Month: June 2012

New Study: Don’t Expect to Run Into Joe Biden at Subway

Trish
beemer
Not likely.

Ever since we looked around and noticed that America is pretty much like your Thanksgiving Day table when it comes to discussing politics, researchers have been fascinated with figuring out what makes liberals and conservatives, Democrats and Republicans, tea partiers and occupyers different.

A market research firm filled out the picture a little more this week, publishing a handful of brand preferences linked to relative blueness or redness.

The results, are, in some cases, counter-intuitive. For starters, Jeep was chosen the “most desired car” among Democrats, while BMW was the favorite of Republicans. As a Democrat, I want it noted I would have voted the other way. Twice, if they let me.

As for insurance companies, progressives picked um, Progressive, while conservatives went for Allstate. One can’t help but wonder if the names of these brands had something to do with the choices.

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Romney’s Appearance on ‘Face the Nation’ Sunday Will Be His First Non-Fox News Interview This Year

Jon Ponder

Mitt Romney rushes to do interviews with Fox News any time they’ll give him air time, but this Sunday, when he appears on CBS News’ “Face the Nation,” it will be the first interview he’s given a legitimate news outlet this year.

Here are five question we wish “Face the Nation” host Bob Schieffer would ask Romney:

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News Flash: God Still Does Not Exist

Buck Banks

In case you need 10 really good arguments against the existence of god, here they are.

It is not up to atheists to prove that God does not exist. It is up to believers to prove that he does. And in the absence of any good, solid evidence or arguments in favor of God’s existence — and in the presence of a whole lot of solid arguments against it — I will continue to be an atheist. God almost certainly does not exist, and it’s completely reasonable to act as if he doesn’t.

Nixon’s ‘Operation Diamond’ Plan to Neutralize Antiwar Protesters Included Mugging Squads and Kidnapping Teams

Jon Ponder

photo-vietnam-war-protest-1970

Washington Post:

John N. Mitchell, Nixon’s campaign manager and confidante, met with Liddy at the Justice Department in early 1972, when Mitchell was attorney general. Liddy presented a $1 million plan, code-named “Gemstone,” for spying and sabotage during the upcoming presidential campaign.

[…]

Here’s Why Politicians Lie

Buck Banks

Because they can — and they know they won’t get called on it.

As Jon pointed out yesterday, Mitt Romney’s campaign has turned lying into something of a craft, if not an art form. But Mother Jones’ Kevin Drum offers an explanation why every time a politician tells a lie, he or she is likely to get away with it:

Politicians have increasingly discovered over the past couple of decades that even on a national stage you can lie pretty blatantly and pay no price since the mainstream media, trapped in its culture of objectivity, won’t really call you on it, limiting themselves to fact checking pieces like Kessler’s buried on an inside page. And because virtually nobody except political junkies ever sees this stuff, it doesn’t hurt their campaigns at all.

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Gingrich: Election System Is ‘Rigged In Favor of the Wealthy’

Buck Banks

It is very difficult in America today. If you look at New York where Mayor Bloomberg spent an extraordinary amount of personal money to buy the mayor’s office for the third time. It is fairly hard to compete with a billionaire if — if they get to spend all the money they want and the middle-class candidate’s raising money in $2,500 units. So I think the current system is rigged, frankly, in favor of the wealthy.

— Former presidential candidate Newt Gingrich, whining to MSNBC and conveniently ignoring the fact that casino sleazebag Sheldon Adelson gave his campaign $25 million and that Gingrich himself had a $500,000 tab at Tiffany’s.