Monday Afternoon Thread: Ohio Residents React to Mitt Romney’s Bus Tour

Scalia’s ‘intellect and integrity’
By Steve Benen – Mon Jun 18, 2012 1:50 PM EDT.

While we wait for the Supreme Court’s decision on the Affordable Care Act, there’s increasing speculation about how Justice Antonin Scalia will rule. The answer now appears rather obvious, with the far-right jurist starting to show his cards.

Before we get to that, though, consider a little history. I often think about this op-ed Harvard Law scholar Laurence Tribe wrote last year, arguing that proponents of the law have nothing to fear — of course a high court majority will uphold the law, because it’s such a “clear” and “open and shut” case. Tribe practically chided folks like me for questioning whether conservative justices would be responsible in this case — Scalia may be conservative, but to think he’d ignore the law is “to insult both his intellect and his integrity.”

A year later, as Sahil Kapur reports, Scalia’s intellect and integrity are looking a lot shakier.

Now, within days of the historic ruling, Scalia is releasing a new book in which he finds fault with a Roosevelt-era Supreme Court decision that forms a critical part of the legal undergirding for the health care reform law. For Scalia, that’s a dramatic turnaround, because he has previously embraced the premise of that decision in an opinion he authored in 2005 that supporters of the health care law have frequently cited.

According to an advance review in the New York Times, Scalia writes that Wickard “expanded the Commerce Clause beyond all reason” by deciding that “a farmer’s cultivation of wheat for his own consumption affected interstate commerce and thus could be regulated under the Commerce Clause.”

When did Scalia reach this conclusion? Well, quite recently, actually. Indeed, the far-right justice seemed to change his mind about the Commerce Clause right around the time he was looking for a way to rule against the health care law.

http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/06/18/12283151-scalias-intellect-and-integrity?lite

This is your second and final notice
By Kay June 18th, 2012

When ALEC was exposed we found out that giant corporate entities and their affliated charitable foundations won’t be seen with conservatives in public. Turns out, no corporation wants to be publicly associated with voter suppression and extraordinary legal protections for irresponsible and/or crazed gun owners, although promoting those things was (apparently) fine as long as no one knew about it.

This very public rejection by the business interests they love was humiliating for the conservative movement, so they lashed out and issued some threats:

“We’re putting the left on notice: you take out a conservative program operating in one area, we’ll kick it up a notch somewhere else,” Amy Ridenour, chairman of the National Center for Public Policy Research, said in a statement. “You will not win. We outnumber you and we outthink you, and when you kick up a fuss you inspire us to victory.”

more here
http://www.balloon-juice.com/2012/06/18/this-is-your-second-and-final-notice/#comment-3357840

miranda – — -GOOD NEWS — – -

– - -Philly mayor Michael Nutter new head of US conference of Mayors – –

– - –Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter has been named 70th president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors.

Click here to read the rest of this story.
THERE IS MORE.

- – -CONGRATULATIONS – - -Mayor NUTTER!! — —Woo! Hoo! – —

miranda- — —-THIS PHOOL! – - – -

— – -Congressman Says 16-Year-Old Children Can Make Their Own Immigration Decisions – - -

– — When President Obama announced on Friday relief from deportation for undocumented people who came to the country as children, he noted, “They were brought to this country by their parents, sometimes even as infants, and often have no idea that they’re undocumented until they apply for a job or a driver’s license or a college scholarship.”

Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-TX) disagrees. During an appearance on CNN’s Starting Point this morning, Farenthold told Soledad O’Brien that he believes that 16-year-old kids can make their own decisions about immigrating to the United States, claiming that his own 16-year-old daughter argues about “pretty much everything the family wants to do”:
THERE IS MORE.

– -Annnnd – –his “CHILD” STILL DOES WHAT SHE is TOLD 2 DO!! — – -

Ain’t nobody no fool!! – - -geesh!!

miranda — –***gulp*** – - -GALLUP! – –***side eye*** – - -

— -Poll Shows Anti-Immigration Sentiment At Historic Low - – -

– - – -Three years ago, shortly after President Obama took office, fully 50 percent of Americans believed that the number of immigrants entering the United States needed to be reduced. Since then, support for more restrictive immigration policies spiraled downward, and is now at its lowest point since the Gallup polling firm started asking this question in 1965:-

- – —Let’s HOPE that these “fact” R real. :>) — -

18 Jun 2012 02:42 PM
What The WaPo Wouldn’t Run

That scene is a free, makeshift dental clinic for the uninsured. It was mobbed – as it would be in a developing country. Except it’s right here in Tennessee, where many of the working poor are uninsured, and where the state is perfectly happy to keep it that way. For these strapped, working class folk, Obama’s demonized healthcare reform is a godsend. Pity almost none of them in this part of deepest red America have heard of what it could do for them:

It was hard to find visitors to the clinic who would not benefit directly from the law. Barbara Hickey, 54, is a diabetic who lost her insurance five years ago when her husband was injured at his job making fiberglass pipes. She gets discounted diabetic medication from a charity, but came to the clinic to ask a doctor about blood in her urine.

http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/06/what-the-wapo-wont-run.html

Mon Jun 18, 2012 at 09:24 AM PDT.

Ann Romney promises not to be all hoity-toity like those family-hating Obamas

Ann Romney is sort of a very awful person. So it’s easy to see why she and Mitt are a match made in heaven. She’s just as clueless as Mitt (We had to struggle to get by on nothing more than my husband’s enormous inheritance), just as unprincipled (I love being attacked as a mother because we can exploit the heck out of it), and, just like her husbandbot, she’s got a bit of mean streak in her:
Ann Romney, the wife of Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, said Monday that she doubted that she and her husband would vacation overseas as frequently as the Obamas if her husband were to win election.
Romney was responding to a question from WJR Detroit’s Frank Beckmann, who asked Romney if her family would be vacationing as frequently as the Obamas.

“I doubt that,” Romney replied. “Our vacations and our happiness come from being with our children and our grandchildren.”

Okay. We all know that Republicans (and Cokie Roberts) are geographically challenged because U.S. Americans don’t have enough maps, everywhere like such as. And that whether Hawaii is part of Kenya or these United States is a matter of some dispute among the dropped-repeatedly-on-their-heads crowd. But even by examining the list of fancy-shmancy Obama vacations wingers feverishly pass amongst themselves to prove something something something, you can see just how many elaborate and overseas their travels have been:

The Obama Vacation List
– President’s Day 2012, Michelle and the first daughters in Aspen, Colorado to ski.
– Christmas 2011, the first family in Hawaii for an extended vacation.
– Summer 2011, in Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., for the annual beach break.
– June 2011, the first lady, her mother and daughters traveled to South Africa and Botswana.
– President’s Day 2011, the first lady and first daughters travel to Vail to ski.
– Christmas 2010, in Hawaii.
– August 2010, the first family traveled to Panama City Beach, Fla., for some sun and fun at the beach.
– August 2010, Obama spent the weekend alone in Chicago for his 49th birthday bash.
– August 2010, the first lady and daughter Sasha traveled to Spain for a mother-daughter vacation.
– August 2010, summer vacation again at Martha’s Vineyard.
– July 2010, the first family went to Mount Desert Island, Maine.
– May 2010, the first family had a four-day trip to Chicago.
– March 2010, first lady and daughter spend Spring Break in New York City.
– Christmas 2009, Hawaii again for the annual break.
– August 2009, at Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Canyon for a short vacation.
– August 2009, their first summer vacation as first family at Martha’s Vineyard, Mass.

Yes, we know that Republicans are about as good at counting as they are at geography, but certainly those readers who aren’t governor of Texas can see that the grand tally of actual overseas Obama vacations is a whopping two. As in, one and then one more and that’s it. The bulk of the family’s travels were to exotic overseas locations like Chicago and and the Grand Canyon and, yes, the president’s home state of Hawaii (still part of the United States).
Repeating the absurd Republican talking point that Obama and his family are always jet-setting off to fabulous places instead of working 27 hours a day to fix the economy and protect lightbulb freedom doesn’t make Ann Romney an awful person, however; it just makes her a Republican.

But suggesting that she won’t be taking those same exotic Florida vacations (unlike the Obamas) because she loves her children (unlike the Obamas)? That is some low-class passive-aggressive Olympic horseshit.

Our vacations and our happiness come from being with our children and our grandchildren

Does that mean the Obamas don’t love being with their children? That spending time with their daughters doesn’t bring them happiness? Even though the children (and often, Michelle’s mother) have been included in pretty much all of their vacations? Is Ann actually trying to say that if the Obamas enjoyed spending time with their family the way Ann does, they wouldn’t need to take vacations? Vacations are for family-haters?
Well, no. Not quite:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/06/18/1100984/-Ann-Romney-promises-not-to-be-all-hoity-toity-like-those-family-hating-Obamas

miranda – — -He went 2 someone’s house — – -2 STAND HIS GROUND!!??- – - – -

WAY-ELL— -NOW he may – - -STAND HIS GROUND in – —
- -the BIG HOUSE!. – -HAH!! :>)

— —Texas man in ‘Stand Your Ground’ case could get life – -

– — -A retired Houston-area firefighter faces up to life in prison after a jury convicted him of murder for gunning down his unarmed neighbor during a dispute over a noisy house party.

In a 22-minute video he recorded the night of the shooting, Rodriguez can be heard telling a police dispatcher “my life is in danger now” and “these people are going to go try and kill me.” He then said “I’m standing my ground here,” and shot Danaher after somebody appeared to grab his camera. The two other men were wounded.
THERE IS MORE.

anyone check April Ryan’s twitter feed from Willard’s bus tour?

What The WaPo Wouldn’t Run

That scene is a free, makeshift dental clinic for the uninsured. It was mobbed – as it would be in a developing country. Except it’s right here in Tennessee, where many of the working poor are uninsured, and where the state is perfectly happy to keep it that way. For these strapped, working class folk, Obama’s demonized healthcare reform is a godsend. Pity almost none of them in this part of deepest red America have heard of what it could do for them:

It was hard to find visitors to the clinic who would not benefit directly from the law. Barbara Hickey, 54, is a diabetic who lost her insurance five years ago when her husband was injured at his job making fiberglass pipes. She gets discounted diabetic medication from a charity, but came to the clinic to ask a doctor about blood in her urine.

Under the law, she would qualify for Medicaid. Her eyebrows shot up as the law was described to her. “If they put that law into effect, a lot of people won’t need disability,” she said. “A lot of people go onto disability because they can’t afford health insurance.”

more here
http://andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2012/06/what-the-wapo-wont-run.html

‘What New Law?’

People who would benefit have little idea what they may lose if Supreme Court strikes down health law.

SEWANEE, Tenn. – As Robin Layman, a mother of two who has major health troubles but no insurance, arrived at a free clinic here, she had a big personal stake in the Supreme Court’s imminent decision on the new national health care law.

Not that she realized that. “What new law?” she said. “I’ve not heard anything about that.”

Layman was one of 600 people who on a recent weekend came from across southeastern Tennessee for the clinic held by Remote Area Medical, a Knoxville-based organization that for two decades has been providing free medical, dental and vision care in underserved areas. Most everyone had spent the night in their parked cars, to get a good spot in line. Daybreak found them massed outside the turreted stone gymnasium of the 150-year-old college, the University of the South, some still wearing pajamas or wrapped in blankets, waiting quietly for the 6 a.m. opening of the doors.

read more here http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/104094/tennessee-health-care

the new-fangled Kneegrow Artur Davis was on Wolf BLitzer, slamming the President.

these self-hating mofos are hard to watch

I honestly thought y’all were making this up

http://thepoliticalcarnival.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/tweet-mitt-romney-cows.jpg

miranda- — – -THIS RACIST -BUFFOON!! – - – -

– - -Limbaugh: ‘Everybody knows Munro was heckling Obama’s white half’ – - – -

– - – -SAAAAAA-LAP!!! – — – — -F 2 da U!! – — – -limpballs!! – –

NO RACIAL OVERTONES – - -HUH – –RE-THUGS!! ????- —

The First Lady’s Family
By EDWARD BALL

Twelve presidents were slaveholders, and perhaps another dozen (including the two named George Bush) came from families that once upon a time owned slaves. In common with many of our most venerable institutions, the presidency has ample connection to “slavery time”: the White House is like an Internet link that, if you click on it, bounces you to the lawn of a plantation.

For 42 million Americans — African-Americans — having slaves in the family tree is almost a given, but this fact wasn’t relevant at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue until the current first family. Michelle Robinson Obama happens to descend from people once enslaved in South Carolina, Georgia, Virginia and Kentucky. She can peer at American history from that far side of the looking glass. Her husband, with no slaves in the family, may not see America in quite the same way.

After the president’s term began, one expected to hear more in the press and from the Obamas about blackness, whiteness and the nation’s never-ending debates about race and class. But Barack and Michelle Obama have not made theirs into a “black” White House. An exception jumped up for two nights last winter, when the commander in chief, on camera, sang the opening lines of a Robert Johnson blues standard, “Sweet Home Chicago,” and Al Green’s R&B ballad “Let’s Stay Together” — the kind of songs that used to be called “race music.”

MORE: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/books/review/american-tapestry-by-rachel-l-swarns.html?_r=2&pagewanted=2&pagewanted=all

Fascinating behind-the-scenes photographs of the Obamas capture President’s private dance with Michelle, playing football… and praying

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2160595/The-First-dance-Fascinating-scenes-photographs-White-House-capture-President-Obama-dancing-Michelle-playing-football-praying.html#ixzz1yBurPRhM

Evening thread is up!