The Hollywood Liberal

Quote of the Day
“I apologize to everyone for the late hour, but we’ve been waiting for the House to conduct their business and they’re having trouble conducting it.”

– Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), quoted by The Hill, before he adjourned the Senate last night.

Palin Fires a Warning Shot
Sarah Palin shoots across the bow of Republican House freshmen in a message on her Facebook page, stating that “we little folk are watching the debt ceiling debate with great interest and concern” and asking that they “remember us ‘little people’ who believed in them, donated to their campaigns, spent hours tirelessly volunteering for them, and trusted them with our votes.”

She ends the letter with a little warning: “P.S. Everyone I talk to still believes in contested primaries.”

Tea Party Congress Members Give Boehner Something to Cry About
Even if John Boehner wins a vote on the debt ceiling, Tea Party-allied members of Congress may end his tenure as House speaker.

The 6 Biggest Lies About the U.S. Debt
As Congress nears a vote on the various debt ceiling deals, let’s look at the lies and misinformation that got us into this mess.

The Debt Crisis’ Greedheads, Fountainheads, Godheads, Airheads, and the Rest of Us
Ronald Reagan’s inauguration in 1981 marked the debut of a strategy to “starve the beast” of big government by ballooning its deficits and the national debt. That would generate a crisis severe enough to force drastic rollbacks of Social Security,…

What the Murdoch Bombshells Really Reveal
Breathtaking accounts like this of the Murdoch meltdown by Don Van Natta Jr., Sarah Lyall, and others are precisely what the New York Times is on earth to do. And that the Times is really doing it is doubly gratifying…

The High Price of Nukes
As President Obama and Republicans in Congress go down to the wire in negotiations over a package of budget cuts that would clear the way for raising the debt ceiling, we shouldn’t lose sight of one key source of reductions:…

Senator Rand Paul To House Republicans: Support Boehner Bill And You Will ?Lose Your Principles?
Tonight on Fox News, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) told host Sean Hannity why he thinks the wavering House Republicans should vote to kill the Boenher debt ceiling plan. According to the latest ThinkProgress whip count, there are 26 reported “no” votes (too many for the bill to pass), and several undecided votes. Noting that Sen. […]

Tonight on Fox News, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) told host Sean Hannity why he thinks the wavering House Republicans should vote to kill the Boenher debt ceiling plan. According to the latest ThinkProgress whip count, there are 26 reported “no” votes (too many for the bill to pass), and several undecided votes. Noting that Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) has made clear that the bill won’t pass the Senate, Paul warned House Republicans: “why lose your principles by voting for [the Boehner debt bill]“:

PAUL: Here’s the other problem for conservative members in the House: the Tea Party doesn’t want this. The conservative Republicans in the country, the grassroots doesn’t want this. If you vote for the Boehner plan, it’s not going to become law. It truly is dead on arrival over here. There’s going to be an amalgamation of the Boehner plan and the Reid plan and they will force it through with a lot of Democrat votes and a few Republican votes so if you’re going to send the Boehner plan over here, you’re abdicating what you stood for in the last election.

HANNITY: So then tell me. You think you know the final outcome, what I’m listening to you say here. What are you telling people tonight ultimately what the final outcome going to be?

PAUL: The Boehner plan is not going to be law so why lose your principles by voting for it?

Watch it:

Legislative riders target environmental protections

For environmentalists, it was something to shout about. In a rare show of defiance, 37 House Republicans broke party ranks two days ago and voted with Democrats to strike an amendment from an appropriations bill that forbade the Fish and Wildlife Service from listing any new plant or animal as endangered.

In telephone calls and e-mails, environmentalists at groups such as the National Wildlife Federation and Defenders of Wildlife called the vote “historic” and “awesome” in surprised reactions.

But a long list of other amendments aimed at weakening environmental protections at the Department of Interior and the Environmental Protection Agency brought them back to Earth.

Read full article >>

Lead birther Orly Taitz still on case, questioning Obama’s Social Security number

It seemed that President Obama’s release of his full birth certificate a couple of months ago — and his brutal skewering of Donald Trump at the White House correspondents dinner in May — completely took the air out of the “birther” movement.

Not so. None other than Orly Taitz , the Los Angeles lawyer, dentist and real estate agent, is still on the case, recently filing a Freedom of Information Act suit in federal court against Social Security Administration Commissioner Michael Astrue.

Taitz is looking for information that would prove that Obama’s Social Security number was from Connecticut, not Hawaii, and is therefore fraudulent.

Read full article >>

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Raymond Jefferson leaves Labor Department after ethics finding

A high-ranking Labor Department official appointed by President Obama to oversee a job-training program for veterans has resigned after an inspector general’s investigation found that he had violated federal procurement rules and ethics principles.

Raymond M. Jefferson, assistant secretary of the Labor Department’s Veterans’ Employment and Training Service, submitted his resignation Tuesday.

Jefferson engaged in “a pattern of conduct .?.?. which reflects a consistent disregard of federal procurement regulations, federal ethics rules and the proper stewardship of appropriated dollars,” according to the report from the Labor Department’s inspector general.

Read full article >>

Michelle Bachmann still a ‘no’ on John Boehner’s debt plan

Rep. Michele Bachmann praised Republican leaders for advancing a plan to raise the national debt limit Thursday even as she reiterated that she would vote “no” on the proposal.

“I am committed to not raising the debt ceiling,” Bachmann said at a National Press Club luncheon, a few hours before a vote was scheduled to take place on House Speaker John A. Boehner’s bill. “Despite John Boehner’s best efforts, absolutely faithful efforts, to try to put a plan on the table, the problem goes back again to the president’s failure of leadership.”

Read full article >>

A Shabby White House: The Emperor’s Clothes
Hugh Hewitt, Townhall
Jay Carney's second personal attack on Fox News' Ed Henry in two days demonstrates that Team Obama is wilting under the glare of a country that cannot believe the president turtled-up because he couldn't get his way.Henry's long run at CNN makes it very hard indeed for anyone to believe Carney's charges, but even if it was a fresh-faced unknown asking about the president's non-existent plan, Carney's is an overbearing and bullying attempt to filibuster the very obvious fact that the president has not released a plan and the public doesn't have …

Under Obama, Millennials Move to GOP
Michael Barone, DC Examiner
Most presidents affect the standing of their political parties. Ronald Reagan advanced his party's standing among young voters. So did Bill Clinton.In his first term, George W. Bush helped Republicans equal Democrats in party identification in the 2004 exit poll — the first time that happened since polling began.But in his second term Bush proved toxic to the Republican label. The Pew Research Center showed Democrats with a 51 to 39 percent party identification edge over Republicans in its 2008 polls.Now Pew Research has come out has come out with figures for 2011. They're not good…

Mexico Needs U.S. Help to Track Weapons

Scientists Create Glow-in-the-Dark Dog
South Korean scientists said on Wednesday they have created a glowing dog using a cloning technique that could help find cures for human diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. A research team from Seoul National University (SNU) said the genetically modified female beagle, named Tegon and born in 2009, has been found to glow fluorescent green under ultraviolet light if fed a doxycycline antibiotic.

Like we’ll need infrastructure in this country
Stop asking for infrastructure spending, can’t you see we’re building a bridge into the 18th Century

pic via erlin1 at flickr.com

Dear advocates of having roads to drive on that remain paved or bridges that don’t collapse — don’t you people know there are at least three or four countries out there that haven’t been invaded or occupied?

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The engineers found that overall, the cost of failing to invest more in the nation’s roads and bridges would total $3.1 trillion in lost GDP growth by 2020. For workers, the toll of investing only at current levels would be equally daunting: 877,000 jobs would also be lost. Already, the report found, deficient and deteriorating surface transportation cost us $130 billion in 2010.

Cry me a river (no wait, there’s no need as one will soon be arriving when that nearby dam breaches).  Have you not caught on to our nation’s brilliant jobs strategy? Instead of spending trillions on internal improvements (screw you Henry Clay!) we’ll spend it occupying every “ran”, “raq” or “stan” we damn well feel like, the more vowels the better.

Soon, the only jobs will be in the military (or para-military) until you can finally retire and collect Social Security at 65, 67, 69, 71 oh screw it you cannot retire, somebody has to pay for the tax cuts of Luke Russert II, and various and sundry Bushes.

Just remember how free you are, you ungrateful bastard.

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Late Late Night FDL: Don’t Wanna Be No Mother, Don’t Wanna Be No Wife
Gina Sicilia — Don’t Wanna Be No Mother, Don’t Wanna Be No Wife.

Gina Sicilia — Don’t Wanna Be No Mother, Don’t Wanna Be No Wife.

What’s on your mind?

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Early Morning Swim

• Boehner’s had enough Teabagging.
• Shorter McCain: Hey everyone! Look at meeeee!
• What’s on tap for the kabuki show today.
• Also, Al Gore is fat.
• Shorter Quitter: Hey everyone! Look at meeeee!

• Boehner’s had enough Teabagging.
• Shorter McCain: Hey everyone! Look at meeeee!
• What’s on tap for the kabuki show today.
• Also, Al Gore is fat.
• Shorter Quitter: Hey everyone! Look at meeeee!

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