August 6, 2014

The Economy Grows Faster Under Democratic Presidents

Jared Bernstein comments on a “provocative new paper by the economists Alan Blinder and Mark Watson that rigorously examines how the economy has performed under presidents since the 1940s. Their main questions are: Which party’s presidents preside over better economies and why?”

“Their answer to the first question is clear: The American economy has grown faster — and scored higher on many other macroeconomic metrics — when the president of the United States is a Democrat rather than a Republican.”

“The two looked at key macroeconomic variables averaged over 64 years (16 four-year terms), from Harry Truman to Barack Obama. Mr. Blinder and Mr. Watson focus mostly on the 1.8 percent annual difference in real G.D.P. growth. That is, over the full study, real G.D.P. growth averaged 3.33 percent per year. But under Democratic presidents the economy grew 4.35 percent and under Republicans 2.54 percent.”



Bernstein concludes: “It is glaringly obvious that complex, advanced economies need well-functioning federal governments that can accurately diagnose and prescribe; they need governments that can absorb factual information and respond to threats and opportunities. These requirements hold regardless of the president’s party, and the fact that we do not currently have such a federal government is without doubt what’s most important and most scary.”

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http://wonkwire.rollcall.com/2014/08/06/economy-grows-faster-democratic-presidents/

August 6, 2014

Bill Clinton rallies Kentucky Senate race voters

Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) — Former President Bill Clinton is raising money and rallying Kentucky voters for Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes.

Clinton is scheduled to headline a fundraiser in Lexington on Wednesday before traveling to eastern Kentucky’s coal country to speak to voters in Hazard. Clinton is a close friend of Grimes’ father, Jerry Lundergan, a former state lawmaker and former state party chairman.

It is the second time this cycle Clinton will have campaigned for Grimes. She’s challenging Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in one of the closest Senate races in the country.

McConnell has focused his campaign on tying Grimes to President Barack Obama, who remains unpopular in Kentucky. But Grimes has tried to distance herself from the president by condemning his energy policies.

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Read more: http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/bill_clinton_rallies_kentucky_senate_race_voters/

August 6, 2014

Barney Frank slams LGBT rights groups for flipping on ENDA

Source: Salon

About a month ago, some of the most influential LGBT civil rights groups in the country announced that, after years of supporting the Employee Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), they would no longer back the bill unless it lost its controversial exemption for religiously affiliated organizations.

But while this move was welcomed by many activists and sympathetic observers, at least one prominent supporter of LGBT rights — who is gay himself — isn’t so pleased.

“There is an element in my community that insists on being the cutting edge, and they are determined never to be for anything that could pass because that means that they are stodgy,” legendary former congressman Barney Frank told the Huffington Post on Tuesday. “I mean this quite literally,” he continued. “The goalposts have not just been moved, they have been propelled at atomic speed. The arguments are ridiculous.”

The groups in question have mostly pointed to the Supreme Court’s recent, controversial Hobby Lobby ruling — as well as the introduction of laws in various state legislatures that would allow private business owners to refuse services to LGBT people on religious grounds — to explain why the religious exemption (which they were never thrilled with) is no longer acceptable. But Frank thinks these reasons are little more than excuses.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/barney_frank_slams_lgbt_rights_groups_for_flipping_on_enda/

August 6, 2014

Putin orders import limits over sanctions

Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

MOSCOW (AP) — President Vladimir Putin has ordered government agencies to restrict imports of food and agricultural products from the countries that have imposed sanctions against Russia.

The text of Putin’s decree released by the Kremlin on Wednesday says that such imports will be “banned or limited” for one year. The decree doesn’t name any specific countries or products, but contains an order to government agencies to spell them out.

The move follows the latest round of sanctions against Russia imposed by the European Union last week, which for the first time targeted entire sectors of Russian economy.

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Read more: http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/putin_orders_import_limits_over_sanctions/

August 6, 2014

UN chief: Gaza deaths and destruction shame world

Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon says “the massive deaths and destruction in Gaza have shocked and shamed the world” and is demanding an end to “the senseless cycle of suffering” in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“We will build again, but this must be the last time to rebuild,” the U.N. chief told the General Assembly Wednesday. “This must stop now. We must go back to the negotiating table.”

Ban said the U.N. understands Israel’s right to defend itself from Hamas rockets but “the horror that was unleashed on the people of Gaza” raises serious questions about respect for international law that requires a distinction between civilians and combatants and proportionality.

U.N. human rights chief Navi Pillay told the assembly that “any attacks in violation of these principles …. may amount to war crimes.”

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Read more: http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/un_chief_gaza_deaths_and_destruction_shame_world/

August 6, 2014

Target publicly endorses same-sex marriage

Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Target Corp. is adding its name to a legal defense of gay marriage, joining other large companies that have taken a stand on same-sex unions.

Target says it signed a court brief backing marriage equality in a pending case. Starbucks, Intel and Apple have publicly backed gay marriage advocates in court cases or ballot issues.

Nearly all of Minnesota’s biggest corporations declined to take a position on the 2012 state referendum to ban gay marriage except for General Mills, which opposed the ban. The referendum failed and the state Legislature passed a bill recognizing same-sex marriage in 2013.

The Star Tribune (http://strib.mn/1qUU8DQ ) says the case that Target’s brief supports combines legal actions in Wisconsin and Indiana. Federal judges overturned gay marriage bans in both states and state officials appealed.

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Read more: http://www.salon.com/2014/08/06/target_publicly_endorses_same_sex_marriage/

August 6, 2014

Key Source In Cochran Vote-Buying Report Points Finger At McDaniel Spokesman

Source: TPM

By DANIEL STRAUSS Published AUGUST 6, 2014, 11:00 AM EDT

The man who said he was paid $2,000 to falsely accuse Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) of a vote-buying scheme to get African-Americans to vote for him in the runoff election of the Mississippi race for U.S. Senate is now saying state Sen. Chris McDaniel's (R) spokesman, Noel Fritsch, was the one who paid him to do the interview, according to the Clarion-Ledger and WJTV.

The man, Stevie Fielder, was the main source in a report by conservative blogger Charles Johnson that said Cochran's campaign promised to pay African-Americans $15 a pop to vote for the incumbent senator in the runoff, which Cochran won by beating McDaniel.

Last Wednesday Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood (D) said his office was investigating whether Johnson himself paid Fielder to point the finger at Cochran. At the time Hood said he did not know who paid Fielder. On Monday evening Hood spokeswoman Jan Schaefer confirmed to the newspaper that Fielder said it was Fritsch who paid him.

Fritsch...denied Fielder's accusation in an email to TPM and, instead, pointed the blame at Johnson and Saleem Baired, who has served as the Cochran campaign's minority outreach director.

-snip-


Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/stevie-fielder-vote-buying-report-thad-cochran-chris-mcdaniel-noel-fritsch

August 6, 2014

Poll: People Disagree With Latest Obamacare Challengers On Subsidies

By DYLAN SCOTT Published AUGUST 6, 2014, 10:11 AM EDT

A new poll has found that a substantial majority of respondents believe that Obamacare's subsidies should be available to everyone, regardless of whether they purchase coverage on a state or federal insurance exchange.

The Morning Consult poll, first reported by the Washington Post on Tuesday, found that 58 percent of registered voters said that all exchanges -- federal and state -- should offer the law's financial assistance. That puts them at odds with the law's latest legal challengers, who argue Obamacare prohibits subsidies on federal exchanges.

Another 27 percent didn't share opinion, and only 15 percent said they should not be available on every exchange.

Average Americans, of course, are not legal scholars. And just 14 percent of those polled said they had been following the legal challenge to the Obamacare subsidies closely; 30 percent said they'd followed it some, 29 percent said not much and 28 percent said not at all.

more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/poll-obamacare-subsidies-halbig

August 6, 2014

The vice mayor is Black, Latina, and a lesbian — and this California town is freaking out

The vice mayor of Richmond, California has been the target of racially-charged and homophobic taunts from opponents who now accuse her of wanting to stifle their free speech rights, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

According to the Chronicle, the vitrol directed at Jovanka Beckles, a lesbian who identifies as a Black Latina, has been a fixture at local city council meetings since her election four years ago. During a meeting last month, one member of the public, identified as Mark Wassberg, was seemingly bragging about the council allowing him the right to berate Beckles over her sexual orientation.

“I’m going to keep coming up here and tell you how gays have no morality,” he was quoted as saying. “You’re filth. You’re dirt. Because I have the constitutional right to say it.”

KTVU-TV also reported last month that critics have called for Beckles to resign after video came to light of her telling a local minister, Rev. Kenneth Davis, to “get out of [her] f*cking face,” and calling other hecklers “bullies” and “women abusers.”

more
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/08/05/the-vice-mayor-is-black-latina-and-a-lesbian-and-this-california-town-is-freaking-out/

August 6, 2014

Ted Nugent ‘deputized’ at Tea Party rally, urges hunters to ‘fix or replace’ their wives

Conservative rock star Ted Nugent was deputized by local law enforcement at a Tea Party event in Wyoming in which he complained about America’s alleged post-World War II decline and women who do not enjoy hunting, Media Matters reported.

“We have bent over since World War II because we couldn’t believe that the universally celebrated good of America crushed the universally understood evil of J*ps and Nazis,” Nugent said during a 30-minute speech to members of the Big Horn Basin Tea Party. “We couldn’t believe that that government that represented us in good over evil could turn on us. They’ve turned on us.”

Nugent also accused hunters in Colorado of allowing “bureaucrats” to limit their Second Amendment rights, and challenged members of his audience to each “fix” 100 people and get them to vote for conservatives.

“If I hear another hunter tell me, ‘Man, I wish I could get my wife to support hunting,’ fix your wife,” Nugent said. “Fix her or replace her.”

more
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/08/05/ted-nugent-deputized-at-tea-party-rally-urges-hunters-to-fix-or-replace-their-wives/