The Hollywood Liberal

GOP Governor Gets Black Support — Via PhotoShop
It’s no secret that things haven’t always gone smoothly for Gov. Tom Corbett in his effort to woo minority voters in Pennsylvania. Most famously, the one-term GOP governor — who’s in the fight of his life for re-election — last year told editors of Philadelphia-based Al Dia at a roundtable that he didn’t have any Latinos in his cabinet, adding: “If you can find us one, please let us know.” Now, according to a report going viral tonight on social media, Corbett’s re-election campaign found an African-American woman to stand next to the governor on his website photos. Not an actual woman. According to Buzzfeed, the black woman who gazes at Corbett was Photoshopped from a stock picture.

Scorned Ex Stalks Man, His Neighbors, Colleagues
A St. Augustine, Florida, man is at ease now that his scorned ex-lover is behind bars. “I finally can breathe again,” Joe Good, 51, told ABC News’ 20/20. “Now I don’t feel like every time I see a police car that, ‘Oh, they’re coming for me.'” Good’s former girlfriend of three years, Tawny Blazejowksi, 41, of St. Augustine would stop at nothing to ruin his life after the two broke up. She succeeded in getting him arrested three times and fired from his job at an insurance company, where he had worked for over 24 years, then targeted his colleagues, neighbors and new girlfriend’s landlord.

Justices balk at last-minute voting changes
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court has allowed Texas to use its strict voter ID law in the November election even after a federal judge said the law was the equivalent of a poll tax and threatened to deprive many blacks and Latinos of the right to vote this year.

S. Korea concert planner found dead after 16 die
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — A South Korean man involved in planning an outdoor pop concert where 16 people were killed after falling through a ventilation grate was found dead Saturday in an apparent suicide, officials said, as doctors treated eight others facing life-threatening injuries from the disaster.

Bermuda clears trees, power lines hit by Gonzalo
HAMILTON, Bermuda (AP) — Hurricane Gonzalo crushed trees, flattened power lines and damaged Bermuda’s main hospital during an hours-long battering that was the second pummeling of the tiny British territory by a powerful storm in less than a week.

Tax returns show Chris Christie and his wife made almost $700K in 2013
It was a significant jump from the New Jersey governor’s 2012 income

Latest Obama order aims to combat identity theft, data breaches
The president pushes the U.S. to do more to halt the “infuriating” exposure of personal financial data to hackers

Lower Oil Prices Are Unambiguously Good
Larry Kudlow, RealClearPolitics
Steep stock market corrections often create shrouds of pessimism that do bad things to people’s brainpower. And one of the absolutely stupidest things I have heard in recent weeks is that the recent drop in oil prices is bad. You heard me right. Serious people on financial television are saying lower oil prices are a signal of worldwide economic collapse. Here at home that translates to recession, deflation, a profits collapse and rising unemployment. I’ve been around for a while, and I’ve seldom heard such gibberish. The latest stock market scare stems from a bunch of fears — such as the…

Labour pledges cancer test wait cut
By 2020 no-one in England will have to wait more than a week for cancer tests and results, Labour pledges.

West urges end to Libya violence
The US and four European allies call for an immediate end to the fighting in Libya between government forces and Islamist rebels.

Rise in weapons found in prisons
The number of weapons confiscated in Scottish prisons has almost doubled in a year, new figures show.

Conflict Uncovers a Ukrainian Identity Crisis Over Deep Russian Roots
A mini-series based on Mikhail Bulgakov’s novel “The White Guard,” set in Kiev, exposes the identity crisis kindled among many older Ukrainians by the confrontation with Moscow.

Of Virtue and Vice, and a Vatican Priest
Accused of money laundering, Msgr. Nunzio Scarano said he was holding money for charity. But some see him as a symbol of a financial system gone awry.

New at the Helm of Indonesia’s Government: A Common Man
Born in a slum in Central Java, Joko Widodo takes office as president of the world’s fourth most populous nation on Monday.

After Delay, Iraq Appoints Two to Posts for Security
Parliament approved two appointees to lead ministries responsible for the nation’s security forces, vacancies that had highlighted sectarian tensions and generated weeks of negotiations.

A Train Ride Through Time: From Iraq’s Checkered Past Into an Uncertain Future
Grand ambitions to restore the country’s run-down train services to their former glory have been halted by Islamic State’s advances.

Why This Politician Kept His Distinguished Military Service A Secret From Voters

Seth Moulton was awarded two medals for heroic service in Iraq, but you won’t hear him talk about it on the campaign trail.

The post Why This Politician Kept His Distinguished Military Service A Secret From Voters appeared first on ThinkProgress.

CREDIT: AP

Smiling spouses are a plus. Young children even more so. Come from a well-known, highly regarded family? That’s another bonus. But there might be no greater asset for a candidate for public office than a distinguished military career.

But one Democratic congressional candidate in Massachusetts has taken a very different approach to his military record: rather than run on it, Seth Moulton has kept hidden his acts of heroism from his time in Iraq during the early stages of the invasion in 2003 and 2004.

According to his military record obtained by the Boston Globe, Moulton was awarded the Bronze Star medal for valor and the Navy and Marine Corps Commendation medal for valor for leading his platoon into battles south of Baghdad.

You wouldn’t know it from Moulton’s campaign though. Whereas many candidates put their military careers front and center, Moulton kept his accolades out of the public eye, even leaving his own parents in the dark until this past week.

Moulton explained his decision as a matter of respect for those who served and continue to serve. “There is a healthy disrespect among veterans who served on the front lines for people who walk around telling war stories,” Seth Moulton told the Globe.

Moulton defeated incumbent John Tierney in the Democratic primary, and is running against Republican Richard Tisei in the sixth congressional district.

The post Why This Politician Kept His Distinguished Military Service A Secret From Voters appeared first on ThinkProgress.

A Health-Care Plan Worse Than Obamacare

What If Republicans Win?
James Freeman, Wall Street Journal
Jeb Hensarling may be the most important Republican elected official you’ve never heard of. He will become even more important if his party wins control of the U.S. Senate in November’s elections, two weeks from this Tuesday. He’s also a leading candidate to eventually succeed John Boehner as House speaker.

Kentucky Showcases the Worst of Politics
Michael Cohen, Boston Globe
ON MONDAY my confidence in representative democracy as an effective form of governance momentarily wavered. The reason: I watched the Kentucky Senate debate between minority leader Mitch McConnell and his Democratic challenger Alison Lundergan Grimes — a depressing tete-a-tete between one candidate afraid to say anything and another seemingly incapable of being honest with his constituents.

How the Feds Block Ebola Cures
Robert Goldberg, New York Post
We have technology to potentially control Ebola and other viral outbreaks today. But the federal bureaucracy refuses to catch up with 21st-century science.For example, diagnostic startup Nanobiosym has an iPhone-sized device that can accurately detect Ebola and other infectious diseases in less than an hour.

Lower Oil Prices Are Unambiguously Good
Larry Kudlow, IBD
Steep stock market corrections often create shrouds of pessimism that do bad things to people’s brainpower. And one of the absolutely stupidest things I have heard in recent weeks is that the recent drop in oil prices is bad. You heard me right. Serious people on financial television are saying lower oil prices are a signal of worldwide economic collapse. Here at home that translates to recession, deflation, a profits collapse and rising unemployment.I’ve been around for a while, and I’ve seldom heard such gibberish.The latest stock market scare stems from a bunch of fears — such as the…