ThinkProgress: The “whistleblowers” at today’s House Oversight Committee hearing on what really happened in Benghazi, Libya last September were supposed to break the dam that would lead to President Obama’s eventual downfall, in the eyes of conservatives. Instead, these witness actually served to debunk several theories that the right-wing has pushed on Benghazi, leaving the hearing a fizzle for the GOP…..
Charles Pierce: There has been quite a bit of hemming and hawing about the death penalty recently. Six states in six years — Maryland most recently, thanks to Esquire’s favorite BFF, Martin O’Malley — have abolished it. Ah, but that’s not to reckon with the great state of Florida, which this week will decide to grease the wheels of state-sanctioned killing, thanks to Governor Rick Scott, who really doesn’t have fk-all to lose at this point.
Governor Bat Boy is poised to sign the Timely Justice Act — Somebody grab Orwell before he throws himself off a cloud — which will restrict the right of Death Row inmates to appeal their sentences. The bill was passed through the legislature with the usual cool reason that we’ve come to expect from Republican state legislatures since the voters of the several states decided to make monkeyhouses out of them in 2010…..
First lady Michelle Obama speaks about the nation’s libraries and museums before handing out the 2013 National Medals for Museum and Library Service to recipients in the East Room of the White House, May 8
Dana Milbank: President Obama hasn’t even begun his second term, yet already he has been ensnared by scandal.
Republicans have uncovered a shocking level of wrongdoing in the Oval Office, and I’m afraid what they say is true: The president is brazenly trying to fill his Cabinet with … people he likes.
Alas, the perfidy doesn’t end there. Not only is Obama naming agreeable people to his Cabinet, he is also — audaciously, flagrantly — nominating people who … agree with his policies.
Hello, operator? In Waco, Tex., I’d like the number for a Starr, Kenneth W.
WSJ: Good news for job seekers: There were 3.3 unemployed workers for every posted job opening in November, the lowest ratio in more than four years.
….. despite fears of the then-imminent “Fiscal Cliff,” both workers and employers showed signs of confidence in November. Employers laid off 17,000 fewer workers than in October, and posted 11,000 more job openings. Some 46,000 more workers quit their jobs — a sign they see the job market as improving.
USA Today: President Obama will award a Medal of Honor to a staff sergeant who helped beat back one of the largest attacks on U.S. troops in Afghanistan.
Clinton Romesha, 31, will the fourth living service member to receive the nation’s highest military award for valor in Afghanistan or Iraq; seven others who served in those wars have received the Medal of Honor posthumously.
ThinkProgress: Former Senator Jim DeMint, the new president of the conservative Heritage Foundation, has decried Obamacare as “a cancer” that is “is fundamentally inconsistent with liberty.” During the Senate Obamacare fight, DeMint famously declared “If we’re able to stop Obama on this, it will be his Waterloo. It will break him.”
But a new report from DeMint’s own organization suggests that, far from being incompatible with freedom, countries with health care systems with as much or significantly more government control over healthcare are the freest countries in the world.
Chicago Sun Times: Mayor Rahm Emanuel will be hosting the late-night post-inagural party on Jan. 21 in one of Washington’s newest venues, the Hamilton, just down the block from the White House. How late? Runs from 11 p.m. to 3 a.m. in an event billed as a “Chicago-Style after hours.” (More here)
The White House has officially responded to the ‘We the People’ petition to commit the US to building a Death Star. Best line: “Why would we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw that can be exploited by a one-man starship?” Next best: “The Administration does not support blowing up planets,” which may represent a slight shift from the position of the previous administration.
President Obama meets former Czech President Vaclav Havel during a summit between the United States and the 27-member European Union in Prague, Czech Republic, in this April 5, 2009 file photo. Havel, the dissident playwright who wove theater into politics to peacefully bring down communism in Czechoslovakia and become a hero of the epic struggle that ended the Cold War, died Sunday Dec. 18, 2011 in Prague. He was 75.
President Obama made the following statement on the death of Czech leader Vaclav Havel:
“I was deeply saddened to learn of the passing today of Vaclav Havel, a playwright and prisoner of conscience who became President of Czechoslovakia and of the Czech Republic. Having encountered many setbacks, Havel lived with a spirit of hope, which he defined as “the ability to work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed.” His peaceful resistance shook the foundations of an empire, exposed the emptiness of a repressive ideology, and proved that moral leadership is more powerful than any weapon. He played a seminal role in the Velvet Revolution that won his people their freedom and inspired generations to reach for self-determination and dignity in all parts of the world. He also embodied the aspirations of half a continent that had been cut off by the Iron Curtain, and helped unleash tides of history that led to a united and democratic Europe.
“Like millions around the world, I was inspired by his words and leadership, and was humbled to stand with the Czech people in a free and vibrant Hradcany Square as President. We extend our condolences to President Havel’s family and all those in the Czech Republic and around the world who remain inspired by his example. Vaclav Havel was a friend to America and to all who strive for freedom and dignity, and his words will echo through the ages.”
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Morning everyone. A bit of a busy day ahead, but will catch up later
Most of the local channels have posted either their full interviews with the President, or clips:
Portland – KGW, NBC, Tracy Barry
Phoenix – KSAZ, Fox, John Hook (no video yet)
Denver – KUSA, NBC, Adele Arakawa
Minneapolis – WCCO, CBS, Amelia Santaniello
Houston – KTRK, ABC, Dave Ward (no video yet)
Omaha – KETV, ABC, Rob McCartney
Tampa – WTVT, Fox, Mark Wilson
Hampton Roads – WAVY, NBC, Tom Schaad
Philadelphia – WPVI, ABC, Brian Taff
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Daily Beast: ….. Dorothy Rodham’s early life was difficult, and at the age of 8, when her parents divorced, she and a younger sister were sent alone by train from Chicago to Alhambra, Calif., to live with grandparents. It was not a happy home, and at 14, she left to make her way on her own, first as a mother’s helper, then after returning to Chicago, doing clerical work. There she met Hugh Rodham, a traveling salesman eight years her senior, and after a five-year courtship, they married in 1942.
…. Dorothy Rodham was a secret Democrat …. Hugh Rodham was a staunch Republican … After Hugh Rodham died in 1993, Dorothy spent much of her time at the White House, caring for Chelsea and bucking up her daughter through a minefield of policy and personal setbacks…..
WH: In 2009, President Obama challenged the Federal Government to lead by example by becoming leaner, greener and more efficient. He asked agencies and departments to become more energy efficient, reduce waste and water use, and use its purchasing power as the largest energy consumer in the U.S. economy to support more environmentally responsible products and technologies in their operations.
The GreenGov Presidential Awards celebrate extraordinary achievement in the pursuit of President Obama’s challenge. Given in six different categories, the awards honor Federal civilian and military personnel, agency teams, agency projects and facilities, and agency programs that exemplify President Obama’s charge to lead by example toward a clean energy economy.
Meet this year’s winners and learn about the award they are receiving – here
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Steve Benen: …. “Last Friday, at the swanky Barley House tavern in Concord, N.H., Rick Perry took a little jab at the Occupy Wall Street crowd, referencing an amusing quote his son had sent him from a protester occupying Toronto (see video)
…..So what’s the problem? There is no “Jeremy” – the quote Perry paraphrased appeared in a satirical piece that ran in Toronto’s Globe and Mail. The piece became a chain email, Perry’s son sent it to him, and the governor failed once again to separate fact from fiction…..
TPM: A potentially huge shoe is dropping in the Herman Cain harassment scandal: one of his accusers indicated through her lawyer on Tuesday that she wants to come forward and tell her side of the story.
Joel P. Bennett, an attorney to one of the two National Restaurant Association employees who allegedly accused Cain of sexual harassment, told the Washington Post on Tuesday that his client is currently barred from speaking by a mutual non-disparagement agreement with the organization. But he says that agreement is being violated by Cain already, who has taken to the press to slam the harassment claim as “baseless,” and that she now wants to come forward and reveal herself to set the record straight.
Daily Beast: The Tea Party Pork Binge – They brought the nation to the brink of default over spending, but a Newsweek investigation shows Tea Party lawmakers grabbing billions from the government trough. Plus, view the letters submitted by the ‘Dirty Dozen.’
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, the Republican leadership’s tether to the Tea Party, flutters the hearts of the government-bashing, budget-slicing faithful with his relentless attacks on runaway federal spending. To Cantor, an $8 billion high-speed rail connecting Las Vegas to Disneyland is wasteful “pork-barrel spending” ….
But away from the cameras, Cantor sometimes pulls right up to the spending trough, including the very stimulus law he panned in public. Letters obtained by Newsweek show him pressing the Transportation Department to spend nearly $3 billion in stimulus money on a high-speed-rail project – not the one he derided in Nevada, but another in his home state….
CBS: Individuals making more than $1 million a year could see an average tax cut of more than $500,000 under Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry’s complicated tax proposal, while some taxpayers at the other end of the income spectrum would see a tax hike compared to the current tax rates, according to an analysis released Monday.
Perry’s plan would also reduce federal tax revenues by hundreds of billions of dollars, forcing the government to make dramatic spending cuts – long a goal of many conservatives pushing for a smaller federal footprint…..
ABC: While President Obama hosts a global economic summit for the first time this month, the first lady will take spouses of the world’s leaders to the valley where ABC-TV’s “Lost” and the classic ”Jurassic Park” were filmed.
When the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit opens in Hawaii Nov.12, Michelle Obama will take as many as two dozen spouses to Kualoa Ranch, where the lush vistas and remote access lured the producers of Hawaii Five-0, Magnum, Fantasy Island, the film Pearl Harbor and Karate Kid, among many others.
This is the first time President Obama has played host to such a big summit – APEC is the conference of economies that ring the Pacific Basin. He chose his home state of Hawaii for two days of meetings, centered in Honolulu.
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Rich Iott, second from right, in a Nazi SS Waffen uniform
Washington Jewish Week: Notorious Nazi impersonator Richard Iott, who’s also a former GOP House candidate, donated $2,400 (the maximum amount permitted) to Rep. John Boehner earlier this year via the House speaker’s political action committee, according to recent FEC filings.
Iott came to prominence late last year when it was revealed that the one-time candidate in Ohio apparently spent his weekends prancing around in a Nazi SS Waffen uniform, reenacting battles….
…. given what we know about Iott’s pastime, should a leader like Boehner keep the contribution? …. I asked the speaker’s office for comment and was told, well, nothing ….The National Jewish Democratic Council called on Boehner to give back Iott’s money this afternoon.
RT @FORUS50: @TheObamaDiary That's just wrong to look so effortlessly relaxed, happy & handsome. It kills the soulless RWNJs who try to ta… 3 hours ago
