5 Issues this Election Should Be About, and One to Drop | Common Dreams

5 Issues this Election Should Be About, and One to Drop | Common Dreams
"One in four working families is spending more than half their income just to keep a roof over their heads. There are more than half a million Americans who are homeless on any given night, and one in three families headed by a single mother is going hungry at least part of the year.
To get the economy moving again, we need to start by putting more earning and spending power in the hands of the poor and middle class, starting with a higher minimum wage and progressive tax policies. Only then can businesses invest, knowing they will have customers."

Laura Ingraham Lashes Out At GOP: 'If You Can't Beat Obama, Shut Down The Party'

Laura Ingraham Lashes Out At GOP: 'If You Can't Beat Obama, Shut Down The Party'
"Like Jeb Bush, who thinks the Republicans' problem is "tone," Ingraham is convinced that if only Republicans had the right candidate saying the right words, they'd be running away with the election.

This is basically crazy.

First of all, this analysis ignores that the last Republican administration was a catastrophic disaster and the last Republican president left office one of the least popular presidents in modern times. One can only speculate why Ingraham is completely oblivious to the massive damage George W. Bush and Dick Cheney inflicted on the Republican brand, but it's real."

Greed and Debt: The True Story of Romney and Bain Capital | Common Dreams

Greed and Debt: The True Story of Romney and Bain Capital | Common Dreams
"By making debt the centerpiece of his campaign, Romney was making a calculated bluff of historic dimensions – placing a massive all-in bet on the rank incompetence of the American press corps. The result has been a brilliant comedy. A man makes a $250 million fortune loading up companies with debt and then extracting million-dollar fees from those same companies, in exchange for the generous service of telling them who needs to be fired in order to finance the debt payments he saddled them with in the first place. That same man then runs for president riding an image of children roasting on flames of debt, choosing as his running mate perhaps the only politician in America more pompous and self-righteous on the subject of the evils of borrowed money than the candidate himself. If Romney pulls off this whopper, you'll have to tip your hat to him: No one in history has ever successfully run for president riding this big of a lie. It's almost enough to make you think he really is qualified for the White House."

Conservatives really don't want to hear more specifics from Mitt Romney

Conservatives really don't want to hear more specifics from Mitt Romney
"And Salon's Steve Kornacki points out that while attacks on Romney's lack of specificity are nothing new, those attacks have typically come from Democrats. Now that they are coming from his own party, it's bad news. Romney is coming under fire from fellow Republicans for not being sufficiently specific, and these attacks do reinforce preexisting story lines about Romney's lack of core beliefs. But I don't believe for a second that Romney's Republican critics actually care about whether and to what extent he offers specific policy proposals. Instead, they care about establishing a narrative to explain his defeat—a narrative that places the blame for that defeat squarely on his shoulders.

For professional conservatives, the only thing more important than winning the 2012 presidential election is not getting blamed for losing it. And as much as they might be disappointed by a Romney defeat this November, the thing that would actually crush their souls would be if Romney were to lose and their ideas were assigned the blame. Better to throw him under the bus now, even if it means he's less likely to win, than to suffer that fate."

Having fun with Romney campaign's 'DON'T PANIC!' memo

Having fun with Romney campaign's 'DON'T PANIC!' memo
"How do you know a campaign is panicking? When they send out memos urging people not to panic."

In defense of red state socialism

In defense of red state socialism
"But almost as galling for many Democrats is the persistent phenomenon of red state socialism. That is, despite Republican paeans to "small government" and "rugged individualism," red states benefit from a one-way flow of dollars from Washi

ngton, a federal gravy train disproportionately provided by blue state taxpayers. But hypocrisy or no, that is as it should be. Because when it comes to health care, education, public safety, needed infrastructure and so much else, Americans' mutual commitment to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness cannot end at the state line.

To be sure, red state socialism is real. As a 2007 analysis by the Tax Foundation (above) of federal spending per tax dollar received by state shows, the reddest states generally reaped the most green. (As Politifact rightly noted, the rankings are based on 2005 data. The Tax Foundation is planning an updated study.) Eight of the top 10 beneficiaries of federal largesse voted for John McCain for president. Unsurprisingly, all 15 states at the bottom of the list—those whose outflow of tax revenue is funding programs elsewhere in the country—all voted for Barack Obama in 2008. Alaska's number three ranking was particularly ironic, given Gov. Sarah Palin's farewell message warning her state to "be wary of accepting government largesse; it doesn't come free."

But the ironies don't end there. A 2010 map of personal government benefits received versus taxes paid showed secession birthplace South Carolina to be one of the big winners."

Flabbergasted Rand Paul Learns Public Employment Decreased Under Obama

Flabbergasted Rand Paul Learns Public Employment Decreased Under Obama: One of the least appreciated but easily-confirmed facts about the current state of the American economy is that the number of Americans employed by the government has gone down under President Obama. But apparently this is news to one the Republican Party’s most prominent tea party conservatives. During a roundtable discussion on ABC this morning [...]/p

Ryan: I Didn’t Vote For The Defense Cuts I Voted For

Ryan: I Didn’t Vote For The Defense Cuts I Voted For: Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan has gotten in hot water before for criticizing President Obama for the very same defense cuts that he voted for in 2011. When confronted with this incongruity today on Face The Nation, Ryan simply denied that he ever voted for the cuts, telling an incredulous Norah O’Donnell that he didn’t [...]/p

Romney campaign admits it: they're losing

Romney campaign admits it: they're losing
"President Barack Obama heads out of the national political conventions with a much clearer path to winning, top advisers to Mitt Romney privately concede"

10 Rankest Hypocrisies of Mitt Romney and the Republican Party | Alternet

10 Rankest Hypocrisies of Mitt Romney and the Republican Party | Alternet
"Modern Republicans give us an opportunity to peer into the soul of a party that has embraced an open aversion to the truth. Meanwhile, their hypocrisy has reached historic proportions. It’s as if they have lost the ability to recognize the obvious contradictions they put forth. Or, more likely, they just don’t care, since lies and hypocrisy are an efficient way to score political points and smear opponents.  The hyper-hypocrisy of today’s GOP has spread through the party’s bloodstream."

Paul Ryan requested Obamacare funding for his district

Paul Ryan requested Obamacare funding for his district
"Remember how a couple of weeks ago Paul Ryan had egg on his face after being forced to admit that he had indeed requested funds from the stimulus bill that he so vehemently opposed and has continued to vilify? His excuse then was that, when he wrote those letters of support for all that federal funding, he didn't know it was stimulus money he was asking for.

So what's his excuse going to be this time?"

The GOP's Disgusting New Southern Strategy: Take the Vote Away from Blacks, Roll Back the Civil Rights Movement | Alternet

The GOP's Disgusting New Southern Strategy: Take the Vote Away from Blacks, Roll Back the Civil Rights Movement | Alternet
"The GOP's war on voting rights isn't new. It harks back to past efforts to alter the political process."

The Republicans as the Party of Big Government | Common Dreams

The Republicans as the Party of Big Government | Common Dreams
"One of the jokes of our era is the Republican Party's claim that it favors “small government.”  An accurate description might go more like this: the present-day Republican Party (libertarians excepted) has never seen an oppressive power of the national security state it didn’t want to bolster or grow.  And it loves big government—the bigger the better—as long as we’re talking about the military-industrial complex.  Mitt Romney, for instance, is eager to build ever more naval vessels, increase the size of U.S. ground forces, and up by an extra $2 trillion or more over the next decade the Pentagon’s already staggering budget.  As the Bush administration proved and the Obama administration emphasized, stimulus packages, including massive infrastructural projects, are fine and dandy when pursued in Baghdad (biggest embassy on Earth) or Afghanistan (most bases ever).  Consider it an irony, that even undocumented aliens are a Republican “go,” if they happen to be part of thesemi-slave labor force that helps to build and service American bases in war zones abroad."

Papantonio: Tea Party Finally Tips The Craziness Scale

The Tea Party's constant charge that "Obama hates America," as well as how the entire Republican Party has become a reactionary, intolerant bunch with no facts to stand on.

Watch A Democratic Mayor Expose The Tea Party’s Deficit Hypocrisy

Watch A Democratic Mayor Expose The Tea Party’s Deficit Hypocrisy: "During an appearance on CNN’s Starting Point on Tuesday, Tea Party Express Chairwoman Amy Kremer refused to condemn the deficit increase that would result from Mitt Romney’s proposed tax cuts, suggesting that the group is more concerned about acting as a surrogate for the Republican candidate than promoting fiscal responsibility.

Romney would extend all of the Bush tax cuts, reduce all individual income tax rates by an additional 20 percent, lower the corporate rate from the current 35 percent to 25 percent, eliminate the Alternative Minimum Tax, the estate tax, Obamacare’s Medicare taxes on high-income individuals, and taxes on investment income for households under certain income levels. The former governor claims that he could recoup the lost revenue by closing unspecified “tax expenditures,” though economists predict that he would have to dramatically slash spending to pay for his tax cuts or add trillions to the national deficit."

The ED Show - History shows we're better off today than 4 years ago

Four years ago, the economy was in free-fall and the country was losing nearly 800,000 jobs a month. Republicans say Americans were better off. The facts speak for themselves.

GOP Rep. Burgess Suggests Medicare Is Unconstitutional

GOP Rep. Burgess Suggests Medicare Is Unconstitutional: At a panel during last week’s Republican National Convention, Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX) strongly suggested that he believes Medicare is unconstitutional — before going on to say that its constitutionality doesn’t matter so long as it is used to achieve conservative ends. Burgess’ comment arose during a discussion of whether the Constitution permits the federal [...]/p

Romney On Whether We’re Better Off: ‘Of Course It’s Getting Better’

Romney On Whether We’re Better Off: ‘Of Course It’s Getting Better’: "But if it’s an insult to say that the economy is better off, then Mitt Romney has been slinging some insults of his own, considering how he answered a question from conservative talk radio host Laura Ingraham back in January"

Ten Big Lies Paul Ryan Keeps Repeating That the Corporate Media Refuses to Push Back On | Alternet

Ten Big Lies Paul Ryan Keeps Repeating That the Corporate Media Refuses to Push Back On | Alternet
"This year’s Republican campaign may be the most dishonest in history. "

Dishonesty on display throughout GOP convention

Three days' worth of lies, distortions and manipulations from dozens of speakers at this year's Republican National Convention.

How the Main Stream Media Helps the GOP Big Lie

Bill Moyers: Christian Right Hypocrite Ralph Reed Has Resurrected Himself in the GOP -- He Must Be Praying We'll Forget His Past | Alternet

Bill Moyers: Christian Right Hypocrite Ralph Reed Has Resurrected Himself in the GOP -- He Must Be Praying We'll Forget His Past | Alternet
"As head of the Faith and Freedom Coalition, Reed boasts he’s building a political dynamo of five million members with a massive database, an annual budget of $100 million and full-time lobbyists in all fifty state capitals, a colossal effort aimed at putting in place a right-wing social agenda and identifying and establishing contact with what it estimates as 27 million conservative voters in America. As you can imagine, with clout like that, Reed and his coalition were in high cotton at the Tampa convention."

Are you a journalist? Politico leads the crop of post-Ryan reporting failures

Are you a journalist? Politico leads the crop of post-Ryan reporting failures
"At this point, thanks to various individuals who have had the meager audacity to know what Paul Ryan was going on about at the time he was going on about it, we have a fairly good list of the biggest lies uttered in Paul Ryan's speech. Among the biggest is Ryan's attack on $700 billion in Medicare savings under Obama, an attack rather effectively neutered once anyone with half a brain in their heads remembers that Paul Ryan quite specifically has always supported and included those same cuts in his own budget proposals, and so Paul Ryan talking about "saving" Medicare from the very cuts he himself has been endorsing is a Damn Curious Thing at best. Bigger still is Ryan's casual assertion that Obama damaged the credit rating of the United States, which is also a Damn Curious Thing when you consider the rating agency involved specifically called out Paul Ryan's personal band of Congressional anarchists and privateers as the seminal reason for downgrading that credit. Then there is the GM plant that announced its closing during the summer of 2008, before Obama had even gained the small pleasure of trouncing the now perpetually crabby John McCain in state after state after state, much less before he was in any position to do anything about a plant closing in Paul Ryan's neck of the woods."

6 Worst Lies In Paul Ryan’s Speech

6 Worst Lies In Paul Ryan’s Speech: His speech was riddled with false claims, so much so that even Fox News wrote, “To anyone paying the slightest bit of attention to facts, Ryan’s speech was an apparent attempt to set the world record for the greatest number of blatant lies and misrepresentations slipped into a single political speech.”

The 8 Worst Examples of Fox News Election Journalism Malpractice (In Just 8 Weeks) | Alternet

The 8 Worst Examples of Fox News Election Journalism Malpractice (In Just 8 Weeks) | Alternet
"Mitt Romney, the Original Bankster , continues to be evasive about his international business affairs, and he refuses to release more than a single year of tax returns in order to quell speculation. His electoral prospects have not been noticeably enhanced with the addition of Wisconsin congressman and right-wing extremist Paul Ryan to the ticket. So, the GOP PR machine (aka Fox News) has swung into action"

Deficit Hawk Hypocrites | Common Dreams

Deficit Hawk Hypocrites | Common Dreams
"Let us never forget that when Bill Clinton left office in 2001, this country enjoyed a healthy $236 billion SURPLUS.

Under George W. Bush and his fellow "deficit hawks," we went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq. Bush and Congress "forgot" to pay for those wars that will end up adding some $3 trillion to our national debt. Where were Paul Ryan and the other "deficit hawks" when we spent trillions on wars and added to the deficit? They voted for those policies.

Under George W. Bush and his fellow "deficit hawks," we gave huge tax breaks to the wealthiest people in this country, which cost $1 trillion over a decade. Where were Paul Ryan and the other "deficit hawks" when Bush and Congress spent a trillion dollars on tax breaks for the very rich and added to our national debt? They voted for those policies.

Under George W. Bush and his fellow deficit hawks, Congress passed an overly expensive Medicare prescription drug program written by the insurance companies and drug industry. The government was barred from negotiating lower drug prices with the pharmaceutical industry under the program, which will end up adding $400 billion to our national debt over a 10-year period. Where were Paul Ryan and the other "deficit hawks" when Bush and Congress spent $400 billion for a much too expensive prescription drug program? They voted for those policies.

Now, having run up huge deficits, our born-again "deficit hawks" want to cut every program in sight to save money. In order to cover the costs they incurred in Iraq and Afghanistan, they want to cut Social Security. In order to cover the costs of the tax breaks for the rich, they want to cut Medicare and Medicaid. In order to cover the insurance-company-written Medicare prescription drug program, they want to cut education and food stamps.

This approach - balancing the budget on the backs of the elderly, the sick, the children and the poor - is not only immoral, it is bad economic policy. It is something that must be vigorously opposed."

Fox News' Megyn Kelly Spreads Propaganda That Mitt Romney Is 'Self Made'

Fox News' Megyn Kelly Spreads Propaganda That Mitt Romney Is 'Self Made'
"My God, George Romney was worth a huge fortune and was Michigan royalty as their long-serving governor. If Romney fell into the kind of real hard times that average Americans do every day with no way out, George would have bailed him out as many times as was required. As it was, Romney got the privileged leg up of an expensive prep boarding school and Harvard education, courtesy of Dad's name and wealth. Many wealthy kids try to make it on their own and it's one thing for a person who has no safety net to venture out into the world, but another when you have a gold-plated safety net in the form of a rich and connected dad waiting their to catch you.

Megyn breathlessly gushes over Mitt like a love-struck puppy."

Michigan’s Republican Governor On Obama’s Welfare Policy: ‘More Flexibility To Governors Is A Good Thing’

Michigan’s Republican Governor On Obama’s Welfare Policy: ‘More Flexibility To Governors Is A Good Thing’: The Romney campaign has aggressively campaigned against President Obama’s recent changes to the welfare program, alleging that he “gutted” welfare, eliminating the work requirement so that “they just send you your check.” In fact, the administration’s welfare waiver initiative would strengthen work requirements by simply empowering states to innovate on new strategies. And it turns [...]/p

EXCLUSIVE: As Hurricane Isaac Targets New Orleans, GOP Rep. Calls For Making Disaster Relief Contingent On Budget Cuts

EXCLUSIVE: As Hurricane Isaac Targets New Orleans, GOP Rep. Calls For Making Disaster Relief Contingent On Budget Cuts: TAMPA, Florida — Though many Republicans are fretting about the optics of holding their party’s convention as Hurricane Isaac slams into New Orleans, a leading Tea Party congressman is vowing to use the opportunity to extract budget cuts if Congress wants to dole out disaster funding to help victims. Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID) told ThinkProgress [...]/p

RNC Official: New Mexico Is ‘Going to Hell’ For Hosting Meeting With American Indians About Economic Development

RNC Official: New Mexico Is ‘Going to Hell’ For Hosting Meeting With American Indians About Economic Development:  An executive member of the Republican National Committee said that his home state of New Mexico is “going to hell” because an annual meeting between the governor and the state’s 22 American Indian tribes [...]/p

Unpopular with minorities, Romney targets 'white vote'

Mitt Romney continues to lie and use the racial "dog whistle" to target the white vote.

An open letter to the people who hate Obama more than they love America

An open letter to the people who hate Obama more than they love America
"Now that you have thrown everything and the kitchen sink at President Obama and it still hasn't worked you are panicking. Obama's approval ratings are still near 50% despite your best efforts to undermine the economy and America's recovery at every step you can. You tried to hold the American economy hostage to force America into default on its' debts, debts that YOU rang up under Bush, so you could blame it on Obama and it failed. You've used the filibuster more than any other Congress ever, going so far as to vote against providing health care access to 9/11 first responders. You remember 9/11, don't you, it's that thing you used to lie us into a war in Iraq, and then when Obama killed Bin Laden and ended the war in Iraq you told people that he hates America and wants the troops to fail. You monsters. You hate Obama with a passion, despite the fact that he is a tax cutting, deficit reducing war President who undermines civil rights and delivers corporate friendly watered down reforms that benefit special interests just like a Republican. You call him a Kenyan. You call him a socialist. You dance with your hatred singing it proudly in the rain like it was a 1950's musical.

Frankly, you disgust me. Your hatred nauseates me. Your bigotry offends me. Your racism revolts me.

Dear haters, I am openly questioning your patriotism.

I think you hate gays, Obama, black people, poor people, all of us, women, atheists and agnostics, Latinos, Muslims, Liberals, all of us, I think you hate every one who isn't exactly like you, and I think you hate us more than you love your country.

I think you hate gay soldiers more than you want America to win its wars.

I don't even think you want America to win wars, you just want America to have wars, never ending wars and the war profiteering it generates. You love that kind of spending, you love spending on faith based initiatives and abstinence based sex education (George Carlin would have loved that one), you love spending on subsidies for profitable oil corporations, you spend like drunken sailors when you are in the White House, but if it is a Democrat then suddenly you cheer when America doesn't get the Olympics because it might make the black President look bad. But oooh you love your country, you say, and you want it back. Well listen here skippy, it isn't your country, you don't own it, it is our country, and America is NOT the religiously extremist Foxbots who hate science, elitist professors and having a vibrant and meaningful sex life with someone we love if Rick Santorum doesn't approve of it. Rick Santorum isn't running for America's fucking high school dance chaperone, he should probably just shut the hell up about sex, but he can't because he has nothing else to run on.

Republicans can NOT win on the issues. They've got NOTHING. All they have is a divide and conquer class war that pits ignorant racist and bigoted people against the rest of us in a meaningless battle of wedge issues and the already proven to fail George W. Bush agenda again of tax cuts for the rich, deregulation, privatization and war profiteering and nothing else, so all they can do is blame black people, gays the government, anybody and everyone else for their own failings. The party of personal responsibility, my ass." Read More

Paul Ryan And The Fountainhead : Information Clearing House: ICH

Uri Avnery:    Paul Ryan And The Fountainhead    :    Information Clearing House: ICH
"Ayn Rand, it was said, was one of the main inspirations for his particular philosophy. Since Ryan is being represented not as an ordinary, run-of-the-mill politician, like Mitt Romney, but as a profound political and economic thinker, the inspiration deserves some scrutiny."

Teaching People to Hate Their Own Govt. Is at the Core of the Project to Destroy the Middle Class | Alternet

Teaching People to Hate Their Own Govt. Is at the Core of the Project to Destroy the Middle Class | Alternet
"Your goal for this step is to figure out how to teach the middle class to hate their own government using a strategy that takes into consideration the political climate of the United States of thirty years ago.

Teaching the middle class to hate their government was an essential part of the plan to implement Corporate Feudalism. A middle class cannot exist without a strong government. This is because only a government has the power to stand up to the giant corporations of today’s world, or the powerful individuals and private armies of earlier times. It is the government that enforces the laws to protect the middle class from those who would like to become their economic rulers. That is why prior to the Industrial Revolution and the creation of the middle class all economies were run according to some version of the feudal system. If you want to put an end to the middle class and replace it with a feudal republic, you would need to change people’s perception of their government."

Paul Ryan Struggles With the Inconvenient Demands of Democracy | Common Dreams

Paul Ryan Struggles With the Inconvenient Demands of Democracy | Common Dreams
"Ryan and Zerban have fundamentally different positions on the issues. Ryan wants to undermine Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid with what former House Speaker Newt Gingrich refers to as “right-wing social experimentation,” while Zerban would preserve these programs. Ryan opposes meaningful healthcare reforms that would expand access to care while cutting costs, while Zerban supports the real reform of a “Medicare for All” program. Ryan supports free-trade deals and manufacturing policies that have led to the shuttering of major industrial facilities in Janesville (a General Motors plant), Kenosha (a Chrysler plant) and Oak Creek (a Delphi plant) during the course of his Congressional tenure, while Zerban favors fair trade policies designed to protect jobs, communities and the environment. Ryan advocates for narrowing the definition of rape as part of an aggressive push to limit reproduction rights, while Zerban supports a woman’s right to choose."

U.S.-Funded War in El Salvador Casts Shadow over Romney/Ryan Campaign

U.S.-Funded War in El Salvador Casts Shadow over Romney/Ryan Campaign
"Even if Romney can distance himself from the death squad-linked Salvadoran investors that provided the seed money for his vast wealth, Ryan's political upbringing and his being mentored by a man of Abrams' pedigree makes it clear that the tragedies of El Salvador's civil war and this dark chapter in U.S. history will continue to cast a shadow over the Romney - Ryan campaign."

Romney’s Blood Money » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names

Romney’s Blood Money » Counterpunch: Tells the Facts, Names the Names
"Recent revelations about Mitt Romney’s highly profitable company Bain Capital help connect the dots between offshore tax shelters, shady investors; and the role that ill-gotten gains plays in today’s casino-like finance capital.

Both the Los Angeles Times and Huffington Post published investigations in the last month showing that over a third of the $37 million raised by Romney to launch Bain Capital in the mid-1980s came from rich Latin Americans, the bulk of it from Salvadoran families linked to death squads."

New Mexico RNC Committeeman Is Custer's Last Fan

New Mexico RNC Committeeman Is Custer's Last Fan
"A RNC National Committeeman told Governor Susana Martinez's staff that her agreeing to meet with Native Americans is disrespectful to the memory of Col. George Armstrong Custer, the infamous cavalry officer who killed thousands of Native Americans in the 1800s, according to emails obtained by ProgressNow New Mexico."

Conservatives' New Plan to Radicalize America Even Further Right

Conservatives' New Plan to Radicalize America Even Further Right
"I gave you a few good examples of how conservative crackpots planned to turn the US into their libertarian/evangelical utopian dream and lo and behold, after decades of futility, they finally have the GOP, hook line and sinker. They understand that by repeating the same lies and propaganda over and over again, eventually (even if it takes thirty more years) fiction will be turned into fact in the echo chamber of the navel-gazing commentariat. With no real fourth branch of government left to be actual watchdogs of democracy and a working class struggling to pay their bills, they feel nobody can stop them.

Whenever I hear politicos say the tea party, birthers or the newly-created legitimate rape believers will now destroy the GOP forevah because of their lunacy, I laugh out loud. We've had sixty years of history to disprove that opinion. Are you really surprised the GOP national party platform reads like a who's who list from the John Bircher Society?"

Romney goes birther

GOP convention planners may bump Rubio to give Ann Romney TV time

GOP convention planners may bump Rubio to give Ann Romney TV time
" guess the GOP has officially decided that their situation with women is now worse than their situation with Latino voters. And considering how badly they're doing with Latino voters, that issaying something."

7 Birthers Speaking At The Republican Convention

7 Birthers Speaking At The Republican Convention: Mitt Romney’s invocation of birtherism on Friday took his campaign to a new level of involvement with the bogus idea that President Obama is actually Kenyan-born and therefore ineligible to serve as Commander-in-Chief. But that dog-whistle theory has already been embraced by many major Republicans with whom Romney has long been happy to consort. Indeed, [...]/p

The Big, Racist Lie at the Center of the Romney-Ryan Campaign | Alternet

The Big, Racist Lie at the Center of the Romney-Ryan Campaign | Alternet
"The Romney team appears to have adopted a strategy of throwing so much dishonest spin around that the fact-checkers just throw their hands up in frustration. Along with his bald-faced lie that Obama “raided” Medicare , this week the campaign tripled-down on its universally debunked claim that the Obama administration had killed the welfare “reforms” passed by Bill Clinton. In fact, they defended that ad by citing a fact-free column by Mickey Kaus published on Tucker Carlson's always-wrong right-wing blog, the Daily Caller .

They hope to make inroads attacking welfare because, like the infamous "Southern strategy," it stokes racial animus. Political scientist Michael Teslerstudied voters' reactions to seeing Romney's first welfare ad, and found that, “among those who saw it, racial resentment affected whether people thought Romney will help the poor, the middle-class, and African-Americans"."

Mitt Romney Attacks The Line Separating Church And State

Mitt Romney Attacks The Line Separating Church And State
"Mitt Romney is the highest-profile Mormon politician in the history of the Latter-Day Saints Church. Since I've been exploring and writing about the subject of Romney's beliefs and how they will shape him as a president, it's not at all surprising to me that he's speaking out against separation between church and state."

Huckabee Breaks With GOP, Throws Support Behind Akin

Huckabee Breaks With GOP, Throws Support Behind Akin: As Republicans continue to pile on Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) for saying victims of “legitimate rape” can’t get pregnant, Mike Huckabee has strengthened his support for the embattled Senate candidate. Huckabee first gave Akin the opportunity to defend the remark on his radio show, which he did by explaining that women often lie about being [...]/p

Texas Judge Suggests He Will Join ‘Civil Unrest, Civil Disobedience, Civil War Maybe’ If Obama Is Reelected

Texas Judge Suggests He Will Join ‘Civil Unrest, Civil Disobedience, Civil War Maybe’ If Obama Is Reelected: Judge Tom Head, a county judge in Lubbock, Texas, announced on a local television station that he would personally join the resistance against a United Nations’ takeover of American sovereignty, which he says will occur if Obama is reelected: [Obama] is going to try to hand over the sovereignty of the United States to the [...]/p

Tea Partyer Calls For Obama To Get Out of 'Our Country'

Tea Partyer Calls For Obama To Get Out of 'Our Country'
"I've written about this lunatic before. Marcia Wood is the same person who called for businesses not to hire anyone until Barack Obama was out of office and fantasized about muzzling Michelle Obama, but as time has gone on and the Republican party implodes more and more, her harsh rhetoric has crossed the line into territory that is at the least, borderline seditious."

Influential Conservatives Defending Akin

Influential Conservatives Defending Akin: Rep. Todd Akin (R-MO) has apologized for his suggestion that women who have suffered a “legitimate rape” cannot be impregnated, admitting his serious error in biology. Much of the pressure for this move has come from Republican figures who have called on him to resign, including Senator Ron Johnson, S.E. Cupp, former Rep. Heather Burns, [...]/p

Akin’s Spiritual Mentor: Women Occasionally Invite Rape, Victims Are ‘Hysterical’

Akin’s Spiritual Mentor: Women Occasionally Invite Rape, Victims Are ‘Hysterical’: Rep. Todd Akin’s (R-MO) spiritual mentor Reverend D. James Kennedy harbored extreme and sometimes flatly misogynistic views about rape and abortion, according to a ThinkProgress review of Kennedy’s sermons on the topic. The Senate candidate, who set off a massive controversy by claiming this weekend that victims of “legitimate rape” don’t get pregnant, has deep [...]/p

Revealed: How Conservative Radio Creates an Echo Chamber of Hate | Alternet

Revealed: How Conservative Radio Creates an Echo Chamber of Hate | Alternet
"The study, released last month by the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center, used Hannity's radio show and four programs – the "Rush Limbaugh Show," the "Glenn Beck Program," "Savage Nation" and the "John & Ken Show" -- as the focus of an investigation of the influence and confluence of specific interests in ultra-conservative radio programming. The results, as you might imagine, were not surprising.

“The findings reveal that the hosts promoted an insular discourse that focused on, for example, anti-immigration, anti-Islam and pro-Tea Party positions,” the study concluded. “This discourse found repetition and amplification through social media"."

Why Romney's Panicked Campaign May Pander Even Harder to the Far Right | Alternet

Why Romney's Panicked Campaign May Pander Even Harder to the Far Right | Alternet
"Mitt Romney, a corporate takeover executive in the private sector, is now in full political makeover mode as he campaigns for president, starting with his attention-deflecting choice of radical U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan as his running mate.

Washington insiders recognize the symptoms of a panicked campaign and see that the attempted makeover is not complete—and won’t be until the Republican National Convention adjourns and the fall campaign begins. And so we are seeing seemingly bizarre musings from known GOP ideologues trying to fill in Romney’s blank pages."

What a Romney-Ryan budget would mean for Americans | Economic Policy Institute

What a Romney-Ryan budget would mean for Americans | Economic Policy Institute
"The Romney-Ryan fiscal agenda would wreak havoc on the middle class—and the U.S. economy at large—in order to keep cutting taxes for millionaires. Romney and Ryan are not serious about accelerating economic recovery or stabilizing the long

-term fiscal outlook, or even proposing evidence-based solutions to our actual economic challenges (raising millionaires’ disposable income is not one of them). What they would enact, if given the chance, would increase unemployment, slow near-term economic growth, destroy the safety net and social insurance programs, and defund non-security discretionary investments, all in order to lavish millionaires with tax cuts more than twice as large as those that would be afforded by continuing all the Bush-era tax cuts."

Why Paul Ryan’s Constitution Has A Lot More In Common With Ayn Rand Than With The Founding Fathers

Why Paul Ryan’s Constitution Has A Lot More In Common With Ayn Rand Than With The Founding Fathers: Last September, GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan spoke at the Hillsdale College’s Kirby Center, a Washington, D.C. arm of the conservative institution that was founded under the leadership of Supreme Court spouse Virginia Thomas. The speech was delivered in commemoration of Constitution Day, and it provides a fairly substantial window into how he understands [...]/p

Tea Party Billboard Compares Obama To Bin Laden

Tea Party Billboard Compares Obama To Bin Laden: A Tea Party group launched a billboard in Elkhart, Indiana this month comparing President Obama to Osama bin Laden. The billboard is funded by We the People of Marshall and Fulton Counties and reads, “The Navy SEALS removed one threat to America… The voters must remove the other.” The Elkhart Truth reports that 25 residents [...]/p

Scott Brown runs away from Paul Ryan question

Scott Brown runs away from Paul Ryan question
"There's one Republican senator in particular who would just as soon completely pretend that there wasn't also a presidential race happening this year. Scott Brown really needs Massachusetts to forget that he's a Republican, and that his standard-bearer, Mitt Romney, just picked the most ideologically extreme choice he could to help him lead the ticket. So when asked about Paul Ryan, what could Brown do but run away from them? Literally."

Ryan Took Stimulus Funds After Voting Against Them, GOP Runs Away From His Budget Plan | Alternet

Ryan Took Stimulus Funds After Voting Against Them, GOP Runs Away From His Budget Plan | Alternet

Meanwhile, the GOP continues its freak-out over Ryan's budget. Politico reports first that the GOP sent out a memo spinning furiously away from the budget: “Do not say: ‘entitlement reform,’ ‘privatization,’ ‘every option is on the table,’” the National Republican Congressional Committee said in an email memo. “Do say: ‘strengthen,’ ‘secure,’ ‘save,’ ‘preserve, ‘protect.’” And another story reveals how the GOP is "fretting" and "panicking" about the pick: "In more than three dozen interviews with Republican strategists and campaign operatives - old hands and rising next-generation conservatives alike - the most common reactions to Ryan ranged from gnawing apprehension to hair-on-fire anger that Romney has practically ceded the election. This is sure going well for the Romney campaign!

MItt Romney Wants a 12.5% Tax Break that you Pay For

Congressman Paul Ryan wants to give Mitt Romney a tax break worth millions of dollars. And if Paul Ryan wanted to give you the same sort of tax break - then you'd probably be hugging him too. But he doesn't want to give you a tax break - in fact - he wants to raise your taxes in order to pay for the tax break he wants to give to Mitt Romney. Here's what's going on...The congressional joint economic committee just released a new study on the paul ryan republican budget - which passed out of the house earlier this year thanks to the support of nearly every single republican. And what they found is - millionaires like Mitt Romney would get a 12.5% tax break. Considering Mitt Romney is worth about $260 million bucks and makes tens of millions a year - that comes out to a pretty hefty million tax break courtesy of his buddy Paul Ryan. That goes on top of the sizeable $77,000 tax break romney got by writing off his wife's horse as a tax deduction. A side note: Ann Romney really loves horses. Unfortunately for the rest of us, who aren't worth $260 million and don't have an addiction to dressage horses that we can write off as tax deductions - The Ryan plan would actually raise our taxes. As the Washington Post points out: "the tax reform plan that house republicans have advanced would sharply cut taxes for the wealthiest americans and could leave middle-class households facing much larger tax bills." Here's how it all breaks down - the Ryan plan creates just two tax brackets - drastically lowering the top income tax down to 25% and creating a second income tax rate of 10% for working people. That might looks like a good deal for everyone - but paul Ryan also eliminates a lot of tax deductions used by working people - so the end result actually works out to a tax increase for low and middle income Americans. These are the facts - the Paul Ryan budget, which - again - was voted on by nearly every single republican in the house - raises taxes on working people. I guess we've found the unwritten exception to millionaire and k street lobbyist grover norquist's pledge - tax increases are ok when they hit working people, but not okay when they hit rich people like Mitt Romney, Grover Norquist, and the Koch Brothers.

Why Religious Leaders Have Condemned The Ryan-Romney Budget

Why Religious Leaders Have Condemned The Ryan-Romney Budget:  Now that Mitt Romney has picked Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) as his running mate, Ryan’s radical budget constitutes Romney’s economic platform. The Ryan-Romney budget is based on a number of false and dangerous [...]/p

Six Republicans Who Think Voters Should Not Be Able To Choose Their Own Senators

Six Republicans Who Think Voters Should Not Be Able To Choose Their Own Senators: Late last week, Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), who is currently campaigning for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by retiring Sen. John Kyl (R-AZ), told a Republican gathering in Payson, Arizona that he supports abolishing the Seventeenth Amendment’s guarantee that voters elect their own senators. Prior to the Seventeenth Amendment’s ratification, the Constitution provided for [...]/p

VIDEO: Tea Party Councilman Holds Sign Featuring Severed Obama Head

VIDEO: Tea Party Councilman Holds Sign Featuring Severed Obama Head: A Tea Party councilman is so far defying calls for his resignation after an old video resurfaced that shows him holding signs depicting President Obama’s head on a pike, former Governor Jennifer Granholm with a noose around her neck and Nancy Pelosi with several bullet holes through her face. Paul Smith, a city councilman in [...]/p

12 Things You Should Know About Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan

12 Things You Should Know About Vice Presidential Candidate Paul Ryan: Mitt Romney has picked as his running mate 42 year-old Republican Congressman Paul Ryan (R-WI), the architect of the GOP budget, which the New York Times has described as “the most extreme budget plan passed by a house of Congress in modern times.” Below are 12 things you should know about Ryan and his policies: [...]/p

The GOP’s Favorite Hate-Monger: How the Republican Party Came to Embrace Bryan Fischer | People For the American Way

The GOP’s Favorite Hate-Monger: How the Republican Party Came to Embrace Bryan Fischer | People For the American Way
"Fischer’s unabashed bigotry is on full display throughout his writings and on-air rants. His entire career is based on leveling venomous attacks against gays and lesbians, American Muslims, Native Americans, progressives and other individuals and groups he detests. He wants to redefine the Constitution to protect only Christians, persecute and deport all American Muslims, prohibit gays and non-Christians from holding public office and impose a system of biblical law.

While Fischer’s views are undeniably shocking, what is most disturbing is his growing influence within not only the Religious Right but also the Republican Party."

Wade Michael Page, WI Terrorist, Was Neo-Nazi Who Lead Racist Skinhead Band | Alternet

Wade Michael Page, WI Terrorist, Was Neo-Nazi Who Lead Racist Skinhead Band | Alternet
"As more details emerge about Wade Michael Page, the man who stormed a Wisconsin Sikh temple yesterday and killed six, it's increasingly evident that there was a racist motivation for his spree. The most basic of the information: he was 40, and an honorably discharged veteran Army sargeant who worked on psy-ops. He was born in Colorado, and used a semi-automatic 9mm pistol at the shooting, which he owned legally. 

More ominous is the information that Page, who was killed by police at the scene, was an active white supremacist who in 2005 formed a neo-Nazi band called "End Apathy." According to the Southern Poverty Law Center:"

Tea Party Group Jokes About Beating Obama To Death

Tea Party Group Jokes About Beating Obama To Death: A local tea party group in Pennsylvania called Northeast Pennsylvania Spirit of 1776 is sending out an email alert in which it imagines the Founding Fathers beating up President Obama in Heaven for being a “radical, socialist leader”: ThinkProgress spoke with a member of the group, who confirmed that the organization sent out the mailing [...]/p

Reports: Sikh Temple Shooter Was A White Supremacist, Part Of Growing Trend Of Anti-Sikh Violence

Reports: Sikh Temple Shooter Was A White Supremacist, Part Of Growing Trend Of Anti-Sikh Violence: Several reports out this morning indicate that Wade Michael Page, the army veteran who is suspected of killing six and injuring three at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, WI, over the weekend, was a white supremacist and a “skinhead.” According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, Page — who was killed in a firefight [...]/p

Right-Wing Plan for Defeating Obama: Gin Up the Hate | Alternet

Right-Wing Plan for Defeating Obama: Gin Up the Hate | Alternet
"Stuck with a lackluster candidate, Tea Partiers focus their rage on the president."

Republican Hate Peddlers Divide America

Rep. King Goes Birther: Suggests Obama’s Parents Telegrammed Fake Hawaii Birth Announcement From Kenya

Rep. King Goes Birther: Suggests Obama’s Parents Telegrammed Fake Hawaii Birth Announcement From Kenya: "The Iowa Congressman noted that his staff had investigated the matter and found birth announcements in the two Hawaii newspapers the week after Obama’s birth. However, King went on to float the absurd notion that his parents “might’ve announced that by telegram from Kenya"." More Tea Party crazy.