If Rick Santorum is God's Candidate than God Loves Corrupt Pathological Liars

If Rick Santorum is God's Candidate than God Loves Corrupt Pathological Liars

Behind the sweater vests, the faith and family, and the self-definition as a congressional reformer lies another Rick Santorum. This Rick Santorum favors big business, curries favor from lobbyists, and helped to bind the Washington influence industry to the Republican Party while serving in Congress.

Beginning in 2001, after Republicans seized control of Congress and the White House, then-Sen. Santorum (R-Pa.) began hosting Tuesday morning meetings with a select group of lobbyists. These meetings were part of a larger plan -- originally launched in the 1990s by Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Texas), conservative activist Grover Norquist and others when the GOP retook the House of Representatives after 40 years of Democratic control -- to pressure lobbying firms and trade associations to dump their Democratic lobbyists and replace them with Republicans. Named after the Washington business corridor famous for housing lobbying firms, the K Street Project was aimed at installing a permanent Republican majority in Washington.

Journalist Nicholas Confessore explained Santorum's role in the K Street Project in a 2003 Washington Monthly article: "Santorum's responsibility is to make sure each [top lobbying job] is filled by a loyal Republican -- a senator's chief of staff, for instance, or a top White House aide, or another lobbyist whose reliability has been demonstrated. After Santorum settles on a candidate, the lobbyists present make sure it is known whom the Republican leadership favors."

This wasn't just backroom chatter. There were real direct effects on policy. When Jack Valenti, the longtime chief of the Motion Picture Association of America, retired, Republicans led by Santorum and DeLay sought to pressure the trade group to hire a Republican. The MPAA ultimately replaced Valenti with former Clinton administration Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, deeply offending leaders of the K Street Project.

Santorum brought up the Glickman hire at a closed-door Republican caucus meeting and was quoted in a 2004 Roll Call article saying, "Yeah, we had a meeting and, yeah, we talked about making sure that we have fair representation on K Street. ... I admit that I pay attention to who is hiring, and I think it's important for leadership to pay attention."

Later in 2004, the Republicans in Congress voted down $1.5 billion in subsidies for the movie industry. Grover Norquist told Roll Call at the time that the movie industry's hire of Glickman was one of the reasons Republicans scuttled the subsidies. "Hollywood has recently expressed contempt for the Republican leadership in the House, Senate and White House," Norquist said.

The MPAA did ultimately hire a Republican for another top position, and many other big influence-industry jobs started to fall into the hands of partisan Republicans. A 2003 Washington Post article reported, "A Republican National Committee official recently told a group of GOP lobbyists that 33 of 36 top-level Washington positions he is monitoring went to Republicans."

These new jobs provided partisans with a direct line to client funds -- that is, contributions from corporate executives and political action committees -- to funnel to the Republican candidates of their choosing. In some cases, these trade associations ran issue advocacy campaigns to support GOP policies or to attack vulnerable Democratic lawmakers.

Running for reelection in 2006, Santorum leaned heavily on this new fundraising base. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Santorum received $496,683 from Washington lobbyists, the most of any candidate during that election cycle. Over his career, Santorum received $731,937 from lobbyists in Washington.
If the K Street Project's goal was to turn Washington's lobbying world into a petri dish of movement conservatism, it backfired. The project's real outcome was to strengthen the connection between the Republican Party in Washington and the business community at large. The business-backed influence industry gained new power over the GOP lawmakers -- and it paid off. Pharmaceutical companies won big in the prescription drug expansion of Medicare, energy company lobbyists wrote most of the 2005 energy bill, and legislation was filled with earmarks requested by the influence peddlers.

The tight ties binding business, lobbyists and the Republican Party became one of the key gripes of the Tea Party movement as it rose to action in 2009 and 2010. Former Alaska governor and vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin has decried "crony capitalism" and called lobbyists "symptomatic of the greater problem that we see right now in Washington." Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) referred to lobbyists as a "distinctly criminal class" in his 2010 run for the Senate.

Matthew Continetti, conservative writer and former editor of the Weekly Standard, wrote a book about the corrupting influence of lobbyists in the Republican Party, "The K Street Gang," back in 2006. In a National Review interview, he explained, "Many lobbyists place the private over the public interest and the economic interests of a client over the national interests of the American people. This contributes to the degradation of public-spiritedness and national identity, and should trouble anyone concerned about American politics and American civic life."

Indeed, by 2006, the K Street Project was a national scandal. Two of its best-known participants, lobbyist Jack Abramoff and DeLay, had been indicted for other crimes -- Abramoff for corruption and DeLay for money laundering. Santorum distanced himself from the project, stating in February 2006, "We don't have a K Street Project. ... I have never called anybody or talked to anyone to try to get anybody a position on K Street with one exception, and that is if someone from my office is applying for a job and an employer calls me."

But one month later, after the temporary, scandal-induced hiatus, Santorum restarted his lobbyist gatherings. He lost his reelection bid later that year by a whopping 18 percentage points, partially due to his role leading the K Street Project.

Rick might be the "values" candidate if you have the values of a gangster, which most conservatives do. If conservatives really cared about corruption in Washington or at the state level there would hardly be any. Conservatives ignore corruption because if they can get what they want using corruption, that justify the corruption. never mind that they are as usual destroying America one piece at a time.

The Indefinite Detention Provisions in the NDAA Does Mean U.S. Citizens May be Detained Indefinitely by the Military. Obama Has Withdrawn Veto Threat So There Goes the 4th Amendment

The Indefinite Detention Provisions in the NDAA Does Mean U.S. Citizens May be Detained Indefinitely by the Military. Obama Has Withdrawn Veto Threat So There Goes the 4th Amendment

Even at this 11th hour – when all of our liberties and freedom are about to go down the drain – many people still don’t understand that the indefinite detention bill passed by Congress allows indefinite detention of Americans on American soil.

The bill is confusing. As Wired noted on December 1st:

    It’s confusing, because two different sections of the bill seem to contradict each other, but in the judgment of the University of Texas’ Robert Chesney — a nonpartisan authority on military detention — “U.S. citizens are included in the grant of detention authority.”

A retired admiral, Judge Advocate General and Dean Emeritus of the University of New Hampshire School of Law also says that it applies to American citizens on American soil.

The ACLU notes:

    Don’t be confused by anyone claiming that the indefinite detention legislation does not apply to American citizens. It does. There is an exemption for American citizens from the mandatory detention requirement (section 1032 of the bill), but no exemption for American citizens from the authorization to use the military to indefinitely detain people without charge or trial (section 1031 of the bill). So, the result is that, under the bill, the military has the power to indefinitely imprison American citizens, but it does not have to use its power unless ordered to do so.

    But you don’t have to believe us. Instead, read what one of the bill’s sponsors, Sen. Lindsey Graham said about it on the Senate floor: “1031, the statement of authority to detain, does apply to American citizens and it designates the world as the battlefield, including the homeland.”

Another sponsor of the bill – Senator Levin – has also repeatedly said that the bill applies to American citizens on American soil, citing the Supreme Court case of Hamdi which ruled that American citizens can be treated as enemy combatants:

    “The Supreme Court has recently ruled there is no bar to the United States holding one of its own citizens as an enemy combatant,” said Levin. “This is the Supreme Court speaking.“

Levin again stressed recently that the bill applies to American citizens, and said that it was president Obama who requested that it do so:

Under questioning from Rand Paul, another co-sponsor – John McCain – said that Americans suspected of terrorism could not only be indefinitely detained, but could be sent to Guantanamo:

U.S. Congressman Justin Amash states in a letter to Congress:

    The Senate’s [bill] does not even distinguish between American citizens and non-citizens, or between persons caught domestically and abroad. The President’s power, in his discretion, to detain persons he determines have supported associated forces applies just as strongly to Americans seized on U.S. soil as it does to foreigners captured on a far away battlefield.

Two retired 4-star generals (Charles C. Krulak and Joseph P. Hoar) write in the New York Times:

    One provision [in the bill] would authorize the military to indefinitely detain without charge people suspected of involvement with terrorism, including United States citizens apprehended on American soil. Due process would be a thing of the past.

Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson – General Colin Powell’s chief of staff – says that the bill is a big step towards tyranny at home.  Congressman Ron Paul says that it will establish martial law in America.

One of the reasons this will pass is that most people are more concerned about their holiday shopping than they are about the Constitution and their rights being trampled. people think the military and the government will not come after them by mistake. It will only happen to the bad guys. Its the government by luck theory of rights.

America Hater Newt Gingrich Has Ethics. They Just Happen to Be Abominable

America Hater Newt Gingrich Has Ethics. They Just Happen to Be Abominable

The GOP presidential primary is a lot like a kindergarten t-ball game: When it comes to being in first place, just about everybody gets a turn. And now, congratulations, Newt Gingrich: It’s your turn!

Steve Kornacki wrote about the Public Policy Polling survey that found Gingrich is following in the footsteps of Donald Trump, Michele Bachmann, Rick Perry and Herman Cain as the Republican flavor of the week. Gingrich benefits from three things: A lot of Republicans can’t stand Mitt Romney, Cain and Perry have shamed themselves in public, and by contrast, he’s had no bad debates. So far he’s come off as smart and affable, trying to rally his rivals against the big, bad media that’s trying to get them to fight.

Since Gingrich has mostly been in single digits, far back in the polls, his rivals have humored him and ignored his liabilities. That’s about to change, and Gingrich, like Perry, Cain and Michele Bachmann before him, will likewise wither under the hot sun of political scrutiny. The seemingly affable professor and author is a hothead with many political liabilities and almost as many enemies. He’s committed so many political and ethical transgressions that his baggage has baggage.

Gingrich is probably best known for serving his wife with divorce papers while she was recovering from cancer surgery, so he could marry his mistress, whom he later divorced to marry a staffer. But he’s also probably the only politician, who when you’re asked “What’s the worst thing he’s done?” has done a lot of things that rival leaving his cancer-stricken wife for his mistress. For most people in the world, in fact, that would be the hands-down worst act ever; for Gingrich, it’s just not that clear-cut (h/t Jamie Kilstein).

For instance, he’s the only House speaker in American history to be disciplined by Congress for ethics violations.  In 1998, he paid a $300,000 fine after he was found to have been misusing his tax-exempt foundations for political gain.

OK, those have to be the two worst things, dumping his wife who had cancer for his mistress, and congressional ethics sanctions, right?

But wait, but there’s more:

    Shutting down the government in 1995 at least partly because President Clinton allegedly snubbed him by seating him in the rear of Air Force One on a flight home from Yitzhak Rabin’s funeral. No, really, he told reporters the “snub” was “part of why you ended up with us sending down a tougher continuing resolution.”
    Advocating that the children of welfare recipients be taken away from their parents and raised in orphanages.
    Leading the drive to impeach Clinton over lying about adultery when he was himself lying about adultery, cheating on his wife with a staffer, Callista Bisek, who became his third wife.
    Insisting President Obama suffers from “a Kenyan anti-colonial mindset” like his Kenyan father, even though he barely knew his Kenyan father.
    Denouncing Paul Ryan’s radical budget (that was actually smart) as “right-wing social engineering,” then flip-flopping and warning that “any ad which quotes what I said Sunday is a falsehood.”
    Railing against Obama’s alleged “class warfare” when he’s run up a $500,000 tab at Tiffany’s.
But my all-time favorite Newt Gingrich “worst” was the time he blamed the horrendous case of Susan Smith, the South Carolina mother( a Republican who was having an affair with her Republican father-in-law) who murdered her young sons in 1994, on Democrats. Smith, you’ll recall, first blamed her son’s drowning deaths on a black man who supposedly car-jacked her, but it turned out, she did it herself. Just before the 1994 election, in which his party swept back into power, Gingrich said:

     I think that the mother killing the two children in South Carolina vividly reminds every American how sick the society is getting and how much we need to change things. The only way you get change is to vote Republican. That’s the message for the last three days.

Two days later, Gingrich defended his comments by insisting he’d been saying the same thing for years: that Democratic rule had frayed the moral fabric of the country: “We need very deep change if we’re going to turn this country around.” Asked directly if he was saying electing Republicans could stop killings like Smith’s, he said flatly: “Yes. In my judgment, there’s no question.”

He later blamed the Columbine and Virginia Tech killings on liberals, too.

America has never been perfect, but its "moral" fabric has always been in most danger by conservatism. Conservatism - forget the names of the political parties Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives were in both parties until the 1980s - has always been the biggest threat to America. Conservatism by its very nature is anti-American. Conservatism as a movement has more in common with the ultra-nationalism of the Japanese leading up to WW II. Gingrich fits in perfectly. he believes in a dog-eat-dog culture and economy. He believes America should be ruled by the elite and voting rights given only to those who believe in the far Right agenda.


Scott Walker recall, Day 1, by the numbers and you can download a Walker recall form here. Beware of false recalls conservative nuts who will throw your recall petition in the trash.

Anti-American Fox News Tries to Hide Connection Between Fox and Georgia Based Domestic Terrorists

Anti-American Fox News Tries to Hide Connection Between Fox and Georgia Based Domestic Terrorists

Fox News is now actively concealing a link between an Alabama-based blogger repeatedly featured on the network as an expert and allegations of a domestic terrorist plot.

This morning on America's Newsroom, Fox News ran an extensive report on yesterday's arrest of four Georgia men accused of plotting an attack on federal employees and U.S. citizens using explosives, guns, and the biological toxin ricin. At the end of the segment, correspondent Jonathan Serrie pointed out that one of the defendants "allegedly cited the online novel Absolved, which discusses small groups of citizens attacking U.S. officials," with the defendant allegedly "saying that the attacks would be based on events in that novel."

Charging documents indeed state that accused plotter Frederick Thomas repeatedly cited as an inspiration the novel Absolved, in which underground militia fighters declare war on the federal government over gun control laws and same-sex marriage, leading to a second American revolution. But Fox's report neglected to mention the allegedly inspirational novel's author, who is no stranger to Fox viewers.

Indeed, the author, Mike Vanderboegh, has been mainstreamed by the network, which has repeatedly featured him as an expert on the ATF's failed Operation Fast and Furious. Fox has identified Vanderboegh as an "online journalist" and an "authority on the Fast and Furious investigation," and has consistently failed to acknowledge his extremist views, actions, and affiliations.

Vanderboegh, a former member of the militia and Minuteman movements and now a leader of the "anti-government extremist group" the Three Percenters, which claims to represent the three percent of gun owners who "who will not disarm, will not compromise and will no longer back up at the passage of the next gun control act" but will instead, "if forced by any would-be oppressor, ... kill in the defense of ourselves and the Constitution."

The complaint against Thomas details a similar scenario:

    THOMAS described a scenario in which he felt would be the "line in the sand" that would result in the activation of militias. THOMAS believed that soon, during a protest action, a protestor would be shot. It is his opinion the militias would act and respond by openly attacking the police. He then openly discussed having complied what he called the "Bucket List" which is a list of government employees, politicians, corporate leaders and members of the media he feels needed to be "taken out" to make the country right again."

Vanderboegh has stated that "another civil war in this country is the last thing I want,"writing in the introduction to Absolved that the novel is "a cautionary tale for the out-of-control gun cops of the ATF," who "need to know how powerful" the "armed citizenry" "could truly be if they were pushed into a corner."

Fox News has repeatedly presented Vanderboegh as a credible source. Their failure to mention his authorship of a novel that allegedly inspired a terrorist plot is telling.

UPDATE: In a subsequent report, Fox's Serrie said that Absolved was written by "the former leader of an Alabama militia," and briefly flashed an image of the book's cover that showed Vanderboegh's name. Serrie did not note Vanderboegh's connection to Fox News.

As Congressional Republicans do everything they can to stop employment programs and make life harder for the unemployed, the conservative media id trying to hide its ties to radical anti-American Republicans. P.T. Barnum once said there was a sucker born every minute. He might as well have been talking about modern day conservatives who keep falling for the conservative movement hiding its anti-American agenda behind the flag and the Bible.  


Subprime Loans, Foreclosure, and the Credit Crisis. What Happened and Why? - A Primer(pdf)

By 2007, subprime loans accounted for 29% of total home loans. The vast majority of the subprime loans causing today’s massive foreclosures were issued by institutions and independent mortgage brokers not covered by the CRA.

Why Do Republicans Hate American Families - Senate Republicans Kill the Democrats' Infrastructure Jobs Bill

Why Do Republicans Hate American Families - Senate Republicans Kill the Democrats' Infrastructure Jobs Bill

Senate Republicans, again, filibustered a component of President Obama's jobs bill, the Rebuild America Jobs Act. In any other world, it would have passed 51-47, but this is a Senate, so a majority vote means that the bill dies. Go USA!

This bill had $10 billion to establish an infrastructure bank, a proposal that has received plenty of Republican support in the past, as well as $50 billion in immediate funding for roads, bridges and airports, something else Republican Senators have supported in the past. When they were just blowing hot air. When it wasn't the nation's infrastructure and economy at stake.

The measure would have been funded by a 0.7 percent surtax on people making more than a million dollars a year, or about 1/500th of American citizens, who would have seen an increase of about 1/217th in their tax bill. Just in case you were left with any doubt over whether Republicans stood with the 1 percent or the 99 percent.

12:46 PM PT: Sens. Ben Nelson and Joe Lieberman voted with the Republicans (I know, you're shocked). The Republican version of the bill, which really didn't have anything m
Senate Republicans, again, filibustered a component of President Obama's jobs bill, the Rebuild America Jobs Act. In any other world, it would have passed 51-47, but this is a Senate, so a majority vote means that the bill dies. Go USA!


12:46 PM PT: Sens. Ben Nelson and Joe Lieberman voted with the Republicans (I know, you're shocked). The Republican version of the bill, which really didn't have anything much to do with jobs, failed 47-53.

Conservatives think it is more important the economy be dragged down to make Democrats look bad than it is to do what is best for the country. Modern conservative Republicans are not patriots as much as they are right-wing zealots who only care about their radical agenda. to make America look like half like a third world country and the other half gated communities where the bankers and elite live.

A History of Sexual Harassment is The Least of The Corrupt Wing-Nut Herman Cain's Problems

A History of Sexual Harassment is The Least of The Corrupt Wing-Nut Herman Cain's Problems

Mark Block, whose face is now familiar to thousands as the Smoking Man in the Cain campaign's latest video, told reporters that Cain was unaware of any settlements paid to the two women who made the accusations while Cain served as president and CEO of the National Restaurant Association, as Politico reported. But the reasons for Block's discomfort likely went beyond Cain's situation to his own. Just hours before Politico burst forth with its explosive accusations, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel laid out a case that suggests significant illegal campaign activity on Cain's behalf by a nonprofit organization, Prosperity USA (also known as America's Prosperity Network), controlled by Block and linked to David Koch's Americans for Prosperity. As AlterNet has reported, Block, the former director of AFP's Wisconsin chapter, has long been known for playing dirty in politics.

Pay to Play?

Prosperity USA, described as a 501(c)(3) in its incorporation documents (and which now seems to be defunct), appears to have been footing the bill for Cain campaign expenses, including a highly unusual payment of $100,000 to the right-wing Congress of Racial Equality in advance of a major speech by Cain. Daniel Bice, who writes the Journal Sentinel's No Quarter blog, reports that the payment to CRE appears to have been disbursed from $150,000 in loans raised from unnamed donors. While Bice asserts that Cain was apparently not paid for that appearance, the New Yorker's Jane Mayer this month uncovered information suggesting that Cain's speaking fees are not directly reported as such on his disclosure forms to the Federal Elections Commission, but are shielded from public view as transactions that take place between his private company and the speaker's bureau representing him. Writes Mayer:

    Yet, mysteriously, Cain discloses no payments from the Washington Speakers Bureau on his federal forms. Instead, on his 2011 F.E.C. form, he lists unspecified payments of between $50,000-$100,000 to his company, the New Voice, which he describes as a “public speaking” and “publishing” entity.

A Visit With Mr. Koch

Among Bice's revelations is a record showing that Prosperity USA paid for Block's travel to meet with David Koch, the billionaire right-wing funder behind Americans for Prosperity and its foundation, and AFP president Tim Phillips in Washington, D.C., in January -- after Block was named "chief of staff" of the Cain campaign. Although the records Bice combed through do not specify a date for that trip, we know that both Phillips and Koch were in the nation's capital to celebrate the swearing in of the new congress on January 6, and to see the speaker's gavel passed from Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., to John Boehner, R-Ohio.

Koch and Phillips had much to celebrate that day, not only in the transfer of power from the Democrats to the Republicans in the House of Representatives, but also for the high number of Tea Party-allied freshmen lawmakers in the new class who owed their good political fortunes to Koch and Americans for Prosperity. They were particularly successful in Wisconsin, where they helped to elect two new congressmen, Sean Duffy and Reid Ribble, and managed to unseat long-time U.S. Sen. Russell Feingold with their ally, Ron Johnson.

Until he signed on as Herman Cain's campaign manager in December, Block ran the Wisconsin state chapter of Americans for Prosperity. In addition to helping to send a handful of Koch-backed lawmakers to Washington, Block also helped elect Scott Walker to the governor's mansion along with a cadre of right-wingers to the state legislature, where they wasted no time in launching an assault against Wisconsin's public employees and their unions. And it was Block who recruited Herman Cain to run for president.

Taxpayer Subsidy for Cain's Private Jet?

Nonprofit organizations classified as 501(c)(3) under the IRS code are forbidden to engage in electioneering. Yet Prosperity USA lists on a rather messy statement of profit and loss, uncovered by Bice, that it is owed more than $40,000 from Friends of Herman Cain (the official name of the fundraising arm of Cain's presidential campaign), including at least $16,000 for Cain's travel on the charter jets of Hill Aircraft to appear at events sponsored by Americans for Prosperity, as well at an event in Chicago called RightNation, which the statement says Cain attended at the "request of AFP." Hill Aircraft, on its Web site, offers this description of its services:

    Our world class FBO facilities offer all the amenities for both passengers and pilots, including computer work stations with internet access, plasma TV screens for catching up on national and world events, pilots lounge with theatre seating and security camera monitors and state of the art flight planning facilities. Our line technicians are NATA Safety 1st trained and Hill Aircraft is a State of Georgia recognized drug free workplace. Our concierge services can take care of passenger and crew ground transportation, hotel reservations and catering, we can even arrange for sporting event tickets or a round of golf. Let Hill Aircraft show you why we have been named the #1 FBO in Georgia multiple times.

Payment for this campaign travel by a tax-exempt organization, which Prosperity USA claims to be, would amount to a taxpayer subsidy of plush accommodations for a political candidate. It appears, according to the Journal Sentinel, that Prosperity USA also forked over $3,700 for iPads used by the Cain campaign.

Koch-Linked Nonprofit Pays Singer of Cain Anthem

The records unearthed by the Journal Sentinel also note a payment of $1,500 to Krista Branch, who sings the Cain anthem, "I Am America" in the campaign's videos. Bice also reports that Branch's husband, who composed the song, works for the Cain campaign:

    Branch's husband, Michael, who wrote the song, has been paid $11,250 in his role as the Cain campaign's Tennessee director and $7,360 as a fundraising consultant.

Prosperity USA also appears to have provided the funding for Prosperity 101, the Koch-linked workplace indoctrination program on which AlterNet (in partnership with the Investigative Fund at the Nation Institute) published an exposé last June. Our reporting showed Prosperity 101, which was fronted by Cain and Wall Street Journal editorial board member Stephen Moore, to be a for-profit venture, with Linda Hansen, the Cain campaign's current fundraiser, listed as its registered agent. Prosperity USA's profit and loss statement shows $12,000 billed to the nonprofit by Hansen's apparently for-profit workplace program, with a note saying that another $30,000 worth of bills from Prosperity 101 had just been submitted by Hansen for payment.

Perhaps Cain should be running for president of some backwards banana republic. One that buys and sells power and votes like the infamous Koch brothers. Conservatives have long run an extensive shadow network of dirty money. Its what they do. Conservatism by definition is the corruption of democracy. That is why they wrap in in the flag in the bible. They have actually got some poor rubes believing they love their country and want the best for America.

What Liberal Media - ABC News Fisker "Exclusive" Is Actually A Recycled Fox News Story From 2009

What Liberal Media - ABC News  Fisker "Exclusive" Is Actually A Recycled Fox News Story From 2009

A story touted as "an ABC News exclusive" actually rehashes a flawed narrative pushed by Fox News more than two years ago.

In collaboration with iWatch News, Brian Ross and ABC's "investigative unit" reported late last week that Fisker Automotive, a hybrid car maker that received a federal loan, "is assembling its first line of cars in Finland." The loan itself, however, can only be used to support operations based in the U.S.

ABC published the story, titled "Car Company Gets U.S. Loan, Builds Cars In Finland," on Thursday night and Ross reported the "ABC News exclusive" on Friday's edition of Good Morning America. Ross said that World News and Nightline would also feature the story on Friday, but ABC did not run those segments.

Instead, Ross appeared on the Fox Business Network Friday night, where he told host David Asman that those in the administration criticizing his reporting "just don't like the takeaway, which is that they got the loan and they're building the car in Finland."

But this news isn't new. In fact, it was explained by the Department of Energy (DOE) in a September 2009 press release announcing the conditional loan. According to the release, "final assembly" of the high-end Fisker Karma "will be done overseas." Indeed, Fisker had a contract to assemble the Karma in Finland before the company ever received funds from DOE. ABC failed to note this fact and the misunderstanding was compounded by other news outlets covering ABC's report.

The loan supports design work carried out in Michigan and California for the Karma, as well as the assembly of Fisker's lower-cost hybrid, Project Nina, which will take place at a former GM factory in Wilmington, Deleware. Fisker began hiring for the Delaware plant in June.

Following the DOE announcement in September 2009, Fox ran a series of segments and an online article exclaiming that the government "gave a half a billion dollars" to "a car company that is creating jobs in Finland," in the words of America's Newsroom anchor Martha MacCallum. Fox characteristically botched some important details, spurring a response from Henrik Fisker, who criticized news reports that "ignored or marginalized the truth, or sensationalized irrelevant aspects of the loan and our company." "It is unfortunate how false information can be disseminated and it is our intention to correct as much of it as possible," Fisker said in a press release at the time.

Fox is now using the ABC report to launch another round of outrage. Fox News and Fox Business have already devoted at least 18 segments to the story since Friday.

It's worth noting that Ford Motors, which received by far the largest of DOE's loans, has numerous overseas manufacturing plants. Oil and gas companies that benefit from taxpayer subsidies also conduct business all over the world. So the notion that federal incentives should not be available to companies with multinational operations has implications far beyond Fisker.

The recent media storm surrounding ABC's report has some at Fox scratching their heads. "I've been talking about it for literally two years," Eric Bolling said Friday night on his Fox Business show. "What happened yesterday that all of a sudden this story is on every single show that I watch?"

ABC's framing might provide a clue. The network's October 20 article referred to "intense scrutiny" of DOE's clean energy investments "in the wake of the administration's failed $535 million investment in solar panel maker Solyndra" and asked if "another Solyndra is in the offing."

On Thursday night, the Drudge Report hyped the ABC report as a "SOLYDRA-like story" before it was even published, citing unnamed "sources":

Drudge Headline

And on Good Morning America, Ross mentioned "questions about whether [Fisker] could end up as another taxpayer boondoggle." ABC followed up Monday with an article titled, "Obama Admin. Defends Fisker Cars From Solyndra Comparison."

CNN also adopted the Solyndra association, despite the lack of any indication at this point that Fisker -- which included in the Wall Street Journal's 2010 list of "Top 10 Cleantech Companies" -- will default on the federal loan. Introducing the story, CNN's Wolf Blitzer said on Friday: "It might, repeat, might just be another Solyndra in the making. That's what some of the critics are charging."

ABC News was among the media outlets that most persistently pursued the Solyndra story. As we showed last month, ABC dedicated more airtime to Solyndra than did CBS and NBC during the month after the solar panel maker announced its bankruptcy filing. In the same month, ABC virtually ignored a report by the Commission on Wartime Contracting which concluded that $31-60 billion has been lost to waste and fraud through contracts related to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, costing taxpayers 56 times more than Solyndra's failure.

ABC's Solyndra reporting was at times misleading and littered with unsupported insinuations that political favoritism played a role in the company's loan guarantee. ABC also reported excerpts from emails leaked by Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee which were later shown to be taken out of context.

After the Obama administration pointed out that the Bush administration intended to give Solyndra the loan guarantee, a claim backed up by internal documents, ABC posted the headline: "Blame It On Bush, Say Obama Officials." 

As in Fisker's case, Fox News embraced ABC's Solyndra reporting and Bill O'Reilly hosted Brian Ross on September 14. During his appearance, Ross said "there are serious questions about whether influence was involved" in the loan guarantee. Asked by O'Reilly if Solyndra "is Enron 2," Ross replied: "It has that aspect. And you know, there are lots of big names that could be drawn in. I think we will be hearing about this all the way through next November."

Like the loan guarantee program that provided financing to Solyndra and other solar companies, the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing loan program was designed to fund innovative projects that inherently carry some risk.

The program was signed into law by President Bush in 2007 and Congress allocated $7.5 billion to cover the costs of any defaults. The $529 million Fisker loan is 7 percent of that amount. The Department of Energy told ABC that Fisker has not missed a loan payment or asked to restructure the agreement.

UPDATE (10/26/11):

ABC posted another report last night titled, "Republicans Call for Probe of Obama's Green Car Program." Brian Ross also appeared on Nightline and World News with Diane Sawyer to discuss the loans to Fisker and Tesla Motors. ABC is promoting the World News segment with the title, "Another Green Company Going Bankrupt?"

On Nightline, Ross said Fisker promised to create jobs in Delaware, "but so far the only cars being made have come off the line at this plant in Finland." Of course Ross didn't explain that when Fisker got the loan in 2009, the company said it would produce the cars in Delaware starting in late 2012.

The major take-away from the story. Bush signed off on the Fisker loan. it was understood even than that Fisker would be assembling the car in Europe. None of the loan money was used for the overseas part of the Fisker company operations. The loan did create American jobs. Ross and ABC have slanted the story along Obama hating right-wing talking points. ABC and Brian Ross have been caught previously acting as a fax machine for right-wing conservative talking points about the "war on terrorism". Finally, Fisker is making the repayments on its loan on schedule. All the negative publicity coming from anti-America conservatives may do more to hurt the company's chances of success than anything else. Why are conservatives always cheering for the failure of American technology and science.

America Hater Karl Rove and His Astroturf Group American Crossroads takes aim at union workers to stop Obama jobs bill

America Hater Karl Rove and His Astroturf Group American Crossroads takes aim at union workers to stop Obama jobs bill

Jonathan Chait looks at the polling memo produced for Karl Rove's American Crossroads on how to kill President Obama's jobs bill. Jed Lewison previously highlighted the memo's origin in fear; Chait points to two key strategies it promotes:

    The key fact to understand about the bill, delicately left unmentioned by the American Crossroads memo, is that Americans want to do all the things Obama proposes. By a twenty-point margin, they favor funding new road construction and a payroll tax cut. By a 30-point margin, they agree with higher taxes on the rich to cut the long-term deficit. They support helping stave off layoffs of police officers, firefighters, and teachers by a 50-point margin. How do you fight that?

    You redefine the issue as a generalization. People don’t like firing police officers and teachers? Fine, just call them “union workers[.]”

The memo (warning: Karl Rove PDF) found that if you describe Obama's proposal to "give billions to states to stop layoffs of teachers and firefighters," 70 percent of them favored it. But let's say you describe it as "giv[ing] billions to states to keep government union workers on the payroll." Support drops dramatically.

That's exactly why it's so important to always remind people that we're talking about police officers and teachers and nurses and firefighters and librarians and custodians and construction workers, no matter how much the repetition can make you feel like you're talking about the Village People.

Chait also highlights how the memo supports the Republican strategy of opposition to every damn thing that Obama wants or that could improve the economy:

    When one party is unanimously opposed to something, and the other party is disagreeing about it, many people figure it’s a bad idea. This was an insight Mitch McConnell grasped from the outset of Obama’s presidency, announcing that unified Republican opposition would help make the president’s policies unpopular. Accordingly, American Crossroads finds that the mere fact of Republican unanimity, and Democratic lack thereof, ranks among its most persuasive arguments against the bill[.]

They're pushing an agenda the American people do not want to see imposed. But they've got a lot of money to push it with, they're good at pushing it, and demonizing workers and obstructing progress are among their most powerful weapons.

It is no surprise that the America hating right-wing conservative movement would destroy millions of American's lives all for the sake of advancing the extremist agenda of the fake patriots who call themselves conservatives. They've been selling America their twisted brand of patriotism for years and just like those products that swear you can get rock hard abs while eating cookies and watching TV, there have always been Americans stupid enough to but into it.

This Is What Evil Looks Like

No Apology From Rush Limbaugh For Defending ‘Christian’ Terrorists

Rush Limbaugh is nothing if not stubborn. He’s now obstinately resisting an international outcry over his incendiary comments about Africa’s Lord’s Resistance Army.

This band of child-abductors, rapists and killers is acknowledged as bad news by pretty much everyone. Everyone, that is, except for Limbaugh, who took to the air shortly after President Obama announced he was dispatching 100 military advisers to help take them on.

    “Now, up until today, most Americans have never heard of the Lord’s Resistance Army. And here we are at war with them. Have you ever heard of Lord’s Resistance Army, Dawn? How about you, Brian? Snerdley, have you? You never heard of Lord’s Resistance Army? Well, proves my contention, most Americans have never heard of it, and here we are at war with them. Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. It means God. I was only kidding. Lord’s Resistance Army are Christians. They are fighting the Muslims in Sudan.”

Much to Limbaugh’s amusement, this passage is now part of the Congressional Record, as last week Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) quoted it on the Senate floor. Inhofe cited this exchange between Limbaugh and his helpers, and then moved on to tackle Limbaugh for taking the vicious LRA’s religious claims at face value.

“I want to make sure everyone knows that [the LRA’s leader] was officially disavowed by the Catholic Church in Uganda,” Inhofe said.

Limbaugh did not respond to this part of the criticism. Instead he tried to wriggle his way out. He completely ignored the dressing-down about the LRA’s well documented brutality, and instead conceded that he had been “misinformed” about whether the advisers President Obama deployed were intended for active combat.

The radio host then noted that Inhofe’s smack-down had included a mention of Limbaugh’s studio assistants, Dawn, Brian, and Snerdley. He transformed this into one big joke, while also implying that Inhofe’s umbrage had come from the fact the crew had never heard of the LRA, rather than the fact that they had fallen for the group’s propaganda hook, line, and sinker. From Limbaugh’s transcript:

    “I wanted to play the sound bites primarily ‘cause you three are now in the Congressional Record. All three of you. And you’re in the Congressional Record because you didn’t know something. How does it feel?”

At no point did Limbaugh address the fact that he had in effect defended a reviled group first listed as terrorists by President George W. Bush.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, this wasn’t enough to stop the story from spreading. On Monday the Times of London ran an article about a young woman, Evelyn Apoko, who it said had been “horribly mutilated while working as a human ‘mule’ for the LRA.”

Limbaugh obviously has a staff of assistants who could have done some research. perhaps it would be expecting too much for the mulch-millionaire pundit who makes a living telling other people what to think and feel because he knows it all, to do some research himself. All Limbaugh knows is that sending military advisers to Africa is president Obama's idea. Anything Obama is for, Limbaugh is against. Limbaugh is not pro good or pro America, he is pro conservatism. If that means being pro evil it doesn't bother Limbaugh or his lunatic followers.

Congressional Republicans Are Running Real Death Panels

America’s real death panels

Remember the good ol’ days when Republicans were running around the country screaming that the Democrats’ proposal to fund voluntary end-of-life counseling would somehow create a government-sanctioned death panel? Oooh boy, the heartland was ablaze back then. Racked by anger at a Democrat occupying the White House, an enraged middle America was genuinely scared about the prospect of a secret group of bureaucrats putting together a “kill list” of citizens deemed to be too much of a nuisance.


For example, at the state level, the death panel commonly called the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles recently opted to execute Troy Davis, despite compelling evidence calling his conviction into question. Similar death panels continue to operate inside the criminal justice bureaucracies of other states, even as more questions emerge about the fairness and accuracy of America’s capital punishment system.

Likewise, at the federal level, Washington, D.C., has become a city of death panels.

For instance, the death panel known as the U.S. House Agriculture Appropriations Committee(chaired by a Republican), despite having seen the latest news of the listeria outbreak, is right now trying to slash funding for food inspections. That effectively continues to sentence 3,000 Americans a year to death via food-borne illness. Additionally, this very same death panel is also considering cuts to food stamps at a time when Louisiana State University researchers report that between 2,000 and 3,000 elderly Americans are already dying of malnutrition every year. Meanwhile, a separate death panel inside the Obama administration last month opted to block a proposed Environmental Protection Agency regulation to reduce smog — a move guaranteeing that the pollutant will continue to annually kill thousands of Americans.

Even the assembled ambassadors at the United Nations often act as a grand death panel in crafting international policy. Last month, in fact, these diplomats were asked to pony up more aid to fight the East African famine, and so far, that aid has not been forthcoming, potentially allowing 750,000 starving Somalis to die.

The point here is that politicians never have to make up stories about death panels that don’t exist when we’re living in the age of government-by-death-panel. We just don’t notice many of them. Why? Because for all the manufactured anti-death-panel hysteria surrounding the Obama healthcare bill, we’ve come to accept that our political leaders are now regularly making blood-soaked decisions that cost people their lives.

Over time, that has made the most coldly calculating death panels all but invisible to us — and regardless of whether that acquiescence is subconscious or not, it undoubtedly represents an ugly form of complicity.



    David Sirota is a best-selling author of the new book "Back to Our Future: How the 1980s Explain the World We Live In Now." He hosts the morning show on AM760 in Colorado.

About 40 percent of deaths worldwide are caused by water, air and soil pollution, concludes a Cornell researcher. Such environmental degradation, coupled with the growth in world population, are major causes behind the rapid increase in human diseases..yet conservatives claim(without any compelling evidence) that we do not need regulation. Regulation would get in the way of their death panels by negligence.

VIDEO: Mitt Heaps Praise on Romneycare "Parent" Ted Kennedy


Ron Paul Calls Out Herman Cain For Lie Over Fed Audit During GOP Debate

Fannie-Backwards - How did Gretchen Morgenson, one of America's best financial reporters, get the story of Fannie Mae's role in the financial collapse so wrong? Despite having no facts conservatives are committed to the evil lie that poor Americans and Fannie May caused the recession, deflecting blame from their pals on Wall Street.

Why Are Conservatives Such Freaks - Herman Cain’s weird opinion columns published by birther website

Herman Cain’s weird opinion columns published by birther website

Apparently for two years now Herman Cain’s been writing an opinion column that is published at hilarious birther conspiracy website WorldNetDaily, and no one noticed this, except for Yahoo’s Chris Moody.

WND has published 113 Cain columns. The site advertises the columns as “exclusive commentary” from Cain, which led Moody to report initially that Cain was writing the columns for WND. Of course, in a very WND twist, it is just making up the “exclusive commentary” thing, because it makes up everything: Cain’s columns are syndicated by North Star Writers Group.

But WorldNetDaily considers Cain one of is own. Cain seems to write the columns himself (or at least he did initially, before his campaign took off), unless his ghost is particularly fond of exclamation points. None of them involve birtherism, which for years now has been WND’s sole driving concern. (Cain did flirt with bitherism earlier this year, thanks mostly to Donald Trump, but he now believes the president is an American.)

    Farah, a friend of Cain’s for several years, told The Ticket that he has been surprised by Cain’s rise over the past few months. While Farah would not make an official endorsement, he said Cain is his “favorite” candidate.

Good work, Herman: You’ve got Farah’s support! That should be more than enough to overcome the fact that Cain is basically taking the month of October off from campaigning in order to sell his book, because this entire “presidential run” was basically done to create a little buzz around a burgeoning conservative media personality, and the fact that he’s now tied for second in the polls is due to the hilarious collapse of various other more “serious” campaigns.

The WND site's stable is crazy conspiracy theories that are filled with opinions and few facts. They know they cannot win a public debate so they create bizarre UnAmerican accusations that are like raw red meat to its loony followers. Cain fits right in. They believe that allowing more poisons in the air and water will be good for business and deny that those poisons cause breast cancer, childhood ailments and respiratory disease. They were the ones who pushed the crazy myth that former Hillary Clinton aid Vince Foster was murdered by Bill Clinton and his associates out of jealousy. They believe if American business do not pay their share of taxes to maintain our infrastructure that America will somehow still be able to function as a healthy free market economy.  They believe a lot of bull. They never seem to have the facts to back up what they believe. So crazy Cain should fit right in.

Conservative Republican Media Tell Bald-faced Lie About EPA and New Bureaucrats, Than Refuse To Correct Story

Conservative Republican Media Tell Bald-faced Lie About EPA and New Bureaucrats, Than Refuse To Correct Story

We talked earlier about the Daily Caller’s massive screw-up yesterday, on an important story about the Environmental Protection Agency. I figured the conservative outlet would grudgingly bury some awkwardly-worded correction and move on. I assumed wrong.

To briefly recap, the Daily Caller reported that the EPA is eyeing new greenhouse gas measures, which would in turn ask American taxpayers “to shoulder the burden of up to 230,000 new bureaucrats — at a cost of $21 billion — to attempt to implement the rules.” The piece was quickly embraced by the conservative message machine, with Fox News, National Review, and others trumpeting the story.

The problem, of course, is that the story isn’t true. The EPA, which only has 17,000 employees, is specifically “tailoring” its rule so that it won’t have to hire 230,000 officials. It’s right there in the court filings the Daily Caller relied on to publish its bogus piece.

Instead of backing off its obviously-wrong reporting, though, Daily Caller executive editor David Martosko is doubling down.

    “The EPA is well-known for expanding its reach, especially regarding greenhouse gas emissions. What’s ‘comically wrong’ is the idea that half of Washington won’t admit it. The EPA’s own court filing speaks volumes,” Martosko said in an email.

    “What’s more likely: that the Obama administration’s EPA wants to limit its own power, or that it’s interested in dramatically increasing its reach and budget? Anyone who has spent more than a few months in Washington knows the answer,” he added. “The suggestion that the EPA — this EPA in particular — is going to court to limit its own growth is the funniest thing I’ve seen since Nancy Grace’s nipple-slip.”

Look, I realize conservative media outlets like to play fast and loose with the facts. I also realize the right’s version of reality is often, shall we say, malleable.

But this is just ridiculous. Martosko is trying to make an argument based on assumptions and evidence-free predictions, and while I’m sure that’s more fun than journalism and abiding by professional ethics, the question here is plainly empirical. The Daily Caller reported — in black and white, and without qualifiers — that the EPA agency is “asking for taxpayers to shoulder the burden of up to 230,000 new bureaucrats.” Either that’s true or it’s not. What’s “well known” or perceived as “likely” is irrelevant. The claim is either accurate or it’s inaccurate.

And in this case, what the Daily Caller reported is plainly wrong.

It happens. Media outlets get things wrong. I’ve been a professional writer for a while and I’ve made plenty of embarrassing mistakes. The responsible thing to do is correct the record and try not to do it again.

The conservative media world, though, just doesn’t seem to care. It explains a great deal about why those who rely on outlets like these seem so woefully uninformed about current events.

Conservatives have a long history of contempt for ant efforts to protect American families and children to add a few more dollars to the bottom-line of corporations like Exxon - who already make millions in profits per day. Add to their contempt for the average American's health a morally bent attitude toward the truth and no wonder the right-wing conservative press just makes things up in their ongoing propaganda. Conservatives have been accusing descent hard working Americans of being socialists for years, yet they are the ones that act most like Stalin's old Politburo.