Rick Perry fundraising drying up

post from Daily Kos on 17 November 2011 10:12:43 AM. © Daily Kos

Indicted for insufficient hatred. (Reuters) Rick Perry has a lot to frown about. (Reuters)
There's a lot more detail in this story from the Houston Chronicle about Rick Perry's fundraising woes, but here's the most important line:

Another Perry fundraiser said he expects the Texas governor to raise between $3 million and $5 million in the final three months of 2012 ? less than one-third of what he generated in the first six weeks of his candidacy.

Perry raised over $17 million in his first six weeks in the race. To only raise $5 million (let alone $3 million) in the next following three months would be a disaster. To put it in perspective: Herman Cain claims he raised $5 million in October alone.

These fundraising numbers are driven by perceptions of a candidates ability to win, and those perceptions are largely driven by polling data. If Perry somehow manages to revive his campaign in the polls, his fundraising pace will pick up, and quickly. But that's not going to happen until and unless both the Cain and Gingrich bubbles pop.

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Trainers, Marines, Troops Everywhere; More US
Deployments Around the Globe

post from Firedoglake on 17 November 2011 10:07:16 AM. © Firedoglake

This needless drive to place little army men around the globe like it's a Risk board, regardless of the expense, only serves a purpose for the little megalomaniacs in the Pentagon who think we have to stretch our military might everywhere. For the rest[...]

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Al Sharpton Slams Fox for Citing Non-Existent
Part of Constitution to Push for Kagan Recusal

post from Crooks and Liars on 17 November 2011 10:00:49 AM. © Crooks and Liars

Al Sharpton Slams Fox for Citing Non-Existent Part of Constitution to Push for Kagan Recusal

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Politics Nation's Al Sharpton went after Fox for their continued drum beat to have Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan recuse herself from the upcoming hearing on the whether the individual mandate is constitutional and ignoring Justices Scalia and Thomas and Thomas' wife Ginni and their many conflicts of interest in hearing the case, the latest being a fundraising dinner they attended with opponents of the health care law.

Here's more from Media Matters on Fox's ridiculous attacks on Kagan -- Fox Cites Non-Existent Part Of The Constitution To Hype Argument For Kagan Recusal:

For the second day in a row, Fox's "straight news" division has hyped the claim that U.S Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan should recuse herself from the case involving the constitutionality of a provision of the Affordable Care Act. Fox pointed to an email Kagan sent to then-Justice Department adviser Laurence Tribe on the day the House of Representatives passed the Affordable Care Act in which Kagan said, "I hear they have the votes, Larry!! Simply amazing."
Legal ethicists have thrown cold water on the argument that Kagan needs to recuse herself over that email. But Fox seems to have an argument that the legal ethicists haven't thought of: Fox national correspondent Steve Centanni said Kagan's recusal may be required by "Article 28 of the Constitution." Fox's graphics department provided the relevant quote from the "U.S. Constitution, Article 28, Sec. 144":

Three glaring problems with this argument: The Constitution has no Article 28, has no Section 144, and does not contain the language quoted.
The Constitution actually contains seven articles, none of which have more than 10 sections. It also has 27 amendments, none of which contain anywhere near 144 sections.
The language Fox quoted from actually comes from a statute passed by Congress, Title 28 of the U.S. Code, Section 455. But that's the very statute legal ethicists have analyzed in finding that Kagan does not need to recuse herself because of the email.

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What You Might Call An 'Opportunity'

post from Talking Points Memo on 17 November 2011 10:00:35 AM. © Talking Points Memo

Greg Sargent points out that while OWS may be losing public support the issues that initially animated the movement remain very popular. [...]

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Wait For It

post from Talking Points Memo on 17 November 2011 10:00:35 AM. © Talking Points Memo

How many weeks (days? hours?) until Newt solemnly chides us that America simply wasn't ready for the profound, transformational change that he embodies?[...]

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The $1.6 Million Historian

post from Talking Points Memo on 17 November 2011 10:00:35 AM. © Talking Points Memo

Even Jack Abramoff is calling BS on Newt. [...]

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Bumpy Road Ahead

post from Talking Points Memo on 17 November 2011 10:00:35 AM. © Talking Points Memo

Dangerous times for solar manufacturing, TPM's Carl Franzen reports.[...]

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How is raising the Medicare age not a tax hike

I'm sorry, but if the Republicans are going to call everything that costs the taxpayers more money a "tax hike" then they're proposing a historically large tax hike by trying to move the age at which people are eligible for Medicare. A good number of us work for ourselves, or are unemployed, and thus have no choice but to buy our own health insurance directly from insurance companies. By the age of 65, private insurance is exorbitant on the individual market. But that doesn't matter to the Republicans. They're happy to force you to pay $2000/month to Blue Cross for another two years, costing you $48,000 more than it would have cost you to go on Medicare.

I'd call a nearly $50,000 tax hike per person pretty darn historic. But for the Republicans, tax hikes are bad if the money goes to the government, but they're good if the money goes to their rich buddies in corporate America.

That's why the GOP is happy to keep socking Americans for the prescription drug tax we pay pharmaceutical companies to compensate them for all the subsidized drugs they sell to Europe. You see, pharmaceutical companies sell the same drugs in Europe for 1/5th to even 1/6th the price they charge Americans. Then they just up the price five or six times when they sell the drug here in states, to make up for their losses in Europe. So we make up the difference, and the Republicans refuse to fix it. And they can fix it. The government can simply negotiate with drug companies and get drug prices lower, at least for Medicare recipients, but they don't because the Republicans (and some Democrats) are in the pocket of Big Pharma. (We also could allow the importation of cheap drugs from abroad, which would also help lower prices, but again, Republicans and some Democrats refuse.) So Americans keep paying their prescription drug tax, oblivious to the fact that we are literally paying six times more than we need to for many of our prescription medicines.

The Republicans are only against taxes when the proceeds aren't going to their rich buddies, who then funnel it back to the GOP in contributions.

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-age-not-tax.html

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Occupy What Next A Geezer Take

As powers-that-be sweep away the Occupy movement, where does the animating spirit go now?

With apologies to generations who have lodged ?99 percent? into the American vocabulary, this will come as unwanted advice for those whose have made visible hidden rage against a financial system that brought the economy to its knees and still keeps profiting while the rest of us suffer.

Even so, as a retiree, I can add my own victimhood credentials?-a return of near-zero on savings that used to supplement Social Security while banks fatten by holding the money without risk. (Ron Paul cited this injustice in the last GOP debate.)

Yet, if they are to effect change rather than just demonstrate for it, the Occupy generations would do well to study the protests of the 1960s.

Then as now, street theater provided great images for TV news but was soon coopted into a sideshow in which the larger population lost interest, while the real financial power and politics ground on unchanged.

Loathsome though it may sound, the Tea Party could provide a model for finding focus, converting free-floating anger into political muscle. As satisfying as denouncing those in power may be, without traction in the real world, it changes nothing.

At this transitional point, the alternative is the kind of increasingly radical rhetoric that is surfacing now and, ultimately, irrelevance.

Anarchy has fortunately never taken hold in American life, and there are issues to which the Occupy energy could usefully attach itself. Putting pressure on Congress not to gut new Dodd-Frank regulation of financial institutions and even expand them is clearly one. Helping a consumer champion like Elizabeth Warren get elected to the Senate is another.

None of this will be as exciting as camping out with signs and slogans, but that?s the way real world works. If Occupy enthusiasts want to change it, they can start by pushing back politically against the damage the Tea Party has done.

The geezer will now fold his tent and retreat into silence on the subject.

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http://ajliebling.blogspot.com/2011/11/occupy-what-next-geezer-take.html

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Wall Street Employees Counter-Protest With Sign
Reading ‘Get A Job’

Hundreds of people have converged on the Financial District in New York City, shutting down intersections and preventing business as usual on Wall Street. Salon’s Justin Elliott snaps this picture of two Wall Streeters who told him they’re trying to get to work. They are carrying signs mocking the protesters, with one saying “occupy a desk” and the other saying “get a job.” Apparently these Wall Streeters have forgotten that their jobs were saved by taxpayers like many of these protesters. Here’s Elliot’s picture: