Colorado University Offers Tuition Break To
Eligible Undocumented Immigrants

Undocumented immigrants are generally not eligible for in-state tuition if they attend Colorado state colleges or universities. One state university, however, will permit undocumented immigrants to pay a lower tuition if they meet certain criteria. Starting this semester, undocumented immigrants who qualify will pay $7,157 per year at Metropolitan State University of Denver — $3,000 higher than tuition for in-state students who are citizens or legal residents, but $8,000 lower than the out-of-state rate. To be eligible, undocumented immigrants must have attended high school in Colorado for at least three years and earned a high school diploma or GED. University officials said more than 100 students have qualified so far.

The university’s board of trustees approved the lower rate in June because the legislature failed to pass the tuition bill, according to Stephen Jordan, the university’s president. “I think what our board was saying was, ?Why wouldn?t we want to provide an affordable tuition rate for these students?” Jordan said. But the move angered state conservatives and has led some to threaten to sue the college:

On June 20, university officials were called before a hearing of the legislature?s Joint Budget Committee to defend their plan.

That same week, Colorado?s attorney general, John W. Suthers, issued a nonbinding legal opinion criticizing the policy.

Tom Tancredo, a former Colorado congressman and presidential candidate who now heads the Rocky Mountain Foundation, a conservative research organization, said his group intended to sue the university in the next few months.

The university’s decision helps make higher education more affordable for undocumented immigrants, but it also underscores the broader problem faced by hundreds of thousands of DREAM Act-eligible undocumented immigrants across the U.S. Only 12 states allow them to pay in-state tuition rates, and four states block undocumented immigrants from receiving in-state tuition

The Obama Administration’s deferred action policy, which went into effect last week, will not help eligible young adults pay in-state tuition either even though it gives them temporary legal status. Moreover, governors in Arizona and Nebraska have vowed to prevent DREAM Act-eligible immigrants from receiving public benefits — like driver’s licenses and in-state tuition — if they qualify for work permits under the new policy.

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/08/21/714061/colorado-university-offers-tui
tion-break-to-eligible-undocumented-immigrants/

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Campus Pride Ranks Top 25 LGBT-Friendly
Universities

Campus Pride has revealed this year’s list of the top 25 LGBT-friendly universities based on its Campus Pride Index, which scores schools on their policies, programs, and practices. It’s the only ranking that takes a detailed look at specific policies that impact LGBT students and staff in addition to incorporating feedback from across each campus. Next year, the ranking will include new questions about transgender students, mental health outreach, and recruitment and retention of LGBT students, raising the bar even more for universities. Here, in alphabetical order, is the list as it stands for 2012:

- Carleton College
- Cornell University
- Emory University
- Indiana University
- Ithaca College
- Oberlin College
- Portland State University
- Stanford University
- The Ohio State University
- The Pennsylvania State University
- University of California, Berkeley
- University of California, Los Angeles
- University of California, Riverside
- University of California, Santa Barbara
- University of Chicago
- University of Illinois at Chicago
- University of Maryland, College Park
- University of Massachusetts, Amherst
- University of Michigan
- University of Minnesota-Twin Cities
- University of Oregon
- University of Pennsylvania
- University of Utah
- University of Vermont
- University of Washington

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2012/08/21/722461/campus-pride-ranks-top-25-lgbt-fr
iendly-universities/

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Moodys: Budget Cuts Hurt State Finances More Than
Health Care Reform

Several state governors say they’ll reject Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion because the program will be too expensive for the states, but federal budget cuts could do more harm to state finances than the Medicaid expansion included in the Affordable Care Act, according to Moody’s Investors Service. States’ credit ratings will likely not be affected by whether [...]

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http://thinkprogress.org.feedsportal.com/c/34726/f/638927/s/2298c107/l/0Lthinkpro
gress0Borg0Bfeedsportal0N0Cc0C347260Cf0C6389270Cs0C2298c10A70Cl0C0ALthinkprogress0ABorg0AChealth0AC20AA120AC0AA80AC210AC7224910ACmoodys0AEbudget0AEcuts0AEhurt0AEstate0AEfinances0AEmore0AEthan0AEhealth0AEcare0AEreform0AC0Cstory0A10Bhtm/story01.htm

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Scott Brown's radical Senate candidates stand
with Akin to redefine rape

Scott Brown puts his money where his values are.Scott Brown was the first Republican out with a statement condemning Rep. Todd Akin and demanding he get out of Missouri's Senate race because of his comments about "legitimate" rape and magical uteri. He had to step up, running as he is as a Republican in Massachusetts, and against a woman. His key to reelection is keeping moderate Massachusetts voters thinking that he's not one of those crazy Republlicans.

So far, according at least to the newest PPP polling in the race, he's succeeding. He's pulling a 58-32 advantage with independents, and gets 20 percent of Democrats. Brown's primary potential weakness, according to PPP's Tom Jensen, is that "53% of voters would like Democrats to have control of the next Senate, compared to 36% who want the Republicans in charge." Because, of course, the Republicans are batshit insane.

What these Massachusetts voters don't know yet is that Scott Brown is very much one of them. All the proof you need of that is where he gets and gives his campaign money. First, where he gets it. Remember Clayton Williams of too extreme for John McCain fame? The guy who said rape was like the weather: "As long as it's inevitable, you might as well lie back and enjoy it." That's this Clayton Williams, from OpenSecrets:
But there's so much more from OpenSecrets to learn about Scott Brown, like where the money from his PAC, SCOTTPAC, goes. You won't be shocked to find out it's gone to a bunch of current Senate candidates. He gave $5,000 to Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), $10,000 to Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT) and $5,000 Rep. Rick Berg (R-ND).

You probably also won't be surprised to find out all of these representatives were cosponsors of the infamous HR 3, the "No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act." You know that one, the one that says there's only really one kind of rape, "forcible" rape, and you can't get an abortion unless you can prove that you were the victim of rape-rape, not one of those other kinds of rape that you might have really enjoyed. With the added bonus that the IRS would actually have to audit your abortion to determine whether your abortion was because of rape or incest.

That's where Scott Brown's loyalties lie, and that's who Scott Brown wants with him in the Senate. In a word, his fellow Republicans.

Please donate $3 to Elizabeth Warren on ActBlue.

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http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/_Eos0lZ2guA/-Scott-Brown-s-radical
-senate-candidates-stand-with-Akin-to-redefine-rape

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The Best and the Brightest

Career Risk Panic: Only 11% Of Hedge Funds Are Outperforming The S&P In 2012Tyler Durden, Zero Hedge08/20/2012 19:10The S&P500 may be soaring to new 2012 highs, and has its all time highs within short squeeze distance, yet paradoxically this is arguably[...]

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http://www.docudharma.com/diary/30656/the-best-and-the-brightest

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After a day of waffling, Mitt Romney finally
decides that Todd Akin should drop out

What Mitt Romney would like to do to Todd AkinMitt Romney, late as usual:

"As I said yesterday, Todd Akin?s comments were offensive and wrong and he should very seriously consider what course would be in the best interest of our country. Today, his fellow Missourians urged him to step aside, and I think he should accept their counsel and exit the Senate race."

Fellow Missourians? More like a bunch of party establishment hacks?like septuagenarian former Sens. John Ashcroft and John Danforth. Of course, to Romney, people like that are salt of the earth. But real Missouri Republicans don't want Akin to go anywhere: SurveyUSA's snap poll showed, by a 52-33 margin, that they still want him to run, and that question was only asked after a battery of damaging information was read to respondents.

But you know, if Mitt really wanted to demonstrate his bona fides on this notion?that the will of the people as expressed through primaries should be overturned when some potentate suggests a candidate ought to drop out?then perhaps he should have listened to Newt Gingrich:

"I think he should bow out of the race so that conservatives can have a debate" about how to take on Obama, Haley said. "It's Mitt Romney who's screwing up this race and it's his establishment support" that's sustaining him over the hesitations of the GOP electorate.

Tell you what, I'll still take that deal: I'd much rather Claire McCaskill run against Todd Akin than anyone else, but if Romney wants to lead by example, I'd be glad to see them both quit. How about it?

1:42 PM PT: Oh, comedy:

Priebus on CNN: "Mitt Romney [who called for Akin to withdraw 13 minutes ago] led the charge against Akin."

? @wexler via TweetDeck

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http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/PFpQ3Nrukkk/-After-a-day-of-waffli
ng-Mitt-Romney-finally-decides-that-Todd-Akin-should-drop-out

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With Ryan on GOP Ticket, Romney Takes One Point
Lead in Wisconsin

We now have our first really solid evidence that choosing Rep. Paul Ryan (WI) may have actually helped Mitt Romney politically. The latest poll from PPP finds that Romney has a one point lead in Wisconsin and that Ryan may have helped cement the[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/firedoglake/fdl/~3/9tnkMQeCcdo/

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Tea Partyer Calls For Obama To Get Out of "Our
Country"

I've written about this lunatic before. Marcia Wood is the same person who called for businesses not to hire anyone until Barack Obama was out of office and fantasized about muzzling Michelle Obama, but as time has gone on and the Republican party implodes more and more, her harsh rhetoric has crossed the line into territory that is at the least, borderline seditious.

enlargeHer latest vomitus comes in the form of a blog post on Tea Party Nation, that fine upstanding racist enclave run by Judson Phillips. The title of the post is "Who is this man some call Obama?" That picture to your right is posted on her blog post. Thanks for that, Clint Eastwood.

Somewhere between her Michelle Obama fantasy and her current outlook, she has made up her mind that President Barack Obama is a puppet king. I'm not sure who she thinks is pulling the strings, but I'm guessing it's one of the usual bogeymen like George Soros or something. Whatever it is in her drinking water that's causing her hallucinations, they are dangerous and dark. Take, for example, this:

Do I think Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan will get the nod if we make it to the 2012 Elections ? definitely they?re a great team, good men and Patriots. But, and this is a big but ? I don?t think the puppeteers will take a chance if they feel Obama can?t win even in a crooked environment at the polls. Obama will be instructed to take the next move whether it?s declaring war or Martial Law ? they will do whatever it takes to keep him from being removed from office.

Got that, patriots? Get out yer guns because the money boys are gonna make that black guy in the White House do their bidding. WTF? Reality check, anyone?

And then there is this:

It?s sickening to hear the old Republican Establishment say, ?Obama says he?s a citizen of our United States? and that?s good enough for me. Let?s get real here ? everything he has done indicates that he has created treason against the greatest Nation in the World and the fact that he?s even on the Presidential ticket again this year is unbelievable. We need to see his school records, his real proof of citizenship and quit this politically correct malarkey ? we have a stranger in our midst and I want to know who the ?He - -? he really is; he?s darn sure not an American.

I realize this woman is deeply disappointed that she can no longer simply claim there's no birth certificate to perpetuate the notion that the White House is in the hands of a Manchurian candidate, but the school records nonsense is just that. Utter nonsense. A last ditch effort to dig up something "not provided" in order to perpetuate the myth that he is either an affirmative action case, a Manchurian candidate, or just some damn foreigner who stole the White House from the White Boys.

But she is beyond the usual nonsensical ravings, and it's not the first time I've heard them. The suggestion that there is a "stranger in our midst" is a call to arms. The mention of treason is code for her strong belief that if you're not white, you've got no business being in that Oval Office, and are therefore committing treason. By the way, the Tea Party Nation site sends out at least 2-3 emails a week calling Democrats the "party of treason." It's a theme.

This post is the post of a seriously deranged woman who almost makes Todd Akin seem middle-of-the-road. Somewhere in Marcia Wood's tiny little primitive brain, an alarm is sounding. The alarm is telling her she must FIGHT, fire the shot, spill the hate over into the mainstream, take up arms and DEFEND.

Keep this post on a list somewhere along with that site. I'm betting we haven't heard the last of Marcia Wood, and I'm betting there will be a time where someone will actually act on the insanity she spews online, to a tragic outcome. That blood will be on her hands.

Read The Full Article:
http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/tea-partyer-calls-obama-get-out-our-country

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AFL-CIO Super PAC and MoveOn join to get out the
vote for Obama

Facing that avalanche of outside money coming in to bail out Mitt Romney and other Republicans who can't win on the strength of their ideas, Democratic-allied groups are working to leverage grassroots strength. Tuesday, MoveOn.org Political Action and AFL-CIO Super PAC Workers' Voice announced that they'll be joining to get out the vote for President Obama this November:

"Our voice is not nearly as loud in television advertising as it once was, but we really see power in mobilizing our members," Adam Ruben, political director of MoveOn.org Political Action, said in an interview. "One of the reasons to partner with Workers' Voice is that they bring the resources of the labor movement, which includes physical infrastructure all across the country. They have labor hall staffs and organizers all across the swing states. ... They bring a lot of their own expertise in how to do labor targeting. We bring our own expertise in how to reach voters, communication and online organizing and how to mobilize our 7 million members." [...]

According to Eddie Vale, a spokesman for Workers' Voice, the groups already have identified 14,000 worksite and canvass coordinators. That's "the most we've ever had, and the earliest they've been ready," Vale said. The goal is to mobilize some 400,000 volunteers by Election Day.

The groups will share data and use micro-targeting to get people across the country to make 1.5 million calls into battleground states.

Aside from the groups' strategy of responding to the Republican advertising war with one-on-one volunteer organizing, the launching of such a far-reaching partnership between the union movement and MoveOn is an interesting development. Michael Podhorzer, executive director of Workers' Voice, said, "Our goal was to make this as broad a movement as possible and go well beyond the traditional union universe." This certainly does that.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/Q0BglAPPmjI/-AFL-CIO-Super-PAC-and
-MoveOn-join-to-get-out-the-vote-for-Obama

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The Akin Fiasco -- Will he stay or will he go

By @BGinKC

You know what the hardest thing about being from Missouri is? It isn't the hillbilly jokes, or the offers to "show me" ... whatever. No, it's the smug certainty that folks who have never really spent any time here have when they paint us all with one broad brush that's dripping barn-red paint. That stereotype just isn't true, but the other one, that Missouri is St. Louis on the east side and Kansas City on the west; and that big part in the middle? That's not Missouri, there's a tear in the time-space continuum and the part that isn't urban is really Mississippi. That bothers me too, because I know liberals can come from outstate because I come from outstate, and so do a whole bunch of my friends, relatives and former students who still live in my home town, a place of about 400 fairly openminded and tolerant people, a place where the gay kids are comfortable coming out publicly and where most of the folks have a live-and-let-live-so-long-as-you-don't-forget-we're-all-in-this-together outlook on things. I don't mean to imply that there's not still a bumper crop of wingnuts, because there certainly is, but the schism isn't as stark as some of the urban folks who joke about Mississippi-in-the-middle think it is, and those Democrats outstate are important.  They're a hearty breed, hanging tough in spite of the fact that they have been completely and utterly abandoned by the state party apparatus. There are no county Democratic party offices on the town squares in the county seats any longer, and haven't been for over twenty years -- and they rarely, if ever, see a Democratic candidate show up and shake their hand and ask for their vote. But there's another little tidbit that might set the urban jokers back on their heels: Missouri elects Democrats to statewide office on a regular basis because enough of those rural Democrats who get no party support turn out and vote Democratic anyway, even when there isn't a Democratic candidate running in their local and statehouse races. And you know what else? Without them, Democrats in this state would never win another statewide election. St Louis and Kansas City are big and blue, but they aren't big and blue enough to run roughshod over the rest of the state, and frankly I don't want them to be.

I honestly thought until about ten o'clock last night that Akin would stay in. He won by a comfortable margin over the other two wingnuts in the race two weeks ago, and he has strong support among the evangelical right and the tea-folk, who turned out en masse (thanks to a right-wing "right to pray" amendment to our constitution) and voted for him while they were there.

But by the time I was ready to turn in, I was convinced that he would step down by close-of-business today, eleven weeks before the general election and the last day he can do so with no muss, no fuss and no involvement by a court -- and Cole County (Jefferson City) judges have made something of a sport out of slapping down wingnut laws and challenges, and sometimes the wingnuts themselves. He doesn't want those headlines, they would blow his chances of getting a sinecure at The Show Me Institute or on one of St. Louis' many right-wing Christian radio stations.

Akin has fallen in for some mockery for sending out a fundraising appeal, but that wasn't actually a fundraising email. That was a barometer of his remaining support. It wasn't about small donations of three to five bucks, it was about how many small donations and phone calls pledging future donations the campaign logged in a short window of time. My guess is his people leaked that he was preparing to step down when the response from the base was dismal.

So if I'm right and he does step aside, where does that leave things in the Show-Me-State?

For want of a better word, let's say it will leave things "unsettled."

Once Akin is out, it will fall to the "establishment" Republicans to choose who will replace him on the ticket. If they put the second-place finisher, John Brunner, on the ballot, the tea-folk and evangelicals will pitch a fit that will make the shriek of the Banshee sound like a soothing Irish lullaby. They would be screaming at the top of their lungs that the fix was in all along and the money-cons were going to get their businessman candidate one way or the other, and if the vote they cast in August for their candidate can be nullified and didn't count for anything, they won't give it to the establishment pick in November. Sarah Steelman would be more acceptable to them, but she came in third, and if she got the nod the establishment republicans would go ballistic and stop writing large checks. Rock, meet hard spot.

Since Brunner and Steelman are the only two potential candidates with anything even remotely resembling an existing statewide presence, infrastructure and campaign offices that could be reopened, and they're both out in the interest of not sparking a civil war in the state GOP, my guess is that they will have to go with someone else and that person will have to hit the ground running and build a campaign organization on the fly.

Here is the thing about Akin withdrawing...the folks who bailed on him while his final syllable still hung in the air don't understand Missouri, and they really don't understand Missouri's right-wing authoritarian evangelical Christians, nor do they realize the extent to which they have taken over the state GOP. If you think for a minute that the state's "establishment" Republicans wanted Akin -- or about 3/4 of the GOP caucus of the current General Assembly, for that fact -- you should contact me immediately about a bridge we have for sale. The "establishment" Republicans in the white-stocking law firms in Kansas City and St. Louis tolerate the tea-vangelicals and bide their time, but they're just waiting for an opening; waiting for their chance to poison the coffee pot, so to speak.

Never mind that those evangelical Christians are the GOTV operation for the Republicans, and his withdrawal will hurt those efforts in November, especially if the candidate the GOP opts for doesn't "excite" the base, and the only prayer Mitt Romney has of carrying this state is for the evangelicals to show up on election day with clothespins on their noses to vote against Obama. Now think back to 2008...Remember, Missouri wasn't called for about two weeks, and in the end Obama lost the state by less than 4000 votes and would have prevailed had he demanded the recount he was entitled to, but he won handily without our electoral votes so we were spared the humiliation of being that year's version of "Florida, 2000."

No matter what happens later today, the Missouri GOP is facing something of a crisis. They have to thread a very fine needle with whoever they pick and their options are extremely limited. Too many of the Republican names that are well-known in this state are well known for all the wrong reasons, and that brings its own set of problems.

No matter what, the candidate they settle on is going to be offensive to about half the Republican voters in the state, even if they manage to get the Risen Christ himself on the ballot, and that candidate is going to have to build a campaign operation from scratch and make appearances in all 114 counties in the state in less than eleven weeks. A Herculean task at best, but more likely a Sysiphean one.

Claire McCaskill must be livin' right, that's all I can say. After the brutal year-and-a-half onslaught of attack ads by Karl Rove's dark money outfit and seeing the Senate "de-Claired" has been the number one goal of the GOP -- and most likely a lot of that dark money is coming from defense contractors and mercenary outfits because she has been worthy of Harry Truman's seat by going after waste, fraud and abuse in the Pentagon and among private military contractors. The turmoil on the GOP side has certainly given her an opportunity, and I've known Claire a long time, since she was the Jackson County Prosecuting Attorney and I know one thing about her as well as I know my own name...That woman has never squandered an opportunity in her life, and she isn't about to start now.

And that goes double for if he stays in. He still has almost two hours to make the establishment squirm, and if he was to bail, he would do so at the last minute after vehement insistence that he was staying in. And if he does stay in to grind some axes against his perceived RINO enemies, well, I still don't believe I've lived that good a life.  


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kin-fiasco-will-he-stay-or-will-he-go

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