Mitt will tour the countries where his money is hidden. He will avoid any place where they might ask difficult questions. By the way, Anne Romney is complaining that the prez is out to destroy her Mitt. Gee, someone bashed for three years, with lies and distortion, is calling out the position-less Romney for his lack of just about anything that would make him presidential. Whoda thunk it.

A Conservative friend on FB posted to crow about how Romney raised over $3 million in the 24 hours after the SCOTUS health reform ruling. ... The Right keeps finding new ways to blow my mind with cognitive dissonance.

Re: Conspiracy: 1) The 2nd Amendment conspiracy, whose advocates point triumphantly to the utter paucity of evidence as proof positive, cannot be discussed in rational terms. There's no more talking about it without lending credence to it. 2) Disclosure; the HuffPost link pretty much says it all. These are the same folks who publicize names and addresses of abortion providers because they maintain that arson and murder are protected speech. 3) Roberts, C.J.; religious/ideological zealots and loyalty oath pushers can't conceive of anyone disagreeing with them for other than an evil reason. An independent and impartial judiciary is not only evil when it disagrees with them, it's literally unconstitutional, Article III of the constitution notwithstanding.

Rachel, why is it that lawmakers are even considering cutting aid to poor and middle class families during this economic crisis?

In the aftermath of a hurricane, earthquake, tornado or other natural disaster, do we not give aid to those that have suffered the loss of a home or family? Why is it during this "Economic Disaster" we are suffering the lawmakers think its the right time to cut aid that directly affects those suffering the most? All to balance a long term debt crisis that the UK clearly proves is the wrong thing to do.

For myself, I say "No".

And for any lawmaker pushing cuts to services I say,

"What is wrong with you? Did some economic fairy magically put everyone back to work and settle everyone's mortgage problems? Maybe you think we are all well-off now because you think we all have hedge fund managers and stock portfolios. Well, I don't and neither do the rest of us. So STOP cutting and START creating jobs! Your constituents are all on Main Street, not Wall Street! And if that is a problem for you then you need to be replaced."

About that whole, Scranton "many workers have already said that without their normal paychecks, they will not be able to pay monthly bills" thing: That's kinda the point, folks.

The average salary in Scranton is $43,975/yr, and it's slightly higher than the national average. That still means that about a quarter of the population lives on half that, or $21,988. The poverty level for 2012 is $23,050. So, even though Scranton is doing well compared to other cities nationally, there's still a large population that already can't support themselves. They always live in the situation that the public workers don't want to enter into temporarily - even with a promise of payback.

By adding those who serve the union population into the pool of those who aren't correctly salaried for survival, Chris Doherty may do more than just temporarily ease the strain on the city's coffers. He may end up successfully calling national attention to just how improbable a successful, enriching lifestyle is at such a low salary. Should the lawsuit be successful, and not just because of prior bargaining, but also in part be successful because the salaries are found to not provide such things as:

• The ability to feed a family
• The ability to pay for insurance and other medically-related services
• The ability to pay for child care, a necessity for a single parent to work
• The ability to pay mortgages, loans, and other bills that left unpaid will destroy credit

the result may mean national news about the suit itself. It seems very few attempts have been made to show legally that the minimum wage so negatively affects a whole class of people. It also seems that, unintentionally, Scranton's union members in this case may be bargaining for those less fortunate than themselves.

I am not one to know the small details involving delegate commitment at the Republican convention but I did have a thought that I wish someone could tell me how far off base I might be.

Romney is the nominee even though the convention has yet to happen and Romney officially crowned as their fella. Given the difficulties of late in attacking "Obamacare" among other things and the establishment Republican resistance to Romney as candidate I wonder if there is a way to have a far different outcome from the convention? Are there enough delegates with the freedom to cast their vote elsewhere? Could pressure be put on Romney to bow out even at that late date in favor of a Jeb Bush or Mitch Daniels? Could the Republican candidate be someone other than Romney in the end?

If anyone knows the details on how this all works and can put this thought to rest I'd appreciate it. I already have nightmares about a Romney administration without having new possibilities to torment me!

I agree there needs to be some changes in the farm subsidies but why do we ignore the subsidies of the oil companies but want to slam farmers? Why do we only want to protect sugar? No matter what happens in life every human needs food to survive and yet we want to cut in an area that helps provide basic human needs. Just reinforces, in my mind, the fact that conservatives would like to get rid of a lot of people in this country and if they die of starvation or disease brought on by lack of healthy food so be it.