Clarence Thomas has a conflict of interest. Will he do the right thing?

At the very least, Clarence Thomas should recuse himself from hearing this case. I’m betting he won’t because the right wing wants to win this so badly. From the Maddow Blog.

Supreme Court to hear health reform case

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Mon Nov 14, 2011 11:22 AM EST

The U.S. Supreme Court has announced that it will take on the question of whether President Obama’s health reform law is constitutional, with arguments by March 2012 and a decision in June. This note, from an earlier case, still matters:

There was no indication, on the other hand, that Justice Clarence Thomas had disqualified himself from the case involving the health care law. His wife, Virginia Thomas, has been affiliated with a group that opposes the law and has not disclosed its contributors.

Virginia Thomas has stepped back from that group, Liberty Central, which she founded, and the group has toned down some of its advocacy against health reform, but she is very much on record as working against it. Her husband, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, initially filed financial disclosure forms that did not reveal the money she earned from political work on behalf a case the court will now hear. And so the old question becomes the new question again: Will Justice Clarence Thomas recuse himself from the case?

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Three Charts to Email to Your Right-Wing Brother-In-Law

Monday 29 August 2011
by: Dave Johnson, Campaign for America’s Future | Op-Ed

Federal spending dramatically increased under former president, George W. Bush and it has not increased much under President Obama. (Photo: Eric Draper / White House)

Problem: Your right-wing brother-in-law is plugged into the FOX-Limbaugh lie machine, and keeps sending you emails about “Obama spending” and “Obama deficits” and how the “Stimulus” just made things worse. Solution: Here are three “reality-based” charts to send to him. These charts show what actually happened.

Spending

Government spending increased dramatically under Bush. It has not increased much under Obama. Note that this chart does not reflect any spending cuts resulting from deficit-cutting deals.

Deficits

Notes, this chart includes Clinton’s last budget year for comparison.

The numbers in these two charts come from Budget of the United States Government: Historical Tables Fiscal Year 2012. They are just the amounts that the government spent and borrowed, period, Anyone can go look then up. Peoplewho claim that Obama “tripled the deficit” are either misled or are trying to mislead.

The Stimulus and Jobs

In this chart, the RED lines on the left side — the ones that keep doing DOWN — show what happened to jobs under the policies of Bush and the Republicans. We were losing lots and lots of jobs every month, and it was getting worse and worse. The BLUE lines — the ones that just go UP — show what happened to jobs when the stimulus was in effect. We stopped losing jobs and started gaining jobs, and it was getting better and better. The leveling off on the right side of the chart shows what happened as the stimulus started to wind down: job creation leveled off at too low a level.

It looks a lot like the stimulus reversed what was going on before the stimulus.

Conclusion: THE STIMULUS WORKED BUT WAS NOT ENOUGH!

More False Things

These are just three of the false things that everyone “knows.” Some others are (click through): Obama bailed out the banks, businesses will hire if they get tax cuts, health care reform cost $1 trillion, Social Security is a Ponzi Scheme or is “going broke”, government spending “takes money out of the economy.”

Why This Matters

These things really matter. We all want to fix the terrible problems the country has. But it is so important to know just what the problems are before you decide how to fix them. Otherwise the things you do to try to solve those problems might just make them worse. If you get tricked into thinking that Obama has made things worse and that we should go back to what we were doing before Obama — tax cuts for the rich, giving giant corporations and Wall Street everything they want — when those are the things that caused the problems in the first place, then we will be in real trouble.

DAVE JOHNSON
Dave Johnson (Redwood City, CA) is a Fellow at Campaign for America’s Future, writing about American manufacturing, trade and economic/industrial policy. He is also a Senior Fellow with Renew California.Dave has more than 20 years of technology industry experience including positions as CEO and VP of marketing. His earlier career included technical positions, including video game design at Atari and Imagic. And he was a pioneer in design and development of productivity and educational applications of personal computers. More recently he helped co-found a company developing desktop systems to validate carbon trading in the US.

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Thursday October 28, 2010

It’s been a busy few days.

Monday Andrea and I went to Letterman. It turns out that he was taping two shows that day, so we got into the Monday taping. It makes me wonder why he was doing two shows since they had just come off a dark week. Maybe he is going to work three days a week now – he already tapes two shows on Thursday. The show was very good. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood after a week off. Charles Barkley was very funny, Gary Dell’Abate so-so, but the Kings of Leon kicked ass. It got cut, but before they played, Dave said something to effect of “The KOL are coming up and we here in the studio will get to enjoy a second song. You folks at home will only see the first one because, frankly, I don’t like your attitudes”.

Tuesday, we took Rosie for a walk to Prospect Park, then to the vet (about a 10 mile walk) to have them look at her tail which has been bothering her. We had just taken her to the vet last week for a checkup and the vet missed the sore on her tail. They had to shave a portion of it, the vet said it looks like its healing fine, just keep an eye on it. If it gets worse we’ll have to put some antibiotics on it and she’ll have to wear a surgical collar aka a cone. Of course, the shaving made it worse. By evening, she was constantly biting and licking at it.

I called the vet Wednesday morning, he wasn’t in, they said he’d call, he never did. It’s very difficult to get to our vet without a car, and I didn’t feel like spending three hours going there to buy their overpriced products. So, I went to Petland Discount, bought a collar and some antibiotic cream that has lidocaine in it to deaden the tail. Rosie did not like the cone at first, but finally gave up trying to get it off. The cream really made a difference in her agitation level. We had a showing last night, so I had to take her out for a walk while the realtor was here. The act of walking so irritated her tail that it took us 45 minutes to walk two blocks because she had to stop and sit until the pain subsided a bit. The weather yesterday was unbelievable. 72 degrees and about 90% humidity – it felt like August.

Today is a busy day. It’s going to be a sunny, warm day but the humidity has dropped drastically. Andrea and I are going to The Bodies exhibit at the South Street Seaport. I’ve seen it before, but Andrea hasn’t and the nurse in her is very intrigued. Then I have an interview and that will be followed by the King Tut exhibit at the Discovery Center in midtown.

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Get a bike with your name on it. From Geekologie.

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Unreal: Fox News claims Obama invoked racial segregation with his car analogy
After President Obama made the analogy that Republican politicians should have to ride “in the back seat” after driving “this car,” the United States, “into the ditch,” Fox News figures have tried to claim that Obama made an “offensive” and “appalling”  reference to racial segregation and “the back of the bus.” They have yet to explain why Obama would want to compare himself to segregationists and his political opponents to civil rights hero Rosa Parks. Read More at Media Matters.

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From Wired. How to hook your computer to your TV. It should be easier than it is.

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From Greg Palast at Truthout. Anybody who tells you that the money doesn’t influence coverage probably still believes in the Easter Bunny.

“Why am I picking on poor, little PBS? I’ll be the first to tell you they are the best you’re going to get on the US boob tube. And PBS has spared us embarrassing scenes of Anderson Cooper pretending to save an oily pelican while floating in a canoe with Bobby Jindal. But I expected more from a public broadcast system than a repetition of the oil industry’s self-serving propaganda campaign.

Last night, in a deep, serious voice, the PBS narrator told us, If BP had only paid attention to the warnings of experts and regulators, the Deepwater Horizon tragedy could have been prevented.

Damn right. And if PBS had paid attention to the oil story, maybe that too could have prevented the tragedy.”

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Sunday October 17, 2010

Hatchet job. AP has sunk to a new low. Even the determinedly non-partisan Mike Allen says so in Playbook.

BREAKING FOR MONDAY PAPERS – “Poll: Many Obama 2008 supporters defecting to GOP,” by AP National Political Writer Liz Sidoti: “[O]ne-quarter of those who voted for the Democrat are defecting to the GOP or considering voting against the party in power this fall, … according to an Associated Press-Knowledge Networks poll … The … interviews occurred Sept. 17 to Oct. 7.” http://yhoo.it/9iMnlk

–PLAYBOOK FACTS OF LIFE: A week-old poll, taken over THREE weeks? Disgraceful. Will be an item in Pfeiffer’s book. We wouldn’t even flag it except we know from coverage of an earlier shoddy AP poll story (the one where they AVERAGED ancient results and made it look like a new poll!) that TV will pick it up anyway.

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Why solar and other green energy sources face an uphill battle. From Greentech Media via Wired.

The industry needs to outline in clear, sound-bite-like blurbs how solar will become the affordable best option in the future. More importantly, the spokesman needs to dig up dirt on the fossil industry.

Things like:

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Tear down that salad Mr. Gorbachev! Red celery? Must be a commie plot. And celery breeders? What?????

Read the whole expose here.

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