Thursday, May 29, 2014

Mitch McConnell’s ACA problem

The Affordable Care Act is working in Kentucky, but Mitch McConell is vehemently opposed to it. So, how to campaign on a losing battle?



Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Joe Scarborough Finally Appears On Fox Where He Belongs

By Heather

MSNBC host Joe Scarborough looked right at home on Fox's The Kelly File, where he was pushing his new book this Tuesday night.



When I saw that Joe Scarborough was appearing on Fox's The Kelly File, my first thoughts were please lord someone tell me he's found a new home there. Sadly he was just there to push his new book and talk over Megyn Kelly, since his regular co-host Mika Brzezinski wasn't around to put up with his abuse as she does every morning.

Apparently Scarborough isn't quite "conservative" enough to suit the right because he hasn't fully embraced every wingnut talking head on Faux "news" and right-wing hate talker and he's dared to occasionally go against some of the talking points they're all repeating day in and day out.

From Fox's blog: Megyn Kelly to Joe Scarborough: How Can You Be a Conservative If You’re At War With GOP Icons?:
Megyn Kelly tonight took on MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, asking him how he would react to Republicans that think he’s a “faux conservative.”
“We had 10 years of big government Republicanism, and what people found out was after the Bush years that big government Republicanism was as bad as big government liberalism, and I was always critical of the Republican establishment,” Scarborough said.
“How can you be a true conservative if […] you’re at war with so many of the conservative icons?” Kelly asked, citing Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh.
Scarborough said he’s not at war with them, and that he has consistently been a small government conservative.
“I’m conservative when Republicans are in the White House. I’m conservative when Democrats are in the White House,” he said.

Sunday, May 25, 2014

James O'Keefe Stings HIMSELF Again in 'Frack Film' Fail

By Brad Friedman

Isn't it time that the suckers dumb enough to have given money to Rightwing con-man and federal criminal James O'Keefe's ironically-named "non-profit" Project Veritas started demanding their money back from this clown?

Or are they simply too stupid to care about being played for complete stooges as Fox "News" and, apparently, Megyn Kelly still appear to be?

Here's O'Keefe's latest really huge fail, as revealed fail after "sting victim", Academy Award-nominated Gasland documentarian Josh Fox, turns out to have recorded the entire conversation deceptively edited and featured in pretend "journalist" O'Keefe's new video...



What O'Keefe got busted doing there, as seen in the Chris Hayes MSNBC segment above, is exactly what he does in every one of his pretend "investigations", as we've demonstrated here for years. This time, at least, one of the victims happened to have had the foresight to have recorded it all independently on his own.

It's remarkable that even the wingnut dupes at Fox "News" are still falling for this tired con, frankly, much less people stupid enough to send actual money to support Jimmy's scam.

For specific details on just some of the deceptively edited bullshit in his latest con, see this at Media Matters. For the entirety of the recording that documentarian Fox made of the encounter deceptively pimped in the scam video premiered recently by O'Keefe at Cannes, see this at The Daily Beast. For more on how despicable O'Keefe's latest scam actually was, see this from one of Josh Fox' business associates.

For the early history of the great James O'Keefe/Andrew Breitbart con that put both on these grifters on the map - before we subsequently revealed them to be top-to-bottom two-bit con-artists by debunking the entirety of their infamous ACORN 'Pimp' Hoax bullshit and more - see The BRAD BLOG's Special Coverage page on them here.

Saturday, May 24, 2014

How the MAFIA helped Ronald Reagan get to the White House

EXCLUSIVE: Revealed, how the MAFIA helped Ronald Reagan get to the White House. 

Shocking documentary reveals Mob connections that catapulted him to the presidency - and how a probe was thwarted at 'the highest levels'

  • President Reagan owed his acting and political career to Hollywood mogul Lew Wasserman, chief of entertainment behemoth MCA, who was in bed with the Mob
  • An investigation into the relationship between MCA and the Mafia was halted and Federal prosecutors believe it was one of the 'political favors' that can be traced back to Reagan's White House
  • 'Ronald Reagan is a complete slave of MCA who would do their bidding on anything,' one secret Justice Department document revealed
  • According to the producer of the documentary, Wages of Spin II: Bring Down The Wall, one MCA executive had ties to Mob boss John Gotti
  • 'Reagan's whole career in politics was subsidized by MCA,' he asserts, and helped him financially because for a long time he was living above his means
  • The Mob was probably working Nancy Reagan too, according to the producer.  'She was a driving force behind Reagan'
A shocking new documentary screened exclusively by MailOnline exposes the chilling conncections between the Mafia, one of Hollywood's most powerful entertainment companies and its head honcho Lew Wasserman and President Ronald Reagan and his Justice Department.

From the mid-1950’s to the early 1960’s, Sunday evenings were reserved for millions of families to sit in front of the tube and watch the General Electric Theatre on CBS hosted by genial Ronald Reagan, whose movie career had since dried up.

Television had offered him another chance.

What viewers didn't know was that Reagan was given this new opportunity of visibility and stardom in a highly lucrative and rare deal. Along with a big paycheck, he was made part-owner of the popular program that he hosted for eight years, making him extremely wealthy.

Scroll down for exclusive video
Thick as thieves: Hollywood powerhouse Lew Wasserman was Ronald Reagan's mentor, once described as 'the Godfather of the film industry.' A new documentary seen exclusively by MailOnline explores Wasserman's connections to the Mafia and how that influenced the man who would be president and his First Lady
Thick as thieves: Hollywood powerhouse Lew Wasserman was Ronald Reagan's mentor, once described as 'the Godfather of the film industry.' A new documentary seen exclusively by MailOnline explores Wasserman's connections to the Mafia and how that influenced the man who would be president and his First Lady


His mentor, close friend and the power behind the deal was Lew Wasserman, the very private head of the Music Corporation of America, better known as MCA, a Hollywood entertainment behemoth.

Under Lew Wasserman's brilliant and often brutal leadership, MCA's hugely financially successful forms of mass entertainment have been popular for generations of couch potatoes and movie-goers: from Leave It to Beaver to Miami Vice on television; from American Graffiti to Jaws on the big screen.

As a talent agency in the beginning, its rich acting stable had included Errol Flynn, Greta Garbo, Fred Astaire, Joan Crawford and Henry Fonda and Bette Davis. 

Wasserman had personally signed and represented many of them. Charlton Heston once described Wasserman as the 'Godfather of the film industry.'

Ronald Reagan, however, was the brightest star in Wasserman's personal firmament.

But there was a dark side to Wasserman - and to Reagan - all of which is revealed in a shocking new documentary, Wages of Spin II: Bring Down The Wall,  that, according to the film's producer and those interviewed, links both of them in darkly shadowed ways to the Mafia, and the killing of a U.S. Department of Justice organized crime Strike Force investigation into Mob influence and infiltration at the highest levels of MCA.
Driving force: According to the film's director, Nancy Reagan was 'the driving force behind Reagan. The mob was probably working her too. She was the one who was pushing him into everything'
Driving force: According to the film's director, Nancy Reagan was 'the driving force behind Reagan. The mob was probably working her too. She was the one who was pushing him into everything'


It's a case that one participant in the film declares ‘dwarfs the Watergate scandal’.

Neither Reagan nor Wasserman were ever prosecuted, let alone interrogated as a result of the events presented in the film because both were so well-insulated.

Reagan died in 2004 at 93 after suffering from Alzheimer's for a decade, and Wasserman died in 2002 at 89. He was said to be one of the largest contributors to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Center for Public Affairs in Simi Valley, California.

Seven years before Wasserman’s death, President Clinton -- who like Reagan got a lot of campaign and financial support from Hollywood power brokers -- presented Wasserman with the nation's highest civilian honor in a ceremony at the White House, the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Wages of Spin II: Bring Down The Wall, produced and directed by Philadelphia filmmaker Shawn Swords, whose previous highly acclaimed documentary revealed the shady business practices of popular TV icon Dick Clark, will soon have it's world premier.

But MailOnline has been given an exclusive screening of the complex film which includes candid interviews with, among others, two former top Justice Department prosecutors and an ex-FBI agent who were spearheading the ill-fated top-secret probe of MCA. These men lost or left their jobs when their investigation was suddenly ordered shut down at 'the highest levels in Washington,' according to Swords and those he interviewed on camera over a two to three year period.
Power player: MCA chairman Wasserman held sway over Hollywood. With his clout, he helped get Reagan elected president of the Screen Actor's Guild, Governor of California and then President. Federal investigators were pursuing his mob ties when the investigation was suddenly halted
Power player: MCA chairman Wasserman held sway over Hollywood. With his clout, he helped get Reagan elected president of the Screen Actor's Guild, Governor of California and then President. Federal investigators were pursuing his mob ties when the investigation was suddenly halted


Richard Stavin, a former veteran federal prosecutor who was assigned to the Justice Department's Organized Crime Strike Force in Los Angeles and was an integral member of the MCA-Mafia probe team, declared in the film for the first time:

'It's my belief that MCA and its' involvement with Mafia individuals, Mafia-dominated companies and our inability to pursue those was not happenstance. I believe it was an organized, orchestrated effort on the part of certain individuals within Washington, D.C. to keep a hands-off policy towards MCA.

'At the time, Ronald Reagan was the President of the United States and Edwin Meese was the Attorney General of the United States [Stavin's ultimate boss]. A little known fact was MCA and Lew Wasserman supported Ronald Reagan when he wanted to become president of the Screen Actors Guild, which was the launch of Mr. Reagan's political career.

'I would like to think that the people in the highest levels of this government were not protective of MCA...But I'm not so sure about that.'

Stavin left his Mafia crime-fighting career to which he was dedicated because, as he said on camera,

'I was unable to fulfill the duties for which I took my sworn oath.'

Another veteran federal Strike Force prosecutor involved in the probe of organized crime infiltration at MCA, Marvin Rudnick, known for his bulldog tenacity, was shockingly fired by the Justice Department and considered 'rogue' because he wanted to continue to pursue the suspected MCA bad guys, even if the trail led to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Disillusioned: Richard Stavin, a former federal prosecutor, left his Mafia crime-fighting career because he was unable to fulfill his duties. 'It's my belief that MCA and its involvement with Mafia individuals, Mafia-dominated companies and our inability to pursue those was not happenstance,' he says. 'I believe it was an organized, orchestrated effort on the part of certain individuals within Washington, D.C. to keep a hands-off policy towards MCA'
Disillusioned: Richard Stavin, a former federal prosecutor, left his Mafia crime-fighting career because he was unable to fulfill his duties. 'It's my belief that MCA and its involvement with Mafia individuals, Mafia-dominated companies and our inability to pursue those was not happenstance,' he says. 'I believe it was an organized, orchestrated effort on the part of certain individuals within Washington, D.C. to keep a hands-off policy towards MCA'


But the investigation was mysteriously ordered closed. He was later reinstated.

'For the Justice Department to kill the case was a little extraordinary,' Rudnick declared on camera.

'You wonder where it starts and where it ends. We did not get the investigation done because of intereference from high up.'

Special Agent Thomas G. Gates, who was heading up the FBI end of the investigation, declared in the film: "The powers trumped what we were trying to to do. The players within MCA tried to stay as low-key as they could. I don't know how much influence Wasserman was able to put on President
Reagan when he was in office because he [Wasserman] was always a backdoor participant, but we knew who he was associating with."

Gates stated that information about the probe 'was leaking out that shouldn't have happened' from the Justice Department in Washington.

The film's director, Shawn Swords, asserted to MailOnline that the Mob or MCA actually had a mole in the Justice Department. "It was somebody who was feeding information to the Mob and MCA. The FBI knew it was one of twelve people, but they couldn't finger the guilty one.'

Along with Rudnick's firing, and Stavin's quiting after his part of the MCA probe was shut down, all of the sealed files and wiretap documents were said to have mysteriously disappeared from a supposedly secure  federal government warehouse in Maryland.

Who was pulling the strings behind all of these questionable events, the more than two-hour documentary essentially asks.
 



As an unnamed Hollywood source was once quoted in a Justice Department document: "Ronald Reagan is a complete slave of MCA who would do their bidding on anything.'

In an exclusive interview with MailOnline, Shawn Swords said about Reagan and MCA, 'One hand washed the other. That relationship was so incestuous, and Ed Meese, who was the attorney general [appointed by President Reagan] who headed the Justice Department was really good friends with the board of directors at MCA.

'Reagan's whole career in politics was subsidized by them and helped him financially because for a long time he was living above his means. MCA backed every political campaign he ran. That's the shocking history -- that MCA was prevalent in his career and that they did so much quid pro quo for each other.'

'Ronald Reagan was an opportunist. His whole career was guided by MCA -- by Wasserman and [MCA founder] Jules Stein who bragged that Reagan was malleable, that they could do what they wanted with him.

'That thing about Reagan being tough on [organized] crime -- that's a fallacy.'

When Reagan's movie career was fading and Wasserman had difficulty getting him starring roles, a decision was made that would launch his political career. In 1947, with the aggressive support and backing of the Godfather at MCA, Reagan was elected president of the powerful Screen Actors Guild, known as SAG, a position in which he would serve for some seven terms.
Bulldog: Strike Force prosectutor Marvin Rudnick was fired by the Justice Department and considered 'rogue' because he wanted to continue to pursue the suspected MCA bad guys, even if the trail led to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Bulldog: Strike Force prosectutor Marvin Rudnick was fired by the Justice Department and considered 'rogue' because he wanted to continue to pursue the suspected MCA bad guys, even if the trail led to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue


SAG's bylaws had always banned talent agencies like MCA from producing any form of entertainment, such as TV programs and movies. But during Reagan's fifth year as the guild's president a secret blanket waiver was negotiated with SAG, and it gave MCA and Wasserman the platinum opportunity to not only market talent as agents but also to move into TV and film making.

After the waiver was granted, MCA formed MCA Television Limited that handled syndication, and then Review Productions to make TV and films, and got the jump on any competitition, making it a Hollywood powerhouse.

When Reagan ran into financial difficulties it was MCA under Wasserman that got him lucrative land deals that made him even wealthier. The General Electric Theater that Reagan hosted and for which he even produced programs was an MCA-Review property.

After Reagan was elected governor of California in 1966, with support and campaign financing from MCA and associates, some with shady ties, MCA benefited from some of his executive decisions.
 
Fast forward to the mid-1980s when Reagan was in the Oval Office. MCA was then in negotiations to sell out to the giant Japanese company Matsushita Electric Industrial for billions of dollars. From that deal Wasserman reportedly was to benefit to the tune of $500 million.
SAG swag: Ronald Reagan held court at the Screen Actors' Guild for seven terms. At one point he was able to change to rules to greatly benefir MCA and Wasserman's bottom line by allowing the management company to produce TV and film projects
SAG swag: Ronald Reagan held court at the Screen Actors' Guild for seven terms. At one point he was able to change to rules to greatly benefir MCA and Wasserman's bottom line by allowing the management company to produce TV and film projects


But the big danger for him and his company, dubbed  the 'Octopus,'  because its tentacles were in virtually all aspects of the entertainment business, was an ongoing U.S. Justice Department probe into suspected organized crime influence at MCA and in particular Wasserman's long purported ties to Mafia figures.

If the probe became public, it would most likely have impacted Wall Street and MCA's publicly held stock, and possibly driven away the Japanese buyers and the lucrative purchase. Wasserman, according to the documentary, wasn't going to let that happen.

The Justice Department-FBI investigation into Mob ties within MCA started by chance when organized crime strike force prosecutor Marvin Rudnick came across intelligence that a man by the name of Salvatore Pisello was in the hierarchy of MCA.

A red flag instantly went up. How and why, Rudnick wondered, was a high-ranking soldier in the Gambino Mafia family of New York who was known to his associates as 'Sal The Banker', 'Sal the Swindler,' and 'Big Sal,' doing businesss in MCA's offices in Universal City.
Thwarted: FBI Special Agent Thomas G. Gates, who was heading up the FBI end of the investigation, declared in the film: 'The powers trumped what we were trying to to do'
Thwarted: FBI Special Agent Thomas G. Gates, who was heading up the FBI end of the investigation, declared in the film: 'The powers trumped what we were trying to to do'


Pisello had just been sentenced to four years in prison on tax evasion charges, and Rudnick at a hearing in U.S. District Court in L.A.  stated that evidence had been uncovered linking him to 'criminal activity in the record industry.'

Pisello had denied any involvement in organized crime, and declared, 'I'll go to prison for 20 years if anyone can prove that. I go to church every Sunday and the only organization I ever belonged to was the Holy Name Society.' Regarding his MCA connection, he declared, 'I'm in the record business for one year and I'm supposed to have destroyed the industry.'

But his connections and dealings became the target of several federal grand jury probes. MCA denied knowing anything about his alleged organized crime links, and claimed to have no idea how he got in the door.

The investigation though led to other crime figures involved with MCA before it got shut down.
 
Another source interviewed on camera  in the documentary, investigative reporter William K. Knoedelseder, Jr., author of Stiffed: A True Story of MCA, the Music Business and the Mafia, published in 1993, had for a dozen years been covering organized crime and other corruption in the entertainment industry for The Los Angeles Times.

He began writing revelatory stories for the paper about Rudnick and Stavin's investigation, and was the first to report that Pisello 'wound up in high-level meetings with MCA officers' negotiating lucrative record deals 'that would place him among the best-paid executives in the industry.'
 


But like Rudnick and Stavin, the series of stories was a newspaper career-ender for Knoedelseder. He was ordered by editors to stop writing about MCA, and he quit his job, according to a 2006 book called 'Supermob' that also dealt with Reagan, Wasserman and the Mafia, and it noted that the publisher of the LA Times at the time had gotten his job 'thanks to Lew Wasserman's kind intercession.'

Rudnick had also been ordered to drop his end of the investigation.

'I was told by my boss not to introduce evidence that was embarrassing to MCA,' he stated in the documentary. 'My office was being told by somebody higher up to stop the investigation to show how Pisello got into MCA which was the most important part of the case. MCA executives weren't cooperating because somebody high up in MCA was trying to kill the deal.

'For MCA to be doing business so closely with Pisello was a primary example of what the Strike Force should be doing, and when the Strike Force looked the other way and turned it down, then you know darn well interference took place. As a prosecutor we should be investigating the people who are interfering, not just walking away from it and this is what I tried to do.'

At one point, Rudnick realized he was being followed as he made his investigative rounds. When he told his superiors in Washington, their response was, 'We got your back.'
Dapper Don: Mafia boss John Gotti was found by investigators to have ties to an MCA executive
Dapper Don: Mafia boss John Gotti was found by investigators to have ties to an MCA executive


According to Rudnick, 'MCA decided to reach out and try to kill our case which they eventually did. MCA sent people out to follow me while I was driving, they stopped a wiretap that was legal. They were able to interfere with all kinds of official acts, but nobody at the highest levels of the Justice Department seemed to care or wanted to stop it. It went all the way to the top.'

During the course of the investigation before it was shut down by powers in Washington the probers found another alleged Mob connection at MCA -- Eugene Giaquinto, who was the head of MCA Home Video. Wiretaps had caught Giaquinto talking to 'La Cosa Nostra people in the East,' and the FBI agent Gates stated on camera that 'Wasserman was Giaquinto's mentor and promoted in the MCA's Home Entertainment Group which was very powerful.'

According to Stavin, Giaquinto, who was an executive at MCA for some two decades, had ties to Mob boss John Gotti, and it was learned by the investigators that when a power struggle between two division heads at MCA had erupted it was allegedly resolved by Gotti, dubbed the 'Teflon Don,' and the 'Dapper Don,' who was Boss of New York's Gambino Family at the time. He died in prison in 2002.

In one bizarre spin-off to the whole complicated case, Gotti was asked to kill a planned movie in which the actor James Caan, who starred in "The Godfather" reportedly was to play the role of Jewish mobster Meyer Lansky.

Giaquinto, a target of the MCA-Mafia probe, reportedly was involved in trying to get the film blocked. Caan dropped the project.
Deal with the devil: GE Theater saved Ronald Reagan's career and a big payday. MCA's Wasserman set up the deal and after that Reagan owed the mogul big time, says the documentary producer
Deal with the devil: GE Theater saved Ronald Reagan's career and a big payday. MCA's Wasserman set up the deal and after that Reagan owed the mogul big time, says the documentary producer


In the book Supermob, Giaquinto was identified as the source who went into action to get the MCA-Mafia probe brought to an end. The author quoted the source as recalling Giaquinto going ballistic and declaring, 'I'm calling [Attorney general Ed] Meese and getting this thing stopped right now.' The book also quoted an attorney for several MCA executives who had been cooperating with Strike Force prosecutor Marvin Rudnick as saying, 'There was [talk] about how Ed Meese wanted certain actions taken because Nancy Reagan had a friend in high places in the entertainment industry.'

According to Swords, 'The Mob were probably working her, too. She was on the board of governors for the Screen Actors Guild. She was a driving force behind Reagan. Apparently she was the one who was pushing him into everything.'

Mrs. Reagan turns 93 this coming July 6.

While the once liberal democrat Reagan became a popular screen star and later switched political allegiance and became a conservative Republican political hero to millions, Wasserman was little known to the general public. A tall and gaunt man of mystery who sported oversize eyeglasses and dressed like a mortician -- black suits, white shirts, black ties, Wasserman made his army of underling agents dress similarly. In the business of entertainment , they were considered 'the black-suited Mafia.'

Wasserman was seen as frighteningly ruthless with a temper that made powerful men cringe.
 
His mentor in the beginning of his career was Jules Stein, an ophthalmologist from the Windy City who in the early years of the Roaring '20s had founded the Music Corporation of America, which booked bands in the Midwest, and had close ties to shady figures, reputedly members of the Chicago Mob.

A poor boy from a Russian immigrant family, Wasserman grew up in Cleveland, worked as a movie house usher at night, and after getting his high school diploma -- he never went to college -- joined up with what was known as the Mayfield Road Gang, an Italian-led Mafia organization with ties to the Jewish mob -- helping to run a casino.
Connections:  President Bill Clinton -- who like Reagan got a lot of campaign and financial support from Hollywood power brokers -- presented Wasserman with the nation's highest civilian honor in a ceremony at the White House, the Presidential Medal of Freedom
Connections: President Bill Clinton -- who like Reagan got a lot of campaign and financial support from Hollywood power brokers -- presented Wasserman with the nation's highest civilian honor in a ceremony at the White House, the Presidential Medal of Freedom


Moving up the career ladder in Chicago, Wasserman was recruited by founder Jules Stein who saw him as a bright boy with good ideas and made him an MCA talent agent. Stein was well-connected: his MCA was booking bands for the flashy nightclubs and crooked gambling houses run by legendary crime boss Al Capone. 

By then, Wasserman had taken a wife -- his attorney father-in-law reportedly was a reputed Mob mouthpiece.

In the late '30s, Stein and Wasserman followed the adage of Horace Greeley and went west, setting up shop in the ritzy center of the entertainment industry -- Beverly Hills, around the same time that the Chicago Mob was putting down roots in the movie capital.

Of all the incredible acting talent in the MCA stable of clients, the first to ever receive a $1 million movie contract was Ronald Reagan-- a deal Wasserman negotiated for him with Warner Brothers Studios in 1941.

Wasserman apparently saw a future for Reagan far beyond the acting world. 

Wasserman was just 36 when Stein anointed him MCA's president, the youngest to ever hold such a position of power. It was in the late '40s that Wasserman saw MCA as a major player in the new technology known as television.

In Hollywood, where all movies and their characters have an arc, Wasserman's rise to power ended after the Justice Department's organized Crime Strike Force investigation was killed. The sale of MCA went through to the Japanese for $6.5 billion in 1990. Wasserman had a role in management for a time. But when MCA was sold again to the Seagram Company in 1995 for $5.7 billion,

Wasserman wasn't even told. By then his power was gone.

Desperate Liar Mitch McConnell Gets Caught In His Own Health Care Trap

By Sarah Jones

Mitch McConnell
Upon Senator Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) primary victory promise to repeal Obamacare, I mused who would ask him about kicking the 413,000 Kentuckians who were on Kynect off of it. Your mainstream media did just that, and the Kentucky Senator told a bold faced lie. A lie so disingenuous and so important policy wise that it can’t be overstated.

The man who is hoping to be Majority Leader of the Senate and who promised to repeal Obamacare if he makes it claimed that the Kentucky state exchange is not connected to Obamacare. But of course, it is. It is Obamacare, under a different name.

ABC reported:
But the veteran senator won’t say what would happen to the 413,000 Kentuckians who have health insurance through the state’s health care exchange.
McConnell told reporters Friday that the fate of the state exchange is unconnected to the federal health care law. Yet the exchange would not exist, if not for the law that created it.
Kynect is the state exchange version of the Affordable Care Act, aka, Obamacare. It’s a marketplace run by the state as the drafters of the ACA intended all marketplaces to be (before Republicans sabotaged the online marketplace by refusing to build the state markets).

A plurality of Kentuckians like their Obamacare, so long as it’s called Kynect, so it’s no wonder that McConnell is trying to dodge his way around kicking them all off of their health insurance.
According to Kynect statistics as of 4/21/14, 413,410 Kentuckians are enrolled in new health coverage, including Medicaid and private insurance.

Per the Kynect website, “Calling it ‘the single-most important decision in our lifetime for improving the health of Kentuckians,’ Gov. Steve Beshear announced in May 2013 the inclusion of 308,000 more Kentuckians in the federal Medicaid health insurance program.

Read slowly in honor of Mitch McConnell:
The expansion – made in accordance with the federal Affordable Care Act (ACA) – will help hundreds of thousands of Kentucky families, dramatically improve the state’s health, create nearly 17,000 new jobs and have a $15.6 billion positive economic impact on the state between its beginning in Fiscal Year 2014 and full implementation in Fiscal Year 2021.
Kentuckians deserve to know what Mitch McConnell plans to do with all of the folks who signed up for insurance under Kynect or got onto Medicaid when he repeals Obamacare, as he has promised to try to do.

It looks like McConnell is caught in his own Obamacare trap. Too bad he and his party never tried to do anything to solve the healthcare crisis in this country — and have staked their entire party upon the public buying their smears about Obamacare — instead of realizing that once it was implemented, they would be running on kicking people off of insurance and that’s not as easy as telling Obamascare lies.

Kynect is Obamacare, and Senator McConnell knows it. This is one of the most brazen, outrageous lies told in the last few years, and I’m ranking it above even Mitt Romney’s Jeep lies, because it is meant to fool innocent Kentuckians who have no clue that Kynect is Obamacare. There aren’t words for this kind of cruel hypocrisy.

Politics is full of spin, but this goes beyond spin. This is a matter of people’s lives.
Desperate Liar Mitch McConnell Gets Caught In His Own Obamacare Trap was written by Sarah Jones for PoliticusUSA.

Darrell Issa Declares War on John Boehner as Benghazi Investigation Turns Into a Circus

By Jason Easley

issa-boehner
The big House Benghazi investigation has turned into a full blown circus, as John Boehner has lost control over Darrell Issa, who has gone rogue, and is trashing Boehner’s big plans.

Video:



Here is a transcript of Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) explaining the meltdown in the House GOP to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer:
BLITZER: What exactly is going on?
REP. CUMMINGS: I think the Speaker has lost control of Issa. Mr. Issa’s trying to interject himself into the Select Committee’s business. Keep in mind, Wolf, when the Select Committee was formed what the Speaker said was everything comes under the Select Committee. Now, here we have Mr. Issa trying to bring the Secretary in, and the Secretary is saying, you know, I’m going to come, but I’m just going to come one time. This is it. By the way, Wolf, it undermines the Select Committee. It undermines them. This is the very thing they were worried about.
BLITZER: I thought if there was a Select Committee, it would supersede the other committees.
CUMMINGS: That’s exactly right….I can tell you. I would think that Trey (Gowdy) would be a little upset about this. In other words, it’s his committee now, the Select Committee, and now he sees Issa operating on the outside, and the Speaker said it would not be a circus, but we’ve got a circus on the side.
Blitzer and Cummings both agreed that Sec. of State Kerry wouldn’t know anything, because he was a senator and not the Sec. of State at the time of the attack.

Yesterday, Issa sabotaged the Select Committee by disclosing details of a memo that confirms that the White House was telling the truth about Benghazi. At the time, it was speculated that Issa was bitter about the Benghazi investigation being taken away from him. Rep. Issa’s behavior today proves that he is actively working to sabotage Boehner’s Select Committee investigating Benghazi.

This whole sideshow has turned into an epic circus before the Special Committee has even formally been seated. I agree with Rep. Cummings. Boehner has lost all control of Issa, who is now acting on his own. The whole let’s get Obama with Benghazi plan is melting into complete chaos and dysfunction.

The great Benghazi investigation is a total joke, as Boehner, Issa, and company are getting what they deserve for trying to exploit the deaths of four Americans for partisan political gain.
 
Darrell Issa Declares War on John Boehner as Benghazi Investigation Turns Into a Circus was written by Jason Easley for PoliticusUSA.

Friday, May 23, 2014

One county shows why Tom Corbett is doomed

By Adam B

In 2010, Tom Corbett carried Centre County, PA, by a 55%-45% margin. It's in the center of the state (duh), and sufficiently purplish that even in 2012, when Barack Obama carried the state 52%-47%, he only won Centre County by 175 votes.  If Tom Corbett is going to be re-elected, he needs to win Centre County.

And here's the Republican primary results for Centre County, Pennsylvania, from Tuesday night:
Have you ever, in your life, seen a reverse drop-off like that?  A thousand in his own party writing in someone else, and another thousand voters also refusing to acknowledge that race at all as demonstrated by the under vote relative to the legislative races?
I should probably mention something else: Centre County is the home of Penn State University.
The rest, I think you know: Corbett, as attorney general, has been accused of slow-walking the investigation into Jerry Sandusky's horrific crimes against children on campus.

As Governor, he slashed funding to Penn State as well as public education across-the-board; bizarrely approved a $3M grant to Sandusky's Second Mile charity while he knew the investigation was ongoing; and is reviled by many for his acquiescence to the NCAA's punishment of the school, and for commandeering what was seen as the disrespectful way in which Joe Paterno was hastily fired (over the phone) after 61 years devoted to the university. (Paterno died two months later.)

Please read below the fold for more on this story.
Tom Fitzgerald, Philadelphia Inquirer, 6-12-13:
A significant number of voters, 47 percent, said in the latest Quinnipiac University poll on Thursday that the Penn State situation would be a "very" or "somewhat" important factor in their choice for governor next year. By a margin of 58 percent to 23 percent, voters thought that Corbett did not do enough to pursue Sandusky.
Forty-six percent of those polled said the NCAA penalties against Penn State are "too severe," while 32 percent said they are appropriate. Perhaps more important from a political point of view: 75 percent said that the sanctions, including limits on scholarships, a ban on bowl appearances, and a $60 million fine, will hurt the football program.
The Pennsylvania Attorney General's office has been pursuing an investigation into Corbett's handling of the allegations against Sandusky; while delayed, its report is expected in the next few months.
There are many reasons why the Washington Post has listed Corbett as America's most vulnerable governor consistently over the past year and a half. As Tuesday's election results demonstrate, it's not just Democrats who realize how ruinous his governorship has been.

Tom Corbett must be defeated, and we will need your help here in Pennsylvania.

Originally posted to Adam B on Thu May 22, 2014 at 07:04 AM PDT.

Also republished by Pittsburgh Area Kossacks, Philly Kos, DKos Pennsylvania, and Daily Kos.

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Maddow slams Republicans for complaining about VA scandal after passing budget cuts

By Arturo Garcia

MSNBC host Rachel Maddow argued on Wednesday that the problems currently surrounding the country’s Veterans Affairs (VA) department predated both President Barack Obama and department Secretary Eric Shinseki’s administrations, and were fueled in part by Republican budget cuts and inaction.

“There is a modern American dysmorphia when it comes to veterans,” she said. “We see things that aren’t really there. We tell ourselves that we’re doing things that we’re not really doing. We have a poetry in this country about our love and respect for veterans that is not matched by the prose of how veterans are actually treated.”

Maddow noted that in March 2003 — the same month the U.S. began its second war against Iraq — the GOP-led House of Representatives approved a budget cutting $14 billion from the VA’s budget. Two years later, Anthony Principi, who was appointed by then-President George W. Bush, released a statement saying the department did not “require additional resources” despite the escalating cost of that conflict.

Lawmakers later had to approve an emergency $1.5 billion budget influx following reports that local VA facilities were instituting hiring freezes and lacking the ability to make necessary purchases.

Yet it’s Republicans who are now engaging in a coordinated effort, she said, to oust Shinseki amid an investigation into alleged record-keeping malfeasance in VA clinics in 26 cities.

“Not even the people who are clamoring for him to go — not even the people who are clamoring for the president to fire General Shinzeki — say they believe that that would solve the problem at the VA,” Maddow said. “I mean, whether or not you want Eric Shinzeki to keep his job, what would it take to fix the problem?”

Watch Maddow’s commentary, as aired on Wednesday, below.

Monday, May 19, 2014

GOP Senator Marco Rubio Is a Frighteningly Stupid Man Who Thinks He's Ready to Be President

Posted By Rude One

One-time Savior of the Republican Party, Senator Marco Rubio, he of the muy beneficial Cuban background (although, you know, Hispanics aren't idiots - believe it or not, they can tell a Mexican from a Puerto Rican from a Cuban), he of the parched lips, he of the allegedly once-reasonable side of the GOP, thinks he's all grown up and ready to be president of these here United States. Oh, sure, he was a bit coy during his Sunday interview, saying that his party of lunatics, whores, and lepers is just filled to the brim with potential candidates. But, yeah, he's ready.

And how can you tell he's ready? Because Marco Rubio talked about complex issues like a brain-damaged Twitchy commenter. "I think a president has to have a clear vision of where the country needs to go and clear ideas about how to get it there," he told ABC combover Jonathan Karl. And part of his clear vision is that you can go fuck yourself with your climate change.

When Karl asked him about it on Sunday, Rubio answered, "I don’t agree with the notion that some are putting out there, including scientists, that somehow, there are actions we can take today that would actually have an impact on what’s happening in our climate." Here's the fuckin' deal: unless you are a scientist and you have slam-dunk evidence in your hand, you don't get to disagree with the "notion" that nearly every climate scientist is wrong. It's like when a fan thinks he can tell the coaches of a pro football team what plays to run by screaming at them from the stands. You know, Senator, a law degree from the University of Miami entitles you to a lot of things. Ignorantly questioning climatologists with statements like "I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it" is not one of them. "These scientists" will kick your ass all over your soon-to-be drowned state.

But let's put aside the usual blah-blah-blah climate change denialism. We're pretty much fucked there, and we're not gonna do a goddamned thing about it until we're having Road Warrior-esque drinking water battles.

Instead, have a read of Rubio's erudite statements on how Democrats want to keep people working at Burger King: "I want people to look at the Republican Party as the party that shows them the way to a new American century versus a Democratic Party that shows us how this is the new normal and we just have to get used to it, that the cashier at Burger King will always be a cashier, and all he or she can hope for is an increase in the minimum wage...And what we say is: No, the cashier at Burger King might be a cashier today, but he or she will be a manager tomorrow, and maybe they're paying for school so she can be a doctor in 10 years."

In order to understand that mindbogglingly stupid paragraph, picture this: The skeleton of Ayn Rand has Marco Rubio sitting on her lap. She's got her bony hand up his ass, operating his mouth like the meat puppet he is. Got it?

What is the magical path by which that Burger King worker becomes a doctor, something that is totally within the realm of possibility? So let's use our brain TVs and imagine that Burger King worker. Let's call her "Claudette." Claudette maybe has her high school diploma, so let's say she's around 20. Chances are that, as a full-time worker at Burger King, she'll make somewhere around $7.40 an hour. Even after working a second job, she might make under $15,000 a year with no benefits. If you can imagine someone like that, she might inform you that, after three years at BK, "I still live at home with my mother and try to go to school on the side. I do dream of something more, but it's really hard to get jobs right now."

Oh, wait. We don't have to imagine Claudette because she's a totally fucking real Burger King employee.

How the fuck is she becoming a doctor, Senator Rubio? Only through the government helping through programs like student loans, health care, and, yes, a higher minimum wage so that she can actually save something and not just exist to serve your kids Whopper, Jrs. And Claudette's a best case scenario (other than middle class kids in high school, the GOP fantasy minimum wage workers). What if she had kids? A sick parent? No place to live? That's where government is supposed to step up and says, "Hey, you wanna be a doctor? Let us help you try to achieve that dream." Not "It's your fault you can't make more than $7.40 an hour after 3 years at Burger King."

Show us the way to the "new American century"? Motherfucker, it's 2014, not 2000. We're in the century, the real century. Deal with what's happening, to the climate, to the people, now, not in some fake future constructed in the cash-stuffed offices of think tanks and SuperPACs.

Saturday, May 17, 2014

Charter Schools Are Crooked and Corrupt Money Pits

Charter schools are bad. In addition to taking funding away from the public education system, a new report by the Center for Popular Democracy and Integrity in Education shows that fraud, waste, and abuse cases are abundant within charter schools.

These cases, which total over $100 million in losses to taxpayers could “be just the tip of the iceberg,” according to the report.

The report sets aside other issues associated with charter schools (segregations, low performance records, and questionable administration practices) and focuses on activities classified as criminal. It also indicated that the fraud, waste, and abuse are due to the actual problem of inadequate regulation. While this may only be one symptom of the problem, it is a huge one and should be brought to light.

There are, however, reform efforts in progress in states such as Hawaii, which repealed its charter school law in 2013. Even the Walton Family Foundation, which is a major advocate for charter schools, spent $5 million in 2012 lobbying to make the regulation of charter schools more stringent.

Kyle Serrette of the Center for Popular Democracy explained that they expected to find fraud within the charter school systems, but it was not expected that it would be so prevalent.

The study was conducted in only 15 states. The fraud is more than likely much more expansive than what is realized.

“And that figure [$100 million in losses] fails to capture the real harm to children. Clearly, we should hit the pause button on charter expansion until there is a better oversight system in place to protect our children and our communities,” said Serrette.

Sabrina Stevens, executive director of Integrity in Education, explains, “Our school system exists to serve students and enrich communities. School funding is too scarce as it is; we can hardly afford to waste the resources we do have on people who would prioritize exotic vacations over school supplies or food for children. We also can’t continue to rely on the media or isolated whistle-blowers to identify these problems. We need to have rules in place that can systematically weed out incompetent or unscrupulous charter operators before they pose a risk to students and taxpayers.”

The people that Stevens are referring to are charter school executives, such as Joel Pourier, who embezzled more than $1 million from Oh Day Aki Heart Charter School.

These are funds that should be spent on bettering the education and lives of the children who attend the schools, not make the rich richer.

When will Americans take notice of the major flaws and problems associated with charter schools? 

The best move would be to eradicate charter schools, instead of abolishing the public education system, which some Republicans propose.

All charter schools are good for is taking away money from the public education system and taxpayers.

Meg is a writer and researcher with Ring of Fire.

The post Charter Schools Are Crooked and Corrupt Money Pits appeared first on Ring Of Fire Radio: Robert Kennedy Jr, Mike Papantonio and Sam Seder.

Friday, May 16, 2014

Limbaugh’s ignorant rhetoric about 2016

Conservative talkers continue their attacks against Hillary Clinton, this time with Rush Limbaugh’s wild theory about the role of gender in the race. Ed Schultz, Lizz Winstead and Annette Taddeo discuss.

Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Marco Rubio's radical denial of climate change

Snow in May, devastating wildfires in California - and Senator Marco Rubio still denies the existence of scientifically proven Climate Change. Ed Schultz, Mike Papantonio and Former Governor Brian Schweitzer discuss.

Want to Know If Your Food Is Genetically Modified?

http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/want-to-know-if-your-food-is-genetically-modified/370812/

Why Karl Rove Uses Dirty Tricks: They Work

By Peter Beinart

Karl Rove reportedly hinted that Hillary Clinton may have brain damage from a fall—then quickly backed away. His history suggests it's a calculated maneuver.

Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

Karl Rove now denies reports that he said Hillary Clinton may have brain damage. “I never used that phrase,” he said on Fox News. True. What Rove said was, “Thirty days in the hospital? And when she reappears, she’s wearing glasses that are only for people who have traumatic brain injury? We need to know what’s up with that.”

In other words, Rove didn’t say Hillary Clinton has brain damage. He hinted it, thus giving himself deniability while ensuring that the slur lingers in the public mind. Which is what he’s been doing his entire career.

In 2004, Joshua Green reported in The Atlantic that Texas insiders accused Rove of spreading allegations that his rival, Republican consultant John Weaver, had made a pass at a young man at a GOP event. Green also quoted an aide to a 1994 state Supreme Court candidate in Alabama who accused Rove of having quietly insinuated that his boss was a pedophile. Similarly, when George W. Bush ran for governor of Texas that same year, rumors swirled about the sexual orientation of incumbent Ann Richards. “No one ever traced the character assassination to Rove,” wrote Bush biographer Louis Dubose, “Yet no one doubts that Rove was behind it.”

Most famously, when Bush was fighting for his life against a surging John McCain in South Carolina in 2000, fliers, emails, and push polls accused McCain of having fathered an African-American “love child” (he had actually adopted a girl from Bangladesh) and of suffering from mental instability as a result of his incarceration in Vietnam. McCain staffers, and McCain’s daughter, have accused Rove of orchestrating the rumors; Rove denies any involvement.

Why does Rove allegedly smear his opponents this way? Because it works.

Consider the Clinton “brain damage” story. Right now, the press is slamming Rove for his vicious, outlandish comments. But they’re also talking about Clinton’s health problems as secretary of state, disrupting the story she wants to tell about her time in Foggy Bottom in her forthcoming memoir.

Assuming she runs for president, the press will investigate Clinton’s medical history and age no matter what Rove says. But he’s now planted questions—about the December 2012 blood clot that forced her into the hospital, and about her mental condition as she ages—that will lurk in journalists’ minds as they do that reporting. If she has a moment of Rick Perry-like forgetfulness sometime between now and the fall of 2016, Rove’s comments make it more likely that voters will wonder whether she’s still with it mentally.     

Political consultants create narratives about the candidates they want to defeat: Al Gore fudged the truth; John Kerry was an elitist; Barack Obama wasn’t fully American; Mitt Romney didn’t care about ordinary people. Once you kindle public suspicion about your opponent, it’s easy to keep throwing logs on the fire. On the eve of the memoir that will launch Hillary’s pre-campaign public relations blitz, Karl Rove is starting that process now, despite having no evidence for the storyline he wants to convey.

For better—but mostly for worse—campaign 2016 is already here.

The cartoon hillbilly

Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Alan Grayson Calls Marco Rubio's Climate Change Denial 'The Endarkenment'

By John Amato

He explains that politicians like Cruz understand what their actions will cost the American government and the taxpayers, but don't care.
Rep. Alan Grayson has always spoken out against the crazy, anti-intellectual side of the Republican party and as I've written before, he always speaks truth to psychosis. Here's what he said about Ted Cruz after he shut down the federal government:
Grayson: No, not at all. Ted Cruz represent the element in the republican party that's trying to hasten the Apocalypse. These are people who understand that Obamacare actually does help save people's lives and they want to destroy it anyway.
These are people who understand that defaulting on the national debt would drive unemployment sky high and they want to do it anyway. Those are the people Ted Cruz speaks to today.
He explains that politicians like Cruz understand what their actions will cost the American government and the taxpayers, but don't care. This past Sunday, Senator Marco Rubio joined the ranks of Ted Cruz , Louis Gohmert and many others as a disbeliever in truth and facts when he denied that climate change was influenced by mankind and said scientists were all wrong when asked if climate change was threatening cities in Florida.
"I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientist are portraying it," Rubio said. "And I do not believe the laws that they propose we pass will do anything about it. Except, it will destroy our economy."
I emailed Rep. Alan Grayson after I watched Rubio's performance on ABC news about his ludicrous positions since he's from Florida too and here's how he responded via email:
Grayson: It’s insane, but that’s what passes for political discourse these days. It’s a complete rejection of facts, evidence and logic – the “Endarkenment.”
To some Christian conservatives, climate change is nothing more than a sign of the approaching End Times, but for Rubio it's just gobbledegook nonsense, but to people who objectively consider and weigh the evidence, it's a threat to our planet's entire existence.

I think "The Endarkenment" describes the Republican party perfectly.

Monday, May 12, 2014

The Big Puff of Wind Rush Limbaugh

Ring of Fire’s Mike Papantonio and Sam Seder discuss Rush Limbaugh's ratings cataclysm.

Saturday, May 10, 2014

North Dakota was the deadliest state to work in 2012

By Laura Clawson for Daily Kos Labor

The workplace fatality rate held steady at 3.4 deaths per 100,000 workers in 2012, which means that 4,628 workers were killed on the job in America in 2012, according to the AFL-CIO's annual "Death on the Job" report. Where you work makes a huge difference in the risk of death. Take North Dakota:

  • The state’s 2012 job fatality rate of 17.7 per 100,000 is more than five times the national average and is one of the highest state job fatality rates ever reported for any state. The state’s fatality rate more than doubled from a rate of 7.0 per 100,000 in 2007, and the number of workers killed on the job increased from 25 to 65.
  • Latino workers accounted for 12 of the North Dakota deaths in 2012, a fourfold increase from the three Latino worker deaths in 2011.
  • The fatality rate in the mining and oil and gas extraction sector in North Dakota was an alarming 104.0 per 100,000, more than six times the national fatality rate of 15.9 per 100,000 in this industry; and the construction sector fatality rate in North Dakota was 97.4 per 100,000, almost ten times the national fatality rate of 9.9 per 100,000 for construction.
By contrast, the workplace fatality rate in Massachusetts was just 1.4 per 100,000 workers. Obviously some industries will always be more dangerous than others, but the elevated fatality rate for construction workers in North Dakota versus other states shows that it's not just that.

Who you are also matters: Latino workers were particularly at risk, with a workplace death rate of 3.7 per 100,000 workers; nearly two-thirds of the Latinos killed on the job were born outside the United States.

The state to state variations in fatalities remind us that regulation and oversight work. They save lives—something to remember when Republicans drone on about "job-killing regulations." That regulations necessarily kill jobs is just not true, but if you need more evidence that regulations save lives, consider that, according to the AFL-CIO, since the 1970 passage of the Occupational Safety and Health Act, "The job fatality rate has been cut by 81 percent; more than 492,000 workers' lives have been saved."

Then consider that Texas hasn't seen last year's devastating fertilizer plant explosion as a reason to push for new safety measures.

Originally posted to Daily Kos Labor on Thu May 08, 2014 at 10:36 AM PDT.

Also republished by WE NEVER FORGET, In Support of Labor and Unions, and Daily Kos.

Friday, May 9, 2014

Set Destroyed During Fight On Live Talk Show In Jordan

A talk show debate between two Jordanian journalists turned into a seat-clearing, set-destroying fight, Young Turks host Cenk Uygur reported amusedly on Thursday.

Thursday, May 8, 2014

The Benghazis the GOP Will Never Touch

Posted By Rude One

The Rude Pundit was going to write a long, graphic, stomach-churning piece about various Republicans, like Darrell Issa, Lindsey Graham, and Trey Gowdy, doing horrible things to themselves and each other sexually using the bones of dead U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens as implements of penetration. There would have been dildo talk, there would have been cries of pain and joy, there would have been gushes of ejaculate and feces all over one another and all over the hearing rooms of the Congress and all over the media and all over their base, who just eat it up, and maybe even all over Hillary Clinton. It would have been vile and depraved, and some of you might have found it shocking and funny, and some of you might have found it shocking and gross, and more than a few of you would have been turned on, and perhaps some of you might have taken notes for use later. That's the kind of service this blog offers.

It would have all been written as a metaphor about the GOP's monomania about What Happened at Benghazi, something that really has no relation anymore to what happened at Benghazi, at that American consulate in Libya some twenty months ago, when four Americans were killed in the chaos of terrorist attacks and riots over whatever people were rioting about. The metaphor would have demonstrated, through nauseating imagery, exactly why Republicans are still beating this drum, even though the drumhead was worn out and torn a long time ago. Yeah, all of that was loaded and cocked and ready to fire.

And then, out of curiosity, the Rude Pundit was reading a bit, and this story came up: "4 Dead, 24 Wounded in Weekend Chicago Violence." It's about how many people were murdered or hurt, mostly by gunfire, in the Windy City just this past Saturday and Sunday.

If this was being written last Monday, the headline would have been "43 Shot, 5 Killed, in Spate of Weekend Violence in Chicago."

If it had been the week before last, the headline would have been "At Least 8 Dead, 44 Wounded In Weekend Shootings."

And on and on heading backwards for as long as you care to look.

In other words, there's at least a Benghazi every weekend in Chicago. Sometimes it's twice a Benghazi. Yet there are no congressional hearings about the dead Americans in Chicago. There's no admonishment of politicians for having policies that contribute to the violence, like the nation's lax gun laws (yeah, Chicago's got strict gun control, which totally doesn't prevent people from getting weapons an hour away). There's no movement on the federal government's part, through action by Congress, to pass things like the Youth PROMISE Act, which at least would establish ways to try to deal with the violence that plagues so many places.

But those are gangs doing most of the murdering, mostly black and Hispanic Americans killing mostly black and Hispanic Americans, not filthy Arabs killing noble white men.

Darrell Issa and Trey Gowdy and whoever else are going to lead the latest bullshit hearings on whatever bullshit committee bullshit leader John Boehner pulls out of his orange ass. If they won't even acknowledge the little Benghazis that are doing far more harm to the nation than a dozen burned-down consulates, they can go fuck themselves with...well, see above.

Jet Magazine to Stop Print Publication and Go Digital

By Breanna Edwards

Jet magazine will be bidding farewell to the newsstand, for the most part, moving forward with plans to transition into a digital magazine—available as an app—at the end of June, Johnson Publishing Co. announced Wednesday.

The black magazine, founded in the early 1950's as a popular news source for black people to get information about their community, has ranked among the top three African-American magazines throughout its existence.

Jet magazine says the new weekly digital-magazine app will harness the power of multimedia, telling stories using video interviews, enhanced digital maps, 3D charts and, of course, photography—along with its daily breaking news. The app will be available across all devices and platforms.
The magazine is not completely leaving the print space, however, and will produce a special print edition once a year.

"Almost 63 years ago, my father, John Johnson, named the publication Jet because, as he said in the first issue, 'In the world today, everything is moving faster. There is more news and far less time to read it,' " Linda Johnson Rice, chairman of Johnson Publishing, stated in a press release. "He could not have spoken more relevant words today. We are not saying goodbye to Jet, we are embracing the future as my father did in 1951 and taking it to the next level."

"The Jet magazine online presence is continuing to grow, and JPC feels strongly we can provide great and timely content to our readers with the first weekly digital magazine app in the African-American space," said Desiree Rogers, CEO of Johnson Publishing.

Tuesday, May 6, 2014

The GOP's 'Summer of Benghazi coverage'

Republicans manufacture hysteria over Benghazi in an attempt to distract the American public from the real issues ahead of the midterms. Ed Schultz, Rep. John Garamendi, and Col. Lawrence Wilkerson discuss.

Monday, May 5, 2014

Hey Democrats, Listen to Elizabeth Warren!

By Gary Bentley

It looks like Republicans have a shot at winning the Senate after the 2014 election, and Democrats need to understand why that is. Ring of Fire’s Mike Papantonio fills in for Thom Hartmann on The Big Picture to discuss how Democrats need strong voices like Elizabeth Warren.

Here's how to debunk their favorite attacks

"Capital in the 21st Century" has sent conservatives into a rage. Here's how to debunk their favorite attacks

By

Thomas Piketty’s wildly popular new book, “Capital in the 21st Century,” has been subject to more think pieces than the final episode of “Breaking Bad.” Progressives are celebrating the book — and its unexpected popularity — as an important turning point in the fight against global wealth inequality. This, of course, means that conservatives have gone completely ballistic.

Rush Limbaugh, for example, has come out guns a-blazing: “Some French socialist, Marxist, communist economist has published a book, and the left in this country is having orgasms over it,” he exclaimed during a recent broadcast.

When the right drops the C-bomb, the M-bomb and S-bomb all at once, you can be certain a book is having an impact. And “Capital” may well be the “General Theory” of the first half of the 21st century, redefining the way we think about capitalism, democracy and equality.

This, of course, means that the right-wing attacks have only just begun. That in mind, here is a handy guide to navigating the more absurd responses:

Claim: Piketty is a dirty Marxist

There are two Marxes. One, a scholar of capitalism of repute, put forward testable hypotheses, some of which you may accept, some of which you may reject. The other is a conservative boogeyman, the human representation of all they find evil. If they dislike something, it must be Marxist.

James Pethokoukis, a formidable writer, went full hack for his National Review review,


Thanks to Piketty, the Left is now having a “Galaxy Quest” moment. All that stuff their Marxist economics professors taught them about the “inherent contradictions” of capitalism and about history’s being on the side of the planners — all the theories that the apparent victory of market capitalism in the last decades of the 20th century seemed to invalidate — well, it’s all true after all.
How to respond: Most times someone drops the M-Bomb, he is intending to be provocative. With enough effort, you can make almost anything Marxist. While Marxists don’t agree on everything, and the term is very nebulous (Marx once said he wouldn’t describe himself as a Marxist), there are some pretty established rules for determining if someone is, indeed, a Marxist. First, he generally doesn’t write things like,
  • “Marxist analysis emphasized the falling rate of profit — a historical prediction that turned out to be quite wrong” (“Capital in the 21st Century,” page 52)
  • “Marx usually adopted a fairly anecdotal and unsystematic approach”. (“Capital in the 21st Century,” page 229)
  • “Marx evidently wrote in great political fervor, which at times lead him to issue hasty pronouncements from which it is difficult to escape. That is why economic theory needs to be rooted in historical sources …” (“Capital in the 21st Century,” page  10)
  • “… Marx totally neglected the possibility of durable technological progress and steadily increasing productivity.” (“Capital in the 21st Century,” page  10)
These are not the words of a Marxist, but rather a reasonable scholar, investigating the truth of the claims written by the greatest political economist who ever lived. The fact that Piketty abstains from the vitriol and misrepresentation that typify most writing on Marx are to his credit.

Piketty certainly does argue that capitalism will not inevitably reduce inequality, as economist Simon Kuznets had famously claimed. As to whether capital will accumulate without end, as Marx believed, he is more nuanced.

Piketty argues that capital will accumulate in the hands of the few when growth is slower than the rate of return on capital and dis-accumulate if not (This is the now famous “r>g” formula). As growth slows, companies can replace workers with machines (written by economists as “substitution between capital and labor”), but only if there is a high elasticity of capital to labor (higher elasticity means easier replacement). This means that the share of income going to the owners of capital will rise, and the distribution of that capital will become more unequal.

Piketty does not hold to a labor theory of value, he does not believe that capitalism is founded on the exploitation of the proletariat, and he does not believe the system will inevitably collapse on its own contradictions. But critics who call Piketty a Marxist don’t actually mean, “Piketty subscribes to a collection of propositions generally accepted by Marxists”; they mean it as a verbal grenade. Step over it and move to more substantive criticisms.

Claim: The social safety net has already solved the problem

In order to somewhat compensate workers for voluntary unemployment and the ludicrously low wages that “markets” pay them, modern societies have developed transfer systems, or social safety nets of various levels of robustness, to bolster the incomes of low-wage workers. Some conservatives argue that these transfers have solved the inequality problem.

Scott Winship, the lovable but irksome economist dedicated to upsetting the inequality consensus, writes in Forbes,
Most importantly, in the United States, most public transfer income is omitted from tax returns. That includes not just means-tested programs for poor families and unemployment benefits, but Social Security. Many retirees in the Piketty-Saez data have tiny incomes because their main source of sustenance is rendered invisible in the data.
How to respond: There’s not enough room to give his data claims a full airing. For our purposes, it suffices to say that, while America does have a transfer system, it’s far less robust than that of other developed nations. (See chart below, from Lane Kenworthy.)

Government revenues are far lower in the U.S. than in other countries, making redistribution more difficult, and thus our safety net is far more frail. (See chart below, from Sean McElwee.)

Far more interesting is what would happen if conservatives made this their line. After all, if transfers are what is preventing inequality from skyrocketing then the rising share of pre-transfer income accruing to the wealthy capital owners means we need more robust transfer system. Because few, if any, thinkers on the right have argued for a stronger transfer system (and are, in fact, attempting to violate it), they must accept the logical conclusion: Their policies will set off skyrocketing inequality (or, more likely: They don’t give a shit).

Claim: Inequality isn’t a problem because look at consumption!

There are lots of ways to look at inequality. You could look at income inequality by examining how much a person takes home every year from their labor, income from assets and transfers. You could also look at wealth inequality by figuring out how many assets they own, in the form of stocks, bonds, property, and subtract from it their debts. Or you could look at how much they are able to consume.

Some conservative economists argue that an increase in income inequality has not been mirrored by an increase in consumption inequality because the wealthy save or invest their income. Kevin Hassett, a former Romney economic adviser, illustrates this point, arguing:
From 2000 to 2010, consumption has climbed 14% for individuals in the bottom fifth of households, 6% for individuals in the middle fifth, and 14.3% for individuals in the top fifth when we account for changes in U.S. population and the size of households. This despite the dire economy at the end of the decade.
Although he initially made this argument against Piketty in 2012, he has revived it recently in a lecture on the subject.

How to respond: In large part, this is a common trope on the right — the “but they have cellphones!” argument. The empirical literature on this subject is still very much in flux, and there is not a consensus. Some recent studies find that consumption inequality has increased with income inequality. But even if we except the consumption inequality argument, conservatives have some explaining to do. After all, if income inequality has been rising while consumption inequality has stayed the same, where is the spending coming from? Debt. Which means that wealth inequality is increasing, as the rich save more and the poor fall further into debt. Research released this week by Amy Traub of Demos finds that the recent increase in credit card debt hasn’t been driven by profligate spending, but unemployment, children, the declining value of homes and lack of health insurance. Recent research by Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman show how the bottom 90 percent simply haven’t been able to save their incomes and thereby build wealth. (See chart below.)

Claim: We need lazy rich people 

Tyler Cowen is one of the more honest of Piketty’s critics, and there is certainly a lot to like in his review. However, this section is a head-scratcher:
Piketty fears the stasis and sluggishness of the rentier, but what might appear to be static blocks of wealth have done a great deal to boost dynamic productivity. Piketty’s own book was published by the Belknap Press imprint of Harvard University Press, which received its initial funding in the form of a 1949 bequest from Waldron Phoenix Belknap, Jr., an architect and art historian who inherited a good deal of money from his father, a vice president of Bankers Trust… consider Piketty’s native France, where the scores of artists who relied on bequests or family support to further their careers included painters such as Corot, Delacroix, Courbet, Manet, Degas, Cézanne, Monet, and Toulouse-Lautrec and writers such as Baudelaire, Flaubert, Verlaine, and Proust, among others.
How to respond: It’s very true that in the past, many artists, writers and thinkers benefited from familial wealth (or rich benefactors). This, however, is not to be celebrated! It means that marginalized people are frequently removed from mainstream discussion. It’s also a dreadful defense of inequality. As theologian Reinhold Niebuhr writes,“The fact that culture requires leisure, is however, hardly a sufficient justification for the maintenance of a leisured class. For every artist which the aristocracy has produced, and for every two patrons of the arts, it has supported a thousand wastrels.”

Poverty and oppression can also create other powerful types of art, from boheim to the blues. More important, there are far better ways to fund the arts than throwing money at rich families and hoping they cook up something nice. For instance, the National Endowment for the Arts has funded arts education, dance, design, folk and traditional arts, literature, local arts agencies, media arts, museums, music, musical theater, opera, theater and visual arts. In the aftermath of the Great Depression the Works Progress Administration had an arm devoted to funding the arts that supported Jackson Pollock, William Gropper, Willem de Kooning, Leon Bibel and Ben Shahn. The CIA has even gotten into the game.

As Niebuhr notes, “An intelligent society will know how to subsidize those who possess peculiar gifts … and will not permit a leisured class to justify itself by producing an occasional creative genius among a multitude of incompetents.” It’s a wonder that conservatives want the wealthy financing art and philosophy — Marx, after all, would have died of penury without the beneficence of the wealthy Engels. Given that his economist friends have been impressed by Piketty’s cultural depth because of his ability to cite Jane Austen, I wouldn’t put much weight on their cultural defense of privilege.

Claim: Piketty is French, and we saved their butts in World War II

This is true. You’ve lost the debate.

Sean McElwee is a writer and researcher of public policy. His writing may be viewed at seanamcelwee.com. Follow him on Twitter at @seanmcelwee.