R.I.P. Anna Nicole Smith

post from TalkLeft on 08 February 2007 07:37:00 PM. © TalkLeft

Anna Nicole Smith is dead at 39. May she rest in peace. She had such a troubled life.

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http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TalkleftThePoliticsOfCrime/~3/88272738/4767

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Hey, Look! Policy!

post from Ezra Klein on 08 February 2007 07:33:00 PM. © Ezra Klein

by Nicholas Beaudrot of Electoral Math Seattle's own Linda Thomas points to a bill in the Washington State legislature adding cyberbullying to the list of things for which schools must discipline their students. While obviously a more serious issue[...]

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http://ezraklein.typepad.com/blog/2007/02/hey_look_policy.html

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The Smokescreen Man

post from Crooks and Liars on 08 February 2007 07:32:20 PM. © Crooks and Liars

It's pretty common knowledge that politics are a game. It's all about positioning and framing in the interest of furthering your or your party's agenda. But people dying in Iraq are not a game. And the fact that the Republicans pull these partisan games despite OVERWHELMING public opinion against it make them reprehensible to me. [...]

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http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/08/the-smokescreen-man/

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Nancy Pelosi Clarifies On Fox

post from Crooks and Liars on 08 February 2007 07:28:54 PM. © Crooks and Liars

Nancy Pelosi was on On The Record on FoxNews last night and clarified the "plane scandal" that the traditional media is only too happy to keep repeating. Big props to Speaker Pelosi for not holding back and being clear that this was a non-story being made into a scandal. &nbspDownload (183)&nbsp| Play (160) &nbspDownload (101)&nbsp| Play (56)…(T)here are [...]

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http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/02/08/nancy-pelosi-clarifies-on-fox/

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Vilsack Revisited

post from Connecting.the.Dots on 08 February 2007 07:22:00 PM. © Connecting.the.Dots

At this stage of the 1976 and 1992 elections, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton were little-known governors of small states with infinitesimal rankings in the Presidential polls.

That?s the slim reed to which Tom Vilsack?s 2008 hopes are lashed as the just-retired governor of Iowa makes his way, in media dimness, toward next year?s primaries.

?I?m not a rock star,? he tells you, ?but I am rock-solid.?

Since we saw him in December, he has raised over $1.1 from admirers including Warren Buffet, made a solid impression at the Democrats? meeting last weekend as the only candidate to call for immediate withdrawal from Iraq and will soon unveil an energy plan calling for a 75 percent reduction from emissions levels of 2000.

In a small room with half a dozen suburban reporters last evening, Vilsack continued to talk sense without notes (as he did last weekend to Howard Dean?s astonishment).

?We?re at the American Idol stage of the campaign,? he told them, but is confident that voters will want answers rather than slogans while talking earnestly and persuasively of his conversation with the Prime Minister of India about the link between literacy and world hunger.

Of course, there are differences between 1992 and 2008, but if Tom Vilsack fails to emulate her husband, ?the Comeback Kid,? Hillary Clinton could do a lot worse in picking a running mate to balance her own strengths.

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http://ajliebling.blogspot.com/2007/02/vilsack-revisited.html

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Who Searches for Me

post from Librocrats - Designed Intelligent on 08 February 2007 07:15:00 PM. © Librocrats - Designed Intelligent

Someone searched for "Saudi Arabia White Concubines" on google. I don't know which is weirder: That someone searched for it or that somehow they got to my site.[...]

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http://librocrat.blogspot.com/2007/02/democratic-propaganda-get-them-while.html

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Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

post from TalkLeft on 08 February 2007 07:14:00 PM. © TalkLeft

Via Crooks and Liars:

Mary Matalin tries to talk her way out of her Russert-Hates-Matthews comment in Scooter Libby's notes. Nice try, no cigar. Video here.

Christy at Firedoglake has more of The Trouble With Mary.

Imus: Mary Matalin Is A Liar: Imus, “None of you can tell the truth, it’s insane. It’s like a disease you guys have.”

Atrios has the transcript from the first call…..And the second call.

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http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TalkleftThePoliticsOfCrime/~3/88267023/3485

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Bush's Other Grandfather

On the Daily Show last night, Ralph Nader told Jon Stewart how his mother, at a reception, refused to release the President?s grandfather, Senator Prescott Bush of Connecticut, from a handshake until he promised to look into a civic problem that was bothering her.

If this is Bush Family History Month, I should tell my story about George W?s other grandfather.

In 1953, I went to work as a junior editor for his mother's father, Marvin Pierce, who was president of the McCall Corporation, a publishing and printing company with several thousand employees.

Soon after I arrived, an elderly secretary edged me into a corner. "You're not the first Jew to work here," she said, "only the first one they know about." Years earlier, she had changed her name to get under the radar.

The company had no personnel department, but hiring was vetted by Marvin Pierce's secretary, a formidable woman named Emily Chestnutt, who grilled publishers and editors about the pedigrees of applicants.

A year later, I told a young woman I knew about a staff opening. All went well until her resume reached Ms. Chestnutt. She called Wade Nichols, the editor, to say she was worried about someone named Dorothy Weichel (suspiciously ethnic) who had worked for a trade union (politically dubious) and the United World Federalists (downright Un-American).

Nichols, who had done who-knows-what to get me on the payroll, somehow charmed Ms. Chestnutt into letting him hire Dorothy. Neither knew that her family was suburban Boston Protestant, her mother eligible to join the Daughters of the American Revolution and the First Families of Virginia .

Marvin Pierce was a genial man with a year-round golf course tan who was always pleasant and approved two promotions for me in the following years. (Redbook had won a national award for opposing McCarthyism.)

When Dorothy, the suspect DAR daughter, and I decided to marry, he even came to our office engagement party.

Before offering a toast, he asked the bride-to-be about her plans. She told him she would quit her job and stay home to take care of me.

Right then and there, George W. Bush?s grandfather made a pre-Feminist joke.

?Why,? he asked, ?doesn?t he quit his job and stay home to take care of you??

Everybody laughed.

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http://ajliebling.blogspot.com/2007/02/bushs-other-grandfather.html

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Preaching it

I saw a movie called Network last night, and I got to tell you. That guy from Deliverance sure preaches a good sermon.

video details and more

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http://patriotboy.blogspot.com/2007_02_04_archive.html#3132926678334412638

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What Confirmation Process

That's a picture of the hearing room of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and thanks to the Bush administration and its republican enablers in Congress, that room will be empty a bit more often.Buried in the fine print of the Patriot Act[...]

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http://www.firedoglake.com/2007/02/08/what-confirmation-process/

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