A federal judge’s ruling clears the way for Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s re-election to be certified by the state of Alaska tomorrow and for her to take her seat in the new Congress.
Iowa’s Gov.-elect Terry Branstad (R) is staying conspicuously silent on the move to impeach four of the state’s Supreme Court justices for ruling in favor of gay marriage.
Two extremely depressing pieces I’ve seen recently about the situation in Israel. This post by Jeff Goldberg. And this oped by Majallie Whbee in the Jerusalem Post. In the latter case, the critical context is the the fact that Whbee is an Israeli Druze (an ethno-religious group with a strong historic alliance with Zionism) who until a few years ago was a member of the Likud. Now he’s an MK with Kadima.
All this for the heroin of the settlements.
Late Update: TPM Reader JE sends in these recent comments from David Remnick.
As many of you know, CPAC (Conservative Political Action Committee Conference) is the premier conservative event of the year held in DC. You can see scenes from the 2010 event here (1, 2 & 3) and 2009 here.
But this year there’s a brewing controversy over the organizers’ decision to allow the gay Republican group GOProud to attend, with a couple high profile groups already refusing to attend.
I noticed an article yesterday in World Net Daily about how President Obama was considering giving Manhattan back to the Indians. And our Jill Rayfield finds that it seems to be the beginning of a new meme on the right.
Apropos of our earlier post on whether there are gays in the SEALs and special forces generally, TPM Reader MT sends in the following …
My wife had a friend in college who was ex-Navy, but was generally pretty vague about what he did in the service. He was also pretty vague about the circumstances of his leaving the service (was he just done, or was he kicked out?), but he was gay and out. Well, as out as a fairly private person in 1990s Mississippi would be. Anyway, their town had just one gay bar, and there was a rash of gay bashings happening. The gang was making plans one Friday night, and he demurred, saying “I think I’m going to go downtown tonight.”
Republicans considering hitting the ground running with vote on phony “death panels” in 2011.
More and more anti-DADT Repeal are focusing on the “shower issue” as the next fight in their battle. Repeal advocates don’t think they’re going to get very far.
House Republicans are loosening the rules that allow using ‘budget reconciliation’ to increase the federal deficit. The key is that deficits created by tax cuts are permissible but those created by spending hikes are not.
Folks who got their audio book version of President Bush’s new memoir Decisions Points on Christmas were surprised to see chapter headings like “Bushit” and “Innocent Children Die” when they popped the CD into their computers on Christmas morning.