Washington Lobbyists Pedal Power

The equivalent of six health-care lobbyists for every member of Congress are registered for this year's biggest political battle.

http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/09/28/how-washington-lobbyists-peddle-power/

2010 Predictions: A Time of Transparency

http://josephalmighty.multiply.com/journal/item/1104

WORLD REJECTS OBAMA: CHICAGO OUT IN FIRST ROUND

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/olympic_games/8283061.stm
CHICAGO ELIMINATED FROM THE 2016 HOST CITY VOTE

Announcements...New Admin.

After begging and pleading, PBE finally gave in(ok actually I cried a lot, too) and allowed me to be an Admin. Please don't tell her about me or congratulate me...she might change her mind.

I am before anything fair minded. I look at things on both sides. As for my political affiliation...I'm more center than anything. I appreciate the chance to be in this group because ive seen some great post. For those who don't know me...ASK!

Divide and Conquered/Fear and Love

For those who think or assume that I wish to play the "race card"...
Know this...we are being played...the game is not designed for us to win.
How can we...the rules keep changing. Our gov't has never failed us...we are the gov't. So we have failed ourselves, our esoteric fears and drama control us, we are concerned with things that have nothing to do with fundamental humanity.
How are we in two wars, financially broke, barely in the top 25 of education, and still care about things that cant give us the necessities of life?

If you believe this is a class war...you are wrong!
The rich has already won...what we experience everyday are just the spoils of that war.

We are the slaves of masters that we gave the controls over to.

WAKE UP! IF YOU ARE NOT MAD...YOU ARE NOT PAYING ATTENTION!
IF YOU ARE ONLY MAD...YOU HAVE GIVEN THE RULE MAKERS EXACTLY WHAT THEY WANT!
UNITE!
ORGANIZE!
PLAN!
EXECUTE!

On this day in 1967: Thurgood Marshall, took the oath of office to become the first African American member of the US Supreme Court.

Start:	Oct 2, '09
Location:	Washington, DC

Born the great-grandson of a slave, his original name was Thoroughgood, but he shortened it to Thurgood in second grade because he disliked spelling it. His father, William Marshall, who was a railroad porter, instilled in him an appreciation for the Constitution of the United States and the rule of law.[1] Additionally, as a child in Baltimore, he was punished for his school misbehavior by being forced to write copies of the Constitution, which he later said piqued his interest in the document.

Before becoming a judge, he was a lawyer who was best remembered for his high success rate in arguing before the Supreme Court and for the victory in Brown v. Board of Education. He was nominated to the court by President Lyndon Johnson.

Marshall received his law degree from the Howard University School of Law in 1933 where he graduated first in his class. He then set up a private practice in his hometown of Baltimore. The following year, he began working with the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in Baltimore. He won his first major civil rights case, Murray v. Pearson, 169 Md. 478 (1936). This involved the first attempt to chip away at Plessy v. Ferguson, which upheld racial discrimination in public places in the United States. Marshall represented Donald Gaines Murray, a black Amherst College graduate with excellent credentials who had been denied admission to the University of Maryland Law School because of its separate but equal policies. This policy required black students to accept one of three options, attend: Morgan College, the Princess Anne Academy, or out-of-state black institutions. In 1935, Thurgood Marshall argued the case for Murray, showing that neither of the in-state institutions offered a law school and that such schools were entirely unequal to the University of Maryland. Marshall and Houston expected to lose and intended to appeal to the federal courts. However, the Maryland Court of Appeals ruled against the state of Maryland and its Attorney General, who represented the University of Maryland, stating "Compliance with the Constitution cannot be deferred at the will of the state. Whatever system is adopted for legal education now must furnish equality of treatment now". While it was a moral victory, the ruling had no real authority outside the state of Maryland.

Marshall won his very first U.S. Supreme Court case, Chambers v. Florida, 309 U.S. 227 (1940), at the age of 32. That same year, he was appointed Chief Counsel for the NAACP. He argued many other cases before the Supreme Court, most of them successfully, including Smith v. Allwright, 321 U.S. 649 (1944); Shelley v. Kraemer, 334 U.S. 1 (1948); Sweatt v. Painter, 339 U.S. 629 (1950); and McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, 339 U.S. 637 (1950). His most famous case as a lawyer was Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954), the case in which the Supreme Court ruled that "separate but equal" public education was unconstitutional because it could never be truly equal. In total, Marshall won 29 out of the 32 cases he argued before the Supreme Court.

President John F. Kennedy appointed Marshall to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in 1961. A group of Democratic Party Senators led by Mississippi's James Eastland held up his confirmation, so he served for the first several months under a recess appointment. Marshall remained on that court until 1965, when President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed him Solicitor General.

On June 13, 1967, President Johnson appointed Marshall to the Supreme Court following the retirement of Justice Tom C. Clark, saying that this was "the right thing to do, the right time to do it, the right man and the right place." Marshall was confirmed as an Associate Justice by a Senate vote of 69-11 on August 31, 1967. He was the 96th person to hold the position, and the first African-American. President Johnson confidently predicted to one biographer, Doris Kearns Goodwin, that a lot of black baby boys would be named "Thurgood" in honor of this choice (in fact, Kearns's research of birth records in New York and Boston indicates that Johnson's prophecy did not come true).

Marshall served on the Court for the next twenty-four years, compiling a liberal record that included strong support for Constitutional protection of individual rights, especially the rights of criminal suspects against the government. His most frequent ally on the Court (indeed, the pair rarely voted at odds) was Justice William Brennan, who consistently joined him in supporting abortion rights and opposing the death penalty. Brennan and Marshall concluded in Furman v. Georgia that the death penalty was, in all circumstances, unconstitutional, and never accepted the legitimacy of Gregg v. Georgia, which ruled four years later that the death penalty was constitutional in some circumstances. Thereafter, Brennan or Marshall dissented from every denial of certiorari in a capital case and from every decision upholding a sentence of death. In 1987, Marshall gave a controversial speech on the occasion of the bicentennial celebrations of the Constitution of the United States. Marshall stated,
"the government they devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments, a civil war, and major social transformations to attain the system of constitutional government and its respect for the freedoms and individual rights, we hold as fundamental today."

In conclusion Marshall stated: "Some may more quietly commemorate the suffering, struggle, and sacrifice that has triumphed over much of what was wrong with the original document, and observe the anniversary with hopes not realized and promises not fulfilled. I plan to celebrate the bicentennial of the Constitution as a living document, including the Bill of Rights and the other amendments protecting individual freedoms and human rights."

Although he is best remembered for his jurisprudence in the fields of civil rights and criminal procedure, Marshall made significant contributions to other areas of the law as well. In Teamsters v. Terry he held that the Seventh Amendment entitled the plaintiff to a jury trial in a suit against a labor union for breach of duty of fair representation. In TSC Industries, Inc. v. Northway, Inc. he articulated a formulation for the standard of materiality in United States securities law that is still applied and used today. In Cottage Savings Association v. Commissioner of Internal Revenue, he weighed in on the income tax consequences of the Savings and Loan crisis, permitting a savings and loan association to deduct a loss from an exchange of mortgage participation interests. In Personnel Administrator MA v. Feeney, Marshall wrote a dissent saying that a law that gave hiring preference to veterans over non-veterans was unconstitutional because of its inequitable impact on women.

He retired from the Supreme Court in 1991, and was reportedly unhappy that it would fall to President George H. W. Bush to name his replacement.

The Rise and Sudden Fall of Bank of America's Ken Lewis

http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1927344,00.html
Last December at a black-tie industry gala in New York City's famed Plaza Hotel, Ken Lewis strode past other top financial executives to the podium to accept the award for Banker of the Year. The financial industry was crashing, but Lewis looked to be at the top of his game. The CEO told the crowd, "It is incumbent upon all of us, especially those of us whose performance has left us in a strengthened leadership position, to help our industry find a new balance between our desire for economic growth and our need for market stability."

This December, Lewis will be out of a job. On Wednesday, he sent an e-mail to the bank's staffers saying he will retire by the end of the year. Lewis, 62, said it was his decision to leave, but no one could miss the huge legal dustup swirling around him over the bank's deal late last year to buy Merrill Lynch. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and New York attorney general Andrew Cuomo have been investigating whether Lewis misled shareholders to gain approval of that acquisition. He could soon face charges in those probes.

For more crooked CEOs, click this link:

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1903155_1903156,00.html

Sick For Profit: Action

http://bravenewfilms.org/blog/?p=71973
Lots of great actions you can take to fight the insurance industry in this post.

Jon Stewart blasts Democrats over public option

On the Daily Show last night, Jon Stewart blasted Senate Democrats for failing to get a public health care option through the Senate Finance Committee despite having a super majority.

Here's the clip via Comedy Central:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Democratic Super Majority
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Ron Paul Interview

Will Gay Marriage Ban Pass in Maine?

In November, Maine residents will vote on whether to overturn a law passed earlier this year by the state's legislature that permits gays and lesbians to get married in the state.

Nate Silver runs the numbers: "I'd lay about 3 to 1 against the marriage ban passing. But it's liable to fairly close -- clearly a winnable campaign for conservatives and a losable one for liberals, especially if the sort of complacency sets in that we saw in California."

Why Israel Hates Obama

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-10-01/a-white-house-of-self-hating-jews/?cid=hp:blogunit1
The president's approval rating has fallen to an astonishingly low 4 percent in the Holy Land. As his envoy jumpstarts peace talks, Richard Wolffe reports on Obama's plans to win the ally back.

On this day in 1974: Watergate cover-up trial opens in Washington D.C.

Start:	Oct 1, '09
Location:	Washington, DC

Also called The Great Cover Up.

The Watergate scandal refers to a political scandal in the United States in the 1970s. Named for the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., effects of the scandal ultimately led to the resignation of Richard Nixon, President of the United States, on August 9, 1974. It also resulted in the indictment and conviction of several Nixon administration officials.

The scandal began with the arrest of five men for breaking and entering into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate complex on June 17, 1972. The men were connected to the 1972 Committee to Re-elect the President by a slush fund and investigations conducted by the Senate Watergate Committee, House Judiciary Committee and the news media.

President Nixon's staff conspired to cover up the break-in. As evidence mounted against the president's staff, which included former staff members testifying against them in a Senate investigation, it was revealed that President Nixon had a tape recording system in his offices and that he had recorded many conversations. Recordings from these tapes implicated the president, revealing that he had attempted to cover up the break-in. After a series of court battles, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the president had to hand over the tapes; he ultimately complied.

Facing near-certain impeachment in the House of Representatives and a strong possibility of a conviction in the Senate, Nixon resigned the office of the presidency on August 9, 1974. His successor, Gerald Ford, would issue a pardon unto President Nixon.

Assessing the GOP brand

http://www.pollster.com/blogs/assessing_the_gop_brand.php
How weak is the Republican brand right now? This issue came up yesterday when a Media Matters criticized The Hill for failing to mention the GOP's poor polling numbers in a story on the 2010 elections. Similarly, I recently suggested that that the damaged Republican brand might limit the number of seats that the party picks up. But is the party really worse off than previous opposition parties at this point in the election cycle?

As a first cut at the question, I pulled all the relevant polling on approval of the party in Congresss and party favorability from the Roper iPoll database for the periods leading up to the four most recent midterms (1994, 1998, 2002, and 2006). In both cases, the results are consistent, but I'll focus on the favorability questions since Pew and CBS asked comparable questions about party favorables in each cycle.*

The overall finding is simple -- the GOP's standing relative to the Democrats on both measures is worse than any opposition party in the sample. For instance, the Pew data show that the Republicans are currently viewed more negatively than any minority party in the previous four midterms in terms of both net favorables and the difference in net favorables between parties:**

Rep. Bachmann Warns of Abortion Field Trips

Sigh...

Wednesday night on the House floor, Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-Minn.) said the latest Democratic health care bill would allow school officials to take girls out for an abortion during the day and send them home on the school bus that night with their parents being "never the wiser."

Don't Ruin American Healthcare!

IMPORTANT PSA on the Healthcare Debate Written by: Rob Kutner & Sheryl Zohn Directed by: David Brundige Edited by: Micah Baskir Cinematography: Chris Freilich Artwork: Annette Price Special Thank...

Democratic Party On Brink of Civil War

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-10-01/the-democrats-civil-war/?cid=hp:mainpromo5
With the defeat on Tuesday of the public-option amendments in the Senate Finance Committee, liberal Democrats are threatening an open revolt against the Obama administration. “If Obama takes the public option off the table, we’re looking at a civil war within the Democratic Party,” says Charles Chamberlain, the political director of the million-member Democracy for America (DFA), founded by Howard Dean, which has helped raise over $200,000 for TV attack ads against wavering Democrats and moderate Senate Republican Olympia Snowe.

Iran Says 'Bring On the Inspectors'

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-09-30/obamas-last-iran-option/?cid=hp:mainpromo1
At a historic six-party meeting, Iran agreed to allow International Atomic Energy Agency representatives to its new nuke site. Reza Aslan writes on why these negotiations are the U.S.A.'s last option.

Progressive Claptrap

Progressive Claptrap

By Robert Higgs

You need a strong stomach to endure the messages disseminated by the mainstream news media, especially by its premier outlets, such as the New York Times. Of course, at this late date, nobody expects anything like political nonpartisanship or sound economic analysis  from the Times, yet one continues to hope that the writers will not flaunt their leftish sensibilities in an utterly buffoonish manner. If you happened upon a September 28 article “Europe’s Socialists Suffering Even in Downturn,” by Steven Erlanger, your hopes in this regard must have been violently shattered.

Much might be said about the article’s main content, but I won’t get into that material here.  What struck me comes right at the beginning in an explicit statement of the writer’s assumptions. The article begins well enough — splendidly, in fact — as its first sentence tells us, “A specter is haunting Europe — the specter of Socialism’s slow collapse.”  The next sentence, however, begins with the prefatory phrase, “Even in the midst of one of the greatest challenges to capitalism in 75 years, involving a breakdown of the financial system due to ‘irrational exuberance,’ greed and the weakness of regulatory systems,” then tells us that European socialist parties nevertheless are not doing well.

Not that style alone reveals much, of course, but one might wonder why Socialism is written with a capital letter, and capitalism is not. This stylistic distinction tempts one to think of the parallelism in writing God with a capital letter, but the devil in lower case.

There’s something charmingly quaint about the leftists’ continuing attack on capitalism, which is a type of economic order that, if it ever existed at all in this country, has not existed in recognizable form since the 1920s — in a more plausible assessment, not since the years before World War I. Yet the so-called progressives never tire of beating the long-dead horse of capitalism. Are they so ideologically blind that they cannot see how governments at every level have intervened and intervened again until they have displaced or distorted every element of the economic order that might once have contributed to its capitalist character? We live, as F. A. Hayek observed as long ago as 1935, not in a market system, but in a situation of interventionist chaos, where virtually every market is so hog-tied by regulations, laws, and taxes or so artificially pumped up by subsidies, regulatory advantages, and tax loopholes that virtually nothing remains pure and unsullied by the filthy hand of the interventionist state. We inhabit, as we have for nearly a century, a blessed “mixed economy.” What’s this ongoing nonsense about the failure of capitalism? Before anything can fail, it must first exist.

Then comes the obligatory progressive whack at greed, as if those who conduct business among consenting buyers and sellers are intrinsically soiled by an unworthy motivation, whereas, in stark contrast, those whose greed is expressed through state-sanctioned robbery and extortion are, lo and behold, verging on sainthood. How did these people come to believe that getting something done by threatening violence against those who don’t care to join the party — that is, by working through the state – stands higher on the holiness scale than private voluntary cooperation? It takes a special kind of intelligence to achieve this sort of twisted moral outlook, but the New York Times, along with the other upscale news media,  has succeeded in finding writers whose ability is equal to the challenge.

Notice also the assumption that markets are driven by “irrational exuberance,” rather than by rational calculation and bottom-line self-responsibility, and that any perceived market failure must have been the result of “the weakness of regulatory systems.” Can anything fly more flagrantly in the face of centuries of facts? When have governments ever acted more rationally than private individuals in free markets? And when have stronger regulations ever solved any real problem, as opposed to creating new or greater problems where private actors were chipping away at genuine solutions, had they only been left alone to carry out their plans? The shelves are groaning under the weight of the Code of Federal Regulations, yet the progressive will never rest until we have reached that nirvana in which everything that is not forbidden is required.

To reflect on the fact that the New York Times serves as a prime source of information for the better sorts and for the political class is to despair of the future of our prosperity and our freedom — what little remains of them. God save us from outrageously overbearing and intolerably impudent, yet tiresomely ignorant and analytically challenged, progressive news media.

(P.S. No one should interpret the foregoing commentary as in any way friendly toward so-called conservatives, whose sins are at least the equal of, and often worse than, those the progressives habitually commit.)

http://www.independent.org/blog/?p=3506

White House Calls Out Fox News and Glenn Beck Directly

In a new post on the official White House blog, Online Programs Director Jesse Lee calls out Fox News for perpetuating lies about President Obama's push to bring the Olympics to the city of Chicago.

Lee writes that Fox News, and in particular Glenn Beck, continues to ignore the facts "in an attempt to smear the Administration's efforts to win the Olympics for the United States."

 

The White House blog post continues to delineate what it deems misleading rhetoric on Obama's Olympics efforts. An example:

RHETORIC: BECK SAID VANCOUVER LOST $1 BILLION WHEN IT "HAD THE OLYMPICS." Glenn Beck said, "Vancouver lost, how much was it? they lost a billion dollars when they had the Olympics." [Transcript, Glenn Beck Show, 9/29/09]

REALITY: VANCOUVER'S OLYMPICS WILL NOT TAKE PLACE UNTIL 2010. Vancouver will host the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Games from February 12 - 28, 2010 and March 12-21, 2010, respectively. [Vancouver2010.com, accessed 9/29/09]

The White House's pointed critique of Fox News and Beck culminates with the statement, "For even more Fox lies, check out the latest "Truth-O-Meter feature from Politifact," linking to another instance of Fox News' misrepresentation of President Obama and the endeavors of his administration.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/30/white-house-calls-out-fox_n_305428.html