 1997, and until recently had struggled to get the drugs needed to carry out executions.

On Tuesday, Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts—who lobbied to retain capital punishment in the state—vetoed a bill that would make a life sentence the stiffest available criminal penalty in the state.

But Wednesday afternoon, the state’s legislative house voted 30-19 to override the governor’s veto.

Sixteen Republicans joined with 13 Democrats and one independent in support of the override. All 19 votes in support of Mr. Ricketts’ veto were lodged by Republicans.

I was surprised at the initial vote, and I am surprised at the override, but it’s a good kind of surprise.

We Already Knew that Hastert was Corrupt

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What you will notice in passing is that Hasterd made his money in real estate investments by earmarking money for a massive highway project that ran past his real estate investments, which jacked up the price of the land. (Prior Link)

Now though, we have allegations that Denny Hastert tried to evade the money laundering statutes and then lied to the FBI:

J. Dennis Hastert, the longest-serving Republican speaker in the history of the U.S. House, was indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury on charges that he violated banking laws in a bid to pay $3.5 million to an unnamed person to cover up “past misconduct.”

Hastert, who has been a high-paid lobbyist in Washington since his 2007 retirement from Congress, schemed to mask more than $950,000 in withdrawals from various ac­counts in violation of federal banking laws that require the disclosure of large cash transactions, according to a seven-page indictment delivered by a grand jury in Chicago.

The indictment did not spell out the exact nature of the “prior misconduct” by Hastert, but it noted that before entering state and federal politics in 1981, Has­tert served for more than a decade as a teacher and wrestling coach at Yorkville High School in Illinois.

In 2010, confronted about the “prior misconduct,” the former speaker agreed to pay $3.5 million to the person “to compensate for and conceal his prior misconduct against Individual A,” prosecutors alleged.

That person, whose identity was shielded by prosecutors, has known Hastert most of his or her life, growing up in Yorkville, the city next to Hastert’s home town of Plano, in the exurbs west of Chicago. Prosecutors said the actions “occurred years earlier” than the 2010 meeting that sparked the payments.

The investigation began in 2013, by the FBI and the Internal Revenue Service, which cited “possible structuring of currency transactions to avoid the reporting requirements.”

First thing to be noted here, if law enforcement (particularly the FBI) wants to have an innocuous discussion with here, tell them no.

  • They know what they are looking for, and you don’t.
  • They have a legal right to lie to you.
  • Even the most innocuous misstatement can be characterized by law enforcement and prosecutors as a felony.
  • If they can show inaccuracies in your statements, even honest ones, they can use this to impeach later testimony.

Politely let them know that you are asserting your constitutional rights, and will not talk without a lawyer.

It is important to specifically mention your constitutional rights.  Recent courses by the perfidious Roberts Court have allowed a person’s silence against them in court unless they specifically invoke the 5th amendment.

The second thing to be noted is that the prosecutors are being remarkably circuitous about the nature of  Hastert’s “Prior misconduct” against “Individual A.”

I’m not sure whether the prosecutor is giving Hastert a pass because he was House Speaker, or if the US Attorney will use that as a lever to get a guilty plea

The indictment provides some tantalizing clues though:

  • Hastert and this person have known each other for most of Individual A’s life, which implies that they are significantly younger than Hastert.
  • Individual is a resident of Yorkville, Illinois.
  • Before politics, Hastert was a teacher and coach at a school in Yorkville.

My guess is that he sexually abused a student when he was a teacher, but it’s just a guess, based on the amount of the blackmail and the above facts.

The interesting thing here is that it is likely, though not certain (Republicans are a perverted bunch), that whatever you and I imagine is far worse than the reality of the situation.

In any case, it’s nice to see Tom Delay’s sock puppet going down.

Ignore Last Time, I Was a Junkie: Worst Presidential Campaign Slogan Ever

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Rick Perry is now saying that the reason that he was so stupid in his 2012 run for President was because he was jacked up on pain pills:

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) offered a critical assessment of some of the problems with his last presidential run.

“I wasn’t healthy. You all know the health stories — it was what it was,” Perry said in front of reporters in Souix City, Iowa, according to an NPR report published on Tuesday. Perry has taken steps toward running for the White House again and is expected to formally jump into the race on June 4 in Dallas.

During a 2012 GOP debate in Rochester, Michigan, Perry struggled to name the three federal agencies he would cut if elected president.

“The third agency of government I would do away with —the Education, the uh, the Commerce, and let’s see. I can’t find the third one. I can’t,” Perry said during the debate. “Sorry, oops.”

Later in the cycle, aides to Perry said that the governor suffered from severe back pains and depended on painkillers to make it through the debates, which seemed to have affected his debate performances.

Seriously?  You are suggesting that unwise use of painkillers made you behave erratically, and it’s all better now?

This is the worst bit of stupidity by a Presidential candidate since ……… Ummmmm ……… Sorry, oops.

I Think That Someone Has Whispered the Words “Obstruction of Justice” in His Ear

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New York Governor Andrew Cuomo has backtracked on his 90 days and then delete email policy:

The emails of New York officials will no longer be automatically deleted after 90 days, aides to Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced last week in response to political pressure over the purge policy.

It’s been a slow burn leading to the policy shift. The purge policy was first reported by the Albany Times Union back in mid–2013, but didn’t stir much protest until more recently, following coverage by ProPublica and Capital New York.

At a public meeting Friday, aides to the governor said they had reviewed the policies of other states and, going forward, any email deletion would be manual. That means more communications should be retained and be accessible in response to public records requests or in the case of investigations of wrongdoing.

Good government groups welcomed the move, writing in an open letter that it “shows the power the governor has to lead by example to increase transparency” – rare praise for Cuomo, whose administration has generally been marked by secrecy.

Since the purge policy was in effect for about two years in some state agencies, it’s probable some public records have been lost.

The cynic in me thinks that Cuomo has already managed to delete records that he wanted deleted.

The optimist in me thinks that someone, perhaps his counsel, or perhaps someone from the US Attorney’s office told him that they would either take actions to protect the data, which would be profoundly embarrassing to Hizzoner.

In either case, this is good news, and I am hoping to see Cuomo indicted, because he is clearly corrupt, at least by the ordinary standards of decency, if not the letter of the law.

Quote of the Day

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It comes from my choice for Democratic nominee for President, Bernie Sanders:

In the interview, Sanders also indicates that he’d like to see a 90 percent tax rate in the country. After he sarcastically referred to that rate existing under “radical socialist Dwight D. Eisenhower,” Harwood asked him if he thought it was too high. “No. That’s not 90 percent of your income, you know?” explained Sanders, “That’s the marginal. I’m sure you have some really right-wing nut types, but I’m not sure that every very wealthy person feels that it’s the worst thing in the world for them to pay more in taxes, to be honest with you. I think you’ve got a lot of millionaires saying, “You know what? I’ve made a whole lot of money. I don’t want to see kids go hungry in America. Yeah, I’ll pay my fair share.”

I love the bit about, “Radical socialist Dwight D. Eisenhower.”

The whole discussion (it’s informal enough that it’s more of a chat than an interview) with John Harwood, NBC’s Chief Washington correspondent, is well worth a watch.

Quote of the Day

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There’s a breed of pedigreed dolt endemic to Washington, D.C. They determine their opinions socially, not empirically; what “everybody knows” trumps facts any old day. Their notion of tough, hard-nosed realism invariably entails that other people should suffer, from the blithe imperialism that cheers on unnecessary wars to the ‘sensible centrism’ that insists that unnecessary cuts to the social safety net are absolutely imperative. (The occasional safely contrarian view offers some novelty and the gloss of independence without truly challenging the establishment framework.) They remain cheerfully cloistered from the effects of their pronouncements about what the less privileged should be doing (and should be having done to them).

—Batocchio at Hullabaloo

The is commenting specifically about the rush to war in Iraq, but it applies generally.

Read the rest.

Smart Political Move

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During the (quite disastrous for Labour) UK elections, Ed Millibrand was insistent on two big issues: He would not go into a coalition with the Scottish National Party (SNP), and he would oppose a referendum on Britain’s EU membership.

Both positions were big political losers, with Labour being basically turfed out in Scotland, and losing votes from a significant Euroskeptic constituency.

Ed is gone, and the acting Labour leader, Harriet Harman, has announced that the party will support the referendum, but campaign for a “No” vote:

Acting leader Harriet Harman has said Labour will now support plans for an EU referendum by the end of 2017.

 Ms Harman told the Sunday Times the change in position came after they “reflected on the conversations we had on doorsteps” during the election.

 The PM has pledged to renegotiate a “better deal” for the UK and hold an “in/out” referendum by the end of 2017.

 Ms Harman told the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show the party would still campaign for the UK to stay in the EU.

 She said: “Whether we are in the European Union or not is a huge, important, constitutional, political, economic decision.”

 The Conservatives were bringing forward a bill to allow the referendum to happen, said Ms Harman, and Labour “wouldn’t succeed” in stopping it.

While she coaches this decision in terms of a lack of agency, this is actually a very politically savvy move.

The mainstream Tories (Conservatives) want to stay in the EU, because big business, particularly The City (London’s equivalent of Wall Street), because it makes doing business (and hiding income from Inland Revenue HM Revenue and Customs) much easier, and, particularly for the British FIRE sector.

As such I am sure that the reelected Prime Minister, David Cameron, is really not particularly eager to put Britain’s continued membership in the European Union up to a vote.

However, political realities forced Cameron to promise a referendum, because the loony right of his party was pressuring him, and because the even more right wing UKIP has been taking an increasing portion of what would have been Tory votes, which in the UK’s first past the post system, could prove problematic.

With Labour saying that they will not oppose a referendum, it removes one of the few excuses for Cameron to delay a vote on status, and regardless of what happens, this will not be good for him politically, because, even while he has promised a referendum, which necessarily will upset UK big business, he must also campaign against it, which would serve to strengthen UKIP.

I am not sure if Ms. Harmon intended for there to put the Conservative mainstream in this position, but they appear to be thoroughly skewered on the tines of Morton’s fork.

Fabulous!

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If there is a Western European country that I would not have expected to vote for same sex marriage, it is Ireland.

Once again, I am pleased to be proved wrong, as Ireland became the first nation to approve same sex marriage by referendum:

Ireland became the first nation to approve same-sex marriage by a popular vote, sweeping aside the opposition of the Roman Catholic Church in a resounding victory Saturday for the gay rights movement and placing the country at the vanguard of social change.

With the final ballots counted, the vote was 62 percent in favor of legalizing same-sex marriage, and 38 percent opposed.

The turnout was large — more than 60 percent of the 3.2 million eligible voters cast ballots, and only one district out of 43 voted the measure down. Cheers broke out among the crowd of supporters who had gathered in the courtyard of Dublin Castle when Returning Officer Riona Ni Fhlanghaile announced around 7 p.m. that the ballot had passed, 1,201,607 votes to 734,300.

Not long ago, the vote would have been unthinkable. Ireland decriminalized homosexuality only in 1993, the church dominates the education system, and abortion remains illegal except when a mother’s life is at risk. But the influence of the church has waned amid scandals in recent years, while attitudes, particularly among the young, have shifted.

This wasn’t just a victory, this was a blowout.

The Catholic Church needs to get with the program. If they get blown out in Ireland, in a plebiscite no less, they need to know that they have lost the war.

Rather ironically, at nearly the same time, Northern Ireland just killed same sex marriage:

Politicians in Northern Ireland will face intense pressure from LGBT rights campaigners to “catch up” with the rest of western Europe after the Irish Republic overwhelmingly backed same-sex marriage in a referendum.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions will join Amnesty International and gay rights group the Rainbow Project to hold a mass rally in support of equal marriage rights on 13 June, while a legal test case has also been lodged with Belfast’s courts.

After Friday’s historic referendum, in which the Republic’s voters endorsed same-sex marriage by 2-1, Northern Ireland remains the last country in western Europe where LGBT couples are barred from getting married.

Attempts to legislate to allow gay marriage have been vetoed by the Democratic Unionist party and a majority of Ulster Unionists in the devolved Northern Ireland assembly at Stormont.

An ICTU spokesman said the region needed to catch up with the rest of democratic Europe – and in particular every other part of the UK. “In 1998 Northern Ireland became one of the most advanced places on earth for human rights. Section 75 of the Good Friday agreement dealt with human rights and enshrined the rights of every citizen to be treated equally in Northern Ireland,” he said.

“Since then Northern Ireland has slipped back in terms of the human rights agenda and is now isolated in the UK as the only place where a gay couple cannot get married. The rally will be held in solidarity with the gay community.”

Section 75 of the Good Friday agreement guarantees the right of every citizen to avail themselves of state services in the region. LGBT rights campaigners believe that these services include marriages in civil spaces such as council chambers.

Amnesty’s campaign director in Northern Ireland, Patrick Corrigan, has called for a mass turnout at the rally, which will start from Belfast’s Writers Square at 2.30pm. Corrigan said people in Northern Ireland should show they are “sick of living in a discriminatory backwater for gay people”.

Last month, a Sinn Féin motion on marriage equality fell after 47 Stormont assembly members voted in support while 49 unionists voted against. Even if there had been a small majority in favour, the DUP would have exercised a special veto drawn up under devolution.

So, we have the political wing of the IRA agreeing with Ian Paisley’s DUP.

I gotta think that this is more political posturing than anything else.

Basically, no one wants to be a first mover.

If You Are a Guy and You Refuse to Go on Your Rescuing-Supermodels Adventure Because Charlize Theron Is Coming with You, You Really Need to Reconsider Your Commitment to Heterosexuality.

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Virginia Hey, “Warrior Woman”, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)


Charlize Theron, Furiosa, Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

You may be aware that Australian director George Miller has done a reboot of his seminal 1979 film Mad Max.

What you may not be aware of is the fact that various members of the really small penis brigade, aka “Men’s Rights Advocates”, have called for a boycott of the film.

Over at Unfogged, a guest poster notes:

The new Mad Max movie may be the most guy movie ever made. The plot is literally Tom Hardy (Mad Max) and Charlize Theron (Furiosa) rescue scantily-clad supermodels. If you asked me when I was 15 to list movie ideas, the list would have gone something like: scantily-clad supermodels, 18 wheelers, guys getting shot, guys getting blown up, fist-fights on top of an 18 wheeler, guys with chainsaws, guys getting run over by 18 wheelers, guys with guitars that shoot fire, and cars crashing into 18 wheelers and blowing up. This list is basically the script for Mad Max: Fury Road. The only thing missing is a helicoper piloted by velociraptors crashing into an 18 wheeler. But there’s always the chance of a sequel.

He further notes that the this shows just how toxic the “Mens Rights” Movement is. Not only are they demandin “guy films”, they are demanding the exclusion of any strong women from the movie, even though the director, George Miller, has a long history of woman warriors in his films.

His closing statement says it all, “If you are a guy and you refuse to go on your rescuing-supermodels adventure because Charlize Theron is coming with you, you really need to reconsider your commitment to heterosexuality.”

That’s gonna leave a mark.

H/t Brad DeLong

Governor Ratf%$# Will Veto This, of Course

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A bill has passed the Maryland legislature which would grant ex-offenders the right to vote while on parole of probation.  It now goes to the desk of the newly elected Republican Governor Larry Hogan.

Gee, a restriction on voting that applies largely to communities of color that vote for Democrats.

Any guess as to what hizzonner will do?  He’s already trying to defund education in Baltimore City and Prince Georges County, so I don’t think that he is counting on getting much in the way of the Black vote the next time around.

He has until May 30 to veto the bill.

Whiny Bitches

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Top House Republicans believe the business community is blowing its chance to clinch a trade deal.

Unlike unions, they say, Big Business advocates aren’t flooding Capitol phone lines. They’re not winning over skeptical Republicans. And they haven’t made much headway with business-friendly Democrats who are considering voting for the package, either.

That threatens to create a dangerous reality for supporters of a sweeping trade deal with Pacific Rim nations: that it will become more politically tenable for Republicans to be against trade promotion authority legislation than for it.

The chorus of GOP complaints — striking considering the typically close ties between Republican leadership and Big Business — is coming from all over the Capitol. But it’s loudest on the House side.

David Stewart, a top aide to Speaker John Boehner, voiced the frustration of Boehner’s office during a meeting Friday with officials from business lobby groups, telling them their effort is falling short. During the meeting at the offices of the Business Roundtable, Stewart said unions are outworking the business groups on calls to GOP lawmakers’ offices.

“The lobbying effort on the Hill has been abysmal,” one senior GOP aide said. “Calls and letters into member offices are running 10 to 1 against TPA. This is an uphill fight already given the lack of trust in the president and the general unpopularity of TPA, and the current lobbying effort has not made it any easier. If TPA passes in the House it will be despite the downtown coalition and the president, not because of them.”

Of course, trade politics are tricky — the debate over TPA has triggered concerns ranging from job losses in individual House districts to currency manipulation — and it’s not just the business community that’s struggling. President Barack Obama hasn’t yet been able to build enough Democratic support to get the fast-track bill across the finish line. He faces a big obstacle in House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), who is vehemently opposed to the legislation as it’s currently written.

Gee, do you want some cheese with that whine?

More important, the big business lobbyists have limited effect on the Teabaggers in the base, and the wackdoodle base cannot deal with being on the same side of an issue as a black President.

If anything, the Republican base is even more opposed to TPP and fast track than the Democratic base.

Considering the number of scalps that the Teabaggers have accumulated in primaries, it’s no wonder that big business lobbyists are having difficulty moving the needle.

It Looks Like I Wasn’t the Only One Who Thought That Obama’s Attitude toward Elizabeth Warren Was Sexist

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It turns out that the distinguished gentleman from Ohio, Senator Sherrod Brown, found Obama’s statements about Warren and the TPP dismissive in a way that he never would be to male members of congress:

Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown threw a grenade into the ongoing war of words between Sen. Elizabeth Warren and President Barack Obama, a war that reached new heights with Tuesday’s dramatic setback of Obama’s trade agenda in the Senate.

Brown, one of the top Democratic leaders of the uprising against Obama’s trade push, criticized the president for what the senator saw as “disrespectful” comments toward Warren and suggested that Warren’s gender may have played a role.

When asked how Obama was being disrespectful of the Massachusetts Democrat, Brown replied: “I think by just calling her ‘another politician.’” He continued, “I’m not going to get into more details. I think referring to her as first name, when he might not have done that for a male senator, perhaps? I’ve said enough.”

Particularly when juxtaposed with a former staffer saying of the Obama White House that, “It actually fit all of the classic legal requirements for a genuinely hostile workplace to women,” and his “Sweetie” comment to a female reporter, I think that the burden of proof must be on the President, and not Mr. Brown.

And now Obama, though his proxy White House press secretary Josh Earnest, is not just asking for an apology from Senator Brown, but is insisting that it inevitable that he will eventually apologize.

The word, “Whiny Bitch,” is completely inadequate to describe this.

We Need to Put This on a T-Shirt, and Have People Wear It Whenever Jeb Speaks

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Less than a week ago, Jeb Bush called his brother, George W., one of his closest foreign policy advisers, and said that he would have invaded Iraq in 2003 as well.

Today, he was giving a speech at a small gathering, and Ivy Ziedrich, who appears to be very sharp said “Your Brother Created ISIS.”

The whole exchange is telling:

“Your brother created ISIS,” the young woman told Jeb Bush. And with that, Ivy Ziedrich, a 19-year-old college student, created the kind of confrontational moment here on Wednesday morning that presidential candidates dread.

Mr. Bush, the former governor of Florida, had just concluded a town-hall-style meeting when Ms. Ziedrich demanded to be heard. “Governor Bush,” she shouted as audience members asked him for his autograph. “Would you take a student question?”

Mr. Bush whirled around and looked at Ms. Ziedrich, who identified herself as a political science major and a college Democrat at the University of Nevada.

She had heard Mr. Bush argue, a few moments before, that America’s retreat from the Middle East under President Obama had contributed to the growing power of the Islamic State. She told the former governor that he was wrong, and made the case that blame lay with the decision by the administration of his brother George W. Bush to disband the Iraqi Army.

“It was when 30,000 individuals who were part of the Iraqi military were forced out — they had no employment, they had no income, and they were left with access to all of the same arms and weapons,” Ms. Ziedrich said.

She added: “Your brother created ISIS.”

Mr. Bush interjected. “All right. Is that a question?”

Ms. Ziedrich was not finished. “You don’t need to be pedantic to me, sir.”

“Pedantic? Wow,” Mr. Bush replied.

Then Ms. Ziedrich asked: “Why are you saying that ISIS was created by us not having a presence in the Middle East when it’s pointless wars where we send young American men to die for the idea of American exceptionalism? Why are you spouting nationalist rhetoric to get us involved in more wars?”

What Ms. Ziedrich said both true and a devastating indictment of Jeb’s and Dubyah’s foreign policy chops.

It’s not just the family thing here.  Jeb Bush described his brother as his most important foreign policy adviser, and he has said, even knowing what we know now, he would have invaded Iraq.

This man should not be a pastry chef.

The Coveted “Biggest Asshole in Silicon Valley” Endorsement., Marco Rubio Haz It

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I am referring, of course, to Larry Ellison, even if one ignores the persistent rumors of sexual harassment at Oracle, who will be hosting a fundraiser for Marco Rubio’s Presidential campaign.

Rubio is, “Not a mindful human being,” to borrow Ron Reagan Jr.’s phrase,* which is why he accepts Ellison’s money with such equanimity.

Of course, for a Republican Party candidate for President, being a, “Mindful human being,” is a luxury that he cannot afford.

Just look at the amount of fellating that is directed toward Sheldon Adelson by various Republicans, where recent news strongly implies strong ties to Chinese mobsters.

We need real campaign finance reform, if just so that Republicans can tell people like Ellison and Adelson to shut the f%$# up.

*RRJ said about Dick Cheney, “I don’t think he’s a mindful human being. That’s probably the nicest way I can put it,” when describing Cheney’s behavior toward his mom, Nancy Reagan at his Dad’s funeral.†
†The Link is here. The Cliff Notes version is that Dick Cheney escorted her to Reagan’s casket, and he stopped at the bottom of some stairs, and allowed an 80 year old woman with glaucoma to flounder her way up the stairs. (Really classy)