Your source for breaking U.S. & international news, political & social commentary from a centrist's point of view
Mr. Clark tried to turn the election into a referendum on Mr. Gingrich, raising virtually no issues other than Mr. Gingrich’s overdrafts at the House bank, his reluctant decision to give up his limousine and $60,000-a-year driver, and his million-dollar political action committee.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1111/68524.html
GOP presidential candidate Rick Perry sent a letter to Nancy Pelosi challenging her to a public debate. Um, Rick, Nancy Pelosi isn’t the one running for the presidency nor is she Speaker of the House at this juncture. You’ve got the wrong person, you idiot. Here’s the letter in its entirety from GOP12:
“Dear Leader Pelosi,
After reading about House Minority Whip Steny Hoyers’ outburst over my “Overhauling Washington” plan, I wonder if his obstructionism reflects your own opposition and that of the Democratic Caucus to urgent reforms the American public so vehemently demand.
After increasing the debt by $4 trillion in less than three years, no one can truly believe that Americans are satisfied with business as usual, and that a permanent political class in Washington can get us out of the mess you and your colleagues have created.
A part-time Congress with half the pay would still make $38,000 a year more than the average American Family. Do you truly oppose lawmakers spending more time in their districts? Is it so important for the Washington power brokers to build their fiefdoms of influence, including providing bailouts to Wall Street while businesses on Main Street are being boarded up every day?
Here is the fundamental question: do you believe Washington is broker? Before answering that question, consider these facts:
1) The Washington metro area is now the most affluent metropolitan area in the country because lobbyists, contractors, elected officials and bureaucrats have been insulated from the economic ruin prevalent in the private sector.
2) Congressional office budgets have doubled since 2000 while employers all across America are laying off workers
3) our nation’s total debt is nearing the size of our nation’s economy, increasing our dependance on competitors like China
4) the number of Americans out of work has increased by more than two million since January 2009, despite the massive stimulus package Democratic leaders promised would revive the economy, and;
5) on top of the job-killing spending policies of the previous Congress, employers are faced with a staggering $1.1 trillion in costs related to federal regulatory compliance.
Do you truly believe the answer to massive debt, over-regulation and bloated big government policies is to continue to protect the status quo, which enriches and empowers Washington insiders at the expense of the American people?
My plan would overhaul Washington, eliminating certain agencies and reducing the size and scope of others. It will force Congress to make the tough decisions to balance the budget or require a further reduction in their pay. It would end lifetime appointments to future appointees to the federal bench. I don’t want to tinker around the edges when the American People demand a complete overhaul of Washington.
Let me conclude with an invitation: I am in Washington Monday and would love to engage you in a public debate about my Overhaul Washington plan versus the congressional status quo.
I think it would be a tremendous service to the American public to see a public airing of those differences. Let the people decide.
If Monday doesn’t work, perhaps we could find a time in Iowa over the course of the next month to discuss these issues in front of the people of America’s heartland.
Should you choose not to respond or engage in such a healthy discussion, I will take it to mean you will continue your obstructionist ways in the face of much needed Washington reform.
Sincerely,
Rick Perry
Governor of Texas
This man just doesn’t get it. Princess Nancy will literally rip him from stem to stern! We’ll see another Rick Perry brain-freeze or two.
University of Texas GOP student leader Lauren Pierce tweets the idea of assassinating President Obama tempting. This comes in the wake of the Pennsylvania State Police arrested Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez for allegedly firing an AK-47 rifle at the White House.
UT’s Lauren E. Pierce tweeted: “Y’all as tempting as it may be, don’t shoot Obama. We need him to go down in history as the WORST president we’ve EVER had! #2012.”
Wow, is this what they now teach college students? To hate and advocate hatred and murder?
Right wing blogger Keith Koffler over at White House Dossier is “calling out” President Barack Obama for “dissing” American public school students during his trip to Australia. But it’s laughable, at best, that Koffler has a problem with Obama telling students in Australia that students in the U.S. have “fallen behind” when it comes to math and science. Um, isn’t that a fact? You can’t put perfume on a pig and expect it to smell like roses. Obama also said he wants to reform the public school.
Let me preface my comments by saying President Obama and his wife send their children to an exclusive Washington D.C. private school to the tune of $30,000 a year, but he wouldn’t be the first president to do so nor will he be the last. Here’s an excerpt from Koffler’s screed:
There’s an unwritten rule in politics that politicians must not criticize the president when they are overseas. How about adding America’s school kids to the list of untouchables?
[....]
Obama also asserted that poor children don’t get “support they need when they’re very young’’ and are “already behind’’’ when they enter grammar school, according to a press pool report.
[....]
One might feel uncomfortable saying many types of unpleasant things about our country to people overseas. But then, one would have to be an American exceptionalist. Source
Mr. Koffler, you can’t have it both ways. The truth is the American public education system is a mess, a hot mess, caused by both parties. President Obama is perfectly right in saying we are falling behind other countries. It is a fact, not an opinion clouded by his “liberal” way of thinking. This is further proof that the right wing loves to present a facade of whatever reality they are trying to elude. In case he hasn’t noticed, American public education is weak and bordering on disgraceful, considering we are such a superpower. Click here to get a bird-eye view into the math and science scores and you’ll see why Keith Koffler is a hypocrite and a sorry one at that.
Disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff told David Gregory that Gingrich’s $1.6 million consulting contract with Freddie Mac to provide “strategic advice” is an example of the corruption that’s taken over Washington politics. Yeah and the Obama machine will have a field day with Newt Gingrich’s Washington dealings. Newt Gingrich’s meteoric rise to the top GOP presidential contender won’t last, particularly since we are all starting to take a keen look at his shenanigans over the years. That was just too good to be true and won’t last. He, like Herman Cain, will implode.
Abramoff said, ”people who come to Washington who have public service, and they cash in on it. And they use their public service and their access to make money, and unfortunately Newt Gingrich is one of them who’s done it. I don’t know if he’ll survive this, to be honest with you.”
He also said that Gingrich is “doing and engaging in the exact kind of corruption that America disdains. The very things that anger the Tea Party movement and the Occupy Wall Street movement and everybody who is not in a movement and watches Washington.”
Newt Gingrich is the same man who left his second wife, on her sickbed, to cheat with his current wife. He is also the same man, who had the hubris to condemn then-president Bill Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky affair, while he was doing the same thing. Newt seems to think we are either stupid or senile. I wouldn’t trust him with this country’s money, no more than I would trust a common criminal.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Stanley Benio, 68, kills sick wife Leatha Benio, 78, in an apparent murder-suicide in their DeLand, Fla., home Wednesday. According to the Sun Sentinel, Stanley Benio told a dispatcher he had just shot his wife and was about to commit suicide. A neighbor reportedly told the newspaper his wife was ill and only left the home when she was going to see the doctor.
The woman suffered from diabetes but Jill Miller, the neighbor who spoke to the newspaper, said she is not sure what else was wrong with her. “She did not leave the house unless she was going to the doctor,” said Miller. “They were truly in love,” Miller said. “I feel at peace about it. They’re not suffering anymore.” Source
It is never okay for anyone to play God, no matter the circumstances one is going through. I believe Mr. Benio felt he was in over his head and just couldn’t deal with it anymore, but that doesn’t mean you commit a murder-suicide to solve your problems. I have covered at least four cases of apparent murder-suicide among elderly couples and it is very disturbing that they see no other alternative but to pull the trigger. Sorry, but that’s not love. That’s just being selfish.
CNN.com – Top Stories Eugene Robinson Paul Krugman Maureen Dowd Memeorandum REUTERS BUSINESS NEWS AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE WORLD NEWS
Connect With Us