World News Korner

This courtesy of US News:

Before, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, launched a 21-hour talk-a-thon on the Senate floor or encouraged the House of Representatives to stand firm in its position to repeal and delay the Affordable Care Act at any cost, he was a candidate. And he made a promise that he wouldn't go to Washington and be part of the establishment. Members of Cruz's own party took him to task for his tactics, referring to it as an "agonizing odyssey."

Back home in Texas, however, local tea party groups and conservatives are applauding Cruz's efforts.

Linda and Mike Vickers, who own a ranch in South Texas and hosted Cruz in 2012 when he was still on the campaign trail, are proud to have Cruz representing them, especially in the wake of his giving Washington a big old headache.

"He is the bravest conservative up there and it is a dirty shame that the rest of them are not the same. These last few weeks resolidified my support for him," Mike Vickers says. "They better watch out because Ted Cruz gets a big thumbs up down here on the border."

Political scientists observe that Cruz's hard line conservatism can only win him points in Texas, which is considered a Republican stronghold. Democrats haven't managed to win a statewide office there since 1994, making the state the longest-reigning red state in the country.

"There are undoubtedly some people who are irritated, but that irritation resides in the usual corners among moderates and Democrats," says James Henson, a state politics expert and a professor at the University of Texas. "There is some degree of irritation among the business community here just like in the business community nationally, but that conflict has been present here for the last couple of cycles and won't prevent Cruz's rise."

So for all of us who hoped that Texas would smarten up and give ole Raphael Cruz the heave ho, it looks like that hope is probably premature.

However with more evidence that Texas is starting to turn, if not blue, at least a deep purple politically and with evidence that support for Wendy Davis continues to grow, we may be seeing signs of the last gasps of rock hard conservationism in the Lone Star state.

Perhaps someday soon we will see the day that the majority of Texans are just as embarrassed about electing Ted Cruz, as today's Alaskans are for ever having elected Sarah Palin.



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NBA legend Bill Russell, right, is seen with President Obama.


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Every once in a while, someone will come up with an idea so great, so obvious, so simple that you’re just like, “How has this not happened until now?" Case in point: these square bottles of wine by Truett-Hurst. No more bottles rolling out of shopping bags, across table tops and then crashing apart on the floor. Sure,they may at first glance be confused with olive oil. But we're betting the wine tastes way better than the stuff you've been trying to suck up via straw off your kitchen floor. Varieties include a ’12 Russian River Valley chardonnay, a ’12 Paso Robles cabernet sauvignon and a ’12 Paso Robles red blend — retailing for $19.99. [Source]

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Smoke rises from a fire near Springwood, west of Sydney, on Thursday, as nearly a hundred wildfires burn across Australia's New South Wales state.



Australian wildfires intensify as temperatures rise


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By Kristen Gelineau of Associated Press

One of the comments that keeps turning up here with irritating regularity is the "Stop talking about Palin, it's what she wants." Or "If you stop talking about her she will just go away."

Trust me I understand the sentiment, believe me I do, I just disagree with the rationale.

As I have discussed before, after Palin quit the governorship a bunch of us Alaska bloggers got together to celebrate and, I'm not ashamed to admit, give out a couple of pats on the back for a job well done.

During that get together we did discuss no longer having to write about Palin, and many agreed that they would gladly remove her name from their vocabulary.

However I disagreed, and said that we could not afford to ignore her, because for one thing I did not think she was done causing harm, and for another she provided a living breathing metaphor for what was happening to the Republican party.

Not to toot my own horn, but I believe what I said that day was somewhat prescient. Especially if you remember that this was before the Tea Party gained national attention, before Gabby Giffords was shot, and well before the traveling side show that made up the Republican primary candidates of 2012.

Take a second to read this from the Examiner:

We, progressives, ignore people like Sarah Palin at our own peril. She, along with Cruz and Lee and Hannity and others, will seek to dismantle any healing we attempt in this country, will not be content with bi-partisanship or the concept of coming together as a nation. In her recent roll-out, Palin casually called our President a murderer, is seeking vengeance on the more sensible wing of the Republican Party who, in the end, voted to end the nonsense driven by the House tea party caucus, and is, once again, recklessly striving to create conflict and foment hatred.

"What emboldened our enemies," Palin told Megyn Kelly recently, "And what empowered competitors was his [President Obama's] promise to fundamentally transform America from being a solvent, free exceptional country into something that we're not gonna recognize . . . then of course he, having left behind . . . our brave men in Benghazi to be murdered . . . and then . . . he, using our military .. . our military, our vets, shutting down their memorials and holding them hostage in terms of budget deals . . . ."

Palin's blatant, reckless dishonesty regarding the facts of the Republican government shutdown, and her use of incendiary rhetoric, is predictable, yet no less shocking for its predictability. This recent battle reflected the willingness of some in the Republican Party to do the right and sensible thing, and they will pay a price from those, like Palin, who believe there are only two options - her way, or her other way.

Her re-emergence on the national stage is alarming, unnecessary, and harmful to any American values. Though hope springs eternal that her relevance is vastly diminished, we've seen what type of havoc the right-wing fringe can wreak. This country has no more room for radical, bitter, enemies to America, domestic terrorists who will stop at nothing to see this President (along with everyone in this country, if that's the price) brought to his knees.

Look, ignoring small pox did not defeat it. Ignoring a tornado does not protect you from danger. And ignoring Sarah Palin does not mean that she will disappear like the things you imagined living under your bed as a child.

I seriously doubt that the folks over at MSNBC enjoy listening to hours upon hours of taped idiocy from Glenn Beck, or Sean Hannity, or Ann Coulter. But they do it in order to call them out on their lies and shine light on their attempts to undermine the President. Ignoring them would only mean that their messages would go out to the world without clarification or scrutiny.

THAT is kind of what they hope will happen.

Today fewer and fewer people are taking Sarah Palin seriously.

That did not happen because I, or anybody else ignored her. It happened because we refused to do so.

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Attorney Klayman Takes On MSNBCERS Over Foreign-Born Obama Comments...

Attorney Larry Klayman takes on two far left Obama lackeys on MSNBC over his recent comments calling Obama a foreign-born Muslim and telling Obama to drop the quran and come out with his hands up...


Attorney Klayman handled himself well under the circumstances. Nothing like being tag teamed by two rabid leftists.





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Courtesy of Raw Story:

A petition posted online at MoveOn.org is calling for the arrest of prominent House Republicans on sedition charges for their role in engineering a 16-day government shutdown.

“I call on the Justice Department of the United States of America to arrest Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor, Speaker of the House John Boehner, and other decision-making House Republican leaders for the crime of seditious conspiracy against the United States of America,” the petition says.

The petition had attracted nearly 36,000 digital signatures by Friday morning. (By the way the number as of this posting is 43,905 and it is only asking for 50,000.)

“Arrest and try all those who were a party to deliberately trying to destroy the American Economy,” said one signer.

The petition’s author, Mark Belisle, said GOP lawmakers bent the rules to prevent the Democratic minority from bringing measures to the floor that could have allowed a so-called clean funding resolution to be brought to a vote.

“The House GOP leadership’s use of the Hastert Rule and H. Res 368 to shut down the government and threaten the U.S. economy with default is an attempt to extort the United States government into altering or abolishing the Affordable Care Act, and thus, is self-evidently a seditious conspiracy,” the petition claims. “Arrest the perpetrators in Congress immediately and bring them to justice.”

I have to start by admitting that I am not the biggest fan of petitions, especially national ones, because I don't think they usually have much of an impact.

However I have to admit that this man makes some very compelling arguments. And in a perfect world I would love to see thee people punished for what they did to this country and to the American people, especially considering that it was a lost cause from the very beginning.

Anyhow I signed it.

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Yes when you are famous for not knowing how birth control works you may not be the best choice for an endorsement. Especially considering the fact that you are apparently a tongue ties imbecile.

Of course this IS Ken Cuccinelli, who said last year that he cannot understand why God has not punished America more for all our abortions:

"Really, Given that God does judge nations, it's amazing that abortion has run as far and foully as it has, without what I would consider to be a greater imposition of judgment on this country," Cuccinelli said. "Who knows what the future holds?"

How far behind Terry McAuliffe is Cuccinelli in the polls again?

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Attorney Updates Case On Obama's Fabricated Selective Service Certificate...

Report on a case dealing with Obama's use of a fabricated Selective Service certificate with a fabricated cancellation USPS stamp and other fabricated IDs, review of current events, what to do till the next debt ceiling on February 7 - Dr. Taitz.





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Via NECN: Vermont Court Rejects Obama Citizenship Challenge

MONTPELIER, Vt. (AP) — The Vermont Supreme Court has rejected a claim by a former Republican U.S. Senate candidate from Vermont that President Barack Obama's name should not have been placed on last year's Vermont ballot because he is not a "natural-born citizen" of the United States.

H. Brooke Paige had made the claim based on what he said were legal treatises and other writings from around the time of the U.S. Constitution. Obama is a U.S. citizen by virtue of his birth in Hawaii. His father, Barack Obama Sr., was born in Kenya. [...] Continued @ NECN. Background reports here.




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"Well crap!"

Courtesy of Raw Story:

The government of Texas under Republican Gov. Rick Perry quietly began to shut down its high risk insurance pool program this week and urged users to enroll in the health care programs offered to people with pre-existing conditions under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) — also known as Obamacare. Think Progress reported that the high risk pool website now directs applicants to the ACA health care exchanges and informs users that the state program will be phased out entirely by January 1, 2014.

“The state has deemed the high-risk pool obsolete,” the website now says, “as the Affordable Care Act prohibits insurance companies participating in the federal marketplace, which launched on Oct. 1, from denying coverage to Texans with pre-existing conditions. Gov. Rick Perry signed Senate Bill 1367 in June, scheduling the pool’s abolishment.”

It stated, “The pool will close Jan. 1, and the 23,000 people currently participating in the pool must sign up for coverage on the insurance exchange by Dec. 15 or find coverage elsewhere to avoid a lapse in care.”

According to the Texas Tribune, since 1998, the high risk pool “has provided high-priced coverage to Texans with pre-existing conditions who can’t find coverage elsewhere."

Insurance policies offered in the federal marketplaces are expected to be half of what families enrolled in the high risk pool have been paying. Also, Pogue (Stacey Pogue, a senior policy analyst for the Center for Public Policy Priorities) said that consumers will have access under the new policies to care not provided under the risk pools, like maternity and pre-natal care.

What? Rick Perry is is caving into the socialist influence of lower health care costs? The horror!

Why it was only a little over two weeks ago when Perry was saying things like this:

“If this heath care law is forced upon this country, the young men and women in this audience are the ones who are really going to pay the price,” the governor told a crowd at the Bendix Diner in Hasbrouck Heights, according to The Star-Ledger. “And that, I suggest to you, reaches the point of being a felony toward them and their future.”

“That is a criminal act, from my perspective, to put that type of burden on them — to mortgage their future like that,” he added. “America cannot stand that.”

Wait, so Perry signed the bill abolishing the high risk insurance pool program in JUNE, knowing full well that would mean they would have to use the Affordable Care exchanges, yet less than three weeks ago was calling Obamacare a "felony?" WTF?

Wow first Jan Brewer in Arizona, and now Rick Perry in Texas. You know pretty soon there won't be ANYBODY left in Sarah Palin's "Let's all hate on Obamacare" fan club.



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This is how we do it...


No matter what you may think about Arnold Schwarzenegger at least he's going about this the right way ... More than you can say about McCain, Obama or the vast majority of politicians infesting DC. Oh, and; the MSM!
Via Page 6: Arnold lobbies For White House Run

Action star and former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has been lobbying for support to change the law to allow him to run for president in 2016, Page Six has exclusively learned.

We’re told Ahnold has been openly talking about his political ambitions while in New York to promote his new movie with Sylvester Stallone, “Escape Plan.”

One source said: “Schwarzenegger has been talking openly about working on getting the constitutional rules changed so he can run for president in 2016. He is ready to file legal paperwork to challenge the rules.”

Arnie was born in Austria, and the US Constitution prevents foreign-born citizens from holding the nation’s top job. Any amendment to the Constitution must be approved by two-thirds majority in the House and the Senate.

But Arnold, who became a US citizen in 1983, still could mount a legal challenge. In 2010, he appeared on the ‘Tonight Show,’ and was asked by Jay Leno if he would make a White House run if the law were changed.

[...] Continued @ NY Post.

Hey Arnold, just have Team Obama forge you one of those Hawaiian birth certificates...

Hold on a second.

I thought the media and talking heads said foreign-born persons can be POTUS?




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A violin believed to be the one played by Titanic bandmaster Wallace Hartley will now go on auction.


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Author: By Associated Press

BOSTON — In 2004, they wore their hair long and projected a goofy, irreverent manner.


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Author: By DAVID WALDSTEIN

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Author: now.msn.com

Professional problem child Justin Bieber has many tween girls willing to hand their bodies over to him at a moment's notice, but only one True Belieber was willing to transform his body for Bieber — and he's a 33-year-old man.

LA-based "songwriter" Toby Sheldon idolizes Bieber to such an extent, that he spent the past five years and nearly $100,000 to turn his face into a shrine for the androgynous Canadian.

Spurred by an acknowledged fear of aging, Sheldon says he's undergone multiple plastic surgeries, Aquamid injections, and hair transplants "to look like Justin."

His last time under the knife back in July, Sheldon had the sides of his mouth extended in a controversial procedure known as "smile surgery."

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Courtesy of the Daily Kos:

Two years ago when Tina Brown and Diane von Furstenberg first envisioned this conference, they asked me to do a play, a reading, called – the name of the play was called Seven. It was taken from transcripts, real testimony from real women activists around the world. I was the Irish one, and I had no idea that the real women would be sitting in the audience while we portrayed them. So I was doing a pretty ghastly Belfast accent. I was just – I was imitating my friend Liam Neeson, really, and I sounded like a fellow. (Laughter). It was really bad.

So I was so mortified when Tina, at the end of the play, invited the real women to come up on stage and I found myself standing next to the great Inez McCormack. (Applause.) And I felt slight next to her, because I’m an actress and she is the real deal. She has put her life on the line. Six of those seven women were with us in the theater that night. The seventh, Mukhtaran Bibi, couldn’t come because she couldn’t get out of Pakistan. You probably remember who she is. She’s the young woman who went to court because she was gang-raped by men in her village as punishment for a perceived slight to their honor by her little brother. All but one of the 14 men accused were acquitted, but Mukhtaran won the small settlement. She won $8,200, which she then used to start schools in her village. More money poured in from international donations when the men were set free. And as a result of her trial, the then president of Pakistan, General Musharraf, went on TV and said, “If you want to be a millionaire, just get yourself raped.”

But that night in the theater two years ago, the other six brave women came up on the stage. Anabella De Leon of Guatemala pointed to Hillary Clinton, who was sitting right in the front row, and said, “I met her and my life changed.” And all weekend long, women from all over the world said the same thing:

"I’m alive because she came to my village, put her arm around me, and had a photograph taken together."

"I’m alive because she went on our local TV and talked about my work, and now they’re afraid to kill me."

"I’m alive because she came to my country and she talked to our leaders, because I heard her speak, because I read about her."

I’m here today because of that, because of those stores. I didn’t know about this. I never knew any of it. And I think everybody should know. This hidden history Hillary has, the story of her parallel agenda, the shadow diplomacy unheralded, uncelebrated — careful, constant work on behalf of women and girls that she has always conducted alongside everything else a First Lady, a Senator, and now Secretary of State is obliged to do.

And it deserves to be amplified. This willingness to take it, to lead a revolution – and revelation, beginning in Beijing in 1995, when she first raised her voice to say the words you’ve heard many times throughout this conference: “Women’s Rights Are Human Rights.”

When Hillary Clinton stood up in Beijing to speak that truth, her hosts were not the only ones who didn’t necessarily want to hear it. Some of her husband’s advisors also were nervous about the speech, fearful of upsetting relations with China. But she faced down the opposition at home and abroad, and her words continue to hearten women around the world and have reverberated down the decades.

I am almost embarrassed to admit that though this is over a year old I had never head anything about it.

But now that I have my very first thought is, "This was the woman that the Republican party thought Sarah Palin would remind voters of? And that making her their VP candidate would attract those upset that she had lost the nomination to Barack Obama? Seriously?"

And then my next thought is that when Hillary becomes the candidate for the Democrats in 2016 the Right is going to come after her with her husband's affair, his impeachment, and Benghazi, and do you know what? It will be as nothing in the face of this woman's incredible achievements, her intelligence, and her strength.

If simply having a photograph taken with her can stop an assassin's bullet, and inspire female leaders around the world, imagine what having her as the leader of your country could accomplish

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Author: By Sandy Cannold

Courtesy of the AP:

Administration officials say about 476,000 health insurance applications have been filed through federal and state exchanges, the most detailed measure yet of the problem-plagued rollout of President Barack Obama's signature legislation.

However, the officials continue to refuse to say how many people have actually enrolled in the insurance markets. Without enrollment figures, it's unclear whether the program is on track to reach the 7 million people projecting by the Congressional Budget Office to gain coverage during the six-month sign-up period.

Obama's advisers say the president has been frustrated by the flawed rollout. During one of his daily health care briefings last week, he told advisers assembled in the Oval Office that the administration had to own up to the fact that there were no excuses for not having the website ready to operate as promised.

The president is expected to address the problems on Monday during a health care event at the White House. Cabinet members and other top administration officials will also be traveling around the country in the coming weeks to encourage sign-ups in areas with the highest population of uninsured people.

The first three weeks of sign-ups have been marred by a cascade of computer problems, which the administration says it is working around the clock to correct. The rough rollout has been a glaring embarrassment for Obama, who invested significant time and political capital in getting the law passed during his first term.

The officials said technology experts from inside and outside the government are set to work on the glitches, though they did not say how many workers were being added.

Officials did say staffing has been increased at call centers by about 50 percent. As problems persist on the federally run website, the administration is encouraging more people to sign up for insurance over the phone.

So gee that is almost half a million people who, once their application is processed, would most likely lose their coverage if the Affordable Care Act was repealed or defunded.

In another few months it might be cool million.

And then two.

And three.

And...well you get my drift.

And as those numbers pile up it just becomes that much more difficulty to convince Americans that trying to repeal this new law is something that THEY should support. ESPECIALLY those of us getting access to health care for the first time.

The rollout may have been sloppy as hell, but clearly there are still people flooding the system and that does not exactly suggest that the program is disliked by the majority of Americans, as those on the Right keep reporting as fact.

Personally I have decided to wait just a week or two more to make sure that the glitches are gone before taking the plunge. This is a big decision for me, and I want to make sure that it happens with as little frustration as possible.

But I WILL get it. After all, it's the law.

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In this photo taken Oct. 2, 2013, in Tbilisi, Georgia, David Lordkipanidze, director of the Georgia National Museum, holds a pre-human skull found in 2005 in the ground at the medieval village Dmanisi, Georgia.



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By Seth Borenstein of Associated Press

The site advertises itself in this way:

"From actual insults posted on John Boehner's Facebook page."

Apparently these were left by Teabaggers who were NOT at all happy with the Speaker over his contribution to opening the government back up.

Here are a few examples:

LEFTY BIG GOVERNMENT RINO BASTARD.

DOUBLE-CROSSING MUSLIM-LOVING LIBTARD.

LYING FREEDOM-HATING COMMIE.

FUCKHEADED FASCIST SOCIALIST. (Uh, those two things don't go together.)


FREEDOM-HATING SELL-OUT.

COWARDLY DICKHEADED RINO TRAITOR.

And it just keeps getting more inane and nonsensical from there.

I am not positive but I kind of felt that some of these people may have visited THIS blog a time or two. Could be, or could just be that crazy people all sound crazy.

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Author: By Chiderah Monde / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Dave has a point.

And by the way I have the same question about prayer. Never made sense to me.

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A picture of Edward Snowden, a contractor at the NSA, is seen on a computer screen displaying a page of a Chinese news website, in Beijing.




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By Reuters

Courtesy of TPM:

The Cook Political Report changed its ratings of 15 House seats Friday, moving 14 of them in the direction of Democrats following the government shutdown.

"Mostly as a result of the damage House Republicans sustained during the 16-day government shutdown, we are making changes to our ratings in 15 House seats, all but one in Democrats' direction," Cook Political Report said in a statement.

House Republican seats Cook deemed more in danger include Rep. Justin Amash (R-MI), Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI), Rep. Tom Reed (R-NY) and Rep. Mark Takano (R-CA).

The Cook statement warned that while Democrats have acheived fundraising success recently, they still have a while before the 2014 elections.

"Democrats still have a very uphill climb to a majority, and it's doubtful they can sustain this month's momentum for another year," the Cook statement says. "But Republicans' actions have energized Democratic fundraising and recruiting efforts and handed Democrats a potentially effective message."

You know there are days when I just have to ask myself if the Tea Party was not some super secret psy-ops program developed by a liberal think tank.

But then I think, "Nah, even WE aren't that smart."

Besides we would NEVER have unleashed this thing on the world.





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