Greg Halvorsen flogs Bill Maher over Tim Tebow. Note his bioblurb below. Bill Maher and Tim Tebow: Self-loathing vs. Grace
....Greg Halvorson is an island of conservative clarity in the liberal cesspool that is Portland, Oregon. The host of Freedom Warrior Radio, his work can be found at American Thinker and other sites promoting market principles, personal liberty and self-reliance.
Is this widespread? How about other cities? Makes me wonder. Hmmm. N.Y.P.D. Leaves Offenses Unrecorded to Keep Crime Rates Down - NYTimes.com
The Montana Supreme Court restored the state’s century-old ban on direct spending by corporations on political candidates or committees in a ruling Friday that interest groups say bucks a high profile U.S. Supreme Court decision granting political speech rights to corporations...
Norman Lear on fighting for the food fight - latimes.com
...One of the most encouraging things to happen in 2011 was the birth of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which is giving the entire country the chance for a "born again American" moment. In calling attention to the country's widening chasm between rich and poor, the Occupiers have unleashed decades of pent-up patriotic outrage against the systematic violation of our nation's core principles by the "say good-bye to the middle class" alliance of the neocons, theocons and corporate America...
Keynes Was Right - NYTimes.com
“The boom, not the slump, is the right time for austerity at the Treasury.” So declared John Maynard Keynes in 1937, even as F.D.R. was about to prove him right by trying to balance the budget too soon, sending the United States economy — which had been steadily recovering up to that point — into a severe recession. Slashing government spending in a depressed economy depresses the economy further; austerity should wait until a strong recovery is well under way...
To save middle class, create good jobs - CNN.com
Every politician in America declares concern for the economic crisis of the middle class. But to truly help the middle class, we must take on our nation's exploding economic inequality.
Consider two basic facts: Between 1979 and 2007, the top 1% of households captured almost 60% of all income growth in the U.S., yet median wage growth in the 2000s has been flat...
I'd say change the quote to "3 decades" and "GOP policies" to have an accurate statement. In campaign stop for Romney, Gov. Christie says America is 'hopeless' after 3 years of Pres. Obama | NJ.com
From the It's Not Just US Department:
Turkey's PM pledges full probe into deadly raid | Reuters
Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan on Friday promised a full investigation into airstrikes on the Iraqi border that killed 35 villagers whom the military had mistaken for Kurdish militants - an attack that has infuriated minority Kurds in Turkey and Iraq...
I share Joe Cannon's concerns about the people at the core of this "new politics." Read on and be not deceived. Cannonfire: "Against Americans Elect"
Verizon Wireless: Yep, that'll be $2 to pay your bill online | Signal Strength - CNET News
Verizon Wireless plans to charge subscribers a new $2 fee every time they pay their wireless bills online or directly over the phone...
Rick Perry to 'Activist Judges': Save Me - Garrett Epps - Politics - The Atlantic
Rick Perry appears to be riding into the sunset, but he is not leaving the stage without exercising a true politician's prerogative of cheerfully sacrificing any principle, no matter how strongly stated, when it becomes inconvenient...
Bachmann Accuses Defector Of Being Bought Off By Paul Campaign | Fox News
Michele Bachmann is accusing a former supporter of being bought off by the Ron Paul campaign after the Iowa state lawmaker defected to the Paul camp on Wednesday...
Egypt’s Forces Raid Offices of U.S. and Other Civil Groups - NYTimes.com
Egyptian security forces stormed the offices of 17 nonprofit groups around the country on Thursday, including at least three democracy-promotion groups financed by the United States, as part of what Egypt’s military-led government has said is an investigation into “foreign hands” in the recent outbreak of protests...
The (surprisingly upbeat) state of the world - CSMonitor.com
First, the good news: Bad news does not define the human race...
Eleven European countries, plus Australia and Canada pay their manufacturing workers more in compensation -- wages plus benefits -- than the United States, according to BLS data from 2010, the most recent on record. Exchange rate fluctuations make the numbers a bit volatile, but with that caveat out of the way, onto the graphs:...
U.S. Navy: Hormuz disruption won't be tolerated - CBS News
The U.S. Navy said any attempts to block the Strait of Hormuz would "not be tolerated," after Iranian officials threatened to choke off the key oil supply route...
Corruption runs wild in NY's private care racket.
Operator of N.Y. Group Homes Thrived Despite Lapses in Care - NYTimes.com
...In 2006, the federation’s board hired as chief executive a retired police officer without experience in the field. It later gave him annual compensation of $350,000 and allowed him to put his son, two sisters and a sister-in-law on the payroll..
Katrina victims fight FEMA debts – USATODAY.com
When the Federal Emergency Management Agency mailed out 83,000 debt notices this year to victims of Hurricane Katrina and other 2005 storms, one of the letters showed up in David Bellinger's mailbox. Bellinger, who is blind, needed a friend to read it and break the news that FEMA wants him to pay back more than $3,200 in federal aid he received after Katrina...
Congress Really Is As Bad As You Think, Scholars Say : NPR
Congressional approval ratings are on the rocks, hovering in or near single digits for the first time since pollsters started measuring them. But just how bad is the current congressional stalemate?
Thomas Mann, senior fellow of governance studies at the Brookings Institution in Washington, is working on a book about Congress with a title that provides a succinct answer: It's Even Worse Than It Looks...
Yes. This is required reading, especially if your Wall Street vibe is vague.
...As 2011 slithers to its end, none of the major problems that led to the crisis point three years ago have really been solved. Bank balance sheets still reek. Europe day by day becomes a financial black hole, with matter from the periphery being sucked toward the center until the vortex itself collapses. The Street and its ministries of propaganda have fallen back on a Big Lie as old as capitalism itself: that all that has gone wrong has been government’s fault. This time, however, I don’t think the argument that “Washington ate my homework” is going to work. This time, a firestorm is going to explode about the Street’s head—and about time, too...
Keeping College Students From the Polls - NYTimes.com
...Political leaders should be encouraging young adults to participate in civic life, but many Republican state lawmakers are doing everything they can instead to prevent students from voting in the 2012 presidential election. Some have openly acknowledged doing so because students tend to be liberal...
The 2000 Presidential campaign included a fight over what to do with the budget surplus — that's right surplus, not deficit, surplus, we had a surplus only 11 years ago. Since then, our government has grown, yes, we know about that (see chart below). But more importantly, we decided in 2001, and every year since then, not to pay for the growth of our government. This decision is popularly known as the Bush Tax Cuts...
Federal judge blocks Arizona’s anti-abortion law | The Raw Story
A federal judge in Arizona issued a temporary injunction against a new law intended to target donations to charities that provide abortion services or refer people to abortion providers, according to The Arizona Republic.
The law, House Bill 2384, excludes organizations that “provide pay for, promote, provide coverage of or provide referrals for abortions” in the Working Poor Tax Credit Program and was scheduled to go in effect on January 1...
No way, Newsweek. I'm not Mad In The Middle for no reason, and you can read "mad" as either "angry" or "insane." It works the same either way. So, bite me, Newsweek.
America's Soft Middle: 'Centrists' Cower in Time of Partisanship - The Daily Beast
The world’s oldest democracy enters this election year in one of the foulest moods on record. Three quarters of Americans tell pollsters the country is going down the tubes. In roughly equal number, they hate the Republicans and the Tea Party, the Democrats and the Occupy [What Have You] movement, Congress, and anyone else in politics. “Get Angry!” the French nonagenarian writer Stephane Hessel urged in his smash-global0hit pamphlet (more than 3 million copies sold). Americans are seemingly as PO’d as any Greek or Spaniard, withouth the proximate cause of epic economic collapse...
How Germany Builds Twice as Many Cars as the U.S. While Paying Its Workers Twice as Much - Forbes
In 2010, Germany produced more than 5.5 million automobiles; the U.S produced 2.7 million. At the same time, the average auto worker in Germany made $67.14 per hour in salary in benefits; the average one in the U.S. made $33.77 per hour. Yet Germany’s big three car companies—BMW, Daimler (Mercedes-Benz), and Volkswagen—are very profitable...
No! It can’t be so! There was sexism in 2008!!!1111!!! Who knew?
She was doomed by media sexists. Two new scholarly studies that blow the whistle on the industry’s lopsided reliance on male reporters find that the media first belittled her effort against Barack Obama, then jumped the gun to push her out of the race earlier than any other recent strong primary challenger.
Awwwwwwwwwwwww you’re pulling my leg! You mean like when AP announced she was quitting the race on the MORNING of the Indiana Primary? ALL morning? And to their disappointment she STILL won?
F*ck the whole lot of you. We’re still “Mad As Hell” and we’re way past needing validation from “scholarly studies’...
Reporting from Des Moines—With a rich trail of utterances, Newt Gingrich has outlined an opinion of himself that ranges from lofty to stratospheric.
In 1985, Gingrich told the Washington Post: "I have enormous personal ambition. I want to shift the planet. And I'm doing it." In 1994, he told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "People like me are what stand between us and Auschwitz." Just the other day, at the Iowa statehouse, he gave himself credit for helping defeat the Soviet Empire...
Online Gaming Loses Obstacle at Justice Department - NYTimes.com
The Justice Department has reversed its long-held opposition to many forms of Internet gambling, removing a big legal obstacle for states that want to sanction online gambling to help fix their budget deficits...
Jules Manson, Failed Tea Party Candidate, Calls For Assassination Of Obama, First Daughters
Jules Manson, a failed Tea Party candidate for local office in California, recently called for the assassination of President Obama and his daughters in a racial epithet-ridden Facebook screed...
...But the S.E.C. complaint makes almost no mention of affordable housing mandates. Instead, it charges that the executives were motivated to begin buying subprime mortgages — belatedly, contrary to the Big Lie — because they were trying to reclaim lost market share, and thus maximize their bonuses.
As Karen Petrou, a well-regarded bank analyst, puts it: “The S.E.C.’s facts paint a picture in which it wasn’t high-minded government mandates that did [Fannie and Freddie] wrong, but rather the monomaniacal focus of top management on market share.” As I wrote on Tuesday, Fannie and Freddie, rather than leading the housing industry astray, got into riskier mortgages only after the horse was out of the barn. They were becoming irrelevant in the most profitable segment of the market — subprime. And that they couldn’t abide..
Tens of thousands of people have rallied in central Moscow in a show of anger at alleged electoral fraud.
They passed a resolution "not to give a single vote to Vladimir Putin" at next year's presidential election.
Protest leader Alexei Navalny told the crowd to loud applause that Russians would no longer tolerate corruption.
"I see enough people here to take the Kremlin and [Government House] right now but we are peaceful people and won't do that just yet," he said.
Demonstrators say parliamentary elections on 4 December, which were won by Mr Putin's party, were rigged. The government denies the accusation...
Fox News' animosity toward President Obama, three years into his presidency, is by now well-known. This is the network that routinely calls Obama a socialist, accuses him of being involved in all sorts of conspiratorial plots, and claims that he hates America. But, as witnessed Thursday on Hannity, Fox's attacks have taken an increasingly racially charged tone: Brent Bozell, who runs the factually challenged outfit of conservative misinformation known as the Media Research Center, likened Obama to "a skinny, ghetto crackhead..."
Peggy Noonan: Jobs, Thatcher and the Force of Life - WSJ.com
...In Iraq this year I asked an Iraqi military officer doing joint training at an American base what was the big thing he'd come to believe about Americans in the years they'd been there. He thought. "You are a better people than your movies say." He had judged us by our exports. He had seen the low slag heap of our culture and assumed it was a true expression of who we are.
And so he'd assumed we were disgusting.
Credit, then, to those who make movies for grown-ups. I end with words I never expected to say: "Thank you, Harvey Weinstein. WELL DONE."
Apple admit Briton DID invent iPod, but he's still not getting any money | Mail Online
Apple has finally admitted that a British man who left school at 15 is the inventor behind the iPod.
Kane Kramer, 52, came up with the technology that drives the digital music player nearly 30 years ago but has still not seen a penny from his invention...
The Unrisen Jobs most famous non-invention persists.
...Officials who defected fled to South Korea told The Daily Telegraph earlier this week they had themselves taken part in stage managed shows of support for Kim Jong-il, and helped organise mass mourning for his father, Kim Il-sung, who died in 1994...
Cannonfire: "Some thoughts about Hillary, propaganda, 2012 and related matters... (UPDATED: A lying ratf*#^ker stands exposed))"
...Joe, I would suggest the issue you have not grappled nor addressed because it is a woman thing and you seem less interested, is the cadre of women who may have felt threatened by Hillary Clinton suddenly have more prominence then they did.
List of well known women who probably felt threatened by a Hillary Clinton presidency include, Nancy Pelosi, Oprah Winfrey, Arianna Huffington, Maria Shriver, and Donna Brazile.
None of these women wanted to be second fiddle to Hillary Clinton as president. Rather than remain neutral in 2008 when either the first african american male president or the first female president could have been elected, these women chose to go for the male candidate well before all the democratic primary votes were counted for reasons that are probably too embarrassing for them to ever admit in public, petty jealousy.
Karl Rove piles on, tells Republicans to cut bait in tax standoff - Political Hotsheet - CBS News
You know it's bad for Republicans when Karl Rove says it's time to cave and move on.
The former political adviser to President George W. Bush said Wednesday that the famously conservative Wall Street Journal editorial page was right when it said House Republicans should cut their losses and agree with a bipartisan Senate plan to extend for just two months the payroll tax cut enacted last year...
Com'on GOP! Stand tall! Stand proud! Stand stupid.
Storming the Bastille is just the first step.
A Christmas Message From America's Rich | | Rolling Stone
...But while they haven’t yet deigned to talk to protesting America face to face, they are willing to scribble out some complaints on notes and send them downstairs on silver trays. Courtesy of a remarkable story by Max Abelson at Bloomberg, we now get to hear some of those choice comments...
Gingrich: Ron Paul's base is "people who want to legalize drugs" - Political Hotsheet - CBS News
Despite his mantra to stay "positive," Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich took a swipe at rival Ron Paul on Thursday, suggesting that the Texas congressman's political base consists of "people who want to legalize drugs..."
My bold following:
Matt Damon Slams Obama, Democrats: 'One Term President With Some Balls Would Have Been Better'
Matt Damon, one of Barack Obama's earliest supporters and once one of his most staunch advocates, slammed the President in the new issue of Elle Magazine.
"I've talked to a lot of people who worked for Obama at the grassroots level. One of them said to me, 'Never again. I will never be fooled again by a politician,'" Damon tells the magazine. "You know, a one-term president with some balls who actually got stuff done would have been, in the long run of the country, much better..."
Analysis: Republicans risk backlash in 2012 - chicagotribune.com
They began this year vowing to slash spending and reduce government.
Republicans in Congress can boast that they have done just that: As 2011 ends, they have wrung $2 trillion in spending cuts from Democrats without conceding a penny in tax increases.But the bare-knuckle tactics and brinkmanship that congressional Republicans have used to achieve several victories could come at a big cost for the party in next year's elections...
Is PolitiFact's 'Lie of the Year' a lie itself? - The Week
...PolitiFact should get its facts straight: It's "really awful" that with all the actual lies out there, PolitiFact is targeting "a statement that happens to be true," says Paul Krugman at The New York Times. Republicans voted for a plan that replaces the guaranteed benefits of Medicare with a system of increasingly worthless vouchers to buy private insurance. Sure, "the new scheme would still be called 'Medicare,'" but it would look nothing like Medicare as we know it. So "how is this not an end to Medicare?" Apparently, PolitiFact is so "terrified of being considered partisan" that they've chosen to become "useless and irrelevant" instead.
"PolitiFact, R.I.P..."
Payroll Processors Say Two-Month Payroll Tax Fix Undoable | Fox News
House Republicans defending their opposition to a two-month payroll tax extension are pointing to a letter sent by a payroll processing trade organization that says even if the bill were made law, it's logistically impossible to make the changes in tax software before the extension expires...
So the geeks won't let me? Wow. What an excuse.
Thousands of women marched through downtown Cairo on Tuesday evening to call for the end of military rule in an extraordinary expression of anger over images of soldiers beating, stripping and kicking a female demonstrator on the pavement of Tahrir Square...
..for his own nefarious reasons.
Bill Clinton's lessons for Obama - CNN.com
...The final reason is that President Clinton displayed a phenomenal ability to show empathy with Americans who were suffering, whether they were struggling with hard economic times or were the victims of the Oklahoma City bombing. Although empathy is much different from policy, it was clear that Clinton's ability to forge connections with voters in small groups, or even through speeches, was one of the reasons his polls remained so strong...
Don’t Tax the Rich. Tax Inequality Itself. - NYTimes.com
...What we call the Brandeis Ratio — the ratio of the average income of the nation’s richest 1 percent to the median household income — has skyrocketed since Ronald Reagan took office. In 1980 the average 1-percenter made 12.5 times the median income, but in 2006 (the latest year for which data is available) the average income of our richest 1 percent was a whopping 36 times greater than that of the median household.
Brandeis understood that at some point the concentration of economic power could undermine the democratic requisite of dispersed political power. This concern looms large in today’s America, where billionaires are allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money on their own campaigns or expressly advocating the election of others...
30 Companies Paid Lobbyists More Than the IRS - Truthdig
An analysis by Public Campaign reveals that between 2008 and 2010, 30 of America’s most profitable companies, including Verizon, Wells Fargo, FedEx, GE and Mattel, spent more money buying influence in Washington than they did paying taxes...
Sunni Leader's Arrest Creates New Iraq Crisis - WSJ.com
Iraq's political crisis took an ominous turn Monday with the issue of an arrest warrant against Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, a leading Sunni Arab figure, for his alleged role in ordering and funding the assassinations of rival Shiite bureaucrats...
Evangelical leader makes case for Newt Gingrich - latimes.com
“ ... Destroying the definition of marriage is not merely “left.” It is wrong. It is sin. Stealing funds from future generations and spending it so that they will be closer to slavery than freedom is not merely “left.” It is wrong. It is sin. Although Mr. Gingrich is not running for 'Theologian-in-Chief' but 'Commander-in-Chief,' he grasps these issues. He understands the moral component...”
...Am I describing Japan at the end of the 1980s? Or am I describing America in 2007? I could be. But right now I’m talking about China, which is emerging as another danger spot in a world economy that really, really doesn’t need this right now...
Gingrich: Capitol Police Could Arrest ‘Radical’ Judges | Crooks and Liars
Update:
Newt Gingrich’s assault on ‘activist judges’ draws criticism, even from right - The Washington Post
...Judicial experts, including conservatives, are questioning the constitutionality of Gingrich’s stance. The Constitution specifically grants federal judges life terms with good behavior, many of Gingrich’s critics note, and provides only for impeachment as the way to remove bad judges. To do so by other means, they say, is an encroachment on judicial independence and an affront to the separation of powers doctrine that underlies the entire document...
BBC News - Gay marriage 'improves health'
Legalising same-sex marriage may create a healthier environment for gay men, say US researchers...
And save tax dollars.
G.O.P. Monetary Madness - NYTimes.com
...I’m talking, instead, about his views on economics.
Mr. Paul identifies himself as a believer in “Austrian” economics — a doctrine that it goes without saying rejects John Maynard Keynes but is almost equally vehement in rejecting the ideas of Milton Friedman. For Austrians see “fiat money,” money that is just printed without being backed by gold, as the root of all economic evil, which means that they fiercely oppose the kind of monetary expansion Friedman claimed could have prevented the Great Depression — and which was actually carried out by Ben Bernanke this time around...
House Republicans Oppose Senate Deal on Payroll Tax Cut, Boehner Says - NYTimes.com
A day after the Senate overwhelmingly approved legislation to extend a payroll tax cut for two months, House Republicans made clear Sunday that they would not support the measure...
"They basically cut our throats."
Those are the words of a woman from Marion, Ind., who worked for SCM, an office supply company. After SCM was bought in the early 1990s by Ampad, a firm controlled by Mitt Romney and his partners at Bain Capital, all 350 workers were laid off. Some then were offered their jobs back, but at lower wages and without benefits...
...If I was a poor black kid I would first and most importantly work to make sure I got the best grades possible. I would make it my #1 priority to be able to read sufficiently...
Rick Perry, Double-Dipping Hypocrite | MyFDL
Republicans hate public employees. But they hate retired public employees even more. And they hate most the public employees who are still on the job while they take a public employee pension at the same time. So how will this newest revelation, of Rick Perry’s double-dipping, convince the GOP base voters that Rick Perry should rise back to the top of the primary polls again?...
It should really be spelled "outting" to separate its meaning from "picnic" etc.
Joe Conason: The Republican Closet That Won’t Stay Closed - Truthdig
...Fair enough, although the straight supporters of GOProud, including Ann Coulter, never seem to have much to say when a politician like Perry openly attacks gays and lesbians to court evangelical voters. That is the reason that the Republican closet door keeps swinging open, with ugly and sometimes chaotic consequences. The “secrets” aren’t really secret—and every time a Republican politician attempts to use bigotry for political gain, the risk of outing is always there.
She may be crazy, and I may not like her politics or her smarmy attitude, but she deserves more respect than Newt gives her with his dismissive pat-on-the-head-eye-rolling crap. It's a debate! On tv!
Opinion: Does Newt Gingrich have a woman problem? With Michele Bachmann, yes - The Washington Post
It takes a lot to get Michele Bachmann to play the gender card. But we all have limits, and Bachmann hit hers in Thursday’s GOP presidential debate, when her rival Newt Gingrich sneered – and you really have to watch this to get the full effect -- “Sometimes Congressman Bachmann doesn’t get her facts very accurate.’’
Normally cool in these outings, an affronted Bachmann had had enough, and demanded the chance for a rebuttal: “Because this isn’t just once; I think it’s outrageous to continue to say over and over through the debate that I don’t have my facts right. When as a matter of fact, I do. I’m a serious candidate for president of the United States... ’’
SEC charges ex-Fannie and Freddie chiefs - FT.com
Six former top executives at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been charged with securities fraud in a civil case brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission for allegedly misleading investors, becoming some of the most senior financial executives yet to be accused of wrongdoing in the financial crisis...
The Protester - Person of the Year 2011 - TIME
..."Massive and effective street protest" was a global oxymoron until — suddenly, shockingly — starting exactly a year ago, it became the defining trope of our times. And the protester once again became a maker of history...
Russia Seizes Radioactive Metals From Tehran-Bound Passenger - Businessweek
Russian customs officials at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport stopped an Iranian citizen who was trying to board a flight to Tehran with luggage containing radioactive materials...
Chinese Village of Wukan Locked in Rebellion Against Authorities - NYTimes.com
A long-running dispute between farmers and local officials in southern China exploded into open rebellion this week after villagers chased away government leaders, set up roadblocks and began arming themselves with homemade weapons, residents said...
In his December 14 Washington Times column titled, "Occupy stooges on parade: It's fun watching Democrats getting hauled off to jail," Ted Nugent wrote about the "hearty laugh[s]" he had after "watching the cops pounce on and pepper-spray a few Occupy stooges and then drag the dirtballs off to jail in shackles." Nugent, and NRA board member, went on to say that this was "good for my conservative soul and gold for my sense of humor." From the Times:..
Read the whole thing if your stomach is rested.
My bold below.
...Just think: Considering his pattern, The Pillsbury Doughboy could easily be the first President to enter the White House with one wife and leave with another, and he knows America knows it. So…. Newt has signed a pledge that, among other things, keeps his current wife safe for 4 years, if he becomes President. I would imagine that if he doesn’t become President, all bets will be off. It must be a great time to be Newt’s wife. That is, so long as she doesn’t get sick. Everybody knows about the cancer of his first wife, but not many know he ditched his second wife 8 months after he found out she had MS. Christian, my ass...
Simply Left BehindThe Non-Rapturist's Guide To The Galaxy: Promises Kept
...Still, in the darkening days of 2011, there is hope. Spurred by the pressures exerted by the Occupy movements, President Obama has begun to finally talk a harder game, a better game. He talks with Americans, not down to them. This demonstrates the symbiotic need of the mediocre to be spurred by the actions of believers, even if the outcome is rarely the one we want, in toto.At least he seems to be hearing. It's time to raise the volume and make him listen.Perhaps it will be another promise kept. Perhaps not. But we ought to make him make that promise.
The many fictions of Huckabee’s abortion forum - Salon.com
...You wouldn’t want to play a drinking game pegged to the outright lies and distortions told at the event, hosted by Citizens United and Mike Huckabee, whose documentary “The Gift of Life” also premiered. It was attended by Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum. (Mitt Romney and Ron Paul had other commitments.) It was the stuff of stomach-pumping. President Obama notoriously supported Kathleen Sebelius’ decision to overrule the FDA and keep Plan B away from most teenagers, but Bachmann made it sound like Obama wanted to give your tween daughter “the morning-after abortion” pill anyway. How’s that for compromise and reason? (Since it may need to be said again, emergency contraception doesn’t end a pregnancy. It prevents ovulation.) Nearly everyone made repeated references to federally funded abortions, which under the Hyde Amendment remain practically nonexistent. And Bachmann made her favorite baseless claim, that “repealing Obamacare” is a pro-life cause, despite the fact that the Affordable Care Act didn’t change the status quo on abortion coverage, much to pro-choicers’ disappointment...
Jon Huntsman leapfrogs Ron Paul in New Hampshire, says poll - CSMonitor.com
The latest poll out of New Hampshire (released late Wednesday night) shows Mitt Romney well in the lead, Newt Gingrich continuing to pick up steam but a surprising charge into third place - Jon Huntsman...
About 2.5 Million Young Adults Gain Health Insurance, U.S. Says - Businessweek
About 2.5 million Americans under the age of 26 received medical insurance because of a rule in the health-care overhaul that allowed them to remain on their parents’ plans.
The percentage of people ages 19 to 25 with insurance rose to 73 percent from 64 percent between September 2010 and June, according to the Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The coverage provision for young adults took effect six months after the overhaul was passed in March 2010...
The 'behemoth' aircraft that could launch rockets into space
The Stratolaunch would have a wingspan longer than a football field, weigh more than 1.2 million pounds, and potentially cost hundreds of millions of dollars
Houston, we have a big one. Engineers are now developing the largest aircraft ever flown — dubbed the "Stratolaunch" — thanks to a partnership of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, aerospace guru Burt Rutan, and the company SpaceX...
