Johnson Caught In A Wringer?

Good to see that the Wisconsin press is looking into the potentially illegal campaign financing arrangement of Rethuglican Sen. Ron "Small" Johnson. Apparently Johnson spent $9 million on his unfortunately successful bid to defeat Sen. Russ Feingold in 2010, and now, VOILA!, his company is giving him $10 million in "deferred compensation." Federal law still prohibits private corporations from giving campaign contributions directly to a candidate for Federal office. Small Johnson was apparently the decisionmaker on the amount of compensation, too. Convenient.

When a Milwaukee Journal-Sentinal reporter tried to get Small Johnson to comment on the apparent illegality, the Senator contemptuously replied, "I don't have to explain it any further to someone like you." Well, here's hoping Small will be giving an explanation soon -- hopefully in court.

Mr. Monkey Wrench

As if to prove our recent point that Rethugs are out to undermine economic recovery in the hope that it will benefit them in 2012, House Majority Leader Eric "Can't" Cantor has pulled out of bipartisan talks to resolve the deficit impasse. While indicating that he would not go along with proposals to close loopholes and raise taxes on the very wealthy, his real agenda seems to be obstruction for political gain.

Let's hope the Dems pound his weaselly, smarmy ass from now to Kingdom come on his cynical "elections first" betrayal.

(photo: The circus is in town to stay)

Better Late Than Never

From their moniker as the "Party of No" starting from the day President Obama was inaugurated through their solid wall of opposition to every Obama initiative to spur the economy, the Rethugs have largely been given a free pass by the Dems (and, of course, the Beltway media) on exposing their obvious motive: to deny the Dems any success in fixing the mess the Rethugs created. Now, it looks like the Dems have located part of their spine:

"Today Senate Dems went there: They accused Republicans of deliberately sabotaging the economy in order to further their own political interests. And a senior Dem Senate aide tells me that Dems will not shy away from making that case in the weeks to come, if the Republicans keep blocking their efforts to spur job creation."

Why they didn't do this prior to the 2010 mid-term elections is beyond us, but fighting back against the lie factory that constitutes the Rethuglican / New Confederate Party hasn't been a Dem strength. We hope they do "go there," because the case is compelling and the evidence overwhelming that the Rethugs have been trying to sabotage the recovery in order to blame the Dems for a bad economy.

S.O.S! The SS Poot Is Sinking!

With the departure yesterday of Rethuglican Presidential candidate Poot Gingrich of his two top fundraisers, it appears that Poot's campaign ship is sinking fast. Barely a week after most of his campaign staff quit, Poot is without the key element of a political campaign -- its fundraising / financing arm, which allows the candidate to travel, prepare media ads, etc., anything that requires money.

With his "campaign" imploding, Poot may be the first Rethug candidate to drop out of the race. . .after little more than a month! Great job, Poot! It's an indicator of how (God forbid) your Presidency would have gone.

(photo: "Did someone turn off the air conditioning?")

Olbermann's New Gig

It's gratifying to see that Keith Olbermann is back and doing very well on Current TV. His "Countdown" program -- airing weeknights at 8 p.m. -- debuted on Monday, and beat the competition on CNN by a wide margin. Previously, Current TV averaged a modest 30,000 viewers; Olbermann had 179,000 viewers in the key 25 - 54 age demographic. His program features what we came to love on his old MSNBC program: Special comment, World's Worst, and strange news items that he covers under his "Time Marches On" segment.

Hopefully, you have Current TV, or can order it. Show Big O some love.

Mid-Week Song

Indie rock group Bon Iver (pronounced bone eeVAIR, after the French bon hiver/"good winter") formed several years ago in Wisconsin (bonus points). In a recent appearance on The Colbert Report, they played "Calgary" off of their just-released album, "Bon Iver."

No Justice

Think Progress has a good article on the ethics problems of Justice Clarence "Long Dong Silver"* Thomas, which include some unseemly acceptance of favors from right-wing sugar daddies. In the latest revelation, the Justice's flaky wingnut wife, Ginnie, received $500,000 from Dallas real estate mogul Harlan Crow (of the Trammel Crow fortune) for her tea party organization, in addition to a bible once belonging to civil rights pioneer Frederick Douglass valued at $19,000.

Think Long Dong will recuse himself from matters involving the teatards or Harlan Crow? Riiiiight. You would be wrong, because hizzoner will always see himself the victim of a left-wing "lynch mob" because he chose to cash in with the Strom Thurmonds and Trent Lotts of the Rethuglican movement. And perish the thought that he would resign. He's a bitter ender if there ever was one.
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* Lest we forget, here's the context for his nickname.

When Self-Parody Becomes Hackery

One of the many criticisms of the Rethuglican propaganda network, Fux News, is that it often uses misleading, edited video to spin a story for the consumption of its wingnut viewers. On Fux News Sunday, Jon Stewart was interviewed by "newsman" Chris Wallace, and, to no one's great surprise, what aired was selectively edited to put Fux in a better light:

"If you tuned in to 'Fox News Sunday' over the weekend, you saw an interesting interview with Jon Stewart, host of 'The Daily Show.' What you didn’t see was Stewart’s reference to Fox News vice president and DC managing editor Bill Sammon.. . .[Stewart speaking]'You know, in ideological regimes, they can’t understand that there is free media other places. Because they receive marching orders. And if you want me to go through Bill Sammon’s emails and…'”

Wallace cut him off, realizing that Stewart about to prove his point that Fux's "news" staff did get political marching orders from Fux's DC Bureau Chief Sammon. (One example that might have been cited was a Sammon e-mail telling his reporters to use the phrase "Government-run health care" instead of "public option" when discussing the 2010 the Affordable Care Act).

It was also interesting that Wallace defended Fux as telling "the other side" of the news presented by NBC, CBS, etc. Who knew that there were other sides to factual news reporting? Unless, of course, you're propagandizing and not reporting "news" at all.

Huntsman Joins Mob of Rethuglican Candidates

Former Utah Gov. and Ambassador to China Jon "Tally Ho" Huntsman has announced his candidacy for the 2012 Rethuglican Presidential nomination. (ed. - what does that make, 14 or 15 Rethugs in the race?) He selected the park in New Jersey across from the Statue of Liberty to make his announcement, as did St. Ronnie of Hollywood in 1980. While Tally Ho is trying to seize the mantle of St. Ronnie, the far-right base of the Rethuglican Party is unlikely to buy it. Tally Ho, after all, served as the Mooslim usurper's Ambassador to China, once advocated for universal health care while Utah's governor, called for energy legislation that would curb greenhouse gases, and has been relatively moderate on immigration issues.

In other words, with the rabid right, this dog won't Hunt-sman.

Quote of the Day

"An attack on the right to vote is underway across the country through laws designed to make it more difficult to cast a ballot. . .These statutes are not neutral. Their greatest impact will be to reduce turnout among African Americans, Latinos and the young. It is no accident that these groups were key to Barack Obama’s victory in 2008 — or that the laws in question are being enacted in states where Republicans control state governments. Again, think of what this would look like to a dispassionate observer. A party wins an election, as the GOP did in 2010. Then it changes the election laws in ways that benefit itself. In a democracy, the electorate is supposed to pick the politicians. With these laws, politicians are shaping their electorates." -- E.J. Dionne, writing about vote suppression laws being enacted by Rethuglican-controlled state legislatures. Thanks to our broken media, this may be the most important under-reported political story of the year.

Middle Class Losing The Class War

A huge gap in income between the middle class and corporate executives is the most extreme since the Great Depression. As this article in the Kaplan Daily notes, pay for executives since the 1970s has increased four-fold, while the average wages for all employees has remained nearly flat.

The article points out that in 2008, the top one percent took in more than 20 percent of the personal income in the U.S. Case in point is the executive compensation at Dean Foods:

"Over the period from the ’70s until today, while pay for Dean Foods chief executives was rising 10 times over, wages for the unionized workers actually declined slightly. The hourly wage rate for the people who process, pasteurize and package the milk at the company’s dairies declined by 9 percent in real terms, according to union contract records. It is now about $23 an hour."

Sadly, until shareholders and the public at large demand that executive compensation be brought down from the stratosphere, these plutocrats will continue on their merry way -- and the American middle class will continue to decline.

There's nothing better than being a father.

It's Why We Call Them "Rethugs," Cont'd.

We've noted in the past that Rethuglicans are known for their attempts to suppress minority votes. From fake leaflets telling voters they can vote after election day, spreading false information about documentation needed, to actual physical intimidation at the polling sites, this has been a Rethug stock in trade for many years. Suppression of Democratic-leaning minority and youth votes is clearly behind Rethug efforts nationally to require State (not student) IDs or to limit early voting. Many minority citizens rely on public transportation and do not have driver's licenses.

In Maryland, the State Prosecutor has won indictments from a grand jury that charge two Rethug officials working for "Beatle Bob" Erlich's unsuccessful campaign for Governor in 2010 with attempting to suppress the black vote. The two are charged with authorizing a robocall to thousands of black voters on election day saying, in essence, "don't worry, stay home, the election's over, we're way ahead" long before polls closed.

This is the essence of Rethuglican political strategy, from Murray Chotiner to Lee Atwater to Karl Rove. Deny citizens their right to vote to ensure your hold on power.

Weekend Song

(h/t Ya-Ya)

Letter of the Week

"In his June 13 op-ed column ["Waiting for 2013"], Fred Hiatt struggled to find both political parties at equal fault for the debt stalemate. After the release of Republican Paul Ryan's long-term budget plan, Mr. Hiatt wrote, 'the president has stuck to the position, belied by his own budget numbers, that his vision of government is affordable without raising taxes on anyone but the rich.'

"In fact, as The Post reported, the president, in an April 13 speech on the national debt, released a deficit plan that targeted $3 in spending cuts for every dollar in new revenue.

"President Obama can be accused of many things, but failure to meet the other party halfway on the budget is not among them. The vast majority of Republicans, meanwhile, have sworn an oath to raise no additional revenue, a position wholly at odds with any serious attempt to fix the deficit.

"So why the equal treatment? Time-honored journalistic convention lets a writer assume a position of neutrality by sharing blame equally between disputing sides. But at moments of deepening political asymmetry -- as in this country today, with a rising radical wing on the political right -- that approach misses the mark."

-- Letter to the editor, WaPo, June 17, from Richard N. Mott of Arlington, VA. My only quibble with this spot-on analysis is that I suspect it's journalistic cowardice rather than convention that motivates Hiatt and his fellow Villagers. They're ignoring the biggest political story of the last 25 years: the radicalization of the Republican Party.