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hue

hue's Journal
hue's Journal
March 21, 2015

GOP hopefuls set to attend fundraiser at David Koch’s Palm Beach mansion

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/03/20/gop-hopefuls-set-to-attend-fundraiser-at-david-kochs-palm-beach-mansion/?postshare=5741426893113127

One of the next stops on the 2016 trail: David Koch’s 30,050-square-foot Palm Beach mansion.

A group of White House hopefuls, including Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, are scheduled to make a pilgrimage to the oceanfront estate of the billionaire industrialist on Sunday afternoon.

The occasion is a lunchtime fundraiser for the Republican Governors Association, of which Koch is a major supporter. The event will also give presidential aspirants face-time with some of the party’s most influential and generous contributors.

Former governors Jeb Bush of Florida and Rick Perry of Texas were also invited to the event; Perry aides said he would not be able to attend.

The RGA Executive Roundtable Program is one of the most successful donor efforts on the right, ballooning from less than dozen members in 2009 to more than 600 this year. The initiative is open only to chief executives, entrepreneurs and wealthy philanthropists, who must donate a minimum of $25,000 a year to participate.
March 17, 2015

Former Scott Walker aide Rindfleisch denied state high court appeal

http://www.jsonline.com/news/statepolitics/former-scott-walker-aide-rindfleisch-denied-state-high-court-appeal-b99464133z1-296601611.html

The state Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from a former aide to Gov. Scott Walker when he was Milwaukee County executive.

Kelly Rindfleisch, who was convicted of misconduct in office for doing campaign work while at her county government job, appealed her conviction to the state's highest court in December. The move came after a state appeals court upheld her conviction in November.

On Monday, the Supreme Court denied her petition. Justice David Prosser did not participate.

Rindfleisch, who served as Walker's deputy chief of staff, was one of six people convicted as part of a now-closed secret John Doe investigation into the activities of Walker's aides and associates while he was county executive. Walker was never charged.

Rindfleisch pleaded guilty to one felony count of misconduct in office for doing campaign work while at her government job. But in her appeal, she argued that the evidence against her investigators obtained in her emails should have been suppressed, saying they were obtained during an unconstitutional search. Rindfleisch argued that the warrant should have been more specifically tailored.
March 17, 2015

Scott Walker Ends Freedom of Contract in Wisconsin

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dean-baker/scott-walker-ends-freedom_b_6882738.html

You probably missed this one, after all most news coverage told people that Governor Walker signed a "right to work" bill. According to the accounts, this bill means that workers will no longer be forced to pay a fee to the union that represents them. This was presented as a victory for workers' rights over the power of unions. In fact, it was about denying the people of Wisconsin the freedom of contract.

This is not just a question of the best slogan for a marketing campaign; it's a question of how we think about workers' rights. Walker and his supporters want people to believe that a basic right of workers is being denied if they are forced to pay a union representation fee. This is nonsense if we think about the issue in its full context.

The problem is supposed to be that some workers dislike unions in general, or the union at a specific workplace, and don't think they should have to pay a representation fee to the union to hold a job. But there are often many things about a job that workers don't like.

Often employers demand that workers work bad shifts, starting their shift late at night or work on weekends. Employers can demand that workers come in on Thanksgiving or that they put in overtime. They might even do it with just a few minutes' notice, forcing workers to make rush plans for child care, skip doctors' appointments, or cancel other commitments.
March 17, 2015

How Scott Walker became king of Kochworld

http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20150217/NEWS02/150219834/how-scott-walker-became-king-of-kochworld

Scott Walker Government and Politics News Politics
- Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker speaks during the Iowa Freedom Summit in Des Moines on Jan. 24.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker speaks during the Iowa Freedom Summit in Des Moines on Jan. 24.

(Bloomberg Politics) — On a sunny Saturday in September 2009, with Wisconsin in the throes of tea party fervor, conservative starlet Michelle Malkin fired up a crowd of thousands at a lakefront park in Milwaukee with rhetoric about White House czars and union thugs and the "culture of dependency that they have rammed down our throats."

Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker, a Republican candidate for governor, casually attired in a red University of Wisconsin Badgers sweatshirt, stepped to the podium to amplify the message. "We're going to take back our government," he shouted, jabbing the air with a finger. The attendees whooped and clapped. "We've done it here, we can do it in Wisconsin and, by God, we're going to do it all across America."

In a way, the event was Scott Walker's graduation to the political major leagues. The audience had been delivered up by Americans for Prosperity, a tea party organizing group founded by Charles and David Koch, the billionaire energy executives whose fortune helps shape Republican politics. With Americans for Prosperity, the brothers had harnessed the tea party's energy in service of their own policy goals, including deregulation and lower taxes. And in Walker, they'd found the perfect instrument to help carry them out. The rally was one of the first times they'd joined forces.

UNION WAR

The relationship between the Kochs and Walker was cemented during Walker's bitter war against public unions that led to a recall election in 2012. During the tense weeks of standoff at the capitol in Madison, it was the Kochs' tea party troops who provided the main counterforce to the tens of thousands of union activists protesting the governor, in a battle Walker eventually won.
March 17, 2015

Schieffer destroys Cotton

“Are you planning to contact any other of our adversaries?” Schieffer asked. “Do you plan to check with the North Koreans to make sure they know any deal has to be approved by the Congress?”

Cotton smiled nervously and changed the subject in desperation: “Right now I and most every other senator is focused on stopping Iran from getting a nuclear weapon.”

Nice try, Cotton.






http://www.occupydemocrats.com/watch-bob-schieffer-destroys-tom-cotton-with-one-question/
March 15, 2015

Tom Cotton Seems Confused About The Basic Geography Of Iran

Source: THINKPROGRESS

But when asked by Face the Nation’s Bob Schieffer what better outcome Cotton expects if a White House-led deal falls through, Cotton seemed to make a key geographic mistake, suggesting that Tehran, the capital of Iran, might be controlled by anyone other than Iranian leaders:

Schieffer: What do you want to happen here? What is your alternative here? Let’s say that the deal falls through, then what?

Cotton: Well as Prime Minister Netanyahu said, the alternative to a bad deal is a better deal. The Iranians frequently bluff to walk away from the table. if they bluff this week, call their bluff. The Congress stands ready to impose much more severe sanctions. Moreover we have to stand up to Iran’s attempts to drive for regional dominance. They already control Tehran increasingly they control Damascus and Beirut and Baghdad and now Sana’a as well. They do all that without a nuclear weapon. imagine what they would do with a nuclear weapon.

Read more: http://thinkprogress.org/world/2015/03/15/3633912/tom-cotton-alarmed-capital-iran-controlled-iran/

March 12, 2015

Press briefing on the Large Hadron Collider restart, season 2

http://press.web.cern.ch/event/press-briefing-large-hadron-collider-restart-season-2

CERN is pleased to invite you to the above press briefing which will take place on Thursday 12 March, in the Globe of Science and Innovation, 1st floor, from 2.30 to 3.30pm (CET).

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is ready to start up for its second three-year run. The 27km LHC is the largest and most powerful particle accelerator in the world operating at a temperature of -271°C and powered to a current of 11,000 amps. Run 2 of the LHC follows a two-year technical stop that prepared the machine for running at almost double the energy of the first run. After substantial consolidation and improvements the LHC will restart at an energy of 6.5 TeV per beam, which will open up a new window for discovery - collisions at a total energy of 13 TeV are expected late spring.
March 12, 2015

You Don't Get to Have an Opinion on How Anyone Gives Birth. Ever.

http://jezebel.com/you-dont-get-to-have-an-opinion-on-how-anyone-gives-bir-1651464132?utm_content=buffer33e28&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Giving birth to a human being—however it happens—is a visceral, memorable and profound life experience. Why do so many people feel entitled to pass judgment on the way that anyone else makes it through?

You know what I mean. You've probably done it, even. Whether or not you've had a kid, you've probably texted about that friend from high school's TMI Facebook birth photos where you can basically see her vagina. You might've told the pregnant lady in the grocery store just how bad the pain is, so don't even think about trying to be a martyr because you should definitely get the meds, honey. This social tendency has practically been ingrained as tradition: passing on advice, mostly unsolicited, is part of almost every conversation about birth.

Which is why it feels so necessary to issue this reminder: You don't actually get to have an opinion about where or how or why anyone else gives birth. Ever.

The culture around birth in the United States is a damaging culture of fear, guilt, and shame. It is a culture that teaches us that once we become pregnant, we are no longer capable of making our own decisions, no longer the stewards of our own bodies. It tells us that our bodies are broken and can't bring a baby into this world without the help of synthetic hormones or a scalpel, while simultaneously reinforcing the idea that childbirth should be a perfect and beautiful experience where we act like amazing warrior goddesses who don't yell or poop or beg for drugs.
March 12, 2015

Vote on Open Pit Mine by Elroy Sparta March 16th

http://wisconsinbikefed.org/2015/03/11/vote-on-open-pit-mine-by-elroy-sparta-march-16th/

Thanks to Eric Zingler, for this update on the proposed open pit mine near the Elroy-Sparta Trail, the nation’s oldest rail trail. Eric is a consultant and writer with a passion for biking who lives on an acreage near the Elroy-Sparta Bike Trail. The permit application will go before the Monroe County Board’s Committee on Sanitation, Planning & Zoning, & Dog Control, March 16th. Click here for the agenda and meeting details. The more people who attend, the better. If you cannot attend, please call or send an email asking the Board to rethink the permit or require a culvert so the dump trucks will not have to cross the trail at the very least.

COMMITTEE: Sanitation, Planning & Zoning, & Dog Control

DATE: March 16, 2015

TIME: 6:00 P.M.

PLACE: Rolling Hills – Auditorium 14345 County Hwy B Sparta, WI 54656,
March 12, 2015

In 4 minutes, Marco Rubio Gets Schooled On US Foreign Policy

"At the recent CPAC gathering, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), a likely Republican presidential candidate, seemed to stumble on one of the basic facts of the Middle East. “The reason Obama hasn’t put in place a military strategy to defeat ISIS is because he doesn’t want to upset Iran,” the Florida Republican said.

The senator seemed confused. In reality, President Obama has put an anti-ISIS military strategy in place, and that’s fine with Iran, since Iran and ISIS are enemies."








http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/kerry-teaches-rubio-the-basics-about-the-middle-east?cid=sm_fb_maddow

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