Clipmarks | BobbyRutan's 'politics' clips

Sooners Governor Endorses Obama - Brad Henry of Oklahoma

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 18:29:43 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: Moderate Southern/Midwestern Governor tired of the politics of destruction coming out of the Clinton camp.

Clip Source: www.kswo.com

Governor Brad Henry is endorsing Illinois Senator Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination.

Clip Source: www.governor.state.ok.us

Clip Source: www.kswo.com

In a statement released by the Obama press office in Chicago, Henry called Obama an inspirational leader who can unite the country. He says the senator will be able to move beyond the divisiveness and partisanship that has characterized Washington politics.

The endorsement gives Obama the official support of 3 of Oklahoma's 10 superdelegates, while Hillary Rodham Clinton has the backing of 1 superdelegate. The rest are uncommitted.

Henry -- a moderate Democrat in a Republican-trending state -- says his own efforts to build a consensus across party lines is why he's so enthusiastic about Obama's candidacy.

Clip Source: www.governor.state.ok.us

Brad Henry is currently serving his second four-year term as governor of Oklahoma. Originially elected in 2002, Governor Henry was re-elected in 2006 by one of the largest margins in state history.

He married the former Kim Blain, a Shawnee school teacher

have three lovely daughters

Tags: sooners president boren, and sooners governor henry endorse obama

Lobby Money: Hillary #1, McCain #2

Tue, 05 Feb 2008 05:43:30 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: More: Even as they pledge to rein in special interests, the leading Democratic and Republican candidates are relying on lobbyists to bring in campaign cash by raising money from other donors, a technique known as bundling.

Heather Podesta, a Washington lobbyist, donated $4,600 to Clinton, FEC records show. She's raised more than $250,000 for Clinton by tapping her network of contacts and holding fundraisers.

Like Podesta, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Steve Ricchetti has also signed on to be a so-called Hillraiser. Ricchetti's firm was paid $1.7 million during the first six months of 2007 to lobby on behalf of Amgen Inc. and Sirius Satellite Radio, among others.

McCain, 71, an Arizona Republican who led the successful 2002 effort to ban corporate and union donations to the political parties, counts as campaign co-chairman former Representative Tom Loeffler of Texas. Loeffler was paid $2.5 million by such clients as AT&T Inc. and Southwest Airlines.

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Democrat Hillary Clinton has raised more money from lobbyists than any other presidential candidate while Republican John McCain has more of them assisting his campaign.

Clinton took in $823,087 from registered lobbyists and members of their firms in 2007 and the second-biggest recipient was McCain, who took in $416,321, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based group which tracks political giving

McCain has 26 registered lobbyists as campaign advisers or fundraisers compared with 11 for Clinton and none for Obama

``These bundlers and advisers are central to the financial success of top presidential candidates,'' said Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics. ``As such, they will essentially carry with them an IOU from the campaign

Clinton's total from lobbyists is a fraction of what they raise on her behalf

Barack Obama, Clinton's rival for the Democratic nomination, doesn't take money from registered lobbyists

Clip Source: thecitizensjournalblog.blogspot.com

Tags: bought and paid for

GOP Theft of 2008 Presidential Election via California

Tue, 23 Oct 2007 18:52:04 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: More: "They're back," said Democratic strategist Chris Lehane in an email this afternoon. "This Freddie Krueger of initiatives is back and once again, it appears the shadowy conservative forces behind this electoral hijacking are trying to hide where the money is coming from."

Clip Source: www.kqed.org

the initiative to change how California's votes for the White House are counted is back... and may have enough cash to gather the needed signatures in only three weeks

The initiative, which received nationwide attention this summer, would mean that California's 55 electoral votes would almost all be doled out by the presidential winner in each of the state's congressional districts

In a phone interview this afternoon, Andrade said that the campaign has amassed close to $3 million to get the roughly 434,000 valid signatures needed to qualify for the June statewide ballot

He said that while volunteer signature gatherers are getting a buck per signature, paid gatherers could end up getting as much as $4 per signature by the time the dust has settled

So who's put up the cash

$2 million has come from what he calls a "national group,

The rest of the money

comes from various social conservatives

including some who helped bankrolled the signature gathering for the 2003 recall of Governor Gray Davis

Clip Source: library.thinkquest.org

Tags: gop, election thieves, politics, conservatives, republicans

Senator Domenici to Retire: New Mexico trending Democratic

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 22:23:21 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Sen. Pete Domenici is retiring after a generation as a dominant Republican voice on budget matters in Congress, deferring to health concerns after six terms in office.

The 75-year-old New Mexico senator scheduled a formal announcement in late afternoon Thursday in Albuquerque. In a draft statement, he said he has a progressive disease that can cause dysfunction in the parts of the brain important for organization, decision-making and control of mood and behavior.

Domenici spent Wednesday telling Senate colleagues that he has frontotemporal lobar degeneration, or FTLD, a type of dementia. Its name refers to the slow deterioration of affected sections of the brain, the front and lower sides — areas that control such things as language and behavior.

In political terms, Domenici's decision to retire represents yet another blow to Senate Republicans, who lost their majority in 2006 and face a hostile political environment little more than a year before the 2008 elections.

AP Photo:

Tags: republican, democrat, conservative, liberal, politics, election 2008, bush

Senator Craig's Efforts Stalled

Thu, 04 Oct 2007 21:04:58 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: I'm guiltocent of the charges.

Clip Source: www.reuters.com

A Minnesota judge on Thursday refused to let Sen. Larry Craig take back the guilty plea he made after a sex sting arrest, raising the possibility the Idaho Republican will resign his Senate seat as planned.

Judge Charles Porter of the Hennepin County District Court ruled a week after Craig's lawyers contended at a hearing that he had panicked and had been rushed into pleading guilty after an undercover officer arrested him in an airport men's room.

Porter ruled Craig's guilty plea was "accurate, voluntary and intelligent, and ... supported by the evidence."

Craig has become a major embarrassment for Republicans, particularly since they promote their party as the one that stands for conservative family values.

prosecutor Christopher Renz told the hearing there was a "series of invasions" during the encounter, starting when Craig gazed for two minutes into the officer's stall.

Clip Source: theculturewarrior.com

Peek-a-boo.

Tags: family values republicans and conservatives, hypocrisy, liars, politics, elections, senate, congress

"Childrens do learn," Bush tells school kids

Thu, 27 Sep 2007 20:34:46 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: Moron.

Clip Source: www.reuters.com

Bush made his latest grammatical slip-up at a made-for-TV event where he urged Congress to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act, the centerpiece of his education policy, as he touted a new national report card on improved test scores

During his first presidential campaign, Bush -- who promised to be the "education president" -- once asked: "Is our children learning?"

On Wednesday, Bush seemed to answer his own question with the same kind of grammatical twist.

Offering a grammar lesson guaranteed to make any English teacher cringe, President George W. Bush told a group of New York school kids on Wednesday: "Childrens do learn."

The White House opted to clean up Bush's diction in the official transcript.

Tags: bush, failure, idiot, grammar, conservative, republican, democrat, liberal, election, politics

Permanent warrantless wiretaps: Bush wants 'em

Sat, 22 Sep 2007 18:10:39 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: Who is to oversee how this is used? How is anybody held accountable when it abused, and it will be abused.

Clip Source: www.csmonitor.com

Politicians are once again debating the legality of the controversial "Protect America Act," which amended the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to allow for warrantless wiretapping. The law's Feb. 1, 2008 expiration date is approaching. President George Bush and his supporters are pushing to make the law permanent

Bush visited the National Security Agency and called for support to make the Protect America Act a permanent law, reports the E-Commerce Times. The temporary act was rushed into law last month

The threat from Al-Qaeda is not going to expire in 135 days," Bush warned during a Wednesday visit to the National Security Agency (NSA) in Fort Meade, Md

Democrats also expressed that they want to give the administration the necessary tools to monitor foreign targets, they also want to ensure that checks and balances are maintained, reports the Congressional Quarterly.

Under the new law, private telecommunications firms

are freed from any legal liability

Tags: the shock doctrine, 1984, never ending war, orwellian, bush, politics, conservative, democract, liberal, republican

Fox finally goes after Bush

Wed, 19 Sep 2007 02:48:57 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan

Clip Source: www.usnews.com

Some Friend, W's Mexican Amigo

At the White House, the president has got to be muttering "some friend" when he pores over the new autobio from his old buddy Vicente Fox, Mexico's former leader. That's because Fox raps his border pal as stubborn and "the cockiest guy I have ever met in my life." Revolution of Hope, out next month, is a well-written, well-researched book about Fox's political career and presidency, which coincided with George W. Bush's. While he expresses a kinship with W, he breaks with the prez on the war and slams the GOP's immigration platform. He blames Bush's stubbornness on Iraq for bad international relations, calls his Spanish "grade-school level," and admits he didn't think Bush would ever become president. "I can't honestly say that I had ever seen George W. Bush getting to the White House," he pens.

Tags: fox, bush, cabrone, iraq, spanish, republican, democrat, conservative, liberal, politics

Thespian Fred Thompson: Not above aiding Terrorists

Sun, 09 Sep 2007 19:03:42 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

A little over three years after Pan Am Flight 103 blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, Fred D. Thompson provided advice to a colleague about one of his law firm’s new clients: The man representing the two Libyan intelligence officials charged in the terrorist bombing

At the time, Libya was facing international outrage for refusing to comply with a United Nations demand that the two suspects be extradited to the West for trial in the 1988 bombing, which killed 270 people

Asked about Mr. Thompson’s participation in the Libya case, James Kreindler, a lawyer who represents 130 of the victims’ families, said: “Pan Am 103 was really an attack on the United States, so while some families understood the concept that everyone deserves a defense, a number were offended and angered that American lawyers were willing to earn fees by doing anything to help this pariah nation or the two bombing suspects

2003, Libya accepted responsibility for the Pan Am bombing and agreed to pay the victims $2.7 billion

Tags: thompson, terrorism, libya, republican, democrat, conservative, liberal, politics, election

Moral Majoritists Love Hookers

Fri, 20 Jul 2007 20:37:05 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: For over three decades, Privette has been one of the best known and most outrageous spokesmen for “family values” and Christian extreme right politics in North Carolina. In the 1970s, he was serving as minister at the North Kannapolis Baptist Church when he joined the tide of evangelicals entering politics that included the Moral Majority and Christian Coalition. He served in the N.C. Legislature from 1984 to 1992, and has been a member of the board of commissioners in Cabarrus County since 1998

Clip Source: www.pensitoreview.com

President of the Christian Action League, 74, Is Arrested after Paying Hooker with Checks

Privette on two occasions allegedly paid the prostitute with checks then reported the checks stolen.

Coy Privette, Tiffany Denise Summers

Privette, 74, was charged with six counts of misdemeanor aiding and abetting prostitution by renting a hotel room and paying for sexual acts, according to State Bureau of Investigation Agent Kevin Canty. Tiffany Denise Summers, 32, of Salisbury, was charged with six counts of misdemeanor prostitution, Canty said

According to its website, the Christian Action League is:

a Christian public policy organization that addresses public policy and legislative issues from a Christian worldview

The Christian Action League is funded by the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina, and it is affiliated with the ultra-rightwing American Family Association

The League’s purpose is to assist the church in fulfilling Christ’s command to be the “salt” and the “light” of the earth

Tags: religion, hypocrisy, crime, conservative, republican, election, bush, cheney, war, terror

Jeb Bush: Poster Child for Gay Marriage

Sat, 02 Jun 2007 18:29:13 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan

Clip Source: thinkprogress.org

Jeb Bush ‘a poster child for gay marriage.’

“A coalition of civil rights groups that back gay marriage is using photos of prominent couples like the former Republican governor and his Mexican-born wife, Columba, in an advertising campaign marking the 40th anniversary of Loving v. Virginia, a U.S. Supreme Court decision that gave interracial couples the right to marry. The groups say they hope to use the couples and the court case to bolster their contention that marriage is a civil right that should know no bounds - even for those of the same sex.”

Tags: civil rights, bush, republican, democrat, independent, libertarian, politics, election

Valerie Plame was Covert CIA, Cheney impeachment begins

Wed, 30 May 2007 07:29:13 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: Froomkin adds that in response to charges that Libby's prosecution was unwarranted, "the special counsel evidently felt obliged to put Libby's crime in context. And that context is Dick Cheney."

Clip Source: rawstory.com

Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald has asserted in new court filings that Valerie Plame was indeed a covert agent at the time of her outing,

Valerie Plame Wilson, he asserts, was a 'covert' CIA officer who repeatedly traveled overseas using a 'cover identity' in order to disguise her relationship with the agency

"When traveling overseas, Ms. Wilson always traveled under a cover identity...At the time of the initial unauthorized disclosure in the media of Ms. Wilson’s employment relationship with the CIA on 14 July 2003, Ms. Wilson was a covert CIA employee for whom the CIA was taking affirmative measures to conceal her intelligence relationship to the United States."

The finding severely hampers a key defense by Libby's lawyers and supporters who have claimed that, since Plame was not covert, Libby had commited no "underlying crime" in revealing Plame's identity

columnist Dan Froomkin noted that Fitzgerald's court filing further points to Vice President Cheney's involvement

Tags: cia, libbey, cheney, bush, iraq, war, politics, terror, republican

GOP Senators will desert W by September

Mon, 07 May 2007 16:47:56 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan

Clip Source: loadedorygun.blogspot.com

Smith Spills: GOP Sens Will Desert Bush by Sept. W/O Turnaround

Babbington achieves a rare feat: backing up an analysis-style political piece with actual on-the-record quotes from Members of Congress. Unless they were badly quoted the thesis--that the Republicans are starting to get sweaty about following Bush once more into the breach, dear friend--appears supported by the testimony of them that should know.

Sen. Gordon Smith (news, bio, voting record) of Oregon, one of two Senate Republicans to oppose the latest spending bill for the conflict, said the war "is a problem because it's defining our party to the American people, and the American people have lost faith in this cause."

"Many Republican colleagues are simply waiting until September," he said, citing the deadline Bush gave to Army Gen. David Petraeus for a progress report on the war. Unless there is a dramatic turnabout by then, Smith said, the party's near-unanimity is almost certain to fracture.

Tags: bush, conservative, democrat, election, iraq, republican, war, religion, politics, environment

Whaling Funds Rightwing Press

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 14:05:11 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan

Clip Source: www.talk2action.org

Moonie Sushi Business Linked To Japanese Whaling

How does Unification Church head Sun Myung Moon finance the Washington Times, an exceedingly partisan newspaper that loses perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars a year ?

As Moon predicted over two and a half decades ago, Americans have taken to raw fish and Moon's Unification Church has been on hand to cash in.

Recently, True World Foods was implicated in an an illegal shark poaching ring

True World Food's partner in a the new supermarket frozen Sushi line planned for launch around the nation this summer, reports IPS News Service, is "Japan's Kyokuyo, a multinational seafood conglomerate, sells between 10 and 20 million cans of whale meat a year,

Back in the early 1980's Unification Church head Sun Myung Moon advised his followers to go into fishing

In a remarkable story that has gone largely untold, Moon and his followers created an enterprise that reaped millions of dollars by dominating one of America's trendiest indulgences: sushi"

Tags: whaling, environment, bush, conservative, corruption, politics, republican, election, democrat, religion

Dick and W - Your Poor? Don't Vote!

Fri, 20 Apr 2007 05:20:55 GMT

clipped by: BobbyRutan
clipper's remarks: Yet more from the uber patriots Dick and W, destroying America one day at a time.

Clip Source: www.baltimoresun.com

Administration tried to curb election turnout in key states

Campaign against alleged voter fraud sought to bolster the GOP

For six years, the Bush administration, aided by Justice Department political appointees, has pursued an aggressive legal effort to restrict voter turnout in key battleground states in ways that favor Republican political candidates,

On virtually every significant decision affecting election balloting since 2001, the division's Voting Rights Section has come down on the side of Republicans, notably in Florida, Michigan, Missouri, Ohio, Washington and other states where recent elections have been decided by narrow margins.

Done little to enforce a provision of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act that requires state public assistance agencies to register voters. The inaction has contributed to a 50 percent decline in annual registrations at those agencies, to 1 million from 2 million.

Tags: war, republican, politics, iraq, iran, hillary, election, conservative, cheney, bush