This year for the first time, you can watch the Super Bowl online at NBC Sports. It requires Microsoft Silverlight, and has a neat picture-in-picture feature that lets you switch between different camera views, including an aerial view of the field.
The game starts at 6pm ET, so in the meantime here's the Volkswagen Super Bowl ad...
The Las Vegas Sun reports that voter turnout for the Nevada caucuses was very low, despite the Republican Party's constant fear-mongering and attacks on President Obama.
Something's going wrong with the GOP strategy of demonization and Tea Party ultra-conservatism; I suspect the toxic atmosphere of the far right is beginning to turn off center right Republicans, and that could spell big trouble for the GOP in the general election.
Mitt Romney’s easy victory in Nevada’s Republican presidential caucuses might, in the long run, be less important than the fact that a surprising number of Republicans who could have participated Saturday chose to stay home.
Republicans’ disappointing turnout foreshadows difficulty energizing GOP voters in Nevada, a key swing state in November’s general election.
Turnout was unlikely to match 2008, when 44,000 Republicans participated in Nevada’s caucuses. Complete figures were not released by the state party as of 10 p.m. Saturday, an indication of a lackluster showing.
“It was less than what we had planned for,” Clark County caucus Director Michael Chamberlain said on KNPR.
Republican turnout in Washoe County, Nevada’s second largest, was 8 percent, well below the 20 percent some had predicted.
“We expected more. Obviously we hoped for more,” David Buell, chairman of the Washoe County Republican Party, said.
Here's an open thread to keep up on news from the Nevada GOP caucuses, in which Mitt Romney is expected to thoroughly trounce Newt "Poor Kids Make Great Janitors" Gingrich.
Ron "I Can't Help It If White Supremacists Dig Me" Paul, for some reason, seems confident that he'll beat Gingrich for second place.
If you're on Twitter, statewide vote totals are being tweeted by @NVGOP...
Anti-Muslim hate group leader Pamela Geller has seized on the murder of a 20-year old Muslim woman in Michigan, labeled it an "honor killing," and is now planning to hold a "conference" using the murdered woman's name -- against the wishes of the woman's family, and even though both the family and the prosecutor in the case say it was the act of an abusive stepfather, not an "honor killing" at all. And to make it even more disgusting, Geller is calling her hatefest a "human rights conference."
It's hard to imagine someone so twisted and dysfunctional that they'd intrude on a family's grief over a murdered child, and use the victim's name against the family's wishes. But Geller is defiantly determined to exploit this murder for all the bigoted hatred she can wring out of it: Slain Woman's Name on 'Human Rights' Conference Upsets Her Family.
Jessica's murder made international headlines. She left Minnesota to escape an allegedly physically and mentally abusive stepfather, but in April of 2011, her stepfather, Rahim Alfatlawi, drove from Minnesota to her grandmother's Warren home and shot her in the head.
Her family calls it an awful tragedy, but others are calling it an honor killing.
"We know that this is a practice under Islamic law. The honor killing is the final act. People know very little of the terror ... that these girls live under," said Pamela Geller.
She is the head of Stop the Islamization of America. Geller is hosting a conference on the anniversary of Jessica's death in Dearborn. It's called the Jessica Mokdad Human Rights Conference.
"We cannot sanction this gendercide. We cannot sanction the diminishment and dehumanization of women. We must speak up," Geller said.
We asked Jessica's stepmother, Cassandra Mokdad, whether her murder was an honor killing. "Absolutely it was not," she said. She told us this disgusting act had nothing to do with Islam, a religion she said Jessica practiced proudly.
"It was nothing about religion or anything. It was just about a sick human being," Mohammed Mokdad said.
"He wanted to have a relationship with Jessica as more than her stepfather. He wanted to have a more romantic relationship with her," Cassandra Mokdad explained.
"She's using Jessica as her poster child for anti-Islam." Even the Macomb County Prosecutor on the case said Alfatlawi murdered Jessica because he was obsessed with her, not the religion, and Jessica's family wants her name taken off the conference.
"She's using Jessica as her poster child for anti-Islam," said Cassandra Mokdad.
"What gulls me is that there is this prohibition on discussing it and the ideology that inspires honor killings," Geller explained.
She said this conference will happen and the name won't be changed.
"We're definitely going to have this conference and it will not be stopped. Their directing their barbs at me. I didn't kill Jessica. I'm trying to save the next girl. They should be helping me save the next girl," said Geller.
"Absolutely I'll go. I won't let her sit there and misuse Jessica's name, and I will let her know exactly how I feel," Cassandra Mokdad told us.
But wait -- the story gets even more repellent, because Geller and her followers bullied and harassed the management of the Hyatt Regency in Dearborn, Michigan into giving her a conference room for free to hold this ugly hatefest, after they canceled a previous Geller hatefest. Unbelievable.
Here's a page with contact info for the Dearborn Hyatt, if you'd like to let the management know how you feel about this disgusting event: Detroit Metro Hotel - Detroit Michigan Hotels - Hyatt Regency Dearborn. They backed down and tried to appease Geller, and as a result she's now using their facilities to exploit a murdered woman against the family's wishes.
The ideological bent of Komen Foundation public policy VP Karen Handel really becomes clear in this 2010 interview with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution on the topic of gay marriage and adoption, in which she says she favors outlawing gay adoptions: Handel Says Gay Parents Not as 'Legitimate' as Hetero Ones.
Q: Do you view committed gay relationships as being less legitimate than committed heterosexual relationships?
A: As a Christian, I view relationships and marriage as being between a man and a woman.
Q: But what about the legitimacy of the relationship? Do you have any gay friends? Do you know gay couples?
A: Of course I do. Are we going to spend our whole day talking on this issue?
Q: I want to know how you feel about this.
A: I’ve been very clear. And you know, as a Christian, marriage is between a man and a woman. I do not think that gay relationships are — they are not what God intended. And that’s just my viewpoint on it. Others might disagree with that. But I would also hope that if you look at what is happening in our state, we’ve got issues we need to be focused on in Georgia . We have a constitutional amendment against gay marriage. And it’s something that I supported wholeheartedly. We have that, and let’s get dealing with the other issues that we also need to deal with in Georgia. And the press can help with that. (Laughs).
Q: Frequently, folks in the Legislature kind of threaten to — there are always rumblings in the Legislature that they may outlaw gay adoptions. You’re against gay adoption.
A: I am against gay adoption. But remember — I mean, if there is legislation on that, certainly I will follow that and look at it. But in the end, ultimately courts are going to be the ones to have to make the decision on that and it’s always in the best interests of the child. Do I think that gay parents is in the best interest of the child? No. But we do have our court system that deals with many and most of those issues.
Q: Would you favor outlawing gay adoptions?
A: Yeah, I would consider that, absolutely.
Q: Do you know any gay couples with children?
A: Not that I’m aware of.
Q: So you think gay couples are less qualified to function as parents than straight couples?
A: I think that for a child to be in a household — in a family in a household with a situation where the parents are not married, as in one man and one woman, is not the best household for a child.
Q: Is it better or worse than a single parent household?
A: Doug, I’m really trying to be straightforward with you but I’m not going to debate all the nuances. I’ve made it abundantly clear that I think that marriage is between a man and a woman. And that’s what I believe, and I don’t know what more you would like me to add to that.
Q: I guess I want to know why you think gay parents aren’t as legitimate as heterosexual parents.
Mona Charen of the National Review Online lamented that “it’s extremely disappointing that Komen has caved” but “it’s hardly surprising given the onslaught they’ve endured over the course of the last few days,” and NRO’s Daniel Foster charged Planned Parenthood with “gangsterism.” Of course, just days prior Kathryn Jean Lopez on NRO hailed Komen’s initial decision as a major victory, noting “this Komen-Planned Parenthood relationship has long been a target of pro-life activists.”
Catholic Family and Human Rights Initiative (C-Fam) president Austin Ruse told LifeSiteNews called potentially successful effort to have the Komen foundation reverse their decision defunding Planned Parenthood a “mafia shakedown”:
Pro-life leaders say that the exact import of the statement is not yet clear, and that Komen seems to be asking for breathing room, possibly with the intention of caving in definitively to pro-abortion pressure.
Austin Ruse of C-Fam told LifeSiteNews.com Friday morning that, “The mafia shakedown tactics may have worked, but we’re not sure.”
Ruse advised that pro-lifers should “take a wait and see attitude” to discern whether the pro-abortion pushback against Komen would succeed.
Kristen Walker of Live Action called it a “terrible shame that Komen has caved in to political pressure from pro-abortion fanatics who demand obeisance to Planned Parenthood” and wondered what will happen to all the money people gave to Komen to reward them for dropping Planned Parenthood:
If raising money to cure breast cancer were their primary concern, they would not have reversed this decision. Their donations went up 100% in the short time since they announced the halting of grants to PP as pro-lifers who have refused to donate to Komen opened their wallets to thank them for their decision, happy to finally be able to give to their good work of fighting breast cancer with a clear conscience. I wonder if Komen has given any thought to the fact that those people gave money in good faith believing it wouldn’t be used to fund abortions. Will they refund that money? I guess we’ll see.
...
It is a terrible shame that Komen has caved in to political pressure from pro-abortion fanatics who demand obeisance to Planned Parenthood. It is a terrible shame they’re allowing PP and its followers to compromise their mission to cure breast cancer.
Evangelist Bill Keller warned that the latest move by the Komen foundation may well lead to “the wrath and punishment of God unleashed on this wicked nation at any moment”:
Keller said, "It only shows the level of spiritual decay in this nation when a private foundation who made a decision to stop giving money to the world's largest abortion provider, Planned Parenthood, causes the media, politicians, and the supporters of killing babies to go into a wild frenzy. The Catholic Church has always stood for the sanctity of life, yet Catholics like Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Joe Biden, and MSNBC's Chris Matthews, were livid that the Komen Foundation decided to stop giving a $250,000 annual grant to Planned Parenthood."
...
Keller concluded, "You don't have to be a Biblical scholar to know that we are on the verge of seeing the wrath and punishment of God unleashed on this wicked nation at any moment. Every 24 hours we slaughter approximately 4,000 innocent babies. Where is the outrage about that in the media, in the halls of Congress? Sadly, society doesn't even give it a second thought and has fully embraced this 'culture of death' which hangs over this nation like a black cloud."
Judging from the statement they released, Planned Parenthood seems to believe the Komen Foundation will restore their funding for breast cancer screening.
I just got off the phone with a Komen board member, and he confirmed that the announcement does not mean that Planned Parenthood is guaranteed future grants — a demand he said would be “unfair” to impose on Komen. He also said the job of the group’s controversial director, Nancy Brinker, is safe, as far as the board is concerned.
As some were quick to point out, the statement put out by Komen doesn’t really clarify whether Planned Parenthood will actually continue to get money from the group. The original rationale for barring Planned Parenthood was that it was under investigation (a witch-hunt probe undertaken by GOP Rep Cliff Stearns). Komen said today that the group would “amend the criteria to make clear that disqualifying investigations must be criminal and conclusive in nature and not political.”
Does that mean Planned Parenthood will get Komen grants in the future?
I asked Komen board member John Raffaelli to respond to those who are now saying that the announcement doesn’t necessarily constitute a reversal until Planned Parenthood actually sees more funding. He insisted it would be unfair to expect the group to commit to future grants.
“It would be highly unfair to ask us to commit to any organization that doesn’t go through a grant process that shows that the money we raise is used to carry out our mission,” Raffaelli told me. “We’re a humaniatrian organization. We have a mission. Tell me you can help carry out our mission and we will sit down at the table.”
Pushed on whether this means the new announcement wasn’t really a reversal, Raffaelli pushed back, arguing that Komen, in response to all the criticism, had removed politics from the grant-making process. “Is it really unclear that we’re changing the policy to address criticism?” he said.
Notice: Komen board member John Raffaelli is explicitly admitting that the decision to cut off Planned Parenthood was politically driven.
Apparently, the people in charge of merchandising at the Susan G. Komen Foundation had a little talk with their anti-abortion executives, and today the Komen Foundation is reinstating their Planned Parenthood funding, and apologizing to Planned Parenthood and the American public.
Planned Parenthood has released the following statement in response:
“The outpouring of support for women in need of lifesaving breast cancer screening this week has been astonishing and is a testament to our nation's compassion and sincerity.
“During the last week, millions spontaneously joined a national conversation about lifesaving breast cancer prevention care and reinforced shared values about access to health care for all. This compassionate outcry in support of those most in need rose above political, ideological, and cultural divides, and will surely be recognized as one of our nation's better moments during a contentious political time. Planned Parenthood thanks each and every person who has contributed to elevating the importance of breast cancer prevention for so many women in need.
“In recent weeks, the treasured relationship between the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation and Planned Parenthood has been challenged, and we are now heartened that we can continue to work in partnership toward our shared commitment to breast health for the most underserved women. We are enormously grateful that the Komen Foundation has clarified its grantmaking criteria, and we look forward to continuing our partnership with Komen partners, leaders and volunteers. What these past few days have demonstrated is the deep resolve all Americans share in the fight against cancer, and we honor those who are at the helm of this battle.
“Planned Parenthood has been a trusted partner with the Komen Foundation in early cancer detection and prevention services. In particular, Planned Parenthood helps the Komen Foundation reach vulnerable populations — low-income women, African-American women, and Latinas — especially in rural areas and underserved communities where Planned Parenthood health centers are their only source of health care. With Komen Foundation grants, over the past five years, Planned Parenthood health centers provided nearly 170,000 clinical breast exams and more than 6,400 mammogram referrals. With the outpouring of support over the past week, even more women in need will receive lifesaving breast cancer care.”
But the Komen Foundation has done enormous damage to their reputation, and it's going to be difficult for them to gain back the trust they've lost -- especially since they still have not acknowledged that anti-Planned Parenthood politics played a large part in their decision to cut off funding in the first place.
As you might expect, this news has driven right wing bloggers into a state of apoplectic rage. A look at the crazed wingnut reactions:
The Komen Foundation continues to deny that anti-abortion politics was responsible for their original decision to defund Planned Parenthood, but the right wing blogs and media seem to have no doubt that it was.
Today at the far right fever swamp known as Free Republic, somebody posted a link to our latest article about Ron Paul's connections to the white supremacist subculture, which led to an amusing and revealing sequence of comments.
First, the wingnuts tried to argue that associating with neo-Nazis might not be so bad, and might even be necessary to "turn this country around."
So what. Obama publicly talks to La Raza, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the NAACP.
February 2, 2012 1:48:07 PM PST by Bryanw92 (The solution to fix Congress: Nuke em from orbit. It's the only way to be sure!)
[...]
“anti-fascist” wing
They gonna hack obozo’s websites next?
February 2, 2012 1:48:17 PM PST by dynachrome ("Our forefathers didn't bury their guns. They buried those that tried to take them.")
[...]
I don’t require hackers to reveal to me that Ron Paul is associated with neo-nazis or neo-fascists. This has been pretty common knowledge around Texas for years and those are the kind of people in his district that keep electing him and supporting him. But what the hell? Maybe we will need that to turn this country around.
February 2, 2012 1:57:31 PM PST by Jukeman (God help us for we are deep in trouble.)
Then, when it finally sank in that they were talking about an article at Little Green Footballs, they dropped this uncomfortable line of discussion and united to attack their common enemy instead:
Let’s keep this an LGF-free site.
No conservative goes there anymore.
February 2, 2012 1:59:55 PM PST by Doulos1 (Bitter Clinger Forever!)
[...]
LGF! My goodness I would rather be Hillary’s towel boy than see Freepers linking LGF!!
February 2, 2012 2:05:11 PM PST by kreitzer
[...]
Little Green Footballs? lol
12 posted on February 2, 2012 2:09:47 PM PST by jpsb
[...]
I’ll put more credence in this when it’s reported somewhere other than LGF.
February 2, 2012 2:16:23 PM PST by Keith in Iowa (Willard Romney, purveyor of the world's finest bullmitt. | FR Class of 1998 |)
[...]
Why are you posting stuff from LGF? You might as well post from Daily Kos or DU.
February 2, 2012 2:28:59 PM PST by Cymbaline ("Allahu Akbar": Arabic for "Nothing To See Here" - Mark Steyn)
[...]
LGF? I hear “Socialist Worker’s Daily” has some interesting pieces, too.
February 2, 2012 3:57:32 PM PST by BfloGuy (The final outcome of the credit expansion is general impoverishment.)
Looks like Nevada Republicans are starting to get used to the idea of holding their noses and taking their Mitt Romney medicine: Romney Poised to Roll, Poll Shows.
A new poll shows Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney headed for a blowout victory Saturday in Nevada's GOP caucuses.
Romney wins support from 45 percent of Nevada Republicans who said they plan to participate in the caucuses, the survey commissioned by the Las Vegas Review-Journal and 8NewsNow said.
Those who self-identify as "Tea Party" pod people are hanging tough with Newt, against the odds, fighting the good fight like our founding fathers would have, tricorne hats and all.
Newt Gingrich is Romney's closest threat with 25 percent backing, thanks in large part to Republicans who say they "strongly support" the tea party movement.
This video is titled "Straight Talk from Ambassador Nancy G. Brinker, Founder and CEO of Susan G. Komen," the official response to the outrage that followed the Komen Foundation's defunding of Planned Parenthood breast cancer screening programs.
Brinker says their grants to Planned Parenthood were canceled because they have "new standards," which for unstated reasons excluded Planned Parenthood.
Notice: she says all this without once mentioning the words, "Planned Parenthood." And she never explains how Planned Parenthood failed to meet their "new standards."
In the Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg has a piece on the controversy, citing three sources within the Komen Foundation who say the "new standards" were adopted specifically to give their anti-abortion VP for public policy, Karen Handel, an excuse to cut off Planned Parenthood: Top Susan G. Komen Official Resigned in Protest Over Planned Parenthood Cave-In.
An entirely avoidable, and deeply regrettable, controversy has been raging this week over the decision by the (formerly highly esteemed) Susan G. Komen For the Cure foundation, the world’s leading breast-cancer research advocacy group, to cut its support for Planned Parenthood, which used Komen dollars (about $600,000 annually) to pay for breast-screening exams for poor people. (The Atlantic’s Nicholas Jackson has an excellent summary of the controversy so far.)
Komen, the marketing juggernaut that brought the world the ubiquitous pink ribbon campaign, says it cut-off Planned Parenthood because of a newly adopted foundation rule prohibiting it from funding any group that is under formal investigation by a government body. (Planned Parenthood is being investigated by Rep. Cliff Stearns, an anti-abortion Florida Republican, who says he is trying to learn if the group spent public money to provide abortions.)
But three sources with direct knowledge of the Komen decision-making process told me that the rule was adopted in order to create an excuse to cut-off Planned Parenthood. (Komen gives out grants to roughly 2,000 organizations, and the new “no-investigations” rule applies to only one so far.) The decision to create a rule that would cut funding to Planned Parenthood, according to these sources, was driven by the organization’s new senior vice-president for public policy, Karen Handel, a former gubernatorial candidate from Georgia who is staunchly anti-abortion and who has said that since she is “pro-life, I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood.” (The Komen grants to Planned Parenthood did not pay for abortion or contraception services, only cancer detection, according to all parties involved.) I’ve tried to reach Handel for comment, and will update this post if I speak with her.
Three sources told me the organization’s top public health official, Mollie Williams, resigned in protest immediately following the Komen board’s decision to cut off Planned Parenthood.
For some reason, it's supposed to mean something that Birther moron Donald Trump has decided to endorse Mitt Romney instead of Newt Gingrich. TIME has an all-caps BREAKING! headline to announce the earth-shaking news: BREAKING: Trump to Back Romney.
I'm sure Mitt Romney's relieved to know he can count on the Birther vote -- a significant segment of the right wing base.
Here's a very handy Javascript bookmarklet I whipped up yesterday, when I realized I was often searching the LGF archives for phrases on other sites; for example, when I was writing the post about the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation, I wanted to search LGF for my previous posts about Planned Parenthood.
What this bookmarklet does: you can just select any word or phrase (by dragging the mouse over it), then click the bookmarklet in your browser's bookmarks bar and it will open a new window for the LGF Search page, using the text you selected.
To install this handy tool, simply drag the link below to your browser's bookmarks bar and name it 'LGF Search' (if you don't see a bookmarks bar, check your browser's View menu to make sure it's turned on).
Then just select any text on a web page and click the 'LGF Search' button, and up comes a list of all the LGF articles containing that word or phrase. The bookmarklet puts double quotes around your selected text, so you'll see matches for that exact phrase.
The "anti-fascist" wing of the "Anonymous" hacker group has broken into a website run by the white supremacist American Third Position (A3P), and released a document dump consisting of private forum messages, emails, organizational notes, and other personal information.
The documents show numerous connections between Republican candidate Ron Paul and these racist Neanderthals; they're heavily involved in campaigning for Paul, and according to the messages, have held regular meetings with Ron Paul himself: Ron Paul, the American Third Position Party and Stormfront.
Also revealed: Ron Paul has held meetings with A3P and Nick Griffin, leader of the British National Party -- the notorious UK fascist group with neo-Nazi roots.
Ron Paul with white supremacists Don and Derek Black at the 2007 Values Voter debateMembers of the nationalist American Third Position Party (A3P), whose website was defaced by Anonymous, organised Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul's meetings and campaigns, according to emails hacked by the collective.
Chairman of the British National Party (BNP) Nick Griffin also took part in meetings with Paul and other representatives of A3P.
"According to these messages, Ron Paul has regularly met with many A3P members, even engaging in conference calls with their board of directors," read a statement from Anonymous.
The WSJ published an op-ed several days ago, in which several notable scientists and luminaries claimed there was no need to panic about global warming. They included former NASA astronaut Harrison Schmidt, Burt Rutan, and several other scientists.
Do you consult your dentist about your heart condition? In science, as in any area, reputations are based on knowledge and expertise in a field and on published, peer-reviewed work. If you need surgery, you want a highly experienced expert in the field who has done a large number of the proposed operations.
You published "No Need to Panic About Global Warming" (op-ed, Jan. 27) on climate change by the climate-science equivalent of dentists practicing cardiology. While accomplished in their own fields, most of these authors have no expertise in climate science. The few authors who have such expertise are known to have extreme views that are out of step with nearly every other climate expert. This happens in nearly every field of science. For example, there is a retrovirus expert who does not accept that HIV causes AIDS. And it is instructive to recall that a few scientists continued to state that smoking did not cause cancer, long after that was settled science.
Climate experts know that the long-term warming trend has not abated in the past decade. In fact, it was the warmest decade on record. Observations show unequivocally that our planet is getting hotter. And computer models have recently shown that during periods when there is a smaller increase of surface temperatures, warming is occurring elsewhere in the climate system, typically in the deep ocean. Such periods are a relatively common climate phenomenon, are consistent with our physical understanding of how the climate system works, and certainly do not invalidate our understanding of human-induced warming or the models used to simulate that warming.
Obviously, Romney isn't really saying that he doesn't care about people living in poverty; he's arguing that a social safety net exists that can take care of them.
But to phrase it like this, after all the criticism of his immense wealth, shows someone who's incredibly out of touch -- and at the very least, insensitive.
Romney says, "I'm not concerned about the very poor. We have a safety net there. If it needs a repair , I'll fix it. I'm not concerned about the very rich.... I'm concerned about the very heart of America, the 90-95 percent of Americans who right now are struggling."
O'Brien asked him to clarify his remarks saying, "There are lots of very poor Americans who are struggling who would say, 'That sounds odd.'"
Romney continues, "We will hear from the Democrat party, the plight of the poor.... You can focus on the very poor, that's not my focus.... The middle income Americans, they're the folks that are really struggling right now and they need someone that can help get this economy going for them."
Romney is infamous for the blatant dishonesty of his campaign ads; for example, his very first ad featured a deliberately out-of-context quote from President Obama. And when called on it, Romney's staff refused to retract the ad, gloated instead that it had "worked."
With this gaffe today, Romney can only hope that his opponents behave more ethically than he does.
Big LGF kudos to Democratic Virginia State Senator Janet Howell, who attached a rectal exam amendment to the misogynistic Republican "ultrasound" bill in that state.
To protest a bill that would require women to undergo an ultrasound before having an abortion, Virginia State Sen. Janet Howell (D-Fairfax) on Monday attached an amendment that would require men to have a rectal exam and a cardiac stress test before obtaining a prescription for erectile dysfunction medication.
"We need some gender equity here," she told HuffPost. "The Virginia senate is about to pass a bill that will require a woman to have totally unnecessary medical procedure at their cost and inconvenience. If we're going to do that to women, why not do that to men?"
The Republican-controlled senate narrowly rejected the amendment Monday by a vote of 21 to 19, but passed the mandatory ultrasound bill in a voice vote. A similar bill in Texas, which physicians say has caused a "bureaucratic nightmare," is currently being challenged in court.
A terrible precedent: apparently caving in to the right wing crusade against Planned Parenthood, the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation has decided to cut off funding to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer prevention. It's a concrete example of how the religious right's reactionary anti-choice agenda is hurting women right now.
NEW YORK – Planned Parenthood Federation of America today expressed deep disappointment in response to the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation’s decision to stop funding breast cancer prevention, screenings and education at Planned Parenthood health centers. Anti-choice groups in America have repeatedly threatened the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation for partnering with Planned Parenthood to provide these lifesaving cancer screenings and news articles suggest that the Komen Foundation ultimately succumbed to these pressures.
“We are alarmed and saddened that the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation appears to have succumbed to political pressure. Our greatest desire is for Komen to reconsider this policy and recommit to the partnership on which so many women count,” said Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
In the last few weeks, the Komen Foundation has begun notifying local Planned Parenthood programs that their breast cancer initiatives will not be eligible for new grants (beyond existing agreements or plans). The Komen Foundation’s leadership did not respond to Planned Parenthood requests to meet with the Komen Board of Directors about the decision.
To ensure that the Komen Foundation’s decision doesn’t jeopardize any woman’s access to lifesaving screenings and services, Planned Parenthood has launched a Breast Health Emergency Fund. The fund will offset the support that 19 local Planned Parenthood programs stand to lose from Komen. The Komen-funded Planned Parenthood programs have helped thousands of women in rural and underserved communities get breast health education, screenings, and referrals for mammograms.
Tampa, Florida (CNN) - It's primary day in the Sunshine State, but more than 600,000 people have already voted in Florida's Republican presidential contest. And a new public opinion poll indicates that the ballots already cast may help former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney take the 50 delegates up for grabs in Florida's winner take all primary.
Early voting began statewide ten days ago, and according to figures released Monday afternoon by the Florida Department of State, which runs the division of elections, 293,760 people had already cast ballots. And according to the state, more than 531,000 people requested and were sent absentee ballots, and 338,753 were returned and received by Florida officials.
Add it all together and more than 632,000 votes were already cast before primary day. To put it in perspective, that's more than the 601,577 who voted in the South Carolina primary, and far outpaces the combined 360,000 that took part in the New Hampshire primary and the Iowa caucuses.
And according to an American Research Group survey released Tuesday morning, 36% of people questioned said they already voted, and among those, Romney led former House Speaker Newt Gingrich 51% to 29%, with former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania at 12% and Rep. Ron Paul of Texas at 10%.
The latest musicians to get upset at Republicans for appropriating a song without permission: the band Survivor, whose song "Eye of the Tiger" has been used by Newt Gingrich for years.
The federal lawsuit, filed Monday in Chicago by Rude Music Inc., contends Gingrich has used the song since 2009 to herald his arrival at rallies and public events.
The lawsuit says Gingrich uses the song without the permission of Frank Sullivan, who with Jim Peterik, composed the song and copyrighted it in 1982.
The lawsuit asks for an injunction to prevent Gingrich from using the song, as well as damages and attorneys' fees.
I'd actually be in favor of never hearing "Eye of the Tiger" again, for any purpose.
This is a battlefield that we must stand upon and we need to let president Obama, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and my dear friend, the chairman of the Democrat National Committee [Debbie Wasserman-Schultz], we need to let them know that Florida is not on the table. Take your message of equality of achievement, take your message of economic dependency, and take your message of enslaving the entrepreneurial will and spirit of the American people somewhere else. You can take it to Europe, you can take it to the bottom of the sea, you can take it to the North Pole, but get the hell out of the United States of America.
Today, in time-tested right wing demagogue fashion, he's blaming the news media for reporting his words, and simply lying about what he said.
WEST: The other thing is that I did not refer to any person leaving. If you go back and read the transcript of the message that I gave, it was about equality of achievement, it was about economic dependence, it was about enslaving the American entrepreneur’s will and spirit. That message needs to leave this country. And that was what I was referring to. And I think that anyone that sat back and looked at the entirety of that 12 minute, 45 second speech would understand that we’re talking about a contrast of visions of this country.
I'm not sure why Sarah Palin is suddenly all over Fox News with her stream-of-semi-consciousness rants, but here's another hilarious word salad from the half-governor in which she comes up with a great slogan for Newt Gingrich: "Annoy a liberal, vote for Newt!"
The latest poll from Quinnipiac University is even more bad news for Newt Gingrich: he's behind Mitt Romney in Florida now by 14 points.
Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has a 43 - 29 percent lead over former House Speaker Newt Gingrich among Republican likely voters in Florida, the nation's first big-state presidential primary, according to Quinnipiac University poll released today. Only 7 percent are undecided, but 24 percent say they might change their mind by tomorrow's election.
In today's survey, self-described conservatives go to Romney 40 - 31 percent. He gets 38 percent of white evangelical Christians to Gingrich's 33 percent and wins 40 percent of Tea Party members to Gingrich's 35 percent.
Texas U.S. Rep. Ron Paul and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum each have 11 percent of likely primary voters today. ...
"Gov. Mitt Romney is headed towards a double-digit victory that touches all the GOP bases," said Peter A. Brown, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. "Romney carries every part of the GOP coalition, including the parts central to Gingrich - self- described conservatives, white evangelical Christians and Tea Party supporters. If this margin holds up tomorrow, it's hard to see where Gingrich goes from here."
As if to illustrate just how incredibly dense some right wing bloggers can be, Andrew Breitbart's editor-in-chief John Nolte picks a fight with ... Kermit and Miss Piggy: Muppets Go Partisan: Kermit and Miss Piggy Trash Fox News.
It's not really a fair fight.
The Fox News segment Kermit and Miss Piggy are responding to (in the video below) can be watched here, and you can see it's a rather innocuous and perfectly valid discussion about the culture. As a response, and nearly a week after the segment aired, the Fox-hating entertainment media (which is all of them) viralized the clip, blew the controversy up into something it really wasn't, and did so because they find it impossible to turn down an opportunity to prove they're one of the minions in the club.
What effectively happened, though, is a week-old Fox Business segment was consequently amplified into the news narrative, which turned the new Muppet film into a political and partisan football. Only our wildly out-of-touch entertainment media minions would think this is a good thing, and as a consequence, a well-reviewed film that opened above expectations entered the divisive culture and political wars and didn't do anywhere near as well at the box office as some had expected and hoped.
That, however, wasn't the fault of the Muppets. That was the immature, clubby entertainment media. The video below, though, puts the Muppets themselves into this controversy, which will only further alienate a very large segment of their audience...
Brilliant.
Miss Piggy tries to back off it some: "If they take what I say seriously..." We get that it was a joke. But parents are careful to ensure that the humor emanating from children's programming fits their values. Hope that doesn't make us humorless and stuffy to the crowd currently waging a jihad against soda pop and Santa Claus.
Ah, the good old wingnut persecution complex, in full flower!
Nolte follows the usual Breitbart rule; he shamelessly distorts the truth about the Fox News fake outrage that led to this exchange, characterizing it as "innocuous and perfectly valid."
In fact, it was a batshit crazy, typically paranoid show featuring Fox News's residentracist, Eric Bolling, in a deranged rant about a secret plot by the Muppets to indoctrinate children to be socialists and hate capitalism.
Only a right wing tool like Nolte would ever describe this as "innocuous."
