Today's edition of quick hits:
* Warnings were ignored: "U.S. officials tell NBC News that at least one person was killed and three others injured when a U.S. Navy ship, the USNS Rappahannock, opened fire on a small boat about 10 miles offshore from Dubai in the Persian Gulf on Monday."
* Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrapped up meetings with Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, who said Egypt will respect its international treaties, before arriving in Israel.
* This probably isn't good: "With a terse four-paragraph statement, North Korea on Monday announced the dismissal of its top military leader, the latest in what analysts describe as a series of increasingly bold shake-ups to strengthen support for young leader Kim Jong Eun."
* When President Obama delivered his full stump speech in the rain in Virginia, it remided me of the second season of "The West Wing" and I kind of wondered whether Aaron Sorkin had started writing reality.
* Not encouraging: "Retail sales fell by 0.5 percent month over month in June, government data showed Monday, in a sign that concerns about the struggling recovery, and especially jobs, are taking their toll on consumer outlays."
* Rick Scott's purge gets a boost: "The federal government has granted Florida election officials access to a database of noncitizen residents for use in Republican-backed efforts to remove people who are not American citizens from voter registration rolls."
* Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) keeps poking Grover Norquist with a stick.
* In Japan's largest anti-nuclear rally since the disaster at Fukushima, "tens of thousands of protesters gathered Monday at a central Tokyo park to urge the government to halt its restart of the nation's reactor fleet."
* And in advance of Wednesday's House Financial Services Committee hearing with Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, members will get a private tutorial tomorrow on what the LIBOR scandal means.
Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
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These folks (too many of them) are unable to state that our president is a U.S. citizen, so what is going to stop them from using the same thought process for registered voters? The folks in election offices are going to be busy and the state will have what employees sifting through the federal date bases?
I am so confused, first the state rights, then SCOTUS overrides states' rights, then the federal data base will be used for state elections, some states are not allowed to limit campaign spending…
McConnell wanted disclosure, now he doesn't…. not confused really, but partisan politics is killing the foundation of the country, democracy.
The desire to win elections overriding the process, then say the secrecy for the donors, but the voters need gov't. photo I.D.
"The federal government has granted Florida election officials access to a database of noncitizen residents for use in Republican-backed efforts to remove people who are not American citizens from voter registration rolls."
This is the kind of thing, and maybe the only thing, that will give Romney a win.
I find the Obama administration's handling of Florida to be as sly as a fox. The person who is legally able to vote and is denied will win the Voter Suppression lottery. The possibilities for human error are inevitable. How much will that cost Florida? Ooooh, the plot thickens.
mmm2: Right, but Romney could still win and be settled, by court if necessary, as having won regardless of voter suppression consequences.
Not that this is proof of voter fraud, but did you see the funny story on the newwires today about the group called the Voter Participation Center - which focuses on getting young people, minorities and women registered - sent out voter registration forms to a couple of dogs....including one that died in 1998. I heard the owner of the deceased dog on the radio today and she said it was funny and amazing that she got the form for her dog since she moved TWICE since the dog died 14 years ago. I do understand that the group paid for mailing lists so this mistake is understandable, but what I find hilarious is that DOGS are on mailing lists. :)
No, not at all.
This is what the woman said:
Where's the logic? Fishing for votes? If people are eligible to vote, what is wrong with them being sent registration forms?
As far as the dog being sent a registration form, obviously the owner filled out some kind of form, perhaps a subscription to K-9 monthly, with the dogs name and her last name. Which is silly. Pets are not part of the family lineage.
I agree Rollo...I did not bring up the fishing for votes quote because I thought it was a stupid statement. I only brought it up for the humor in the story. You're probably right about how her dog got on the mailing list, but the dog has been dead for over a decade. You would think that the firm that sells mailing lists out would at least update every 10 years or so. :)
Oh no... once you're on a mailing list, you're on it for eternity. The same with e-mail spam; not even God himself could stop that.
Funny....:)
Skip
I still get mail for people who have been dead for decades not just one decade but mulitiply decades. It happens. <sigh>
I wonder who may care so little about his/her future political career that she/he would agree to be Mitt's running mate?
When President Obama delivered his full stump speech in the rain in Virginia, it remided me of the second season of "The West Wing" and I kind of wondered whether Aaron Sorkin had started writing reality.
A retroactive presidency was in the making?
@!$%# Grover Norquist.
That is all.
Fornicating with that tool? I wouldn't wish that fate on anyone.
See you all at the polls-if they let you in. Patriotic bunch are they not?
Just a couple of thoughts about the shooting of the small boat in the Persian Gulf. Wouldn't it be a lot better if we were not there in the 1st place to protect oil supply lines. I wonder what it cost to keep the military presence there and add that to the price of a gallon of gas.
Actually Tom it was a Navy refueling ship that the small boat was approaching and apparently at a high speed - at least that's what the official word is.
I guess if we did get out of there and NOT protect the oil supply lines, I would imagine that rouge nations and/or pirate types could choke off or at least bring down the amount of oil coming out of that region and that in itself would probably add to the cost of gas since there would be less on the global market - sort of a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario.
Skip, I really believe we will be stuck there for quite awhile. Some thoughts I had in mind before I posted before was the republicans yelling drill baby drill and people mocking Obama when he suggested the easiest thing people could do to use less fuel was to keep their tires properly inflated.
Just frustration on my part on not seeing more focus on alternate energies.
(sarcasm alert!)
Hey buddy, doncha know that "alternate energies" are eleetist and UNAMURRICAN!!!
I watched EVS26 video from May 2012 where conservative Bob Lutz said there should be no stigma for electric vehicles, but it's an energy security issue.
http://events.ntpshow.com/evs26/public/MainHall.aspx?ID=5124&sortMenu=101000
This is long (about an hour), but sort of interesting panel discussion. Electric Vehicles are getting better and are demand driven. Too bad the price is so high because their investment, but long term would pay off if people would stop trying to point out the warts on them as deterrent. It would not be so hard to envision larger vehicles for those who need them, just put more batteries in the larger vehicles. The Tesla has how many batteries? 11?
http://webarchive.teslamotors.com/display_data/TeslaRoadsterBatterySystem.pdf
Technically, this is off topic, but...
The "Those who sign the backs of checks" thread has been taken over by trolls. I sent the following email to the rachel@msnbc.com address, not that they will care.
I doubt that anyone will care, not even Steve Benen, but there is an unusual amount of really vicious troll activity (complete with the "mad cow" epithet) on this thread. It never ceases to amaze me that you people don't seem to care that trolls routinely use this blog as a toilet.
According to an article by the Huffington Post, [“…Romney Tax Plans Propose Unfunded Corporate Rate Cuts”, 2/22/2012] Romney’s corporate tax reform plan, suggests that he, and the GOP, do not think Bush-tax cuts for corporate America were big ‘enough’ to work.
The article states, ‘Moreover, the Romney plan's shift to a so-called territorial international corporate tax system would in fact create an incentive for U.S. corporations to funnel money through offshore accounts to avoid paying taxes. Under the existing U.S. system, companies that stash money in the Cayman Islands do not pay taxes on it until it is brought back to the United States. Under a territorial system, companies never have to pay taxes on those profits, whether they bring them back to the U.S. or not.’
"It's just a permanent exemption from tax," said Rebecca Wilkins, senior counsel for federal tax policy at the nonpartisan nonprofit Citizens for Tax Justice, reports Huffington.
‘In his proposal, Obama called for eliminating dozens of different tax deductions. He also wants to impose a minimum tax on multinational corporations so they cannot shelter profits overseas.’ [“Obama, Romney offer contrasting tax plans”, The Washington Post, February 22, 2012]
(Too bad Romney and the Republican leadership will not work to compromise with the Democrats for tax cuts for some of the smaller corporations, and the less of the wealthier, while agreeing to end tax cuts for the billionaires and biggest corporations. It looks like the Obama Administration beat the Republican’s to the punch, when it comes to cutting business taxes for mid-size businesses.)
I'm seeing and hearing on different news outlets and blog posts, the term "Swiftboating" Romney. I don't think it's clever, cute, or accurate. When I think of swiftboating I think of all the lies used for a smear campaign against a vet by people that never left American soil to do anything in support of our country.
I think using that term is telling people that the Obama campaign is using lies against Romney. Swiftboating = Lies. Stop trying to be cute teapubs.
The people who are using that term to pretend that Romney is a victim do not care that it isn't cute, clever or accurate. It only has to be effective.
Whats todays name for Al Capone and Framk Nitti? Sheldon Adelson and Willard Romney
I also don't think this is Swiftboating but Romney has much better chance to win and latest polls support my claim http://www.pollheadlines.com/electoral-map.php
That's not what the polls say: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/us/general_election_romney_vs_obama-1171.html In every poll but the always-biased Rasmussen and the WSJ, Obama is on top. So, you might want to hit REAL polling sites.