• Mitt Romney couldn’t even introduce his running mate without committing a major gaffe. When the moment came to introduce Paul Ryan, Romney called him the next president of the United States.
• The reason this blunder will resonate is because it speaks to a larger truth: it’s Ryan who Republicans will be excited about and it’s Ryan who has the vision the ticket will run on.
• At a fundraiser this morning, Mitt Romney took a shot at Japan, saying that country’s economic decline is not a path the United States will follow under his leadership. “We are not Japan,” he told donors at a $2,500-a-plate fundraiser. “We are not going to be a nation that suffers in decline and distress for a decade or a century. We’re on the cusp of a very different economic future than the one people have seen over the past three years.”
• A Tea Party councilman is so far defying calls for his resignation after an old video resurfaced that shows him holding signs depicting President Obama’s head on a pike, former Governor Jennifer Granholm with a noose around her neck and Nancy Pelosi with several bullet holes through her face. Paul Smith, a city councilman in Sterling Heights, Michigan, is clearly seen in a 2009 video holding a sign with a photo of President Obama’s dismembered head atop a pike and a caption reading “shit on a stick.”
• Another one?: After a 17 year old suspect died in the back of their patrol car, police in Indiana unbelievably claim that the handcuffed teenager strangled himself with his own seat belt. The police arrest a teenage burglary suspect. They leave him alone in the back of the patrol car. They come back and he’s dead. It is important to keep in mind exactly what this young man was arrested for. He didn’t harm anyone. He wasn’t facing life in prison or the death penalty. He and some friends wanted to steal some alcohol and probably get drunk.
• Ryan Lewis, a 32-year-old North Vancouver man, has been arrested after he allegedly posted death threats on Facebook outlining plans to commit similar crimes to the deadly shooting at the Colorado movie theatre showing of the new Batman film. Police are not disclosing the exact nature of the comments, said there were multiple entries and they were “in depth and graphic.”
• President Hugo Chavez said Venezuelan authorities have detained an American man and are interrogating him, suspecting he could be a “mercenary” plotting to destabilize the country if the opposition loses the upcoming presidential election. Chavez told reporters on Friday that under questioning the man said he had been a U.S. Marine and was detained while crossing into Venezuela from Colombia on a bus in the middle of the night. He said the American had entered the country illegally.
F.D.Brightly
Starting out with a gaffe [Shorter Question Everything]
• Mitt Romney couldn’t even introduce his running mate without committing a major gaffe. When the moment came to introduce Paul Ryan, Romney called him the next president of the United States.
• The reason this blunder will resonate is because it speaks to a larger truth: it’s Ryan who Republicans will be excited about and it’s Ryan who has the vision the ticket will run on.
• At a fundraiser this morning, Mitt Romney took a shot at Japan, saying that country’s economic decline is not a path the United States will follow under his leadership. “We are not Japan,” he told donors at a $2,500-a-plate fundraiser. “We are not going to be a nation that suffers in decline and distress for a decade or a century. We’re on the cusp of a very different economic future than the one people have seen over the past three years.”
• A Tea Party councilman is so far defying calls for his resignation after an old video resurfaced that shows him holding signs depicting President Obama’s head on a pike, former Governor Jennifer Granholm with a noose around her neck and Nancy Pelosi with several bullet holes through her face. Paul Smith, a city councilman in Sterling Heights, Michigan, is clearly seen in a 2009 video holding a sign with a photo of President Obama’s dismembered head atop a pike and a caption reading “shit on a stick.”
• Another one?: After a 17 year old suspect died in the back of their patrol car, police in Indiana unbelievably claim that the handcuffed teenager strangled himself with his own seat belt. The police arrest a teenage burglary suspect. They leave him alone in the back of the patrol car. They come back and he’s dead. It is important to keep in mind exactly what this young man was arrested for. He didn’t harm anyone. He wasn’t facing life in prison or the death penalty. He and some friends wanted to steal some alcohol and probably get drunk.
• Ryan Lewis, a 32-year-old North Vancouver man, has been arrested after he allegedly posted death threats on Facebook outlining plans to commit similar crimes to the deadly shooting at the Colorado movie theatre showing of the new Batman film. Police are not disclosing the exact nature of the comments, said there were multiple entries and they were “in depth and graphic.”
• President Hugo Chavez said Venezuelan authorities have detained an American man and are interrogating him, suspecting he could be a “mercenary” plotting to destabilize the country if the opposition loses the upcoming presidential election. Chavez told reporters on Friday that under questioning the man said he had been a U.S. Marine and was detained while crossing into Venezuela from Colombia on a bus in the middle of the night. He said the American had entered the country illegally.