Year: 2014

Biden Says LaGuardia Airport is a Third-World Facility

Buck Banks

If I blindfolded someone and took them at 2 o’clock in the morning into the airport in Hong Kong and said ‘where do you think you are?’ They would say, ‘this must be America. This is a modern airport.’ If I took them blindfolded and took them to LaGuardia airport in New York, he would like ‘I must be in some third world country.’ I’m not joking.

— Vice President Joe Biden, quoted by CNN.

Liz Cheney Raised Less, Spent More Than She Told Reporters

Buck Banks

-$183,000

Amount of the deficit in ex-Wyoming Senate candidate Liz Cheney’s campaign account at the end of 2013, despite telling reporters that she raised $1 million in the fourth quarter of 2013. Cheney raised just under $720,000 in the fourth quarter of 2013, but her campaign spent more than $900,000, FEC reports show. “The daughter of former President Dick Cheney dropped out of the race just days after the end of the fundraising period,” reports the National Journal.

GOP Prepares to Screw the Pooch on Immigration

Buck Banks

As political momentum in Washington, D.C. swings toward tackling immigration reform, the Republican Party once again is ready to squander a mighty electoral advantage heading into the 2014 midterms. The general failure of President Obama’s economic agenda, health-care reform, civil liberties record, and foreign policy is an electoral gift. Yet with a Senate majority in plain sight, the GOP faithful is crying that ‘Amnesty=Suicide’ and Republican leaders are calling for massively invasive new rules that will only increase the size, scope, and spending of the federal government. … And this is the party of small government? No wonder the country is so screwed.

— Nick Gillespie, in the Daily Beast.

Americans Expressing a Current of Individual Optimism

Buck Banks

2/3

Of Americans think the country is in a recession or going in the wrong direction, but the vast majority believe their personal prospects will improve or stay the course, according to a new NBC/Marist poll. “A current of individual optimism — the highest level detected since 2009 — runs through the results of the survey, despite evidence that millions of Americans, especially those in lower income brackets, are struggling to balance their budgets. And yet that individual optimism is trumped by political pessimism of the country’s situation as a whole.”

Come to Kansas Because We’re Openly Racist!

Buck Banks

I’m going to invite you, because we have a lovely doctor from India. She’s in her mid-30s, and she’s highly respected by the community. And another doctor from India that did my carpal tunnel when I did a stupid thing. And so, I think you’d be right at home, and we would welcome you.

— Sen. Pat Roberts (R-KS), quoted by Dave Weigel, suggesting Indian-American nominee for Surgeon General Vivek Murthy visit Kansas.