Give it a rest, Al, the scam is over.

Via Daily Caller:

Former Vice President Al Gore showed that he isn’t giving up on sounding the alarm on global warming and its catastrophic consequences in an appearance on Current TV’s “The War Room with Jennifer Granholm” on Thursday.

Gore, who owns CurrentTV and appeared alongside former Obama administration “green jobs czar” Van Jones, explained that “dirty energy and dirty money” are thwarting a green economy. And that, according to the former vice president, is behind “dirty weather” due to “extreme climate events.”

“Let me add if I could briefly,” Gore said, “As Van said, it’s the intersection of dirty energy and dirty money. And we can’t forget it’s creating dirty weather because the extreme climate events that the scientific community has been telling us are connected to global warming are getting worse. We had 12 events last year here in the U.S. that cost more than a billion dollars that were connected to climate. And it’s getting worse. And now, we have this extensive drought in big areas of the country, dramatic floods, stronger storms — completely consistent with what people have been predicting.”

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Personally, I’d call her something much worse than a “mutant” if I could get away with it.

Even lib blog Mediaite hits her for singling out someone who can’t fight back as proof the GOP is overrun with so-called “extremists.”

Via Mediaite:

Meghan McCain is certain the reason many people in the Republican Party lack respect for her is that she is a moderate Republican. “I’m a proud moderate Republican, but moderate in the current Republican party is a dirty word,” she told Al Sharpton today, asserting that this was a “scary time” politically for her, and she could not “understand the popularity of Michelle Malkin and Andrew Breitbart.”

“Many people in the Republican party treat me like I’m a freak,” McCain told Sharpton, noting that she was “blessed” to be a moderate with a platform but “if you’re not an extreme conservative in this party you are not given respect.” She joked that she “works for this network for a reason”– not elaborating, she leaves that reason up to viewers. Sharpton expressed surprised that Republicans appeared “as intolerant of moderate Republicans [those] in another party.” Panelist Maria Teresa Kumar, also on the panel, adding that the problem Republicans now have is that “they’re going to cannibalize their supporters.” McCain agreed. “Unless we’re going to start building a bigger tent, we’re not going to win elections — and isn’t winning elections the point?” she asked.

Sharpton asked when she believed the shift towards the right began, and McCain responded that she thought it was under the Bush administration that blogs became particularly vicious (she made sure to clarify this had nothing to do with President Bush, but that the timing was during his tenure). “I don’t understand the popularity of Michelle Malkin and Andrew Breitbart,” she added, though noting that Democrats had an extremism problem, too. The segment concluded with McCain noting it was a “really scary time” in politics, but ultimately, “you can’t actually kick me out of the Republican Party.”

Much of what is stated in this clip merits reflection: the claim that it is exclusively the fact that she brands herself a moderate that ostracizes her from many conservatives; the claim from Sharpton and Kumar that this sort of thing is limited to Democrats. But the most memorable bit of the clip is and will always be that McCain chose as an example of everything wrong with the party she can’t get kicked out of a man who died in March of this year — despite the fact that the thesis of her argument is that the Republican Party is teeming with extremists, coming up with the name of a so-called extremist who is still alive is too much for her. Which begs the question: doesn’t Breitbart deserve an emoticon of respect at this time, less than three months removed from his death? Couldn’t the name of almost any conservative blogger work in the paradigm she presented, given that she argues they all hate her?

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When all else fails, blame mom. You may confidently write this one down as a textbook sociopath.

(Mass Live) — Democratic Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren said Thursday that she knows she has Native American ancestry because her mother told her so.

Warren’s comments came after nearly four minutes of tense back and forth between Warren and Fox 25 reporter Sharman Sacchetti and 7News reporter Andy Hiller. As both reporters questioned Warren about why she listed herself as a minority in law directories, Warren refused to answer, saying she had already answered questions about her background.

Finally, Warren said, “I am proud of my family and I am proud of my heritage.”

Hiller followed up: “Does it include an Indian background?”

Warren replied, “Yes.”

“How do you know that?” Hiller asked.

Warren responded, “Because my mother told me so. This is how I live. My mother, my grandmother, my family. This is my family. Scott Brown has launched attacks on my family. I am not backing off from my family.”

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And we wish you would just go away.

WASHINGTON — Michelle Obama secretly wishes she could be Beyoncé.

“Gosh. If I had some gift, I’d be Beyoncé,” the first lady told People magazine in an interview scheduled to hit newsstands Friday. “I’d be some great singer,” Mrs. Obama added. “The power of music, being able to play an instrument. . . It looks like musicians just have the most fun.”

“I’d be some great singer,” Mrs. Obama added. “The power of music, being able to play an instrument. . . It looks like musicians just have the most fun.”

Beyoncé, 30, and her hip-hop mogul husband Jay-Z, 42, are both ardent supporters of President Barack Obama and his wife.

The first lady, 48, added that her husband has a fondness for singing and enjoys belting out a tune “all the time. Sometimes I can’t get him to stop,” she said.

Federico Peña, vulture capitalist

(The Daily Caller) — One of President Barack Obama’s top campaign spokesmen is a private equity manager whose firm has shut down several factories and laid off hundreds of people amid a stalled economy.

Federico Pena’s role at Vestar Capital Partners has emerged as Obama’s aides and deputies continue their effort to portray former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s investment career as ruthless, job-destroying, profit-maximizing “vulture capitalism.” Pena has been a partner at Vestar since 2000.

Pena is a former mayor of Denver in swing-state Colorado, a former cabinet member for President Bill Clinton and one of 35 “national co-chairs” of the president’s 2012 campaign. . . .

Pena has already contributed $5,000 to Obama’s campaign, even though Vestar laid off 1,000 workers from Del Monte this month, closed three factories and laid off 540 people at Solo Cup Co., and fired another 500 workers at BirdsEye food-processor in 2006, according to the report.

The Pena revelation follows reports highlighting the venture capital careers of two people on the president’s jobs council.

Richard Parsons, chairman of Citigroup, is a senior adviser at Providence Equity Partners, and Mark Gallogly is a co-founder of Centerbridge Partners. . . .

Keep reading. . .

Remind me again, how many billions has Obama lost on the “green energy” businesses he invested our money in? Yeah, I think we’ll take Mitt.

DES MOINES, Iowa — President Obama celebrated the role Iowa played in his campaign in 2008 and took aim once again at Mitt Romney’s business background at a campaign rally on the Iowa State Fairgrounds on Thursday.

“The last time he visited these same fairgrounds, he famously declared that corporations are people,” Obama told a crowd of roughly 2,500 packed into an exhibit space. “Human beings, my friends.”

The president maintained that the private equity industry is a welcome part of the economy — risk-takers and investors should be rewarded, he said. But their motives are not job creation.

“The people who work in these firms will tell you that’s not their goal,” Obama said, explaining that the goal for private equity companies, such as Bain, the company Romney co-founded, is “maximizing short-term gains for your investors.”

“There may be value for that type of experience but it’s not in the White House,” the president said, where the goal is “strong and sustainable, broad-based growth.”

The Romney attacks now appear to be part of Obama’s regular stump speech — he has employed them several times this week, despite criticism from some Democrats that he is wrongly villifying the industry.

(CBC) — The Muslim Brotherhood is claiming a lead in Egypt’s historic presidential elections after polls closed on Thursday and vote counting began.

A Brotherhood spokesperson said exit polls conducted by the party’s campaign workers all over Egypt suggested Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi is out front of the rest of the pack. The reliability of the party’s exit polls could not be confirmed but several regional television stations were reporting a lead for Morsi, with Hamdeen Sabahi and Ahmed Shafiq battling it out for second place.

There are 13 candidates in the race — including liberals, Islamists and former regime figures — to elect a successor to Hosni Mubarak, the longtime authoritarian ruler who was ousted during the Arab Spring more than a year ago.

Shafiq and Amr Moussa are the two leading secular contenders and are both veterans of Mubarak’s regime — Shafiq as prime minister and Moussa as foreign minister.

Via HuffPo:

Small-business owners are leaning right leading up to the U.S. presidential election. Forty-nine percent of business owners plan to vote for presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney, while 32 percent of respondents say they’ll support President Obama, according to a report released this week by Manta.

In Manta’s last poll in January, the president was the clear winner against the Republican field as a whole, but received just 34 percent of the total vote. Now, with Romney emerging as the GOP favorite, Obama appears to face a challenge among business owners — although Romney is yet to earn support from all the 61 percent of small-business owners who planned to back a Republican in January.

In the eight swing states shaping up to be the central election battleground, small businesses favor Romney even more, Manta found. Of the small-business owners surveyed in those states, 53 percent said they’ll vote for Romney, while 32 percent said they will choose Obama.

In a sane world he would have rotted away in a ditch with two slugs in the back of his head a long time ago.

Is it me or does he look like a homeless wizard?

(MSNBC) — U.S. military officials are investigating whether new images of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, alleged mastermind of al-Qaida’s 9-11 terror attacks, posted on a jihadist website were smuggled out of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.

The photos, which show a relaxed and often smiling Mohammed, were published Wednesday by “Al-Ebdaa,” an jihadist media group, and documented by Flashpoint Partners, a global security company run by NBC News terrorism analyst Evan Kohlmann.

Kohlmann said the images appear to have been taken at GTMO, the U.S. Navy base and detention facility in Cuba, where Mohammed is currently facing a military tribunal with four other alleged al-Qaida members on murder and terrorism charges in connection with the 2001 terrorist attacks on New York City’s World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Priceless.

Via Politicker:

Though the Obama campaign has repeatedly attacked Mitt Romney for his career at Bain Capital, President Obama still accepted $7,500 in campaign contributions from three Bain executives. His campaign press secretary, Ben LaBolt told The Politicker the president has no intention of giving the money back.

“No one aside from Mitt Romney is running for President highlighting their tenure as a corporate buyout specialist as one of job creation, when in fact, his goal was profit maximization,” said Mr. LaBolt. “The President has support from business leaders across industries who have seen him pull the economy back from the brink of another depression, manufacturing and the auto industry revived, and support his agenda to build an economy that lasts where America outinnovates and outeducates the rest of the world and economic security for the middle class is restored.”

On Tuesday, Vice President Joe Biden defended the attacks on Mr. Romney’s tenure at Bain Capital. Though he insisted he wasn’t “criticizing private equity firms,” Mr. Biden said there were many examples of Mr. Romney and his Bain colleagues causing tremendous harm.

“You hear all these stories about his partners buying companies. . . where they load up with a tremendous amount of debt. The companies go under, everybody loses their job, the community is devastated, but they make money,” said Mr. Biden. “They make money even when a company goes bankrupt, when workers lose their jobs.”

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0% Cherokee, 100% Bullshit.

(click image for video)

He’s nearing four years in office and he still can’t take a shred of responsibility for the economy, what a pathetic excuse for a leader.

Via RCP:

“We all know how difficult these past few years have been for this country. After the worst recession of our lifetimes, it’s going to take some time for the economy to fully recover. More time than any of us would like. And we’re still facing some headwinds, like the situation in Europe. But while there are certain economic developments we can’t fully control, there are plenty of things we can control. There are plenty of steps we can take — steps that we must take right now — to speed up this recovery; to help create jobs; and to restore some of the financial security that so many families have lost. It’s within our control to do all of that right now,” President Obama said in a speech in Newton, Iowa today.

“But here’s the thing: too many of my Republican friends in Congress are standing in the way. They either want to do nothing at all or they want to double down on the same failed policies that got us into this mess. They want to cut more taxes — especially for the wealthiest Americans. They want to cut back more of the rules we put in place for banks and financial institutions. They want to wait for the housing market to hit bottom, and just hope for the best,” Obama said.

And like a good comrade, she returned the favor and endorsed Obama earlier today.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The daughter of Cuban President Raul Castro brought her fight for gay rights to a U.S. forum Wednesday, stressing the need to secure social equality for all, regardless of sexual orientation.

Speaking in Spanish through a translator, Mariela Castro addressed about 50 medical professionals and transgender advocates at San Francisco General Hospital on Wednesday.

She has an international reputation as an outspoken gay rights advocate and lobbied her father’s government to cover sex reassignment surgery under the national health plan, which it has since 2008, and to legalize same-sex marriages, which so far it has not.

“If we don’t change our patriarchal and homophobic culture. . . we cannot advance as a new society, and that’s what we want, the power of emancipation through socialism,” she said. “We will establish relationships on the basis of social justice and social equality…It seems like a Utopia, but we can change it.”

Patty Murray, who has repeatedly accused Republicans of waging a “war a women,” is one of the worst offenders.

(Washington Free Beacon) — A group of Democratic female senators on Wednesday declared war on the so-called “gender pay gap,” urging their colleagues to pass the aptly named Paycheck Fairness Act when Congress returns from recess next month. However, a substantial gender pay gap exists in their own offices, a Washington Free Beacon analysis of Senate salary data reveals.

Of the five senators who participated in Wednesday’s press conference — Barbara Mikulski (D., Md.), Patty Murray (D., Wash.), Debbie Stabenow (D., Mich.), Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) and Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.) — three pay their female staff members significantly less than male staffers.

Murray, who has repeatedly accused Republicans of waging a “war a women,” is one of the worst offenders. Female members of Murray’s staff made about $21,000 less per year than male staffers in 2011, a difference of 35.2 percent.

That is well above the 23 percent gap that Democrats claim exists between male and female workers nationwide. The figure is based on a 2010 U.S. Census Bureau report, and is technically accurate. However, as CNN’s Lisa Sylvester has reported, when factors such as area of employment, hours of work, and time in the workplace are taken into account, the gap shrinks to about 5 percent.

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How many times have we heard this before?

Remember this the next time Obama and his surrogates argue for civility in politics.

PHILADELPHIA — When Mitt Romney came to an inner-city charter school here Thursday to promote his new education agenda, he received something of a history lecture about the persecution of blacks in America and the struggles of African American children to meet the academic achievements of their white counterparts.

Seeking to broaden his appeal heading into the general election, Romney was venturing for his first time in this campaign into an impoverished black neighborhood to hear the concerns of local educators and community leaders. But here in the streets of West Philadelphia, the emotion surrounding his contest with the nation’s first black president was raw, as dozens of neighborhood residents shouted, “Get out, Romney, get out!”

Romney arrived at Universal Bluford Charter School aboard his logo-emblazoned campaign bus and began his morning visit by meeting school and civic leaders at a formal roundtable session. “I come to learn, obviously, from people who are having experiences that are unique and instructive,” he said. [...]

Outside, meanwhile, some brick row houses across from the school were boarded up. Police had cordoned off a full city block to protect Romney and his entourage. Residents, some of them organized by Obama’s campaign, stood on their porches and gathered at a sidewalk corner to shout angrily at Romney. Some held signs saying, “We are the 99%.” One man’s placard trumpeted an often-referenced Romney gaffe: “I am not concerned about the very poor.”

No thanks.

(CNSNews.com) — Ahead of a mammoth United Nations sustainability conference in Rio de Janeiro next month, the Brazilian government has signaled a new push to get the U.N.’s top environmental body upgraded — a push long opposed by the United States.

Brazil wants to breathe new life into an initiative — vigorously promoted since the 1990s by European leaders — to replace the 40 year-old U.N. Environment Program (UNEP) with a full-fledged “specialized agency,” dubbed the U.N. Environment Organization (UNEO).

Brazilian Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira told a press briefing last Friday that the issue was a priority for her government, but she acknowledged that “there is no consensus in international organizations on the proposal to create an environment agency” during the summit, known as Rio+20.

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(The Hill) — Senate appropriators unanimously voted Thursday to cut Pakistani aid by $33 million, or $1 million for every year a Pakistani doctor will spend in prison for helping the CIA find Osama bin Laden.

While the cut represents a small fraction of U.S. aid to Pakistan, the 30-0 vote in favor of the amendment from Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) highlights a new low in tensions between the two countries sparked by Wednesday’s sentencing in Pakistan of Shakil Afridi on treason charges by a tribal court.

Afridi used a vaccination drive to try to get DNA samples from people inside the compound where bin Laden was hiding in Pakistan. While he was unsuccessful, U.S. officials say he helped an intelligence program that led to the killing of bin Laden.

“This conviction says to me that al-Qaeda is viewed by the court to be Pakistan,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said during the mark-up. “I don’t know which side of the war Pakistan is on. This makes me seriously question our financial support to Pakistan.”

Gross on so many different levels.

Via The Hill:

Senate appropriators voted 18-12 on Thursday to reinstate funding for family-planning programs abroad, setting up a clash with the House.

The amendment to the $52.1 billion foreign aid and operations bill was introduced by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.). It permanently repeals the so-called “global gag rule,” which bars federal funding for nonprofit groups that promote or provide abortions.

“House Republicans continue efforts to put politics in the way of vital health care for women by attempting to reinstate the global gag rule,” Lautenberg said in a statement. “This amendment ensures this backwards policy never returns and protects access to family planning services for some of the world’s poorest women.”

Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson (Neb.) voted against the amendment, while Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) sided with Democrats.

Beyond satire.

Via Keith Koffler:

President Obama at a Denver fundraiser last night suggested he’s been spending his life in “the real world” while Romney has not. Here’s a look at what he said:

There was a woman in Iowa who shared her story of financial struggles, and he gave her an answer right out of an economic textbook. He said, “Our productivity equals our income.” And the notion was that somehow the reason people can’t pay their bills is because they’re not working hard enough. If they got more productive, suddenly their incomes would go up. Well, those of us who’ve spent time in the real world — (laughter) — know that the problem isn’t that the American people aren’t productive enough — you’ve been working harder than ever.

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You think we’re getting under his skin?

Via FishbowlDC:

MSNBC “Hardball” host Chris Matthews is never short on feisty. He appeared on a panel at NCTA’s Cable Show Tuesday in Boston alongside CNN’s John King and Univision’s Maria Salenas and moderated by C-SPAN’s Steve Scully. The event is a three-day annual convention that attracts upwards of 20,000 attendees. When Scully brought up Matthews’ infamous “thrill up his leg” line about President Obama, Matthews bristled and referred to Scully as one of the “jackasses” who always asks this question. [...]

But Matthews wasn’t finished. “So I hope you feel satisfied that you raised the most obvious question that is raised by every horses ass right winger that I ever bump into,” he said. He then put the knife in and twisted it: “Thank you Steve for serving up that little soufflé you have been working on since last night sometime when your brain exploded with this idea that you were going to ask me about it.”

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Naturally.

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) — Fidel Castro’s niece on Wednesday hailed Barack Obama’s support for gay marriage and the loosening of US-Cuba travel restrictions, saying: “I would vote for President Obama.”

Mariela Castro, the daughter of President Raul Castro, also lamented the “small group of delinquents” whom she said were preventing the warming of ties between Washington and Havana.

“I think he’s sincere and speaks from the heart,” Castro — whose US trip has been denounced by opposition Republicans — said of Obama’s recent public endorsement of gay marriage.

“I think it’s something that he truly believes in. . . If I were a US citizen, I would vote for President Obama,” she added, speaking via an interpreter at her first public event in a trip to San Francisco.

But Castro said US voters must press their government to completely “remove the economic and social blockades” that have characterized the US-Cuba relationship since her uncle Fidel seized power more than five decades ago.

“It’s not fair — you can’t allow a small group of delinquents to continue to manipulate and make it difficult for the US and Cuba to have a relationship,” she told about 200 people gathered at a local gay rights center.

“We have a lot in common,” Castro, wearing a purple scarf and flanked by several nervous bodyguards, said. “Don’t let them pull us apart.”

Thanks, fag.

Via BreitbartTV:

While speaking to Harvard Graduates this week Barney Frank took time to hammer a woman who challenged him at a town hall two years ago over his ideology. He then went on to explain that legislation he was promoting would not prevent pastors from speaking their views at the pulpit. “You can still call me a fag,” Frank said and cited that at the time he was chair of the Finance Committee so he “wouldn’t advise it if you were in the banking industry.”

Yup.

(Politico) — Nikki Haley said Wednesday that she found the recent video of an AFL-CIO leader smashing a piñata of her “creepy,” and the South Carolina governor described the incident as typical behavior of “union thugs.”

“It’s creepy. I still hurt every time I see it,” Haley said to Greta Van Susteren of Fox News. “This is not typical of South Carolinians. This is typical of union thugs.”

Haley was responding to a YouTube video that surfaced over the weekend, in which Donna Dewitt, the president of the South Carolina AFL-CIO, takes a baseball bat to a piñata featuring the Republican governor’s face. With onlookers cheering her on with comments like, “Wait ‘til her face comes around, then whack her,” Dewitt repeatedly beats the piñata until it eventually falls down.

The governor told Van Susteren that the incident only made her more determined to be a “union buster.”

“All it does is it makes my heels taller, my heels sharper so that I can kick harder,” she said. “I’m not going to stop beating up on the unions. I’m not going to stop beating up on the Democrats for wasteful spending. . . . I’m a lot tougher than that. I’m going to keep on kicking.”

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Not sure if Tingles realizes this or not but his explanation actually makes it more creepy, not less.

Via The Daily Caller:

Remember when pundits criticized former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s claim during his run for the Republican presidential nomination that he fell into the trap of marital infidelity because he loved America so much? Remember MSNBC host Chris Matthews piling on?

It turns out Matthews has a similar explanation for why he crossed the boundaries of traditional journalistic decorum and admitted to feeling physical sensations from hearing President Barack Obama speak, first in 2004 and again in 2008.

At The Cable Show convention in Boston this week, CSPAN’s Steve Scully, hosting a media panel that included Matthews, CNN’s John King and Univision’s Maria Elena Salinas, asked Matthews if “the thrill” was still there today.

“If you had done your reporting over at C-SPAN, you would have checked that I said the exact same thing in 2004 after I heard his address up in Boston,” Matthews said. “[T]he thrill was real. In fact, Ronald Reagan, I’ve been reading a lot about him, I’ve been working on a book about him, every time he came to the House chamber, you would feel a thrill up your spine. I do have physical reactions when people are talking about my country.”

Matthews said it was Obama’s “amazing story” that gave him that “physical reaction,” which he deemed “American exceptionalism.” He doubled down on that sentiment and admitted “a guy like Tom Brokaw wouldn’t have said,” but it was part of his reporting.

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Via Washington Secrets:

If you go outside on hot summer days, prepare to feel sick — or die. A new global warming report claims that temperatures will rise up to 11 degrees over this century, killing an additional 150,000 or more Americans, and nearly 6,000 a year in the Washington-Baltimore corridor by 2099.

First to fall, according to a shocking report titled “Killer Summer Heat” from the National Resources Defense Council, will be the elderly, kids and the poor. And with more Baby Boomers heading into their Golden Years, they will likely be part of the death boom, if the alarmist projection comes true.

The report reviewed by Secrets is based on new analysis of the historical relationships between heat, weather conditions, and mortality for 40 cities. Those elements were then factored into projections that temperatures could rise 4 degrees-11 degrees.

“Our findings indicate that rising temperatures driven by unabated climate change will increase the number of life-threatening excessive heat events, resulting in thousands of additional heat-related deaths each year, with a cumulative toll of approximately 33,000 additional heat-related deaths by midcentury in these (40) cities, and more than 150,000 additional heat-related deaths by the century’s end,” said the report.

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