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    links for 2009-12-04

    • South Carolina’s Tea Party Senator, Jim DeMint, is either quite serious about his perpetual campaign for “purity” or else he is pandering to the far right. When one considers that the combined voting power of the far right who adores him and five bucks can get you a frap at Starbucks, it is entirely possible he is quite sincere.

      DeMint is a big supporter of Chuck DeVore who is going all out against Carly Fiorina in California. If this is any indication, DeVore is not exactly a class act.

      “…I’m not exactly sure what California Senate candidate Chuck DeVore, running to Fiorina’s right in the Republican primary, is trying to achieve with this Twitter taunt:

      @carlyforca has been following the same 314 on Twitter for months. I follow 9,044. I listen to those whose votes I ask for. #tcot #gop #rs…”

    • Further proof that Rudy Giuliani is less than focused on running for office has emerged in an unlikely spot – Rio de Janeiro.

      Brazilian officials, joined by Giuliani in sunny Rio, announced Thursday they would hire the former mayor as a long-term security advisor for the 2016 Olympic Games in the city.

      "He's going to help us in day-to-day security and, especially, with an eye toward … the Olympic Games," said Sergio Cabral, the governor of the state of Rio de Janeiro, after eating lunch with Giuliani.

      Giuliani's continuing efforts to boost his bottom line – and that of his security firm, Giuliani Security & Safety, which technically holds the Rio contract – would not preclude him from running for U.S. Senate, as some suggest the mayor is considering.
      ++++++
      I did not think Rudy would run for the Senate, despite his lead in early polling.

    • DeVore's idea was to give pregnant and post-pregnant women some special so-called "handicapped" parking privileges. More specifically, a bill recently introduced by DeVore, AB 1940, would have defined women's last trimester of pregnancy and the first two months after birth as a time of "temporary disability," which would have entitled them to obtain handicapped placards and to park in most handicapped spots during that five-month period.

      "This is a reasonable accommodation," said DeVore, R-Irvine, adding that the idea came from a constituent who had recently struggled with balancing late pregnancy and early motherhood with the driving – and parking – demands of modern urban life. DeVore said he also ran the idea past his closest and wisest advisor – which is to say, Mrs. DeVore, the mother of their two children.
      ++++++++
      Talk about Nanny-Statism.

      Good Grief, Chuck – Listen to Your wife , would you?

    • We're pleased a Nanny State intrusion wisely was rejected Monday in a legislative committee vote that killed Assemblyman Chuck DeVore's plan to extend special parking privileges to pregnant women.

      Mr. DeVore, R-Irvine, often has lambasted Nanny Staters for their know-it-all intrusions into peoples' lives. But apparently he isn't immune to the "fix-everyone's-problem" syndrome. His bill would have extended temporary handicapped parking passes to pregnant women, despite the obvious fact pregnant women aren't handicapped. This GOP version of Nanny Statism had the usual flaw we see when Big Brother "helps." It's entirely arbitrary.

      (tags: Chuck_DeVore)
    • The AMA strongly believes that addressing these issues will create a better foundation for health system reform. In addition to these principal concerns, we offer for your consideration a number of other policy refinements and technical changes that we believe will improve the bill, which are described in the attached Addendum.

      Once again, the AMA wishes to reiterate its commitment to working with Congress and the Administration to enact comprehensive reforms. There are many aspects of H.R. 3590 that we support, and we recognize that improvements have been made already to earlier versions of the legislation. We are committed to continuing to work constructively with you and your Senate colleagues to make essential refinements to H.R. 3590 as the legislative process continues.

      (tags: Obamacare AMA)
    • Two Hollywood conservatives have called on the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to rescind the Oscar that it gave ex-Vice President Al Gore two years ago for the environmental movie "An Inconvenient Truth."

      Roger L. Simon and Lionel Chetwynd, both Academy members, are among a small pack of known political conservatives in the liberal bastion of movie-making, according to the Los Angeles Times.

      In 2007, Hollywood's Academy sanctified Gore's cinematic message of global warming with its famous statue, enriched his earnings by $100,000 per 85-minute appearance and helped elevate the Tennesseean's profile to win the Nobel Peace Prize.

      Chetwynd and Simon were prompted to make their hopeless demand this week by the leak two weeks ago of a blizzard of British academic e-mails purporting to show that scientists at the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit systematically falsified data to document the appearance of global warming in recent years, The Times reported..

    • One of the subplots to the health care debate I've been following is the cozy relationship between AARP and the Obama administration, as the group has thrown its full-throated support behind the Democrats' health care push even though their membership comes from the age group most opposed to Democratic health care proposals. ..AARP is in a position to recieve tens of millions of dollars in "kickbacks" if Democratic health care legislation becomes law.

      President Obama and Democrats have proposed saving money to pay for health care legislation, in part, by cutting $162 billion in payments to Medicare Advantage, which allows Medicare recipients to choose privately-administered coverage. If these changes go through, millions of seniors who have chosen Medicare Advantage would lose their current coverage, forcing them into government-administered plans with less generous benefits. As a result, many of them would have to purchase policies to supplement traditional Medicare. Enter AARP.

    • I’m not exactly sure what California Senate candidate Chuck DeVore, running to Fiorina’s right in the Republican primary, is trying to achieve with this Twitter taunt:

      @carlyforca has been following the same 314 on Twitter for months. I follow 9,044. I listen to those whose votes I ask for. #tcot #gop #rs
      +++++++
      Why, is a good question.

  • Chuck DeVore,  Nanny State

    CA-Sen: Chuck DeVore A Nanny State HYPOCRITE?

    From California Assemblyman Chuck DeVore’s Twitter Stream

    Afraid so.

    As Chuck who is running for the United States Senate while an incumbent member of the California Legislature, rails about the NANNY STATE re: solid brass fittings for his house, it is EASY to point out that DeVore himself did the same with regards to pregnant women.

    DeVore’s idea was to give pregnant and post-pregnant women some special so-called “handicapped” parking privileges. More specifically, a bill recently introduced by DeVore, AB 1940, would have defined women’s last trimester of pregnancy and the first two months after birth as a time of “temporary disability,” which would have entitled them to obtain handicapped placards and to park in most handicapped spots during that five-month period.

    I mean for a so-called small government conservative as DeVore considers himself how stupid is this?

    But, good ol’ Chuck is undeterred – at least on Twitter as he fires again.

    From DeVore’s Twitter Stream

    And, even writes a piece for the Andrew Breitbart’s blog, Big Government, about what?

    Yeah, those damn brass plumbing fixtures for HIS house.

    Last night was one of those nights when I was mad as hell at the California State government and their foolish, micro-managing, Big-Nanny ways.  (Caution, dear reader, such rage at the machine has been known to cause the temporary insanity of running for public office.)

    The cause of my extended rant?  AB 1953, a law passed in 2006 that goes into effect on January 1, 2010, the purpose of which was to define lead-free plumbing from 4% in fixtures down to the European Union standard of 0.25%.  Not that the science supported this change.  Once lead was removed as a gasoline additive, taken out of paints, and removed from plumbing (the Latin word for plumbing is where we get the chemical symbol for lead: Pb), human lead exposure dropped significantly.  Having a small percentage of lead bound up in a brass alloy plumbing fixture isn’t going to add a statistically meaningful amount of lead exposure to anyone.

    But, Chuck what about your own bill for pregnant women?

    We’re pleased a Nanny State intrusion wisely was rejected Monday in a legislative committee vote that killed Assemblyman Chuck DeVore’s plan to extend special parking privileges to pregnant women.

    Mr. DeVore, R-Irvine, often has lambasted Nanny Staters for their know-it-all intrusions into peoples’ lives. But apparently he isn’t immune to the “fix-everyone’s-problem” syndrome. His bill would have extended temporary handicapped parking passes to pregnant women, despite the obvious fact pregnant women aren’t handicapped. This GOP version of Nanny Statism had the usual flaw we see when Big Brother “helps.” It’s entirely arbitrary.

    Assembly Bill 1940 would have extended special privileges to 500,000 pregnant women a year in California, but not at once. It was only for the last three months of pregnancy. Why not the last four? Why not all nine? It was also for women for two more after giving birth. Why not four months? Why not a year? Why at all?

    We like pregnant women. In fact, we’re indebted to them. But Mr. DeVore’s bill was just another intrusion into places the government should not go. When government doles out privileges, they are not only arbitrary, they instantly create a subclass dependent on government for continuing the special consideration denied to others. This is typical of Democratic politics, which divvies the population into interest groups, each relying on government to fund or protect its special privilege.

    It sounds to me like Nanny state for ME but NOT for thee.

    And, this guy is running for the United States Senate? Someone who becomes unhinged because of plumbing fixtures and then exposes his own hypocrisy?

    Wow, just weird!


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  • Arnold Schwarzenegger,  Climate Change,  Global Warming

    Chicken Little Arnold Schwarzenegger Warns California About a San Francisco Under Water Due to Climate Change

    This tour is designed to promote awareness of the challenges we face from climate change in California, and the kind of things that we can do together to overcome those challenges

    Didn’t Arnold receive the e-mail about the faked global warming/climate change data?

    A British university said Thursday it would investigate whether scientists at its prestigious Climatic Research Unit fudged data on global warming.

    Thousands of pieces of correspondence between some of the world’s leading climate scientists were stolen from the unit at the University of East Anglia and leaked to the Internet late last month. Skeptics of man-made global warming say the e-mails are proof that scientists have been conspiring to hide evidence showing that global warming was not as strong as generally believed.

    California is bankrupt and Arnold has yet to balance a budget yet he parades around the state touting this nonsense. Too bad Californians cannot TOTALLY RECALL this idiot Governor.

    Gad, Ahnold cannot leave office soon enough.


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  • Harry Reid,  Polling

    Poll Watch: Nevada Senator Harry Reid In Re-Election Trouble

    Nevadans are NOT supporting Democrat Senate Majority leader Harry Reid for re-election next year, according to the latest polling.

    The survey of 625 registered Nevada voters by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research suggests the promotional bombardment that Reid launched more than six weeks ago has yet to hit its target.

    “I’d be worried,” said Michael Franz, an assistant professor at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, who studies political advertising. “I’d stop if I had aired ads for two or three weeks and it wasn’t moving the needle.”

    According to the poll commissioned by the Review-Journal, 49 percent of respondents had an unfavorable opinion of Reid, while 13 percent were neutral.

    “We’ve always said we will run an aggressive campaign that includes early television, and this is just the beginning,” said Reid campaign manager Brandon Hall. “Senator Reid is fighting to make Nevada stronger every day, and his leadership position is particularly important during these tough economic times. We’re confident that as voters begin to understand the clear choice between his leadership for Nevada and Republican candidates with no new ideas, they will ultimately decide that Nevada is best served by re-electing Senator Reid next November.”

    Among nine Republican candidates vying to challenge Reid in November only three had support levels in double digits: businesswoman and former GOP official Sue Lowden, attorney and businessman Danny Tarkanian, and former Nevada assemblywoman Sharron Angle.

    If the Republicans can unite behind a strong candidate, Senator Reid WILL be voted out of office next year.

    And, it cannot happen too soon.


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  • Barack Obama,  Day By Day

    Day By Day December 4, 2009 – The Big Suck

    Day By Day by Chris Muir

    The problem with Barack Obama as a POL has been his policy statements always come with an expiration date. But, now, after having been in office almost a year, the President must actually be held accountable for the policy decisions he and his Administration have made.

    And, the American public is NOT happy with Obama.

    Look at the latest polling with 40 per cent strongly disapproving of the way Barack Obama is performing his role as President:

    Today, the national unemployment rate improved 0.2 per cent to a national average of 10.0%. If the economy improves, so will President Obama’s popularity. But, economic forecasters are saying economic prospects for the coming year are unfavorable.

    The economy will have to improve in a major way and quickly, if the Congressional Democrats wish to maintain their majority in the Congress next year. As for the President, his re-election is currently at risk.

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