Ugh. Get me out of here.
Via ampacus.webs.com
After a brief détente, chaos resumes on Capitol Hill.
Jonathan Ernst / Reuters
WASHINGTON — Just when it seemed like politicians were kind of getting along, crazy season returned to Capitol Hill in full force Wednesday.
Although for the better part of three years, Congress has been unable to conduct even the most basic functions of its job without acrimony, drama, and last-minute brinkmanship, for almost two weeks while debating the use of military force in Syria, Congress seemed for once singularly focused and serious.
Gone was the bitter infighting between Democrats and Republicans, and between Republican leaders and their conference, replaced by serious-minded lawmakers, showing up for multiple classified briefings during the final week of a five-week recess.
They even started working together: Liberals and conservatives joined forces to oppose the war, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and House Speaker John Boehner both supported the strike, and then practically every elected official in Washington embraced the diplomatic option presented by Russia, indefinitely delaying a vote on authorization.
But the vote delay forced congressional leaders to immediately turn their attention to pressing budgetary matters like keeping the government open, which in turn brought the brief period of comity to a close.
It would seem obvious that keeping the government up and running would be a relatively uncontroversial task, but nothing is that easy on Capitol Hill.
"We can look for reconciliation and peace over Christmas. Maybe we'll take a pause for Thanksgiving, but that's about it," quipped Democratic Rep. Luis Gutierrez.
Conservatives immediately balked at a plan put forth this week by Majority Leader Eric Cantor, that leadership saw as the best way to get Republicans everything they could want: vote on defunding Obamacare, force the Senate to do so as well, and eventually get a clean continuing resolution passed, leaving them with tons of leverage for a looming debt ceiling battle where they believed they'd eke out some Obamacare concessions from the Senate and the president.
House leadership quickly realized that they wouldn't have the votes to pass their plan, and by mid-afternoon they had scrapped plans to vote on it.
Even before Congress returned to normal operating procedures, signs that the bipartisanship and serious-minded tone wouldn't last were already emerging.
For instance, in a response to President Obama's address to the nation on Syria, Sen. Rand Paul unleashed a series of attacks on the president, arguing that "Twelve years after we were attacked by al-Qaeda, 12 years after 3,000 Americans were killed by al-Qaeda, President Obama now asks us to be allies with al-Qaeda."
Lawmakers were clearly frustrated by the resurgence of their old divisive ways.
"Of course you get tired of it. I'm also well aware from watching what has happened historically as it relates to the debt limit that most major reforms happen at that debate, so that's normal. The [continuing resolution] is a sin of our own making. If we would just pass a budget and do our appropriations, we wouldn't have this," said Wisconsin Republican Reid Ribble. "You wouldn't be dealing with all this last-minute kabuki dance that we do around here, but that's not the situation we have. I don't have a say over that."
Frustrated too are Capitol Hill aides, who have begun to view budgetary showdowns like the political version of Groundhog Day. When asked their thoughts about a continuing resolution and the possibility of a government shutdown, a GOP aide simply sent over a YouTube clip from the movie Zoolander, where Will Ferrell's character declares he feels like he is taking crazy pills.
The PR firm’s biggest Russia coup ever?
Ria Novosti / Reuters
WASHINGTON — The public relations firm Ketchum is responsible for placing a controversial editorial that appeared under Russian President Vladimir Putin's byline in the New York Times on Wednesday night.
"The op-ed came through the PR firm (Ketchum) and went through the normal editing process," said New York Times spokesperson Eileen Murphy in an email to BuzzFeed.
Spokespeople for Ketchum did not return requests for comment.
Ketchum is the main PR firm used by the Russian government. Using documents publicly filed with the Department of Justice, ProPublica showed last year how Ketchum places pro-Putin op-eds under the bylines of "seemingly independent professionals" in various news outlets like CNBC and the Huffington Post.
A tweet last week from Paddy Blewer, a Ketchum employee, references a "big" project:
Blewer also tweeted a fundraising appeal from the U.N. Human Rights Council for Syrian refugees:
“Breasts.Proof men can multitask2” reads the image’s caption that was liked by a top-tier Democratic recruit for U.S. Senate. “This was spam,” a Montana Democrat says.
WASHINGTON — The Democratic party's top recruit for the U.S. Senate race in Montana has a Facebook problem. Either he's dangerously clumsy with the site's iPhone app — or he recently let the world know how much he appreciates breasts.
A screengrab captured by a Republican operative with interest in the 2014 Senate race shows Democratic Lt. Gov. John Walsh — whom national Democrats are hoping will jump into the Senate race soon — "liked" a Facebook profile featuring pictures of women's breasts on Facebook around 9:45 p.m. on Aug. 19. The name of the account is "Breasts.Proof men can multitask2."
Walsh's Facebook profile disappeared sometime later before reappearing later with the "like" deleted. Walsh's likes now include the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the National Guard, various Montana Democrats, and "The 2nd Amendment Keeps Us Free." There's no mention of "Breasts.Proof men can multitask2."
Walsh has access to the page, and engages with Facebook through his iPhone. A senior Montana Democrat close to Walsh said the "like" was a mistake on Walsh's part.
"This was spam and an unintentional accident. Once the Lt. Gov. knew that it had happened it was immediately removed from the page," said the Democrat. "It looks like D.C. Republicans are so fearful of John Walsh running for Senate that they're attacking a war hero with spam. That's the best they got?"
Walsh has not announced his plans on the Senate race, but he's a top recruit for the DSCC after former Gov. Brian Schweitzer, who Democrats hoped would run, decided against a bid. The DSCC hopes to hold onto to the seat in what's expected to be a tough race for Democrats.
It’s not every day you see a Democrat and Grover Norquist saying nice things about each other.
Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, Rep. Earl Blumenauer, Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist, and Aaron Smith from the National Cannabis Industry Association.
Kate Nocera/BuzzFeed
WASHINGTON — What is one way to get reporters to attend a sweltering outdoor press conference about a wonky provision in the tax code? Make it about weed.
An exceptionally odd group showed up to talk about the unfair tax burdens on pot dispensaries in two dozen states. The issue brought together Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform, a constant boogeyman of the left, and the super-liberal Rep. Earl Blumenauer, who introduced a fix to the provision with conservative Californian Dana Rohrabacher.
"It's goofy, it's goofy. And this is perhaps the most insane because it doesn't allow legal businesses to operate like other businesses," Blumenauer said. "Grover Norquist and the Americans for Tax Reform, with whom I am not often sharing a stage unless it's a comedy performance, have done a superb job. Their policy statement has vivid illustrations about the inequity."
A 1982 piece of the tax code, designed to punish drug traffickers, forces legal marijuana dispensaries in states across the country to pay an effective tax rate of around 87%, whereas most small businesses pay around 35%.
"The organizers of the press conference feared that a press conference dealing with marijuana might not get the attention of the press, so they said could you come and talk about capital cost recovery and ordinary and necessary business deductions in the IRS tax code," Norquist quipped. "I'm glad that brought you all here."
Norquist said that ATR does not have a position on drug prohibition, but said, "the government ought not to be picking winners and losers in the tax code."
Blumenauer and Rohrabacher said the legislation wasn't about whether or not smoking weed should be legal, though both have pushed for more flexible laws when it comes to legalizing marijuana.
"It is absolutely ridiculous to be wasting our federal dollars enforcing laws that local people don't want," Rorhabacher said. "It's an enormous waste of money. Instead what we should be doing is making sure, which is what this legislation does, molding the federal regulations, whether it's taxes or otherwise, to respect the will of the communities in states throughout our country."
While Blumenauer heaped praise on Norquist, and repeatedly pointed to the fact that the legislation was really nonpartisan, Norquist and Rorhabacher couldn't help themselves but to goad the liberal Oregonian a bit.
"Mr. Blumenauer and other Democrats are very pleased that several conservative Republicans have come over in favor of promoting the states and the people that make the decisions at the state level," Rorhabacher said. "I want you to know Republicans are very happy that Mr. Blumenauer has come out for lower taxes."
"Feels good," Blumenauer said.
"It's habit-forming," Norquist added.
Vroom. Vroom.
His name is Mark.
New Purple Strategies poll shows Democrat Terry McAuliffe leading Republican Ken Cuccinelli 43% to 38%. “With 19% undecided and nearly two months to go, this race remains volatile,” the pollster says.
Win McNamee / Getty Images
WASHINGTON — The Democratic Party's plan to cast Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli,, the Republican nominee for Governor, as anti-woman appear to have had the desired effect.
A new poll by the bipartisan firm Purple Strategies shows Democratic nominee Terry McAuliffe has built up an 18-point lead among women, a margin that's helped him to a five point lead in the race overall. Cuccinelli has a 10-point lead among men, but the poll finds he "has room to grow" when it comes to consolidating Republican voters behind him.
In recent days, McAuliffe and the Democrats have highlighted Cuccinelli's history as a social conservative. Cuccinelli has largely tried to avoid social issues on the campaign trail, but the Purple Poll suggests he's been unable to escape them.
It's not all good news for McAuliffe, however.
"The Virginia governor's race pits two of the least well-liked candidates that we can recall competing in a single election," reads the pollster's analysis.
Just 24% of Virginians have a favorable impression of Democrat Terry McAuliffe (39% unfavorable). Similarly, 29% have a favorable view of Ken Cuccinelli (49% unfavorable). Both have comparable net ratings with embattled Governor Bob McDonnell (31%/44%).
Purple Strategies founding partner Alex Castellanos says the survey shows the race is still anybody's game with about three months to go to the November election day in Virginia.
"This could be a volatile race until the last minute," Castellanos said in a statement. "In Virginia, we seem to have two candidates running against each other, neither of whom can possibly win."
Purple also polled potential 2016 presidential matchups in Virginia. Democrat Hillary Clinton led Republicans Rand Paul by 7% and Chris Christie by 2%.
“Shameful comes to mind…”
Jason James Richter, who played the lead role of Jesse in the 1990s blockbuster Free Willy, slammed Republicans Thursday for using the movie's iconic poster in an anti-ObamaCare graphic.
Republican Congressman Tim Griffin of Arkansas posted the image of the poster on his Facebook page Thursday with the title "FREE AMERICA FROM OBAMACARE." The post contained a link at the bottom to GOP.gov, the Republican House Conference official page chaired by Congresswoman Cathy McMorris-Rodgers of Washington. SeaWorld confirmed Monday that they would be cutting employee hours to avoid offering employees medical insurance under ObamaCare.
"I think it's terrible. To many thought to convey in 140 characters. Shameful comes to mind though," Richter told BuzzFeed via Twitter.
In a follow-up tweet, Richter again said the use of the film for partisan political gain was "shameful."
"The film holds a special place for a lot of people. To use the iconic poster image to further a political agenda is shameful."
Congressman Tim Griffin responded on Twitter: "Any word yet on whether @JasonRichter_ also thinks it's terrible that SeaWorld's employees and their families are being hurt by #Obamacare?"
Richter replied to Griffin "really congressman? Don't you have better things to do? Go do your job, sir."
The image of the Republican graphic and the theme song to Free Willy have been embedded below:
This headline has been updated to reflect the latest developments
Ketchum says it didn’t write Putin’s New York Times editorial.
Maxim Shemetov / Reuters
WASHINGTON — A public relations firm responsible for placing a controversial op-ed under Russian President Vladimir Putin's byline in the New York Times on Wednesday says that Putin wrote the piece himself.
"The opinion piece was written by President Putin and submitted to The New York Times on his behalf by Ketchum for their consideration," a spokesperson for Ketchum said in an email to BuzzFeed on Thursday.
Ketchum's statement echoes one issued by Putin's spokesman, who told The Guardian that "The basic content was written by [Putin], then his assistants worked out the text."
The editorial, which argues against American military intervention in Syria and says that the Assad regime is not responsible for an August 21 chemical weapons attack, has provoked a response from the White House, which said that the op-ed would test Putin's credibility on his offer to remove Assad's chemical weapons.
The op-ed has gotten a negative reaction on Capitol Hill. Senator Bob Menendez said he "almost wanted to vomit" because of it, and Speaker of the House John Boehner said he was "insulted."
A spokesperson for the New York Times confirmed to BuzzFeed on Thursday that the piece had been pitched by Ketchum and said it "went through the normal editing process."
Les Chansons D’Amour , a 2007 French musical, contains “propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations,” Russian officials say. A TV station that aired the film has been warned the airing violates the country’s anti-LGBT propaganda law.
WASHINGTON — The Russian government took its first action against a media company under its new law banning LGBT "propaganda," warning a television station that its airing of a movie with gay themes violates the law.
According to The Hollywood Reporter:
Russia's federal media oversight body, Roskomnadzor, on Thursday warned popular movie channel EvroKino after it aired 2007 French musical Les Chansons d'Amour (Love Songs).
The agency said the film contains "propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations."
“I think that’s great. I hope it applies to gays and lesbians in Russia as well.”
Democratic House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi dinged Russian President Vladimir Putin's record on gay rights Thursday. Pelosi was speaking with reporters about a controversial op-ed the Russian president had published Wednesday evening in The New York Times.
"What I found interesting was the closing," Pelosi said. "He says when we pray to God he judges us all as — I don't know exactly was his words are — but he says that we are all God's children. I think that's great. I hope it applies to gays and lesbians in Russia as well."
Putin made his comments in the New York Times Wednesday evening in an attack on President Obama saying the United States was not an especially exceptional nation.
"I would rather disagree with a case he made on American exceptionalism, stating that the United States' policy is "what makes America different. It's what makes us exceptional." It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation," Putin wrote. "There are big countries and small countries, rich and poor, those with long democratic traditions and those still finding their way to democracy. Their policies differ, too. We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord's blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal."
Russian President Vladimir Putin is writing about international norms and equality now, with his sights on Syria. In the run-up to the Olympics — and with those words in mind — attention will soon turn back to his own country’s anti-LGBT laws and environment.
Maxim Shemetov / Reuters
WASHINGTON — The current focus on Russian President Vladimir Putin's involvement in the international debate over Syria has turned some of the attention away from his country's own increasingly anti-LGBT environment. As three events in the past 24 hours show, however, Putin's LGBT problem isn't going away — and his leadership role on Syria has the potential to raise the LGBT issues to an even more prominent place on the global stage.
First, Putin penned an op-ed in The New York Times. Focused on Syria, the United Nations, and Russia-U.S. differences over how to address the alleged use of chemical weapons in Syria, the op-ed did not raise LGBT issues.
Focusing on international norms, Putin wrote, "The United Nations' founders understood that decisions affecting war and peace should happen only by consensus, and with America's consent the veto by Security Council permanent members was enshrined in the United Nations Charter."
His ending, however, set him and his country up for a response from LGBT advocates and allies within and outside its borders. "We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord's blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal," he wrote.
Then, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi — not the only person, but one of the highest-ranking U.S. government officials to make the connection explicit — called out the perceived hypocrisy of Putin's statement.
"He says when we pray to God he judges us all as — I don't know exactly was his words are — but he says that we are all God's children," she told reporters Thursday. "I think that's great. I hope it applies to gays and lesbians in Russia as well."
Pelosi's reference to Russia's anti-LGBT propaganda law — which his government has maintained is aimed at protecting minors — was noted across Twitter throughout the afternoon. Her decision, and the reaction, suggested that Putin's own decision to raise his global profile in the Syria debate could make him a more direct target for questions about the country's treatment of its LGBT citizens. The coming Winter Olympics in Sochi guarantee the wait on such questions won't be long.
Finally, as Americans were discussing the implications of his NYT op-ed, his own government, through its media oversight body, issued a warning to a popular TV station over its airing of a French musical with gay themes. The movie shows two men making out and contains what would be termed "implied" sexual activity between the two, and the oversight body decided the movie contained "propaganda of nontraditional sexual relations."
The decision to warn a TV station that it violated the propaganda law to show a movie that includes gay themes and gay characters doing the same things that opposite-sex couples are free to do is evidence that the law will be enforced as broadly as its opponents have suggested it could be enforced. The Russian government says the law is violated whenever a public depiction or discussion of LGBT people is made in a way that paints those people in a positive light.
With Putin working hard to make himself a bigger figure on the global stage — and relying on claims about international norms to do so — he is quickly going to be faced with questions about his own adherence to those norms as his country readies the Olympic Village in Sochi and ramps up enforcement of laws that are becoming increasingly outside of those norms.
A member of the TVNewsTalk.net forum found what appears to be the into graphics and theme music for The Kelly File while snooping around a Fox News producer’s Vimeo page .
Once dismissed by the GOP establishment as a gadfly, Paul is starting to look a lot like the leader of his party — and his enemies are panicking. “There’s a big transition in the Republican Party,” the Kentucky senator says in a BuzzFeed interview.
Illustration: John Gara/ BuzzFeed, Photos: Charles Dharapak / AP (Paul), Philip Kamrass / AP (Cheney), Scott Applewhite / AP (McCain), Alex Wong / Getty (Graham)
WASHINGTON — Sen. Rand Paul was in the middle of one of his trademark takedowns of the "right-wing hawks" in his party who "have never met a war they didn't want to get involved in," when he suddenly paused and began grinning.
"There was a funny article the other day in Mother Jones — did you see it? About one of my colleagues?" he asked.
He was trying to do the polite, senatorial thing by not mentioning his "colleague" by name. But when his vague prompt was met with a blank look during an interview with BuzzFeed, he scrapped the pretense of diplomacy and charged forward.
"It ranked the different countries on how eager Sen. [John] McCain wanted to be involved [militarily]," he explained, not even attempting to contain his amusement. "So, like, for getting involved in Syria, there's five Angry McCains. For getting involved in the Sudan, there's two Angry McCains. And there's a little picture of him. You know, he was for getting involved to support [former Libyan president Muammar] Gaddafi before he was for overthrowing Gaddafi. He was for supporting [former Egyptian president Hosni] Mubarak before he was for supporting the Muslim Brotherhood before he was for supporting the generals."
Not long ago, the Washington grown-ups who run the Republican Party would have dismissed the junior senator from Kentucky making cracks about an establishment pillar like McCain as little more than the goading of a gadfly. But over the past two weeks, it has become clear that Paul's brand of Republicanism has spread deeply within his party. He successfully rallied a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers against a military intervention in Syria; thoroughly embarrassed Republican leaders who supported the air strikes; and temporarily elevated himself to the role of de facto foreign policy spokesman for the GOP. When President Obama took his case for war to the American people in a primetime address this week, it was Paul who delivered the unofficial Republican counterargument in a series of interviews and a widely covered speech.
Paul, in short, is winning. The Syria debate marked the first time since House Republicans tried to keep America out of the Kosovo conflict in 1999 that a libertarian approach to foreign policy seriously challenged the GOP's old-guard caucus of hawks. And this time, the libertarians came out on top. In this context, his McCain mocking didn't come off as mischievously trolling for a couple headlines — it seemed a little like punching down.
Don't expect Paul to stop swinging. The plainly ambitious libertarian and prospective 2016 presidential candidate has big plans for his party and his country — plans that will require winning a lot of arguments, defeating a lot of opponents, and effectively conquering a GOP establishment that often treats him like a tumor that needs to be surgically removed. He is always on offense: Over the course of his 20-minute interview with BuzzFeed, he took swipes — with varying degrees of force — at Bill Kristol, Samantha Power, Chris Christie, President Obama, President Bush, Cory Booker, humanitarian interventionists, and pro-war Christians (to name a few).
One of his favorite targets — and the one that most delights the political press — is the Bush-era army of neoconservative Republicans who championed the Patriot Act and led the U.S. into war with Iraq. (Paul believes the U.S. should only use military force when the country's national security is directly at risk.)
"So many of the neocons in our party, they think they're the great defenders of the military. They think, Oh, the soldiers must love me because I want to be involved in war," Paul said, before criticizing the assumption that members of the military are eager to fight. "They will, they volunteered, and they're the most patriotic of our young people. But they're not excited about war. They want to go to war if it's the thing they have to do to defend our country."
When asked about the misguided prediction Kristol made earlier this month that only five Senate Republicans would side with Paul in opposing the Syria strikes, the senator interjected to ask, "You saw my response to him?" (Paul had challenged his neoconservative nemesis to visit a military base and talk to GIs before assuming popular opinion was on his side.) Satisfied that his jab had properly penetrated the media sphere, he proceeded to lay out where he believed the votes stood in the Senate. His estimate that 20 or 25 Republicans would vote no was probably modest: The latest unofficial count suggests the number could top 30.
It would be easy to mistake Paul's successes this year — from his campaign against the Syria intervention to his attention-grabbing filibuster against U.S. drone use to the public backlash against the types of domestic surveillance programs he'd been warning about for years — as some sort of permanent sea change in American politics.
Paul knows better. He acknowledges that his ideas have benefitted from "a degree of partisanship" on the right. Republicans, after all, might not be quite so skeptical of executive power, or outspoken against the ever-expanding surveillance state, once one of their own is in the Oval Office. What's more, he spent enough time watching the GOP ignore, then laugh at, then co-opt, then abandon his father's libertarian platform to recognize the fickleness that can define political parties.
But he is also adamant that his agenda's growing popularity is a product of the times: "There's a big transition in the Republican Party, but also in the public. People are right about the public being war-weary. They're right."
Meanwhile, his recognition that the fight is nowhere near won seems to fuel his apparently endless appetite for political combat.
Paul often aims at the president, using his nonstandard political philosophy to find fresh critiques of the administration. He laid into the "Samantha Powers of the world" who foolishly want to "send troops to feed people" in remote countries all over the world. And he called out Obama himself, whose rationale for putting armed forces at risk in Syria he finds indefensible.
"The other day, when [the president] came to lunch, [he said] that we're not facing very many direct threats in this world to the United States... and so you're going to have to be involved in much more ambiguous situations," Paul recalled. "I'm guessing he wouldn't use that term in public but that's the term he used with us."
Paul also finds plenty to dislike in his own party's approach to beating the war drum — particularly the theological overtones of the Bush years. In a strikingly candid speech last year at the Value Voters Summit, Paul, a Presbyterian, cited his religious beliefs while declaring, "I'm not a pacifist. But I do think it unacceptable not to hate war."
He elaborated to BuzzFeed: "I think some within the Christian community are such great defenders of the promised land and the chosen people that they think war is always the answer, maybe even preemptive war. And I think it's hard to square the idea of a preemptive war and, to me, that overeagerness [to go to] war, with Christianity."
In the world of politics, though, Paul seems preternaturally comfortable at war. One particularly instructive example is his feud with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. Earlier this summer, Christie accused the libertarian of prioritizing "esoteric, intellectual debates" over national security — a harsh attack that seemed to come out of nowhere. Though Paul didn't instigate the spat, he happily stretched it out over several days, answering every interviewer's question about his aggressor, and memorably referring to the governor at one point as "the king of bacon." The fight fizzled when Paul invited Christie for a beer (he declined), but he has never quite let it go.
When BuzzFeed asked him this week whether he was surprised Christie didn't engage the Syria debate more directly by staking out a position, Paul paused for a beat before offering a cutting response.
"I guess I didn't really notice or think about it that much," he said.
The reviews are in, and the critics predictably hate the new Crossfire . It’s only been a week and it ain’t all bad!
The majority of this great nation's media critics hated the idea of Crossfire's return when it was announced. That's natural, since actually watching cable news is way down on the list of what media critics like to do. The average cable news junkie, on the other hand, seems to enjoy opinion-based programming. Take a look at this chart from the Pew Research Center and you'll see that super opinionated networks like MSNBC and FOX have been growing since 2005, while CNN, which decided to go down the "newsy" route, saw no growth in audience.
Do you think that news and politics junkies, who have been obsessively monitoring Twitter and Facebook all day long, want to watch the major networks try to cram a bunch of stuff they already know into a half-hour broadcast? CNN doesn't.
This is the perfect amount of time for Crossfire's current format. The only way an hour could possibly work is if CNN brought in the other two hosts off the bench, along with two fresh guests, to debate a totally different topic. Actually, that's not a bad idea.
After cable news slogged through several weeks of a fairly boring political news cycle, the crisis in Syria provided the producers of Crossfire with a controversial topic which forced partisans on both sides to take stances that are all over the map. It was a perfect time to get the show rolling, and, so far, Crossfire has beat its closest competition, MSNBC's Politics Nation, in the demo every day since its debut.
Brad Clark is leaving Colorado’s LGBT rights group to help the national organization with advancing its issues in states where they are lagging. “[M]y married friends in Iowa can literally get on a plane and, when they land in another state, their family is no longer recognized,” Clark says.
Courtesy of Brad Clark
WASHINGTON — In the aftermath of the Supreme Court wins on marriage issues this June, the Human Rights Campaign is bringing a successful state advocate to D.C. to help the organization narrow the gap between states that have made significant progress on LGBT issues and those that have thus far been left behind.
Saying it's time for him "to take on a new challenge," Brad Clark is leaving his role as the executive director at One Colorado — the state's LGBT rights group — to join HRC next month as its director of programmatic development. Prior to joining One Colorado in May 2010, Clark was the campaign director at One Iowa.
"At my core, I'm still from what many people would describe as a flyover state. We've made huge advancements in both Iowa and then in Colorado. I have that small-town experience, and I think that's a really important voice in moving things forward," Clark told BuzzFeed Thursday.
"The other thing is I'm really a firm believer that we need to build authentic relationships with various people across the board, including Republicans, Libertarians, and people of faith."
The hire is one of HRC President Chad Griffin's few high-profile hires since taking the helm of the largest LGBT rights group last June and Griffin's first high-profile hire from outside of D.C. Clark will report to Ana Ma, a former Obama administration Labor Department official who became HRC's chief operating officer and chief of staff this month.
"Brad has the experience and expertise to ensure our work is touching LGBT people in every corner of this country," Griffin said of Clark's hire in a statement.
Talking about his decision to move to D.C. at the end of the month and start at HRC on Oct. 7, Clark said, "It's just really incredible to me that my married friends in Iowa can literally get on a plane and, when they land in another state, their family is no longer recognized." He explains his role at HRC as one "helping bridge that divide in figuring new and coordinating strategies that already exist in helping bridge that divide between the two Americas."
Asked if his new role is an attempt to continue an organizational focus on marriage to the exclusion of other, non-marriage work, Clark said, "No, absolutely not. I grew up in a small town in Iowa. I really know the feeling, how folks feel growing up in a rural or small community and the need to really address everything, from school safety to employment discrimination. We have a patchwork of protections throughout our country on various issues that are impacting our community."
In discussing his hire, HRC officials pointed to Colorado's civil unions and anti-bullying laws, as well as transgender protections in health care, as among Clark's successes in the state.
Nobody is going to miss Anthony Weiner more than the people who bring you cable news…and they know it. Bonus points for the using BuzzFeed’s all-time favorite Boyz II Men song.
Not that long ago.
Pool / Reuters
The White House says President Obama not being decisive on Syria isn't a bad thing and one the American people appreciate.
"I would simply say that when it comes to being commander-in-chief, I think that the American people, at least in my assessment, appreciate a commander-in-chief who takes in new information and doesn't celebrate decisiveness for the sake of decisiveness," said White House Spokesman Jay Carney at the Thursday press briefing.
"And in this case, the president's objectives are clear," he continued. "And he believes that the American people would certainly support the proposition that if there's a diplomatic opportunity here to remove from Assad's control these chemical weapons stockpiles, that we ought to pursue it. And that's what he is doing."
The White House has, however, has been quite fond of boasting about taking decisive action in the past. A search of WhiteHouse.gov returns 218 results for the phrase "decisive action," 29 results for "decisive steps," and eight results for "decisive response."
"We, of course, asked Congress to support a limited but decisive response to the use of chemical weapons," Jay Carney said Tuesday to reporters of the case the Obama administration made to Congress over Syria.
"It does remind all of us that we need to take decisive action on the things that we can control. And one of those things we can do is take action on measures that can grow the economy and create jobs," said Jay Carney on Nov. 28, 2011, of the economic crisis in Europe.
"As I said at the top, we were in severe dire straits economically in this country and globally when the president took office. And he took — working with partners in Congress as well as other stakeholders — decisive action to stem the bleeding, to prevent a Great Depression, to put us back on track towards economic growth, and to give the middle class some tools so that it could feel more secure as we emerged from the recession," Carney said on July 22 of this year about President Obama's action to avert the financial crisis.
"The administration promised and took decisive action, making considerable changes in travel and remittance policy for Cuban Americans as it relates to Cuba. If there's going to be discussion about next steps, I think as the president said, the ball, so to speak, is probably in a different court," said former White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs on April 17, 2009, of the Obama administration's Cuba policy.
"The Obama Administration has taken decisive action in critical areas aimed at helping vulnerable Americans through the economic crisis and strengthening the economy," says an October 2011 fact sheet on the economy.
"Because of the President's leadership and decisive action, the American people will have a consumer watchdog fighting tooth and nail on their behalf," wrote White House communications director Dan Pfeiffer in January of this year on President Obama's appointment of Richard Cordray to lead the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
"The Obama Administration has partnered with tribal leaders and taken decisive action to support infrastructure and workforce development to drive economic growth," wrote senior policy adviser for Native American affairs Kimberly Teehee in February 2012.
"The time for decisive action is now. The American Jobs Act provides law enforcement officers and other critical public safety officials with the support – and the resources – they desperately need," wrote Attorney General Eric Holder on Sept. 9, 2011, of the need to pass the American Jobs Act.
"The Administration is taking bold, decisive steps to cut red tape and modernize processes," says a White House report on flexibility for state and local governments.
"As we emerge from a historic economic recession, my administration has taken decisive action to accelerate growth and remove barriers for entrepreneurs and small business owners to grow, hire, and prosper," said President Obama in a presidential proclamation for National Entrepreneurship Week in November 2010.
Less pork jokes.
After all, Muslims love their country too, and many of them have died in it's service.
“We decided to settle it like men do when they’ve had a little bit too much to drink.”
Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher of California arm-wrestled Vladimir Putin back in the early 1990s, and it didn't go well. Rohrabacher told the story while speaking with 89.3 KPCC radio in California Thursday.
"Oh, it was about 1990 or 1991, and communism had just fallen and the Soviet Union no longer existed, now it was Russia. A group of young political leaders came into my office and they wanted to meet me because I had been a Reagan speechwriter," Rohrabacher said. "Well I talked to them and I said, 'I'm spending the weekend here — do any of you want to play some American football with me and my buddies?' Three of them said, 'Yeah, sure.' I come to find out later that was Putin. He was the deputy mayor of St. Petersburg, that's all we knew. But he did have a huge bodyguard, so maybe that sort of gave a little hint he's more important than just St. Petersburg."
Rohrabacher went on to say he and "a bunch of my right-wing friends," including Scooter Libby, future chief of staff to former Vice President Dick Cheney, played Putin and some of his Russian counterparts in a game of football. Rohrabacher said the teams were mixed between the Russians and Americans.
After the game, Rohrabacher took Putin to the Irish Times Pub, where he said that after a little bit too much to drink they started arguing about who won the Cold War.
"We all ended up going to the Irish Times Pub afterwards, and we were having a little bit too much to drink, I guess," Rohrabacher said. "Anyway, we started arguing about who won the Cold War, etc. And so we decided to settle it like men do when they've had a little bit too much to drink at the pub. So we got down to these arm-wrestling matches and I ended up being paired off with Putin — and he's a little guy, but boy, I'll tell ya: He put me down in a millisecond. He is tough, his muscles are just unbelievable. And then his bodyguard gets up and this buddy of mine and says, 'Oh, I'll take him.' And my friend put his bodyguard down so it was good."
Rohrabacher concluded Putin's "tough guy" demeanor wasn't a reason the United States shouldn't engage him on Syria.
"Ya know, he's a tough guy. He's supposed to be a tough guy. That's what the Russian people want, but that's no reason we shouldn't try to work with him."
