Dan Quayles and John Snows Flunkies Putting Greed
Ahead of America

You'll recall that last we heard, Chrysler was hoping to stay alive long enough to have Fiat's Sergio Marchionne swoop in and save it. Even if that happens, though, Chrysler will need to get some customers to buy its cars until such a time as Marchionne[...]

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http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/04/20/dan-quayles-and-john-snows-flunkies-
putting-greed-ahead-of-america/

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Congratulations to Eugene Robinson, but

I thought all morning about this one. It doesn’t come easy, believe me. Mainly because this whole thing is so over. I’m so very satisfied that Barack Obama is the man for the times, which has been proven already, in my estimation. And I[...]

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http://www.taylormarsh.com/2009/04/21/congratulations-to-eugene-robinson-but/

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The System Is Working On Torture

So now we have vented, we were appalled at the evil of the Bybee memo and the other memos justifying state sponsored torture of prisoners. Here on the internet our outrage has flared and been shared. This is an important aspect as we must make it clear[...]

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-torture

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Tom Swatzel's latest round of lies

Former House Seat 108 candidate Jill Kelso has finally felt enough heat from the constant truth being told, she's now decided to come out against, get this, clean elections. GOPher chairman Tom Swatzel had a letter in the paper before this tirade on Vida Miller which merited a response from Waccamaw Neck Democratic Club Chairwoman Susan Smith:

Almost weekly we are subjected to the wild rantings of the Georgetown County Republican Party chair Tom Swatzel. Most of his bilious vitriol is aimed at Representative Vida Miller. Recently, he quoted the extremely conservative 'think tank' the SC Policy Council as supporting his increasingly unpopular support of Gov. Sanford's the refusal of the stimulus money. It is as preposterous as someone declaring that the earth is flat ... and using 'statistics' to prove it from The Flat Earth Society. The SC Policy Council accepts money from the ultra-conservative think tanks like the Cato Institute (90,000 dollars in '06). In addition, watchdog group Media Transparency says the SC Policy Council received 847,000 dollars from the same folks who fund South Carolinians For Responsible Government. In other words, those are the school voucher supporters like Howard Rich, people who front dubious PACS who funnel money into targeted campaigns across the country. Let's put a human face on this. Republican chair Tom Swatzel is supporting our Governor in allowing the job losses of thousands of public school teachers across this state. In addition, he is allowing thousands of families across SC to go hungry. Republicans across this country think this governor is a fool to refuse this stimulus package.
Also, I must address the issue of Mr. Swatzel repeating information about Representative Miller that he knows to be false. He quotes an article from The Greenville News from January stating that Rep. Miller was one of six state legislators warned by the Employment Security Commission (ESC) that the trust fund went from an 800 million dollar surplus to huge deficits this past year.
As Mr. Swatzel already knows, that is false information about Rep. Miller he's repeating. Mr. McLeod is already on record stating this: In a letter dated January 30, 2009, SCESC Commissioner William "Billy" McLeod clears up any misunderstanding regarding S.C. House Rep. Vida Miller and her "meeting" with him to discuss the SCESC trust fund.

"As you know, contrary to the phrasing in the Greenville News article we never had a meeting. I do recall that during a phone conversation regarding unemployment in your district the trust fund was mentioned. At that time I provided you with some unemployment figures we had been discussing for your district and also included information about the trust fund in that mailing."

"Again, I apologize for any confusion that may have been caused by providing a copy of the letter I sent to you in September of 2008 to Senator Ryberg."

How many times can Mr. Swatzel get away with slander? Instead of repeating information that he knows is untrue, why doesn't he discuss why the unemployment figures are so high? Here's the reality: During the past eight years, we suffered under a Republican president who ignored a domestic economy to perpetuate an ongoing war, and a Republican Governor who has been derelict in his duty to stimulate our SC economy by creating jobs. This is why SC ranks the third highest in unemployment in the country. And to paraphrase Mr. Swatzel, there is nothing petty in pointing out this fact.

More on the SC Policy Council.

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http://thepoliticsofjamiesanderson.blogspot.com/2009/04/tom-swatzels-latest-round
-of-lies.html

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Disappearing the Historic Record

Via Spencer Ackerman, I see that former Bush State Department official (and 9/11 Commission executive director) Philip Zelikow now says that not only did the Bush torture architects solicit terrible legal advice from the likes of Bybee, Yoo and Bradbury[...]

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e_historic_record.php

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Dr. J.'s Commentary: Death and Taxes

Oh those "tea parties." They just go to show you how much publicity you can get for a cause that troubles not very many people when you've got a powerful Privatized Ministry of Propaganda behind you. And boy, was the Fox "News" Channel there for several weeks running up to the event. They ran both paid and unpaid ads for it incessantly. The main line? The Republican mantra that has been tried-and-true since the time it first worked in the battle over "Prop. 13" in California in 1977. That was the one that slashed funding for education in California under the guise of "cutting your taxes."

No one mentioned what the reductions in state and local revenue would do to education in the state nor the fact that the bulk of the cuts would go to businesses, not individuals. But it did solve the problem that the so-called "small government" Republicans (that is small government for anything smacking of national domestic spending, not small government for matters ranging from freedom of religious belief as to when life begins to supporting a mountainous military-industrial complex) had. Goldwater had found that he couldn't run against specific programs. But when his successors discovered running "against taxes," away they went.
Bookmark/Search this post with: buzzflash | delicious | digg | yahoo | technorati Technorati Tags: Steven Jonas

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Is somebody getting a case of 'Beck envy'

On this clip captured by Media Matters, a caller accuses Limbaugh, Fox News, and other radio hosts of hyping last week's tea bag parties.

Limbaugh's retort? That the caller was simple "regurgitating the drivel I have read on left-wing blogs" calling tea bag parties "nothing but a bunch of mind-numbed robots who were led there by svengalis and pied pipers like me. I had nothing to do with a single tea party."

Actually, Rush, most of us left-wing bloggers completely ignored you last week. Are you getting jealous?

Poor Rush. He feels abandoned.

Transcript of Limbaugh's comments:

What you're doing to me, what you're saying -- you are regurgitating the drivel I have read on left-wing blogs. ...

You are trying to mischaracterize and impugn the people at the tea parties as nothing but a bunch of mind-numbed robots who were led there by svengalis and pied pipers like me.

I had nothing to do with a single tea party.

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http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/J-qtWzI5JaI/-Is-somebody-getting-a
-case-of-Beck-envy

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S.C. New Democrats - Project 2010: Winning NOW

We are proud to release our new report Project 2010: Winning NOW Why We Can Win in 2010 and How We Can Win Download Summary and Full Report Analysis includes Winning South Carolina's Future By Patrick Caddell National political analyst and pollster Join Us for a Discussion of our Report Winning NOW: Seminar and
Open Strategy Session
Barack Obama's win has changed politics in America. SC New Democrats will bring together the best and brightest to help develop new strategies so that New Democrats can win in South Carolina in 2010. And, we will honor those 'Rising Stars' who are winning now and changing politics in South Carolina today.
Winning in the South
Panel of Experts on Southern Politics

Jeremy Bird
Obama '08 SC and Ohio

Patrick Caddell
Political Strategist & Analyst

Jack Bass
Author on SC Politics

Mudcat Saunders
Southern Political Consultant

Winning in South Carolina
Potential Candidates for
SC Statewide Office in 2010

Sen. Vince Sheheen

Rep. Harry Ott

Mullins McLeod

Others Invited

Rising Stars Reception
Honoring the New Democrats' Rising Stars, Sponsorships
Event Sponsor ........................ $10,000
Reception Sponsor ................ $5,000, 12 tickets
Seminar Sponsors ................. $2,500, 10 tickets
Reception Table Sponsor..... $1,000, 8 tickets
Supporters .............................. $500, 4 tickets
Ticket ....................................... $25

To Buy Tickets, go to www.SCNewDemocrats.org

For more information, please contact Jamie Kirk.

Phone: 803.707.2038 Jamie@scnewdemocrats.org PO Box 11373 Columbia, SC 29211 www.SCNewDemocrats.org ____________________________________ SCDPJefferson Jackson Dinner to follow with a 6:00pm reception and 7:00pm dinner.

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http://thepoliticsofjamiesanderson.blogspot.com/2009/04/sc-new-democrats-project-
2010-winning.html

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WHAT WOULD YOU SAY YOU DO HERE

Tangentially-related to the question of whether Wall Street types deserve their compensation packages is the yearly phenomenon in which actively managed mutual funds underperform the market. Between 2004 and 2008, 66.21% of domestic funds did worse than[...]

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http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/ezraklein_archive?month=04&year=2009&base_name
=what_would_you_say_you_do_here

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Senator: OPR Torture Report Likely To Be
"Devastating"

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) went on MSNBC's Rachel Maddow Show last night, to talk about the fallout from the release last week of the Bush administration's torture memos. And his appearance added to the growing sense that pressure is mounting to hold the memos' authors accountable.

Whitehouse, who sits on the Senate Judiciary committee, did temporarily pour a little bit of cold water on the spate of calls to impeach Jay Bybee, the author of one of the memos, who is now a federal judge. He said that it's "certainly possible" that Bybee should be impeached, but that first, we should wait for the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility to release its long-held report into the authorship of the memos.

But he added that the report's release "can't be more than a few weeks away," and that he has "every reason to believe it will be a devastating opinion."

And he seemed eager to downplay President Obama's prior statements that he favors looking ahead, saying that Justice Department lawyers will decide, on a case by case basis, whether there's enough evidence to charge Bush officials.

Watch:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TPMmuckraker/~3/Vi0QkKZinGg/whitehouse_opr_torture
_report_likely_to_be_devasta.php

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