A college football star, poised to become an early NFL draft pick in May, announced Sunday that he’s gay and proud of it.
Michael Sam, coming off an All-American season as a defensive lineman for the University of Missouri Tigers, said he knows well that coming clean about his sexual orientation is a “big deal.”
“I am an openly, proud gay man,” Sam, 24, last year’s Southeast Conference defensive player of the year, said in interviews with ESPN and the New York Times.
Projected by some to be taken in the early rounds of the NFL draft this summer, Sam would become the first openly gay professional football player.
Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO) on Sunday suggested that President Barack Obama’s health care law would make some people so lazy that they didn’t want to work at all.
Last week, Republicans used a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report that said 2.3 million less hours would be worked after the Affordable Care Act was implemented to claim that the law was destroying jobs.
A Washington Post fact check, however, pointed out that access to health care meant that people would no longer be forced to work if their only reason for working was to receive insurance benefits.
But on Sunday, Blunt stuck to the Republican talking point, saying that providing health care “can’t be a good idea” if it allowed people who were only working for health insurance benefits to leave the workforce.
“I think any law you pass that discourages people from working can’t be a good idea,” the Missouri Republican asserted. “Why would we wanna do that? Why would we think that’s a good thing? How does that allow people to prepare for the time when they don’t work?”
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-MD), who also appeared on Fox News Sunday, was ready with an answer.
“They’re in employment solely because they get health benefits,” Cardin explained. “This is a voluntary choice.”
“In some cases, these people might have two jobs because of these health benefits,” he added. “Now, they don’t need to work two full-time jobs to get their health benefits.”
I have two favorite passages from Moran’s article. Here is the first:
Yes, we knew Christie was a bully. But we didn’t know his crew was crazy enough to put people’s lives at risk in Fort Lee as a means to pressure the mayor. We didn’t know he would use Hurricane Sandy aid as a political slush fund. And we certainly didn’t know that Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer was sitting on a credible charge of extortion by Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno.
With all due respect to Moran, and I do agree with him on many issues, I knew that Christie was a nightmare way before he actually lulled the rest of New Jersey to sleep. He did put people’s lives in danger by cutting programs to the poor, the less fortunate, and to schools by making cuts that could have been alleviated with a small increase in revenue. He did treat Sandy as a political event right after it happened and rode that wave all the way to this past November since he didn’t have an economic record he could successfully run on. His YouTube videos also showed that he had no patience for anyone who disagreed with him and that he would not take any responsibility for the negative aspects of his policies. I can’t speak for Kim Guadango, but she and Christie do make a wonderful team.
So when Moran says that we didn’t know, he’s wrong. Many of us did know and tried to make it clear what was happening. But the Christie ad machine was too well-oiled and too loud. Blame yourself, Mr. Moran. Leave the rest of us out of it.
And now for the second:
And let’s not forget his opponent, Sen. Barbara Buono. She was not up to the job of being governor — even in the view of many Democrats. She got the party’s nomination because more credible candidates, including Cory Booker, backed out in the face of Christie’s strength.
I have not forgotten Barbara Buono and the ethical, caring campaign she ran. Nor have I forgotten that she spoke about the people who make up the majority of New Jersey; people who need to work for a living and whose lives have not benefited from the governor’s policies and, indeed, are being asked to give more while the wealthy are not. She was, and is, certainly up to the job of being governor. The problem is that Moran cannot recognize the difference between a noise machine and beautiful music. That the Democratic Party did not support her is a problem that I recognized and wrote about. President Obama could have come to New Jersey, and he abdicated his responsibility. But you can’t make the connection between Barbara Buono’s ability to run this state with the lack of endorsements.
Governor Chrisite has always been an ego-driven bully and he has now been wounded politically. What was going to be one of his main campaign weapons, his outrageously inappropriate berating videos, will now be his greatest liability. He’ll need to come up with a different persona in order to reclaim the political middle if he wants to be president, and that will be extremely difficult. Will the core conservative Republican voter shun him? Probably not, but that’s not where elections are won.
Chris Christie has won his final election victory. He was always as he appears now, and it was always apparent to those of us who looked hard at his record and actions. That the Star-Ledger is just noticing tells us all we need to know about its myopia.
After weeks of waiting, The Walking Dead mid-season premiere is set for tonight at 9 p.m. eastern/pacific on AMC.
Let’s refresh ourselves on what happened last time.
Given the amount of time that’s passed since the mid-season finale in December, you may need a refresh on what happened in The Walking Dead season 4, episode 9.
1) Hershel and The Governor have died. In a shoot out at the prison, The Governor kills Hershel, and Michonne kills The Governor (a.k.a. Brian) moments later.
2) Speaking of the prison… bye, prison! The gun fire battle also sent the prison up in flames, so now Rick and company are in need of a new place to call home. Rumors indicate that by the end of season 4, they’ll have a new place.
3) All of the survivors are out on their own. Numerous promos (viewable below) show that each of the good humans are on the run by themselves. Some of them are in very small groups of two – maybe three – but the mid-season premiere will show how they all cope without being in a bigger group setting.
4) Baby Judith may or may not be dead. Rick and Carl believe she’s been killed, but viewers think someone like Beth may’ve picked her up. If so, we can’t wait to see the reunion between the father, son, and daughter. Hypable readers have speculated wildly about whether or not she’s alive.
Although the main stories in the press focus on gridlock and the lack of compromise, that doesn’t mean that things aren’t slowly changing in the United States. As usually happens, change is driven by the people as they react to circumstances created by the politicians, and that in turn leads to more calls for change. Politicians, meanwhile, usually lag behind the grass-roots calls because they are essentially reactive beings loathe to offend or move too fast.
Consider immigration. There is clearly a need to reform out immigration laws, and most of that is related to things other than a path to citizenship. The Republicans have already felt the wrath of Hispanic voters, but because most of the conservatives have safe districts, and because of their irrational fear of giving President Obama any political victory, the party doesn’t full see the urgency for a vote this term.
The latest argument is that Obama is not to be trusted with the law because he’s already made executive changes to the ACA, and the GOP fears that he will make similar changes to anything they negotiate with him. Now, though, they’re being called out by Senator Charles Schumer. His idea is to pass the law, but have it become operative in 2017, after Obama leaves office. After all, the ACA was passed in 2010 and didn’t become fully operational until 2013. Why not immigration? The GOP’s answer, through Rob Portman of Ohio, seems somewhat promising, but overall the Republicans have little interest in taking voters’ minds off the health care rollout, even if millions of Americans now have the security of health insurance.
Make no mistake that immigration reform will get done sooner or later. Sooner, it will be done with Republican input. Later, it will be done solely by Democrats because the growing Hispanic community will see the GOP as an obstacle. The next Republican presidential nominee had better drop the deportation rhetoric if they want to have any chance of being elected.
Meanwhile, the country will move forward with or without the politicians. As it always has.
A new candidate for a Michigan seat on the Republican National Committee wants gays “purged” from the GOP and claims homosexuality is a “perversion” created by Satan himself.
Mary Helen Sears of Houghton County in the state’s Upper Peninsula, elected vice chair of the Michigan Republican Party’s 1st District last year, posted a rant in April on the Schoolcraft County GOP website — preceded by a warning asking readers to “please use your discretion before taking any decisions based on the information in this blog.”
In the post, Sears claimed that homosexuals prey on children, argued that “Satan uses homosexuality to attack the living space of the Holy Spirit” and advocated that Republicans “as a party should be purging this perversion and send them to a party with a much bigger tent.”
A long long time ago, Glenn Beck admitted that he was involved in the type of propaganda that caused division in the country. He made that revelation two weeks ago.
Glenn Beck apparently forgot his moment of truth from two weeks ago. He is now back to his same old tricks to fool his uneducated audience into thinking the worse of the President and his policies. In his recent diatribe however, Glenn Beck’s conclusion had nothing to do with any policies of the president, but solely based in fear and further division.
Expanding on something said by Justice Scalia a week ago, Beck warns that if Americans refuse Obamacare, Abortions or Global Warming, they would be rounded up and tossed into internment camps.
The United States Constitution forbids foreign born citizens for running for president, but many have attempted to challenge the law. According to the New York Post, former governor of California and action movie star, Arnold Schwarzenegger will attempt to challenge the law and run for president in 2016. The news broke while Schwarzenegger was promoting his new film “Escape Plan,” in New York City, also costarring another veteran action star, Sylvester Stallone.
The 66 year old Schwarzenegger was born in Austria and became a United States citizen in 1983. The former Republican governor of California was elected in 2003 during a recall election and won reelection 2006, holding the office until 2011. Sources note that Schwarzenegger will file paperwork in an attempt to challenge the Constitution so he can be on the ballot in 2016.
“Schwarzenegger has been talking openly about working on getting the constitutional rules changed so he can run for president in 2016. He is ready to file legal paperwork to challenge the rules.”
Schwarzenegger appeared on the “Tonight Show” in 2010 and told host Jay Leno that if the law was changed, he would seriously consider a run for the nation’s top office. In order to have the law changed, it would have to be approved by two-thirds in the House and Senate and be ratified by 38 of the country’s 50 states.
The Republican messaging machine is at it again, cranking out scurrilous memes that defame the president and distract from the party’s inaction.
The latest talking point is that the president is a “lawless” “dictator” hellbent on operating outside, and indeed above, the law.
This is not a particularly new line of attack. Conservatives have been using some variation of the lawlessness theme for some time to refer to the president’s actions, particularly to the administration’s adjustments to the Affordable Care Act.
But the distillation and repetition of the word “lawless” gathered new steam last month when the president signaled that he would work with Congress where he could but would issue executive orders, to the extent that he could, when he was stymied by Congress.
Before a cabinet meeting, the president said, “One of the things that I will be emphasizing in this meeting is the fact that we are not going to be waiting for legislation in order to make sure that we are providing Americans the kind of help that they need.” He added, “I’ve got a pen, and I’ve got a phone.”
Before the president could even repeat the sentiment in his State of the Union speech, Republicans were up in arms.
Representative Tim Huelskamp tweeted that night, “1st Release of Obama speech reads like the dictates from a King. All orders he will do to bypass Congress #LawLess.”
Huelskamp went on to repeat the #LawLess hashtag throughout the night, and it was picked up by others.
After the speech, Michele Bachmann threatened to sue the “king,” Obama.
It seems to matter not that this president has in no way been an abuser of executive orders. Quite the opposite. According to the American Presidency Project, a collaboration between John T. Woolley and Gerhard Peters at the University of California, Santa Barbara, President Obama had issued only 168 executive orders as of Jan. 20, fewer than any two-term president in more than 100 years.
Still, the “lawless” messaging has only picked up steam.
The brain behind the George Zimmerman vs DMX fight has called off the event. Damon Feldman revealed on Twitter that he decided to forgo the event because people’s feeling is more important than money.
I want to thank everyone for the good n bad comments I’ve made the choice to cancel the fight w George Zimmermann more to life then money
What would first lady Michelle Obama, a mother of two girls, do if she also had a son — or more to the point, a 19-year old international pop star with a penchant for fast cars, private jets and alcohol named Justin Bieber?
“I would pull him close. You know, I don’t know if it would be advice as much as action,” Obama said in a recent interview with Univision Radio host Enrique Santos. “I would be very present in his life right now. And I would be probably with him a good chunk of the time, just there to talk, to figure out what’s going on in his head, to figure out who’s in his life and who’s not, you know.”
And Obama is not the only one at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. being asked to weigh in on Bieber’s case.
A petition created on the White House’s “We the People” site calling for the government to deport Bieber and revoke his green card has garnered more than 250,000 signatures — far exceeding the 100,000 signature threshold to require an official response.
“That response will come I’m sure relatively soon,” White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said last week.
The petition, which was filed on the day Bieber was arrested for an alleged DUI and drag racing, says: “We the people of the United States feel that we are being wrongly represented in the world of pop culture. We would like to see the dangerous, reckless, destructive, and drug abusing, Justin Bieber deported and his green card revoked.”
Michelle Obama, who was not asked about the petition during her radio interview, was nothing but motherly when it came to the famous wayward teen who could face a trial in Florida as early as March 3.
“I found that to be the case with my kids,” she said. “They just want you near, you know — they want that advice from a parent. They want to see you on a daily basis, you know, because the thing is he’s still a kid. He’s still growing up. So, I would pull him close.”
You’d think Russia Olympic officials would do a bit more vetting before including these people in their Olympic ceremony. It is now being revealed that the lady who lit the Olympic flame to begin the games in Russia has some controversial tweets in her past. Notably one showing the President and First Lady looking at a digitally imposed banana.
Three-time gold medalists Irina Rodnina, who won gold in 1972, 1979 and 1980, tweeted this photo back in September. And like expected, the Republicans and racists here in America (most of the times, they’re all the same) rejoice in 3, 2, 1…
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