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Sweet dreams and wake up tomorrow ready to continue the march for a more equal and just world. :D
Posts Tagged ‘action
08
Feb
14
A Year Of Action
23
Jul
13
Rise and Shine
President Barack Obama on the White House colonnade passing by members of the military, who were about to visit the Oval Office, July 22,2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
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Presidential Daily Schedule (All Times Eastern)
10:45AM: Pres. Obama meets with members of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus
11:45AM: Press Secretary Jay Carney briefs the press
12:30PM: First Lady Michelle Obama delivers remarks about the problem of childhood obesity at the 2013 NCLR Annual Conference in New Orleans
2:10PM: Pres. Obama honors the 2013 NCAA Men’s Basketball Champions, the Louisville Cardinals
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President Obama’s OFA remarks last night:
OFA
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President Barack Obama talks on the phone with President Nicolas Sarkozy of France in the Oval Office, Saturday, July 23, 2011. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
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Nedra Pickler: President Barack Obama is enrolling some star power to promote health care. Obama stopped by a private White House meeting Monday with celebrities including singer Jennifer Hudson and actors Amy Poehler, Michael Cera and Kal Penn. The White House says the artists expressed interest in helping spread the word about the health insurance marketplaces opening Oct. 1.
The White House says Obama told the artists they could help reach young uninsured Americans who will be vital to his signature law’s success. Insurers need healthy young customers to help offset the costs of older, sicker consumers. The group also included representatives for Oprah Winfrey, Alicia Keys and Bon Jovi. Also in attendance were officials with internet video makers YouTube and Funny or Die, which are teaming up on promotions featuring comedians.
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News! Oprah, Amy Poehler, Funny or Die, the Grammys and others in talks with the White House to promote Obamacare. washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog…
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Sarah Kliff (@sarahkliff) July 22, 2025****
Washington Post: Oprah, Funny or Die and the Grammys want to promote Obamacare
What do Oprah, Funny or Die and the Grammys have in common? All three, it turns out, have volunteered to promote Obamacare.
Senior advisor Valerie Jarrett hosted a meeting Monday with a star-studded group of actors, musicians, writers and producers who have “expressed a personal interest in educating young people about the Affordable Care Act,” according to a White House official.
Young people are crucial to the Affordable Care Act’s success, and the White House estimates it needs 2.7 million of them to sign up for health coverage in 2014. With typically low health costs, it’s this demographic that Obama administration is relying on to keep premiums low on the new marketplaces.
More here
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24
Jun
13
Today at the Supreme Court
Steve Benen: High court largely sidesteps affirmative action case in 7-1 ruling
One of the four biggest cases of the current Supreme Court term deals with the constitutionality of affirmative action in a case called Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin. The ruling came down this morning, and in a 7-1 decision, the high court majority sent the case back to the lower court to be heard again.
More here
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NBC: Supreme Court raises bar for affirmative action in college admissions
The Supreme Court on Monday allowed affirmative action to survive in college admissions but imposed a tough legal standard, ruling that schools must prove there are “no workable race-neutral alternatives” to achieve diversity on campus.
While the ruling was not a sweeping pronouncement on the future of affirmative action, it amounts to a warning to colleges nationwide that the courts will treat race-conscious admissions policies with a high degree of skepticism.
More here
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24
Jun
13
Rise and Shine
Random Pic: President Obama talks with Treasury Secretary Jack Lew outside the Oval Office, May 1, 2025 (Photo by Pete Souza)
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Today:
11:45: The President meets with Secretary of the Treasury Lew
12:0: Press Briefing by Press Secretary Jay Carney
2:0: The President meets with CEOs, business owners and entrepreneurs to discuss the importance of commonsense immigration reform
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NYT: Within days, the Supreme Court is expected to issue a series of decisions that could transform three fundamental social institutions: marriage, education and voting.
The extraordinary run of blockbuster rulings due in the space of a single week will also reshape the meaning of legal equality and help define for decades to come one of the Constitution’s grandest commands: “the equal protection of the laws.”
If those words require only equal treatment from the government, the rulings are likely to be a mixed bag that will delight and disappoint liberals and conservatives in equal measure. Under that approach, same-sex couples who want to marry would be better off at the end of the term, while blacks and Hispanics could find it harder to get into college and to vote.
More here
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SCOTUS Blog: On Monday, June 24, we will begin live blogging at 9 a.m. ET.
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Michael Tomasky: Today begins one of the biggest weeks in the Supreme Court’s recent history. Certainly the biggest since it decided on Obamacare almost exactly a year ago, and I would say even bigger, because while that was a huge deal in a news sense, these decisions will drill right into the muscle and bone of our competing constitutional theories in this country—whether the Constitution is a living document that permits judges to use it to reach conclusions about changing social morality (the liberal view), or whether it should do no such thing and judges should never think about “outcomes” (the conservative one). The decisions should certainly focus liberals’ minds on what a crucial role the Court plays in shaping our lives, and the fact that we have four justices, two on each side, age 75 or older is a reminder of how the next president may well shape the nature and size of the Court’s majority for at least a generation to come, maybe two.
More here
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Rep Thompson hangs the coathanger on the mike. Bloody awesome. #HB60 pic.twitter.com/poq3Sutaas
— Beck Wise (@wisebeck) June 24, 2025
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Time: Republicans used their majority to cut short debate and give preliminary approval early Monday to some of the toughest abortion restrictions in the country as time was running out on the Texas Legislature’s special session.
Many members of the conservative majority had flyers on their desks that read “Psalm 139:13-14,” which reads in part, “You covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”
Democrats gained strength from more than 800 demonstrators who packed the hallways of the Capitol carrying signs reading, “Stop the War on Women” to oppose Senate Bill 5. The measure would ban abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy, require doctors to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals and limit abortions to surgical centers.
More here - and more at ThinkProgress
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@ReignOfApril As POTUS says, it will be tough and the climb steep, but we will get there. OFA team is down here & I don’t bet against them.
— Nerdy Wonka (@NerdyWonka) June 24, 2025
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y’all keep making jokes at Texas’s expense. when we start to go blue in 2014, line of apology for kissing my Texas feminist ass forms left.
— Kat, Holy Soap (@meadowgirl) June 24, 2025
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i care about the NSA, but #reprorights are under assault in this country. since civil libertarians are silent, abortion HAS to be my issue.
— Lauren Rankin (@laurenarankin) June 24, 2025
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Excellent:
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Steve Benen: Where in the world is Edward Snowden?” is proving to be a rather complicated question.
….. there was apparently some drama in Moscow’s airport this morning, when there was heavy security surrounding a flight to Havana. Journalists tracking Snowden’s whereabouts quickly bought tickets on the flight, only to discover once they were on board and the doors were shut that he would not be on the plane.
It is, incidentally, a 12-hour flight from Moscow to Havana, which those journalists are apparently taking for no reason. On the other hand, it’ll be a whole lot of frequent-flier miles for them.
….. All of this, by the way, is turning into quite an international media spectacle. The New York Times front-page report on Snowden’s whereabouts this morning featured reporting from ten journalists in five cities on two continents…. Who knew the Snowden story would become a full-employment initiative for reporters?
Full post here
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18
Mar
13
This and That
President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama greet guests following the Women’s History Month reception in the East Room of the White House, March 18 (Photo by Pete Souza)
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OFA
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The full speech:
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07
Mar
13
Rise and Shine
OFA
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Today:
12:0 Jay Carney briefs the press
12:30: Michelle Obama delivers remarks to winners of the Let’s Move! Communities
1:55: President Obama signs the Violence Against Women Act; the President and VP Biden deliver remarks
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Sign up!
Jim Messina (Op-ed at CNN) You can’t change Washington from the inside. President Obama was criticized for stating that simple truth during the campaign, but without Americans organizing in support of the issues they believe in, lobbyists and special interests will drive the agenda in Washington.
At this crossroads for our economy, we can’t afford business as usual. That’s why we’ve formed Organizing for Action, to ensure that the voices of the majority of Americans who voted for policies that will strengthen the middle class will be heard.
As we worked for change during the president’s first term, we saw special interests spend unprecedented amounts in an attempt to persuade Congress to vote against policies the American people voted for.
History is repeating itself…..
More here
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TPM: President Obama has invited House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan to lunch Thursday at the White House. Rep. Chris Van Hollen has also been invited…
TPM: President Obama dined with 12 Republican senators at Jefferson Hotel in Washington on Wednesday night. In attendance, per the White House:
Senators Lindsey Graham, Bob Corker, Kelly Ayotte, John McCain, Dan Coats, Tom Coburn, Richard Burr, Mike Johanns, Pat Toomey, Ron Johnson, John Hoeven and Saxby Chambliss.
More here
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Jamelle Bouie: Over at the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza chides President Obama for “crying wolf” on sequestration…. There’s no doubt the White House indulged in hyperbole during the debate over sequestration. But Cillizza is exaggerating the degree to which Obama’s rhetoric was overheated or overhyped…..
…. Sequester furloughs have already begun for some federal workers, and communities that rely on military bases and federal spending will see real hardship. Over time, if sequestration is allowed to run its course, more and more Americans will feel the consequences of sudden austerity.
Private forecasting firm Macroeconomic Advisers estimates “sequestration would cost roughly 700,000 jobs …. Did Obama cry wolf on the sequester? No. And besides, it’s only been five days. We’ll see the effects of sequestration as time passes, and they won’t be good.
Full post here
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NYT Editorial: Unable to stop the sequester’s job-killing spending cuts, President Obama now says he wants to move past the endless wars of budget attrition. Though he still wants a long-term deficit deal, he said last week, it is time to turn to immigration, gun control, universal preschool, a higher minimum wage and voting reform.
But Republicans are not going to allow that pivot. Most are unalterably opposed to all of those initiatives, and want to keep their focus on cutting domestic programs and fighting off tax increases…. Paul Ryan will soon unveil his caucus’s 2014 budget, which will start to make good on the party’s ruinous plan to balance the budget in 10 years…..
Republicans are hoping to wear down their opposition with these eternal battles. But their proposals are too dangerous to allow that to happen.
Full editorial here
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Steve Benen: Maybe you agree with Sen. Rand Paul’s civil liberties arguments; maybe you don’t. Perhaps you see him as an ideal messenger for his message; perhaps you notice that he’s a strange conspiracy theorist who talks a little too often about Hitler and believes civil liberties end when a woman wants control of her own reproductive freedoms.
….. as Paul’s allies grew throughout the day, it was hard not to wonder whether at least some of his new-found friends endorsed him on the substance or whether “Stand with Rand” had become a temporary fad on the right, driven by Republicans who were simply happy to see President Obama’s national security agenda facing criticism, even if they happen to agree with President Obama’s national security agenda.
…. There’s room for a real debate about the balance between civil liberties and national security, and if Paul helps spark that conversation, I’d be delighted. But I’ll be eager to know just how much yesterday’s spectacle changed minds and how much of it was about putting on a show.
Full post here
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Will Femia (Maddow Blog): While Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s remarks during oral arguments in the Voting Rights Act case left some of us scratching our heads about where he came up with the “perpetuation of racial entitlement” argument, Chad Flanders, an assistant professor of law at Saint Louis University School of Law, has an idea, tracing the phrase to a 1979 paper by then-professor Scalia…..
More here
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ThinkProgress: Meet 34 Corporations That Help Inflate The NRA’s Membership
….. A recent NRA promotion invited people to join at a discounted $25 rate. In addition to receiving an official membership card, a subscription to an association magazine, and free gun insurance, new members received a $25 gift card for Bass Pro Shops, making the membership essentially free.
In addition to those incentives, members of the NRA and its business alliance receive a bevy of other discounts courtesy of the Association’s corporate affiliates. National and local companies provide discounts on everything from car rentals to identity theft protection. The companies get listed on the NRA’s site as corporate partners and can promote themselves as “NRA endorsed.” And, in some cases, the NRA gets a percentage of the profits.
Among the companies are….
See here
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ThinkProgress: As the 10th anniversary of President George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq approaches, the body charged with overseeing Iraq’s reconstruction has issued its final report, capping a tale of spending far too much money for very little results.
Appointed in Oct. 2004, over a year into War in Iraq, the Special Inspector-General for Iraq Reconstruction (SIGIR) was charged with being a watchdog over the use of funds provided for rebuilding the Iraqi state after the downfall of Saddam Hussein. Those reconstruction and stabilization efforts wound up costing nearly $60 billion — or about $15 million per day — with up to $10 billion of that amount wasted, according to SIGIR Stuart Bowen.
The examples provided of fraud and abuse of the system are staggering both in number and nature….
More here
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MooOOOooOOOoooorning!
REI Chief Executive Officer Sally Jewell is congratulated by outgoing Interior Secretary Ken Salazar after she was nominated by President Barack Obama to be the next Secretary of the Interior
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O……..kay:
Syracuse.com: It didn’t take long for a Connecticut toymaker to hop on the news that President Barack Obama enjoys skeet shooting at Camp David.
The company, Herobuilders.com, is selling its “Skeet Shooting Obama Action Figure” through its website. The first 1,000 customers to order will get a special price, $19.95, according to the site.
More here
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President Obama travels aboard Marine One from Annapolis, Md., en route to the White House, Feb. 6 (Photo by Pete Souza)
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Did I mention Ireland beat Poland 2-0? :cool:
14
Nov
12
Rise and Shine
President Obama talks with Lt. Gen. Doug Lute, Deputy Assistant to the President and Coordinator for South Asia, left, and National Security Advisor Tom Donilon in the Oval Office, Nov. 13 (Pete Souza)
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Today:
10:0 House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi addresses reporters (C-Span)
1:30: President Obama holds a news conference
2:45: President Obama and VP Biden attend a meeting with business leaders
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McClatchy: President Obama assured labor unions and liberal organizations Tuesday that he’s firmly committed to letting tax cuts for higher incomes expire as scheduled at the end of the year….
Obama met with the labor and liberal groups for an hour at the White House, his first extended meeting with anyone from outside his administration since he won re-election a week ago. He told them he’s committed to raising taxes on higher incomes as he negotiates with Congress on avoiding the “fiscal cliff” of automatic tax increases when Bush-era tax cuts expire at the end of the year and automatic spending cuts negotiated during last year’s debt crisis kick in.
“President Obama today strongly reiterated his steadfast commitment to ensuring that the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 2 percent finally end Dec. 31 and to protecting the middle class in the process,” said Justin Ruben, executive director of MoveOn.org….
More here
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ThinkProgress
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Mother Jones (thanks Melanie)
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NYT
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Link
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Cagle
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Dana Milbank: President Obama’s opponents have unwittingly come up with a brilliant plan to avoid the “fiscal cliff.” They want to secede from the union.
If Obama were serious about being a good steward of the nation’s finances, he’d let them.
…. a large number of patriotic Americans, mostly from states won by Mitt Romney last week, have petitioned the White House to let them secede. They should be careful about what they wish for…..
Red states receive, on average, far more from the federal government in expenditures than they pay in taxes. The balance is the opposite in blue states. The secession petitions, therefore, give the opportunity to create what would be, in a fiscal sense, a far more perfect union.
…. would-be rebels from the red states should keep in mind during the coming budget battle that those who are most ardent about cutting government spending tend to come from parts of the country that most rely on it.
Full article here
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Cagle
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Cagle
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Now 7.5 million views:
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Moooooooorning everyone!
by Tally
CALL TO ACTION: PLEASE READ THIS PIECE IN ITS ENTIRETY. IT’S IMPORTANT.
(Yes, that means click the link after the snippet.)
I know everyone is frustrated at the level of incompetence, ignorance, and outright stupidity of the American public, and their preference for ALL THINGS LOHAN over things that personally make their lives better like Affordable Healthcare, and actually, I don’t know…VOTING. I get it. Me too. However, I have to say that I for one, am sick to death of hearing, “The White House/President Obama’s messaging on the ACA <or insert your pet topic here> has been horrid…. waaaaaaaaaah…”
Stop. Take a deep breath. Now THINK: Has the Press/Media ever, in your lifetime, so actively ignored and mislead the public on a Presidency and the legislation it’s trying to bring forward? (Of course, it doesn’t help that the Media™® is now a wholly-owned subsidiary of the GOP. Forget that fact at the peril of us all.)
- Since when did it become okay to shirk your own personal responsibility to learn and gather information you are lacking? Wasn’t that the Prime Directive you learned in school - if you don’t know something, you know how and where to look it up?
- Since when is the Executive Branch of the US Government in the PRESS/MEDIA business? Where does it say in their job description, they must communicate all details of what is happening to the American public and by-extension, the GLOBE, personally, to every US Citizen? Isn’t that our “Fourth Estate’s JOB”? Isn’t that really, the true job of our “PRESS”? Isn’t that exactly WHY they were given the licenses they were given in the first place? If you’re going to call someone out for lack of communication, shouldn’t it be the PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATIONS INDUSTRY?
Read full post here
24
Feb
12
rise and shine
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Comedian Bill Maher announced last night that he will donate one million dollars to President Obama’s re-election campaign. At the end of his groundbreaking comedy special, “CrazyStupidPolitics: Live from Silicon Valley,” which streamed live on Yahoo!, Bill brought out a check, making a personal donation of one million dollars to Obama’s Super PAC, Priorities USA Action. He explained that having a country governed by Barack Obama rather than any of the Republican candidates is “worth a million dollars” and that in his own financial interests, “this is the wisest investment I think I could make.” He also encouraged other wealthy liberals to do the same and give until it hurts.
More at Mediaite
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Washington Post (Editorial): Run to the extreme in the primary, move to the center in the fall: That’s expected. But moving from the cartoon world the Republican presidential candidates have constructed back into three dimensions might prove more difficult.
In their debate Wednesday night, the remaining candidates seemed to be continuing their drift from reality - the reality of a center-right electorate they propose to woo and govern, and of the complexities of the problems they promise to solve.
…. From his perch of thorough hypocrisy - Paul is a master earmarker who preserves his purity by voting against appropriations bills he knows will pass - the Texas congressman declared: “I don’t accept that form of government.”
And, of Santorum, “He is a fake.” No, what’s fake is the two-dimensional canvas they’re presenting to voters.
Full editorial here
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TPM: Mitt Romney’s got a problem. Purple Strategies released their “Purple Poll” on Thursday, data from twelve swing states … “His favorable ratings are just atrocious,” Doug Usher, a managing partner at Purple Strategies said. “You can’t be sitting on 27 percent favorability in the general,” the level Romney is at in their new numbers.
“The best thing that Mitt Romney could actually do is actually run a campaign that said something,” Bruce Haynes, one of the founding partners of Purples Strategies and a veteran of GOP campaigns, told TPM. “It’s a Seinfeld campaign. It’s a campaign about nothing….”
More here
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Robert Shrum: Mitt Romney is pandering so desperately to the far-right fringe that he’s become all but unelectable in November …. As he demonstrated in this debate, he’s so desperate to pander his way to the nomination that he’s making it increasingly worthless.
This may do for the primary - it may be essential - but it’s a disaster in the making for the fall campaign. Romney’s cynical hope has to be that his shape-shifting will convince voters he doesn’t really mean this stuff. He can pray that his character weakness is his saving grace - that his reputation for lying about his beliefs will pull him back from the edge of a gender gap that will otherwise pose an unbridgeable barrier to the White House. The longer the primaries drag on, and the more he has to profess his hostility to women’s rights, the less likely it is that he can ever convince the majority who are women to take a chance on him.
…. From Oklahoma to Ohio, which both vote on March 6, and then onto Wisconsin and across the Midwest, Romney is well behind Santorum in the polls. He will have to keep pandering - and above all, right now, he has to win Michigan.
In the Arizona debate, he may have staunched his bleeding in the primaries, but he opened his veins for November.
Full article here
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Martin Bashir: “Newt Gingrich said he’s going to take oil prices down to $2 or $2.50 - the only thing that Newt Gingrich is very skilled at doing is taking his underpants down in the form of the number of adulteries that this man commits.”
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Steve Rattner (NYT): …. As a presidential aspirant, Mr. Romney evidently hasn’t felt a need to be consistent or specific as to what should have been done to address the collapse of the auto industry starting in late 2008. But the gist is that the government should have stayed on the sidelines and allowed the companies to go through what he calls “managed bankruptcies,” financed by private capital.
That sounds like a wonderfully sensible approach - except that it’s utter fantasy. In late 2008 and early 2009, when G.M. and Chrysler had exhausted their liquidity, every scrap of private capital had fled to the sidelines.
I know this because the administration’s auto task force, for which I was the lead adviser, spoke diligently to all conceivable providers of funds, and not one had the slightest interest in financing those companies on any terms. If Mr. Romney disagrees, he should come forward with specific names of willing investors in place of empty rhetoric. I predict that he won’t be able to, because there aren’t any.
Full article here
Thanks Africa
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A source tells National Confidential that 26 American cars will be arranged by the United Auto Workers to echo Mitt Romney’s infamous “let Detroit go bankrupt” op-ed when he visits Ford Field on Friday. The cars will be on top of a parking garage right across from Ford Field where Romney will be giving a speech to the Detroit Economic Club.
More here
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The Week
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Morning everyone ;-)
09
Nov
11
a very good afternoon
President Obama makes an unscheduled visit to the African American Policy in Action Leadership Conference, Wednesday, Nov. 9, in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building
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President Obama signs an Executive Order to cut waste and promote efficient spending across the federal government, Nov. 9
President Obama shakes hands with Carolyn Colvin of the Social Security Administration
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Vote here
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Methinks the President will be happy to see the creep go:
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TPM
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Thanks creolechild
White House.gov