The Hollywood Liberal

District of Corruption
Washington, D.C., has the highest rate of AIDS in the country, and millions of federal dollars are spent trying to alleviate it. But a new investigative piece uncovers a corrupt system where books were cooked, corners cut, and $400,000 lost to a nonprofit launched by the leader of a cocaine ring. The Washington Post: In a city ravaged by the highest rate of AIDS cases in the nation, the D.C. Health Department paid millions to nonprofit groups that delivered substandard services or failed to account for any work at all, even as sick people searched for care or died waiting. More than $1 million in AIDS money went to a housing group whose ailing boarders sometimes struggled without electricity, gas or food. A supervisor said she was ordered to create records for ghost employees. About $400,000 was paid to a nonprofit organization, launched by a man who once ran one of the District’s largest cocaine rings, for a promised job-training center that has never opened. Read more READ THE WHOLE ITEM

Washington, D.C., has the highest rate of AIDS in the country, and millions of federal dollars are spent trying to alleviate it. But a new investigative piece uncovers a corrupt system where books were cooked, corners cut, and $400,000 lost to a nonprofit launched by the leader of a cocaine ring.

The Washington Post:

In a city ravaged by the highest rate of AIDS cases in the nation, the D.C. Health Department paid millions to nonprofit groups that delivered substandard services or failed to account for any work at all, even as sick people searched for care or died waiting.

More than $1 million in AIDS money went to a housing group whose ailing boarders sometimes struggled without electricity, gas or food. A supervisor said she was ordered to create records for ghost employees.

About $400,000 was paid to a nonprofit organization, launched by a man who once ran one of the District’s largest cocaine rings, for a promised job-training center that has never opened.

Read more

READ THE WHOLE ITEM

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New Medical Marijuana Policy: Obama Administration Will Not Seek Arrests For People Following State Laws
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Tom Engelhardt: Who’s Next? Lessons from the Long War and a Blowback World
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Robert Kuttner: The Blair Project
Tony Blair, the former British prime minister who turned a once-progressive party into Tory-lite, is now in line to be the first President of Europe. Given Blair’s central role in creating the conditions that invited Britain’s financial collapse, this idea makes about as much sense as putting protégés of Bob Rubin in charge of cleaning up after the mess that Wall Street made (whoops, that happened, too). Why, then, is Blair likely to be the first President of Europe? Because he is just what Europe’s ruling financial elite wants — nominally a man of the center-left who can be trusted to continue business as usual.

Paul Abrams: To al-Qaeda’s Cheers: Dick Cheney Is Running, Will Be the 2012 Republican Nominee
Barring illness, Dick Cheney will be the Republican Presidential nominee in 2012. Of course, the mainstream media will yap away for the next two years…

Following criticism of being an “arm” of the GOP, Fox News aired no live coverage of Oct. 17 media “malpractice” tea party

Following White House communications director Anita Dunn’s recent critique of Fox News serving as an “arm” of the Republican Party, Fox News did not devote any live coverage to what it had previously referred to as the October 17 “tea part[y]” protests by Operation: Can You Hear Us Now?, an organization that planned “to show the MSM [mainstream media] that we as the American Public are absolutely fed up with their journalistic malpractice.” By contrast, Fox News devoted significant promotion and live coverage of the April 15 tax day tea party and the September 12 “March on Washington.”

On October 17, Fox News aired no live coverage of media protests

Operation: Can You Hear Us Now? organized October 17 protests against “journalistic malpractice.” According to the Frequently Asked Questions page of the Operation: Can You Hear Us Now? website, the protests were a “nationwide event meant to show the MSM that we as the American Public are absolutely fed up with their journalistic malpractice.”

Fox News did not cover “Tea Parties Marching on Media Outlets” live on October 17. According to a Media Matters for America review of Fox News’ programming on October 17, the network did not report live on the media protests that day. While Fox News devoted no on-air coverage to the protests that day, FoxNews.com ran an October 17 OperationCanYouHearUsNow.com, a post on the Fox Nation stated:

October 17 non-coverage follows criticism of Fox News

WH’s Dunn: Fox News is “opinion journalism masquerading as news.” An October 8 Time magazine profile quoted Dunn labeling Fox News as “opinion journalism masquerading as news.”

Dunn: “Fox News often operates almost as either the research arm or the communications arm of the Republican Party.” On the October 11 edition of CNN’s Reliable Sources, Dunn said that “I think what is fair to say about Fox and certainly the way we view it is that it really is more a wing of the Republican Party.” Dunn also criticized Fox News’ “story selection.”

Media Matters president Burns: Fox News “a 24/7 political operation” geared to destroy Obama presidency, progressive agenda. On the October 12 edition of MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Media Matters president Eric Burns criticized Fox News as “a 24/7 political operation with a very specific goal. And that is to destroy this presidency, and destroy any sort of progressive policy agenda that the American people voted for in November.”

By contrast, Fox News heavily promoted and live-covered 9-12 protests

Beck’s 9-12 Project helped organize protests, which Fox News covered live. Fox News host Glenn Beck founded the 9-12 Project, which describes itself as “a place for you and other like-minded Americans looking for direction in taking back the control of our country.” Beck’s 9-12 post on the 9-12 march website states, “The recent coverage by Glenn Beck is really helping our numbers grow!” The website frequently mentions Beck’s promotion of the march and excerpted a September 8 USA Today article reporting that the march has been “[e]ncouraged by conservative commentators such as Fox’s Glenn Beck.”

Fox relentlessly promoted Tea Party Express. Fox News heavily promoted the Tea Party Express tour — edition of Fox News’ America’s News HQ, anchor Shannon Bream said, “We want to let folks know” the tour schedule so “they can be a part” of events. The Tea Party Express was organized by a political action committee — formed by Republican operatives — whose mission is to oppose President Obama and other Democrats.

Protesters said they were viewers of Beck and Fox News. In a September 15 video titled, “Brought To You By Fox,” Media Matters for America documented numerous 9-12 protesters crediting Beck and Fox News with providing “fair and balanced” coverage.

Fox News also heavily promoted, live-covered, and took ownership of April 15 tea parties

Network was chief promoter of April 15 “FNC Tax Day Tea Parties.” In the lead-up to the April 15 tea parties, which the channel repeatedly described as “FNC Tax Day Tea Parties,” Fox News frequently aired segments publicizing and encouraging viewers to get involved with the protests. Fox News itself described the protests primarily as a response to the Obama administration and its policies. A Media Matters study found that from April 6 to 13, Fox News featured at least 20 segments on the “tea party” protests, and a subsequent Media Matters local and national media outlets noted that Fox News was a driving force behind the tea parties. Numerous reports quoted participants saying they were driven to the protests by Fox. CNN and Washington Post media critic Howard Kurtz remarked, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a news network throw its weight behind a protest like we are seeing in the past few weeks with Fox and these tea parties.”

Maddow On ‘Muslim Intern Spy’ Hunt: Sen. Johnny Iselin Lives!
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Daily Pulse: Republicans Launch Strategy to Derail Bill
“Senate Republicans, acknowledging they lack the votes to block a health care reform bill outright, have implemented a comprehensive political strategy to delay, define and derail,” Roll Call reports.

“With Democratic leaders and White House officials holed up in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) office negotiating a final bill, Republicans are demanding a deceleration of the process and moving to define whatever plan that emerges as a combination of Medicare cuts, tax increases, higher insurance premiums and rising overall costs.”

“Senate Democrats are rejecting Republicans’ demands to slow things down, charging that the GOP isn’t interested in working with the majority to craft a bipartisan health care bill. Rather, Reid said repeatedly last week, the Republicans’ primary goal is to sink reform in order to undercut President Barack Obama.”

Said Reid: “There are challenges that lie before us because the Republicans are going to insist that we do it alone.”

However, Bloomberg notes the biggest challenge for Democrats may to “navigate fault lines in their own party over how to remake the U.S. medical system.”

Got Pot? It’s Legal to Take It on the Plane in Oakland

Oakland International Airport may be the nation's only airport with a specific policy letting users of medical marijuana travel with the drug.

Democrats Risk Electoral Disaster If They Drop the Public Option

The public option offers the only means for a reform to be quickly implemented and to demonstrate a beneficial effect for the people by 2010 and 2012.

Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh Are Crazy — Yet Corporate Media Legitimize Them

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Going Green Means Having Fewer Kids

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The Silliest Form of Stimulus: Homebuyer’s Tax Credit by a Mile
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Josh Marshall Says Israel Should Recall Ambassador Plus The Nation On American Jews Re-Thinking Israel
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Kristol: ?Thank God Most Of The Workforce Isn?t Unionized?
Earlier this week, hate radio host Rush Limbaugh was dropped from an investor group that was trying to purchase NFL’s St. Louis Rams franchise. Limbaugh’s involvement with the group sparked a week of controversy due to his history of racially divisive commentary. African-American NFL players said they “wouldn’t play” for Limbaugh’s team while the […]

Earlier this week, hate radio host Rush Limbaugh was dropped from an investor group that was trying to purchase NFL’s St. Louis Rams franchise. Limbaugh’s involvement with the group sparked a week of controversy due to his history of racially divisive commentary. African-American NFL players said they “wouldn’t play” for Limbaugh’s team while the head of the NFL’s players union said he opposed Limbaugh’s bid because sports are meant to reject “discrimination and hatred.”

On Fox News Sunday today, the “All-Stars” jumped to Limbaugh’s defense. NPR’s Juan Williams set up a false comparison, claiming that people don’t complain about MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann announcing football games even though he makes “divisive” statements about conservatives. The Weekly Standard’s Bill Kristol used the NFL player’s union’s opposition to Limbaugh to attack unions in general, saying “thank God most of the workforce isn’t unionized”:

KRISTOL: Thank God most of business isn’t a monopoly. Thank God most of the workforce isn’t unionized. Why could this happen? This could happen because all the NFL players are in one union. Because all the NFL owners are in one club and pressure can be put on them. Thank God there’s more diversity in this country in terms of different industries and different businesses. And people can be controversial and can still find places that are willing to have them.

Watch it:

Kristol’s attack on unionization ignores the fact that unions are good for the American economy since unions help workers secure higher wages and greater benefits. Additionally, the collective bargaining of unions give workers the ability to shape the conditions of their employment, as the NFL players union successfully demonstrated.

According to Dan Lebowitz, executive director of the Center for Sports and Society at Northeastern University, the NFL has 78 percent African-American players. Because the player’s union has leverage, that means the players won’t have to work for someone who said just two years ago, “the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.”

Specter rips GOP: ?A Party of obstructionism.?
Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA), who until late April of this year was a lifelong Republican, castigated his former party this morning on Fox News. Specter ripped the GOP for refusing to be a good-faith negotiator in the health care debate: On the Republican side, it’s no, no, no. A party of obstructionism. … You have responsible […]

Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA), who until late April of this year was a lifelong Republican, castigated his former party this morning on Fox News. Specter ripped the GOP for refusing to be a good-faith negotiator in the health care debate:

On the Republican side, it’s no, no, no. A party of obstructionism. … You have responsible Republicans who had been in the Senate — like Howard Baker, Bob Dole, or Bill Frist — who say Republicans ought to cooperate. Well, they’re not cooperating.

Watch it:

Specter also indicated he would fight hard for the public option. “I’m not prepared to recede at all. I think the public option is gaining momentum,” he said. “I am not going to step back a bit. I am going to fight for the best public option.”

In the Loop
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In health debate, those numbers are just numbers
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