Virginia Readying To Execute Woman For First Time In 98 Years

Conservatives don’t like the government running (or doing) anything, but that doesn’t extend to killing people by either wars or executions.  Virginia is planning to execute Teresa Lewis by lethal injection Thursday.  Lewis pleaded guilty to hiring two people to kill her husband and stepson to collect a $250,000 insurance policy.

Rodney Fuller and Lewis’ lover, Matthew Shallenberger, entered her home on Oct. 30, 2002, and fatally shot Julian Clifton, Jr., 51, and Charles Lewis, 25. Teresa then rummaged through her husband’s pockets for money while he was dying. She also waited nearly an hour before calling 911. The …

Obama To Hedge Fund Managers: You Should Be Taxed At Least As Much As Your Secretary

Steve Schwarzman, Chairman and CEO of the Blackstone Group, equated efforts to raise taxes for hedge funders above 15% with “Hitler invading Poland in 1939.”  President Obama deftly handled tough questions at the CNBC town hall meeting Monday and got applause when he told the big money guys that he should have been tougher on them (via Mediaite).

Obama’s message to hedge fund managers: “Maybe you should taxed more like your secretary.”

Obama’s line came after CNBC pundit Anthony Scaramucci claimed that he and “the Wall Street community” have “felt like like a piñata.” Said Scaramucci:

And in response …

NY GOP Gov. Candidate Paladino Names Panel. Those Named Don’t Know Of It, And Wouldn’t Serve

New York’s Republican nominee for governor, Carl Paladino (the distributor of racist, sexually graphic emails), named four members of a “blue-ribbon-tax-cut team.”  The problem is that those named were unaware of it, and those who commented said they wouldn’t serve even if they were.

Two of the men Paladino identified as team members, CNBC business-show host Larry Kudlow and former state Comptroller Ned Regan, said they had never even spoken to the candidate and knew nothing about the panel.

Regan said he wouldn’t serve while Kudlow laughed uncontrollably when asked if he would.

Kudlow cracked up for several …

Real Health Care Benefits Kick In Thursday

While conservatives are busying saying “no,” some real health care reform begins Thursday. Among the benefits:

Small Business Or Business As Usual

by Stuart Shapiro

The Republican argument against ending the tax cuts for the richest two percent of Americans is essentially that small businesses would get a tax increase if we didn’t do so.  But which small businesses would be affected?  Steve Benen has some examples.

Under the Republican definition of “small business,” the GOP is fighting to protect companies like Wall Street buyout firm Kohlberg, Kravis and Roberts, “which recently reported more than $54 billion in assets managed by 14 offices around the world.” PricewaterhouseCoopers, a massive international auditing firm, qualifies for the label, too. So does Tribune Corp., …

Alaska Senate Candidate Joe Miller Flip-Flops On Unemployment Benefits

Alaska’s tea party candidate for U.S. Senate, Joe Miller, is reversing himself on the issue of unemployment benefits.  He stated that these benefits are not “constitutionally authorized,” but wouldn’t go into detail about that when talking the FOX’s Chris Wallace.  But with John King on CNN, Miller talked about how we have to “maintain unemployment benefits…”

…

Anti-Gay Slur On Joe Jervis’ Site Traced To Senator Saxby Chambliss’ Office

Someone named “Jimmy” posted “All Faggots Must Die” on the popular site Joe.My.God, and it was traced to the office of Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss.

U.S. Sen. Saxby Chambliss confirmed Tuesday that he investigating whether one of his staffers left a threatening slur on an Internet discussion of the right of gays and lesbians to serve openly in the U.S. military.

“We have seen the allegations and are moving quickly to understand the facts. This office has not and will not tolerate any activity of the sort alleged,” Chambliss spokeswoman Bronwyn Lance Chester said. “Once we have ascertained whether …

Down Goes Larry Summers! But Who Will Replace Him?

By Yashwanth Manjunath

According to three individuals familiar with the matter and confirmed by Savannah Guthrie at MSNBC, White House officials expect Lawrence “Larry” Summers to leave the White House as Obama’s National Economic Council director and return to Harvard University. According to early speculation, the Obama administration has indicated that they would prefer a prominent corporate executive to replace Summers and prove they are not “anti-business.” A name being thrown around at the moment is Ann Fudge as a possible replacement. Fudge is the current director of GE and former CEO of Young and Rubicam Brands, so …

On Tuesday’s Radio Show…

• Former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed, whose new novel is The Confirmation, sits down with Alan to debate the role of religion in politics.

• What the Devil? Alan examines the latest anti-Obama insanity from the radical right.

• Spiritual guru Deepak Chopra, author of Muhammad: A Story of the Last Prophet, shares his thoughts on the recent rise of anti-Muslim rhetoric.…

Swift Boat Merchant Jerome Corsi Calls On President Obama To Renounce Lucifer (Really)

Jerome Corsi, whose wrote the swift boat attack book on John Kerry and another smear job on Obama during the presidential campaign, both filled with factual errors, is calling on President Obama to renounce the devil.  You see, Obama was once a community organizer in Chicago. Saul Alinski was a community organizer in Chicago. Some of Alinsky’s ideas became Obama’s ideas.

…Alinsky included a facetious dedication in his book “Rules for Radicals” to Lucifer, the “first radical.” And that got Corsi thinking, “Hmmm, you know, I don’t recall President Barack Obama ever distancing himself from Lucifer!” And so: …

Senate Votes Against Starting Debate On “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell”

A 56-43 Senate vote fell short of the 60 votes needed to move forward with repeal of the military policy of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” The vote also delays the “DREAM Act” which would provide a route to citizenship for those who served in the military or attended college.

A Republican-led filibuster on Tuesday blocked efforts to repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on gays in the military, shelving an Obama administration priority at least until after the November election.

The measure repealing the military policy banning gays from serving openly was part of the 2011 Defense authorization bill. …