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The Morning Flap: March 12, 2012
A Newt Ginrich – Rick Perry GOP Ticket?
These are my links for March 9th through March 12th:
- President 2012 GOP Poll Watch: Too close to call in Alabama and Mississippi – Tuesday looks like it’s going to be a close election night in both Mississippi and Alabama. In Mississippi Newt Gingrich is holding on to a slight lead with 33% to 31% for Mitt Romney, 27% for Rick Santorum, and 7% for Ron Paul. And Alabama is even closer with Romney at 31% to 30% for Gingrich, 29% for Santorum, and 8% for Paul.
Gingrich and Santorum are both more popular than Romney in each of these states. In Mississippi Gingrich’s net favorability is +33 (62/29) to +32 for Santorum (60/28) and +10 for Romney (51/41). It’s a similar story in Alabama where Santorum’s at +32 (63/31), Gingrich is at +26 (58/32), and Romney’s at only +13 (53/40).
The reason Romney has a chance to win despite being less popular in both states is the split in the conservative vote. In Mississippi 44% of voters describe themselves as ‘very conservative’ and Romney’s getting only 26% with them. But he’s still in the mix because Gingrich leads Santorum only 35-32 with them. In Alabama where 45% of voters identify as ‘very conservative,’ Romney’s at just 24%. But again he remains competitive overall because his opponents are so tightly packed with those voters, with Santorum at 37% and Gingrich at 31%.
- Doonesbury strip on Texas abortion law dropped by some US newspapers – Doonesbury cartoonist Garry Trudeau has defended his cartoon strip about abortion, which several US newspapers are refusing to run, saying he felt compelled to respond to the way Republicans across America are undermining women’s healthcare rights.
The strip, published on Monday and scheduled to run all week, has been rejected by several papers, while others said they were switching it from the comic section to the editorial page.
In an email exchange with the Guardian, Trudeau expressed dismay over the papers’ decision but was unrepentant, describing as “appalling” and “insane” Republican state moves on women’s healthcare.
- Gingrich, Perry deny they seek a joint ticket – Newt Gingrich’s spokesman on Sunday dismissed speculation about a potential Gingrich-Rick Perry ticket being announced before the Republican National Convention in August, saying the two camps have not discussed the idea “at any level.”
A report by Fox News cited “sources close to the Gingrich campaign” saying preliminary conversations about such a ticket have begun with the hopes that pairing the former Speaker of the House and the Texas governor might unite evangelical, tea party and other conservative voters.
But Gingrich spokesman R.C. Hammond said no one in the campaign has reached out to Perry’s camp about a shared ticket.
- Campaign 2012, 6th Congressional District: No cakewalk election for Rep. Spencer Bachus –
- Former Sarah Palin Adviser Says ‘Game Change’ Was ‘True Enough to Make Me Squirm’ –
- McCain slams ‘Game Change’ movie –
- Reid: Kerrey ‘promised nothing’ to run –
- Grayson Involved In Crash With Lynx Bus – –
- Amid anger over Afghan killings, U.S. faces growing public weariness about war –
- Speaking With the Speaker –
- Untitled (http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/03/election-expectations-move-obamas-way-yet-rising-gas-prices-fuel-gop-pushback/) – WaPo/ABC poll: Americans by a broad 65-26 percent disapprove of how the president is handling the price of gas
- Traitor Jane Fonda Wants Rush Limbaugh Kicked Off the Radio – Really? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Traitor Jane Fonda Wants Rush Limbaugh Kicked Off the Radio – Really?
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-12 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-12
- Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News – Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News
- Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News – Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News
- Many California Election Filing Deadlines Extended to Wednesday » Flap’s California Blog – Many California Election Filing Deadlines Extended to Wednesday
- Untitled (http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/ccrov/pdf/2012/march/12083em.pdf) – The 2012 filing deadline was extended in dozens of seats w/ no incumbent. Here’s the full list:
- Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News – Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News
- Candidate-filing deadline extended in 3 Ventura County districts – The secretary of state has determined that the deadline for candidates to file to run for office will be extended until Wednesday in three political districts that include portions of Ventura County — the 26th Congressional District, the 19th Senate District and the 38th Assembly District.
State law provides for such extensions whenever an incumbent eligible to run for re-election decides not to do so.
- Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News – Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News
- Maxwell Keith – Attorney for Two of Charles Manson Family Has Died | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Maxwell Keith – Attorney for Two of Charles Manson Family Has Died
- Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News – Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles
- Iron Dome Foils 90 Percent of Missiles – The Iron Dome system has intercepted 90 percent of missile attacks on urban centers during the latest rocket bombardment from Gaza.
The expensive systems were inaugurated last year amid controversy over its worth. A primitive Kassam rocket costs terrorists only a few hundred dollars while each Iron Dome anti-missile missile costs $50,000.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu stated Saturday night, “We will continue to improve home front defense including by means of additional Iron Dome systems, the effectiveness of which was shown again over the weekend.”
- Nicolle Wallace On Sarah Palin ‘Game Change’ Movie – By Nicolle Wallace
“Game Change” is not a movie about Sarah Palin. And it’s definitely not about staffers like me.
It’s a film about the vast, murky gray area in which the majority of politics takes place. I’m not talking about what you see on television: the speeches, the rallies, the debates. I’m talking about the man-in-the-mirror moments, the decision-making that takes place behind closed doors, with the counsel of very few men and women, and with high stakes and irreversible consequences.
Watching “Game Change” is like reliving the most tumultuous professional roller coaster ride on which I’ve ever been. It brought back the highs – Palin’s surprise selection and her glorious moment on stage at our national convention – and the now well-documented lows.
In the end, it’s also a film about how far great men like John McCain are willing to go in order to serve the country they love. Ultimately, every candidate makes the same calculation he did: ”Whom can I select to help me win, and will that person make a good governing partner if we prevail.”
Movies like “Game Change” bring politics to life in an important way by showing the human beings behind the headlines and the caricatures. And on the eve of another national presidential contest, it’s probably a good idea to remind ourselves that all our candidates are human.
- Video: Support @Flap – Gregory Flap Cole in the Los Angeles Marathon | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Video: Support @Flap – Gregory Flap Cole in the Los Angeles Marathon
- Beautiful day in Austin. Really like this place! #sxsw – RT @LizMair: Beautiful day in Austin. Really like this place! #sxsw
- Day By Day March 11, 2012 – Off Course | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day March 11, 2012 – Off Course
- Bennett faces 3 challengers; no takers against Long and Zaragoza – Bennett faces 3 challengers; no takers against Long and Zaragoza
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-11 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-11
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-11 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-11
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-10 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-10
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-10 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-10
- Dodgers FYI: Clayton Kershaw effective in spring debut – latimes.com – RT @latimesbaseball: Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw effective in spring debut
- ‘Hack’ allows first-gen iPad owners to install iPhoto (hands-on video) | The Verge – ‘Hack’ allows first-gen iPad owners to install iPhoto (hands-on video)
- California lawmaker drops bid to oust Fish and Game commissioner – latimes.com – RT @LATPoliticsCA: California lawmaker drops bid to oust Fish and Game commissioner
- Why Job Growth Is Likely to Slow – If you looked only at the monthly jobs report, you could start getting pretty optimistic about the American economy. The largest, broadest survey of employment — a survey of businesses — shows the best job growth in more than five years over the last 12 months, with the pace mostly accelerating in recent months. The other survey that the Labor Department does — of households — shows even faster job growth, suggesting that the business survey may be understating the economy’s strength.
But the jobs report isn’t the only measure of economic activity, and another major measure — of gross domestic product — doesn’t look quite so cheerful. The most likely situation is that job growth will slow in coming months, economists say, which will make President Obama’s economic narrative a bit more complicated than it now is.
On Friday, Macroeconomic Advisers, one of the most closely watched forecasting firms, reduced its estimate of economic growth in the current quarter to an annual rate of 1.8 percent, from 2 percent. And 1.8 percent growth does not generally lead to very strong job growth. In the fourth quarter of last year, by comparison, the economy grew 3 percent.
Beyond the current quarter, forecasters expect the economy will grow at an annual rate of 2 to 2.5 percent for the rest of the year, according to Bloomberg.
- Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12 – Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12
- Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12 – Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12
- CA-25: Dante Acosta to Run for Congress Against Rep Buck McKeon | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-25: Dante Acosta to Run for Congress Against Rep Buck McKeon
- Gloria Allred Loses Her Mind – Wants Rush Limbaugh Prosecuted | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Gloria Allred Loses Her Mind – Wants Rush Limbaugh Prosecuted
- Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12 – Wisconsin Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12
- Yes, Scott Walker has governed as he campaigned – With the recall effort against Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker heating up, Democrats are recycling the old claim that somehow Walker’s public union reforms came out of nowhere once he took office.
Earlier this week, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported that one of the Democrats hoping to challenge Walker, Kathleen Falk, “repeatedly accused Walker of being dishonest during his 2010 campaign, citing as a prime example his decision to all but eliminate collective bargaining for most public workers even though he didn’t talk about it during his run for office.”
To be sure, the eventual budget repair bill did include measures that weren’t specifically proposed during the campaign, but it’s typical to campaign on broad outlines and fill in the specifics when elected. The bottom line is that Walker’s reforms shouldn’t have come as a surprise to anybody. For more, check out this still relevant February 2011 Stephen Hayes piece.
- Wisconsin Elections board wants recalls on May 15, June 12 – The head of the Wisconsin state elections board recommended Friday that any recall elections against Gov. Scott Walker and five other Republicans be held on May 15 and June 12.
Government Accountability Board director Kevin Kennedy said in a memo to the full board that those dates make the most sense given the work that remains to be done verifying signatures on recall petitions and other timing concerns related to the proximity of the April 3 presidential primary election.
The full board was to discuss the issue Monday and if it agrees, ask a Dane County judge for more time on Wednesday.
The attorney for Democrats who launched the recall efforts said he would oppose the request in court.
“That seems totally unreasonable and unnecessary and it would change the character of the election,” attorney Jeremy Levinson said. Democrats have consistently argued the recalls should be held as soon as possible.
Republican Party spokesman Ben Sparks refused to comment on the proposed election dates. Instead, he reiterated the party’s position that multiple recalls be held on the same dates to cut down on election expenses. The elections board has also advocated for scheduling only two election dates.
Under the judge’s order currently in place, any primary elections would take place May 1 and the general election would happen May 29.
- Obama Photo of the Day | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Obama Photo of the Day
- The real unemployment rate? It sure isn’t 8.3% – Even if it were a legit number, the 8.3% February unemployment rate, released today by the Labor Department, would be simply terrible—and unacceptable. It would still extend the longest streak of 8%-plus unemployment since the Great Depression. The U.S. economy hasn’t been below 8% unemployment since Obama took office in January 2009. And back in May 2007, unemployment was just 4.4%.
But, unfortunately, the true measure of U.S. unemployment is much, much worse.
1. If the size of the U.S. labor force as a share of the total population was the same as it was when Barack Obama took office—65.7% then vs. 63.9% today—the U-3 unemployment rate would be 10.8%.
2. But what if you take into the account the aging of the Baby Boomers, which means the labor force participation (LFP) rate should be trending lower. Indeed, it has been doing just that since 2000. Before the Great Recession, the Congressional Budget Office predicted what the LFP would be in 2012, assuming such demographic changes. Using that number, the real unemployment rate would be 10.4%.
- President 2012 Poll Watch: Obama Beating Romney in Four Key Battleground States of VA, FL, OH, NC | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012 Poll Watch: Obama Beating Romney in Four Key Battleground States of VA, FL, OH, NC
- Bill O’Reilly | Anita Dunn PR Firm | Sandra Fluke | The Daily Caller – O’Reilly: Former Obama adviser Anita Dunn’s PR firm representing Sandra Fluke
- President 2012 GOP Poll Watch: Too close to call in Alabama and Mississippi – Tuesday looks like it’s going to be a close election night in both Mississippi and Alabama. In Mississippi Newt Gingrich is holding on to a slight lead with 33% to 31% for Mitt Romney, 27% for Rick Santorum, and 7% for Ron Paul. And Alabama is even closer with Romney at 31% to 30% for Gingrich, 29% for Santorum, and 8% for Paul.
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The Morning Flap: March 9, 2012
These are my links for March 8th through March 9th:
- Limbaugh attack boomerangs on the White House – Perhaps the left carried on a little too long and a little too loudly regarding Rush Limbaugh’s nasty language about Sandra Fluke. Conservative activist Penny Nance, executive director of Concerned Women for America, has sent a letter to the White House chief of staff demanding President Obama’s super PAC live up to the same standard Democrats have articulated for Republicans and Rush Limbaugh.
- Apple at center of e-book price-fixing allegations – The Justice Department has threatened to sue Apple and major publishers in a high-profile case that could reshape the digital-books market, driving down prices but also potentially shifting market power from publishers to e-commerce giant Amazon.
The government warned Apple and five major book companies that it intends to file a lawsuit accusing them of colluding to boost the prices of e-books, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed sources. Several of the publishers are already in talks to settle the matter, although those discussions appear to be at an early and uncertain stage, the Journal reported.
The publishers in question include Simon & Schuster, Hachette Book Group, Penguin Group, Macmillan and HarperCollins Publishers.
- Limbaugh spurns Sleep Train’s bid to resume advertising ties – First it was Sleep Train Mattress Centers that spurned its longtime ally and business partner Rush Limbaugh.
Now Limbaugh is returning the favor – and the split between the Sacramento retailer and the controversial radio host appears to be permanent.
Limbaugh on Thursday rejected Sleep Train’s offer to resume advertising on his national radio show and rehire Limbaugh as a paid spokesman. Limbaugh’s spokesman said the conservative commentator would no longer carry Sleep Train’s ads “in the future.”
Sleep Train stopped advertising on the show last Friday, becoming one of the first sponsors to drop Limbaugh. The company’s decision came two days after Limbaugh called a Georgetown University law student a “slut” and a “prostitute” over her stance on health insurance coverage for contraception.
Limbaugh apologized to the student over the weekend.
Sleep Train’s decision was especially noteworthy because Limbaugh and Sleep Train chief executive Dale Carlsen have known each other since the 1980s, when Sleep Train was a small company and Limbaugh was an on-air personality at Sacramento’s KFBK (1530 AM).
- Kucinich May Still Run from Washington – Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), who just lost his re-election bid in a Democratic primary on Tuesday, did not close the door to running for Congress in a new district — in a new state, CBS News reports.
He said “there’s new possibilities that are being born at this moment.”
Should he decide to run again, Washingtion state’s “most appealing choices for a Kucinich run could be the first and sixth congressional districts which lack incumbents because of the retirements of Democratic Reps. Jay Inslee and Norm Dicks.”
- Scandal at The Washington Post: Fraud, Lobbying & Insider Trading –
- Pro-Obama PAC Won’t Give Back Maher’s Money – Current and former White House aides on Thursday rejected demands by a conservative group that a Super PAC supporting President Obama refund a $1 million check from comedian and talk show host Bill Maher because of coarse comments he’s made about Sarah Palin and other Republican women.
While Obama earlier this week denounced similar comments that radio talk show host made about a college student, Sandra Fluke, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters the president is not going to get involved in the Maher battle.
- Romney Really Might Not Have the Delegates by June – The Republican primary has revealed distinct geographic tendencies. Mitt Romney is dominant in New England and in the West. Newt Gingrich has run well in the Deep South, while Rick Santorum has done well in caucus states, the Great Plains, and the peripheral South (it remains to be seen whether his support has bled into Gingrich’s strength in the Deep South). That leaves the Midwest as a battleground between Romney and Santorum.
While Romney had a good night on Super Tuesday, the truth is that he did nothing to alter the basic regional nature of his support. He won handily in New England and the West, essentially tied in the Midwest, and ran poorly in the South.
- I refuse to go to the Radio and Television Correspondents Association Dinner – no one should go –
- AD-38: Scott Wilk and Edward Headington Officially File For California Assembly » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38: Scott Wilk and Edward Headington Officially File For California Assembly
- Mayor Barrett Indicates When He’ll Decide About Run For Governor – Milwaukee News Story – WISN Milwaukee – Mayor Barrett Indicates When He’ll Decide About Run For Wisconsin Governor
- Mayor Barrett Indicates When He’ll Decide About Run For Wisconsin Governor – There are some new developments in the potential recall race for governor.
For the first time, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett is putting a timeframe on his decision whether to enter the race.
He’s running for re-election as mayor but will he also jump into a possible recall race for governor?
He’s not answering that question yet, but now, for the first time, the mayor is indicating when he might make up his mind.
With an election for mayor less than four weeks away, Barrett continued to deflect any questions about a possible run for governor.
“I am certainly considering running for governor, but I haven’t made a decision quite honestly,” Barrett said.
Barrett spoke at a forum sponsored by Wispolitics.com, and afterward, 12 News reporter Kent Wainscott asked him whether Milwaukee voters deserved to know whether he plans to enter a likely governor’s recall race.
“I don’t know what the future holds, and that’s why I didn’t deny that this is something that I’m thinking about, because I am thinking about it, and I think the voters know that,” Barrett said.
- GOP strategist: Appeal to Latino voters is party’s ‘great challenge’ – Republican Party strategist Whit Ayres says a new Fox News poll showing a strong preference for Democrats among Latino voters underscores what he called “the great challenge of the Republican Party going forward” – doing better with non-white voters, especially Latinos and Asians.
- President 2012 Video: Fred Davis on Mitt Romney and How to Win in November | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012 Video: Fred Davis on Mitt Romney and How to Win in November
- Obama adviser David Axelrod slams Romney for Limbaugh while planning to go on Maher – While slamming Mitt Romney for not standing up to the “strident voices” on his side, a top Obama advisor is planning to spend some quality time with one on his own, The Daily has learned.
David Axelrod, President Obama’s senior campaign strategist, is scheduled to appear on Bill Maher’s late-night talk show within the next few weeks, according to Kelley Carville, an HBO spokesman.
As the controversy over Rush Limbaugh’s comments about Sandra Fluke continued, a former Obama White House official today joined Republicans in pointing out that Maher, who recently donated $1 million to a pro-Obama super PAC, has a history of his misogynistic slurs.
Last year, he was rebuked by the National Organization for Women for calling Sarah Palin a “dumb tw*t.”
“palin is right to point out that bill maher has said some pretty disgusting things about women, comedian or not. they are rush like,” Austan Goolsbee, the former chairman of President Obama’s Council on Economic Advisors, and currently a professor at the University of Chicago, tweeted.
After Obama spoke with Fluke, the Georgetown University Law Student called a “slut” and “prostitute” by Limbaugh, Palin challenged Priorities USA to return Maher’s donation.
“Pres. Obama says he called Sandra Fluke because of his daughters. For the sake of everyone’s daughter, why doesn’t his super PAC return the $1 million he got from a rabid misogynist?,” Palin wrote Tuesday on her Facebook page.
- Senate rejects GOP measure to construct Keystone pipeline, 56-42 – The Senate has rejected a GOP plan to approve construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline after President Obama made personal calls to Democrats urging them to oppose it.
The 56-42 vote staves off an election-year rebuke of Obama, but will give political ammunition to backers of TransCanada Corp.’s plan to build a pipeline connecting Alberta’s massive tar sands projects to Gulf Coast refineries.
Despite Obama’s efforts, 11 Democrats brushed off Obama on the vote and sided with Republicans.
The 11 Democratic defections were Sens. Max Baucus (Mont.), Mark Begich (Alaska), Bob Casey (Pa.), Kent Conrad (N.D.), Kay Hagan (N.C.), Mary Landrieu (La.), Joe Manchin (W.Va.), Claire McCaskill (Mo.), Mark Pryor (Ark.), Jon Tester (Mont.) and Jim Webb (Va.).
No Republicans voted against the measure, and 60 votes were needed to move forward.
- AB-38: Scott Wilk Hyping Santa Clarita Valley Republican Assembly Weekend Straw Poll » Flap’s California Blog – AB-38: Scott Wilk Hyping Santa Clarita Valley Republican Assembly Weekend Straw Poll
- CA-26: Democrats Attacking Democrats Over Julia Brownley Carpetbagging Issue | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-26: Democrats Attacking Democrats Over Julia Brownley Carpetbagging Issue
- Bill Bennett: A lesson in how to turn the tables – Bill Bennett had this to say on CNN about the Rush Limbaugh hypocrisy fest: “My question is whether the president will give back the million dollars Bill Maher gave him. I don’t know how he’s going to explain that to Sasha and Malia, when that guy uses language that would make Rush blush.”
The comment is, in a word, perfect. The gentle tone of irony contrasts with the left’s hyperventilating. The matter-of-fact assertion highlights how the left’s “outrage” is reserved for political opponents’ entertainers. And his gentle rebuke to the president — who chose to drag his daughters into a phony political gambit — is the frosting on the well- baked cake.
Notice, in fact, how it is now the representative of the left who wants to move on? The Obama spinners have got as much mileage out of Limbaugh as they can, and if the conversation is now going to turn to their side, well then, for heaven’s sake, it’s time to turn the page! Or, as Dave Weigel put it in reference to David Axelrod’s inanity (“If Romney couldn’t stand up to “the most strident voices in your party, how can he stand up to Ahmadinejad?”): “Axelrod has no case. He’s a nomad flogging a camel to get one last mile out of it after it’s already crossed half the Gobi with no water.”
- Carbonite shoots its business model in the foot – The decline in the price of Carbonite stock since it announced it was dropping its longstanding advertising on the Rush Limbaugh show is not the real story of the damage done to Carbonite.
The price of Carbonite stock has been dropping since October for reasons unrelated to this controversy, although it did fall off a small cliff this week.
The real problem for Carbonite and its shareholders is that in leaving behind 15 million Rush listeners, Carbonite has shot its business model in the foot.
- Video: Why Run the Los Angeles Marathon? | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Video: Why Run the Los Angeles Marathon?
- Poll Watch: U.S. Unemployment Rate Increases to 9.1 Per Cent | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Poll Watch: U.S. Unemployment Rate Increases to 9.1 Per Cent
- CA-25: Rep Buck McKeon Proposes Afghanistan Surge | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-25: Rep Buck McKeon Proposes Afghanistan Surge
- SD-19: Republican Mike Stoker to Run for California State Senate » Flap’s California Blog – SD-19: Republican Mike Stoker to Run for California State Senate
- CA-25: The Heat is On Rep Buck McKeon Over Defense Contractor Contributions | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-25: The Heat is On Rep Buck McKeon Over Defense Contractor Contributions
- The Morning Flap: March 8, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: March 8, 2012
- SD-27: Republican Marine Lt. Colonel and LA County Prosecutor to Run for California State Senate » Flap’s California Blog – SD-27: Republican Marine Lt. Colonel and LA County Prosecutor to Run for California State Senate
- Poll Watch: California Governor Jerry Brown’s Tax Increase Proposal in Trouble » Flap’s California Blog – Poll Watch: California Governor Jerry Brown’s Tax Increase Proposal in Trouble
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The Morning Flap: March 1, 2012
These are my links for February 29th through March 1st:
- National GOP: Romney 40%, Santorum 24%, Gingrich 16%, Paul 12% – Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, coming off his primary wins in Arizona and Michigan, has jumped to a 16-point lead over Rick Santorum in the battle for the Republican presidential nomination. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely Republican Primary Voters shows Romney with 40% support to 24% for the former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania. This is Romney’s biggest lead to date and the highest level of support any GOP candidate has earned in regular surveying of the race. Two weeks ago, it was Santorum 39%, Romney 27%.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich earns 16% support, closely followed by Texas Congressman Ron Paul at 12%. Two percent (2%) prefer some other candidate, and six percent (6%) are undecided. The new findings mark virtually no change in national support for Gingrich and Paul.
- Day By Day March 1, 2012 – Hot | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day March 1, 2012 – Hot
- Recruiters Solicit Young Patients for Texas Medicaid Dentists Outside Food Stamp Offices | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Recruiters Solicit Young Patients for Texas Medicaid Dentists Outside Food Stamp Offices
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Morning Drill: March 1, 2012 – The Morning Drill: March 1, 2012
- AD-38: Former Congressional Staffer Calls McKeon Campaign an All-Cost Frenzy » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38: Former Congressional Staffer Calls McKeon Campaign an All-Cost Frenzy
- In Memorium: Andrew Breitbart – R.I.P. | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – In Memorium: Andrew Breitbart – R.I.P.
- RealClearPolitics – As Gingrich’s Hopes Dim, Georgia Offers Potential Spark – RT @RealClearScott: Will Georgia be Newt’s last stand or a spark to revitalize campaign for third time?
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-01 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-01
- KQED Radio’s John Myers moving to Sacramento television gig – KQED Radio’s John Myers moving to Sacramento television gig
- Romney Wins in Wyoming – Jonathan Miller – NationalJournal.com – Romney wins in Wyoming
- Obama Holds 100th Reelection Fundraiser – By Jim Geraghty – The Campaign Spot – National Review Online – The president who is demanding a list of Koch donors just held his 100th campaign fundraiser since April.
- If You Disagree With Obama, He Wants to Know Where You Get Your Money – If You Disagree With Obama, He Wants to Know Where You Get Your Money
- Rush Limbaugh blasted for ‘slut’ comment – Rush Limbaugh blasted for ‘slut’ comment
- GOP Slightly Ahead in Voting Enthusiasm – GOP Slightly Ahead in Voting Enthusiasm
- Two U.S. Troops Killed by Afghan Gunmen – Jonathan Miller – NationalJournal.com – Two U.S. troops killed by Afghan colleagues
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-01 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-03-01
- Capitol Alert: Assembly Democrats reject Gov. Jerry Brown’s welfare cuts – Capitol Alert: Assembly Democrats reject Gov. Jerry Brown’s welfare cuts
- Christie slams NYPD over Muslim spying program in N.J. | NJ.com – Gov. Christie lashes out at NYPD for its secret surveillance of NJ mosques and Muslim businesses
- Capitol Alert: Assembly Democrats reject Gov. Jerry Brown’s welfare cuts – RT @CapitolAlert: Assembly Democrats reject Gov. Jerry Brown’s welfare cuts
- Bob Kerrey running for Senate in Nebraska – Climbing down from the fence, Democrat Bob Kerrey said Wednesday that he will run for his old Senate seat from Nebraska, soon to be vacated by retiring Sen. Ben Nelson and a major target for Republicans who hope to win control of the chamber in November.
The decision comes on the heels of Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe’s surprise announcement Tuesday to not seek re-election in Maine. And the twin events breathe new life into Democratic hopes of holding onto the Senate.
- CA-26: Ventura County Supervisor Linda Parks Re-Registers as Decline to State from Republican | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-26: Ventura County Supervisor Linda Parks Re-Registers as Decline to State from Republican
- AD-38: Congressional Candidate Catherine Wright Blasts Patricia McKeon for Receiving Campaign Funds from Husband Rep Buck McKeon » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38: Congressional Candidate Catherine Wright Blasts Patricia McKeon for Receiving Campaign Funds from Husband…
- Home prices fell in 18 out of 20 major metro areas, but the p… on Twitpic – Home prices fell in 18 out of 20 major metro areas, but the pace of decline appears to be slowing. #infographic
- CA-25: Republican Catherine Wright to Challenge Rep. Buck McKeon | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-25: Republican Catherine Wright to Challenge Rep. Buck McKeon
- Kentucky to Settle for Compromise Methamphetamine Legislation? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Kentucky to Settle for Compromise Methamphetamine Legislation?
- Santorum Leads Big in Tennessee – A new Middle Tennessee State University poll shows Rick Santorum way ahead in next week’s Tennessee GOP primary with 40%, followed by Mitt Romney at 19%, Newt Gingrich at 13% and Ron Paul at 11%.
- Video: Obama Secretary of Energy Steven Chu: Energy Dept Working To Wean U.S. Off Oil, Not Lower Gas Prices | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Video: Obama Secretary of Energy Steven Chu: Energy Dept Working To Wean U.S. Off Oil, Not Lower Gas Prices
- Poll Watch: Obesity and Chronic Diseases Stable Across the United States in 2011 | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Poll Watch: Obesity and Chronic Diseases Stable Across the United States in 2011
- Odds of a Brokered Convention Are Increasing – We’re finally close enough to Super Tuesday to get a sense of how the overall delegate count might work out in the GOP primary. The end result: Assuming that none of the four candidates drops out of the race, it looks increasingly as if no one will be able to claim a majority of the delegates. The candidate with the best chance is Mitt Romney, but he probably wouldn’t be able to wrap up the nomination until May or even June. The other candidates will probably have to hope for a brokered convention.
- US Stocks: Stocks Add to Losses Amid Bernanke Speech – Bernanke said the job market is still “far from normal” and may require the Fed to launch more stimulus measures, in his semi-annual monetary policy report to Congress. (CNBC.com is streaming this event live.)
Bernanke also added rising gasoline prices will likely push up inflation temporarily, while reducing consumers’ purchasing power.
- Home – American Dental Association – ADA.org – ‘No tobacco products should be exempted from oversight’ – American Dental Association –
- Chu: DOE working to wean U.S. off oil, not lower prices – The Energy Department isn’t working to lower gasoline prices directly, Secretary Steven Chu said Tuesday after a Republican lawmaker scolded him for his now-infamous 2008 comment that gas prices in the U.S. should be as high as in Europe.
Instead, DOE is working to promote alternatives such as biofuels and electric vehicles, Chu told House appropriators during a hearing on DOE’s budget.
- News from The Associated Press – RT @AP: Britain says union’s threat to strike during the London Olympics is “unacceptable and unpatriotic.” -EF
- House Democrats have left the Iowa Capitol in protest of gun bills | Des Moines Register Staff Blogs – Iowa House Democrats this morning left the Capitol in protest of two gun bills the Republican majority had planned to debate today that critics contend would make the state part of the “Wild, Wild West.”
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy accused House Leader Linda Upmeyer of failing to properly inform legislators about planned debate today on the bills. The short notice hindered Democrats from offering amendments to improve the bills, McCarthy said.
But Upmeyer, R-Garner, shot back this morning that Democrats did have adequate warning, and suggested their flight from the Capitol was an attempt to make a political scene.
“Iowans didn’t send us down here just to do easy stuff,” she said. “The Second Amendment is a question that many Iowans would like placed before them. I don’t know why they’re afraid to have a debate on a subject just because they don’t like the subject. That seems ludicrous to me.”
One bill would alter the state constitution to specifically include gun rights. Another would rewrite the law on “reasonable force” so that a person may use force — including deadly force — against someone who they believe threatens to kill or cause serious injury or who is committing a violent felony.
- ‘No tobacco products should be exempted from oversight’ – American Dental Association – ADA.org – The Association urged the U.S. Senate to reject legislation that would exempt “traditional large and premium cigars” from Food and Drug Administration regulation.
In separate communications Feb. 23, ADA officials urged the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions to table or vote against S. 1461, and the Association joined dental, other health, religious and social organizations expressing “our strong opposition” to the bill in a letter to the full Senate.
The 2009 ADA-supported Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act authorizes FDA regulation of the manufacture, marketing and distribution of tobacco products. The proposed S. 1461, the Traditional Cigar Manufacturing and Small Business Jobs Preservation Act of 2012, would prohibit the FDA from promulgating any regulations involving certain types of cigars.
“There is a strong association between cigar smoking and mortality from oral (mouth) and pharyngeal (throat) cancers,” the Association told the HELP Committee bipartisan leadership in a letter signed by Dr. William R. Calnon, president, and Dr. Kathleen T. O’Loughlin, executive director. “About 8 out of 10 people with mouth and throat cancers use tobacco. Smokers are many times more likely than non-smokers to develop these cancers and the risk increases with the amount smoked and the duration of the habit. On average, 40 percent of those with the disease will not survive more than five years after being diagnosed.
“Taxpayer dollars would be better spent discouraging the use of cancer-causing products, including traditional large and premium cigars,” the Association said. “It is vital that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration be allowed to retain its strong, effective authority to regulate these products.”
- Scott Walker Recall: Wisconsin Governor Narrowly Trails Likely Opponents In New Poll – A new poll finds Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) trailing two likely opponents in a recall election. However, their narrow leads suggest a long road ahead for Democrats hoping to unseat the embattled governor.
According to PPP, Walker’s two potential contenders, Tom Barrett and Kathleen Falk, hold narrow leads over the unpopular governor. The poll shows Barrett with a 49-46 advantage, while Falk has a slight 48-47 edge over Walker.
The poll also found that former Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) would have a more commanding lead over Walker than either Barrett or Falk. PPP found that Feingold would hold a 52-45 advantage over the governor. Feingold, however, has said he will not run in the recall election.
- Poll: Wisconsin’s Walker to survive union recall drive – So much for that recall effort. According to a new Rasmussen poll of likely Wisconsin voters, Gov. Scott Walker should survive an effort to throw out his 2010 election, a campaign driven by pro-union activists angered that he limited collective bargaining rights for public employees in a budget-cutting move.
It’s a huge and positive switch for Scott’s fortunes. Opponents made headlines when they easily collected 1 million signatures on a recall petition. Walker this week said he would not challenge the signatures-including names like “Donald Duck”-because there isn’t enough time before the May recall election.
Rasmussen’s poll is the latest done on the election and finds that 54 percent of likely Wisconsin voters at least somewhat approve of the governor’s job, while 46 percent somewhat disapprove. He does good with independents, as 58 percent approve of his performance. The telephone poll of 500 likely voters conducted Monday shows a pro-Walker move, coming days after a Public Policy Polling survey conducted February 22-26 that found the state divided 49 percent-49 percent on the recall.
- The Morning Flap: February 29, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: February 29, 2012
- National GOP: Romney 40%, Santorum 24%, Gingrich 16%, Paul 12% – Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, coming off his primary wins in Arizona and Michigan, has jumped to a 16-point lead over Rick Santorum in the battle for the Republican presidential nomination. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey of Likely Republican Primary Voters shows Romney with 40% support to 24% for the former U.S. senator from Pennsylvania. This is Romney’s biggest lead to date and the highest level of support any GOP candidate has earned in regular surveying of the race. Two weeks ago, it was Santorum 39%, Romney 27%.
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The Afternoon Flap: February 27, 2012
These are my links for February 27th from 06:55 to 13:48:
- Gingrich slams Santorum as ‘big labor Republican’ – Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on Monday slammed rival Rick Santorum as a “big labor Republican,” accusing him of siding with unions over Memphis-based FedEx when the Senate grappled with a labor dispute in the 1990s.
Gingrich, the former Georgia congressman and House Speaker, is hoping to revive his struggling campaign in the South, and he tailored his message Monday to Republican voters in Tennessee. Although polls show a close race between Santorum and Mitt Romney, Gingrich challenged the former Pennsylvania senator and his conservative credentials.
- Michigan Forecast Update: Romney’s Lead Looks More Tenuous – Since we ran the Michigan numbers early Monday morning, three new polls are out that make the state look more like a true toss-up and less like one that favors Mr. Romney.
Two of the surveys, from Mitchell Research and American Research Group, in fact give Rick Santorum a nominal lead in Michigan, by 2 and 1 percentage points respectively. The third, from Rasmussen Reports, gives Mr. Romney a 2-point advantage.
We also added a hard-to-track down survey from Baydoun Consulting, which gave Mr. Romney an 8-point advantage. However, it is less recent than the others, having been conducted on Thursday night rather than over the weekend.
Among the five polls that were conducted over the weekend — including those that had been included with the previous update — three give Mr. Romney a small lead while two show an edge for Mr. Santorum.
Mr. Romney still has the advantage in the FiveThirtyEight forecast, but it is more tenuous than the one we released overnight. The model gives him a 64 percent chance of winning the state, down from 77 percent in the previous forecast.
- GOP Referendum on California State Senate Districts Qualifies for November Ballot – But Who Cares? » Flap’s California Blog – GOP Referendum on California State Senate Districts Qualifies for November Ballot – But Who Cares?
- Untitled (http://www.sacbee.com/2012/02/27/4294955/california-ag-calls-for-fannie.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter#mi_rss=Latest%20News) – RT @CapitolAlert: RT @sacbee_news: California AG calls for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to halt foreclosures
- The Recall Elections Blog: The Walker Recall: What to Expect When You’re Expecting a Recall – With the news that Scott Walker is not going to challenge the signatures, the gubernatorial recall is going forward. The Wisconsin GAB is set to rule today on all six recalls — against the Governor, Lieutenant Governor, and four Republican state Senators — have qualified for the ballot. From numerous press reports, and from the past history with signature verification, the recalls are very likely to be approved. The only recall that is in any doubt is against the Majority Leader of the Wisconsin state Senate, Scott Fitzgerald.
This would represent the second year in a row that we are staring at an unprecedented use of the recall. This recall could have an effect well beyond Wisconsin. There are potential dangers for both sides.
Let’s look at some of the history and background on the use of the recall:
- Governor Scott Walker will not challenge recall signatures – Gov. Scott Walker will not challenge any signatures by Monday’s deadline in an attempt to stop a recall election against him.
That leaves only a review by state elections officials standing between the Republican governor and only the third recall election for a governor is U.S. history. An independent conservative group released its own analysis of the recall petitions Monday, but state elections officials said the law does not allow it to count those outside challenges.
“We are not filing any specific challenges to any specific signatures today,” Walker campaign spokeswoman Ciara Matthews said. “We simply ran out of time.”
Organizers gathered more than 1 million signatures in 60 days seeking to force the recall – well over the 540,000 valid signatures needed. Over the last month, Walker and Republicans have been examining the signatures seeking to find ones to challenge as invalid.
In a filing Monday, Walker’s campaign called on the elections agency to continue its official review of the signatures.
Government Accountability Board spokesman Reid Magney confirmed that the elections agency would continue that review, including the search for incomplete, duplicate or fraudulent signatures. Currently, the agency has until March 19 to complete that review but Magney said he wasn’t sure how much time it would take.
“That’s something we’re obviously still working on,” Magney said.
- Video: California Legislative Analyst’s Office – The 2012-13 Budget: Economic and Revenue Update » Flap’s California Blog – Video: California Legislative Analyst’s Office – The 2012-13 Budget: Economic and Revenue Update
- CD-8: Former California Republican Assemblyman Anthony Adams to Run for Open Congressional Seat | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CD-8: Former California Republican Assemblyman Anthony Adams to Run for Open Congressional Seat
- The Morning Flap: February 27, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: February 27, 2012
- California State Senator Sharon Runner Receives Double Lung Transplant » Flap’s California Blog – California State Senator Sharon Runner Receives Double Lung Transplant
- AD-66: Candidates in Swing District Court Centrist Voters » Flap’s California Blog – AD-66: Candidates in Swing District Court Centrist Voters
- Substituting Smokeless Tobacco for Smoking Will Save Lives? | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Substituting Smokeless Tobacco for Smoking Will Save Lives?
- LinkedIn Rolls Out ‘Follow Company’ Buttons for Brands – RT @mashable: LinkedIn Rolls Out ‘Follow Company’ Button for Brands –
- Larry J. Sabato’s Crystal Ball » Crystal Ball projection: Michigan & Arizona – RT @LarrySabato: IN CASE YOU MISSED IT: On Friday, the Crystal Ball projected wins for Romney in AZ & MI:
- Hawaii Continues as the Best State for Well-Being | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Hawaii Continues as the Best State for Well-Being
- Flap’s California Morning Collection: February 27, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Morning Collection: February 27, 2012
- Gingrich slams Santorum as ‘big labor Republican’ – Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich on Monday slammed rival Rick Santorum as a “big labor Republican,” accusing him of siding with unions over Memphis-based FedEx when the Senate grappled with a labor dispute in the 1990s.
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The Morning Flap: February 27, 2012
These are my links for February 24th through February 27th:
- The State of the Twitterverse 2012 – Brian Solis – The first time I wrote about Twitter was March 2007. My, how time and Tweets fly. With 500 million registered users and 33 billion Tweets flying across the Twitterverse every day, Twitter has become a fabric of our digital culture. Twitter is now ingrained in our digital DNA and is reflected in our lifestyle and how we connect and communicate with one another.
While many struggle to understand its utility or its significance in the greater world of media, it is the most efficient global information network in existence today. News no longer breaks, it Tweets. People have demonstrated the speed and efficacy of social networking by connecting to one another based on interests (interest graph) rather then limiting connections to relationships (social graph). Twitter represents a promising intersection of new media, relationships, traditional media and information to form one highly human network.
I recently stumbled upon a well done infographic created by Infographic Labs to communicate the state of of the Twitterverse. It’s quite grand in its design. So, to help get the most out of it, I’ve dissected it into smaller byte-sized portions.
- Southern California Most Infamous Murderers – And, why California needs to retain the death penalty.
- Santorum maintains lead in Ohio –
- Romney headed for an Arizona rout – Public Policy Polling –
- Barbour: Romney Loss in Michigan Would be ‘A Real Setback’ –
- Poll Watch: Santorum Back on Top Over Romney in Michigan –
- Poll: Obama holds double digit leads over Romney and Santorum –
- AP News: Romney-Santorum clash turns next to Ohio –
- Swing states poll: Health care victories hurt Obama and Romney in 2012 –
- Log In – The New York Times – U.S. Agencies See No Move by Iran to Build a Bomb
- U.S. Agencies See No Move by Iran to Build a Bomb – Even as the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog said in a new report Friday that Iran had accelerated its uranium enrichment program, American intelligence analysts continue to believe that there is no hard evidence that Iran has decided to build a nuclear bomb.
- Stages in Developing a Nuclear Nation – A report by international nuclear inspectors offers new details about Iran’s nuclear program. While Iran has increased production of a type of fuel needed to create the core of a nuclear bomb, it stops short of crossing that line
- 55% Oppose Affirmative Action Policies for College Admissions – The U.S. Supreme Court last week agreed to hear a case involving the use of race as a factor in college admissions. Most voters oppose the use of so-called affirmative action policies at colleges and universities and continue to believe those policies have not been successful despite being in place for 50 years.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 24% of Likely U.S. Voters favor applying affirmative action policies to college admissions. Fifty-five percent (55%) oppose the use of such policies to determine who is admitted to colleges and universities. Twenty-one percent (21%) are undecided.
- Mexican Methamphetamine Replacing American Domestic Supply | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Mexican Methamphetamine Replacng American Domestic Supply
- Flap’s California Sunday Collection: February 26, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Sunday Collection: February 26, 2012
- EPA Needs More Time to Reconsider Boiler MACT Rules – American workers and the industries that employ them face an ill-thought out and incomplete set of Boiler MACT regulations costing $14 billion to implement. Given current economic realities, these regulations place at risk the jobs of your constituents and 200,000 working Americans across the country. With the economic climate as it is now, we cannot afford to lose too many more American manufacturing jobs.
The EPA asked for proper time to reconsider the Boiler MACT rules, and even attempted to stay the rules to have more time to clarify them. The forest products industry, for example, is compiling additional data at the EPA’s request, but may not have time to complete needed testing. The courts have made it clear that only Congress can give the EPA the time they have asked for and need to provide clarity. As a result, this legal uncertainty is a cloud over American businesses, which must be able to plan for the future in these uncertain economic times. Our communities deserve environmental rules that have been fully considered, and will hold up scientifically in the long term
- President 2012: If Mitt Romney Loses Michigan – We Need a New Candidate Says Top GOP Senator | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – RE: Romney and T-Paw – Wow!
Even Mitch Daniels would look good.
I’ll take any of the POLS you mentioned.
- “Cutting the Bureaucratic Gridlock” by Senator Tony Strickland – While I was visiting Teixeira Farms to discuss agricultural issues, the owners told me that one state agency said they needed to recycle all their water, while another state agency said they couldn’t recycle any of their water. The owners of the farm told me they were happy to do whatever was needed, but they couldn’t recycle all their water and none of their water at the same time.
Sadly, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened. Constituents and small business owners in my district often call my office, telling me that one state agency has given them the run-around about an issue and referred them to yet another state agency. Round and round they go, from agency to agency, until they finally give up.
Cleary, California’s vast bureaucracy is not working. There has to be a way to make government more efficient and maximize your precious tax dollars that come to Sacramento.This is why I’ve authored Senate Bill 953. SB 953 would create the Bureaucracy Realignment and Closure Commission (BRAC). SB 953 is modeled and named after the successful Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) program, which was established by the federal government after the end of the Cold War. The Federal BRAC program successfully identified and closed obsolete military bases, saving an estimated $20 billion annually.
- State party chief wants GOP candidates to rally around statewide theme – Tacitly acknowledging that the California Republican Party will likely be strapped for funds to support candidates in the tough new districts in which many of them will be running this fall, Chairman Tom Del Beccaro said Friday he hopes GOP candidates will rally around “statewide themes” to maximize the party’s efforts.
“We need to make this a statewide election around an issue that coalesces voters,” he said at a news conference at the opening of the state GOP convention. “We can’t be the party of no. Parties become more attractive when they have positive ideas.”
- President 2012: If Mitt Romney Loses Michigan – We Need a New Candidate Says Top GOP Senator | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – RE: It will be worse than McCain in 2008 because we know more about Obama (and what he will do in his second term) a…
- Day By Day February 26, 2012 – Privates | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day February 26, 2012 – Privates
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-26 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-26
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-26 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-26
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-25 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-25
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-25 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-25
- Co-founder Mark Meckler resigns from Tea Party Patriots – Mark Meckler, the co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots, has resigned from his role with the grassroots group over internal disputes about the leadership of the organization, The Daily Caller has learned.
In an email obtained by TheDC, Meckler told the state coordinators of Tea Party Patriots on Thursday night that he “fought long and hard” to maintain the group “as an organization that is run from the bottom up, with the intent of serving the grassroots.”
“Unfortunately, it is my belief that I have lost this fight,” Meckler said. “I probably fought the internal fight longer than I should have, but I wanted to give absolutely every possible effort to preserving what I believe was the unique nature of the TPP organization.”
Since the organization’s founding, Meckler has shared the role of national coordinator with co-founder Jenny Beth Martin. But Meckler wrote in the email that he had lost “influence in the leadership of the organization, and it has been that way for quite some time.”
Meckler said the board granted Martin “almost complete power over the day-to-day operations” in November 2011 after a “protracted fight in which I was complaining about the direction, operation (top-down) and finances of the organization.”
- Poll Watch: Contraception Issue Divides Americans | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Poll Watch: Contraception Issue Divides Americans
- The Weekly Power List: 02.24.12: Death Race 2012: GQ on Politics: GQ – The Weekly Power List: 02.24.12: Death Race 2012: GQ on Politics: GQ
- A talk with Scott Walker – For many conservatives frustrated with the Republican Party, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has been a bright spot. After taking office last year in a bluish state, Walker set out to close a $3.6 billion budget hole, in part, by reforming public sector unions. His reforms, which gave workers choices as to whether they wanted to join a union and curbed union collective bargaining powers that were crippling local budgets, sparked a wave a protests. But Walker stood firm and prevailed. Now unions plan to spend tens of millions of dollars on a campaign to recall him, with an election anticipated by June.
On Thursday, the Washington Examiner spoke with Walker by telephone about his reforms, the upcoming recall election, his decision to reject Obamacare funding, his views about the proper role of government and the extended Republican presidential primary.
- California Field Poll: Millionaires Tax Out Polling Governor Jerry Brown’s Tax Increase Measure » Flap’s California Blog – California Field Poll: Millionaires Tax Out Polling Governor Jerry Brown’s Tax Increase Measure
- California Assemblyman Tim Donnelly Charged Over Airport Gun in His Briefcase » Flap’s California Blog – California Assemblyman Tim Donnelly Charged Over Airport Gun in His Briefcase
- Los Angeles Times Launches Paywall Subscription Service » Flap’s California Blog – Los Angeles Times Launches Paywall Subscription Service
- (403) http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2012/02/24/abc-is-up-year-to-year-and-week-to-week-in-late-night-as-nbc-and-cbs-decline/121841/?utm_campaign=WP%3ETwitter&utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitter – RT @TVbytheNumbers: ABC is Up Year to Year and Week to Week in Late-Night, as NBC and CBS Decline
- Los Angeles Times launches new membership program – The Los Angeles Times will begin charging readers for access to its online news, joining a growing roster of major news organizations looking for a way to offset declines in revenue.
Starting March 5, online readers will be asked to buy a digital subscription at an initial rate of 99 cents for four weeks. Readers who do not subscribe will be able to read 15 stories in a 30-day period for free.
Separately, The Times announced plans to launch a new weekly lifestyle section called Saturday for its print subscribers.
Other news outlets that have begun charging for online journalism include the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Dallas Morning News. Gannett, the nation’s largest newspaper company, this week announced plans to launch a similar program at 80 publications, saying it could boost earnings by $100 million in 2013.
- LA Times puts up a web paywall * – LA Observed – RT @LAObserved: LA Times paywall will settle in at base rate of $3.99 for 4 weeks, with 15 free stories first.
- Untitled (http://twitter.com/CAGOP/status/173116438477934593/photo/1) – RT @CAGOP: The @CAGOP Press Room is open. Credentialed media can pick up their passes in Sandpebble D.
- U.S. does not believe Iran is trying to build nuclear bomb – As U.S. and Israeli officials talk publicly about the prospect of a military strike against Iran’s nuclear program, one fact is often overlooked: U.S. intelligence agencies don’t believe Iran is actively trying to build an atomic bomb.
A highly classified U.S. intelligence assessment circulated to policymakers early last year largely affirms that view, originally made in 2007. Both reports, known as national intelligence estimates, conclude that Tehran halted efforts to develop and build a nuclear warhead in 2003.
The most recent report, which represents the consensus of 16 U.S. intelligence agencies, indicates that Iran is pursuing research that could put it in a position to build a weapon, but that it has not sought to do so.
Although Iran continues to enrich uranium at low levels, U.S. officials say they have not seen evidence that has caused them to significantly revise that judgment. Senior U.S. officials say Israel does not dispute the basic intelligence or analysis.
- Could California swing the Republican nomination? – If no clear front-runner in the delegate count emerges by the end of April, Texas and California will move to the center of the political universe. These two gigantic, expensive states could then hold the keys to the nomination and determine whether we are headed for a brokered convention.
What would a hotly contested California Republican primary campaign, unseen in decades, look like? Certainly it would be very expensive, and waged almost entirely on television. The state is too big to quickly organize on a district level (ask anyone who has run for statewide office in California), making broadcast media critical. A quick bus tour, some fly-arounds and earned media stops would make up the rest. An insurgent candidate could also conceivably attempt to organize the small number of Republicans who live in heavily Democratic congressional districts in Los Angeles to score a few delegates.
California’s primary is “closed,” meaning only registered Republicans may participate. This results in a more conservative electorate than in “open” primary states where voters of other affiliations may vote in the Republican primary.
Although California votes late enough to be winner-take-all, it isn’t. Under rules adopted in 2000 and first put into effect in 2004, the California Republican Party will allocate delegates proportionally by congressional district. In 2008, John McCain won in 48 of 53 districts, with Mitt Romney winning in the remaining five.
- The Morning Flap: February 24, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: February 24, 2012
- The State of the Twitterverse 2012 – Brian Solis – The first time I wrote about Twitter was March 2007. My, how time and Tweets fly. With 500 million registered users and 33 billion Tweets flying across the Twitterverse every day, Twitter has become a fabric of our digital culture. Twitter is now ingrained in our digital DNA and is reflected in our lifestyle and how we connect and communicate with one another.
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The Morning Flap: February 24, 2012
These are my links for February 23rd through February 24th:
- Giuliani: Social issues make GOP ‘look like it isn’t a modern party’ – Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani said Thursday that he was concerned that Republican stances on social issues would alienate voters and make “the party look like it isn’t a modern party.”
Giuliani added that he was “absolutely” sure that the GOP’s stance on issues like abortion and contraception could open it to the risk of a rising third party.
“I’m concerned about how do we get back the Northeast as a voting bloc when we seem to be not modern enough on social [issues],” Giuliani said to CNN.
The former mayor went on to say the issue of gay rights, in particular, could be increasingly difficult to justify.
“I think the biggest problem right now, I think abortion you can work out … but I think the gay rights issue is a more current one right now. I think beyond all the religious and social parts, it makes the party look like it isn’t a modern party, it doesn’t understand the modern world we live in,” Giuliani said.
- Obama Speech On High Gas Prices Contained Five Major Whoppers About Energy – Investors.com – Energy: The White House billed President Obama’s energy policy speech as a response to mounting criticism of record high gas prices. What he delivered was a grab bag of excuses and outright falsehoods.
Obama’s main message to struggling motorists was: It’s not my fault, so stop whining. The speech only got worse from there, recycling excuses and myths that Obama’s peddled for years. But there were some standout whoppers that deserve debunking. The five biggest:
“We’re focused on production.”
Fact: While production is up under Obama, this has nothing to do with his policies, but is the result of permits and private industry efforts that began long before Obama occupied the White House.
Obama has chosen almost always to limit production. He canceled leases on federal lands in Utah, suspended them in Montana, delayed them in Colorado and Utah, and canceled lease sales off the Virginia coast.
His administration also has been slow-walking permits in the Gulf of Mexico, approving far fewer while stretching out review times, according to the Greater New Orleans Gulf Permit Index. The Energy Dept. says Gulf oil output will be down 17% by the end of 2013, compared with the start of 2011. Swift Energy President Bruce Vincent is right to say Obama has “done nothing but restrict access and delay permitting.”
“The U.S. consumes more than a fifth of the world’s oil. But we only have 2% of the world’s oil reserves.”
- Supreme Court’s Obamacare decision will reshuffle political deck | Washington Examiner –
- GOP 12: Palin asked about divorce in 2007 –
- Palin on Alaska job: I can’t take it anymore – BroadcastNewsroom –
- Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog
- Sarah Palin aide sought ‘confidential’ ‘Game Change’ role – Maggie Haberman – POLITICO.com – Sarah Palin aide sought ‘confidential’ ‘Game Change’ role – Maggie Haberman –
- Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog
- Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – (500) …
- (500) http://flapsblog.com/2012/02/23/can-female-athletes-compete-in-the-olympics-against-men/#comment-447410385?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter – Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog
- Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – RE: Did you read the linked piece at the Wall Street Journal?
There are some sports that there is not a physical st…
- Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca Supports Driver’s Licenses for Illegal Immigrants » Flap’s California Blog – Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca Supports Driver’s Licenses for Illegal Immigrants
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Daily Extraction: February 23, 2012 – The Daily Extraction: February 23, 2012
- (404) http://www.flapsblog.net/2012/02/daily-extraction-february-23-2012.html – The Daily Extraction: February 23, 2012
- Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Can Female Athletes Compete in the Olympics Against Men?
- AD-44: Welcome Home Assemblyman Jeff Gorell » Flap’s California Blog – AD-44: Welcome Home Assemblyman Jeff Gorell
- Wisconsin’s La Follette to file to run for governor – Longtime Wisconsin
Secretary of State Doug La Follette said Wednesday he intends to
take the first step toward running for governor against
Republican Scott Walker if there is a recall.La Follette, a Democrat, said he would visit the Government
Accountability Board office Thursday to file initial paperwork
declaring his potential plans to run.“This is a formal step,” said La Follette in a telephone
interview with Reuters.La Follette will be only the second Democrat with statewide
name recognition to formally announce his plans to run. Democrat
Kathleen Falk, a former Dane County executive who lost the race
for governor in 2002, announced her candidacy last month.Walker and other Republican lawmakers were targeted for
recall by Democratic organizers after the Republicans led a
successful effort to limit public worker collective bargaining
rights last winter. - Calbuzz Co-Blogger Jerry Roberts May Finally Have Beaten Wendy McCaw » Flap’s California Blog – Calbuzz Co-Blogger Jerry Roberts May Finally Have Beaten Wendy McCaw
- The Morning Flap: February 23, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: February 23, 2012
- Giuliani: Social issues make GOP ‘look like it isn’t a modern party’ – Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani said Thursday that he was concerned that Republican stances on social issues would alienate voters and make “the party look like it isn’t a modern party.”
-
The Morning Flap: February 23, 2012
These are my links for February 22nd through February 23rd:
- Rand Paul Says ‘It Would Be An Honor’ if Romney Asked Him to Be VP – Kentucky’s junior senator says it would be an honor to be considered as a possible running mate for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
Senator Rand Paul first discussed his higher aspirations at the beginning of this year. He said he wouldn’t close the door on being a Vice Presidential candidate. After a speech in Louisville today, Paul held that door firmly open, saying he wants to be part of the national debate.
Paul’s name has swirled as a possible pick that would give Romney points with the Tea Party. When asked directly what he would say if Romney made the offer, Paul tried to punt.
“I don’t know if I can answer that question, but I can say it would be an honor to be considered,” he said.
- Flap’s California Morning Collection: February 23, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Morning Collection: February 23, 2012
- New Anti-Obesity Drug Qnexa Receives FDA Advisory Panel Approval | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – New Anti-Obesity Drug Qnexa Receives FDA Advisory Panel Approval
- Bonuses given after raises at Solyndra – Washington Times – Several of the nearly two dozen employees at bankrupt solar panel maker Solyndra LLC who were approved for bonuses Wednesday had months earlier received pay raises as high as 70 percent, a fact the company never disclosed in its request for bonus cash.
The company’s bankruptcy attorneys sought permission for the bonuses in a court hearing, arguing that the extra cash is needed to keep key employees from fleeing only to be replaced by more expensive outside consultants.
With little chance of stable employment and officials moving to liquidate assets, the workers needed to wind down the company have little incentive to stay, the Solyndra attorneys argued.
But an attorney for fired Solyndra workers railed against the plan, saying several of the proposed bonus recipients had received significant salary increases even after the company went bankrupt.
- Romney not winning over grumpy pundits – Right Turn – The Washington Post – The media’s coverage, unless you are Mitt Romney, is almost comical in their aversion to him and exaggerated portrayal of him as unlikable. You’d never guess it from the media, both mainstream and conservative, but Republican voters like Romney quite a lot.
The Post-ABC News poll reports that 69 percent of Republicans have a favorable impression of him, the highest among all the GOP contenders. Even among “very conservative voters” he draws a 62 percent favorable rating. Rick Santorum scores a 74 percent rating (although this may change after his dreadful debate performance), but the numbers suggest that these voters don’t dislike Romney. They simply like (or liked) Santorum better.
In part, voters see perhaps what the right-wing bloggers, with visions of flat taxes and privatized Social Security ( i.e., ideal but unachievable conservative purity) dancing in their heads, miss: Romney is running on a rather conservative agenda. Not hardcore or angry conservatism, but definitely right of center.
- President 2012 Poll Watch: Romney and Santorum Within Striking Distance of Obama in National Polling | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012 Poll Watch: Romney and Santorum Within Striking Distance of Obama in National Polling
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Morning Drill: February 23, 2012 – The Morning Drill: February 23, 2012
- AD-38: Scott Wilk Formally Announces California Assembly Campaign » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38: Scott Wilk Formally Announces California Assembly Campaign
- Video: Santorum on No Child Left Behind: I took one for the team » The Right Scoop – – Video: Santorum on No Child Left Behind: I took one for the team » The Right Scoop –
- Santorum Keeps Lead in Michigan – A new American Research Group poll in Michigan finds Rick Santorum continues to lead the GOP presidential field with 38%, followed by Mitt Romney at 34%, Ron Paul at 12% and Newt Gingrich at 7%.
- Day By Day February 23, 2012 – Shotgun Wedding | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day February 23, 2012 – Shotgun Wedding
- Los Angeles News and Video for Southern California – KTLA.COM – KTLA 5 – ktla.com – Illegal Immigrants Driver’s Licenses: LAPD Chief Backs Driver’s Licenses for Illegal Immigrants –
- Illegal Immigrants Driver’s Licenses: LAPD Chief Backs Driver’s Licenses for Illegal Immigrants – ktla.com – Illegal Immigrants Driver’s Licenses: LAPD Chief Backs Driver’s Licenses for Illegal Immigrants –
- National (US) Poll * February 23, 2012 * American Voters Hum, ‘happy Da – Quinnipiac University ? Hamden, Connecticut – RT @PounderFile: Q Poll: “Voters Support 64 – 23 Percent The Proposed Keystone Pipeline”
- Senate Democrats hammer opponents over social issues – The Hill’s Ballot Box – Senate Democrats hammer opponents over social issues – The Hill’s Ballot Box
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-23 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-23
- Colonoscopy May Halve Colon Cancer Deaths, Long Term Study – Colonoscopy May Halve Colon Cancer Deaths, Long Term Study
- Mitt Romney DESTROYED Rick Santorum Last Night – Mitt Romney DESTROYED Rick Santorum Last Night
- Once-hot Santorum up in smoke –
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-23 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-23
- Santorum campaign suggests Mitt Romney may have done deal to make Ron Paul his running mate – After tonight’s debate, in which Ron Paul and Mitt Romney repeatedly attacked Rick Santorum over his 16-year record in Congress, the former Pennsylvania hinted that something nefarious was going on.
“You have to ask Congressman Paul and Governor Romney what they’ve got going together,” Santorum told reporters in the spin room in Mesa, Arizona. “Their commercials look a lot alike and so do their attacks.”
Santorum’s top strategist John Brabender went even further, charging that the two men had “joined forces” and were coordinating attacks against his man
“Clearly there’s a tag team strategy between Ron Paul and Mitt Romney. For all I know, Mitt Romney might be considering Ron Paul as his running mate. Clearly there is now an alliance between those two and you saw that certainly in the debate.”
The was also coordination in their attack ads, he charged. “Ron Paul for all practical purposes has pulled out of Michigan. Correct? Where’s he running negative ads against Rick Santorum? Michigan.
“It was interesting to me that if you watch Ron Paul when he came into the debate wrote negative things about Rick Santorum down because when he started to get questions he would immediately pick up his paper and start mentioning Santorum stuff.”
He added: “What is amazing to me this shows a remarkable ability by Romney, who has already proven to be the most negative man in history on TV, now he’s even training his opponents to be negative for his benefit and actually I think that takes remarkable skill.”
The Romney campaign ridiculed the notion there was any coordination. “If ever there was an iconoclast who got up there and said what he believed it’s Ron Paul,” said Stuart Stevens, Romney’s chief strategist.
- Falk: Pay for worker training with corporate taxes – Recall candidate Kathleen Falk wants to increase taxes on multi-state companies to pay for worker training.
The plan would roll back tens of millions of dollars in spending cuts for the Wisconsin Technical College System as well as a corporate tax cut passed by Republicans last year. Falk, a Democrat and former Dane County executive, is seeking to challenge Gov. Scott Walker in a likely recall election.
“My ‘Invest in Success’ plan will create jobs and spur economic growth by supporting what worked in Wisconsin for 100 years – investing in education and training workers through our technical college system,” Falk said in a statement.
To help balance the state budget, Walker and GOP lawmakers in June of last year cut nearly $73 million, or 25%, from the Technical College System budget over two years. To undo part of that, Falk wants to roll back a tax cut on multi-state corporations approved by Walker and GOP lawmakers in the budget.
- California Poll Watch: Rival Tax Increase Measures Blocking Jerry Brown » Flap’s California Blog – California Poll Watch: Rival Tax Increase Measures Blocking Jerry Brown
- Capitol Alert: Sen. Sharon Runner announces she won’t run for re-election – California Sen. Sharon Runner announces she won’t run for re-election
- California Sen. Sharon Runner announces she won’t run for re-election – Republican Sen. Sharon Runner, who is awaiting a lung transplant for a rare autoimmune disease, announced today that she will not seek re-election in November.
Runner has been absent from the upper house since January, when she disclosed that complications related to her condition required her to work outside of Sacramento. She said today that she expects to make a full recovery and will focus on “business and philanthropic efforts” after leaving office.
“Serving the people of our community over my lifetime has been an amazing blessing and I am so very thankful for their support throughout each of my elections and my tenure in office,” Runner said in a statement. “In the coming years, I will be working on behalf of the community that I love, but not in the role as an elected official.”
- Untitled (http://maristpoll.marist.edu/wp-content/misc/AZpolls/AZ120219/Republican%20Primary%202012/Complete%20February%2022nd%202012%20Arizona%20NBC%20News-Marist%20Poll%20Tables.pdf) – RT @HotlineJosh: Buried in NBC AZ poll: Immigration hurting Obama Only 57% of DEMS approve; 29/57 approval w/ indies
- President 2012: GOP Debate in Arizona Tonight – A Season Finale? | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012: GOP Debate in Arizona Tonight – A Season Finale?
- The Morning Flap: February 22, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: February 22, 2012
- Poll Watch: Obese Americans Report Higher Rates of Daily Pain | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Poll Watch: Obese Americans Report Higher Rates of Daily Pain
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Newly Identified Oral Bacteria Linked to Heart Disease – Newly Identified Oral Bacteria Linked to Heart Disease
- Obama’s Dividend Assault – A plan to triple the tax rate would hurt all shareholders – WSJ.com – President Obama’s 2013 budget is the gift that keeps on giving—to government. One buried surprise is his proposal to triple the tax rate on corporate dividends, which believe it or not is higher than in his previous budgets.
Mr. Obama is proposing to raise the dividend tax rate to the higher personal income tax rate of 39.6% that will kick in next year. Add in the planned phase-out of deductions and exemptions, and the rate hits 41%. Then add the 3.8% investment tax surcharge in ObamaCare, and the new dividend tax rate in 2013 would be 44.8%—nearly three times today’s 15% rate.
Keep in mind that dividends are paid to shareholders only after the corporation pays taxes on its profits. So assuming a maximum 35% corporate tax rate and a 44.8% dividend tax, the total tax on corporate earnings passed through as dividends would be 64.1%.
- Why Obama’s corporate tax plan is a total bust – The current U.S. economic recovery is arguably the worst in modern American history. Incomes are flat, housing is moribund, and the past three years have seen the longest stretch of high unemployment in this country since the Great Depression. Yet President Barack Obama—with the backing of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner—has the temerity to propose a corporate tax reform plan that would actually raise the tax burden on American business by $250 billion over a decade (and de facto on workers, too) without lowering rates to an internationally competitive level. This is a terrible, terrible plan:
1. The Obama-Geithner plan would lower the statutory corporate tax rate to 28 percent from 35 percent, currently the second-highest among advanced economies. But that would still leave the combined U.S. corporate tax rate—state and federal—at 32.2 percent, far above the OECD combined average of 25 percent. The U.S. combined rate would be a bit below slow-growing Japan and France but above the U.K. and Germany. That’s not nearly good enough. Canada just lowered its corporate tax rate, for instance, to 15 percent. So instead of having the second highest corporate tax rate in the world, the United States would probably be fourth behind Japan, France, and Belgium.
- Chris Christie tells Warren Buffett: ‘Shut up’ – Chris Christie has heard enough about Warren Buffett, and in typical fashion, the New Jersey governor had a certain blunt way of putting it.
“He should just write a check and shut up,” Christie said Tuesday on CNN’s “Piers Morgan Tonight.” “Really, and just contribute. The fact of the matter is that I’m tired of hearing about it. If he wants to give the government more money, he’s got the ability to write a check — go ahead and write it.”
- Racial Preferences Redux – The Supreme Court revisits discrimination and government – When the Supreme Court last upheld racial preferences in college admissions, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor wrote that she “expects that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary.” That was 2003. By agreeing to hear a challenge to the University of Texas’s admissions policies yesterday, the Justices may have pushed up that deadline.
- Dependency Is On The Rise, Despite Gov’t Attempts To Tell Us Things Are Getting Better – The government is at full throttle to present the economy as improving especially in light of the upcoming election. At the same time, there has been a stunning rise in dependency as most recently presented by the Heritage Foundation.
Heritage defines dependency as significantly depending on the government for help in two of the following basic expense items: housing, food, shelter, income security or higher education.
At the end of 2007, Heritage conservatively estimates there were 59.4 million Americans significantly dependent on the government.
By the end of 2010, this number had risen to 67.3 million, an increase of nearly 8 million. It is likely that another two or three million were added in 2011, for a net increase of 10 million to 11 million over the past four years.
It is not a coincidence that the number of people participating in the labor force has comparably declined over the same period.
- Flap’s California Morning Collection: February 22, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Morning Collection: February 22, 2012
- California rates health plans on quality measures – California’s largest health plans have improved their care for diabetic patients, but many need to do better at treating children with throat infections, testing for lung disease and helping people overcome drug and alcohol addictions.
These are among the findings of the 11th annual report card released Wednesday by the state Office of the Patient Advocate.
The report card is meant to give consumers an easy-to-use tool to compare the quality of care delivered by the state’s nine largest health maintenance organizations, six largest preferred provider organizations and 212 medical groups.
Each plan is ranked in categories of care with one to four stars, depending on how well it meets national standards or how its members rate it in such areas as ease of getting appointments and customer service.
“Publicly reporting is one tool to keep plans accountable,” said Sandra Perez, director of the Patient Advocate’s Office.
“The report card helps educate everyone on what types of treatment they should be receiving from their health plan,” she said.
As in previous years, Kaiser Permanente outshone its competitors, receiving the top ranking of four stars in most categories. Most other HMO or PPO plans had no categories with four stars.
Among medical groups, the Palo Alto Medical Foundation also earned top scores, with four stars in both patient rankings and meeting national standards of care.
- CA-30: Sen Barbara Boxer Endorses Rep Howard Berman » Flap’s California Blog – CA-30: Sen Barbara Boxer Endorses Rep Howard Berman
- Tightening Arizona Race Heightens Pressure on Romney – With polls showing Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum within the margin of error of each other in Arizona and Michigan, both candidates have some tough decisions to make ahead of the states’ primaries on Tuesday.
Just a few weeks ago, Romney seemed headed for big wins in both races. Now he finds himself trailing Santorum in his native Michigan, and Santorum creeping up on him in Arizona. That means the top rivals have to carefully figure out how to best divide their time and energy over the next six days.
- Obama to propose lowering corporate tax rate to 28 percent – President Obama on Wednesday plans to propose a major overhaul of the nation’s corporate tax code, an election-year gambit that is likely to draw a contrast over a key policy issue with the Republicans vying to replace him.
Obama will propose lowering the nation’s corporate tax rate to 28 percent. At the same time, however, he will seek to increase the amount of revenues raised overall through corporate taxation by eliminating numerous deductions and loopholes that save companies tens of billions of dollars a year on their tax bills, according to a senior administration official.
- Chris Christie: Rick Santorum’s Satan Comments Are Relevant – Rick Santorum says his 2008 comments that “Satan has set his sights on the United States of America” are “not relevant” to the 2012 presidential race, but Chris Christie told me on “GMA” that Santorum is wrong.
“Listen, I think anything you say as a presidential candidate is relevant. It is by definition relevant. You’re asking to be president of the United States. I don’t think [Santorum’s] right about that. I think it is relevant what he says. I think people want to make an evaluation, a complete evaluation of anyone who asks to sit in the Oval Office,” the New Jersey governor said.
Adding to the religious discussion on the campaign trail, yesterday Santorum said he would “defend everything” he says and Mitt Romney said the Obama administration has “fought against religion.”
But Christie doesn’t think a debate over religion is a conversation the Republican Party wants to engage in.
“Do I think it’s the things we should be as a party talking about and emphasizing at the moment? No,” he said. - Valerie Jarrett: ‘People Who Receive that Unemployment Check Go Out and Spend It and Help Stimulate the Economy’ – This evening, speaking at North Carolina Central University in Durham, North Carolina, White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett said that folks getting and spending unemployment checks is a healthy thing . . . because it stimulates the economy:
- Rand Paul Says ‘It Would Be An Honor’ if Romney Asked Him to Be VP – Kentucky’s junior senator says it would be an honor to be considered as a possible running mate for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.
-
The Morning Flap: February 13, 2012
Republican presidential candidate, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum, flanked by his wife Karen, right, and daughter Elizabeth, addresses the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, Friday, Feb. 10, 2012
These are my links for February 9th through February 13th:
- Congressman wants Afghanistan study group – Citing an Army lieutenant colonel’s claims that there is no progress being made in Afghanistan, Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., is urging Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to create an independent study group to review U.S. strategy in the sandbox.
In a letter dated Friday, Wolf wrote he is deeply troubled by the conclusions reached by Lt. Col. Daniel Davis and asks Panetta to immediately create an Afghanistan/Pakistan Study Group.
In 2010 and 2011, Davis traveled to Afghanistan on assignment with the Army’s Rapid Equipping Force, an organization tasked with getting urgently needed equipment to soldiers in the field.
“What I saw bore no resemblance to rosy official statements by U.S. military leaders about conditions on the ground,” Davis wrote in an opinion piece titled “Truth, lies and Afghanistan,” published online Feb. 5 by Armed Forces Journal.
Rather than the gradual progress described by top U.S. officials, Davis wrote he saw, “the absence of success on virtually every level.”
During a yearlong deployment that began in late 2010, Davis wrote, his job sent him around the country to talk, travel and patrol with troops in Kandahar, Kunar, Ghazni, Khost, Paktika, Kunduz, Balkh, Nangarhar and other provinces. It was his fourth combat deployment, and his second in Afghanistan.
Davis wrote a classified and unclassified report. He has not released either report publicly. On his website, he says he will publish the full unclassified version as soon as Army public affairs completes its review and grants permission for release.
On Feb. 10, Rolling Stone magazine published a copy of the unclassified version on its website.
Davis has provided the reports to members of Congress — both Democrats and Republicans, senators and House members. He has also sent his reports to the Defense Department’s inspector general.
He declined to comment for this story.
The Pentagon maintains that the security environment in Afghanistan continues to improve.
During a briefing this week, Army Lt. Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, deputy commander of U.S. Forces-Afghanistan, described steady progress in the country, from local and national government to the development of Afghan security forces. Responding to a question about Davis’ report, Scaparrotti said, “it’s one person’s view of this,” adding that he thought the Defense Department’s outlook is accurate.
Wolf has written similar letters to Panetta over the past several months.
The congressman is the author of the legislation that created the Iraq Study Group and has been pushing for the Obama administration to conduct a similar review of the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
- Santorum surges into the lead – Public Policy Polling – Riding a wave of momentum from his trio of victories on Tuesday Rick Santorum has opened up a wide lead in PPP’s newest national poll. He’s at 38% to 23% for Mitt Romney, 17% for Newt Gingrich, and 13% for Ron Paul.
Part of the reason for Santorum’s surge is his own high level of popularity. 64% of voters see him favorably to only 22% with a negative one. But the other, and maybe more important, reason is that Republicans are significantly souring on both Romney and Gingrich. Romney’s favorability is barely above water at 44/43, representing a 23 point net decline from our December national poll when he was +24 (55/31). Gingrich has fallen even further. A 44% plurality of GOP voters now hold a negative opinion of him to only 42% with a positive one. That’s a 34 point drop from 2 months ago when he was at +32 (60/28).
Santorum is now completely dominating with several key segments of the electorate, especially the most right leaning parts of the party. With those describing themselves as ‘very conservative,’ he’s now winning a majority of voters at 53% to 20% for Gingrich and 15% for Romney. Santorum gets a majority with Tea Party voters as well at 51% to 24% for Gingrich and 12% for Romney. And with Evangelicals he falls just short of a majority with 45% to 21% for Gingrich and 18% for Romney.
It used to be that Gingrich was leading with all these groups and Romney was staying competitive enough with them to hold the overall lead. No more- a consensus conservative candidate finally seems to be emerging and it’s Santorum. - Labor unions left sour with President Obama set to sign FAA funding bill – Labor’s division over the bill funding the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has helped clear the way for President Obama to sign it.
Unions are split in their opposition to the measure, with some fearing its provision on union election rules endangers organizing.
Union officials say they were kept in the dark about the negotiations between Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) that helped pass the bill.
- Does Indiana Need a Pro-Teapot Museum GOP Senator? – By Jim Geraghty – The Campaign Spot – National Review Online – RT @jimgeraghty: In Indiana’s GOP Senate primary, Richard Mourdock releases new statewide ad hitting Lugar on earmarks:
- Day By Day February 12, 2012 – Logic | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day February 12, 2012 – Logic
- Romney and Birth Control: a Shift – WSJ.com – RT @LizMair: Rough news day for Mitt Romney on many counts, but especially this one:
- Shrinking Senate Hopes – for 2012 – Three other Democratic seats are vulnerable. No state has trended Republican in recent years more than Missouri. John McCain narrowly beat Obama in Missouri in 2008. Roy Blunt won the open Senate seat there in 2010 by 14 percentage points. So it’s no surprise that Democratic senator Claire McCaskill is in deep trouble this year. The Republican Senate primary is August 7.
Wisconsin is more Democratic, but it offers Republicans a great opportunity. Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin, the Democratic candidate, is gay, liberal, and a zealous campaigner. Either of the GOP candidates, former governor Tommy Thompson or ex-House member Mark Neumann, could beat her. When Neumann gave up his House seat in 1998 to run (unsuccessfully) for the Senate, by the way, he was replaced by Paul Ryan.
In Hawaii, Democrat Dan Akaka is stepping down after three terms, and there’s only one Republican with a realistic chance of winning his seat, former governor Linda Lingle. Fortunately for Republicans, Lingle is running. She didn’t have to buck a Democratic tide in a presidential year when she won the governorship in 2002 and 2006. With Obama, a native of Hawaii, leading the ticket, she’ll have to overcome a strong partisan headwind.
Where does this leave us? Duffy projects a Republican gain of three to six seats. The Rothenberg Report says two to five. A year ago, I’d have said four to seven. Today, three to six seems about right, with emphasis on the three. But my rule of politics is that the future is never a straight line projection of the present. In November, Republican prospects may look better—or worse.
- Canada’s Harper talks oil with China as U.S. faces $4 gas | Washington Examiner – RT @mtapscott: Canada’s Harper talks oil with China as U.S. faces $4 gas | Washington Examiner: #TCOT #TEAPARTY #SG …
- AD-38: California Assemblyman Cameron Smyth Endorses Scott Wilk for Assembly » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38: California Assemblyman Cameron Smyth Endorses Scott Wilk for Assembly
- Media Matters | Sources | David Brock | The Daily Caller – Inside Media Matters: Sources, memos reveal erratic behavior, close coordination with White House & news organizations
- SNL Parodies of Clint Eastwood’s Half Time in America Are Really Stupid | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – SNL Parodies of Clint Eastwood’s Half time in America Are Really Stupid
- Weasel Zippers » Blog Archive » Occupy Oakland Burns The American Flag For The Third Week In A Row… – Occupy Oakland Burns The American Flag For The Third Week In A Row…
- Merkel taking Europe in wrong direction: Soros – Merkel taking Europe in wrong direction: George Soros
- Greek lawmakers approve austerity bill as Athens burns
| Reuters – Greek lawmakers approve austerity bill as Athens burns - Day By Day February 11, 2012 – Listing | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day February 11, 2012 – Listing
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-12 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-12
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-12 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-12
- foursquare :: Gregory Flap’s Badges :: Greasy Spoon – I just unlocked the “Greasy Spoon” badge on @foursquare! Bring on the burgers!
- foursquare :: Gregory Flap @ Ronnie’s Diner – Finished @LAMarathon 20 miler! Yay! (@ Ronnie’s Diner w/ 6 others)
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-11 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-11
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-11 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-11
- The Afghanistan Report the Pentagon Doesn’t Want You to Read – Earlier this week, the New York Times’ Scott Shane published a bombshell piece about Lt. Colonel Daniel Davis, a 17-year Army veteran recently returned from a second tour in Afghanistan. According to the Times, the 48-year-old Davis had written an 84-page unclassified report, as well as a classified report, offering his assessment of the decade-long war. That assessment is essentially that the war has been a disaster and the military’s top brass has not leveled with the American public about just how badly it’s been going. “How many more men must die in support of a mission that is not succeeding?” Davis boldly asks in an article summarizing his views in The Armed Forces Journal.
Davis last month submitted the unclassified report –titled “Dereliction of Duty II: Senior Military Leader’s Loss of Integrity Wounds Afghan War Effort” – for an internal Army review. Such a report could then be released to the public. However, according to U.S. military officials familiar with the situation, the Pentagon is refusing to do so. Rolling Stone has now obtained a full copy of the 84-page unclassified version, which has been making the rounds within the U.S. government, including the White House. We’ve decided to publish it in full; it’s well worth reading for yourself. It is, in my estimation, one of the most significant documents published by an active-duty officer in the past ten years.
- Flap’s California Afternoon Collection: February 10, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Afternoon Collection: February 10, 2012
- Poll Watch: Americans View China as Leading Economic Power | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Poll Watch: Americans View China as Leading Economic Power
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Afternoon Drill: February 10, 2012 – The Afternoon Drill: February 10, 2012
- Teachers union defends endorsement of Falk – The state’s largest public teachers union is standing behind its endorsement of Kathleen Falk for governor despite controversy among Democrats and some union members.
Some complained the endorsement came too early: A recall election hasn’t been ordered, and many expect other prominent candidates to join the race. Others felt the unions shouldn’t play kingmaker before a primary or give the impression that the election is about only collective bargaining rights.
Mary Bell, Wisconsin Education Association Council president, said she understood the passionate feelings but said the recommendation was made with input from union leaders throughout the state.
“It’s not surprising,” she said. “Our members have a lot invested in what’s happening.”
Though acknowledging other candidates may enter the race, Bell said she is confident the former Dane County executive is the best choice to beat Republican Gov. Scott Walker.
Bell said the short and uncertain time frame of a recall made it necessary to put out a recommendation early.
Mike Tate, chairman of the state Democratic Party, said the party is proud to work closely with organized labor – which he called “the backbone” of the party – though he said the election is about much more.
“A million Wisconsinites signed a recall petition; each one has their own reason,” he said. “There’s a number of reasons to recall Scott Walker.”
He shrugged off the significance of the WEAC decision.
“Unions make endorsements,” Tate said Thursday. “That’s what they do.”
- Day By Day February 10, 2012 – The Useful | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day February 10, 2012 – The Useful
- Here’s A Peek At What Falk As Governor Would Look Like – Don’t say you haven’t been warned!
Kathleen Falk, the candidate from WEAC, says she wants to “undo the harm” that Governor Walker has done and is apparently willing to devastate Wisconsin in order to advance her agenda.
Want to see what “undoing the harm” would look like?
A year ago Pat Quinn, the ultra-liberal Governor of Illinois, faced many of the same challenges that Scott Walker faced. Instead of standing up to public employee unions and reining in spending, Quinn pushed for massive tax increases and business as usual.
So how did that work out?
In contrast to Governor Walker (who has an approval rating over 50%), Quinn has an approval rating of 30%! That’s right! 30%.
Let’s be real clear. Kathleen Falk is a slightly more opportunistic version of Pat Quinn with a Madison mailing address. The policies of Quinn have decimated Illinois. There’s absolutely no reason to think that they’d work any better in Wisconsin under Kathleen Falk.
Want to see what Wisconsin would look like one year after Kathleen Falk became Governor? Just look at Illinois today.
It’s not a pretty sight.
- Nearly 1 in 20 US adults over 50 have fake knees – Nearly 1 in 20 Americans older than 50 have artificial knees, or more than 4 million people, according to the first national estimate showing how common these replacement joints have become in an aging population.
Doctors know the number of knee replacement operations has surged in the past decade, especially in baby boomers. But until now, there was no good fix on the total number of people living with them.
The estimate is important because it shows that a big segment of the population might need future knee-related care, said Dr. Daniel Berry, president of the American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons and chairman of orthopedic surgery at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. He was not involved in the research.
- Medscape: Medscape Access – Midlife smoking in men linked to more rapid cognitive decline in later life i
- Majority of Search Queries Go Mobile By 2016 — Bernstein – Peter Kafka – Mobile – AllThingsD – RT @allthingsd: Here’s What Apple and Google Are Fighting Over: Search Goes Mobile By 2016 -by @pkafka
- Report: Adelson done giving to Gingrich as funding dries up – The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room – Report: Sheldon Adelson done giving to #Gingrich as funding dries up #tcot #GOP12
- Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-10 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Blog @ Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-10
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-10 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-02-10
- ObamaCare: The Catholic Epiphany | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – ObamaCare: The Catholic Epiphany
- AD-38: Patricia McKeon to Address Simi Valley Moorpark Tea Party » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38: Patricia McKeon to Address Simi Valley Moorpark Tea Party » Flap’s California Blog
- Untitled (https://plus.google.com/105353644409523560325/posts/VtTyPoGT4nP) – Nancy Pelosi said, “We have to pass it to find out what is in it,” referring to the Health Care bill
- AD-38 Video: Rep Buck McKeon Doesn’t Want to Answer Questions About Defense Contractors Contributing to His Wife Patricia McKeon’s Assembly Campaign » Flap’s California Blog – AD-38 Video: Rep Buck McKeon Doesn’t Want to Answer Questions About Defense Contractors Contributing to His Wife…
- AD-38: Patricia McKeon to Address Simi Valley Moorpark Tea Party » Flap’s California Blog – (500) …
- (500) http://flapsblog.org/2012/02/09/ad-38-patricia-mckeon-to-address-simi-valley-moorpark-tea-party/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=ad-38-patricia-mckeon-to-address-simi-valley-moorpark-tea-party&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter – AD-38: Patricia McKeon to Address Simi Valley Moorpark Tea Party
- President 2012: The GOP Presidential Delegate Calculator | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012: The GOP Presidential Delegate Calculator
- Obama administration reaffirms support for California high-speed rail – latimes.com – Obama administration reaffirms support for California high-speed rail
- Carmen Trutanich will run for L.A. district attorney – latimes.com – Carmen Trutanich will run for L.A. district attorney
- How the housing settlement might affect you | HealthyCal – How the housing settlement might affect you
- Flap’s California Afternoon Collection: February 9, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Afternoon Collection: February 9, 2012
- Sen Jim DeMint Video: Brokered GOP Convention Possible | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Sen Jim DeMint Video: Brokered GOP Convention Possible
- Poll Watch: 22 Per Cent of Americans Satisfied With the Way Things Are Going | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Poll Watch: 22 Per Cent of Americans Satisfied With the Way Things Are Going
- President 2012 Ohio Poll Watch: Santorum Tied With Obama While Romney Trails | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012 Ohio Poll Watch: Santorum Tied With Obama While Romney Trails
- Updated: President 2012 Video: Mitt Romney’s Greatest Hits | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Updated: President 2012 Video: Mitt Romney’s Greatest Hits
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Tom’s of Maine to Award Five $20K Grants to Non-Profit Dental Clinics – Tom’s of Maine to Award Five $20K Grants to Non-Profit Dental Clinics
- Congressman wants Afghanistan study group – Citing an Army lieutenant colonel’s claims that there is no progress being made in Afghanistan, Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Va., is urging Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to create an independent study group to review U.S. strategy in the sandbox.
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The Morning Flap: January 26, 2012
Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and President Obama yesterday
These are my links for January 25th through January 26th:
- Apple’s iPad and the Human Costs for Workers in China – In the last decade, Apple has become one of the mightiest, richest and most successful companies in the world, in part by mastering global manufacturing. Apple and its high-technology peers — as well as dozens of other American industries — have achieved a pace of innovation nearly unmatched in modern history.
However, the workers assembling iPhones, iPads and other devices often labor in harsh conditions, according to employees inside those plants, worker advocates and documents published by companies themselves. Problems are as varied as onerous work environments and serious — sometimes deadly — safety problems.
Employees work excessive overtime, in some cases seven days a week, and live in crowded dorms. Some say they stand so long that their legs swell until they can hardly walk. Under-age workers have helped build Apple’s products, and the company’s suppliers have improperly disposed of hazardous waste and falsified records, according to company reports and advocacy groups that, within China, are often considered reliable, independent monitors.
More troubling, the groups say, is some suppliers’ disregard for workers’ health. Two years ago, 137 workers at an Apple supplier in eastern China were injured after they were ordered to use a poisonous chemical to clean iPhone screens. Within seven months last year, two explosions at iPad factories, including in Chengdu, killed four people and injured 77. Before those blasts, Apple had been alerted to hazardous conditions inside the Chengdu plant, according to a Chinese group that published that warning. - Thou Shalt Not Write Bad Things About Obama – Drudge has a story about Obama getting off of Air Force One in Arizona, greeting Republican governor Jan Brewer, and immediately giving her a piece of his mind. Evidently our president did not appreciate something Brewer wrote about him. According to the pool report, they had a testy exchange from which the president walked away as Brewer was still speaking.
Sound familiar? Bobby Jindal got the same treatment when Obama came to visit Louisiana and the governor met him on the tarmac
- Geithner Says Obama Won’t Ask Him to Lead Treasury if He Wins Re-Election – Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner, the last remaining member of the Obama administration’s original economic team, said he doesn’t expect the president to ask him to stay in office if re-elected.
“He’s not going to ask me to stay on, I’m pretty confident,” Geithner said in an interview with Bloomberg Television today. “I’m confident he’ll be president. But I’m also confident he’s going to have the privilege of having another secretary of the Treasury.”
Geithner, 50, has led President Barack Obama’s efforts to pull the U.S. economy out of the worst recession since World War II. Before joining the administration in 2009, Geithner was president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, playing a key role in the U.S. government’s bailouts of banks including Citigroup Inc. (C) and Bank of America Corp. (BAC), and automakers General Motors Co. and Chrysler Group LLC.
- President 2012 GOP Florida Poll Watch: Mitt Romney Has Jumped Back in Front of Newt Gingrich | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012 GOP Florida Poll Watch: Mitt Romney Has Jumped Back in Front of Newt Gingrich
- As Obama demands rich Americans pay more in taxes, the IRS reveals 36 Obama aides are far behind in their taxes – How embarrassing this must be for President Obama, whose major speech theme so far this campaign season has been that every single American, no matter how rich, should pay their “fair share” of taxes.
Because how unfair — indeed, un-American — it is for an office worker like, say, Warren Buffet’s secretary to dutifully pay her taxes, while some well-to-do people with better educations and higher incomes end up paying a much smaller tax rate.
Or, worse, skipping their taxes altogether.
A new report just out from the Internal Revenue Service reveals that 36 of President Obama’s executive office staff owe the country $833,970 in back taxes. These people working for Mr. Fair Share apparently haven’t paid any share, let alone their fair share.
Previous reports have shown how well-paid Obama’s White House staff is, with 457 aides pulling down more than $37 million last year. That’s up seven workers and nearly $4 million from the Bush administration’s last year.
Nearly one-third of Obama’s aides make more than $100,000 with 21 being paid the top White House salary of $172,200, each.
The IRS’ 2010 delinquent tax revelations come as part of a required annual agency report on federal employees’ tax compliance. Turns out, an awful lot of folks being paid by taxpayers are not paying their own income taxes.
- Leak to media about House Ethics probes ignites chatter on source, motives – A leak to the media that identified three Republicans who are being investigated by the House Ethics Committee has lawmakers and staffers wondering who the source is, and his or her motive.
There are many theories on who, over a four-day period, forked over the names of GOP Reps. Pete Sessions (Texas), Buck McKeon (Calif.) and Elton Gallegly (Calif.) to media outlets in reference to an ongoing investigation into VIP loans given to lawmakers by Countrywide.
The leaks stunned the three legislators, who have all denied accepting special rates on the loans in exchange for political favors.
Some are pointing the finger at House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) for releasing the publicly sensitive information, though his office is pushing back at that notion.
- Post-State of the Union Analysis – Post-State of the Union Analysis Where Americans stand on 16 issues Pres. Obama raised in the State of the Union
- Flap’s California Morning Collection: January 26, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Morning Collection: January 26, 2012
- How Patrick Swayze died: Why we should care – When I finished my book on famous patients, the most common question I received was “Are the stories of sick celebrities really relevant to other patients?” My answer was that yes, with some caveats, these experiences are well-worth knowing.
The same can be said for the story of Patrick Swayze’s terminal pancreatic cancer, which has now been told by his widow, actress Lisa Niemi Swayze, in a new book, “Worth Fighting For: Love, Loss and Moving Forward.” Patrick Swayze, a dancer and actor best known for his roles in the films “Dirty Dancing” and “Ghost,” was diagnosed in January 2008 and died of the disease in September 2009 at the age of 57. He was originally told he would live only a few months.
First, the caveats. Like most celebrities, Swayze had the means, as his wife says, to “think outside the box.” He enrolled in a clinical trial at Stanford University, traveling regularly to Palo Alto from Los Angeles for experimental chemotherapy. Swayze also was a VIP patient, getting first-class attention from top doctors and hospital staffs. Most patients experience greater hurdles.
Nor should pancreatic cancer patients who read “Worth Fighting For” assume that they, like Swazey, can beat the odds and survive longer if they take the same medications that he did. Every case of pancreatic cancer, like all cancers, is different.
- Many Patients Continue to Smoke Even After Being Diagnosed With Cancer | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Many Patients Continue to Smoke Even After Being Diagnosed With Cancer
- Florida’s Rubio a star, but an unlikely VP pick
| Reuters – Florida’s Rubio a star, but an unlikely VP pick - Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Morning Drill: January 26, 2012 – The Morning Drill: January 26, 2012
- Day By Day January 26, 2012 – Da Damonator | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day by Day January 26, 2012 – Da Damonator
- The Buffett Ruse – WSJ.com – Remember the moment in 2008 when Charlie Gibson of ABC News asked Senator Barack Obama why he would support raising the capital gains tax even though “revenues from the tax increased” when the rate fell? Mr. Obama’s famous reply: “I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness.” Well, we were warned.
Here we are four years later, and President Obama on Tuesday night linked the term “fair” to U.S. tax and economic policy seven times. The U.S. economy is still hobbling out of recession, real family incomes are falling and 14 million Americans are unemployed, but Mr. Obama declared that his top priority is not to reform the tax code to promote growth and job creation. His overriding goal is redistributing income.
Mr. Obama endorsed the political ruse he calls the Buffett rule, which asserts as a matter of moral principle that millionaires should not pay a lower tax rate than middle-class wage earners. Specifically, Mr. Obama is proposing that anyone earning more than $1 million pay at least 30% of that income to Uncle Barack.
The White House says that if a millionaire household’s effective tax rate falls below 30%, it would have to pay a surcharge—in essence a new Super Alternative Minimum Tax—to bring the tax liability to 30%. For those facing this new Super AMT, all deductions and exemptions would be eliminated except for charity.
- Review & Outlook: The Buffett Ruse – WSJ.com – The Buffett Ruse Obama’s ploy means the highest capital gains tax rate since 1978 #tcot
- Obama’s 30% millionaire tax – CNN Political Ticker – CNN.com Blogs – Obama’s 30% millionaire tax –
- Drudge, conservative media criticize Newt Gingrich – Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen – POLITICO.com – SIREN — The Newt bomb: Conservative media leaders see possible Gingrich win in FL; blast him to avoid “disaster”
- Digital download tax: O’Malley proposes digital downloads be subject to state sales tax – baltimoresun.com – Beyond Amazon taxes: @GovernorOMalley is considering a tax on iTunes and app downloads:
- Untitled (http://www.memeorandum.com/120126/p7#a120126p7) – Times-Union/Insider Advantage poll: Romney 40, Gingrich 32 (Matt Dixon / Florida Times Union)
- Times-Union/Insider Advantage poll: Romney 40, Gingrich 32 | jacksonville.com – Times-Union/Insider Advantage poll: Romney 40, Gingrich 32 (Matt Dixon / Florida Times Union)
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-01-26 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-01-26
- Dick Armey: Daniels could still run – CNN Political Ticker – CNN.com Blogs – RT @Students4Mitch: Dick Armey: Daniels could still run –
- When Gingrich Tried, and Failed, to Intimidate Tom Coburn – By Jim Geraghty – The Campaign Spot – National Review Online – When Gingrich Tried, and Failed, to Intimidate Tom Coburn
- (404) http://t.co/T – RT @fivethirtyeight: We’ve got Romney back ahead in our FL forecast and gaining quickly. Newt needs a big debate tomorrow. …
- The Christian Science Monitor – CSMonitor.com – Why Jerry Brown is standing firm on shaky California high-speed rail plan –
- Why Jerry Brown is standing firm on shaky California high-speed rail plan – CSMonitor.com – Why Jerry Brown is standing firm on shaky California high-speed rail plan
- Brewer, Obama exchange tense words over book, immigration at airport – Oh My! | Brewer, Obama exchange tense words over book, immigration at airport – #tcot
- The Page by Mark Halperin | Gen Elex Match-Ups, Sunshine State Edition – President 2012 Poll Watch: Romney 47% Vs. Obama 42% and Obama 49% Vs. Gingrich 40% Jan 22-24 Florida Likely Voters
- Warren Buffett’s Secretary Likely Makes Between $200,000 And $500,000/Year – Forbes – RICH | Warren Buffett’s Secretary Likely Makes Between $200,000 And $500,000/Year
- Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair – Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair
- Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair – Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair
- Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair – Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair
- Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair – Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair
- Poll: Romney Regains Momentum in Florida – Steven Shepard – NationalJournal.com – RT @HotlineSteve: New CNN/Time/ORC Fla. poll: Romney 36, Gingrich 34. But Romney regained the momentum most recently:
- Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair – RT @gallupnews: Americans Divided on Whether U.S. Economic System Is Unfair…
- CA-26: California Republican Party Chairman Tom Del Beccaro Endorses Tony Strickland for Congress | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-26: California Republican Party Chairman Tom Del Beccaro Endorses Tony Strickland for Congress
- For Smokers Seeing Arterial Plaque Makes No Difference on Whether They Quit Smoking | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – For Smokers Seeing Arterial Plaque Makes No Difference on Whether They Quit Smoking
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: California Dental Association Supporting Dental Mid-Level Providers? – California Dental Association Supporting Dental Mid-Level Providers?
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Morning Drill: January 25, 2012 – The Morning Drill: January 25, 2012
- Scott Walker leads in Wisconsin recall poll – Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) is ahead in his likely recall election even as his campaign raises — and spends — millions of dollars in expectation of a tough race later this year.
According to a new Marquette Law School poll the governor leads Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, a likely candidate, 50 percent to 44 percent. He leads former Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk, the only declared Democratic candidate, 49 percent to 42 percent margin, former Rep. David Obey 49 percent to 43 percent and state Sen. Tim Cullen 50 percent to 40 percent.
Democrats started targeting Walker last year, when he spearheaded controversial legislation limiting collective bargaining for public employees. Under Wisconsin law, Walker was not eligible for a recall election until January of this year.
- President 2012: Pelosi Folds – No New Dirt on Gingrich | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012: Pelosi Folds – No New Dirt on Gingrich
- Flap’s California Morning Collection: January 25, 2012 » Flap’s California Blog – Flap’s California Morning Collection: January 25, 2012
- Gingrich says Pelosi is living in a fantasy world – The Hill’s Video – Gingrich says Pelosi is living in a fantasy world
- Rubio scolds Gingrich camp, says ad bashing ‘anti-immigrant’ Romney is ‘inaccurate, inflammatory’ | Naked Politics – Rubio scolds Gingrich camp, says ad bashing ‘anti-immigrant’ Romney is ‘inaccurate, inflammatory’
- 33% of GOP Voters Say It Would Be Good If New Candidate Entered Presidential Race – Rasmussen Reports™ – 33% of GOP Voters Say It Would Be Good If New Candidate Entered Presidential Race
- Senior Runners Improve Marathon Performance | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Senior Runners Improve Marathon Performance
- The Morning Flap: January 25, 2012 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: January 25, 2012
- Apple’s iPad and the Human Costs for Workers in China – In the last decade, Apple has become one of the mightiest, richest and most successful companies in the world, in part by mastering global manufacturing. Apple and its high-technology peers — as well as dozens of other American industries — have achieved a pace of innovation nearly unmatched in modern history.
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The Morning Flap: November 17, 2011
These are my links for November 15th through November 17th:
- Berkeley police break up Occupy Cal; tents removed, 2 arrested – Police moved in early Thursday to break up the Occupy Cal protest at UC Berkeley, arresting at least two protesters.
Scores of officers conducted the raid, removing the tents and clearing the area.
On Tuesday, more than 1,200 singing, sign-waving students and faculty members rallied for much of the day on Sproul Plaza, a site of the 1960s Free Speech Movement.
At one point, the demonstrators chanted “Hey, hey, ho, ho, police violence has got to go,” a reference to an incident last week in which baton-wielding police officers stopped an Occupy camp from being set up on the campus. Dozens of protesters were arrested in last week’s confrontation, and several were injured.
- Protesters prepare to take over downtown L.A. intersection – Organizers of a demonstration planned Thursday morning in downtown Los Angeles say protesters are prepared to be arrested by police for committing acts of civil disobedience — including shutting down an intersection.
The march, which is timed to coincide with other demonstrations across the country to protest the imbalance of wealth and power in the country, is set to begin at 7 a.m. at Bank of America Plaza on Hope Street. It will then make its way through the Financial District to the corner of Figueroa and 4th streets, where demonstrators plan to shut down traffic by erecting tents in the middle of the street.
Jacob Hay, a leader of the coalition of labor and community groups that helped organize the march, said the group has secured police permits, but that protesters are prepared to be arrested for blocking traffic.
- Perry challenges Pelosi to debate part-time Congress plan – Rick Perry has challenged House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi to debate him next week about his plan for a part-time Congress.
In a letter to Pelosi (D-Calif.) obtained by The Hill, the Texas governor wrote: “I am in Washington Monday and would love to engage you in a public debate about my Overhaul Washington plan versus the congressional status quo.
“I think it would be a tremendous service to the American people to see a public airing of these differences,” he continued. “Let the people decide. If Monday doesn’t work, perhaps we could find a time in Iowa over the course of the next month to discuss these issues in front of the people of America’s heartland.”
- San Franciso police arrest 100 in Bank of America protest – Protesters in the Occupy Wall Street movement seized a Bank of America branch in the city’s financial district Wednesday, a demonstration that forced jittery customers and employees to flee and ended in nearly 100 arrests.
It took about 40 police officers in riot gear nearly four hours to clear the bank, but no one was injured. Police said many of those arrested were UC Santa Cruz students who were protesting fee increases and budget cuts.
Police removed the protesters methodically, placing them in plastic handcuffs, citing them for misdemeanor trespassing and sending them off in police wagons for further processing.
- Wall Street clashes start Occupy’s day of action – Police arrested protesters who sat on the ground and blocked traffic into New York’s financial district on Thursday, part of a day of mass gatherings in response to efforts to break up Occupy Wall Street camps nationwide.
Police in riot helmets hauled several protesters to their feet and handcuffed them one block from Wall Street.
“All day, all week, shut down Wall Street!” the crowd chanted.
- Occupy Wall Street protesters vow to wear suits, blend in and get revenge for the Zuccotti Park raid – Occupy Wall Street hoped to show there was life after Zuccotti Thursday by staging a series of marches and rallies – starting with a sneak attack on the Stock Exchange itself.
As the city braced for a “sizeable” crowd, observers on both sides said the scale of the protest would show whether the two-month-old movement could regain momentum after Tuesday’s demoralizing defeat.
OWS hoped anger over the NYPD raid that razed their iconic tent city at Zuccotti Park would breathe new life into a cause that had begun to sputter.
The “day of action” is to begin early, with protesters converging on Wall Street camouflaged in business suits hoping to blend in with office workers trooping out of the subway.
- Zuccotti Park protester Nkrumah Tinsley arrested after threatening to burn down city – A protester was arrested in Zuccotti Park Wednesday after he threatened to fire bomb the city — and his rant went viral on YouTube, police said.
Nkrumah Tinsley, 29, was busted after cops saw a video of him claiming he would torch the city during Thursday’s mass protest posted online, police said.
“On the 17th (of Nov.), we’re going to burn New York City to the f—ing ground,” an angry Tinsley told a crowd of demonstrators in the video posted on Tuesday.
“In a few days, you’re going to see what a Molotov cocktail can do to Macy’s.”
When officers from the NYPD’s intelligence division saw the video, they immediately began working on trying to identify the raging man, police said.
“We didn’t want him out there [Thursday]. We wanted him in our custody,” said Paul Browne, top spokesman for the NYPD. “He was specific as to date, location and method for the fire bombing …maybe it was just a rant, but we didn’t want to take that chance.”
Cops later spotted Tinsley at Zuccotti Park Wednesday and collared him about 5 p.m., police said. He was charged with making terroristic threats.
- Romenesko Leaves Poynter After Conflict Over Quotes – Jim Romenesko, the blogger who developed a large and loyal following by chronicling and summarizing news in the media world, quit his post on Thursday evening after a bizarre spat with the institute that hosts his writing.
An editor at Poynter, which purchased Mr. Romenesko’s blog 12 years ago, had questioned his failure to use quotation marks when summarizing articles in his daily round-ups of media stories — summaries that Mr. Romenesko never claimed credit for as his original work.
In an e-mail to the institute on Thursday night, Mr. Romenesko said, “I’ve had a great dozen years at Poynter, and I look forward to my next chapter.”
- Felix • A couple of points about Romeneskogate, for those who aren’t completely bored of it by now – The original Julie Moos post was highly misleading in one respect — she made it seem as though Romenesko hadn’t blockquoted two full paragraphs in this post, when in fact he had used blockquote. I know Moos was misleading because Jack Shafer said that she “pointed to a recent example from Romenesko’s work in which he ran whole sentences from a Chicago Tribune story in his summary of it without placing the words in quotation marks or block quotation”. I suspect that the problem here is that Poynter’s CSS has problems with blockquotes-within-blockquotes, but in any case Moos should have been much clearer that only a minority of the text in question was outside quote marks or blockquotes.
Justin Peters managed to commit exactly the same sin that Moos did, when he reminisced about freelancing on Today’s Papers. “I knuckled down and found a way to say things in my own words, because I am a journalist, and that is my job,” he writes, managing to to completely miss the point of what an aggregator does. It’s not the job of a journalist, saying things in his own words: instead, it’s the job of a curator, linking to great content. If Peters thinks that Romenesko’s job was that of a journalist, writing things in his own words, he’s missing the point entirely. - Holding aggregators to journalistic standards – Moos is using the standards of original journalism, here, to judge a blogger who was never about original journalism. Copy-and-pasting other people’s stories is what Romenesko did, at high volume, and with astonishing speed and reliability, for many years. And the media community, including Poynter, loved him for it.
Moos might have “spent weeks in 2004 developing explicit publishing guidelines with the understanding and expectation that they would be adopted”, but guidelines are always reverse-engineered from already-existing best practice. And Romenesko is a shining example of best practice in the aggregation world. If he’s violating the guidelines, then it’s the guidelines which are at fault, not Romenesko.
Petty bureaucrats like Moos love to codify things, so that they can cite chapter and verse when telling people off. But if you’re running a grown-up media organization, please: follow Paton’s lead, and not Moos’s. Journalists will behave unethically, sometimes. When they do, they should be reprimanded or even fired. But basic common sense is always the best guide to whether a journalist has done something wrong. And when Julie Moos presumes to judge Jim Romenesko by the standards of a Moos-written rulebook, it’s right and proper that the wrath of the Twittersphere come down on her as a result.
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Connecticut Mall Teeth-Whitening Entrepreneurs Sue the Connecticut Dental Commission – Connecticut Mall Teeth-Whitening Entrepreneurs Sue the Connecticut Dental Commission
- Wisconsin’s Governor: Recall Drive Is About Unions Seeking ‘Power’ – Many of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s citizens may be signing petitions for his recall in reaction to the battle he led earlier in the year to weaken his state’s public-employee unions.
But Walker doesn’t appear to be backing off one inch from his stance that he did what was right for his state.
Indeed, in a conversation with Tell Me More host Michel Martin, Walker essentially blamed outside agitators in organized labor for the recall effort.
He accused his political foes of really being after “power” while presumably camouflaging their true intent with platitudes about workers’ rights, among other things.
Unions are in particular coming after him, Walker said, because the new budget law he and the the Republican-controlled state legislature in Madison enacted, gave workers a choice about whether or not to belong to a union.
- California Appeals Court Rules: Cell Phones at Red Lights Are Not OK » Flap’s California Blog – California Appeals Court Rules: Cell Phones at Red Lights Are Not OK
- The Cease and Desist Letter From the Smile Center of San Antonio and Dr. Stephen Simpton | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Cease and Desist Letter From the Smile Center of San Antonio and Dr. Stephen Simpton #tcot #catcot
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Updated: The Cease and Desist Letter From the Smile Center of San Antonio and Dr. Stephen Simpton – The Cease and Desist Letter From the Smile Center of San Antonio and Dr. Stephen Simpton
- CA-26: Ventura County Supervisor Steve Bennett to Announce Candidacy for Congress | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – CA-26: Ventura County Supervisor Steve Bennett to Announce Candidacy for Congress #tcot #catcot
- Is the Gingrich Bubble Already Popping? – Is the Gingrich Bubble Already Popping?
- Gingrich Said to Be Paid $1.6M by Freddie Mac- Bloomberg – Gingrich Said to Be Paid at Least $1.6 Million by Freddie Mac
- Is the Gingrich Bubble Already Popping? – Joe Klein says news of Newt Gingrich’s ties to Freddie Mac threaten to halt his recent recent rise in the polls.
“You must understand: to Republican stalwarts, a relationship with Freddie Mac is the moral equivalent of satanism. Gingrich was a paid helper — and, believe me, he didn’t get paid $1.6 million to lecture the organization on the failures of government intervention in the market — in a ‘socialist’ effort to make home-buying easier for people who ordinarily wouldn’t be able to afford houses, an effort that famously went off the rails when the government began supporting sub-prime and other highly questionable mortgages.”
“In other words, Gingrich was supporting — the best guess was that Gingrich was hired to win some Republican support for Freddie — the very sort of program that he routinely excoriates. This sort of hypocrisy is astounding but, sadly, not unknown to Newt. After all, this was the guy who led the Republican Impeachment of Bill Clinton while having an extra-marital affair of his own.”
- Gingrich Said to Be Paid at Least $1.6 Million by Freddie Mac – Newt Gingrich made between $1.6 million and $1.8 million in consulting fees from two contracts with mortgage company Freddie Mac, according to two people familiar with the arrangement.
The total amount is significantly larger than the $300,000 payment from Freddie Mac that Gingrich was asked about during a Republican presidential debate on Nov. 9 sponsored by CNBC, and more than was disclosed in the middle of congressional investigations into the housing industry collapse.
Gingrich’s business relationship with Freddie Mac spanned a period of eight years. When asked at the debate what he did to earn a $300,000 payment in 2006, the former speaker said he “offered them advice on precisely what they didn’t do,” and warned the company that its lending practices were “insane.” Former Freddie Mac executives who worked with Gingrich dispute that account.
Gingrich’s first contract with the mortgage lender was in 1999, five months after he resigned from Congress and as House speaker, according to a Freddie Mac press release.
His primary contact inside the organization was Mitchell Delk, Freddie Mac’s chief lobbyist, and he was paid a self- renewing, monthly retainer of $25,000 to $30,000 between May 1999 until 2002, according to three people familiar with aspects of the business agreement.
- Poll Watch: Americans Favor Repealing ObamaCare 47% Vs. 42% | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Poll Watch: Americans Favor Repealing ObamaCare 47% Vs. 42% #tcot #catcot
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Has the MAGIC Mouthwash to Fight Tooth Decay Arrived? – Has the MAGIC Mouthwash to Fight Tooth Decay Arrived?
- Dilbert November 16, 2011 – Goals for the Year » Flap’s California Blog – Dilbert November 16, 2011 – Goals for the Year
- U.K Doctors Call for Car Smoking Ban | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – U.K Doctors Call for Car Smoking Ban
- Day By Day November 15, 2011 – Rule | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day November 15, 2011 – Rule #tcot #catcot
- Untitled (http://www.businessweek.com/pdf/poll11-16-11.pdf) – RT @ByronYork: Bloomberg NH: Romney 40, Paul 17, Gingrich 11, Cain 8, Huntsman 7, Perry 3, Bachmann 2, Santorum 1.
- @Flap Twitter Updates for 2011-11-16 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2011-11-16 #tcot #catcot
- AD-66: Huey, Mintz and Muratsuchi Will Face Off In 2012 South Bay Assembly Race » Flap’s California Blog – AD-66: Huey, Mintz and Muratsuchi Will Face Off In 2012 South Bay Assembly Race
- Amazon.com: Gregory Cole: Flap’s Wish List – I just wished for: ‘Covenant of Liberty: The Ideological Origins of the Tea Party Movement’ by Michael… via @amazon
- Covenant of Liberty: The Ideological Origins of the Tea Party Movement – Due Out in March | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Covenant of Liberty: The Ideological Origins of the Tea Party Movement – Due Out in March #tcot #catcot
- Terror three plead not guilty – 38-year-old Iraqi-Kurd Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak, Uzbek David Jakobsen, 33, and alleged Uighur (China) mastermind 40-year-old Mikael Davud, pleaded not guilty to planning an assault using explosives on Danish paper Jyllands-Posten at today’s opening of their trial in Oslo District Court.
All also denied their guilt relating to charges of trying to obtain bomb ingredients, as well as plotting to assassinate Danish cartoonist and author of the contentious Prophet Mohammed caricatures, Kurt Westergaard.
Police Security Service (PST) officials arrested now indicted Bujak, Jakobsen, and Davud in Norway and Germany last year on suspicion of planning to blow up the Chinese Embassy in Oslo.
The case is also believed to be connected with plans to bomb a New York subway and a shopping mall in Manchester, UK, in 2009.
According to NRK, Prosecutor Geir Evanger said today that, “There is no doubt that David Jakobsen ordered hydrogen peroxide at a pharmacy on Jernbanetorget [in Oslo] on 02 September 2009. There is [also] no doubt that this can be used to make explosives.”
“He picked it up on 04 September, and the bottle was handed over to Mikael Davud in his Oslo apartment the same evening. However, police had already replaced the contents of the bottle contents with something harmless,” he continued.
All three men also have suspected links with al-Qaida. Officials believe Mr Davud had travelled to Pakistan and was trained by the extremist group how to make explosives, as well as agreeing he would commit acts of terror.
“He made a deal with Bujak and Jakobsen to hit Jyllands-Posten’s offices when he came back to Norway,” alleged Geir Evanger. - Gallegly Has Decision To Make – Last November voters elected Elton Gallegly to a 13th term in the US. House of Representatives.
Today the 24th District Representative told Key News he was humbled by phone calls urging him to run again.
But redistricting being challenged in Federal court puts his Simi Valley hometown in the 25th district represented by Republican Buck McKeon.
McKeon has already announced his run for re-election.
Now Gallegly must decide whether to run against McKeon in the 25th or run again in the 24th, something he can legally do.
To make an informed decision the Congressman wants to see what happens with the Federal lawsuit challenging redistricting.
Members of the Camarillo Los Posas Republican Womans Federated group hope he will continue to represent them.
Many business owners hope so too.
Although would be challengers are anxious to see Gallegy will do, he has time to decide.
- 3 plead not guilty as terror trial opens in Norway – Three men accused in Norway of an al-Qaida-linked plot to attack a Danish newspaper that caricatured the Prophet Muhammad pleaded not guilty Tuesday to terror charges as their trial began.
The trial of Mikael Davud, Shawan Sadek Saeed Bujak and David Jakobsen is being seen as a key test of Norway’s anti-terror laws. The men had been under surveillance for more than a year when authorities moved to arrest them in July 2010.
Norwegian investigators, who worked with their U.S. counterparts, say the defendants were building a bomb in a basement laboratory — a plot linked to the same al-Qaida planners behind 2009 schemes to blow up New York’s subway and a British shopping mall.
The men deny the terror charges. Prosecutors must prove they worked together in a conspiracy, because a single individual plotting an attack is not covered by Norway’s anti-terror laws.
Prosecutor Geir Evanger told the Oslo district court that Davud, the alleged ringleader, received explosives training in Pakistan. They said he conspired with al-Qaida operatives to attack the Danish Jyllands-Posten newspaper, whose 12 cartoons of Muhammad triggered furious protests in Muslim countries in 2006.
- Herdt: Opportunity knocks; is anyone home? – In the national struggle for control of Congress next year, both Democrats and Republicans acknowledge that Ventura County’s new 26th Congressional District will be an important battlefield.
It has all the key elements: voter registration that is closely divided, a healthy percentage of independents and a history of split results.
It has all the elements, that is, except for this: very few warriors.
There are two announced Democratic candidates, Moorpark City Councilman David Pollock and Westlake Village businessman David Cruz Thayne. Most observers are waiting for another to emerge — Supervisor Steve Bennett, or perhaps Assemblywoman Julia Brownley, or perhaps some other surprise candidate with proven fundraising ability.
There are no announced Republican candidates because everyone is waiting on Rep. Elton Gallegly, R-Simi Valley, to publicly reveal his intentions.
The growing frustration over that uncertainty last week led Rep. Buck McKeon, R-Santa Clarita, to issue what appeared to be a calculated poke at Gallegly to make up his mind. McKeon told his hometown newspaper that “as near as I can pin him down,” Gallegly intends to run in the 25th District against McKeon.
Gallegly actually lives in the 25th District, but his Simi Valley home is only a couple hundred yards from the boundary, and most of the 26th District is made up of areas he now represents. As long as the 26th District remains an option for Gallegly, other Republicans are frozen out by the political protocol that frowns on challenging an incumbent in a primary.
- AD-66: Craig Huey Will Run for California State Assembly » Flap’s California Blog – AD-66: Craig Huey Will Run for California State Assembly
- Grow Elect and Rebuilding the California Republican Pary By Electing Local Latinos » Flap’s California Blog – Grow Elect and Rebuilding the California Republican Pary By Electing Local Latinos
- Why Do Two-Thirds of Online U.S. Adults Use Social Media? | Smiles For A Lifetime – Temporary (Locum Tenens) Dentistry – Why Do Two-Thirds of Online U.S. Adults Use Social Media?
- President 2012 GOP Poll Watch: As Cain Crashes – Newt Rises | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012 GOP Poll Watch: As Cain Crashes – Newt Rises #tcot #catcot
- President 2012 GOP California Poll Watch: Gingrich 33% Vs. Romney 23% Vs. Cain 22% Vs. Perry 6% Vs. Paul 5% » Flap’s California Blog – President 2012 GOP California Poll Watch: Gingrich 33% Vs. Romney 23% Vs. Cain 22% Vs. Perry 6% Vs. Paul 5%
- Day By Day November 14, 2011 – School’s Out | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – Day By Day November 14, 2011 – School’s Out #tcot #catcot
- Election 2012: Generic Presidential Ballot – Rasmussen Reports™ – RT @RasmussenPoll: Election 2012: Generic Republican 46%, Obama 42%…
- (404) http://t.co/tTc – RT @AP: AP Video: Sen. John McCain, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta spar over decision to pull all U.S. troops from Iraq: …
- » Sen. Feinstein Loaded up on Biotech Stock Just Before Company Received $24 Million Gov’t Grant – Big Government – RT @AndrewBreitbart: Sen. Feinstein Loaded up on Biotech Stock Just Before Company Received $24 Million Gov’t Grant:
- President 2012: Rick Perry Proposes Making Congress Part-Time and Ending Lifetime Tenure for Federal Judges | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – President 2012: Rick Perry Proposes Making Congress Part-Time and Ending Lifetime Tenure for Feder… #tcot #catcot
- Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The Morning Drill: November 15, 2011 – The Morning Drill: November 15, 2011
- The Morning Flap: November 15, 2011 | Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog – The Morning Flap: November 15, 2011 #tcot #catcot
- Berkeley police break up Occupy Cal; tents removed, 2 arrested – Police moved in early Thursday to break up the Occupy Cal protest at UC Berkeley, arresting at least two protesters.