Tuesday Reads

Posted: May 24, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: child sexual abuse, children, morning reads, Republican presidential politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 34 Comments

Good Morning!! I know I shouldn’t keep complaining about my weather, with all the tornadoes and floods in other places, but I sure wish we’d get a little bit of spring here in Beantown. It has been raining almost every day for the past couple of weeks. We had 1-1/2 nice days on Friday and Saturday, and then went back to rainy and soggy. Tomorrow it’s supposed to be 80 degrees, but still raining. And it’s rain, rain, and more rain for the foreseeable future. Ugh! This kind of weather tends to make the news seem even more depressing than usual.

A couple of days ago, Sima posted a wonderful story about a fawn that was rescued by firefighters. That really cheered me up, so I decided to offer you some heartwarming animal rescue stories this morning.

72-Year Old Florida Man Saves Pet Dog from Alligator Attack

Gary Murphy, 72, was at his home in Palm City, about 80 miles north of Miami, on Thursday evening when he heard his West Highland terrier named “Doogie” making noise in the backyard.

Murphy found his beloved pet in the mouth of an alligator that had entered the yard from marshland behind the property, and launched a rescue bid by jumping on the reptile’s backing and hitting it on the head.

“I had loafers on and I hit the back of that gator. It was like jumping on a pile of rocks,” Murphy told the newspaper.

The alligator let go of Doogie, who needed veterinary treatment for deep gouges, lung injuries and liver damage, but was expected to make a full recovery.

Nemo

Kitten Rescued From Island In Detroit Park

The Michigan Humane Society said animal rescuers used a canoe to reach a kitten that was stranded Monday on an island in Detroit’s Palmer Park.

The organization said it didn’t know how the three-month kitten got there, or how long it had been stuck.

The kitten’s rescuers have named him Nemo.

He was taken to the MHS Detroit Center for Animal Care and checked out by veterinarians, who said he’s in good health.

Animal rescue team dispatched to Joplin

The Humane Society of Missouri is deploying a 15-person disaster response team to Joplin, Missouri to rescue and shelter pets affected by Sunday’s devastating tornado.

The team is made up of trained professionals, as well as a veterinarian to help care for sick and injured animals.

The HSMO field assessment team will work in conjunction with Joplin Animal Control and the Jasper County Emergency Management Agency to operate an animal shelter on the campus of Missouri Southern State University and to set up a separate pet shelter to care for hundreds of animals who are unable to be sheltered at MSSU.

For more information on donations to help this and future needs, please visit the Humane Society of Missouri’s website.

In other news, the Obama administration is raising objections to the new Indiana law that bans all government assistance to Planned Parenthood.

The changes in Indiana are subject to federal review and approval, and administration officials have made it clear they will not approve the changes in the form adopted by the state.

Federal officials have 90 days to act but may feel pressure to act sooner because Indiana is already enforcing its law, which took effect on May 10, and because legislators in other states are working on similar measures.

If a state Medicaid program is not in compliance with federal law and regulations, federal officials can take corrective action, including “the total or partial withholding” of federal Medicaid money. The mere threat of such a penalty is often enough to get states to comply. Actually imposing the penalty would, in many cases, hurt the very people whom Medicaid is intended to help.

Hmmm… that doesn’t sound so good. Isn’t there a better way? Fortunately, Mitch Daniels isn’t going to run for President. Tim Pawlenty is running, however, and a Minnesota reporter, Nick Pinto, has published a couple of embarrassing stories in honor of Pawlenty’s throwing his hat in the presidential ring.

Jeremy Giefer, accused child molester, got Pawlenty pardon to open childcare center

Child molester Giefer and friend Tim Pawlenty

Jeremy Giefer served time in jail in 1994 for having sex with a 14-year-old girl. But you wouldn’t know it to look at the record of the man now charged with sexually molesting his daughter more than 250 times over the last eight years.

That’s because two years ago, Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Attorney General Lori Swanson, and then-Chief Justice Eric Magnuson unanimously voted to wipe Giefer’s record clean, granting him a pardon extraordinary.

One reason Giefer wanted his record cleared? His wife wanted to open a childcare center in the house where they live–the same house where Giefer allegedly molested his young daughter throughout the six years prior.

Watch Nick Ayers, Tim Pawlenty’s presidential campaign manager, get arrested for DWI [VIDEO]

Back in the fall of 2006, Ayers, then only 24, was running the reelection campaign of Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue.

On October 25, just days before the election, Trooper First Class J.W. Rickett of the Georgia State Patrol saw Ayers’ Chevy Tahoe weaving and doing 50 in a 35-mph zone. Rickett followed the truck, which turned into a parking lot, sped up, and nearly hit another vehicle in an apparent effort to hide.

As the dash-cam video of the incident shows, Ayers’ first words to Rickett are: “We’re with Governor Perdue’s campaign headquarters.”

Ayers claims he’s only had one Jack Daniels and Diet Coke, but Rickett’s report states he smelled strongly of alcohol.

Ayers’ association with the governor apparently doesn’t impress the trooper, who puts him through a field sobriety test, which he fails.

Ayers then refuses to take a breath test, so he’s arrested and put in handcuffs.

You can watch the video at the link.

This is a strange one from Raw Story: Alan Greenspan had to be convinced that he existed before meeting Ayn Rand

A friend had to convince Greenspan that he actually existed prior to a meeting with Ayn Rand in the 1950s.

Nathaniel Branden told the story about Greenspan in the BBC 2 documentary “All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace,” according to The Spectator. Part one of the three part series premiered Monday.

“You have to realize that Alan Greenspan was, and is, a brilliant mind doing brilliant things in the real world but in his 20s he is sitting with me in my apartment telling me that he cannot say with certainty that he exists, he cannot say for certain that I exist and he cannot say for certain that this conversation exists,” Branden recalled.

“That aside he’s got lots of opinions about everything… My challenge became to persuade him that he can be certain that he exists,” he explained.

Apparently, Ayn Rand didn’t like Greenspan much, but Brandon convinced her to allow him to join her group anyway. Greenspan went on to make major contributions to the destruction of the economy of the United States of America.

The U.S. Supreme Court wouldn’t help a poor young girl who was forced to cheer for her rapist, but today they ordered the state of California to release tens of thousands of convicts from state prisons because of overcrowding.

The court gave the state two years to shrink the number of prisoners by more than 33,000 and two weeks to submit a schedule for achieving that goal. The state now has 143,335 inmates, according to Cate.

Monday’s 5-4 ruling, upholding one of the largest such orders in the nation’s history, came with vivid descriptions of indecent care from the majority and outraged warnings of a “grim roster of victims” from some in the minority.

In presenting the decision, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, a Sacramento native, spoke from the bench about suicidal prisoners being held in “telephone booth-sized cages without toilets” and others, sick with cancer or in severe pain, who died before being seen by a doctor. As many as 200 prisoners may live in a gymnasium, and as many as 54 may share a single toilet, he said.

Kennedy, whose opinion was joined by his four liberal colleagues, said the state’s prisons were built to hold 80,000 inmates, but were crowded with as many 156,000 a few years ago.

If they let small-time drug users go, that would be fine with me, but I hope they continue to keep Charlie Manson, Tex Watson, Patricia Krenwinkel, and Leslie van Houten behind bars, along with other vicious murders.

I’ll end with the latest rapture news: Radio host says Rapture actually coming in October

California preacher Harold Camping said Monday his prophecy that the world would end was off by five months because Judgment Day actually will come on October 21.

Camping, who predicted that 200 million Christians would be taken to heaven Saturday before the Earth was destroyed, said he felt so terrible when his doomsday prediction did not come true that he left home and took refuge in a motel with his wife. His independent ministry, Family Radio International, spent millions — some of it from donations made by followers — on more than 5,000 billboards and 20 RVs plastered with the Judgment Day message.

But Camping said that he’s now realized the apocalypse will come five months after May 21, the original date he predicted. He had earlier said Oct. 21 was when the globe would be consumed by a fireball.

{Sigh…}

So what are you reading and blogging about today?

Republicans in Wonderland

Posted: May 21, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Economy | Tags: , , , , , , , | 21 Comments

Republicans embrace and peddle voodoo economic memes whereever they can.  They all hold Ronald Reagan up as the godfather of great economics.  Just look at that graph to determine who exactly is responsible for the current deficit which they all think is a terrible problem.  Even odder are their “unorthodox”  economic policy prescriptions.  Here’s some of the more egregious suggestions as provided by Politico.

The Republican field is filled with potential candidates who have called for radical overhauls of the tax code, the abolition of the IRS, an end to the Federal Reserve central bank— and even a return to the gold standard.

Oddly enough, Mitt Romney is the only one that actually talks real economics.  The rest of them are in some bizarro world where math never adds up.  If Tim Pawlenty hasn’t disappeared by 6 pm CST, we may have to deal with his odd views in a debate where odd views will prevail.  Pawlenty is scheduled to announce his candidacy on Monday.

In one particularly striking recent moment, former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty railed against “fiat currency” in a recent appearance on Fox — a signal to a narrow constituency of voters who believe that America’s woes began when it abandoned the gold standard in the 1930s. He also has gone on the record supporting a flat tax — a single-rate income tax that would eliminate the bracket system. The single tax rate for all is a simple concept but would probably involve wiping out the current tax code — including many popular deductions and credits — just to generate enough revenue.

“I support a flatter tax rate. I don’t know if we can get to a flat tax in one leap, but moving in a flatter, more transparent direction, absolutely,” Pawlenty said on Larry Kudlow’s CNBC show in March.

Newt Gingrich has also indicated support for an across the board 15% flat tax.

Gov. Mitch Danielscalled for a value-added national sales tax paired with a flat tax. (Jon Huntsman passed a flat tax as governor of Utah, but hasn’t articulated a national platform.) And Paul wants no income or sales taxes at all, envisioning a government funded with tariffs, highway fees and excise taxes.

Further into the field, the plans get more exotic.

Herman Cain has backed the ‘Fair Tax’ plan, a proposal with a small, well-organized and vocal constituency, which would impose a national sales tax of just under 25 percent and abolish the income tax system. He has also backed a possible return to the gold standard — but only after we “significantly pay down our national debt, stabilize and grow our economy,” spokeswoman Ellen Carmichael told POLITICO.

 Our economy has always used a progressive tax rate.  We’ve never really considered value-added taxes or national sales taxes because we know these kinds of taxes hit the poor hardest.  Social Security is about the only real regressive tax that’s been enacted. However, disabling a reasonable capital gains tax has giving enormous wealth to the major rich who receive bonuses and inherit trust funds.  The suggested Republican tax schemes are most likely unworkable and would hit the middle class hard.  This would be especially true of those who are financing homes.

The odd calls for gold standards, eliminating the Federal Reserve Bank, and possibly even ending fiat currency are all insane suggestions that shouldn’t even merit a public platform.  Academic research has indicated that monetary policy has been mostly effective since the 1980s in achieving its intent.  Also, the Fed’s structure and laws have been copied by every other economic entity that’s formed within recent history because it’s been so successful. The most important aspect is to keep monetary policy out of the hands of politicians.

“Fiscal policy, I can see how we might want to have a broader debate. With monetary policy, it’s harder to see that,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Analytics. “The strong consensus view is that the Fed has done a very good job — that it was put in a very difficult position.”

“I think there’s less sympathy for the argument that Federal Reserve needs a significant overhaul,” said Zandi.

But, facts and peer-reviewed research don’t appear to phase these folks.

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), a supporter of the Fair Tax, faced attacks in his own state for supporting what Democrats cast as a massive sales tax increase. Gleeful Democrats simply neglected to mention that DeMint’s proposed policy would have also abolished the IRS. Similar attacks on Fair Tax candidates have occurred in other races. And this cycle, Herman Cain has already faced a similar tough questioning about his support for the Fair Tax in the most recent GOP presidential debate.

“According to the experts, the practical effect of a Fair Tax would be a tax cut for the wealthy and a tax increase for the middle class,” Fox’s Chris Wallace pointed out.

“Your experts are dead wrong — because I have studied the Fair Tax for a long time,” said Cain to loud audience applause.

So, who would you believe?  Economists or some CEO of a small time pizza chain?  The fact that these guys get a pretty receptive audience in the GOP is appalling until you see where the support comes from.  For some reason, the GOP has done a pretty good job ginning up support via xenophobic, homophobic, and gynophobic dog whistles and making economic statements that were never true and would never happen.  Since their voters reward them, there appears to be no end to the insane suggestions for economic policy that comes out of their mouths.

TBIF Reads

Posted: May 6, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: morning reads | Tags: , , , , , , , , | 44 Comments

Good Morning!

Today we’re thanking the Buddhas for Friday just ’cause I feel like it!!  Well, not that any Buddhas had anything to do with naming today Friday or inventing the calendar or anything.  Let’s just say I felt contrarian today.

So, some of the Republicans who want to be president had a debate last night and it was all about denial of the last few centuries or progress.  Heck, it was denial of maybe 5 or so centuries.  Here’s a blast from the past from one of the more “credible candidates”.

MR. BROKAW: In the vast scientific community, do you think that Creationism has the same weight as evolution, and at a time in American education when we are in a crisis when it comes to science, that there ought to be parallel tracks for Creationism versus evolution in the teaching?

GOV. PAWLENTY: In the scientific community, it seems like intelligent design is dismissed — not entirely, there are a lot of scientists who would make the case that it is appropriate to be taught and appropriate to be demonstrated, but in terms of the curriculum in the schools in Minnesota, we’ve taken the approach that that’s a local decision. I know Senator Palin — or Governor Palin — has said intelligent design is something that she thinks should be taught along with evolution in the schools, and I think that’s appropriate. My personal view is that’s a local decision —

MR. BROKAW: Given equal weight.

GOV. PAWLENTY: — of the local school board.

MR. BROKAW: And you would recommend it be given equal weight?

GOV. PAWLENTY: We’ve said in Minnesota, in my view, this is a local decision. Intelligent design is something that, in my view, is plausible and credible and something that I personally believe in but, more importantly, from an educational and scientific standpoint, it should be decided by local school boards at the local school district level.

I guess he doesn’t think stuff like science should be left up to scientists.  School Boards know so much more.  But that’s pretty funny, because last night, he couldn’t exit that question fast enough.  He also said he was for cap-and-trade before he was against it.

10:07 p.m. “Do we have to?” Pawlenty’s candid comment before he’s asked to listen to an old interview where he backs the cap-and-trade approach to put a price on carbon. Afterwards, he reiterates he’s changed his mind. “I don’t try to duck it, bob it weave it. I’m just telling you I made a mistake.”

10:05 p.m. Pawlenty pivots off a question about creationism to burnish his blue collar credentials: “My family is a union family,” he said. “It’s not about bashing unions it’s about being pro-jobs…Pressed on to answer the creationism question: “I believe that should be left up to parents and local school districts.”

The shocker of the evening was that  there is another pro-choice Republican politician still standing besides Rudy Guilliani.  It’s Governor Gary Johnson of New Mexico.  Former Senator Rick Santorum is as Spanish Inquisition as ever.

10:00 p.m. Santorum offers a robust defense of the party’s social conservative wing — and takes a direct shot at Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels: “Anybody who would suggest we call a truce on the moral issues doesn’t understand what America is all about,” he says.

9:56 p.m. Johnson acknowledges he’s writing off the anti-abortion vote. “I support a woman’s right to choose up to the viability of the fetus,” he says.

9:54 p.m. Gays could get married if they want to under a President Paul: “The government should just be out of it,” the congressman says of the definition of marriage. “I have my standards, but I shouldn’t have the right to impose my standards on others… Just get the government out of it.”

If you haven’t noticed, Mittens and a few others were AWOL.  The debate was carried by Fox News.  This is interesting.  Gingrich didn’t show up but his contract with Fox was ended as was Rick Santorum’s contract.  How DO they tell the difference between dabblers and done thrown the hat in?  Huckabee still has his program.  Then, there’s the Donald on NBC.  NBC isn’t talking one way or the other about canceling whatever reality show Trump’s cooked up at the moment.

Fox News has terminated its contracts with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Sen. Rick Santorum after the deadline for them to decide on presidential bids passed on May 1, a source familiar with the move told POLITICO.

Fox suspended the two contributors in early March and stopped paying them as they mulled presidential runs, but left them the option of returning to the network. The contracts’ end marks another sign that Gingrich, who has repeatedly delayed his decision citing business obligations, is in the race — though he dropped out of tonight’s Fox debate.

For what it’s worth, the pundits and the focus groups liked former CEO Herman Cain’s debate performance.   For some reason, Santorum came in second with the Fox News debate focus group.  Most of them should just head to the ice floes now for the good of society.

In an interesting twist of fate,  Paul Ryan Agrees That His Budget Includes An Individual Mandate  for Health Insurance.

Q: If Medicare becomes a voucher program, would you require seniors to purchase private insurance and if so isn’t that an individual mandate? If you will not require them to purchase insurance how do you propose to prevent a situation where the costs of uninsured seniors is very expensive and gets passed on to me as a private policy holder? […]

RYAN: Its mandate works no different than how the current Medicare law works today, which is you just select from a wide range of different plans. It literally would be like Medicare Advantage…

So much for the faux outrage on “Obamacare”.  This was the same kind of crap that went on back in the day when it was all called Dolecare.  The centerpiece of all the Republican plans has been forcing people to buy stuff from private businesses.  I still can’t figure out how Obama got the Democrats to go along with it after they’d been fighting it for like 15 years.

The Daily Mail asks “Will Bin Laden’s sea burial backfire?” According to one British scholar, Radical Muslims have already renamed the Arab Sea  location ‘Martyr’s Sea’

Radical Muslims are already calling the site of Osama bin Laden’s ocean burial the ‘Martyr’s Sea’, according to one of Britain’s leading Islamic scholars.

The US said the decision to drop bin Laden’s body into the North Arabian Sea was taken to avoid creating a shrine for the slain Al Qaeda chief.

But Abdal Hakim Murad, Muslim Chaplain at Cambridge University, claimed yesterday that the move could backfire on the Americans.

Speaking on Radio 4’s ‘Today’ programme, he said it was ‘disappointing’ that bin Laden wasn’t taken into custody.

‘By tipping him into the sea, the Americans may have created a kind of shrine. Some radicals are already calling the Arabian Sea the Martyr’s Sea,’ he said.

Okay, here’s a  new study that’s  interesting but maybe not very useful:   WILL a baby be a boy or a girl? If the mother started her period at a young age, it is more likely to be a girl.”

That’s according to Misao Fukuda at the M&K Health Institute in Hyogo, Japan, and colleagues, who found subtle differences in sex ratios of children depending on when a mother entered menarche.

Fukuda asked over 10,000 mothers the age at which they had begun their period and the sex of their baby. Forty six per cent of the children born to women who began their periods at age 10 were boys. This figure rose to 50 per cent when the woman began her period at 12, and 53 per cent when the women entered menarche at age 14 (Human Reproduction,DOI: 10.1093/humrep/der107).

Fukuda points to previous research demonstrating higher levels of the female sex hormone oestradiol in women who entered menarche before the age of 12. This may lead to spontaneous miscarriage of fertilised male eggs, he says. The theory is plausible, says Valerie Grant at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, as male embryos are known to be more vulnerable to hormone imbalances.

WAPO has a very interesting personal feature up on Bradley Manning:  “Bradley Manning is at the center of the WikiLeaks controversy. But who is he?” It basically gives a brief biography of the young solider in the center of so much controversy and trouble.

Despite his struggles, Manning was excited about his future in Army intelligence, a field that suited his analytical mind. “It’s going to be a different crowd when I get through with basic,” he told the friend. “I’m going to be with people more like me.”

He enjoyed classes at the Fort Huachuca, Ariz., intelligence school, where he received a top-secret security clearance, graduated and joined the 2nd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum, N.Y.

It was here, constrained by the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, that he began speaking out anonymously about gay rights. He attended a rally in Syracuse and noted on Facebook that he had gotten an “anonymous mention” in an article. The reporter wrote of a gay soldier who complained he was “living a double life. … I can’t make a statement. I can’t be caught in an act.”

Manning now had a love interest: Tyler Watkins, a freshman interested in neuroscience at Brandeis University who was an active member of Triskelion, the Brandeis club for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender students. Manning began to make weekend visits to Watkins’s dorm at the tranquil, wooded campus west of Boston. On his Facebook page, Watkins declared that he was “totally in love with Bradley Edward Manning!!!!!!!”

It still seems that TV is centered on OBL.  I’m glad that we’ve been able to scrap up some alternatives around here. Well, that’s enough to get you started today! What’s on your reading and blogging list?

Hypocrisy ad infintum

Posted: March 25, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: Republican presidential politics | Tags: , , , | 10 Comments

I actually know something about Sharia’h compliant finance and banking systems.  They’re roughly similar to those used by orthodox Jewish communities in places like New York state that follow the biblical imperative of no usury.  Just as orthodox Jewish communities have long been allowed clauses in laws providing institutions that reflect the no interest imperative, Minnesota had a program to help strict followers of the same Islamic imperative.  That is until today when Governor and Presidential Wannabe Tim Pawlenty shut down a program aimed at structuring loans that would be compliant in both faiths.  I want you to remember and read his rationale first.

Pawlenty’s objection: “The United States should be governed by the U.S. Constitution, not religious laws,” Conant said.

This is from a man that wants his extremist Christian views defining abortion rights among other things.  Here’s some of the background from Adam Serwer who framed the Minnesota Housing program as Pawlenty’s “Sharia problem”.

Abid Lakhani wanted to buy a home.

Unfortunately, as an observant Muslim, his options were limited. Many Muslims hold that the paying or charging of interest is prohibited, which makes it difficult to purchase a home in the United States.

“The house I was living in, I was living in it for 22 years because I don’t believe in getting interest-bearing loans,” the 44-year-old insurance salesman and father of four explains. But after years of renting, he was finally able to acquire a home for himself and his family this month through University Islamic Financial, Corp., which structures house payments so as to avoid charging interest. “For a Muslim living in this day and age, it’s difficult to practice and stay within the rules of the faith,” Lakhani says. “These kinds of options weren’t available before.”

Sharia-compliant financing is a growing industry, particularly when it comes to mortgages. “Traditional secular, money lending banks are setting up Sharia-compliant products because they make money,” says Abed Awad, an attorney who specializes in Islamic law. Companies like Citigroup and Visa have tried their hand at Sharia-compliant products. Usually companies structure the payments in a sort of house-buying layaway plan. “It’s a major moneymaker for banks.” Shariah compliant mortgages allow observant Muslims like Lakhani to buy homes, where previously they were stuck renting to avoid interest payments.

There’s nothing sinister about the growth of Sharia-compliant finance. It is just capitalism at work, an emerging market in which firms are meeting demand for a particular kind of product. But a decision by one 2012 Republican hopeful, Tim Pawlenty, may come back to haunt him in the GOP presidential primary, where any association with Sharia-compliant finance could be toxic.

Yes, there is absolutely nothing sinister about Sharia’h finance or any other numbers of laws that we have that help people’s religious tenets co-exist with modern, secular life.  This includes allowing Jehovah’s witness’s to forgo “so help me god” in oaths so they don’t take their god’s name in vain.  They can say “I so affirm” instead.  This clause lets me–an atheist and vajrayana Buddhist–say the same so I don’t have to violate my Buddhist and atheist precepts.  I’m not suppose to do anything that  puts any worldly gods ahead of dharma, sangha, and buddha. This includes all the possible monotheistic and polytheistic combinations of gods you can come up with.  Every time I have to swear an oath, it puts an earthly god in front of my own beliefs.  This really makes me highly uncomfortable. As a matter of fact, having to recognize some one else’s invisible friend creeps me out completely.  So, you know that it’s not like I want to establish religious laws.  I do believe that we can do things to accommodate various belief systems and this one is no more than an accommodation.   Like I said, we have accommodated the same set up for Orthodox Jewish Communities for years.  There were three people in Minnesota that used this particular accommodation.

Here’s Sewer’s explanation in The American Prospect which makes it even more sad that it was his article that  motivated Pawlenty to remove the program from devout Muslims in Minnesota.   Talk about stoking the flames of bigotry and hatred.  Pawlenty’s probably afraid it will bite him in his extremist Republican ass;  just as the article speculates.

While many conservatives believe Sharia-compliant finance is part of a “stealth jihad” to subvert the Constitution, Islamic finance is no more frightening than Kosher food. “You have a segment of society willing to pay more for products as long as they comply with their religious strictures,” Awad says. “We want to grow our businesses and make more money. This is the American way.” In 2005, when the MHFA issued its plan for increasing minority homeownership, the idea of the U.S. coming under Taliban-style Islamic law was still a fringe conspiracy theory, if it existed at all.

This just makes me sick.  Pawlenty can’t rise above naked political pandering or the opportunity to be hatefully macho in the face of right wing republican religious extremists.  Not even a subtle gesture of accommodation can ever be made by an ideologue and his fanatical followers.

Potential Republican Presidential Contenders 101

Posted: January 13, 2011 | Author: | Filed under: 2012 presidential campaign, Republican presidential politics | Tags: , , , , | 22 Comments

Just a few items came to light today on future presidential contenders from the Republican Party. (Be afraid. Be very afraid.) Three of them are in the news today for something other than discussion concerning ramped up rhetoric.

First up, Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty makes a pledge to repeal DADT. In this video, Pawlenty self identified as a ‘social conservative’ to right wing talk show host and spokesjerk for the American Family Association Bryan Fischer. Bryan Fischer is a well known for his hate speech and “openly hostile bigotry against gays, Muslims, and all those who do not share his radical worldview”.  The video and article come via People For The American Way.

Pay attention closely or read the transcript because you’ll hear Pawlenty use all the code words like “strict constructionist” for a discussion of Roe v. Wade.  If you are not familiar with the winks and nods that extreme right wing candidates use to signal how extreme they really are to their key constituencies, you really should take the time to learn.

The Grand Forks Herald announces the governor is undecided but is just touring around promoting his book.  Does any one else see a theme here? Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin have also been touring around the country fund raising and getting some face time using book tours. I am definitely sensing a theme here.  Pawlenty says his book highlight his ‘faith’. He has a blue collar upbringing and has republican populists roots like Palin and would have to fight Huckabee and Palin for the religious right/’Reagan Democrat’ crowd.

Little known compared to rivals Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich and others, Pawlenty uses the book to trace a path from a boyhood handling rotten meat in a stockyards town to a political career that made him a vice presidential contender in 2008.

And Pawlenty, who was raised Catholic and later converted to an evangelical church with Baptist roots, heavily emphasizes religion. It’s befitting a book from Christian publisher Tyndale House Publishers and a possible political calculation for someone sizing up a White House bid since ruling out a third term as governor.

Social conservatives have an outsized voice in the GOP nominating process, especially in Iowa, where Pawlenty has focused much of his campaign-building work.

An entrance poll done during the 2008 Iowa caucuses found that more than half of the Republicans who turned out described themselves as evangelical Christians, and more than eight in 10 of caucus winner Mike Huckabee‘s supporters described themselves as born again or evangelical.

I’m sensing we’re going to get heavily doused with that old time religion as we get closer to the Iowa primaries.  Can some one hand these people a copy of the constitution and tell them to stop skipping number 1 in favor of number 2?

Another possible Republican candidate is the corporate ex-CEO of the pizza chain Godfather’s. I used to hang out on Fridays afternoons with the University of Nebraska’s University Women’s Action Group at Godfather’s when it was the second location of two pizza parlors run by one man.  Herman Caine  now lives in Georgia and is a popular talk show host.  (Do all of these right wingers eventually do a stint as talk show hosts?)

The announcement came on his website, where Cain wrote:

“The American Dream is under attack. In fact, a recent survey found 67% of the American People believe America is headed in the wrong direction. Sadly, this comes as no surprise to those of us who have watched an out-of-control federal government that spends recklessly, taxes too much and oversteps its Constitutional limits far too often.”

Cain, an African-American Republican, holds a master’s degree in computer science from Purdue University and was a corporate vice president for Burger King before running Godfather’s Pizza. Previously, he served as chairman of the board of directors for the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City — and was chairman of the board for the National Restaurant Association.

Caine has been omnipresent in Republican Fund raising.  Does he have an appeal outside the business base?  That will be a big question.  He’s got far more gravitas than most of the other Republicans that are running since he’s always held a job outside of politics.  Folk are implying that he may have a solid base in the conservative blogosphere.  Frankly, I think he’d be a formidable candidate.  I’ve heard him talk back when he took over Godfather’s and back in his Fed Days too.   Those were business talks but he knows his stuff.

But though Cain has himself admitted that he would be a “dark horse” candidate, he will be greatly aided by the fact that he is a full-spectrum conservative with solid fiscal and social credentials. Christian conservatives love him, and The Club for Growth endorsed him for Senate in 2004. Cain is also close with fiscal conservative and two-time presidential candidate Steve Forbes. Depending on the field, there is great potential for him to rally conservative activists and bloggers to his cause.

For months now, Cain has been rumored to be seriously considering a presidential run. Perhaps not coincidentally, RedState’s Erick Erickson recently announced the launch of a new radio show, “The Erick Erickson Show” on Atlanta’s WBS radio — a station which also broadcasts Cain’s popular radio show.

Finally, we’re seeing Romney solidifying his campaign to move the helmet hair tradition of the Richie Rich side of Republican party forward in this RCP piece.  He’s hiring staff.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has secured both a pollster and a political director for his near-certain presidential bid this coming cycle, according to sources connected to Romney’s 2008 presidential effort.

Rich Beeson, a Republican operative who has worked as a political director at the Republican National Committee and was most recently a partner at the voter contact firm FLS Connect, will be Romney’s political director. Beeson has already moved his family to Massachusetts for his new role.

A GOP source who worked against Romney in the last campaign said Beeson was a savvy hire for Romney’s team, as he brings an outsider perspective to Romney’s Boston inner circle.

Romney’s political director for his last bid was Carl Forti, who now has a high-profile job at the Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie GOP group, American Crossroads.

There’s no news up today on Gingrich but you can be assured that ol’ Georgia Bull Dog is up to something.  It’s going to be an interesting few years.

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