Tea-Parties so Diverse, They Had to Use the Same Black Guy in 5 Different Scenes of Tea-Bagger Movie
Posted by Oliver Willis, Oliver Willis.com on November 20, 2009 at 5:26 PM.

So there’s this ludicrous trailer for a ridiculous movie about the Tea Party people that came out today, and when I watched it I noticed that it kept showing the same black guy. Now, I knew the Teabaggers weren’t the most diverse crowd, but it’s kind of hilarious that they used the same dude in five shots in their trailer.

00:42

00:59

1:03

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Utah Lawmaker: I Don't Mind "the Gays," but "I Don’t Want ‘Em Stuffing it Down My Throat all the Time"
Posted by Zaid Jilani, Think Progress on November 20, 2009 at 2:32 PM.

Earlier this month, the Church of Latter Day Saints made headlines when it threw its support behind a measure in Salt Lake City that barred “landlords and employers from discriminating based on sexuality,” making it the first city in Utah to adopt the gay rights measure. Now, the Mormon Church is backing a similar statewide bill, enlisting the help of a variety of lawmakers to help get it passed. One such lawmaker is Sen. Chris Buttars (R), who, despite his adamant support for an earlier proposition that banned same-sex marriage, does believe that sexual orientation deserves protection from employer and landlord abuse. However, while explaining his opposition to allowing same-sex couples to adopt children, he told the press that while he doesn’t “mind” gays, he doesn’t want them “stuffing it down [his] throat all the time“:

BUTTARS: I meet with the gays here and there. They were in my house two weeks ago. I don’t mind gays. But I don’t want ‘em stuffing it down my throat all the time. Certainly not in my kid’s face.

Watch it:

In the past, Buttars has said that gay men and women are “the greatest threat to America going down.” “I believe they will destroy the foundation of the American society,” he said in February. “In my mind, it’s the beginning of the end. … Sodom and Gomorrah was localized. This is worldwide.” Last year, the NAACP called for his resignation because of his comments about a controversial bill: “This baby is black, I’ll tell you,” said Buttars. “This is a dark and ugly thing.”

Will the Tea-Baggers Come After McCain? Will Palin Ride to His Rescue?!?
Posted by Steve M., No More Mister Nice Blog on November 20, 2009 at 12:08 PM.

I don't put much stock in the wingnut-skewed Rasmussen polls, but there's one out now that says John McCain might be at risk of a teabag purge -- according to the poll, McCain is barely ahead of talk-radio host and ex-congressman J.D. Hayworth, 45%-43%, in a potential primary matchup. (Hayworth isn't a declared candidate.)

In response to this, Bill Kristol writes:

Still, who could help McCain beat back a populist conservative challenger? Sarah Palin. I predict that Palin will come to Arizona next summer to campaign for McCain, will make an impassioned case for him, and will help him win. She will thereby repay McCain for his confidence in picking her last year, help keep McCain as a crucial voice in the Senate for a strong foreign policy, and get credit for being a different kind of populist conservative -- a Reaganite, not a Buchananite, populist -- than the immigration-obsessed, voter-alienating (he was ousted in 2006 in a Republican district) Hayworth.

Really? And risk damaging Brand Palin, which stands for the rescue of America from both Marxist Kenyan fascism and the RINOism of which all teabaggers believe John McCain to be the living embodiment?

Nahhh -- there's no way she's going to endorse someone against a candidate who is (or might be) identified with the teabag Cause. And as we can tell from her memoir, she's certainly not going to do anything for McCain out of gratitude for his decision to make her a star. So no, Bill -- you're wrong again.

Video: Progressive Change Campaign Committee Robocalls For the Public Option
Posted by AlterNet Staff, AlterNet on November 20, 2009 at 11:00 AM.

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Last month, as Majority Leader Harry Reid considered whether to include a public health-insurance plan in the bill he would put before the Senate, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee ran as him hard, pressuring the leader with television ads in his home state of Nevada, where Reid is expected to face a difficult re-election campaign for his Senate seat.

Now, having won that battle -- Reid indeed included a public option in the Senate bill -- PCCC is marshaling support for Reid as he shepherds the bill though the legislative process, making robocalls recorded by Lee Slaughter, the Nevada nurse who appeared in the ad that was used to pressure Reid. People receiving the call are given a keypad option that allows them to sign up for PCCC's public option campaign. (The online sign-up page is here.)

Below find a video that features Slaughter's robocall as its audio.

VIDEO AFTER THE JUMP

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Hmmm ... Why Do So Many Wingnuts Have Such an Obsessive Fear of Being Raped?
Posted by Staff, Media Matters for America on November 20, 2009 at 10:45 AM.

Conservative commentators such as Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and Michael Savage frequently employ rape metaphors when discussing progressives or progressive policies. For example, Beck said that New Yorkers are "being raped by [their] government," while Limbaugh, during a discussion of health care, told his listeners: "Get ready to get gang-raped again."

Video to your right; much more after the jump ...

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More Republicans Think Obama Stole an Election than Democrats Believe Bush Did
Posted by Chris Bowers, Open Left on November 20, 2009 at 9:53 AM.

A new survey from PPP (PDF) shows that 26% of Americans, most of whom are Republicans, think that ACORN stole the election for President Obama.

For the sake of comparison, a Gallup poll immediately following Gore's concession in the 2000 election showed that 18% of the county, a significant percentage of whom were African-American, believed that Bush stole the election.

In 2004, the numbers for Bush were even lower.  Back then, in the wake of Kerry's concession, a Gallup poll showed only 13% of the country believed that Bush stole the election.  (FWIW, I was among the 5% or so that shifted from 2000 to 2004.)

This is simultaneously a demonstration that hard-core conservatives live in an entirely different reality than the rest of the country, and that the hardcore conservative base is as much as twice as large as the hardcore progressive base. 

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The Best Paragraph Written About Sarah Palin's "Going Rogue"
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 19, 2009 at 4:48 PM.

I'm giving the nod to va, at Whiskey Fire:

The most unbelievable thing about Going Rogue, by the author-function "Sarah Palin," is that it's supposed to be self-serving. The problem a self-serving narrative about Sarah Palin confronts is that it's about Sarah Palin, whose entire life, it appears, consists of worse and worse attempts to create self-serving narratives explaining away bigger and bigger fuck-ups. Going Rogue's burden is that it must claim to be the definitive, encyclopedic explanation, the final excuse, for a long history of failure begat by failure; it's an epic of failure, if you will, and if the goal here is some kind of ultimate vindication, well, it is monumentally unsuccessful. Going Rogue is, at bottom, the story of every one of Sarah Palin's projects ending in grotesque catastrophe; it is only self-serving in the sense that these catastrophes either prove benign or turn out to be some other schlub's fault. If everything I knew about Sarah Palin came from this book (and basically it does), I would say her life has been like a play in which a deus-ex-machina descends at the end of every act to bestow peace and harmony, except the deus forgot to put on pants and everyone's just standing around going "uhhhh..." and then the lights go out and the scene changes.

Paragraphs 2 through 5 offer some fine and fun writing as well, so I urge you to read the whole thing.

No Stupak Language in Senate Bill; Boxer "Couldn't Be Happier," Hatch Promises "Holy War"
Posted by Adele Stan, AlterNet on November 19, 2009 at 6:46 AM.

At Majority Leader Harry Reid's announcement yesterday about the health-care bill he seeks to introduce on the Senate floor, the elephant in the room was women's reproductive rights, which were not addressed from the podium.

But ever since the House passed its health-care bill with the egregious Stupak amendment attached -- which bars virtually all abortion coverage from being offered in the exchanges through which most individual policies will be purchased -- battles over reproductive rights have taken center stage as the Senate hammered out its version of the legislation, titled the the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. 

The Washington Post reports that the bill does not go the Stupak route, and instead establishes a "firewall" between federally-funded subsidies for insurance premiums and private funds that could be used to pay for plans that contain abortion coverage. ""I couldn't be happier," Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., told the Post. "For those who want to keep abortion out of this bill, Senator Reid did it the right way." Boxer is regarded as the Senate's foremost pro-choice advocate.

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News Flash: Christians Still Not Victimized by Hate Crimes Legislation
Posted by Steven D., Booman Tribune on November 19, 2009 at 6:38 AM.

There is a group which has seen a 25% rise in hate crimes against them in Florida, 17% which involve violent physical assaults. This might surprise some of my counterparts on the Right, but the group which is incurring these vicious attacks is not the one they would suspect.

That's right, violent hate crimes against white Christians are not increasing despite the election of that Kenyan Born Muslim loving Barack Husein Obama. I know it's hard to believe considering all the angst expressed on right wing talk shows about how Christians are under attack and are being victimized and terrorized by Obama, Atheists, Secularists, Democrats and Gays, but its true, nonetheless.

Let me ask all those concerned Republicans and Conservative Christians who are so afraid/whiny/have their undies in a twist over their alleged claim that that the recent hate crimes legislation protecting gays was directed against them (despite the fact that all people of religious faith have been a protected class under hate crime legislation since the first such laws were written years ago.

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Senate Leader Announces Health-Care Bill
Posted by Adele Stan on November 18, 2009 at 4:12 PM.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid announced that his Democratic caucus was ready to begin debate on a health-care bill that will be made public later this evening.

Reid told reporters that the bill contains a public option with an opt-out provisions whereby state legislatures could deny citizens participation in the plan.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the bill will cost $849 billion.

Reid made his announcement this evening surrounded by a group of senators, including Chris Dodd of Connecticut, who wrote the health-care legislation that came out of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee that was chaired by the late Ted Kennedy, for whom health-care reform was a life-long goal. Other senators, all Democrats, around the podium included Sen. Patty Murray, Wash.; Al Franken, Minn.; Chuck Schumer, N.Y.; Debbie Stabenow, Mich., and Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin, Ill.

Absent from the scene were the Senate's most ardent pro-choice women senators, Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein of California. Also absent was Sen. Jay Rockefeller, W.V., who opposed the Senate Finance Committee bill for its lack of a public option -- a situation Reid has attempted to remedy with this opt-out provision. Rockefeller is regarded as the Senate's health-care scholar.

Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, Mont., was notably absent, as well, though for family reasons. Dodd said that Baucus' mother was ill, and that accounted for his absence. The bill that Reid announced today melds Dodd's HELP Committee bill with the one crafted by Baucus' committee.

Reid promised that the bill would be available to the public online later this evening.

C-SPAN has the video here of Reid's press announcement.

Americans Want a Health Surtax on Wealthy
Posted by Daniela Perdomo, AlterNet on November 18, 2009 at 2:00 PM.

Although the House bill includes a surtax on the wealthy in order to help fund the proposed health care overhaul, the possibility of it being included in the final health care bill seems uncertain. As Majority Leader Reid prepares the Senate's bill, he ought pay attention to this newly released Associated Press poll which shows that 57% of Americans are in favor of a health surtax on the richest among us -- and only 37% are opposed.

The poll also found that respondents dislike other options that are publicly being discussed on the Hill, such as the so-called "Cadillac plans," that would tax insurers on high-value coverage plans. Higher taxes on insurance providers, pharmaceutical companies, and medical device manufacturers were not as popular either.

The surtax included in the House bill would levy a 5.4% income tax surcharge on individuals earning $500,000 a year and households raking in $1 million.

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Inspiring, Kickass Drug Activist to Take on Chuck Schumer -- Meet Randy Credico
Posted by Jan Frel, AlterNet on November 18, 2009 at 1:18 PM.

A New York Times blog from this morning alerted me to a promising development, and gave me new respect for fellow Santa Monican Larry David:

"Randy Credico, 54, a stand-up comedian and drug law activist who was director of the fund for the past 12 years, has decided to step down from [the William Moses Kunstler Fund for Racial Justice. He plans to devote himself full-time to his United States Senate campaign, in which he intends to challenge Senator Charles E. Schumer for the Democratic nomination next September."

Mr. Credico said his campaign manager is a former comedy writer for “Saturday Night Live,” and then he began pouring forth with phone numbers of celebrities and comedians he said were endorsing him. I called only one: Larry David, at his office in Los Angeles. Mr. David would not reveal any details about the season finale of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” on HBO, but he did offer his support of Mr. Credico’s candidacy – in his own inimitable, free-associative, hilarious style – and praised his passion for fighting harsh drug laws.

“It’d be pretty interesting, Credico in the Senate — kind of like tying a bunch of cans to a dog and setting him loose in a china shop,” he said. “I don’t envy Schumer. Randy’s really going to get under his skin.”

When told that Mr. Credico plans on running the race sober, Mr. David said, “Listen, I can’t tell the difference whether Randy’s drunk or sober.”

Then Mr. David said, in an unprintable way, that Mr. Credico had a lot of guts.

“He’ll say absolutely anything that’s on his mind,” he said.

Hmm, just like Larry David, I observed.

“No, I only do it on TV,” Mr. David shot back. “I’m only Larry David on TV. Credico’s Larry David in real life.”... 

“My campaign slogan is going to be, ‘Which candidate would you rather smoke a joint with? Credico or Schumer?’” he said, while racing around the penthouse apartment of a friend and directing a small staff of young adults with laptops on how to get out word of his candidacy. He wore his usual jeans and sport jacket and smoked cigarettes and chugged Coke — the soft drink — directly from the 2-liter bottle. He had on hand two boxes of Cuban cigars that he claimed were a gift from former Manhattan District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau.

Last year, Mr. Credico was arrested after interfering with police officers making a marijuana arrest on Gay Street.

Mr. Credico makes no pretense about his longtime battle with drugs and alcohol addiction. He said he has been free of drugs and alcohol for two months now and hopes to stay sober for the entire campaign.

Though sober, Mr. Credico does hope to appeal to the partying public.

It's worth going into that line about how Credico was arrested to understand him  -- the story behind it gives good insight into his real-world approach to activism, and puts on display a very direct theory of social change: Be the change. Tony Papa of the Drug Policy Alliance gives the fuller description in a June 2008 article:

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Wow, Turns Out Sarah Palin Really Is a Dumb Wingnut*
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 18, 2009 at 12:00 PM.

During the 2008 campaign, Sarah Palin earned some ignominy when Katie Couric asked her to name a publication she relied on for news and she couldn't name a single one.**

Apparently, she's not exactly shining on her publicity tour when "grilled" with soft-ball questions by friendly right-wing bloggers. John Cole (italics are his too):

This is great. Red State “interviews” Sarah Palin, although I’m not really sure you could call this an interview, because there are no real quotes, and it turns out she has been doing some book learning:

One of the criticisms leveled by the right when Palin was chosen as McCain’s nominee is that she had not shown she’d done the reading to lead, i.e. read the Hayek, Friedman, Goldwater, Bastiat, to form her thoughts. She admitted she is a gut level conservative, but also said that criticism comes mostly from “shallow people who have not delved into [her] record.”

I did not want to sound like Katie Couric and ask what she’s read, but I broached the subject and she went right into mentioning Thomas Sowell and Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism. She said she has read some of the foundational stuff, but she sees no need to focus on the old writings. She likes “the modern stuff too.” Her preference is policy and application, focusing on writers who are not just following up on foundational conservative ideas, but applying those ideas too.

I am a liberal moonbat, whose name nobody is kicking around for national office, and I've read Hayek, Friedman and Goldwater.

And... Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism? That a book like that informs the "intellect" of a person many think represents the future of the conservative movement -- the Great White Hope -- is enough to make you feel like beating your head against the desk.

Update: in the comments, Anna writes, "C'mon Josh! The secret's been out for a long time." Absolutely true -- I should have said it's surprising that after that string of public humiliations during the campaign she didn't either, A) bone up, maybe read a few books without pictures, or B) figure out how to dodge those questions without coming off like such a teenager.

*Obviously it's sexist to say so.

** But we have to take her very, very seriously and it would be a grave error to underestimate her abilities.

Video: Rep. Stupak: We Had an Agreement Until 'the Extremes Took Over'
Posted by Adele Stan, AlterNet on November 18, 2009 at 7:37 AM.

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After threatening to scuttle the House version of health-care reform legislation last week by refusing to accept a compromise on anti-abortion language the bill, Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., is positioning himself to be the savior of health-care reform as the Senate takes up its bill -- even agreeing to support language that would require insurance companies not to drop abortion coverage from policies paid for with private dollars.

Appearing on MSNBC's Hardball last night, Stupak claimed to have had an agreement with House leaders, on the night before the Saturday vote, "to put part of my amendment" into bill. Then, he said, "the extremes took over," forcing the need for his amendment, which would make it virtually impossible for insurance companies to offer, through a federally administered insurance exchange, health insurance policies that provide abortion coverage -- even if the purchaser pays for the policy entirely out of her own pocket.

Who might these "extremes" be, Congressman Stupak? The Catholic bishops, per chance?

David Rogers of Politico reported yesterday that ahead of the vote, Speaker Nancy Pelosi received a call from Rome; on the line was Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, the retired former archbishop of Washington, D.C., whom Pelosi, a Roman Catholic herself, knows. Neither will discuss the substance of the call. But we do know that anti-choice Democrats refused to sign off on the compromise because representatives of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops would not grant their blessing on the compromise.

(Of course, without naming them, it's more likely that Stupak is speaking of pro-choice members.)

Nontheless, Stupak, in his interview last night with Hardball host Chris Matthews, seemed to be trying to recast himself as a moderate by painting other anti-choice legislators as extremists. When Matthews asked which anti-choicers on the Senate side Stupak might be working with on abortion language, he pressed Stupak for names. Maybe Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, or Ben Nelson of Nebraska?

"Well," Stupak replied, "if you're gonna get the extremes on both sides, then you can't find common ground; I agree with you. You really have to try to find people much like myself, who are the moderates, who will actually try to work with leadership."

But Stupak also struck a note of bitterness, complaining that pro-choice Democrats had kept him from offereing anti-choice amendments to legislation other than heath-care reform, and balking at his opponents' complaints about his amendment.

"You know, we had a fair-and-square vote; we won -- 55 percent of the representatives said we should not have public funds paying for abortion, so you win on the floor, now suddenly they want us to come back and compromise."

VIDEO AFTER THE JUMP

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Priceless: Gay Rights Activists Take Over Christian Right Hate-Fest in DC
Posted by Joshua Holland, AlterNet on November 17, 2009 at 12:00 PM.

I guess Dana Milbank just worships power and delights in picking on the marginalized. So while I've grown to detest him for years of snarky columns cherry-picking little vignettes to make progressives -- environmentalists, anti-war activists, human rights experts -- look like hopeless geeks who should be ignored when the GOP was in power, now that the Democrats are riding high he seems to be focusing that admittedly sharp pen on tea-baggers and the religious right -- the GOP's immoderate base.

Today he tells an interesting story that could have been titled: Reverend Smith Goes to Washington ...

Conservative Christian ministers from across the land, determined to test the bounds of a new law punishing anti-gay hate crimes, assembled outside the Justice Department on Monday to denounce the sin of homosexuality and see whether they would be charged with lawbreaking.

Needless to say, no arrests were made.

No hands were cuffed. In fact, the few cops in attendance were paying no attention to the speakers, instead talking among themselves and checking their BlackBerrys.

The evangelical activists had been hoping to provoke arrest, because, as organizer Gary Cass of the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission put it, "we'd have standing to challenge the law." But their prayers were not answered. Nobody was arrested, which wasn't surprising: To run afoul of the new law, you need to "plan or prepare for an act of physical violence" or "incite an imminent act of physical violence."

But there was some drama ...

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