August 6, 2014

Scoring points: Fox reduces general’s murder to ‘a touchdown for the Taliban’ to slam Obama

The hosts of Fox & Friends on Wednesday politicized the death of an Army general as a “touchdown for the Taliban” so they could score some points against President Barack Obama.

“We had terrible news yesterday,” Fox News host Steve Doocy announced on Wednesday. “A Two Star General, Major General Harold Greene, was murdered at the military academy for Afghanistan training Afghanis to take over their own security.”

After playing a clip of Fox News White House Correspondent Ed Henry challenging White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest on the administration’s claim that progress was being made in Afghanistan, the camera returned to Doocy.

“Well, this is a huge touchdown for the Taliban,” Doocy opined.

more
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/08/06/scoring-points-fox-reduces-generals-murder-to-a-touchdown-for-the-taliban-to-slam-obama/

August 6, 2014

Dinesh D’Souza’s fever dream: Obama invented border crisis to kill America for his lefty pals

In an interview with USAWatchdog’s Greg Hunter, disgraced conservative commentator Dinesh D’Souza claimed that a petty President Barack Obama created the border crisis to “manipulate the goodness of the American people.”

In the wide-ranging interview, D’Souza claimed that Obama only went to Chicago in order to work under the tutelage of conservative bogeyman and alleged — though not actual — communist Saul Alinksy. “He’s somebody Obama heard about, and that’s why Obama kept going back to Chicago. Think about it — Obama has no roots in Chicago. He comes from Hawaii. He lived part of his life in Indonesia, but he kept going to Chicago because he heard about this guy, Alinsky,” D’Souza said.

“Who was Alinsky?” he asked. “He was basically a shakedown artist. He used to hang out with the mafia, and he realized what the mafia does–they shake people down for money. Alinsky said, how do I do that politically?”

D’Souza then said that this is exactly what the president has done with the situation at the Mexican border — “taken people of good will and put them into an impossible situation.” According to D’Souza, Obama “simply put out the word on the other side of the border that we are not that serious about enforcing the immigration laws. Moreover, we are trying to get amnesty for lawbreakers already in this country. Pretty soon, half the world shows up, and Obama throws up his hands and pretends, ‘How did they all come here?’”

more
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/08/06/dinesh-dsouzas-fever-dream-obama-invented-border-crisis-to-kill-america-for-his-commie-pals/

August 6, 2014

Ugandan lawmakers in campaign to revive gay law

Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Ugandan parliamentarians are launching a campaign to revive a recently invalidated anti-gay measure and hope to have it passed within weeks, a lawmaker said Wednesday.

About 150 lawmakers have promised to vote in support of the bill when parliament emerges from a recess later this month, said parliamentarian Latif Ssebaggala, who is collecting signatures from lawmakers who support the anti-gay measure.

Ssebaggala said he was treating the anti-gay measure as a “national priority” after a Ugandan court last week declared it illegal because it was passed during a parliamentary session that lacked a quorum.

The Constitutional Court didn’t rule on the substance of the law, so lawmakers are now able to reintroduce the same legislation, which allows for jail terms of up to life for homosexual offenses. Although the law had wide support among Ugandans, activists and watchdog group called the measure draconian and said it was unnecessary in a country where homosexuality had long been banned.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/ugandan_lawmakers_in_campaign_to_revive_gay_law/

August 6, 2014

Only 31 Voter Fraud Incidents Since 2000

A comprehensive investigation of voter impersonation finds 31 credible incidents out of one billion ballots cast

By Justin Levitt August 6 at 6:00 AM

Note: This is a guest post by Justin Levitt, a professor at the Loyola University Law School and an expert in constitutional law and the law of democracy, with a particular focus on election administration and redistricting.

Voter ID laws are back in the news once again, with two new opinions from the Wisconsin Supreme Court late last week dealing with the state's ID requirement, which would allow people to vote only if they provide certain forms of government-issued ID. The Court made some minor changes to the law but otherwise upheld it. However, the ID requirement is still on hold pending a federal lawsuit.

Part of this litigation — and any rational debate about the issue generally — hinges on two things: costs and benefits. The costs of these sorts of laws vary, because the laws themselves differ from state to state (some are far more burdensome than others). The ostensible benefits, though, are all the same. And in addressing these purported benefits, the Wisconsin Supreme Court blew it. Twice.

First, the court cited the idea that ID laws could enhance public confidence--that is, in theory, the laws might make us feel better about elections in that they might provide some security theater. It turns out, though, that this effect is hard to spot. People in states with more restrictive ID laws don’t generally feel better about their elections than people in more permissive states. People who think elections are being stolen, and people who think they’re not, each hold on to that opinion no matter what the governing ID rules in their area. The factor that really influences whether people think the elections are fair? Whether their preferred candidates win.

Second, the court said that ID laws can help stop fraud. It then cited an example of recent fraud … that ID laws aren’t designed to stop. Specifically, it mentioned a case in which a supporter of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker was charged with 13 counts of election fraud, including "registering to vote in more than one place, voting where he didn't live, voting more than once in the same election, and providing false information to election officials," according to an account by Talking Points Memo. Wisconsin's ID law would not likely have prevented any of the alleged violations.

more
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/08/06/a-comprehensive-investigation-of-voter-impersonation-finds-31-credible-incidents-out-of-one-billion-ballots-cast/

August 6, 2014

Conservatives get their Obamacare wish — and now condemn their own sabotage

Gov. Rick Scott bemoans premium hikes in Florida -- which were caused by his anti-Obamacare minions

SIMON MALOY

There was once a time – five months ago, to be precise – when the big fear surrounding the Affordable Care Act was that it would cause health insurance premiums to “skyrocket.” That, at least, was the terminology the Hill used in a headline for a story on its health policy blog, which quoted a handful of anonymous insurance executives in reporting that “ObamaCare-related premiums will double in some parts of the country, countering claims recently made by the administration.” The Hill’s report was eagerly shared and promoted by conservative and Republican opponents of the ACA, who waved it around as proof that the law was a disaster.

Despite all the fanfare, there was little reason to believe the Hill’s reporting. The ACA’s first open enrollment period was still going at that point, so there was no way to know how many Obamacare enrollees there were, their ages, their health status – all factors that go into calculating rate increases. Getting a better picture of what the rate adjustments for 2015 would like required waiting, and patience.

Well, now we’re starting to see the picture develop, and it looks very different from the 100-percent increases conservatives were secretly (or overtly) hoping for just a few months ago. PricewaterhouseCoopers put together a “preliminary look at 2015 individual market rate filings,” and they found that, for the 27 states for which data are available, the average premium increase will be 7.5 percent. It’s all preliminary, of course, but it’s a hell of a lot better than the Hill’s citation of a former insurance executive’s “gut” feeling. The New Republic’s Jonathan Cohn writes that “the experts I consulted all saw the available information as relatively encouraging, particularly in comparison to what many were predicting just a few months ago.”

more
http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/conservatives_get_their_obamacare_wish_and_now_condemn_their_own_sabotage/

August 5, 2014

Rand Paul: I Do Not Support Impeachment

By DANIEL STRAUSS Published AUGUST 5, 2014, 4:53 PM EDT

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) seems to be going against some of his Republican colleagues in the House concerning whether to impeach President Barack Obama: He's against it.

That's according to reporter Chris Moody.

Aaron Blake ✔ @AaronBlakeWP
Follow
RT @moody: In Iowa, Rand Paul asked about impeachment: "I do not support it."
3:57 PM - 5 Aug 2014

A number of other lawmakers, contrary to Paul, have suggested an openness to impeaching Obama.

State Sen. Jim Tracy, a Republican running to defeat two-term Rep. Scott DesJarlais, for instance, also said he would be open to impeaching the president.

more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/rand-paul-impeach-obama-against

August 5, 2014

Meghan McCain To Beck: Let’s Chat About How You’ve Divided The GOP

By NICOLE LAFOND Published AUGUST 5, 2014, 5:15 PM EDT

Meghan McCain said on Monday that she wants conservative pundit Glenn Beck to come on her digital news and lifestyle show to talk about all the "nasty things" he's said about fellow Republicans.

On her show, “TakePart Live” on Pivot, the daughter of Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) discussed Beck’s interview with CNN on Sunday, in which he admitted to saying “stupid things” during his time at Fox News and playing a role in further diving Democrats and Republicans.

“What you say on TV matters no matter who you are, and if you’re the type of person that’s going to divide America, which I believe Glenn Beck had a part in doing, are you taking culpability?” McCain asked.

She went on to blame Beck and other conservative media leaders for not only widening the gap between Democrats and Republicans, but also for dividing the Republican party.

more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/meghan-mccain-glenn-beck-gop

August 5, 2014

Russian Crime Ring Gains Internet Security Data on 1.2 Billion

Source: New York Times

A Russian crime ring has amassed the largest known collection of stolen Internet credentials, including 1.2 billion username and password combinations and more than 500 million email addresses, security researchers say.

The records, discovered by Hold Security, a firm in Milwaukee, include confidential material gathered from 420,000 websites, ranging from household names to small Internet sites. Hold Security has a history of uncovering significant hacks, including the theft last year of tens of millions of records from Adobe Systems.

Hold Security would not name the victims, citing nondisclosure agreements and a reluctance to name companies whose sites remained vulnerable. At the request of The New York Times, a security expert not affiliated with Hold Security analyzed the database of stolen credentials and confirmed it was authentic. Another computer crime expert who had reviewed the data, but was not allowed to discuss it publicly, said some big companies were aware that their records were among the stolen information.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/06/technology/russian-gang-said-to-amass-more-than-a-billion-stolen-internet-credentials.html?emc=edit_na_20140805

August 5, 2014

Rand Paul’s stunning cowardice: Wants to be president but fears a “dreamer”

While low-rent congressman Steve King debated a dreamer, Paul dropped his burger and ran. Not ready for prime time!

JOAN WALSH

Sen. Rand Paul has been getting lots of credit lately for his efforts to widen the GOP’s reach beyond its older white Christian base, speaking to the National Urban League and other African-American groups and even warning his party not to go “crazy” passing voter ID laws (though he later said he supported them).

But Paul hit some turbulence yesterday in Iowa, at a fundraiser for far-right immigration-reform foe Rep. Steve King. A young woman approached King and Paul and shook their hands, as a smiling Paul greeted her, then went back to enjoying a hamburger. But when she identified herself as a “dreamer,” things got weird. Paul, who was literally in the middle of a bite of his burger, seemed to almost cough it up – then he dropped it, and bolted from the table with an aide.

You’ve got to see it to believe it.

It’s probably on an endless loop in Sen. Ted Cruz’s office today. You might even see it in Cruz ads if the two men face off for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.

more
http://www.salon.com/2014/08/05/rand_pauls_stunning_cowardice_wants_to_be_president_but_fears_a_dreamer/

August 5, 2014

Greenwald: Megyn Kelly's Views Are 'Viscerally Repellent,' But She's Better Than Most On Cable

By TOM KLUDT Published AUGUST 5, 2014, 10:29 AM EDT

Glenn Greenwald's feelings on Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly are, well, mixed.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, who's been a passionate source of both reportage on the surveillance state and fierce media criticism, offered his thoughts on Kelly for a profile published Tuesday by Politico's Hadas Gold.

Greenwald said although he finds Kelly's views to be "viscerally repellent," he believes she "distinguishes" herself from her Fox colleagues and other cable news hosts.

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http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/glenn-greenwald-megyn-kelly-repellent