Palin and Bachmann need to read a history book

The brain power of two of the leading potential Republican presidential nominees, half-term Alaska Governor Sarah Palin and bat shit crazy Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, is underwhelming.

Bachmann, who apparently speaks for the teabaggers, gave the teabagger response to the President’s State of the Union address last week. Why I have no idea. But in one of her more notable quotes on the Founding Fathers she claimed, “the very founders that wrote those documents worked tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States….Men like John Quincy Adams, who would not rest until slavery was extinguished in the country.”

There are, of course, lots of problems with that harebrained statement. About a third of the signers of the Declaration of Independence were slaveholders, as were many delegates to the Constitutional Convention, so the fact is many founders worked tirelessly to make sure slavery continued. Not only that, but John Quincy Adams was not a Founding Father.

Perhaps she got him mixed up with his father, the second President John Adams, who was a Founding Father.

After playing the victim after the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona, Palin appeared on the propaganda arm of the GOP, Faux News, last week where she didn’t have to answer any tough questions from real journalists. She gave her take on the SOU address, and she went on a ridiculous rant on the President’s use of the term “Sputnik moment” that embarrassed the U.S. that served as a wake up call that led to the U.S. putting the first man on the moon in 1969.

The name of the SOU speech was “Winning the Future,” and Palin referred it as “one of those WTF moments,” for what The Fuck. This woman wants to be president? It seems she wants to be Ann Coulter.

“That was another one of those WTF moments, when he so often repeated this Sputnik moment that he would aspire Americans to celebrate,” she said. “And he needs to remember that what happened back then with the former communist USSR and their victory in that race to space, yes, they won, but they also incurred so much debt at the time that it resulted in the inevitable collapse of the Soviet Union.”

Now we know why Palin couldn’t tell Katie Couric what she read. It appears not much, and it most definitely was not a history book or a dictionary. The word is inspire, not aspire.

No, the USSR did not win the space race. They managed to put the first satellite into orbit in 1957, but the U.S. took up the challenge and won the space race. In the process, President Kennedy inspired many young people to become engineers and scientists and made the U.S. the world leader in technology for years.

The fact is the Soviet Union fell in 1991, but it was because of a variety of economic and political issues. The biggest reasons were because of the nuclear arms race that almost bankrupted the U.S. in the process and the millions of dollars and manpower it poured into Afghanistan. I hope we don’t repeat the same mistake.

The real death panels are in Arizona

The false, debunked talking point of so-called “death panels” invented by the right and popularized by former half-term Alaska Governor and failed GOP Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin to kill health insurance reform was a bad fairy tale, but it appears there are real death panels, at least in Arizona.

According to CBS News, second person denied transplant coverage by Arizona under a state budget cut has died this month after Republican Gov. Jan Brewer and the Republican-led Legislature reduced Medicaid coverage for transplants under cuts included to help close a shortfall in the state budget.

Republicans are right in saying that U.S. has one of the best health care systems in the world, but the problem is that only those who can afford it have access to it. That’s what the historic health care insurance reform passed last March was all about, access.

A lack of health care coverage has led to the death of millions of Americans, but this latest example has only led to two. But we can expect more deaths.
Dr. Rainer Gruessner, chair of the University of Arizona Surgery Department, said as many as 30 Arizona transplant patients will die because of this cut this year.
What’s even more disgusting is we are talking about $1.4 million of funding. If you divide $1.4 million by 30 that means each life is worth only $46,000 to Brewer and her death panels. It’s sad that in a budget in excess of $8 billon, they can’t find $1.4 million to save lives.

Those are the real death panels.

Palin plays the victim; no questions please

“Have you no sense of decency at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”

That quote is from Joseph Welch, the lead counsel for the United States Army while it was under investigation by Joseph McCarthy's Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations for Communist activities delivered to McCarthy in June of 1954, but it could also apply to former half-term Alaska Governor Sarah Palin after she broke her silence on Wednesday over the shooting on Sunday of Democratic U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona that killed six people and wounded 13 others by a mentally disturbed college student with anti-government views.

To quote Palin, she didn't retreat, she reloaded and released a statement, of course, on her Facebook page, saying, “But, especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible.”

She also refused, again, to take any responsibility for the possible harm her violent rhetoric and images could provoke in someone who is unbalanced. While she personally probingly didn’t have any effect on the shooter, the violent and hateful anti-government rhetoric from the right most likely did.

Giffords had been targeted by Palin’s PAC after Giffords voted for health insurance reform. Palin had circulated a "hit list" – scrubbed from her web site immediately after the shooting - of political targets, which included Giffords. A map had been circulated with target crosshairs placed over Giffords’ district and others.
Giffords herself had expressed concern over Palin’s actions after her office was vandalized after the health insurance vote last March.

In the seven and a half minutes video Palin released, instead of talking responsibility for her actions, Palin acted as if she was a victim. I would just once like see her submit to an actual interview with a real journalist.

Annual list of banished words ‘repudiates’ former half-term Alaska Governor

Happy New Year, and with the New Year comes the annual “List of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Misuse, Overuse and General Uselessness” by Lake Superior State University.

The Upper Peninsula public university, one of 15 public universities in Michigan, released the 36th annual list, and it was not kind to the half-term former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin. It included a few of her favorite mangled and misused words, like “refudiate" and “mama grizzlies.”

LSSU's popular list began on Jan. 1, 1976, when former LSSU Public Relations Director Bill Rabe and a group of friends each contributed a few expressions that they disliked to form the first list. After that, the nominations stacked up for future lists and Rabe's group, known then as The Unicorn Hunters, didn't have to make up its own list again. LSSU receives well over 1,000 nominations annually through its website.

Here is the 2011 list:
REFUDIATE
"Adding this word to the English language simply because a part-time politician lacks a spell checker on her cell phone is an action that needs to be repudiated." Dale Humphreys, Muskegon, Mich.
Kuahmel Allah of Los Angeles, Calif. wants to banish what he called 'Sarah Palin-isms': "Let's 'refudiate' them on the double!"

MAMA GRIZZLIES
"Unless you are referring to a scientific study of Ursus arctos horribilis , this analogy of right-wing female politicians should rest in peace." Mark Carlson, Sault Ste. Marie, Mich.

MAN UP
"A stupid phrase when directed at men. Even more stupid when directed at a woman, as in 'Alexis, you need to man up and join that Pilates class!'" Sherry Edwards, Clarkston, Mich.

VIRAL
"Often used to describe the spreading of items on the Internet i.e. 'The video went viral.' It is overused. I have no objection to this word's use as a way to differentiate a (viral) illness from bacterial." Jim Cance, Plainwell, Mich.

EPIC
More than one nominator says the use of 'epic' has become an epic annoyance.
"Cecil B. DeMille movies are epic. Internet fallouts and opinions delivered in caps-lock are not. 'Epic fail,' 'epic win', 'epic (noun)' -- it doesn't matter; it needs to be banished until people recognize that echoing trite, hyperbolic Internet phrases in an effort to look witty or intelligent actually achieves the opposite." Kim U., Des Moines, Iowa.

FAIL
One nominator says, "what originally may have been a term for a stockbroker's default is now abused by today's youth as virtually any kind of 'failure.' Whether it is someone tripping, a car accident, a costumed character scaring the living daylights out a kid, or just a poor choice in fashion, these people drive me crazy thinking that anything that is a mistake is a 'fail.' They fail proper language!"

WOW FACTOR
"This buzzword is served up with a heaping of cliché factor and a side order of irritation. But the lemmings from cable-TV cooking, whatever design and fashion shows keep dishing it out. I miss the old days when 'factor' was only on the math-and-science menu." Dan Muldoon, Omaha, Neb.

A-HA MOMENT
"All this means is a point at which you understand something or something becomes clearer. Why can't you just say that?" Audrey Mayo, Killeen, Tex.

BACK STORY
"This should be on the list of words that don't need to exist because a perfectly good word has been used for years. In this case, the word is 'history,' or, for those who must be weaned, 'story.'" Jeff Williams, Sherwood, Ariz.

BFF
"These chicks call each other BFF (Best Friends Forever) and it lasts about 10 minutes. Now there's BFFA (Best Friends For Awhile), which makes more sense." Kate Rabe Forgach, Ft. Collins, Colo.


THE AMERICAN PEOPLE
"These politicians in Congress say 'the American People' as part of what seems like every statement they make! I see that others have noticed it, too, as various websites abound, including an entry on Wikipedia." Paul M. Girouard, St. Louis, Mo.

I'M JUST SAYIN'
"'A phrase used to diffuse any ill feelings caused by a preceded remark,' according to the Urban Dictionary. Do we really need a qualifier at the end of every sentence? People feel uncomfortable with a comment that was made and then 'just sayin'' comes rolling off the tongue? It really doesn't change what was said, I'm just sayin'." Becky of Sault Ste. Marie, Mich.

FACEBOOK / GOOGLE as verbs
"Facebook is a great, addicting website. Google is a great search engine. However, their use as verbs causes some deep problems. As bad as they are, the trend can only get worse, i.e. 'I'm going to Twitter a few people, then Yahoo the movie listings and maybe Amazon a book or two." Jordan of Waterloo, Ont.

LIVE LIFE TO THE FULLEST
"It's an absurdity followed by a redundancy. First, things are full or they're not; there is no fullest. Second, 'live life' is redundant. Finally, the expression is nauseatingly overused. What's wrong with enjoying life fully or completely? The phrase makes me gag. I'm surprised it hasn't appeared on the list before." Sylvia Hall, Williamsport, Penn.

Palin wins tough fight to be named ‘Misinformer of the Year’

In a year of stiff competition, former half-term Alaska Governor and current Faux “News” contributor Sarah Palin was chosen as “Misinformer of the Year” by the media watchdog group Media Matters.

The rightwing has had a great year misinforming, lying and spinning, and it culminated in the November elections, but Palin stood head and shoulders above the usual crowed. Past “winners” include Faux “news” madman Glenn Beck and Faux “News” hatemonger Sean Hannity.

“This year, Palin stood out for her sheer ability to dominate our national conversation and draw the attention of the entire news media to her factually challenged claims and vicious attacks. She has blurred the line completely between media figure and political activist.”

“From spreading lies about "death panels" to cropping Obama's comments about "American exceptionalism," from her comfortable perch at Fox News to her self-promoting books and reality show, Palin has truly broken new ground in misinformation.”

To show how her misinformation has taken hold, just last night I got into a “debate” with a trio of vicious right-wingers on Facebook where “death panels” and health care rationing was claimed.

Last month the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced that new evidence suggests the risks outweigh the benefits of Avastin for treating metastatic breast cancer, and the FDA has now begun the process of withdrawal of the popular advanced breast cancer treatment.

One right-winger used that as proof of death panels and rationing. But that’s not surprising, based on a recent study by scholars at the University of Maryland. They conducted a survey on the impact of the news business on good citizenship, and they found that viewers of Faux “news” were the most misinformed. Right-wingers prove that every day.

One reason they are so misinformed may be how Faux spins the news, and in fact they just got caught at it. Earlier this month the Fox News Washington managing editor was caught trying to slant the news in emails to staffers. It just happens it was two subjects right-wingers are the most misinformed on, health care and climate change.

Dingell makes clean sweep of newspaper endorsements

The Dean of the U.S. House of Representatives - Rep. John Dingell, D-Dearborn, - made it a clean sweep of endorsements from newspapers covering the 15th Congressional District when the News Herald, the voice of Downriver, gave Dingell the nod.
That makes it a perfect six for six, and the News Herald joins the Toledo Blade, the Detroit Free Press, the Detroit News, the Ann Arbor online News and the Monroe Evening News in singing Dingell’s praises.

“…We’d argue that Dingell has been Downriver’s only true voice in Congress since departing Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (D-13th District) and another veteran, U.S. Rep. John Conyers (D-14th District) — whose districts moved into parts of Downriver and Dearborn as a result of redistricting — essentially are Detroiters who have few or no ties to these communities,” the paper said. “Dingell, the longest-serving member of the House, has represented this area for 55 years. And, he continues to take interest in and aid Downriver communities that no longer are in his district, but that he used to represent.”

The only support opponent Rob Steele has garnered has been that of teabaggers, and the News Herald recognized that.

“Conservatives are going to vote for Steele. Liberals and mainstream voters are going to cast ballots for Dingell. We believe our endorsement represents those in the middle.”

Steele did pick up one endorsement that will matter to no one but some teabaggers. However, precious few of his endorsements have even been from people inside Michigan, let alone the 15th District. Failed Alaska Governor and Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin announced today she is endorsing him. That might have been a big deal in the primary election, but a week away from a General Election doesn’t mean a whole lot. Maybe that will help Steele lose by 17 percentage points instead of 19.

An endorsement from someone who has never completed a term she was elected to, to some who has never ran for public office. It should carry a lot of weight, but not with voters.

Teabagger candidates take refusing to talk to the press to new heights

It’s pretty sad that federal Republican teabagger candidates refuse to take to the press; instead taking the advice of queen teabgger Sarah Palin and “talking through Faux News,” but fellow Alaskan teabgger Senate candidate Joe Miller took it a step further and arrested and handcuffed a member of the conservative mainstream media.

Palin, Miller, Sharon Angle and Jan Brewer in Nevada, Christine O'Donnell in Delaware and Rand Paul in Kentucky are staying away from real media in favor of the propaganda arm of the GOP, but they are even avoiding some hosts on faux in favor of more friendly interviewers like sean haity as they run away from their previous extremists positions for the General Election, such as killing Social Security and Medicare and privatizing the VA.

Even U.S. Rep. John Dingell’s opponent is running away from his primary election position on Social Security and Medicare, even though it is in print for everyone to see.

But Miller takes the cake. Alaska Dispatch staffer Tony Hopfinger dared to ask Miller about his record as attorney for the Fairbanks North Star Borough. According to published reports, Miller said last week he would no longer talk about his personal background. Miller was disciplined for violating the municipality’s ethics policy in 2008 when he was a part-time borough attorney. Miller used borough computers for political purposes in 2008 when he organized a failed effort to oust state Republican Party Chairman Randy Ruedrich.

Apparently, Miller thinks his conduct as a public official is his “personal background.”

As a former reporter for more than a decade, I can tell you reporters are treated with a little more respect because what they say or write reaches so many people. If a reporter gets treated so badly, you can just imagine how badly a constituent will get treated. Why does a Senate candidate even need private security? I have seen Michigan Senators Carl Levin and Debbie Stabenow show up at events alone and at most with a staffer. Considering how hateful and violent some teabaggers are it appears they have more guts than Miller.

There is no doubt that the teabggers are dragging the Republican Party off the cliff, and every reasonable or moderate Republican that wants to clean up the mess left by Bush is drummed out of the party.

It’s telling that every single Michigan Republican statewide candidate but GOP Gubernatorial candidate Rick “The Chief Executive Outsourcer (CEO)” Snyder appeared at another teabagger rally on Saturday in Livonia; including the candidates for Attorney General, Supreme Court, Secretary of State and the candidates opposing Dingell and U.S. Reps. Mark Schauer, D-Battle Creek, and Gary Peters, D-Bloomfied Township.

Another corporate and GOP lobbying firm sponsored teabagger bus tour was launched by Palin on Monday, and it will only stop in places where Republicans have a chance to take Democratic seats, including the districts of Schauer and Peters here in Michigan.

Do you remember the days not so long ago when teabaggers claimed that the “movement” was nonpartisan and “not about Democrats or Republicans?” So long ago; almost two years.

If you need further evidence of the radical extremist direction of the GOP, we have the words of Palin at the event.

“Heaven forbid the GOP machine strays from this message," said the unsuccessful Republican vice presidential candidate. “If so, the GOP is through."

On that, I agree with Palin.

Teabagger convention launches a thousand conspiracy theories

The media was focused on Sarah Palin at the big, expensive tea party convention in Nashville last weekend, but apparently, her ridiculous attacks on President Obama and the Democrats were mild compared to some other disgusting attacks from tea baggers.

Supposedly, the teabagger movement is all about bipartisan anger at big government and out of control spending, but that’s simply not the case. As I have said before, this is all too familiar to the anti-government rhetoric I saw in the mid-1990s when I went to work as a reporter in Lenawee County after being out of Michigan for a number of years serving in the military.

This militia movement is back, and we are seeing the same old anti-government, “New World Order” rhetoric and government conspiracies around every corner. The only thing these two eras have in common is that there is a Democratic President. This has always been a fringe group, but as the Republican Party veers ever farther to the right, the Militia, white supremacists and other, anti-government, rightwing hate groups are becoming mainstream.

Jonathan Kay, a conservative columnist, attended the convention as a participant, and even he was shocked at the anti-government rhetoric and conspiracy theories he saw.

“It has become clear to me that the movement is dominated by people whose vision of the government is conspiratorial and dangerously detached from reality,” Kay wrote. “It's more John Birch than John Adams.”

“Steve Malloy, author of Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Ruin Your Life, kicked off the first full day of conference proceedings by warning that Obama and his minions are conspiring to control every aspect of Americans' lives—the colors of their cars, the kind of toilet paper they use, how much time they spend in the shower, the temperature of their homes—all under the guise of U.N. greenhouse-gas-reduction schemes. "Obama isn't a U.S. socialist," Malloy thundered. "He's an international socialist. He envisions a one-world government."

There was “Texas radio host Alex Jones, whose documentary, The Obama Deception, claims Obama's candidacy was a plot by the leaders of the New World Order to "con the American people into accepting global slavery.” There’s that New World Order BS again.

There’s “Judge” Roy Moore, who is a darling of the right for, as an Alabama Supreme Court Justice, refused the orders of a Federal judge to take down a display of the Ten Commandments, in violation of the Constitution. In Nashville, “Moore warned, among other things, of "a U.N. guard stationed in every house.”

Then we have the most disgusting and racist remarks by former U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colorado, who wants to go back to the deep south of the 1960s when African-Americans were barred from voting by a number of ways, including a literacy test. He called President Barack Obama a "committed Socialist idealogue" who was elected because "we do not have a civics, literacy test before people can vote."

The most disturbing thing is people actually cheered those remarks. So much for the alleged progress in race relations.

Right-wingers have new heroine and VP candidate in Miss California

Right-wingers have a new heroine; a Josephine the Plumber, if you will.

That heroine is Miss California Carrie Prejean. She was the runner up at the Miss USA pageant on Sunday, and she is claiming her answer in the exciting Q & A section of the pageant cost her the crown.

I have no idea if that’s true, but I certainly hope that’s the case.

After picking his name in a fish bowl, she was asked by judge Perez Hilton whether gay marriage should be legalized in all 50 states. She stammered, and then replied, "In my country, and in my family, I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman."

I guess some people don’t cotton to discrimination. Again, I have no idea if that answer cost her the crown, but like I said, I hope it did. If the judges can’t take their answers into account, then do away with that portion of the competition and replace it with something else.

But her answer earned her more fame and adulation from the right than the person who actual won the crown; who happened to be Miss North Carolina, Kristen Dalton, by the way.

We will see Prejean’s face all over Faux “News,” and considering the qualifications of the last GOP Vice-presidential candidate, I expect to see her in politics. After all, Sarah Palin failed to make it to the Miss USA pageant after Miss Wasilla failed to win the Miss Alaska crown.

Quote of the Week:OMG you guys are jerks

This week's Quote of the Week sounds like it can from the captain of the high school cheerleading team, but, surprisingly, it came from former Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin.

She was lashing out at a report from Faux News that she did not know Africa was a continent and what countries were part of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The reports from the McCain campaign were just confirming what glimpses we saw from the very few media interviews she did. Palin, of course, used the old GOP standby of blaming the media for her lack of intelligence, or maybe for daring to report it.

The weird thing is that during the campaign the press could not get within 10 feet of her to ask an impromptu question, but after the election I can't turn on the TV and not see her face. Granted, most of her appearances are on Entertainment Tonight and other show biz type shows, but isn't her 15 minutes up? We can only hope.

Her excuse for the more than $150,000 spent on her for clothes and makeup is laughable. Republican Party lawyers are still trying to determine exactly what clothing was purchased for Palin at such high-end stores as Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus, what was returned and what has become of the rest.

But here is our Quote of the Week:

"That’s cruel. It’s mean-spirited. It’s immature. It’s unprofessional, and those guys are jerks if they came away with it, taking things out of context, and then tried to spread something on national news.”

Quote of the Week: What part of America do you live in

I wonder what part of America I live in? The pro-America or the anti-America part?

We have just one more week of ridiculous, dumb and disgusting quotes from Republican Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin, so I chose her as the Quote of the Week. We know the Republican strategy of fear and finding an issue that divides the country has worked so well for Republicans in the past, but it will fall short this year.

Back to the all important question of what part of the country I live in. I live in a Blue state, but I wonder if Howell is a small enough of small town to qualify as the "real America" and the "Pro-America Area?" I also wonder what I have to do to be patriotic? I pay my taxes, I served in the military and I vote in every election. Perhaps someone can tell me what else I can do.

"We believe that the best of America is in the small towns that we get to visit, and in the wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard working very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation." Republican Presidential Candidate Sarah Palin at a fundraiser in Greensboro, NC. on Oct. 16.

GOP and their allies are pulling out all the stops to bust unions

With Senator Barack Obama taking a wider leader after last night's debate and poll results showing that the Democrats will maintain control of the U.S. House and Senate Democrats poised to pick up a veto proof 60-seat majority in the Senate, Republicans and their allies are panicking and doing their best to fool people over the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA).

The Grand Oil Party and their bankrupt cronies are using the false mantra "Protect the workers' right to a secret ballot" to pull the wool over people's eyes. Michigan GOP Chair Saul Anuzis uses that line in his daily dose of propaganda that he posts on his "blog." No wonder he does not allow comments on that thing he calls a blog.

The U.S. House passed the EFCA with a clear majority vote of 228-183 in March of 2007, but the minority Senate Republicans blocked a vote in the Senate.

Under current U.S. law, if more than 50 percent of employees certify their desire for representation, then a union can choose to form using card check procedures by signing a card and the employer would have to recognize the bargaining unit. However, the employer does not have to recognize the card check petition of the majority and can veto the majority and require a secret-ballot vote overseen by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), and it does every single time. Under the proposed Employee Free Choice Act, an employer could only challenge a card check petition if fraud or illegal coercion was alleged.

Once the workers indicate they want a union, the employer calls for an election, and then the intimidation, threats of closure, threats of firing and actual firing begin. Many companies have special teams or flying squads that come in and work to defeat the vote. That includes actually firing organizers, forcing employees to go to mandatory meetings where the union is bashed and threats are made to actual physical violence. They also offer token raises and befits that can easily be rescinded after the union threat has passed.

Union organizers are left to try and reach employers with flyers as they zoom out of the parking lot while the employer has unfettered access.

A union is the most democratic institution in the workplace where the leaders and the contract are voted on. What the GOP and its lackeys want to do is to keep the playing field title to their advantage, and the Employee Free Choice Act works to level it.

In addition to the MIGOP propaganda, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce has been flooding the airwaves with ads that parrot the GOP mantra in an attempt to stifle union organizing efforts. The Chamber has long been leading the cause of union busting, and this is just one more link in the chain. It's funny that GOP VP nominee Sarah "Spiro" Palin is trotting out her husband's union membership at rallies, but she is leading the charge to bust unions. She knows that the majority of Americans know unions helped create the middle class and raised the standard of living for all.

Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, has gone so far as telling its employees not to vote for Democrats in the 2008 election, especially Obama. The giant, anti-union and anti-worker retailer uses its regular meetings with employees to drive that message home. Wal-Mart is one company notorious for flying squads that come in at the slightest whiff of workers organizing.

The EFCA also addresses companies simply refusing to bargain in good faith and dragging their feet until workers must come back to work or take what ever is offered or starve. If the company and union are not able to reach agreement within 90 days, either party may ask the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS) to step in. If after 30 days of mediation the FMCS cannot resolve the dispute, it gets referred to an arbitrator whose ruling is binding for two years.

The EFCA also protects those workers who were targeted by anti-union employers who fire them for union activities. There are currently no consequences for a company who illegally fires an employee who supports the union. The new law will require the NLRB to take legal action to immediately reinstate workers fired for union activity. Companies that punish or fire employees for lawful union activity would have to pay triple damages.

Palin shares abuse of power gene with Bush Administration

If we need any more proof that a Grampy McSame administration will be nothing but a repeat of the crooked, secretive and incompetent Bush Administration, we now have the results of the investigation of the Alaska Legislative Council that found that Sarah “Spiro” Palin violated state ethics laws and abused her power by trying to have her former brother-in-law fired as a state trooper.

Like Bush, Palin ignored the Constitution and did whatever it took to get what she wanted, and we see the absolute vindictiveness against people she and her husband perceived as wronged them. Granted, this is not illegal wiretapping, torture of prisoners or starting an illegal and unnecessary war, but given how small Alaska is, this is the best - or worse - Palin could do.

Could you imagine the havoc Palin and her husband Todd would cause with the power of the IRS and the already politicized Department of Justice in their hands? It’s as scary as having a totally inexperienced person like Palin as the Commander-in-chief.

Palin is also following the example of the incompetent Bush Administration by releasing a much anticipated report on a Friday when it’s hoped not as many people are paying attention and news rooms only have skeleton crews.

According to the Associated Press, the report said the inquiry looked into Palin's dismissal of Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan, who was fired because he resisted pressure to fire a state trooper involved in a bitter divorce and custody battle with the governor's sister. The retired prosecutor hired to conduct the investigation, said Monegan's firing was lawful. But the pressure Palin and her husband put on him was not.

According to the report, it was her husband, Todd, who led the charge. “Todd Palin had extraordinary access to the governor's office and her closest advisers and he used that access to try to get Wooten fired Gov. Palin knowingly "permitted Todd to use the Governor's office and the resources of the Governor's office, including access to state employees, to continue to contact subordinate state employees in an effort to find some way to get Trooper Wooten fired," Branchflower's report reads.

It’s kind of funny, Palin is McSame’s attack dog spreading hateful lies and whipping the crowds up into a frenzy of hatred, and apparently Todd Palin is the attack dog for his wife.

The McSame campaign failed in its attempt to block the report until after the election, but they immediately tried to spin it as politically motivated and an attempt to tarnish the GOP VP candidate. That ignores, of course, the fact that the investigation began when no one had any idea Palin was even being considered as a VP candidate.

This is just more proof that conservatives cannot govern. I’m reading a great book by John Dean, the former Richard Nixon legal counsel, called “Broken Government.” The gist of the book is how Republican rule has destroyed the three branches of government.

This report shatters the farce that Palin is a reformer, and what she really is, is the queen of earmarks, and Dean’s book highlights how the Grand Oil Party used earmarks as bribes.

In the book, Dean talks about how earmarks increased under GOP rule and how it was used to pay off lobbyists for their role in the K Street scandal. Dean says over the past 50 years there have been 9,242 earmarks in highway bills. Of those, 8,505 or 92 percent have been inserted in the three highway bills enacted since Republicans took the House 10 years ago prior to 2007. That’s how we got the infamous bridge to nowhere that Palin lied about when she said she said, “Thanks but no thanks” failing to revel she took the money anyway.

Republicans getting increasingly desperate and turn campaigns even uglier

Extremist Tim Walberg is becoming a little unhinged as he desperately tries to chip away at the lead of Sen. Mark Schauer, D-Battle Creek, in the race for the 7th Congressional seat in the U.S. House.

Walberg's most recent lie-filled ad compares Schauer to Michigan filmmaker Michael Moore, and it calls Schauer "dangerous." This is the same Academy Award-winning filmmaker Michael Moore who founded and is the president of the extremely successful Traverse City Film Festival. Moore has done far more for Michigan than Walberg ever has.

Walberg then stoops to the old, reliable Grand Oil Party tactic of fear and discrimination by making the false claim that Schauer voted to give illegal immigrants' driver's licenses. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

Folks, no illegal immigrant can get a driver's license in Michigan. There was controversy last year over this issue when Attorney General Mike Cox issued a totally unneeded opinion on December 27, 2007 that says driver's licenses can only be issued to permanent residents of the state. That was already the case, but in his early campaign for Governor, Cox issued this opinion to please the base. This spring the Legislature had to correct it because it denied a license to the thousands of foreign nationals living and working legally in Michigan.

The false attack ad against Schauer referenced House Bill 5497. The bill was passed on February 7, 2002 when Schauer was in the Michigan House. It passed the House, but the Senate did not even take it up. Like Cox's misguided and unnecessary opinion, it was not needed, and it claimed it would ban illegal immigrants from getting a license. It would do the same thing as Cox's opinion; deny a license to the thousands of foreign nationals living and working legally in Michigan. Those against the bill were the Michigan Catholic Conference, Catholic Social Services Refugee Services and The Michigan AFL-CIO.

There was also a blurb about Schauer voting for the gas tax, but I have no idea what he is talking about.

The attack ads by the GOP is a disturbing trend. We have seen GOP VP candidate Spiro Palin make the false claim that Sen. Barack Obama is "paling around with a terrorist," because he served on two nonprofit boards with Bill Ayers, a Distinguished Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a former Vietnam anti-war activist.

It seems ironic that no one is bringing up Grampy McSame and Spiro's connections to a terrorist and an anti-American group, so I will. Convicted felon G. Gordon Liddy has made four contributions totaling $5,000 to Grampy's campaigns. Grampy went on Liddy's radio show during the presidential campaign and Liddy greeted him as "an old friend," and McCain replied. "I'm proud of you, I'm proud of your family. Liddy - of Watergate fame, or better infamous - was convicted to 20 years in prison after he was convicted of conspiracy, burglary and illegal wiretapping. As a Watergate burglar, he concocted several plots that included firebombing the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., kidnapping anti-war protest organizers and transporting them to Mexico and luring mid-level Democratic campaign officials to a house boat in Baltimore where they would be secretly photographed in compromising positions with call girls. In sharp contrast, Ayers has not been convicted of anything.

McSame's nasty and disrespectful behavior at Tuesday's debate was unprecedented when he called Obama "that one there."

The Grampy McSame and Palin rallies are becoming increasingly ugly, and the pair are close to inciting their followers to violence. At recent rallies, the pair have stooped to calling Obama a terrorist, and the crowd has responded with cries of "terrorist" and "kill him." McSame and Palin must put a stop to this and denounce it instead of pretending they did not hear it.

Quote of the Week: Putin's head attacks Alaska

This week's Quote of the Week is dedicated to the VP debate Thursday night where Democratic VP Candidate Joe Biden scored a clear victory over Grand Oil Party candidate Sarah Palin.

The bar and expectations were set so low for Palin that many people actually thing it was a tie and that she even won. This was a woman who was making references to Civil War General George McClellan, I think. I guess she wanted him to move on Richmond.

Nielsen just released the ratings for the debate, and for the 55 local markets where Nielsen has electronic meters, the overall rating was 45.0. That's significantly higher than the Obama/McSame debate last week that had a rating of only 31.6. I think people were either waiting to see if Palin would repeat the disaster that was the Katie Couric interviews, or they thought they were tuning in to a Saturday Night Live skit string Tina Fey.

Here are a couple of doozies from Palin. If she ever faces the media and answers a question or two, we will have lots more to choose from. But I don't see the McSame handlers allowing that to happen.

"As for that VP talk all the time, I'll tell you, I still can't answer that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the VP does every day?" Interview with CNBC's "Kudlow & Co," July 2008.

"As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where– where do they go? It’s Alaska. It's just right over the border." Explaining why Alaska's proximity to Russia gives her foreign policy experience, interview with CBS's Katie Couric, Sept. 24, 2008.

Debate shows Palin missed her calling

After watching the Vice-Presidential debate last night, I got the impression GOP VP candidate Sarah Palin missed her calling: she should have stuck with reading baseball scores or better yet she would make an excellent happy talk meteorologist or a happy talk TV news anchor.

It just seemed a little creepy to me that the talk was about nuclear weapons, war and an economy where people are losing everything they spent a lifetime working for she was smiling and giggly and winking at the camera. Democratic candidate Sen. Joe Biden clearly won, but based on Palin's disastrous interviews with that tough interviewer Katie Couric, if Palin just completed a sentence without breaking into a Miss Teen South Carolina "such as the Iraq" speech, right-wingers will say she won.

In her closing remarks she took more shots at the media she is avoiding like the plague, saying she liked debates where there is no filter. I would like her to explain what filter she is talking about when a reporter simply asks her a question and simply plays the video. We know why she is avoiding the media because they will not allow her to duck questions like the debate moderator did, and she will not get softball questions like Couric served up.

I heard from a few women who were offended at her cutesy delivery on some very serious issues, even winking at the camera and giving shout outs to a school class. I have a hard time imagining her staring down Putin or some other dictator from across the table. I can, however, see Joe Biden doing it, and in fact he has looked Slobodan Milosevic in the eye and called him a war criminal.

The bottom line is Joe Biden is presidential, Sarah Palin is not.

Palin did not answer a single question the moderator posed. I don't think Jim Lehrer would have let her get away with that. She gave Biden a hard time about looking at the past when he pointed out Grampy McCame's support of Bush's failed policies, but she couldn't identify a single area where she or McSame would change Bush's economic or foreign policy positions. Her "say it ain't so, Joe," and her Reaganisqe "There you go again" lines were ridiculous.

If you were playing a drinking game where you took a shot when she said certain words, you would have been pretty drunk if you chose the word "maverick." That's why I was so happy when Biden debunked that one.

In an ABC-Washington Post poll released Thursday, six in 10 Americans said Palin lacked the experience to be an effective president; a third of those surveyed said they were less likely to vote for McCain because of her. I think this debate should increase those numbers.

Quote of the week:Fake pig outrage

This week's Quote of the Week is dedicates to the presidential ticket of Grampy McSame and Spiro Palin and their fake outrage.

You will recall that the McSame campaign came unglued recently when future President Barack Obama said McSame's policies were the same as Bush's failed polices but with a little lipstick to dress them up, using the old cliché that you can put lipstick on a pig but it's still a pig. The fake outrage came immediately from the right when they accused Obama of calling Palin a pig, based on her "joke" in her acceptance speech where she said she was a hockey mom and the only difference between pit bull and a hockey mom was lipstick.

But before Grampy launches into another made up controversy, he should have checked if he had said it, because he did, at least three times. The quote of the week is when he said it about then Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's health care plan. This time, McSame was referring directly to a woman, unlike Obama who was referring to McSame.

Was McSame calling Hillary pig? I doubt it. He just needs to remember when he flips and when he flops.

It’s vaguely, not vaguely, eerily reminiscent of what they tried in 1993. I think they put some lip stick on the pig, but it’s still a pig, John McCain, talking about Hillary Clinton’s health care plan.

Revived Quote of the Week feature highlights GOP VP pick

The recent open mike situation showed that right-wingers are just as appalled as the rest of the country is over the choice of the inexperienced and ethically-challenged Sarah "Spiro" Palin as the Republican Vice-Presidential nominee.

A new feature here at The Conservative Media is the Quote of the Week. This is similar to our Ann Coulter Quote of the week, but this will not always be as disgusting as those that come from the queen of hate. However, she may be featured on occasion. You never know what stupid, hateful crap will come out of her mouth.

This inaugural quote comes from conservative radio talk show host and self-styled family expert Laura Schlessinger where she talks about Grampy McSame's pandering pick of Palin as his running mate:

"I’m stunned - couldn’t the Republican Party find one competent female with adult children to run for Vice President with McCain? I realize his advisors probably didn’t want a “mature” woman, as the Democrats keep harping on his age. But really, what kind of role model is a woman whose fifth child was recently born with a serious issue, Down Syndrome, and then goes back to the job of Governor within days of the birth?
I am haunted by the family pictures of the Palins during political photo-ops, showing the eldest daughter, now pregnant with her own child, cuddling the family’s newborn."

Brewer squashes McCain’s false maverick claim

HOWELL -- Michigan Democrat Party Chair Mark Brewer was supposed to talk about the sweeping Reform Michigan Government Now ballot question Tuesday, but a decision by the Michigan Supreme Court to keep it off the ballot put a crimp in that.

“You all probably know by now that the Supreme Court tanked the speech he was going to give,” said retired Livingston County Circuit Court before Judge Daniel Burress, who introduced Brewer. “The court is not going to let Joe six-pack like us vote on it.”

A major topic of discussion was the state Supreme Court race between Cliff Taylor and Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Diane Marie Hathaway. Taylor leads the Republican majority of activist judges known as the “Gang of Four” that has been rated the worst court in the country.

Burress has his own view of the court, and it’s not good. He said he got a sense of the court’s disdain for the common person over a simple slip and fall case when a blind man slipped on ice and injured himself using the restroom. He said it was tossed out of court because the hazard was “preventable and obvious.”

“That’s the type pf ruling the court has used to throw cases out of court,” he said.

The comprehensive RMGN will amend the Michigan Constitution, and it will fundamentally change Michigan government. To name just a few of the many complex changes it will address, it cuts the Supreme Court Justices to five members, from seven, reduces the Court of Appeals by seven members and adds 10 circuit court judges. The House would be cut to 82 members from the current 110 and the Senate to 28 from 38 and half of the Senate seats would be decided at each election. It also cuts pay and benefits of legislators.

“We have some fine state legislators, but they are not sharing the sacrifices everyone else is making,” Brewer said. “It’s about sharing sacrifice.”

A ballot question to have a constitutional convention will automatically be on the ballot in 2010, and Brewer was asked why not wait until then. Brewer said it would take at least five years before any changes were seen, it would be too expensive and too partisan.

“We can’t wait, it’s too expensive, and too partisan,” he said.

Brewer had plenty to day about the McCain/Palin ticket.

“I really have to laugh when John McCain and Sarah Palin claim to be reformers,” he said. “He says he will fight the lobbyists, but he has Washington lobbyists running his campaign. “

He said the two have received massive amounts of money from big oil, and McCain’s claim to be a “maverick” is ridiculous.

“When he first came to Washington he was part of the Keating 5, a major scandal,” he said. “That wasn’t a very good start.”

He said Palin was vetted so badly by the McCain camp that news is breaking daily on her dismal record and questionable ethics. The most recent is she accepted per diem for travel when she worked at home.

“It’s our job to be the truth squad for the next two months,” he said.

Palin heaps on disgusting personal attacks that lack substance or truth

As the dust settles after the Grand Oil Party's long disgusting rant last night at the Republican National Convention, the facts are beginning to revel their stretching of the truth and outright lies.

Sarah Palin should be renamed Spiro Agnew for her attacks on the corporate media. When you do not have the issues on your side, you attack the media; and doing it for doing their job. Like Grampy McSame's campaign manager says, this election is not about the issues. Again, when you don't have the issues on your side, you attack.

I was shocked, although I should not have been, at the personal attacks and belittling of the Sens. Barack Obama and Joe Biden. I was also shocked at the way Palin demeaned Community Organizers. They work to help the poor, improve substandard housing and even advocate for the education of special needs children.

Calling her mean spirited seems charitable. I cannot wait for the debate between Palin and Biden. She's very good at reading a speech someone else wrote; after all, that was her brief career in TV "news." I was initially worried that after Biden kicked her butt in the debate, he would be accused of being a bully, but after her disgusting personal attacks last night, that goes out the window and the gloves should be off.

Rudy Giuliani's stand up routine was even more disgusting to watch. The ethically challenged mayor did not spare the lies. His maniacal laugh was also rather disturbing. Man, this guy's ego must be huge. The good news was we only heard the words 9/11 once from him.

The Associated Press has done a little fact checking, and maybe the conservative, corporate media is trying to make up for the poor job they did leading up to the unnecessary Iraq invasion.

Palins's claim that she did away with wasteful spending and championed to end the abuses of earmarks flies in the face of the fact she hired a lobbyist to go after earmarks when she was the mayor of a small Alaska town.

She also falsely claimed Sen. Barack Obama authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform in the Senate, ignoring, of course, his record. She also completely misrepresented his tax policy.

One the most insulting and obvious lies was from former GOP presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, claming Palin got "more votes running for mayor of the small town she served than Joe Biden got running for president of the United States."

Palin got 616 votes in the 1996 mayor's election, and got 909 in her 1999 re-election race, for a total of 1,525. Biden dropped out of the race after the Iowa caucuses, but he still got 76,165 votes in 23 states and the District of Columbia where he was on the ballot during the 2008 presidential primaries. I guess he describes to the GOP strategy if you're going to tell a lie, you might as well tell a big one.

The base may have enjoyed the disgusting performance, but I don't think the rest of Americans will appreciate it.