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Huntsman Documentary: Republicans "Disconnected From The Realities Of The World Stage"

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With Obama and Romney still fighting for the “toughest on China” title, a new documentary highlights Huntsman and his ambassadorship. He thinks his party has “an overly simplistic and extreme way of looking at the world.”

Image by Chris Keane / Reuters

A forthcoming documentary film on former Ambassador and Governor Jon Huntsman will portray him as a reluctant candidate who never got the chance to focus the race on what he sees as a central issue: Relations with China.

Geralyn Dreyfous, a Huntsman friend based in Utah who produced an Academy Award winning documentary in 2004 on child prostitution in Calcutta, followed Huntsman around for two and a half years. She started in China, where the former Governor of Utah served as U.S. ambassador, and ended up New Hampshire, where the Huntsman campaign lived and died.

"The campaign turned out to be a non-starter," Dreyfous said.

But Dreyfous, who executive produced the Huntsman documentary, said the candidate's central disappointment had to do with American attitudes toward China.

"The campaign never got off the ground, but China never became a campaign issue in the way that he wanted it to be," Dreyfous told BuzzFeed. "It was only there as a kind of hostile example of how Republicans could be tougher on trade."

Although reticent to leave his post as ambassador of China, Huntsman ultimately entered the race "because there was a tremendous amount of pressure on him from moderate Republicans and business leaders who thought the party had gone too afar," explained Dreyfous.

From his seat in Beijing, "it became very clear to Jon that the Republican party was becoming more and more disconnected from the realities of the world stage," said Dreyfous. "He was very torn about running but he decided to do it."

Dreyfous' documentary, titled "A Forty-Year Engagement," will focus on Huntsman and United States-China relations. Select clips from the documentary were aired Wednesday night in Salt Lake City, with Huntsman and his wife in attendance, and Dreyfous plans to submit the film to the 2013 Sundance Film Festival.

Since the early days of the campaign, the major candidates have shared China as a worst best friend — a common enemy, and the best ammunition in any debate. President Obama and Mitt Romney are still fighting to define who would best "stand up to China" or be "tough on China."

In the last month alone, Romney has released five television ad spots that use China to attack the President — "Obama had years to stand up to China. We can't afford four more," one Romney ad urges. Obama, who has released three China ads in the last month, has done just the same — "Romney's never stood up to China," says one ad, "all he's done is send them our jobs."

Dreyfous said China's portrayal in the GOP primary was frustrating for Huntsman and his family, but was also reflective of the reasons the former ambassador got into the race to begin with.

"China was being used as the scapegoat. Other Republican candidates would talk about being tougher on China, and Jon was trying over and over again to say that it was more complicated than that — we don't exist without each other, we need to figure out what we have in common." said Dreyfous. "It was just an overly simplistic and extreme way of looking at the world."


The 12 Best Bibi And The Bomb Memes

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Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu got the attention of the internet Thursday at the UN General Assembly when he pulled out a dramatic prop. (Not to be confused with Bibi-bombing .)

The original:

The original:

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu draws a red line on the graphic of a bomb used to represent Iran's nuclear program as he addresses the 67th United Nations General Assembly at the U.N. Headquarters in New York, September 27, 2012. The red line he drew represents a point where he believes, the international community should tell Iran that they will not be allowed to pass without intervention.

Image by Lucas Jackson / Reuters

Via: quickmeme.com

Via: 972mag.com

Via: frompalestinewithlove.tumblr.com


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Romney Mocked In New Storage Space Ad

Mitt Romney's A "Pretty Darn Good" Water-Skier

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In an interview with WJLA in Washington DC yesterday Mitt Romney said a thing most people don't know about him was that he is a “pretty darn good” water-skier. A 2009 NBC Sports broadcast shows we already know that, and that Romney's not lying.

Source: youtube.com

From 2009.

Source: youtube.com

Taxpayers Foot Congressman's Hotel Bills

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Rep. Denham had morning TV hits to make. Where he denounced federal spending.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — California Congressman Jeff Denham spent more than a thousand dollars in taxpayer funds in April and May to spend the night in hotels in San Francisco and Sacramento, an expense he said was necessary to make appearances on various morning television shows.

He was on TV to denounce lavish spending by the Obama administration on, among other things, hotels and conferences.

Denham, a Republican who chose Courtyard Inns and other midmarket locations, isn’t the only member of Congress to bill the Treasury for hotel stays inside his district. Greg Walden of Oregon and Sean Duffy of Wisconsin also racked up large hotel bills because, spokespeople said, their large districts make overnight stays important in visiting constituents.

And billing nights at a hotel for a morning media hit is not unheard of – congressional aides said members like Denham who don’t have satellite uplink studios in their districts will occasionally do so. Ethics attorneys also said that there are no irregularities with the spending, since the publicity was part of Denham’s official duties as congressman.

In a statement to BuzzFeed, Denham not only defended the overnight stays to conduct interviews but noted they helped build public support for efforts to force the General Services Administration, which manages federal buildings, to begin selling off excess federal properties and recouping billions in federal funds for the treasury.

“As Chairman overseeing GSA, there is a need to inform the public about the systemic waste and culture of corruption within GSA,” Denham said. “The interviews required travel to destinations outside the district and with the media’s help, I’ve been able to discuss the huge amount of waste within the agency, and forced them to begin selling many properties around the nation that will save taxpayers billions of dollars.”

Denham, who chairs the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s subcommittee with jurisdiction over General Services Administration, had seized on the scandal over GSA’s more than $820,000 bill for a conference in Las Vegas to not only harshly criticize the agency’s spending on conferences but to launch an assault on its very existence.

“I am prepared to systematically pull apart GSA to the point where we will make it a question to the American public of whether GSA is needed at all,” the freshman lawmaker saidduring a hearing in April.

Denham ultimately took his push to the airwaves, conducting at least seven morning show interviews on CNN, Fox and MSNBC April 5th and May 29th, according to his office. During those stays in San Francisco and Sacramento — the two closest television studios to his Modesto-based district with satellite uplink capability — he accumulated about $1,000 in hotel bills, all of which he was paid back for by the federal government, according to a review of his disbursement records by Buzzfeed.

Denham isn’t the only critic of GSA’s spending that has at times spent federal money on his own travel.

In May, Roll Call reported on a 2011 trip by Sen. Jeff Sessions – one of the harshest critics of spending by GSA and the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on conventions – took a trip to the tony Croatian resort town of Opatija, which he described during an interview on Croatian television as “just beautiful, fabulously beautiful … I have not been disappointed.”

And it’s difficult to pin down how many hotel stays members of Congress make on a yearly basis. But disbursement records show that over the last two years members have billed the government 394 times for “lodging,” many of which were for multiday stays in a single hotel.

But because many lawmakers have disbursements made for expenses directly to their credit cards and do not provide a full itemization of their expenditures in publicly available documents, that number could be significantly higher.

Still, dozens of members have listed receiving compensation for lodging expenses over the last several years, most one off instances in which a member finds himself or herself out of town for a conference or field hearing.

Some members of Congress, like Walden, say it’s a simple matter of geography. Walden’s district covers 70,000 square miles in eastern and central Oregon, totaling some 20 counties. According to disbursement records, the Treasury has paid him for 54 hotel visits over the last two years — almost all of which have come because of a rigorous district travel schedule.

Likewise, disbursement forms show Duffy of Wisconsin has been paid 27 times for hotel stays since coming to Congress in 2011. Duffy has one of the largest districts east of the Mississippi, making travel to meet with constituents time consuming. Duffy also lived some five hours from the closet airport, which meant he was often forced to stay over night when traveling to and from Washington, according to his office.

“Rep. Duffy represents the largest district, geographically, in Wisconsin, and one of the largest districts in the country east of the Mississippi River. From various parts of the district to the other, it takes upward of 5 hours to drive. Rather than make the long drive and turn around to go home, occasionally, Rep. Duffy will stay overnight and hold town halls and conduct constituent work over several days to maximize his time and taxpayer dollars,” Duffy spokesman John Gentzel said in a statement.

Gentzel also noted the distance between Wausau – where the airport is located -- and Duffy’s original home Ashland Wisconsin. Additionally, the vast majority of his lodging receipts were for the first part of his term when he still lived in Ashland as a reason for some of the stays, and noted that, “He and his wife and six kids have since moved to the Wausau area.”

Allen West's New Ad Is Epic

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And also brutal.

Rep. Allen West's latest campaign ad pits his record as an Army colonel against his opponent Patrick Murphy's as someone who got thrown out of a bar for drunken fighting.

The text:
"February 16, 2003, Fort Hood, Texas: Lt. Col. Allen West had just received deployment orders, and prepares his men to go to war. That night, South Beach, Miami: Patrick Murphy is thrown out of a club for fighting, covered in alcohol, and unable to stand. Murphy then confronts and verbally assaults a police officer. Patrick Murphy was arrested and taken to jail. Two men, a country in crisis — you decide."

h/t TPM

Israeli PM's "Bomb" Stunt Makes The Front Page

Can You Tell A Woman's Politics By Looking At Her Face?

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Scientists call it the “Michelle Bachmann Effect.” Test yourself below.

Can you guess which of the US Representatives below is a Republican, and which is a Democrat, just based on their faces? (Answers are at the bottom, no peeking — unless you already recognize all these congresswomen, in which case you can scroll right down to the science.)


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How Virginia Turned Blue

Inside The Planning Of A James O'Keefe "Sting"

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The conservative provocateur planned a sting of SEIU in 2010 — based off information from a source of John Fund's, with Foster Friess as a potential investor. It didn't end up working out. (Updated below)

Source: images.politico.com

Conservative activist James O'Keefe plotted a potential voter fraud sting of the Service Employees International Union in 2010 in Massachusetts — a sting that, had it been carried out, could have been funded by Rick Santorum patron Foster Friess.

The plot is elaborated on and eventually ruled out in an email chain started by conservative writer John Fund, who emailed Republican National Lawyers Association executive director Michael Thielen that the union was "contracting for buses on election day."

"If you're black or brown they'll rope you in and take you to the polls, registration can be worked out," Fund wrote, per his "Boston source." His email was forwarded on to others, forming the basis for the plans.

The email exchange, parts of which may be missing, is below. Read from the bottom. The last email is from James O'Keefe to associates Stan Dai and Nadia Naffe, who later filed harassment charges against O'Keefe.

Others on the thread include Heather Higgins, the founder of the conservative Independent Women's Voice and the late Andrew Breitbart.

Naffe told BuzzFeed she flew to Boston to investigate, but that they never uncovered anything of interest and the project fizzled.

From: "James E. O'Keefe III" Date: January 13, 2010 12:21:54 PM EST To: xxxxxxx@gmail.com, xxxxxx@aol.com Subject: Fwd: brainstorm of sorts, here - far-fetched? Maybe not?...

Your thoughts Nadia?

---------- Forwarded message ----------From: Heather Higgins Date: Wednesday, January 13, 2010 Subject: Re: brainstorm of sorts, here - far-fetched? Maybe not?... To: Steve Friess , James O'Keefe xxxxxxxxxx@gmail.com, Andrew Breitbart Cc: Foster Friess

Andrew and James, I'm forwarding what could be a very clever idea from Steve Friess in response to the intel below from John Fund re SEIU's intentions in Tuesday's election in MA. Don't know what it would cost, but you all should talk.

Warmest regards -Heather Higgins

On Wed, Jan 13, 2010 at 12:25 AM, Steve Friess wrote:

Wouldn't it be great if a "ACORN sting video" could be produced about these busses?

Dad - maybe bounce this off Breitbart?

Some black /Latina conservatives could be wired for video, and get picked up on one of these busses, and show what goes on. My guess -they are offering cash, (which I am pretty sure is illegal), and I also would wager that at least some of these busses are making more than one stop with the same people - ie getting them to vote twice -though I don't know the mechanics of that.

Perhaps some private detective types would be needed to help track down the busses, and a block or two ahead of them to drop our cameramen off...

Too much to dream? Imagine pulling this off - legal / image problems for SEIU would be a good thing... think there's upside to this?

Brietbart would know, and Fund would know - 'if we catch them doing X, it could mean Y' - I just don't know what the stakes are...

On Jan 12, 2010, at 12:46 PM, Heather Higgins wrote:

Foster --See below from John Fund re SEIU -Acorn is in MA as well. It would be hugely helpful if you would assist with our non-glamorous but highly effective GOTV effort. If you could possibly let me know today, that would be helpful to our planning. This is such a great opportunity for making trouble in the best sort of way - I hope you can help us really capitalize on it.

Many thanks, Heather

-------- Original Message --------Subject: FW: John Batchelor From: "Fund, John" Date: Tue, January 12, 2010 8:25 am To: 'Michael Thielen'

Tip from Boston source (normally reliable)

Seiu contracting for buses on election day and heading to roxbury, mattapan, roslindale and jamaica plain. If you're black or brown they'll rope you in and take you to the polls, registration can be worked out.

Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

In the next installment, O'Keefe, who appears to have contacted Fund at this point, starts setting up

From: "James E. O'Keefe III" > Date: January 13, 2010 4:16:14 PM EST> To: "mikeroman.com" > Subject: Re: ACORN videos / seiu / election>> what time zone are you in. I'm assuming you mean 8Est. That works.> I'm 201-637-0564>> On Wed, Jan 13, 2010 at 1:10 PM, mikeroman.com wrote:>>>> Have time to talk around 8?>>>>>> On Jan 13, 2010, at 3:41 PM, James E. O'Keefe III wrote:>>>> > Mike,>> >>> > Got your info from John Fund.>> > I was the producer of the ACORN Videos>> > Would like to know whereabouts of the busses in Boston SEIU, et al are using in order to bus people in to vote in the Tuesday special election.>> > Thinking about sending some undercover folks up there.>> >>> > James

Then O'Keefe proposed sending Nadia Naffe up to Boston:

From: "James E. O'Keefe III"
Date: January 14, 2010 11:10:49 PM EST
To: xxxxxxx@aol.com
Cc: Stan Dai
Subject: Boston

Nadia,

We're willing to book you a plane ticket to Boston to get some footage from the SEIU busses.
Joe will be joining you taking care of logistics/equipment--- but i'll be in new orleans causing trouble.
im confident your training will take you far.

Interested in making some more video history?

James

A couple days later, O'Keefe has booked travel for Naffe, who was to do the operation. This email included an Orbitz booking confirmation:

From: "James E. O'Keefe III" > Date: January 15, 2010 2:46:09 PM EST> To: nknaffe@aol.com, Stan Dai , Joe Basel > Subject: Fwd: Travel Document - Boston 1/18/10>> Nadia,>> here's what I could come up with- one stop but its along the way - no 12 hour flights, more like 4-5 hour flight.> leaving tampa mon at noon> leaving boston wed at 2pm so you can sleep.>> keep in mind Wed morning is for additional work - if the polls are continuing if its close..>> I'll also get you a hotel room for the mon night - Joe is flying in overnight from San Francisco and arrives at 6:30am.>> Joe will be picking you up shortly thereafter. But you will have to wake up around 7 on tuesday - your country needs you.>> More details to follow.> James

He also set up a place for her and Joe Basel, one of the men later arrested with him after the Senator Landrieu affair, to stay in Boston (Naffe and Basel are copied on the email):

From: "James E. O'Keefe III"
Date: January 16, 2010 10:59:14 PM EST
To: Amy Contrada
Cc: xxxxxx@aol.com, Joe Basel
Subject: Boston election day,

Amy,

Two of my collegues are coming to Boston to infilrate the SEIU on election day. One of them is a female.

Would you be able to put them her up Monday night?

James

The video from the trip, if it was ever made, was never published.

"I believe there was discussion of doing something but O'Keefe's office will tell you nothing was done," said Fund, reached by email.

"This is a classic example of someone trying to breath life into a three-year old dead horse," said Fund.

He said that other reporters had contacted him about it in the past and that some "pointed out the email thread looked truncated and edited." .

Reached by email, Naffe said the emails were authentic: "Fund and Steve Friess, the son of billionaire Foster Friess, introduced the idea to O'keefe that SEIU would fraudulently register anyone with brown skin to vote."

"James flew me out to Boston to find the SEIU busses, just days after that email was sent," Naffe said. She claimed that "Congressman Steve King from Iowa was waiting at the hotel when we arrived to take us to dinner. He gave us a pep talk about illegal voting."

"O'keefe has the footage, though I'm doubtful he would share any of it. Since, he was arrested a week later in New Orleans while attempting to wire tap Senator Mary Landrieu," Naffe said.

O'Keefe didn't respond to a request for comment.

Update: Fund emailed to say that he thinks his original email was altered: "I maintain the email was edited to take out the fact I was referring to what someone told me might be happening and that I was asking a source (whom I have quoted in the past) if they had heard anything about it."

He also wished to clarify that he did not personally tip O'Keefe to the busing. That has been reflected above.

Napolitano Orders Same-Sex Couples' Immigration Rights To Be Put In Writing

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“I have directed [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] to disseminate written guidance to the field that the interpretation of the phrase 'family relationships' includes long-term, same-sex partners,” the Homeland Security Secretary wrote. Pelosi and more than 80 colleagues had requested the move.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano testifies before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on September 19, 2012.

Image by Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Thursday that she has ordered written guidance be issued that same-sex couples' relationships be considered "family relationships." The move is the most tangible proof yet that the Department is taking action urging field offices not to pursue deportation cases against a foreign same-sex partner of an American citizen who would be able to obtain a green card if in an opposite-sex relationship.

The news came in a letter from Napolitano to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday, where she stated that "the phrase 'family relationships' includes long-term, same-sex partners" for purposes of exercising prosecutorial discretion in immigration enforcement matters, nearly two months after a DHS spokesman told BuzzFeed that such a policy was in place.

The written guidance had been requested repeatedly by lawmakers.

From Napolitano's letter:

In an effort to make clear the definition ofthe phrase "family relationships," I have directed [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] to disseminate written guidance to the field that the interpretation of the phrase "family relationships" includes long-term, same-sex partners. As with every other factor identified in Director Morton's June 11 memorandum, the applicability ofthe "family relationships" factor is weighed on an individualized basis in the consideration of whether prosecutorial discretion is appropriate in a given case.

Because of the Defense of Marriage Act's prohibition on the federal government recognizing same-sex couples' marriages, such couples — when one is not a U.S. citizen — are not able to obtain a green card, which is readily available to opposite-sex couples.

Pelosi said in a statement, "The directive by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano for DHS to issue written guidance to clarify that 'family relationships' includes LBGT couples is welcome and will provide a measure of clarity and confidence to families dealing with separation in immigration cases.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler of New York, who has long been the lead sponsor in the House of the Uniting American Families Act to allow , said in a statement, "With the written guidelines that I requested and which will be issued by ICE, federal immigration officials will finally have the clear direction they need to make responsible and compassionate decisions on family ties in immigration cases."

Pelosi, however, pushed for legislative changes that she has said in the past will only happen if Democrats take back the House, "We have more to do: we need to pass the Uniting American Families Act and the Reuniting Families Act, to relegate DOMA to the dustbin of history, and to fight discrimination in all of its forms. From supporting marriage equality to seeking fairness in our immigration laws, the Obama Administration has embraced progress for LGBT families — progress that will and must continue."

Advocates also had been pushing for the move, which Immigration Equality executive director Rachel Tiven called "huge."

"Until now, LGBT families and their lawyers had nothing to rely on but an oral promise that prosecutorial discretion would include all families," she said in a statement. "Today, DHS has responded to Congress and made that promise real."

Napolitano's Letter

Joe Biden “Absolutely” Wanted "Everything" On The Table To Solve Entitlements In 2007

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The Vice President may be hitting Paul Ryan for his entitlement reform plans now, but in 2007 he wasn't ruling anything out.

Source: youtube.com

Let's Just Pretend Obama Is Actually Rapping "99 Problems"

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The best part is when Mitt Romney shows up as “the cop.” (Via Diran Lyons , H/T to WFMU .)

Source: youtube.com

This isn't the first time someone has tried this joke, but it's the best execution, with sound bites pulled from dozens of sources. Here's another version from July by an Obama impersonator:

Source: youtube.com

"Morning Joe" Mocks Romney For Something That Didn't Happen

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A misleading subtitle leads to a viral clip making fun of Romney. A frustrated Scarborough defends the clip on Twitter, says he will “take note” of all those who note the mistake.

On Wednesday, MSNBC's Morning Joe kicked off a discussion about Mitt Romney's reliance on running mate Paul Ryan to excite supporters by airing footage of an Ohio rally the evening before.

In the clip, Romney is shown taking the stage with Ryan as supporters inaudibly chant. According to the subtitle provided by MSNBC, the crowd is chanting, "Ryan!" — before Romney interjects and leads them in chanting, "Romney! Ryan! Romney! Ryan! There we go, alright, that's great!"

Host Joe Scarborough's exasperated reaction to the footage, which made Romney look hapless and a bit desperate, went viral.

"Oh, sweet Jesus!" Scarborough said, burying his face in his hands. He added, "What do the Catholics say? Holy mother of God, we pray for our sinners now in their hour of peace?"

But the subtitle in the clip misrepresented what actually took place. BuzzFeed was present at the event, and took note that the crowd was actually chanting Romney's name, before he encouraged them to add his running mate to the chant.

The New York Times story that MSNBC displayed before the clip noted the same thing. Reporter Ashley Parker wrote:

After Mr. Ryan whooped up the crowd in Vandalia on Tuesday, Mr. Romney moved to the front of the stage. As the crowd began chanting “Romney! Romney!” he cut them off.“Wait a second,” Mr. Romney said, instructing the audience to cheer for “Romney-Ryan! Romney-Ryan!” They did.

“There we go,” he said, pleased.

The discrepancy was noted on two conservative sites, The Blaze and Breitbart News — and Scarborough took issue with the posts.


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Tax Checkoff Finances Green Party Candidate's Presidential Bid

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Jill Stein was awarded $260,000 from the FEC through the presidential public funding program. Public funds account for one third of her war chest.

Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein participates in a news conference this summer at the National Press Club.

Image by Mark Wilson / Getty Images

The Federal Election Commission announced Friday night that $260,389 in federal matching funds was awarded to Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein.

The announcement makes Stein, a physician and former Massachusetts gubernatorial contender, one of three candidates to rely heavily on public funding dollars in their bids for the presidency.

Buddy Roemer, the former congressman and governor who suspended his presidential campaign in May, received over $351,000 from the FEC, and Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson — still in the race — has received over $303,000 in federal funds.

The presidential public funding program is financed by a $3 check-off option that appears on personal income tax returns. Neither Mitt Romney nor President Obama accepted federal funding — to become eligible for the program, the candidate must agree to an overall spending limit.

But for candidates like Stein and Johnson, the influx of federal dollars is worth the restrictions of the FEC program. The cash Stein has received makes up over one third of her campaign's overall revenue. Through contributions alone, the Green Party candidate has raised just $374,116 as of Aug. 31.


Republican Jewish Coalition Paying "Volunteers" With iPads, Gift Cards

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Nice work if you can get it.

The Republican Jewish Coalition is offering its volunteers incentives to continue to phone-bank, but unlike traditional gimmicks which provide hard-working supporters with special acces, the RJC is providing iPads and American Express gift cards.

According to an email to supporters, supporters of the RJC DC Chapter who make calls during designated phone-banks stand to earn:

—Phone-bank for 50+ hours and get an ipad3 (32 gig)
—Phone-bank for 40-49 hours and get an ipad 3 (16 gig)
—Phone-bank for 30-39 hours and get an iPad 2 (16 gig)
—Phone-bank for 20-29 hours and get a $100 AmEx gift card

RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks said the arrangement is "not unusual at all."

"We really appreciate and are thankful for our volunteers," he said. "We wanted to do something special as a way to say thank you for all the time, hard work and effort they are putting into the effort to make an impact in the Jewish community. For people who put in lots of hours working to defeat President Obama and highlight the concerns about his failed mid-east policies this is a small token of our appreciation."

No, The Mormon Church Is Not Excommunicating Romney Critics

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But a baseless story that went viral this week highlights a daunting challenge for Mormonism. Can the faith escape being defined by its most famous member?

Last Friday, The Daily Beast popped a story trumpeting what seemed, at first, like a scoop the press had been chasing all year. The splashy headline said it all: “MORMONS WANT TO EXCOMMUNICATE ROMNEY CRITIC."

The article told the tale of a Mormon blogger named David Twede who said he was facing excommunication on charges of “apostasy.” His supposed sin: Writing critically about Mitt Romney. As journalist Jamie Reno framed it, Twede’s travails represented the first sign of a church-wide “witch hunt” aimed at rooting out political dissent and ensuring universal allegiance in Zion to the Mormon Candidate. The story went viral within hours.

But interviews with many of the people involved in the episode suggest that while the story’s sexy headline may be literally true — Twede does face Church discipline — there’s no evidence it has anything to do with his criticism of Romney. Indeed, many Mormons who are far more critical of the Republican nominee have never faced any formal censure.

But the way in which the politics-laced version of the story spread — with Twede's allies making a concerted pitch to reporters anxious for a fresh angle on Romney's religion — underscores a challenge the Mormon Church has faced since the start of the Republican primaries. Despite Mormon leaders' best efforts to demonstrate political neutrality, virtually every article written about their faith in 2012 has been built around Romney. The result, exasperated church officials complain, is that Mormonism's doctrines, quirks, and controversies are being introduced to the country through the filter of Romney's presidential bid — a reality that could have a lasting effect on the public perception of the church.

The politicization of Twede's potential excommunication is emblematic. A 47-year-old scientist and fifth-generation Latter-day Saint living in Orlando, Twede ran MormonThink.com, a relatively obscure blog offering a defiantly unorthodox take on LDS history and doctrine. He had recently returned to the church after a five-year hiatus — not because of a spiritual awakening, he says, but so he could play watch-dog at the services.

"I cannot effectively address the concerns of members of my church if I am not there with them seeing what they see and hearing what they hear," he told CNN this week in an e-mail.

On his blog, he talks about befriending a member of his ward and then e-mailing him materials designed to shake the congregant's faith in Mormonism. And perhaps most troubling to church leadership, he devoted several posts on MormonThink to "revealing" temple rituals that Mormons believe are sacred, and should be kept private.

The Mormon Church has struggled throughout its history to decide how much doctrinal antagonism it will allow in its ranks, and it has long fielded charges of anti-intellectualism from its critics. So, when LDS leaders in Orlando confronted Twede about his writings in mid-September, he joined a long line of self-fashioned reformers who have clashed with church hierarchy over the years.

But when Twede took his story to The Daily Beast, he offered a very different angle, one that no reporter could could pass up: Local church leaders, he said, were “acting as agents of HQ leadership in Salt Lake" and trying to excommunicate him for the Romney-bashing on his blog. It was a serious charge, and one that, if true, would undermine the church's longheld claim to political neutrality — and perhaps even threaten its tax-exempt status.

But hours after the Daily Beast article published, Twede changed his story, telling the Salt Lake Tribune and the New York Times that politics likely had nothing to do with the church discipline he faced. Then, the next morning, he returned to his original thesis, writing on his personal blog, "I felt in my gut that the Romney pieces were a part of why this happened."

The church quickly released an official statement dismissing Twede's claims as "patently false" and saying that excommunication is only wielded "in those rare occasions where an individual's actions cannot be ignored while they claim to be in good standing with the church." Citing a longstanding policy of confidentiality in these matters, the church declined to go into further specifics of Twede's case.

Meanwhile, a loosely-formed coalition of ex-Mormons and Romney detractors was kicking into gear — saturating message boards with links, launching the news through the blogosphere, and aggressively selling their version of the story to reporters. Over the course of four days, the story was pitched to BuzzFeed by three separate individuals, the last of whom left an anonymous voice message scolding us for ignoring the scandal: "[Twede's] made it to CNN but I don't see the fellow's name anywhere on your site."

At the same time, Twede worked to harness the newfound national attention as a vehicle for his Lutheresque agenda of reform. Reached for comment by BuzzFeed, Twede declined to talk about his Romnapostacy — he'd already done enough interviews on that, he said — but went on to pitch a number of other potentially juicy angles, complete with MormonThink links, and sources he said would speak out on the the controversies of Mormonism.

"There are also many other interesting Mormon stories, such as a super-secret special Mormon temple ordinance for a select elite few," Twede offered, for example.

And on Thurday, when he learned that his disciplinary hearing had been postponed, Twede celebrated by posting a call to arms on his blog, un-ironically urging likeminded Mormons to join him in a "Paisley Pestroika." Those who wanted to "overturn the tables of corporate empowerment" in the church, and "stop the suppression of dissent" were to wear paisley-patterned accessories to church as a sign of solidarity.

But Twede's claim that he was being targeted for his politics was met with deep skepticism by seasoned religion reporters and Mormon liberals alike.

"I have been openly critical of Mitt Romney's candidacy, and I have never experienced pressure from the LDS Church's leaders from my political views," said Joanna Brooks, a prominent Mormon scholar and blogger.

"I've been involved in organizing Latter-day Saints who support President Obama for over a year," said Rob Taber, national director of the grassroots Mormons for Obama. "My church leaders know I'm doing this. We park a car with a 'Mormons for Obama' bumper sticker in the church parking lot every Sunday."

He added, "Not once has anyone suggested I might face church discipline, and the idea that I would for... criticizing Mitt Romney would be quite a stretch."

Salt Lake Tribune religion reporter Peggy Fletcher Stack, whose aggressive coverage has long been a thorn in the Mormon Church's side, wrote an article debunking the notion that Mormons are booting Romney detractors. And, as if on cue, earlier this week Mormon Democrat Harry Reid publicly declared that Romney had "sullied" their shared religion. (At press time, Reid remained un-excommunicated.)

The Daily Beast's Reno told BuzzFeed, "I stand by our story 100 percent. I quoted Davide Twede accurately. We believed he was a credible source and we simply reported what he believed to be true." He added that Twede changed his version of events because he was "concerned about the impact any further negative comments about Gov. Romney might have on his job."

But Reno didn't have the advantage of personal experience or beat knowledge when Twede approached him with his story — and his one article was all it took to launch the "election-meddling Mormons" narrative into the ether. The entire episode is a cautionary tale, of sorts, but one without an obvious solution. As long as Romney is running for president — and particularly if he's elected — the national press will focus the vast majority of its Mormon coverage on understanding the faith's most famous member.

Some Mormons think while the Romney-centric coverage of their faith may sometimes be misleading, it's ultimately a net positive.

"There's still quite a bit that's misunderstood, but media coverage is generally much better informed that it was even in 2007, and that wouldn't have happened without Romney," said Taber.

But as Romney’s favorability ratings continue to slip along with the rest of his poll numbers, Mormonism risks having its international brand defined by an unpopular politican. And as the church hurdles toward the election-day conclusion of the “Mormon Moment,” its longsuffering public affairs office will face the daunting task of escaping this year without a partisan brand stamped onto its public image.

The David Twedes of the world will make them work for every inch.

Chris Hayes Quotes "Ten Crack Commandments"

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The MSNBC weekend host invoked Notorious B.I.G. during a monologue that described Republican strategists who question the credibility of national polls as being caught in a “bubble trap” of “smoking what they're dealing.”

In the song "Ten Crack Commandments," Biggie Smalls offered a set of rules for drug dealers who wanted to avoid the perils of the trade and one of them was a piece of old advice:"Never get high on your own supply." Same goes for political strategists: never confuse your own talking points for the truth, don't start believing that everyone out there in the voting booths are seeing the world the way you do. The GOP has, I think lost sight of this simple wisdom. They're smoking what they're dealing. It's a big part of why those polls numbers look the way they do... and good a reminder of the dysfunction and incompetence that happen when the people in charge only listen to themselves.

Source: leanforward.msnbc.com

LINK: Conservatives Embrace Alternate Polling Reality

And, Paul Ryan Gets Mocked By Storage Ad

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Manhattan Mini-Storage does it again. Much more of a personal jab than the Mitt Romney billboard .

Like I said yesterday, when MMS's political ads are related to storage, they're good. But this is just a pointless cheap shot.

Via: newsweek

New Ad Ties New York House Candidate To Todd Akin

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It begins.

A new advertisement for Dan Maffei, a Democrat running for Congress in upstate New York, links his opponent to controversial Senate candidate Todd Akin. It's the first ad to do so in an election cycle where Akin, who was nearly pushed out of his race over his "legitimate rape" comment, has become a bludgeon for Democrats to use in other races.

The ad focuses on a bill that would redefine rape as "forcible rape," which both Akin and incumbent Congresswoman Ann Marie Buerkle cosponsored.

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