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What a train-wreck!

Richardson to withdraw as Commerce secretary - Politics- msnbc.com

New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, tapped in December by President-elect Barack Obama to serve as secretary of Commerce, has withdrawn his name for the position, citing a pending investigation into a company that has done business with his state.

Buck Naked Politics: Bill Richardson: Unlucky Target in Pay-to-Play Investigation

Obama’s pick for Commerce Secretary, New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, is apparently under investigation for corrupt activities. The Los Angeles Times reports:

LexisNexis News

NBC News Transcripts
SHOW: NBC Nightly News 6:30 PM EST NBC
December 23, 2008 Tuesday
427 words
Questions over Bill Richardson’s political contributions while governor
ANN CURRY
LISA MYERS

ANN CURRY, anchor:

The Obama team may have another problem on its hands: a growing investigation into New Mexico governor and former presidential candidate Bill Richardson, who is Obama’s choice for Commerce Secretary. At issue is whether there was a relationship between political contributions to Richardson and his actions as governor. More on this now from NBC’s chief–rather, senior investigative correspondent, Lisa Myers.

President-elect BARACK OBAMA: Secretary of commerce, my great friend, Governor Bill Richardson.

LISA MYERS reporting:

The allegations now being investigated by a federal grand jury involve whether Richardson as governor steered state bond business to a firm whose founder made substantial contributions to Richardson’s political action committee. Two former state officials involved in the bond deals told NBC News that they testified before a grand jury in Albuquerque last week. One official says prosecutors focused on whether Richardson or staff pushed to give business to CDR Financial Products. It specifically asked about what’s called pay to play.

Now, feds probe Gov. Richardson of Obama Cabinet for ‘pay-to-play’ - Los Angeles Times

It seems that Illinois’ legally challenged Gov. Rod Blagojevich is not the only close Barack Obama associate and Democratic governor being investigated by the feds for possibly selling government business in return for campaign contributions.

New Mexico’s Gov. Bill Richardson, who is the newly named Secretary of Commerce in Obama’s about-to-be Cabinet, is also being investigated by a federal grand jury in his home state for possibly steering state bond business from the New Mexico Financial Authority toward David Rubin, a significant campaign contributor, according to an NBC News report, among other

Gee…. here is a real shocker

Al Jazeera English - Americas - Obama cleared in governor scandal

An internal probe has cleared Barack Obama and his transition team of any inappropriate contacts with the Illinois governor accused of plotting to sell off the US president-elect’s senate seat.

obama, blago, al jazeera, craig, crime, Blagojevich

What a difference a candidate makes. TPM hackery on full display.

Funny how when a report cleared Governor Sarah Palin of any wrongdoing on bogus accusations Talking Points Memo and the rest of the nutroots cried foul because one report was done by the Governors office.

Talking Points Memo | Election Eve Info “Dump”

It’s fitting that the McCain-Palin campaign ends with a couple of politically motivated pretend nods to transparency.

First Sarah Palin’s own personnel board released a report earlier this evening clearing her in the Trooper-Gate investigation. Nice timing.

Now Palin has released a letter from her personal physician proclaiming her to be in good health and fit to serve — instead of releasing her medical records, which she’d promised to do days ago.

They see fit to do this on the night before the election?

(As a side note, the McCain camp press release is titled “GOVERNOR SARAH PALIN RELEASES MEDICAL HISTORY SUMMARY.” But it appears all they released was that letter (.pdf). Over at The Page, that morphs into the headline: “PALIN RELEASES MEDICAL RECORDS.” A letter becomes a summary becomes medical records.)

Now today, with their own report, Barack Obama clears himself and his Chief of Staff to be Rahm Emanuel, the same Talking Points Memo and nutroots are shouting from their laptops that all is well on this night before Christmas Eve document dump, prepared by and released by team Obama itself.

Talking Points Memo | Read It Yourself

We have the Obama team’s report on its contacts with Blago posted here.

TPM Election Central | Talking Points Memo | Obama Team Releases Blago Report

The Obama transition team has now released its much-awaited internal report on staff contacts with Rod Blagojevich and his own office, saying that members of the transition team did not behave improperly.

What a joke.

Daily Kos puts on the Media Matters mask. One could make an argument that Obama was “out of the country” but I challange anyone to make an argument that there are “57 states” in the United States.

Daily Kos: Conservative Blogger Needs Geography Lesson

MSNBC anchor Tamron Hall points out to conservative blogger Matt Lewis that Barack Obama would not be on vacation in Hawaii if he needed to be in Chicago to do damage control on the Blago report being released tomorrow.

After conceding that the report was likely to be no big deal, Lewis offers up a tin foil theory explaining Obama’s vacation: “You could make an argument,” Lewis says, “that if he wants it to appear to not be a big deal, that he would be out of the country.”

Now I know it’s fashionable on the right to claim that Obama isn’t American, but someone really needs to tell Lewis that Hawaii is actually part of the United States — it’s not some foreign land. Just ask anyone about Pearl Harbor.

Gee….where was the Daily Kos post calling out Barack Obama…their “chosen one”, when he claimed that America was comprised of 57 states?

nutroots, blogs, obama, daily kos, hawaii, geography, 57 ststes, Matt Lewis

The “Employee Free Choice Act” is one of the biggest scams and lies to be laid on the American worker in a long time, a last ditch effort by corrupt unions to hold  onto and possibly gain power.

The Communist Party USA endorses a cause…enough said.

CPUSA Online - Endorsement of the Employee Free Choice Act

The 28th National Convention of the Communist Party, USA unanimously endorsed the Employee Free Choice Act (H.R. 1696 and S. 842) that would help 57 million U.S. workers gain a union.

I said it before and I will say it again, whenever “progressives”, democrats and modern day liberals use words like “choice” and “free” you better check your pockets and read the fine print.

The Employee Free Choice Act Is Unconstitutional

A top priority of the incoming Democratic Congress and Obama administration is the misnamed Employee Free Choice Act. The EFCA, as is well known, introduces a card-check procedure that allows a union to gain recognition without an election by secret ballot. Thereafter a government arbitration panel can impose, without judicial review, all the terms of an initial two-year collective “agreement” if the parties cannot negotiate an agreement within 130 days.

The Supreme Court (unfortunately, in my view) has held that the peculiar labor-law environment justified these abridgements of ordinary speech rights. But it hardly follows that if the government can curtail speech rights, the EFCA can eliminate them. There is simply no legitimate government interest in promoting unionization that justifies a clandestine organizing campaign which denies all speech rights to the unions’ adversaries.

The mandatory arbitration provisions of the EFCA are also constitutionally suspect. True, the takings clause of the Fifth Amendment today is quite lax when the state just restricts how an owner can use his property. But it imposes a firm duty to compensate someone whose property is occupied pursuant to a government decree. The Supreme Court also has established that any company subject to rate regulation (such as in telecommunications, transportation, insurance, etc.) may raise a judicial challenge to secure a reasonable rate of return on invested capital.

These Fifth Amendment protections apply to labor markets. The NLRA strips employers of basic common law rights, including the right to refuse to deal with the union. It imposes on employers (and unions) a duty to bargain in good faith toward a contract. But this duty does not force agreement. Either side is free to walk away from any deal it does not like. Unions can strike, and firms can lock out workers. Today’s law, accordingly, restricts arbitration to interpreting existing agreements, not to making agreements from whole cloth.

The EFCA takes away the employer’s right to walk. Now the successful union, backed by direct government power — i.e., mandatory arbitration — can force itself on the firm. Yet the proposed law does not let any court block the deal or ensure that the mandated terms offer a reasonable return on its invested capital. (Even modern rent control statutes require that much.)

The government-chosen panel could well impose terms that might cripple the firm competitively.

Employee Free Choice Act - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Former Democratic presidential nominee Senator George McGovern broke with Democratic Party orthodoxy by opposing the EFCA in an August 2008 editorial in the Wall Street Journal:

“ To my friends supporting EFCA I say this: We cannot be a party that strips working Americans of the right to a secret-ballot election. We are the party that has always defended the rights of the working class. To fail to ensure the right to vote free of intimidation and coercion from all sides would be a betrayal of what we have always championed.”

labor, employment, employee free choice act, unions

James Carville is begging for donations to help fund Media Matters, the far left smear machine Hillary Clinton helped to create.

TheHill.com - Carville soliciting help for Media Matters

Democratic strategist James Carville, using Secretary of State nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton’s e-mail list, sent out an e-mail Friday trying to recruit supporters and donations for Media Matters for America, the liberal media watchdog group.

As the Democrats continue to unravel a NY Senator-elect Hirram Monserrate figures he would contribute to the the unraveling by assaulting his girlfriend

The Daily Politics - NY Daily News

Senator-elect Hirram Monserrate was arrested early this morning after he brought a woman believed to be his girlfriend to Long Island Jewish Hospital with severe lacerations on her face that will require multiple sitches to close, sources confirmed.

Monserrate and his girlfriend arrived at the hospital at approximately 4:30 a.m. where he was detained for questioning and subsequently arrested, according to an NYPD source. The incident occurred at an apartment at 37-20 83rd St. in Jackson Heights, Queens.

Monserrate was charged with assault one.

UPDATE: More details on the incident: It involved a beer bottle, which Monserrate allegedly used to cut his girlfriend, Karla Giraldo, 30, in or around her left eye so badly that she required 20 to 40 stiches.

HIRAM MONSERRATE - City Room Blog - NYTimes.com

Officials said that Mr. Monserrate had taken his girlfriend, Karla Giraldo, 30, to Long Island Jewish Medical Center with what appeared to be a serious injury in or around her left eye.

Ms. Giraldo told hospital staff members that it was Mr. Monserrate who had assaulted her, officials said. It appeared that she had been punched and slashed in or around her left eye with a shard of glass, and officials said it took 20 to 40 stitches to close the wound. A doctor at the hospital, which straddles the border between Queens and Nassau County, called the police at 4:50 a.m.

MySpace.com - Hiram Monserrate - 100 - Male - Queens, New York - www.myspace.com/hirammonserrate

Hiram Monserrate made history in 2001 when he became the first Latino elected to public office in Queens, winning a seat representing the 21st Council District of Corona, East Elmhurst, Elmhurst and Jackson Heights. Since then, he has brought his unique experience as a Marine, NYPD police officer, and civil rights advocate to the City Council, working to empower and protect all New Yorkers.

democrats, crime, new york, senate, monserrate

I expect Politico to be reporting on the life and times of all future in-laws of American governors.

Bristol Palin’s future in-law arrested - Andy Barr - Politico.com

Sherry L. Johnston, Bristol Palin’s future mother-in-law, was arrested Thursday night on drug charges.

I’ll be waiting for the stories on the law run-ins of Joe Biden’s current and future in-laws………………………

politico, palin, Johnston, wasilla

What a joke.

News from The Associated Press

One week ago, Ronnie Ambrosino was a millionaire.

Now, Ambrosino is among the long list of investors whose fortunes were allegedly wiped out by Bernard Madoff. Like them, she’s left hoping for a bailout that might never come.

I have not used IE for years and in light of the recent Internet Explorer HUGE security hole you may want to switch to one of these web browsers

• Firefox
• Opera
• Google Chrome (google will track you)

Microsoft: Hole exploit endangers all IE versions | Security - CNET News

An unpatched security hole in Internet Explorer that is being exploited affects all versions of the browser, making it more serious than originally believed when it was first publicized two days ago, Microsoft says.

Microsoft is investigating reports of attacks against a new vulnerability in IE but said in an update to a security advisory issued late on Thursday that all versions of IE are potentially vulnerable.

ie, web, browsers, tech, internet explorer, ie, security