deminks
deminks's JournalThe Man Behind Gingrich’s Money
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/us/politics/the-man-behind-gingrichs-money.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes&seid=autoThe trip to Jordan by a group of United States congressmen was supposed to be a chance for them to meet the newly crowned King Abdullah II. But their tour guide had a more complicated agenda.
The guide was Sheldon Adelson, a Las Vegas casino magnate who helped underwrite trips to the Middle East to win support for Israel in Congress. On this occasion in 1999, as the lawmakers enjoyed a reception at the Royal Palace in Amman, Mr. Adelson and an aide retreated to a private room with the king.
(snip)
In 2006, when Mr. Gingrich began laying the groundwork for a possible run for the presidency, Mr. Adelson provided $1 million in seed money for his political committee, American Solutions for Winning the Future. Mr. Adelson donated an additional $2 million the next year; his contributions to the group have totaled more than $7 million.
During the 2008 election cycle, Mr. Adelson became recognized as a top-tier donor to the right and a moneyed villain to the left. He was the primary financier of a conservative nonprofit group, Freedoms Watch, which trumpeted plans to spend as much as $200 million on the presidential election. Those plans, however, fizzled as internal problems paralyzed the organization, with Mr. Adelson micromanaging the groups efforts, Republican operatives familiar with the organization said at the time. The group still spent about $30 million through early 2008, almost all of which came from Mr. Adelson, according to the operatives.
Today, the Venetian and the adjoining Sands Convention Center have become default destinations for Republican events in Las Vegas.
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Elizabeth Drew: Can We Have a Democratic Election?
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2012/feb/23/can-we-have-democratic-election/?pagination=falseBeneath the turbulent political spectacle that has captured so much of the nations attention lies a more important question than who will get the Republican nomination, or even who will win in November: Will we have a democratic election this year? Will the presidential election reflect the will of the people? Will it be seen as doing soand if not, what happens? The combination of broadscale, coordinated efforts underway to manipulate the election and the previously banned unlimited amounts of unaccountable money from private or corporate interests involved in those efforts threatens the democratic process for picking a president. The assumptions underlying that processthat there is a right to vote, that the system for nominating and electing a president is essentially fairare at serious risk.
In all of the excitement over the Republicans sweep of the 2010 electionstheir recapture of the House of Representatives, the decrease in the Democrats margin in the Senate, and the emergence of the Tea Party as a national forcemost of us missed the significance of their victories in the states. The Republicans took control of both the governorship and the legislature in twelve states; ten states were already under Republican control. The Republican-controlled states undertook quite similar efforts to tilt the outcome of the presidential election in their partys favor by denying the right to vote to groups that traditionally voted Democraticminorities, the elderly, and students.
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Just as the benevolent casino owner helped Gingrich stay in the race, Rick Santorum was similarly blessed. By any objective standard Santorum had no business being in the presidential race. His mediocre Senate record and his scratchy intolerance of opposing views on social issues were bound to get him in trouble. Santorum not only opposed abortion without the federally required exception for rape or the life of the mother, but he even opposed contraceptives, saying that the states should regulate them.
Having come triumphantly from Iowa, where he was first announced to have nearly tied Romney (only to have it announced more than two weeks later that he had won), Santorum found himself facing less sympathetic audiences in New Hampshire, particularly young people, and he was often met with boos. Santorums dismal vote in New Hampshire (he came in fifth) would ordinarily have sent a candidate home. But he was able to fight on in South Carolina thanks to the generosity of Foster Freiss, a billionaire mutual fund tycoon in Wyoming. Freiss gave the Santorum Super PAC the Red, White, and Blue Fund $1 million to keep going. According to Politico, Freiss issued instructions on the types of ads it should run while traveling in Santorums entourage.
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‘Dead’ Voter Talking: O’Keefe Voter Fraud Stunt Confused 23-Year-Old For Dead 84-Year-Old
http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/01/okeefe_voter_fraud_stunt_confused_23-year-old_for_dead_84-year-old.phpRobert William Beaulieu is 23-years-old, lives in Nashua, New Hampshire, and is a registered Democrat. Hes also very much not dead.
But you wouldnt have known that if you watched the lastest undercover sting video from James OKeefes Project Veritas, which featured a man with an Irish accent attempting to obtain a ballot on behalf of a Robert Beaulieu who lives on Cassandra Lane.
Thats the home University of New Hampshire graduate Robert W. Beaulieu, pictured above, shares with his parents. Robert P. Beaulieu, unrelated, died a few months back at the age of 84, and is apparently the man Project Vertitas investigator intended to impersonate. By all appearances, they got the wrong guy.
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Theres four of us, everyone is alive, joked Beaulieus brother Timothy William Beaulieu, who first noticed that his brothers name and address being used by a man with an Irish accent during a segment on Current TV this week.
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So, let me get this straight, Little Jimmy O sets out to impersonate dead people voting, but gets the wrong guy, who's living, and whose family watches Current TV.
Sometimes comedy writes itself.
Which carries a longer jail sentence? Impersonating a dead person at the polls, filming people without their knowledge, or impersonating living people?
N.H. widow shocked by ploy at polls
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/us_politics/view/20220112id_theft_at_polls_stuns_nh_widow/A grieving New Hampshire widow said she was stunned to learn her beloved husbands identity was used for a political gotcha just 10 days after his death.
Thats awful, Rachel Groux said. Why should they use his name? They shouldnt use anybodys name alive or deceased.
Activist filmmaker James OKeefe secretly recorded video showing his operative using Roger Grouxs name and address to obtain a Republican ballot at Manchester polls Tuesday. The U.S. Navy veteran died Dec. 31 at an assisted living home. His family held funeral services Monday, his widow said. Oh my God, I know what he would say, Call the cops, call the police, Rachel Groux said.
City officials may have not received notification in time to remove Groux from voter lists, said Manchester City Clerk Matthew Normand.
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O'Keefe is despicable.
Vanity Fair: The Meaning of Mitt
http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/2012/02/mitt-romney-201202(snip)
The Book of Mitt
If Romney is exceedingly comfortable around family and close friends, hes much less so around those he doesnt know well, drawing a boundary thats difficult to traverse. Its a strict social orderus and themthat has put co-workers, political aides, casual acquaintances, and others in his professional circles, even people who have worked with or known him for years, outside the bubble. As a result, he has numerous admirers but, by several accounts, not a long list of close pals. Hes very engaging and charming in a small group of friends hes comfortable with, said one former aide. When hes with people he doesnt know, he gets more formal. And if its a political thing where he doesnt know anybody, he has a mask. For those outside the inner circle, Romney comes across as all business. Colleagues at work or political staffers are there to do a job, not to bond. Mitt is always the star, said one Massachusetts Republican. And everybody else is a bit player. He has little patience for idle chatter or small talk, little interest in mingling at cocktail parties, at social functions, or even in the crowded hallway. He is not fed by, and does not crave, casual social interaction, often displaying little desire to know who people are and what makes them tick. He wasnt overly interested in peoples personal details or their kids or spouses or team building or their career path, said another former aide. It was all very friendly but not very deep. Or, as one fellow Republican put it, He has that invisible wall between me and you. Referring to the time later when Romney was governor of Massachusetts, a Democratic lawmaker recalls, You remember Richard Nixon and the imperial presidency? Well, this was the imperial governor. There were the ropes that often curtailed access to Romney and his chambers. The elevator settings restricted access to his office. The tape on the floor told people exactly where to stand during events. This was the controlled environment that Romney created. His orbit was his own. We always would talk about how, among the legislators, he had no idea what our names werenone, the lawmaker said, because he was so far removed from the day-to-day operations of state government.
(snip)
Hayes was deeply insulted. She told him she would never surrender her child. Sure, her life wasnt exactly the picture of Rockwellian harmony, but she felt she was on a path to stability. In that moment, she also felt intimidated. Here was Romney, who held great power as her church leader and was the head of a wealthy, prominent Belmont family, sitting in her gritty apartment making grave demands. And then he says, Well, this is what the church wants you to do, and if you dont, then you could be excommunicated for failing to follow the leadership of the church,? Hayes recalled. It was a serious threat. At that point Hayes still valued her place within the Mormon Church. This is not playing around, she said. This is not like You dont get to take Communion. This is like You will not be saved. You will never see the face of God.? Romney would later deny that he had threatened Hayes with excommunication, but Hayes said his message was crystal clear: Give up your son or give up your God.
Not long after, Hayes gave birth to a son. She named him Dane. At nine months old, Dane needed serious, and risky, surgery. The bones in his head were fused together, restricting the growth of his brain, and would need to be separated. Hayes was scared. She sought emotional and spiritual support from the church once again. Looking past their uncomfortable conversation before Danes birth, she called Romney and asked him to come to the hospital to confer a blessing on her baby. Hayes was expecting him. Instead, two people she didnt know showed up. She was crushed. I needed him, she said. It was very significant that he didnt come. Sitting there in the hospital, Hayes decided she was finished with the Mormon Church. The decision was easy, yet she made it with a heavy heart. To this day, she remains grateful to Romney and others in the church for all they did for her family. But she shudders at what they were asking her to do in return, especially when she pulls out pictures of Dane, now a 27-year-old electrician in Salt Lake City. Theres my baby, she said.
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Ladies and Gents, the Lead Clown in the Clown Car.
Karl Rove: “Climate Is Gone”
from 2010 first thing out of KKKarl's mouth after the 2010 mid term election.
http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2010/11/05/206992/karl-rove-climate-is-gone/
Karl Rove, former consigliere to the worst president of the modern era, who has done as much as anyone to help destroy a livable climate for our children, blurted out the awful truth this week. Brad Johnson has the the story.
Republican strategist Karl Rove, who helped organize the outside groups that spent millions to install Republicans in the midterm elections, spent election day celebrating with Pennsylvanias growing drilling industry. Like other corporate sectors, the fossil industry is hoping that Republicans will be able to roll back regulations that limit their profit-seeking at the expense of peoples health and safety. Rove told the attendees of a shale-gas conference in Philadelphia that the incoming Republican House of Representatives sure as heck wont pass legislation to limit greenhouse pollution from fossil fuels:
Climate is gone, said Rove, the keynote speaker on the opening day of a two-day shale-gas conference sponsored by Hart Energy Publishing L.L.P. And Rove told the trade show, I dont think you need to worry the new Congress will consider proposed legislation to put the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing under federal rather than state regulation. The procedure, known as fracking, is responsible for the dramatic growth of shale-gas drilling in formations such as Pennsylvanias vast Marcellus Shale.
Santorum tells Iowans: ‘I don’t want to make black people’s lives better’
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/01/02/santorum-tells-iowans-i-dont-want-to-make-black-peoples-lives-better/Speaking to Republicans in Iowa on Monday, former Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA) said his administration would reform welfare to the point that it would offer no welfare at all.
After suggesting that an expansion of Medicare is really just a plot to make voters more dependent on Washington, Santorum added: I dont want to make black peoples lives better by giving them other peoples money.
I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn their money and provide for themselves and their families, he added. The best way to do that is to get the manufacturing sector of the economy rolling.
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and the crowd cheers.
video at the link.
DNC Top 5 Mitt Fits of 2011.
Mitt does NOT like to be interrupted when he thinks he is speaking. Anderson??!!!1!!!
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