Steven Reynolds

Palin Is Sinking the McCain Campaign

Every single Democrat should be worried about the outcome of this election until at least midnight of November 4th. Still, the polls are encouraging, and they are showing, amazingly enough, that Sarah Palin hurts John McCainÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s candidacy worse than does George Bush. ThereÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s no turning that one around.

The first polls are out with even a hint of a reaction to the Powell endorsement of Barack Obama, and those polls should make Republicans weep.

The NBC/Wall Street Journal Poll gives Obama a 10 point lead nationally. 60% of respondents in the CNN poll think McCainÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s attacks on Obama are unfair, a figure that hurts McCainÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s chances further with independent voters. Reuters/Zogby has an 8 point Obama lead in its latest tracking poll. And the Pew poll, which takes into account cell phone users, has Obama up by 14 points. The prediction here is that these totals will go up in the next couple days as the impact of the Powell endorsement fully hits the polling results.

WhatÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s the big news here? Sure, McCain has been hurt by his association with Bush for a long time. But in the NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, it appears that Sarah Palin is a bigger drag on the Palin/McCain ticket than is Dubya. SheÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s now seen as unqualified for the vice Presidential job by 55% of the public, and her negatives are now 47%, higher than her positives for the first time. HereÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s a bit from the Pew results about the Palin drag on the ticket, and about McCainÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s lack of judgement:

The Whack Jobs Holding Out for a Palin/McCain Ticket

The latest Washington Post/ABC poll has Barack Obama with 53% of the voters and a ten point lead. No, polls are not the final word, but 53% is a big number in Presidential politics, and with three weeks to go the trend line is strongly in Barack Obama’s favor. Here’s a little of the Washington Post reporting about this big number:

McCain has made little headway in his attempts to convince voters that Obama is too “risky” or too “liberal.” Rather, recent strategic shifts may have hurt the Republican nominee, who now has higher negative ratings than his rival and is seen as mostly attacking his opponent rather than addressing the issues that voters care about. Even McCain’s supporters are now less enthusiastic about his candidacy, returning to levels not seen since before the Republican National Convention.

Conversely, Obama’s pitch to the middle class on taxes is beginning to sink in; nearly as many said they think their taxes would go up under a McCain administration as under an Obama presidency, and more see their burdens easing with the Democrat in the White House.

OK, there are some amazing numbers underlying this poll, as there are amazing numbers underlying other polls. Newsweek investigates those numbers, like trying to find out just who the whack jobs are in their poll who are satisfied with the economy. In this poll, 8% of the people had worse opinions of Barack Obama. Those are the ones shouting “terrorist” and “traitor,” I’m betting. Yeah, whack jobs. Newsweek may think it has the answer, but it is just as easy to conclude there are whack jobs out there, and Republicans seem proud to have them on board and voting.

Thou Shalt Not Go Negative Against a Comedian

Al Franken, known far more as a comedian than as a politician, is certainly benefiting from the Obama surge in the last week or two, but it appears Norm Coleman is doing his part in boosting the Franken candidacy, as reported by the Minneapolis Star Tribune:

U.S. Senate candidate Al Franken has moved into his first solid lead over incumbent Republican Norm Coleman, according to a new Star Tribune Minnesota Poll.

The survey, conducted Tuesday through Thursday by Princeton Survey Research Associates International among 1,084 likely Minnesota voters, shows Franken leading Coleman 43 to 34 percent. Independence Party candidate Dean Barkley is supported by 18 percent of respondents.

. . .

The new poll suggests that one reason for FrankenÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s gain is votersÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ reaction to the abrasive advertising in the campaign.

The survey shows that 56 percent of poll respondents consider ads criticizing Franken to be Ã¢â‚¬Å“mostly unfair personal attacks.Ã¢â‚¬Â� Only 42 percent said the same about ads criticizing Coleman.

Some of the ads by the Coleman campaign and national Republicans show Franken when he was an entertainer, cursing and ranting on political subjects.

I suppose voters understand that in his previous occupation as entertainer and comedian, it was Franken’s job to be abrasive on these issues. The Coleman attacks using old SNL footage are backfiring because Minnesota voters are smarter than Norm Coleman gives them credit for.

Go Stuart Smalley!

FEC Decides that the First Amendment Actually Applies to Bloggers

We bloggers are media! We get to exercise our rights to free speech! Who knew? Well, since weÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ve had those rights for a couple hundred years, so I knew. The Federal Election Commission, however, has seen fit to confirm my rights as a blogger to write about . . . politics! Yes, even if I commit the sin of favoring a candidate!

Heck, you can even be political and all that stuff. Nope, you don't need any stinking "freedom of speech" to give you these rights. The FEC has assured them. The whole case evidently extends from a whine by the Clinton campaign against a blog in Iowa advocating for Barack Obama. The report on this action is from mediapost.com:

Is Helping Big Oil the New Third Rail in American Politics?

Another Republican incumbent has lost an election, this time a primary in Tennessee. He was painted as beholden to Big Oil, and that's what led to Dave Davis' loss. Meanwhile, John McCain is in opposition to the New Energy Reform Act of 2008 precisely because is scales back Big Oil subsidies. This is the stuff of political ads against McCain.

courtesy of Think Progress

So it seems. There was a primary in Tennessee yesterday, and the incumbent Republican lost. David Davis, who represented the Northeastern part of the state, was upset by the Mayor of Johnson City, Phil Roe. While this one is going to be in the Republican column come November, Roe worked hard to tie Davis to Big Oil, and the pundits are reporting that is why Davis lost. RawStory has the scoop, as does Ben Pershing at the Washington Post:

Has Cheney Been Disinvited to the GOP Convention?

The lineup for the GOP Convention isnÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t set, but Dick CheneyÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s role seems set. HeÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s going to be absent. Evidently the current Vice President is so toxic in his disapprovals that few Americans, even Republicans, want to be seen with him. Everyone who is surprised, raise your hands.

We know that a whole bunch of GOP Senators, the ones up for reelection, are not attending this year's GOP Convention. We know that Mr. Bush will be making an early speech at the GOP Convention, then will likely be whisked off the stage. The current Veep, though, Dick Cheney? Evidently nobody is quite sure if Dick Cheney will attend, though it seems axiomatic that nobody wants Cheney to show up at the GOP Convention. Here's a bit on the subject from CNN.com:

Vice President Cheney will be a no-show at the Republican convention in Minnesota, Republican officials said, citing a desire by Sen. John McCain's campaign to turn the page on the Bush-Cheney years.

One GOP official told CNN there's a "mutual understanding" between Cheney's office and the McCain camp that he is "unlikely" to attend the convention.

A second Republican official said there are still "talks going on" between Cheney's office and the McCain camp and both sides are "still trying to work it out."

The conservative American Spectator first reported Monday that Cheney, who has low national approval ratings but is still popular among conservatives, is not expected to attend the convention.

A Wall Street Journal-NBC News Poll from June showed that while 31 percent of Americans had a positive opinion of President Bush, only 23 percent had the same feeling for Cheney.

Yeah, one can certainly understand why the Republicans would want to hide both Bush and Cheney when they dominate the airways during their convention. It is a bit odd that there's any confusion here, though. I would think even Cheney would immediately say he wouldn't attend. But these sources are not unanimous, that's for sure.

Boy Scouts Want to Discriminate Using Public Dollars

The Boy Scouts here in Philly want the city to support them to the tune of $200,000 per year. They’re suing for that “right,” feeling themselves to be entitled. They’ll lose, at least according to precedent, but this time they are using some particularly whiney courtroom strategies that go against what they claim to teach boys.

Commentary By: Steven Reynolds

We’ve had a long controversy here in Philadelphia. (I’ve written about this before, here and here.)The Cradle of Liberty Council of the Boy Scouts of America has long had a $1 lease on a fine building in a very expensive part of town. The national Boy Scouts won a Supreme Court ruling allowing them to discriminate in the last several years, sure. But the Boy Scouts are in a bind, Cradle of Liberty Council in particular. They don’t want to discriminate against gays and athiests as the national coucil tells them to do, at least not quite as much, but if they do discriminate, then the City of Philadelphia will have to follow its own laws. You see, it is against the law in Philadelphia to fund groups that discriminate. So what’s the solution? According to the Cradle of Liberty Council of the Boy Scouts of America, the solution is a lawsuit, demanding that the City of Philadelphia aid and abet their discriminatory policies by reducing their rent from $200,000 to $1 per year.

Now it has come down to it, here in Philly, that the Boy Scouts feel they are entitled to suck off the public teat, to soak up my tax dollars, even if they do treat my fellow citizens in a discriminatory manner. There are articles on the subject in both the Philly Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News this morning, and there’s a wonderful quote from Mayor Nutter on the situation in the Inquirer:

Will Gay and Lesbian Voters Swing Philly for Obama or Clinton?

There’s an article in today’s Philadelphia Inquirer about how both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are courting the gay vote in PA as they square off for the primary here in just three weeks. It mentions how both campaigns value that voting bloc, and how Chelsea extended her campaign visit to Woody’s, a major gay bar here, in order to visit with the largely gay and lesbian crowd. I’m thinking this is a good thing. Neither Clinton nor Obama seems to have a lock on this segment of the voting population, but they sure are energizing the gay and lesbian voters here in Philly. Here’s a little of the piece from the Philadelphia Inquirer:

You don’t see many women at Woody’s, but Chelsea Clinton popped in last week.

To a packed house of screaming supporters, the 28-year-old former first child led a presidential pep rally for her mother at one of the oldest gay bars in Philadelphia.

“We love your highlights!” a man yelled from the crowd, referring to Chelsea’s tresses. “Wow,” she said, temporarily bumped off message, “that’s something I never heard before.”

At the end of an exhausting day of nonstop events, Chelsea was supposed to leave after 10 minutes. She ended up staying 25.

A few years ago, such a scene would have been unthinkable. But with an eye on the April 22 Pennsylvania Democratic primary, Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama are fervently courting the gay vote.

In Philadelphia, gays constitute an estimated 5 percent of voters, according to Malcolm Lazin, president of Equality Forum. That is not an inconsequential percentage in a race as tight as this one.

Why Republicans Should Be Scared of Don Siegelman

Donald Siegelman has been freed from jail. As many know, Siegelman was Governor of Alabama and was prosecuted for giving a position on a Board in the state to a major contributor, Richard Scrushy. I suppose if we were doing a tit for tat thing, that would mean every major contributor President Bush appointed to Ambassadorships is up for investigation, but that’s not how the US DOJ was working under President Bush and Alberto Gonzales. Nope, they prosecuted only Democrats for that sort of thing, even when Senior preosecutors in their office counseled otherwise. Scott Horton in Harpers, over a year ago, noted, basically, that miscarriage of justice should be seen as obstruction of justice on the part of the Bush appointed US Attorneys.

A couple of interesting things here. First, Siegelman would not be released unless there were a strong possiblity his appeal would go through. From the Birmingham News:

The judges wrote that Siegelman met both requirements for an appeal bond: He is not a flight risk and his appeal raises a substantial question of law or fact likely to result in reversal or an order for a new trial.

“After thorough review of this complex and protracted record, we conclude Siegelman has satisfied the criteria set out in the statute, and has specifically met his burden of showing that his appeal raises substantial questions of law or fact,” the judges wrote.

It’s going to be overturned, and we should have an investigation, a real one, into the role of the Bush Administration, Karl Rove in particular, in the prosecution here. I’m guessing the motive behind this selective prosecution was that the GOP felt threatened in their electoral bastion, the deep south. Be that as it may, the GOP claims they had not political role here, that Siegelman was prosecuted on the merits. Then why the heck do they have to act as if this is so godalmighty important to them, to the extent that they’re protesting the judge’s order? They’re protesting a whole whale of a lot for folks who claim they had no interest in the case. From WSFA in Alabama:

Atheist Soldier Says Army Punished Him for His Beliefs

At the very least, atheists aren't going to make it anywhere in the army during the Bush Administration. Fiorst we had that scandal at the Air Force Academy, where it seemed as if the place was run by evangelical Christians, with bias and intimidation included. No news on whether they've solved that problem. Now it seems that a soldier has been denied a promotion because he is an athiest. It appears, even, that he was told he wasn't a good soldier because he couldn't pray with his fellow soldiers. From Yahoo News:

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Idiot Reporter Asks David Duke to Weigh In on Concept of a Black President

Michael Crawley of the New Republic called up David Duke to ask him his opinion on a Presidential race that just might bring us an African-American President. Yeah, he called David Duke, who claimed to be somewhere in Europe at the time, and was using secret email addresses. This is supposed to be of some import?

The content of this interview with David Duke on the prospects of Barack Obama, a potential Obama Presidency and its effect on America. . . the contents of the interview are pretty luke warm. I'm thinking those contents are so luke warm as to be a waste of bandwidth on the innertube. Well, it would be a complete waste, since there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of animus against Mr. Obama in the fringe white supremacist groups surveyed by Mr. Crawley. Here's how Crawley describes Duke's reaction to the Obama candidacy in the New Republic:

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Hillary Continues Anti-Hope Campaign

Hillary continues to ridicule Barack Obama and his supporters on the notion that all he is bringing to the table is hope, as if that were insubstantial. The Tribune notes, however, that Obama is bringing more substance to his speeches than Hillary or John McCain. Denigrating hope, though, is the wrong, and probably fatal, move for her campaign.

Oh, she needs a lot more than that, but it is the wrong move for the Hillary Clinton campaign, once again, to mock the hope the Barack Obama campaign is bringing to millions and millions of people. Look here at what Hillary Clinton had to say at a campaign stop Sunday. From the "Caucus" at the New York Times:

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Clinton Should Hold Open Casting Call for a Campaign Director

The Hillary Clinton campaign is desperate for ideas, so desperate they're asking anyone, ANYONE, to send in ideas about how the campaign can gain some traction against Barack Obama. I'm thinking this kind of call should have been made a lot earlier.

The Hillary Clinton campaign did nothing in last night's debate to help their situation, which seems to be deteriorating fast, and some would say that Hillary really screwed up in last night's debate (I'm agreeing, because of the moment mentioned in the article, but also because of the smirk that appeared and stayed on Hillary Clinton's face). The point spread in Texas has moved from a Clinton edge of 16 points to an edge of 3 points in the latest Rasmussen poll. Hillary Clinton has also taken to borrowing words from John Edwards' speeches. (Some might call that plagiarism, but I'm not going to.) I'm saying here that thewse folks are getting desperate, but they've got the answer. They're wanting a new campaign manager, and they're holding an open casting call for the position. From the Telegraph:

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Swiftboaters for Hillary Clinton?

Hillary Clinton's campaign failed when it went negative in Wisconsin, and here's a bet that each attempt at negative campaigning is going to fail in the future, even if those negative attacks come from the new 527 group formed to support Hillary Clinton.

As George Curry mentions today, andI mentioned one week ago today, negative campaigning by the Hillary Clinton camp is simply not going to work. Man, I'm thinking these folks should just get rid of the whole campaign staff and hire bloggers. They're clueless, and it appears they're now going to ratchet up the negatives rather than seek a strategy that has a prayer of working against Barack Obama. Some of Hillary Clinton's most well-heeled reporters are forming a 527 group to support her in Ohio and Texas. Here it is from the Philadelphia Inquirer:

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Ex-Con Televangelist Jim Bakker Returns to TV With a New Real Estate Scheme

The faith depicted in this next story seems strong to me, sweet in its forgiveness, and ever so gullible and malleable. There is a beauty and goodness in those first two qualities, but that latter quality shows us why Christian conservatives bow down and kiss the rings of the Radical Religious Right Wing Christian Clerics in this country. The report is about Jim Bakker, disgraced televangelist from the late eighties, who is making a comeback in Branson, MO. He's had a TV show (the Jim Bakker Show) for a while on some pretty local outlets, and now he's built himself a megachurch called Morningside, a name his followers often slip up on, calling it "Heritage."

The real story here is not about the comeback of Jim Bakker, whose empire collapsed in shame, indictments, convictions and a successful class action suit in the late eighties. It is certainly not about tear-stained eye shadow -- that's in the past, and God rest Tammy Faye Meisner. This story is about the followers of Jim Bakker, the women who have forgiven him or think he was railroaded during that time nearly two decades ago when his empire named Heritage USA came crashing down. This is about the sweetness of the faith of those women, and also about the power of those women to convince their husbands to go along, after the couples lost so many thousands a couple decades ago. Yes, they "con"vince their husbands. I'm guessing this is yet another con job in the making. Check it out. From STLToday.com:

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Texas Primary Will Be a Wild Ride for Dems

Texas seems a confused place for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. It might be trending Obama's way, though, and should do more of that trending when he wins in Wisconsin and Hawaii.

Maybe Hillary was right to campaign so hard there at the expense of Wisconsin. Two polls are out, and even the best one for Hillary Clinton only gives her a small edge in the vote. The other poll leans towards Obama, and I'm betting we'll see even more bandwagon jumping if Obama wins in Wisconsin (he's holding a 50-39 point lead as of a few days ago). Here's some internals from that poll in Texas that favors Hillary Clinton, from the statesman.com:

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Why Is the Trend Towards Obama?

We Democrats really like our candidate choices. Even now there's rarely a negative word about John Edwards. Still, the votes are moving towards Barack Obama, and I'm thinking it is because that "unity" theme is starting to take hold.

Dick Polman has a short column addressing why Maine voters gave Barack Obama a landslide, and it mirrors my issues with Clinton. Perhaps Dick Polman has hit on some of the reasons for the numbers trending Obama's way. He lists a whole bunch of compalints from a friend in Maine, and those complaints center on Hillary's "Billy baggage" and her being "too caught up in the old politics game." We Democrats seem to like both Obama and Clinton, but we're buying into the unity theme of the Obama campaign, and that's not a theme that works for most Democrats when we think of Hillary Clinton. Make no mistake, the numbers are indeed trending towards Obama, with the national numbers going to Obama for the very first time. From USA Today:

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Is Ohio the Nexus of GOP Corruption?

We've got another political scandal in the land of Tom Noe and Bob Ney. Alas, Mike Turner, US Representaive from Dayton, OH, appears to have steered some work to his wife's company. Tsk, tsk! Will the Republicans ever learn about ethics? Not a chance.

Abramoff gave us Bob Ney, and that was a sweet thing for Ohio electoral politics, as it led to several Democratic wins in 2006. Then there was coingate and that corrupt guy in Toledo, Thomas Noe. Heck, they had a controversy about the election in 2004, and the governor had severe ethics problems, too. Now we've got another ethical problem in Ohio with Representative Mike Turner. Turner's wifge is now being accused of getting sweetheart deals for her consulting firm. Oh, this is delicious! From the Dayton Daily News:

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Hillary Cans Campaign Manager After Very Bad Weekend

It isn't a coincidence that Hillary Clinton has her worst week of this campaign and then her Campaign Manager demotes herself. I'm willing to bet Patty Solis Doyle was pushed, and that she didn't voluntarily jump from the Hillary Clinton train.

After Hillary Clinton lost Maine to Barack Obama, by nearly 20 points with 90% of the precincts reporting, last I saw, it's a very bad weekend. Now Hillary Clinton has changed her campaign staff, with the campaign manager, Patty Solis Doyle, stepping down. Here it is from the Politico, the email from Patty Solis Doyle to the campaign staff, and it is all sweetness and light:

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Young Republican Caught Forwarding Racist Email About Obama on Student Government Listserv

Nicholas Phelps is the Student Body President of the University of Kentucky, and by one report is a protegee of Mitch McConnell. He's evidently been learning the Republican dirty tricks at the master's knee. Yeah, this one is about Barack Obama. And there are calls for Nick Phelp's resignation for passing on the ugly and false internet rumor on a university-owned list serv. From the Lexington Herald-Leader:

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Why Are the Polls Going Against Hillary?

Things are tightening up leading to Super Tuesday in the Democratic primaries. There's several story lines we can follow, too. California, healthcare, Ann Coulter. Man, those are three disparate issues, aren't they?

The polls are going against Hillary. She's held a national lead in the polls but today those same national polls are showing a statistical dead heat with Barack Obama. Wow! That's a huge gain for Obama in a very short time. In California the same story is being told, a huge Clinton lead melting into a statistical dead heat. Wow! The question here is whether this is an Obama surge or a result of policy and endorsements for Hillary.

There's no question that Barack Obama has a good bit of the big Mo. Obama won in South Carolina, and Obama has those big endorsements from the Kennedys. But I gotta wonder if Hillary's actions and endorsements are moving the electorate both across the country and in California.

The first big thing is that the only contentious issue in the last Democratic debate is starting to play out. On healthcare Barack Obama suggested that Hillary was going to have to punish people if they did not sign on to her plan. Today it looks like she's planning to garnish wages in order to get people to comply. I'm willing to say this is a very difficult issue that's going to have some real sacrifice on the part of some people in this country, but Hillary advocating the garnishing of wages will not help her at all. Here it is from the AP wire:

Radical Right Wing Christian Cleric Embroiled in Perjury and Adultery Scandal

An update on the sexual scandal involving an 80 year old scion of a big old fundamentalist megachurch in Atlanta. Evidently there's evidence of serial adultery here. So the question is which Republican Presidential candidate does Earl Paulk endorse, Rudy Guiliani or Mitt Romeny.

OK, OK, I wrote about this nearly two months ago, but there's some new developments in the case of Earl Paulk, 80 year old serial adulterer and scion of the mega-church Cathedral of the Holy Spirit at Chapel Hill Harvester Church in Atlanta. (Boy, isn't that a mouthful? And what kind of church has "Harvester" in its name?) Anyway, here's the news from CBS:

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Fundamentalist Christian Uses Colorado Shootings for Political Gain

This post, written by Steven Reynolds, originally appeared on The All Spin Zone

Tony Perkins takes off on secular media again, this time blaming the secular media for the tragic shootings in Colorado. Nevermind that the shooter was protected all his life from the secular media by being homeschooled in a "very, very religious" household. No, Tony doesn't like the facts much here, he's more after political gain.

First, let me direct you to Daniel DeRito's excellent piece on Matthew Murray, the shooter in the Colorado tragedies last week. Daniel's piece does not explain or excuse the tragedy, and it does not exploit the tragedy either. It is merely an illumination of the mind of Matthew Murray through his own writings. As such, the piece is intriguing and leads us towards, though certainly not all the way there, understanding the mind of this very troubled young man.

Tony Perkins does not have the kind of integrity as does Daniel DeRito. Tony has taken this horrible tragedy of shooting deaths in Colorado churches and run with it for political advantage, blaming secular culture. Yeah, it's the liberals according to Perkins who caused this young man to go over the edge and start shooting. As The Carpetbagger notes, it is disgusting to see this knee-jerk reaction on the part of Tony Perkins, to immediately exploit a tragedy for political gain. It is also not surprising, as The Carpetbagger also mentions:

I'm not sure what's more twisted -- Perkins seeking to exploit a tragedy to advance his religio-political agenda, or his bizarre belief that the "secular media" is responsible for fomenting hostility towards evangelicals.

In both instances, Perkins, a prominent religious right leader, has the story backwards. Murray, who was obviously suffering from severe mental illnesses, wasn't immersed in the "secular media," he was home-schooled in "a deeply religious Christian household."

Also, it's frustrating to see how predictable far-right activists have become. It seems whenever there's a tragedy involving a young person with a gun, right-wing voices step up to blame the American culture.

Halliburton/KBR Cover Up Gang Rape

This post, written by Steven Reynolds, originally appeared on The All Spin Zone

Yes, a gang-rape in Baghdad, by Halliburton and KBR employees with a Halliburton employee as a victim. The cover-up has been swallowed, if not actively abetted, by US personnel there. This should result in massive investigations and firings. In Bush World it will probably result in renewed Halliburton contracts and medals for their workers.

There's not much one can say to increase the disgust that this story is going to serve up to the American public on ABC's 20/20 in a couple nights. A young American woman working for Halliburton was gang raped by her fellow employees, then Halliburton covered up the crime and threatened the woman if she chose to report it. Evidently the US government, such good friends of Halliburton, is supposedly taking part in the cover-up, evidently favoring Halliburton over a gang-raped citizen. Here's the report, but the video is on TV in a couple days:

A Houston, Texas woman says she was gang-raped by Halliburton/KBR coworkers in Baghdad, and the company and the U.S. government are covering up the incident.

Jamie Leigh Jones, now 22, says that after she was raped by multiple men at a KBR camp in the Green Zone, the company put her under guard in a shipping container with a bed and warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job.

"Don't plan on working back in Iraq. There won't be a position here, and there won't be a position in Houston," Jones says she was told.

In a lawsuit filed in federal court against Halliburton and its then-subsidiary KBR, Jones says she was held in the shipping container for at least 24 hours without food or water by KBR, which posted armed security guards outside her door, who would not let her leave.

"It felt like prison," says Jones, who told her story to ABC News as part of an upcoming "20/20" investigation. "I was upset; I was curled up in a ball on the bed; I just could not believe what had happened."

Finally, Jones says, she convinced a sympathetic guard to loan her a cell phone so she could call her father in Texas.

Ron Paul Supporters Caught Using Their Own Candidate Inspired Currency

This post, written by Steven Reynolds, originally appaeared on The All Spin Spin Zone

Ron Paul currency has been sold, and used in an underground economy. Did nobody tell them that is a crime? Or maybe it is central to the beliefs of some of Ron Paul's supporters that breaking the law is OK.

Well, someone's already put him on a platinum coin that sells for one thousand dollars. Alas, the people who did so were the National Organization for the Repeal of the Federal Reserve Act, and the coins have been used as tender in an underground economy. So, in a sense, Ron Paul's face is illegal. From the Washington Post:

The ardent supporters of Rep. Ron Paul, the iconoclastic Texas libertarian whose campaign for the presidency is threatening to upend the battle for the Republican nomination, got word yesterday of a new source of outrage and motivation: reports of a federal raid on a company that was selling thousands of coins marked with the craggy visage of their hero.

Federal agents on Thursday raided the Evansville, Ind., headquarters of the National Organization for the Repeal of the Federal Reserve Act and Internal Revenue Code (Norfed), an organization of "sound money" advocates that for the past decade has been selling a private currency it calls "Liberty Dollars." The company says it has put into circulation more than $20 million in Liberty Dollars, coins and paper certificates it contends are backed by silver and gold stored in Idaho, are far more reliable than a U.S. dollar and are accepted for use by a nationwide underground economy.

Norfed officials said yesterday that the six-hour raid occurred just as its six employees were mailing out the first batch of 60,000 "Ron Paul Dollars," copper coins sold for $1 to honor the candidate, who is a longtime advocate of abolishing the Federal Reserve. The group says it has shipped out about 10,000 silver Ron Paul Dollars that sold for $20 and about 3,500 of the copper $1 coins. But it said the agents seized more than 50,000 of the copper coins -- more than two tons' worth -- plus smaller amounts of the silver coins and gold and platinum Ron Paul Dollars, which sell for $1,000 and $2,000.

Limbaugh Launches Dishonest Attack Campaign On An Elementary School

This post, written by Steven Reynolds, originally appeared on The All Spin Zone

Rush Limbaugh went on a rant against Bay Haven School of Basics Plus (an odd name for a school) based on some bad information from a caller. Yes, more little victims for Rush! The claim was that the school was going to honor Veterans Day by honoring conscientious objectors. During the rant, Limbaugh had his listeners call the school, and of course they became inundated with callers accusing the school of doing something it never intended to do. From Tampa Bay Online:

While office workers took up to 15 phone calls every 10 minutes from Limbaugh listeners and people who had heard about the controversy, Asheim-Dean emphasized that students at the school will gather tomorrow for a color guard.

"We will be honoring our veterans tomorrow in a very traditional way," Asheim-Dean said. "That was the plan from the beginning, and that is the plan now."

Right-Wing Christian Cleric Caught Soliciting Underage Boys for Sex

This post, written by Steven Reynolds, originally appeared on The All Spin Zone

CSI: Sex Crimes Among Christian Conservatives, has caught themselves another perpetrator. This one is from a megachurch in Florida. His victims are underage boys.

This one is Marshal Seymour, formerly of the Lakeland, FL megachurch First Baptist Church at the Mall. (Hey, if you look at their web site you'll see why the "Mall" in the name is so, so appropriate. These folks are marketing themselves like mad, to mothers of preschoolers, bikers. . . I'm sure they'll have a ministry for child molesters soon.) Marshal is charged paying young people for sex, or maybe just paying them to keep quiet about it. According to Tampa Bay Online:

After two weeks of investigation, Lakeland police arrested a trusted church member and accused him of sex offenses involving three boys he mentored at the church.

"This is a pastor's worst nightmare," Dennis said.

Marshal Seymour, a 40-year-old student ministry volunteer at Lakeland's prominent First Baptist Church at the Mall, turned himself in Friday night after Lakeland police issued a warrant.

Seymour met his victims through the church and paid them to perform sex acts or to keep quiet about sexual encounters, Lakeland police said. The boys were 15, 16 and 17 at the time of the incidents, which occurred during the past two years, according to arrest documents.

Seymour is charged with three counts of using a child in sexual performance and one count each of unlawful sexual activity and tampering with or fabricating physical evidence.

And I love this part of the article. Man, it reads a bit like the Roman Catholic child sex scandals, doesn't it, with clergy and volunteers getting caught and then just going on to another church?

The Lakeland police investigation revealed that Seymour had been arrested on felony sex charges in Mobile County, Ala., in 1998. The circumstances were similar, with Seymour accused of victimizing a boy he met at church, Lakeland police said.

However, the charges were reduced to misdemeanor assault, and Seymour was sentenced to a suspended one-year sentence in 1999, police said. That's the same year he came to Lakeland and First Baptist Church at the Mall.