Month: June 2011
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Understanding The Other Side
Paul Krugman thinks liberals understand conservatives but not vice versa. He’s half right.
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Federal Judge: Copying An Entire Article Can Be “Fair Use” Under Copyright Laws
For the second time in two weeks, copyright lawsuit mill Righthaven has suffered a loss in Federal Court.
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Revisiting Fukushima: Worse Than You Think
The nuclear disaster that occurred at the Fukushima nuclear power plan in Japan in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami that occurred in April has largely disappeared from the American media, where stories about a murder trial in Florida, the wine cooler induced antics of an Alaska teenager, and a Congressman’s body parts have…
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Huntsman Makes it Official
The former governor of Utah and ambassador to China is running for the Republican nomination (so reports CNN).
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Where Will The Jobs Come From, And When Will They Get Here?
If you’re looking for a job in some of America’s hardest hit cities, it may be awhile before you find one: A new economic report commissioned by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, which is meeting this week, predicts that at least 50 metro areas, or about one-in-seven cities, in this country won’t see a return…
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Does Privacy Still Exist?
When everyone can record video at any time and post it for all the world to see, is there such a thing as privacy anymore?
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Sarah Palin Trademarks Her Name
As of June 17, Sarah Palin is a registered US trademark, serial number 85-170,226.
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John Bolton Will Not Serve in Obama Administration
Former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton: “I will say this, unequivocally: I would not work in Barack Obama’s administration.”
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Are Fox News Viewers Least Informed?
Jon Stewart told Chris Wallace that Fox News viewers are consistently the least informed. It’s actually not true. PolitFact looks at a number of surveys on the subject and finds that Fox viewers do relatively well–indeed, Fox outperforms CNN and MSNBC–although not nearly as well as viewers of the Daily Show or listeners to Rush…
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Republicans At A Foreign Policy Crossroads
For the first time since the end of World War II, the GOP is wrestling with two diametrically opposed visions of foreign affairs.
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Jon Stewart vs. Fox News
Daily Show host Jon Stewart spent 15 minutes on yesterday’s Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace trying to explain why he thinks Fox is a propaganda machine.
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22% Of Americans Still Unwilling To Vote For A Mormon
Two weeks ago, I asked whether Mitt Romney’s religion was still an issue that could hobble his Presidential campaign. Today, Gallup releases a poll that seems to say that the answer is possibly yes: PRINCETON, NJ — Though the vast majority of Americans say they would vote for their party’s nominee for president in 2012…
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Guns and Democracy
Is it reasonable to state that countries with less guns are more likely to become tyrannical than countries with more guns?
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Supreme Court Curtails Class Action Lawsuits In Wal-Mart Case
An important employment law decision today from the Supreme Court.
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The NRSC’s Dumb Twitter Stunt: Fake Retweets From Democratic Politicians
Politics tends to be very juvenile at times and this is no where more true than on Twitter, where the 140 character limit tends to reduce political debate to an electronic form of an elementary school playground fight — I know you are but what am I?. Today, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the committee…
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Opposing Dumb, Unnecessary Wars Is Not “Isolationism”
Contrary to what Senator McCain, seeking realism in military policy does not make one an isolationist.
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Is The Pledge Of Allegiance Un-American?
Alex Knapp’s post about the latest outrage of the day that erupted yesterday over NBC’s editing of the Pledge of Allegiance reminds of something that a co-blogger at The Liberty Papers wrote several years ago: We can decry pictures of children standing at attention wearing the red scarf of the Young Pioneers uniforms or the…
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Huntsman Lining Up Big Names
C. Boyden Gray, former White House Counsel and EU Ambassador, has signed on as the chair of the Jon Huntsman policy team, Mark Halperin reports.
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NBC Removes “Under God” From The Pledge. Who Cares?
NBC stoked a minor furor among the perpetually victimized by using the original version of the Pledge of Allegiance.
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Gingrich Just Phoning It In Now?
It certainly looks like Newt Gingrich is just going through the motions rather than running a real campaign for the Presidency: Prominent Iowa Republicans say they have seen no evidence that Newt Gingrich’s presidential campaign has made efforts to hire a new Iowa staff since its entire paid crew abruptly resigned almost two weeks ago.…
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Mitt Romney With Strong Lead In Delegate-Rich California
Not surprisingly, Mitt Romney is well ahead of the rest of the Republican field in California: Mitt Romney is getting some good news as he arrives to spend three days fundraising in California this week: He holds a solid lead over his 2012 GOP presidential rivals among the state’s Republican voters, a new Field Poll…
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States Rigging 2012 Elections?
States are racing to put obstacles in front of voters in the name of fraud prevention.
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FP Twitterati 100
Foreign Policy‘s annual Twitterati 100 list of “who’s who of the foreign-policy Twitterverse in 2011.” I’ve made the list again under the “Washington Wonks” category. WASHINGTON WONKS Spencer Ackerman (@attackerman) — National security correspondent for Wired‘s Danger Room; tweets on everything from Afghanistan policy to comic books to punk rock. Joe Cirincione (@Cirincione) — President of…
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ICANN Approves New Top-Level Domains, Branding Coming
The Internet’s dot.com period may be under assault, as brand-specific domains become available.
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Alabama State Senators Refers to Blacks as “Aborigines”
Wearing a wire can come back to bite you.
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Foreclosures Moving Like Frozen Molasses
Numbers that make you go “wow” (via the NYT: Backlog of Cases Gives a Reprieve on Foreclosures): In New York State, it would take lenders 62 years at their current pace, the longest time frame in the nation, to repossess the 213,000 houses now in severe default or foreclosure, according to calculations by LPS Applied…
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Idaho State Majority Caucus Leader Arrested for DUI and Grand Theft
Via the Idaho Statesman: State Sen. John McGee arrested for drunken driving, grand theft McGee began drinking at a golf course at about 10 p.m. Saturday night. At some point, McGee left the clubhouse on foot and walked for a distance, eventually coming upon a parked Ford Excursion with a 20-foot travel trailer near the…
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A Democracy Fail In Virginia
The vast majority of the seats in the Virginia legislature will not even be contested this November.
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Romney Clarifies Abortion Stance, Takes His Own Pledge
Mitt Romney sought to clarify his pro-life bona fides yesterday. But, will it matter?
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Bobby Jindal: Hating President Obama Is Foolish
Louisiana’s Bobby Jindal sent a warning to his fellow Republicans. Too bad they probably won’t listen.
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Happy Father’s Day
For Dads of a certain age:
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Christians More Militant Than Muslims!
Trevor Phillips, chairman of the UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission, says fundamentalist Christians are a far bigger problem than Muslims. And, no, he’s not anti-religion.
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Obama Impersonator Tells Racist Jokes at Republican Conference
I’ve been arguing for years that what the Republican Party needs is to embrace its crazies and play more to racist elements in its base. It looks like someone’s listening.
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Jon Huntsman Takes Surprise Second In Republican Leadership Conf. Straw Poll
Speaking of taking Jon Huntsman seriously: Ron Paul won the presidential straw poll at the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans Saturday, easily beating out his rivals for the GOP nomination. Second place went to Jon Huntsman, the little-known former Utah governor who missed the conference with a cold. With the Libertarian-leaning Paul seen as…
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Taking Huntsman Seriously
Matt Bai makes the case for why we shouldn’t necessarily write off the former Governor of Utah: Those who laugh, though, should keep a few things in mind about next year’s campaign. One is that the presidential primary electorate will be very different from the 2010 primaries for House and Senate, which, like all off-year…
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Barack Obama, First Tweeter
Starting very soon, the President of the United States will be tweeting on his own: U.S. President Barack Obama will start regularly tweeting from his official Twitter account. In an update today, it was announced that the President’s reelection staff would be managing his social media presence and accounts on Facebook and Twitter. A rep…
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Romney and the Abortion Pledge
Mitt won’t sign the Susan B. Anthony List’s Pro-Life Pledge.
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Aides To Rick Perry Scouting In Iowa
At the very least, it appears that Texas Governor Rick Perry is keeping his 2012 options open: DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — Key advisers to Texas Gov. Rick Perry are beginning to lay the groundwork for a campaign for Iowa’s leadoff GOP presidential caucuses by making inquiries about the process in case the Republican seeks…
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Michele Bachmann: Schools Should Teach “Intelligent Design”
Minnesota Congresswoman, and Presidential candidate, Michele Bachmann thinks that public schools should teach so-called “Intelligent Design” alongside evolution in science classrooms: Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann explained her skepticism of evolution on Friday and said students should be taught the theory of intelligent design. Bachmann, a congresswoman from Minnesota, also proposed a major overhaul of…
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Schoolhouse Rock For Sex Scandals
From Jimmy Kimmel: H/T: Taegan Goddard
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Obama Overruled Lawyers on Libya
President Obama overruled his top legal advisors in deciding that the Libya operation does not amount to “hostilities” under the War Powers Act.
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What Sarah Palin Can Teach Us About Writing
A distinguished linguist is quite impressed with Sarah Palin’s facility with the written word.
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Join Me For Some Saturday Morning Radio
Tomorrow morning between 10:00am and Noon Eastern, I’ll be a guest on Da Tech Guy show on WCRN 830am in Worcester, Massachusetts, hosted by DaTechGuy himself Peter Ingemi. The first hour we’ll be talking about the New Hampshire Presidential Debate, the war powers dispute between Congress and the President over Libya, and the recent decision…
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Medvedev Distancing Himself From Putin On Role Of Government
Russia’s President seems to be setting up the upcoming Presidential election, where his biggest opponent is likely to be his predecessor Vladimir Putin, as a debate over the role of government in Russia’s economy: ST. PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Friday challenged the legacy of his powerful predecessor, Vladimir Putin, condemning…
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Poll: Ryan Plan Not Hurting Republicans With Voters
Democrats would like people to believe that supporting the Ryan Plan’s Medicare changes is so unpopular with the public that it will hurt the GOP at the polls, but that’s not necessarily the case: A Wall Street Journal/NBC poll asks Americans whether they would be more likely or less likely to vote for a candidate who…
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Dutch to Outlaw Kosher and Halal Slaughter
The Netherlands is considering a new animal cruelty law that would effectively ban kosher and halal slaughter practices.
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France and Germany Seek Bail-out Agreement on Greece
Via the BBC: Greece: Merkel and Sarkozy urge bail-out The leaders of Germany and France have said that they want a new rescue package for debt-laden Greece to be agreed as soon as possible. Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy were speaking after Greece’s Prime Minister George Papandreou announced a cabinet reshuffle. […] Mrs Merkel and…
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Obama Losing To Generic Republican, Doing Better Against Actual Republicans
A new Gallup poll has “Generic Republican” beating President Obama. Unfortunately, the GOP won’t be able to nominate this anonymous candidate.
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Protests Continue in Syria
Via the BBC: Syria unrest: fresh protests erupt Fresh demonstrations against President Bashar al-Assad’s regime have erupted across Syria, with reports of at least eight people killed by security forces. Activists and witnesses said security forces had opened fire in Homs, Damascus, and Deir al-Zour in the east. Official media played down the size of…
