[In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. --L.]
- Texas Board Of Ed Wants To Scrub Textbooks Of ‘Pro-Islamic, Anti-Christian Distortions’
- [...the fuck, Texas. -L]
- The Takeover — the far right’s been around forever. But they’ve never been the dominant faction of the GOP before
- [Hullabaloo - digby]
Glenn's written a widely circulated piece this morning in which he rightly points out, as I and others have as well, that the Tea Party is not something new, it is just the far right of the Republican Party. It's an amalgam of all the fringes, from John Birchers, to neo-confederates to the Christian Theocrats, all coming together with the help of some very wealthy benefactors…
One thing to remember, however — while these people have been around forever, this is the first time they have become a truly powerful institutional force in the Republican party. They have moved smartly into the vacuum left by the Cheney failure and they have done it in a time of crisis, which gives them opportunities they wouldn't normally have.
- WH Again Assures CIA Wrongdoing Won’t Be Prosecuted; But Who Has JSOC’s Back?
- [Firedoglake - emptywheel]
I guess this piece is supposed to be a warning to the White House–which has already assured CIA that it won’t be prosecuted for breaking the law on Obama’s orders–that it needs to make triple sure that none of those with the legal means to do so hold the CIA responsible for the illegal things it is doing.
…does Hayden believe that Presidents really do have unlimited ability to make laws disappear?
- Elizabeth Warren, in Her Own Words
- [Firedoglake - David Dayen]
Elizabeth Warren appeared on the White House blog today, explaining her new position as Assistant to the President. [transcript]
…UPDATE: We’ll see what the announcement brings, but there is a good deal of confusion surrounding Treasury’s ability to stand up the agency based on how the law was drafted.
none
- Google Is Introducing Social Networking “Layers”… Wait, What Does That Mean?
- [SocialTimes.com - Neil Vidyarthi]
[Whatever it is, I bet it will still be less user-configurable than Dreamwidth. -L]
- Haley In The Middle
- [Hullabaloo - digby]
Things have moved so far to the right that Haley Barbour is a centrist now.
- New Studies Expose GOP Lies about Public Employees
- [Crooks and Liars - Jon Perr]
[Chart]
…there's only one problem with Rush Limbaugh's claim that public sector employees are "freeloaders" and the charge from Indiana Governor and GOP White House hopeful Mitch Daniels that they are a "new privileged class in America."
Like so much else conservative mythmaking, it's simply not true.
That's the conclusion of a new study by the Economic Policy Institute. [They] found that "on average, state and local government workers are compensated 3.75% less than workers in the private sector." The report by Labor and Employment Relations Professor Jeffrey Keefe of Rutgers University revealed that public employees are undercompensated compared to similarly skilled private sector counterparts… [links, stats, blockquotes, and links]
The Of interest (Fri, Sep 17th, 8am) by Lee Salazar, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at leesalazar.com.