Just when you thought the birther morons couldn’t get worse…
• During a tele-townhall meeting late last week, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) was asked about his views on whether President Obama is a natural-born American citizen. The Iowa Congressman noted that his staff had investigated the matter and found birth announcements in the two Hawaii newspapers the week after Obama’s birth. However, King went on to float the absurd notion that his parents “might’ve announced that by telegram from Kenya.” – That doesn’t mean there aren’t some other explanations on how they might’ve announced that by telegram from Kenya. The list goes on.
• Best retort to a “tea party” conservative ever. “You actually seem to be jealous of poor people.”
Romney’s Terrible Vacation:
• In 2010 book, Romney ascribed Israeli-Palestinian economic disparities to culture [but] in ascribing the Israeli-Palestinian economic disparities to cultural differences, he’s not allowing for the role of the occupation in helping to cause them. In chapter 10 of No Apology, Romney writes of his travels: I wondered how such vast differences could exist between countries that were literally next door to each other. How could Americans be so rich and Mexicans so poor? How could Israelis have created a highly developed, technology-based economy while their Palestinian neighbors had not yet even begun to move to an industrial economy? As I traveled to Africa, Asia, the Middle East, South American, and to both halves of Europe that had previously been divided by the Iron Curtain, I discovered that the prosperity gap is really a canyon. Why is that?
• On Sunday, Mitt Romney boldly declared that Israel’s economic superiority over the Palestinians was due to its culture. On Tuesday morning, he dismissed any notion that he had even discussed Palestinian culture. On Tuesday night, Romney reversed himself yet again, in an op-ed entitled “Culture Does Matter.”
• To Mitt, richer means superior and we’re all Palestinians.
• The world, on Romney’s trip:
- GERMANY: The trip to Israel may help Romney in the short term. In the long term, however, the Republican has done damage: The Middle East needs the United States as mediator. As such, the would-be president has already disqualified himself.
- FRANCE: This while the U.S. does not officially recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Their embassy, like those of virtually all the countries represented in Israel, is in Tel Aviv.
- AUSTRIA: Now the next occasion of putting his foot in his mouth: on Sunday, the Republican called Jerusalem the “capital of Israel.”
- UNITED KINGDOM: Mr. Romney’s behavior in Israel is… a throwback to a time when U.S. foreign policy considered the bulk of the Middle East to be irredeemably horrible; a great morass of messy “other” with which grown-up engagement was close to impossible. As a response to the patchwork of petty tyranny that the region used to be, this made some sense. Today, it makes none at all.
- US: Despite what Mr. Romney says, all American presidents have been pro-Israel, including Mr. Obama. But that doesn’t mean subcontracting American policy to Israeli leaders or donors. [... Romney's] policies would complicate America’s ability to act as a broker in Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts.
• Visiting Poland for the final leg of his gaffe-filled trip abroad, Romney praised how the nation has “lifted the heavy hand of government” to become one of the fastest growing economies in Europe. The problem with Romney’s speech, however, is that the the Polish government plays a larger role in its economy than the U.S. government plays here.
• Jurassic Park: Romney’s ‘Bush-Era’ energy team is dominated by fossil fuel insiders and its lobbyists.
• Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has what he says is an informed explanation for why Mitt Romney refuses to release additional tax returns. According a Bain investor, Reid charged, Romney didn’t pay any taxes for 10 years. Romney couldn’t make it through a Senate confirmation process as a mere Cabinet nominee, the majority leader insisted, owing to the opaqueness of his personal finances.
About those guns:
• No Connection: Despite insistence from GOP leadership that the White House was behind the so-called “Fast and Furious” gunwalking program, a report from House Republicans released Tuesday names five officials at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms as culprits in the misguided effort. All five were reassigned before the release of the report — the first of three. The indictments in the report contradict House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) insistence that the President invoked executive privilege over the Justice Department’s information on ongoing investigations to protect his personal interests. The indication, however, is that the upcoming reports will try to tie the President to the program. It will “address the unprecedented obstruction of the investigation by the highest levels of the Justice Department, including the attorney general himself,” according to the Republicans who wrote the report.
• The conservative website The Daily Caller will be giving away an FMK 9C1 high-capacity 9mm pistol to whoever can track down the hacker that trolled the site with porn ads on Monday. The gun — which comes specially engraved with the Bill of Rights — will be presented to any reader who can turn over the hacker’s name, allowing The DC “to hold them responsible.”
Military Industrial Complex:
• The Navy’s next-generation drone, the X-47B, on display Tuesday at the Naval Air Station in Patuxent River, Maryland.
F.D.Brightly
Retroactively born in Hawaii? [Shorter Question Everything]
Just when you thought the birther morons couldn’t get worse…
• During a tele-townhall meeting late last week, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) was asked about his views on whether President Obama is a natural-born American citizen. The Iowa Congressman noted that his staff had investigated the matter and found birth announcements in the two Hawaii newspapers the week after Obama’s birth. However, King went on to float the absurd notion that his parents “might’ve announced that by telegram from Kenya.” – That doesn’t mean there aren’t some other explanations on how they might’ve announced that by telegram from Kenya. The list goes on.
• Best retort to a “tea party” conservative ever. “You actually seem to be jealous of poor people.”
Romney’s Terrible Vacation:
• In 2010 book, Romney ascribed Israeli-Palestinian economic disparities to culture [but] in ascribing the Israeli-Palestinian economic disparities to cultural differences, he’s not allowing for the role of the occupation in helping to cause them. In chapter 10 of No Apology, Romney writes of his travels: I wondered how such vast differences could exist between countries that were literally next door to each other. How could Americans be so rich and Mexicans so poor? How could Israelis have created a highly developed, technology-based economy while their Palestinian neighbors had not yet even begun to move to an industrial economy? As I traveled to Africa, Asia, the Middle East, South American, and to both halves of Europe that had previously been divided by the Iron Curtain, I discovered that the prosperity gap is really a canyon. Why is that?
• On Sunday, Mitt Romney boldly declared that Israel’s economic superiority over the Palestinians was due to its culture. On Tuesday morning, he dismissed any notion that he had even discussed Palestinian culture. On Tuesday night, Romney reversed himself yet again, in an op-ed entitled “Culture Does Matter.”
• To Mitt, richer means superior and we’re all Palestinians.
• The world, on Romney’s trip:
- GERMANY: The trip to Israel may help Romney in the short term. In the long term, however, the Republican has done damage: The Middle East needs the United States as mediator. As such, the would-be president has already disqualified himself.
- FRANCE: This while the U.S. does not officially recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Their embassy, like those of virtually all the countries represented in Israel, is in Tel Aviv.
- AUSTRIA: Now the next occasion of putting his foot in his mouth: on Sunday, the Republican called Jerusalem the “capital of Israel.”
- UNITED KINGDOM: Mr. Romney’s behavior in Israel is… a throwback to a time when U.S. foreign policy considered the bulk of the Middle East to be irredeemably horrible; a great morass of messy “other” with which grown-up engagement was close to impossible. As a response to the patchwork of petty tyranny that the region used to be, this made some sense. Today, it makes none at all.
- US: Despite what Mr. Romney says, all American presidents have been pro-Israel, including Mr. Obama. But that doesn’t mean subcontracting American policy to Israeli leaders or donors. [... Romney's] policies would complicate America’s ability to act as a broker in Israeli-Palestinian peace efforts.
• Visiting Poland for the final leg of his gaffe-filled trip abroad, Romney praised how the nation has “lifted the heavy hand of government” to become one of the fastest growing economies in Europe. The problem with Romney’s speech, however, is that the the Polish government plays a larger role in its economy than the U.S. government plays here.
• Jurassic Park: Romney’s ‘Bush-Era’ energy team is dominated by fossil fuel insiders and its lobbyists.
• Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has what he says is an informed explanation for why Mitt Romney refuses to release additional tax returns. According a Bain investor, Reid charged, Romney didn’t pay any taxes for 10 years. Romney couldn’t make it through a Senate confirmation process as a mere Cabinet nominee, the majority leader insisted, owing to the opaqueness of his personal finances.
About those guns:
• No Connection: Despite insistence from GOP leadership that the White House was behind the so-called “Fast and Furious” gunwalking program, a report from House Republicans released Tuesday names five officials at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms as culprits in the misguided effort. All five were reassigned before the release of the report — the first of three. The indictments in the report contradict House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-OH) insistence that the President invoked executive privilege over the Justice Department’s information on ongoing investigations to protect his personal interests. The indication, however, is that the upcoming reports will try to tie the President to the program. It will “address the unprecedented obstruction of the investigation by the highest levels of the Justice Department, including the attorney general himself,” according to the Republicans who wrote the report.
• The conservative website The Daily Caller will be giving away an FMK 9C1 high-capacity 9mm pistol to whoever can track down the hacker that trolled the site with porn ads on Monday. The gun — which comes specially engraved with the Bill of Rights — will be presented to any reader who can turn over the hacker’s name, allowing The DC “to hold them responsible.”
Military Industrial Complex:
• The Navy’s next-generation drone, the X-47B, on display Tuesday at the Naval Air Station in Patuxent River, Maryland.
