DOJ says no charges in the destruction of those CIA torture videotapes.
When Barney Frank and Henry Waxman both come out for Steny Hoyer, you gotta figure this one’s all wrapped up.
Both are important Pelosi allies, Waxman’s a fellow Californian (which is a bigger deal than people realize). And of course both big liberals.
Arizona Tea Partiers lash out against garbage collection socialism.
Fresh off his Tea Party election victory, Sen.-Elect Rand Paul embraces pork and says he’ll fight for Kentucky’s fair share of earmarks and federal spending projects.
With mounting evidence that Steny Hoyer may have built an insurmountable lead in the fight to be the next House Minority Whip, the number two in the Dem leadership, there’s been talk of some agreement to pave the way for an orderly transition, avoiding a divisive caucus election. But Jim Clyburn’s team is saying, no way. They’re going to fight it out until the vote.
It’s a little hard for me not to see this situation in the House as just a needless blow up that didn’t have to happen at all. Speaker Pelosi is apparently now trying to find a resolution of the fight for Minority Whip between Steny Hoyer and James Clyburn. But Clyburn’s people are telling us he’s not going to compromise. He wants a vote. And he’s apparently flying home this afternoon to South Carolina without any meetings scheduled with Pelosi or Hoyer. Read More
I’m listening to Stuart Varney on Fox News interviewing renowned economist Andrew Napolitano about how we need to return to the Gold Standard. But then the conversation seemed to veer in a bizarre direction and the two actually seemed to be talking about using gold as a common currency. As in, not an economy based on paper money backed by gold. But an economy based on gold. They even said something about new vending machines that are being set up where you can put in your dollars and get out a few grains of gold to take back to the bunker with you so you can still buy a Snickers Bar or shotgun ammo after the apocalypse or maybe just after Ron Paul becomes president and puts us back on the metallic barter system.
In writing a memoir and going on a publicity tour, George W. Bush isn’t doing anything that all his recent predecessors haven’t done. The main difference is Bush has a lot worse reputation to try to spin us into forgetting.
But part of the Bush rehabilitation spin is to pretend/deny that there’s any spinning going on. “I have zero desire to try to battle for reputation,” Bush told USA Today in an interview splashed across the front page and billed as his “first newspaper interview since leaving the presidency.” His denial that he’s battling for his reputation made it into the caption under the front-page photo (.pdf) of Bush looking wistful and repentant — even though Bush, the paper, and anyone with a pulse knows it to be false. Read More