Yesterday, four Republicans in the New Hampshire State House supported a hearing requested by a group of birthers who want President Obama officially removed from the state’s primary ballot. Of course, Birther attorney Orly Taitz is in the midst of it and had filed a complaint about Obama’s candidacy that, according to WND, was joined by several state lawmakers. Ortiz had submitted “evidence”...

Is NATO pondering an Arab-backed, Libya-like invasion of Syria? Are Israel and the West planning to strike Iran’s nuclear program? Columnist Mohamed Kawash of Jordan’s Al-Arab Al-Yawm writes that the Arab street has a sinking feeling that history is about to repeat itself. For Jordan’s Al-Arab Al-Yawm, Mohamed Kawash writes in part: How similar today is to yesterday. History is repeating itself....

How desperate is Rick Perry as he tanks in the polls? Well, with the last seconds ticking down in the fourth quarter of his run for the Republican presidential nomination, he is airing a new television commercial that is a wall-to-wall distortion of the truth in claiming President Obama called Americans “lazy” and grew up a child of privilege. The ad begins with a clip of Obama stating, “We’ve...

John Cole, The Scranton Times-Tribune Former Godfather’s Pizza CEO seems to be less involved in a race for the 2012 Republican nomination than in a race to offer one of the most inept campaigns in recent memory. Forget the quick melt down of Texas Gov. Rick Perry. Cain’s damaging comments, his handling of the sexual harassment allegations in a way that suggests Mel Gibson was contracted to handle...

by WALTER BRASCH There is nothing the media love more than a good celebrity sex scandal. Since the story of Scarlett Johansson’s purloined nude pictures had run its course, and the media squeezed every drop of ink it could from the Kim Kardashian/Kris Humphries engagement/wedding/ marriage/divorce, they had to find something else to feed the beast with the insatiable appetite. Something else was Penn State....

David Fitzsimmons, The Arizona Star How often do Republicans running in New Hampshire seemingly go out of their way to offend the state’s big, famous Republican-editorial-position newspaper? And do it in way that is so transparently an attempt at image control that it hits the journalistic hot-buttons of the paper’s bigwigs? The Huffington Post reports that Herman Cain seems to be doing just that: UPDATE:...

Has Washington intentionally set things up so that Iraq will have no choice but to allow U.S. forces to remain in the country past 2011? According to Sotal Iraq columnist Qasim Al-Kafaji, the U.S. has no intention of pulling out, which explains its 16,000 ‘diplomats’ at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad and its failure to fully prepare Iraqis to take contol of their own territory. For Sotal Iraq/aka...

When the Tea Party was at its heyday during the 2010 elections, when the Palins and the Bachmanns ruled the day, we were treated to some soaring oratory by real, “take-our-country-back” Americans: You know, those real Americans, real patriots, real believers who belong to the party of core values, of family values — the good party, the party of God. Feeling quite dejected, feeling like a...

The Paterno home near the Penn State campus. Eleven days after the arrest of former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky, the hydra-headed scandal shows no sign of abating. In the last 48 hours, there have been these development: * Mike McQueary, the assistant football coach under fire for his reported lack of action in an alleged 2002 anal rape of a boy by Sandusky in the team’s locker room...

It’s February 2013. It’s 3 A.M. The phone rings in the President’s bedroom — it has an urgent ring. Finally the President picks up the phone. The voice of his National Security Advisor, John Bolton: “Mr. President, we have a serious situation developing in Asia.” The President: “Asia? Which Asia? Can’t you be more specific than that …” Bolton: “In China, Mr. President.” The...

The healing at Penn State in the wake of the firing of legendary football coach Joe Paterno and the university president is on hold. As 10 more alleged victims came forward with allegations that Jerry Sandusky molested them, the former defensive coordinator and accused pedophile went on the offensive and maintained he was innocent of the charges. In a phone interview with NBC‘s Bob Costas last night,...

WASHINGTON — Unemployment is at 9 percent, the housing market is moribund, “consumer confidence” is an oxymoron and three-fourths of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track. So how is it that President Obama leads each of his likely Republican opponents in the polls? And why on earth is the gap widening rather than closing? It’s simple: Voters are paying attention to...

First we had Cain’s brain difficulties on handling the sexual harassment accusations; then we saw Cain’s brain malfunction on China having a nuclear capability; then we had Perry’s brain freeze on naming three departments he wanted to eliminate; today we have Cain’s total brain failure on remembering what Libya is or was and on explaining his position on Obama’s Libya policy. Even for someone who does...

There’s a new video that’s now surfacing on the cable shows and on various political websites — one that could be the final nail in the coffin of Herman Cain’s sagging campaign. It shows Cain having a Rick Perry like brain freeze when asked about Libya during an interview session with the editorial board at the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. These extended interviews campaigns have with...

When CNN anchor Don Lemon released his autobiography “Transparent” several months ago the big news “peg” was that in the book he noted that in the book he announced that he was gay. This was the fact that seemed at the center of many new and old media stories about him and his book at the time. And then there was the racial component added to it: his experience of being gay and black...

Our political Quote of the Day comes from Time’s Joe Klein who looks at a recent CBS News poll that showed former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain still going strong, with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney frozen at his usual polling take and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich rising: There are three messages being delivered in this poll. The first is about Mitt Romney, who has performed as...

Several news sources are reporting a huge blast occurring inside an Iranian military base near the capital, Tehran. BBC News: There has been at least one explosion inside a military base west of Iran’s capital, Tehran, officials say. Windows in buildings in the nearby village of Bidganeh have been shattered. Some deaths have been reported, according to the semi-official Fars news agency, but this has not...

Both ABC News and the Washington Post are reporting that kidnapped Washington Nationals catcher Wilson Ramos has been found alive and well in Venezuela. According to the Washington Post: Wilson Ramos has been rescued in Venezuela and is with the police on his way back home, his agent, Gustavo Mercano, said in a phone conversation. The Interior Minster called to tell the family at roughly 10 minutes before...

The flap in Happy Valley, Home of Penn State University, reminds us again that we receive our “news” from an entertainment driven media. What is news is squeezed out by deciding who should get star billing. Multiple children, likely more than a dozen, were raped, their bodies, souls and psyches violated. They will live their entire lives with the emotional fallout of having been betrayed and assaulted...

I know just how Rick Perry felt during his “brain freeze” the other night. As other GOP candidates were spewing out new versions of their non-sequiturs about Barack Obama and the economy, my eyes were drawn to the Texas governor every time the cameras showed him in a shot. A curious combination of expressions fleeted across his face, some of earnest determination to follow what another candidate was saying,...

But what else do you expect?

Daryl Cagle, MSNBC.com This copyrighted cartoon is licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

In a few short hours last night, the board of trustees of Pennsylvania State University exorcised demons that had haunted a campus fondly known as Happy Valley for 13 long years. Legendary football coach Joe Paterno was fired outright despite his pleas to retire on his own terms after an extraordinary 62 seasons and more victories than any major college coach. University President Graham Spanier also was sacked. The...

One thing most Kochian front groups have in common is that they get nasty when you call them out. Case in point, ThinkProgress‘ Lee Fang: Koch Brother Front Group Americans For Prosperity Pushes Smear Campaign Against Me By Lee Fang on Nov 9, 2011 at 5:30 pm ThinkProgress Levi Russell, Americans for Prosperity Director of Public Affairs, contributed to a blog post calling me a “liar.” Russell,...

From evidence so far, the Pizza Man’s skirt-chasing seems as random as his economic studies, making casual passes at objectives but cheerfully taking nein-nein-nein as a final answer and moving on to keep selling. After lurid testimony by Woman #4, which led the PBS NewsHour, #5 comes as a letdown, with Cain, after a speech in Egypt, asking to be set up with a woman in the audience, then trying to settle for...