September 2009
ArchPundit
It’s Hard To Be This Stupid
I’m finding the defund ACORN Act to be a great idea. Why?
SEC. 2. PROHIBITIONS ON FEDERAL FUNDS AND OTHER ACTIVITIES WITH RESPECT TO CERTAIN INDICTED ORGANIZATIONS.
(a) Prohibitions- With respect to any covered organization, the following prohibitions apply:
(1) No Federal contract, grant, cooperative agreement, or any other form of agreement (including a memorandum of understanding) may be awarded to or entered into with the organization.
(2) No Federal funds in any other form may be provided to the organization.
(3) No Federal employee or contractor may promote in any way (including recommending to a person or referring to a person for any purpose) the organization.
(b) Covered Organization– In this section, the term `covered organization’ means any of the following:
(1) Any organization that has been indicted for a violation under any Federal or State law governing the financing of a campaign for election for public office or any law governing the administration of an election for public office, including a law relating to voter registration.
(2) Any organization that had its State corporate charter terminated due to its failure to comply with Federal or State lobbying disclosure requirements.
(3) Any organization that has filed a fraudulent form with any Federal or State regulatory agency.
(4) Any organization that–
(A) employs any applicable individual, in a permanent or temporary capacity;
(B) has under contract or retains any applicable individual; or
(C) has any applicable individual acting on the organization’s behalf or with the express or apparent authority of the organization….
(3) The term `applicable individual’ means an individual who has been indicted for a violation under Federal or State law relating to an election for Federal or State office.
This would exclude any just about ever government contract. KBR itself has been accused of submitting $13 Billion in fraudulent bills to the Pentagon. Any corporation that tried to cover up a pollutant release would be covered making GE pretty much unable to get any contracts. Blackwater? LOL–goodbye. But also Boeing and almost all defense contractors who ever have been caught having an employee submitting a padded bill.
Realistically this sort of legislation could never be practically implemented, but I think it raises some excellent issues regarding fraud and government contractors on a level far greater than ACORN which gets relative chicken feed from the federal government. This doesn’t mean ACORN shouldn’t be held accountable, it just makes the crusade against them look insane. Democrats ought to sign on as sponsors and see if the Republicans really want to follow through with it.
Thursday
The Blagorgeous goes on the Daily Show. His last appearance was pretty bad:
Drag Queens Blathering On A Bunch of Lies
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wcChG5pRTOE[/youtube]
Of course, I don’t have a birth certificate from the hospital. I have one from Will County which is the legal one that is accorded full faith and credit by the Constitution. There’s a level of wingnuttery that continues to get into normal discussion that is remarkable.
Response to Tai(n)tz most recent filing
“It was deja vu all over again.”1
In her most recent tirade, Plaintiff’s counsel seeks
reconsideration of the Court’s order dismissing this action. Instead 2
of seriously addressing the substance of the Court’s order, counsel
repeats her political diatribe against the President, complains that
she did not have time to address dismissal of the action (although
she sought expedited consideration), accuses the undersigned of
treason, and maintains that “the United States District Courts in the
11th Circuit are subject to political pressure, external control, and
. . . subservience to the same illegitimate chain of command which
Plaintiff has previously protested.” (Pl.’s Emergency Req. for Stay
of Deployment 2.) This filing contemptuously ignores the Court’s
previous admonition that Plaintiff’s counsel discontinue her
illegitimate use of the federal judiciary to further her political
agenda. The Court finds that the claims and legal contentions
asserted in the present motion are not warranted by existing law and
that no reasonable basis exists to conclude that Plaintiff’s
arguments would be accepted as an extension, modification, or
reversal of existing law. Simply, put the motion is frivolous.
Moreover, the Court further finds that Plaintiff’s motion is being
presented for the improper purpose of using the federal judiciary as
a platform to espouse controversial political beliefs rather than as
a legitimate forum for hearing legal claims. Counsel’s conduct
violates Rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, and
sanctions are warranted. Accordingly, Plaintiff’s motion for
reconsideration (Doc. 15) is denied, and counsel for Plaintiff is
ordered to show cause why the Court should not impose a monetary
penalty of $10,000.00 upon Plaintiff’s counsel for her misconduct.
Counsel shall file her response to this show cause order within 14
days of today’s order.
The new Andy Martin.
Playboy Makes You Gay
According to Tom Coburn’s COS:
SCHWARTZ: And one of the things that he said to me, that I think is an astonishingly insightful remark. He said, “all pornography is homosexual pornography because all pornography turns your sexual drive inwards. Now think about that. And if you, if you tell an 11-year-old boy about that, do you think he’s going to want to go out and get a copy of Playboy? I’m pretty sure he’ll lose interest. That’s the last thing he wants.” You know, that’s a, that’s a good comment. It’s a good point and it’s a good thing to teach young people.
Yes, and telling them they will go to hell will stop them from masturbating. Or that 10 % of them will lie about masturbating.
Flippity Floppity
Greg Hinz runs a uncharacteristically negative story on Kirk for Kirk’s flip flop on climate change legislation. Kirk is a bit of a golden boy in the press even for very good political reporters like Hinz because he seems to be uniquely talented as a politicians. It certainly helps that he is that centrist split the difference kind of guy that editorial boards and commentators tend to gravitate to, but ultimately the biggest thing about Kirk is that he seems to be a teflon candidate with incredible talent and admiration for the game does translate into admiration of the guy. That’s a fairly natural point that many press critics miss when discussing press bias.
Specifically — a video of Mr. Kirk’s speech is posted on YouTube — a congressman known for his pro-environmental stances said he voted the way he did on this issue
because, “It was in the narrow interests of my congressional district.
“But,” he quickly added as some in the Republican crowd booed, “as your (senator), representing the entire state of Illinois, I would vote ‘no’ against the bill coming up, and that’s because we are manufacturing, agriculture and coal state.”
What’s wrong with the statement? Answer: So many things, I almost don’t know where to begin.
For starters, it’s at odds with the explanation Mr. Kirk gave earlier this year. Asked then why he was one of only three House Republicans to back Mr. Obama’s proposal, Mr. Kirk cited “national security” considerations, arguing that a modest carbon tax would spur development of domestic energy sources and reduce dependence on oil controlled by Saudi sheiks and Venezuelan dictators.
So, are 10th District residents the only Illinoisans who care about national security?
At some point, consistency matters and generally statewide big name races are generally that point. Kirk isn’t faced with a serious candidate during the primary right now, but petitioning is open until November 2nd. I’m not convinced someone might not show up, but that’s exactly what Kirk is worried about right now and he’s tacking to his right to avoid that. His goal is to not make too many promises to his base that he can’t safely tack to the center for the general election. The other possibility is that the Club for Growth could come in for this opponent Patrick Hughes making it a Spector versus Toomey kind of race.
But right now the narrative that could well develop and Democrats are certainly happy to help with is that Kirk will say anything and has no core beliefs. It works on two levels, it hits moderate voters and it works against him with his base which is already skeptical.
One fascinating stat from Rich’s post yesterday on Hughes’ poll is this:
58% oppose same sex marriage with 28% in favor.
.
There was some discussion that Giannoulias and Hoffman might be making a mistake on gay marriage by endorsing it, but I think this tells the story pretty well why it won’t matter. Only 58 % of Illinois GOP primary voters are against gay marriage–that’s pretty stunning. While some Democratic constituencies are against gay marriage such as black and latino voters, they don’t vote primarily on the issue and the GOP’s tack to the racist fringe isn’t going to change that anytime soon. It’s a safe position for a Democratic politicians statewide. Certainly in a very close election, such positions can cost someone an election, but that’s true of almost any position.
Thrown in a Black Woman and Two White Guys and You Get Lazy Journalism
In what may well get me taken off their e-mail list, Roll Call runs one of the dumbest stories on the Illinois Senate race. They compare the 2010 U.S. Senate race to the 1992 Senate race in which Carol Moseley Braun beat incumbent Al Dixon and Al Hofeld. The primary comparison being that there are two white guys and a black woman.
So who is the incumbent? There isn’t one running. So who is the multimillionaire white guy attacking the no incumbent–they allude to Hoffman, but Hoffman has little in common with Hofeld. Jackson is automatically Braun, but that’s not much of a comparison even. Braun had served in the State House, had been Recorder of Deeds, and had a fairly strong record including suing the Illinois Democratic Party for reapportionment–not that she turned out well, but she started from a very different place. Second, the dissatisfaction with Dixon was sparked by his vote to confirm Clarence Thomas and a general view that he was too open to compromise–and in this case the two white candidates are running to the left with both Alexi and Hoffman endorsing gay marriage.
So essentially all the article rests on is pure ethnic politics. No one should dismiss the ethnic politics angles of the story, but that is far from the entire story and certainly not necessarily defining of the race.
Now, what one might compare it to is Barack Obama’s 2004 primary race, but that falls apart with SEIU being a key element to that election and they have already endorsed Alexi. Obama won with a coalition of SEIU, African-Americans, liberals, and goo-goos as well as he’s working traditional trade unions hard. Alexi has strong efforts with SEIU, liberals, and goo goos and has made some inroads into the African-American community plus is following an important aspect of Blagojevich’s first win–a significant downstate strategy. He certainly won’t win the African-American vote, but in a primary it’s a competition over the margins. Jackson has little presence outside of Chicago and she has to catch up in a relatively short time. Hoffman is not well known anywhere and without knowing how his fundraising will go or if he’s willing to self-finance, it’s impossible to tell if he can be competitive. Neither is likely to do well with traditional trades and anyone attached to Blagojevich is going to have a hard time with AFSCME.
I think as the one thing the article gets right is that Alexi is the frontrunner with two big caveats. We don’t know good of a candidate Hoffman will be, but up until now he appears to be fairly lackluster, though he is laying out a good progressive agenda. Jackson has a base, but it’s hard to see how she expands on that base. She does have Emily’s list support and that’s can be positive, but the salience of women’s issues is far lower than in 1992.
Daily Dolts: Ron Stephens and Kirk Dillard—ACORN Must Flouridate Our Water
In the world of stupid legislators, few outdo Representative Ron Stephens (R-Wingnuttia South). Ron decided that flouridation of the water was a bad idea and introducted a bill against flouridation. Seriously.
Stephens jumped on the bandwagon to cut off state funding to ACORN last week. Problem is—ACORN doesn’t receive state funding and while ACORN Housing operates in Illinois, ACORN not housing does not. So…let’s recap, ACORN no longer operates in Illinois and hasn’t for a couple years and the state doesn’t fund it, but Ron Stephens wants to defund them.
Thanks for keeping your eye on the important things, Ron.
Rich then adds that the fine Dillard Campaign called for an end to all such funding on Friday as well.
Teh Stupid is spreading.
Schock Runs Into Racist at a Teabagger Event
Schock went down to Quincy for a teabagger rally on 9-12 and he hung out with the other featured speakers like Andrew Breitbart, Glenn Reynolds, and, oh yeah, Jim Hoft, the Gateway Pundit. A guy who likes to link to the fine white supremacists at the Council of Conservative Citizens:
Saint Louis Pushes Back catches Jim Hoft giving some love to the Council of Conservative Citizens:
Jim Hoft, also known as Gateway Pundit, has amazingly descended to a new, despicable low. After trumping up the school bus beatings in Belleville as “vicious racist attacks” (even though students, the mayor, and prosecutors said the attack was not racially motivated), he now links to a youtube channel from a white supremacist group with the video title, “2nd White kid attacked by blacks on school bus, racial slur used”:
Despite the claim in the title of the video, nothing is said in any of the news reports about the attackers’ skin color. In the KMOV interview, the victim emphasizes only that they were “too older kids in eighth grade.” He did mention that they called him a “white N”, but that name seems just as likely to come from white racists as anyone else. In fact, Hoft even admits in an update, “I do not have a reliable source for the race of the attackers.”
Yet that does not stop Hoft from playing the race-baiting card by linking to the youtube channel from the white supremicist group The Council of Conservative Citizens, who are the direct offshoot of the White Citizen’s Council. You can see on the bottom right of the following screen the link the council from the host channel:
For those who haven’t been around long, here’s my past run in with the white supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens. Warning harsh racist rhetoric.
The Teabaggers want to claim they don’t have a problem with racism, yet a featured speaker at many of their events is approvinglin linking to a group of white supremacists that are well known in the area. I don’t doubt that Dana Loesch and Hennessey are not racists–but pretending some of their allies aren’t is delusional.
It’s not just a picture with Hoft though, Hoft was a featured speaker with Schock at the event as you can see by the videos on the page. Some find friends there Aaron.
Andy McKenna?
Really? The IL GOP is going to come back with him ?
I understand Murphy’s fundraising was subpar, but he was pretty much the only guy I saw as a serious threat given the screwed up nature of the Illinois GOP.
McKenna has serious base problems and isn’t particularly well liked in the media. Schillerstrom is a baby killer (I’m not making fun of him with that statement). Brady is, well Brady. Dillard did a commercial for Obama and has many base problems and he is the Foghorn. Andrzejewski (the z is killing me) has virtually no political base and no political experience. Finally, every Democrats’ favorite candidate, Dan Proft who has never met a situation he couldn’t blow up to make worse.
Murphy has a sort of calm charm to him that makes him safe to swing voters and is conservative enough without too much bipartisanship to balance the demographics of the state with Democratic problems–and of course, he’s not running for Governor anymore.
Excellent.