Piece of work, that guy:
Category: It’s OK If You’re A Republican
Jon Stewart v. Oliver North
Thank God for comedians who are actually old enough to remember exactly what happened in the past, because otherwise, these hypocrites would never be challenged by our Librul Media. An exceptionally good segment:
Jon Stewart rips Oliver North: Are you mad that prisoner-trading has ‘gone mainstream’? (via Raw Story )
Daily Show host Jon Stewart sarcastically commended Fox News on Wednesday for inviting convicted felon and former Army Lt. Col. Oliver North to comment on the U.S. deal to free POW Bowe Bergdahl — especially when North’s “commentary” included…
‘Welcome home, creep’
Coordinated
Leave it to the Republicans! They manage to get past through normal human emotions like shame and go for the win every time:
Fox News contributor Richard Grenell and his public relations firm have been coordinating interviews for soldiers criticizing the actions of recently-released Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl.
Those critics have said that Bergdahl, who had been imprisoned by the Taliban since 2009, risked the lives of soldiers who tried to find him after he reportedly walked off his Afghanistan base.
Several media outlets have reported on these soldiers and their concerns, including Fox News, The New York Times, Time, The Los Angeles Times, The Daily Mail, and The Daily Beast. According to a report in Buzzfeed, Fox News contributor Richard Grenell and his firm Capitol Media have “played a key role in publicizing” these critics.
Grenell served as a spokesman for former U.N. ambassador (and current Fox News contributor) John Bolton in the George W. Bush administration, and also worked for a short time on the Romney 2012 campaign.
The New York Times reported on June 2 that “Republican strategists” arranged for the paper to interview soldiers who served with Bergdahl and have animosity towards him because they believe he is a deserter.
One of the soldiers quoted in the article, Cody Full, sent out a tweet thanking Grenell “for helping get our platoon’s story out.”
Buzzfeed reported that Grenell’s partner at his firm, Brad Chase, confirmed that they were behind the public relations campaign (Grenell also sent out a tweet explaining his firm offered “pro bono services” to the soldiers). Chase disputed the Times’ characterization of his firm as “Republican strategists” because he is not a Republican.
But a radio producer who booked one of the soldiers told Buzzfeed that Grenell was their point of contact for the appearance. Two other reporters confirmed to Media Matters that Grenell put them in contact with the soldiers.
Of course he will
In other words, he lied to the voters because he’s trying to salvage his presidential fantasy:
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie said he’ll reverse course on promised pension contributions this year and next, cutting back to balance the budget after revenue fell short of his goals by as much as $875 million.
This year’s payment of $696 million will be less than half the planned $1.58 billion, Christie told reporters in Trenton. For fiscal 2015, the payment will be $681 million, less than one-third of the record $2.25 billion he had proposed.
New Jersey faces a cash shortage next month, with $2.6 billion due on tax- and revenue-anticipation notes, or TRANs, and just $2.2 billion on hand. The 51-year-old Republican, a potential 2016 presidential candidate, has refused to raise taxes to remedy three straight years of missed revenue.
“This is a political decision — it’s all about 2016,” Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute in West Long Branch, said by telephone. “Now that he’s not the odds-on favorite of the moderate wing of the Republican Party, he’s got to win conservative voters. He’s got to do everything in his power not to raise taxes.”
About fucking time
The Internal Revenue Service has revoked the tax-exempt status of a conservative-aligned charity for engaging in political activity as far back as the 2004 presidential election — including statements opposing Hillary Clinton for president.
The Patrick Henry Center for Individual Liberty, based in Manassas, Va., “has shown a pattern of deliberate and consistent intervention in political campaigns” and made “repeated statements supporting or opposing various candidates by expressing its opinion of the respective candidate’s character and qualifications,” according to a written determination released by the IRS Friday.
Although the name of the group was redacted from the determination, the facts of the case match statements made by the Patrick Henry Center’s founder. A separate IRS noticeconfirms that the Patrick Henry Center’s tax exemption was revoked in February.
The group’s founder, Gary Aldrich, did not return phone calls and e-mails seeking comment.
Aldrich, a former FBI agent, established the group after publishing a book critical of President Bill Clinton in 1996 — alleging, among other things, that First Lady Hillary Clinton decorated the White House Christmas Tree with crack pipes and condoms. The purpose of the Patrick Henry Center was to represent government whistleblowers, and its first client was Linda Tripp, the Pentagon employee whose recorded phone calls with Monica Lewinsky launched an effort to impeach Clinton.
[…] The center’s most recent tax return disclosed $343,503 in revenue for tax year 2012. In recent years, it’s become aligned with the Tea Party movement, contributing to at least one of the groups targeted for extra scrutiny by the IRS beginning in 2010. Also in 2010, the Patrick Henry Center merged with Liberty Central, an advocacy group headed by Virginia Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Former U.S. Attorney General Edwin Meese serves on the center’s board.
Oopsy daisy
Looks like Chris made a boo-boo:
A PandoDaily investigation has discovered evidence that Gov. Chris Christie’s pending deal to award a $300 million pension management contract to a controversial hedge fund is in violation of state anti-corruption laws.
New Jersey state pay-to-play statutes prohibit state contractors from directly or indirectly financially supporting the election campaigns of state officials. Those statutes also explicitly prohibit the use of outside groups or family members to circumvent that ban.
Additionally, separate Department of Treasury rules appear to prohibit public pension contracts from being awarded to investment firms whose employees have made significant financial contributions to political entities organized to operate in New Jersey state elections. Those laws also bar investment firms doing business with the state from making contributions “for the purpose of influencing any election for State office.”
Yet, late last month, the New Jersey State Investment Council moved to award a controversial $300 million investment contract to Chatham Asset Management, despite the fact that Chatham’s principal, and a woman living at his address and sharing his surname, donated more than $50,000 to a Republican election group that oversaw major portions of Gov. Christie’s 2013 re-election operation. The proposed investment is already highly controversial given the hedge fund also reportedly owns a stake in the Atlantic City casino, Revel.
Who, me?
A “comprehensive and exhaustive” review that doesn’t include interviews with the principals? And of course Christie gave them access to his phone records and emails, since he was famously paranoid about not leaving anything incriminating. But I hear there’s some guy named Frankie in Newark who’s pretty excited his governor has been cleared!
Everyone can stop speculating about Chris Christie’s involvement in Bridgegate, and the other controversies that surfaced in its wake, because a new review has cleared the governor of all wrongdoing. Though, the haters will point out that Christie commissioned the study. And Gibson Dunn & Crutcher, the firm that conducted it, has close ties to his administration. Plus, they weren’t able to talk with Bridget Anne “time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee” Kelly, ex-Christie aide Bill Stepien, or former Port Authority official David Wildstein, who are all key figures in the George Washington Bridge lane closure. Aside from those factors, the lead investigator calls it a “comprehensive and exhaustive” review.
While Kelly, Stepien, and Wildstein refused to participate in the investigation, over the past two months Gibson Dunn & Crutcher had tremendous access to Christie’s administration. The New York Times reports that lawyers interviewed more than 70 people, including Christie and his senior staff. The governor turned over his phone records and personal email accounts, and lawyers had records on the phone calls, text messages, and emails of top current and former administration officials.
Lawyers would not discuss any of the report’s specific findings, but it’s said to include a detailed account of who ordered the lane closures, analysis of how the culture of the Christie administration contributed to the scandal, and recommendations for preventing similar incidents. The report will be delivered to Christie, who’s said he’ll release it to the public without alterations – which seems only fair, since New Jersey taxpayers are footing a bill of $1 million or more.
Christie’s piggy bank
Scott Raab at Esquire on the real reason Christie turned down the new commuter tunnel:
Which brings us to the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which is the agency that built and owns and runs the George Washington Bridge, which is the world’s busiest, with two decks, 29 toll lanes (cars $13, trucks $17/axle) — and more than 100 million vehicles per year. It’s a tasty bit of business.
Toss in the take from the Lincoln Tunnel and the Holland Tunnel, plus Newark, LaGuardia, and JFK airports, plus one of the eastern seaboard’s busiest seaports — the list goes on and on. By statute, the PA sells its own bonds and wields the power of eminent domain — the PA seized 16 acres of downtown Manhattan to create the World Trade Center in the 1960s — and it operates mostly in secret.
If you’re Chris Christie, that’s a corner candy store pleading to be plundered. Early in his first term, Christie “borrowed” $2 billion by killing a crucial tunnel project jointly funded by New Jersey, New York, and the federal government, and he used that dough for New Jersey road work that the New Jersey budget couldn’t cover without raising the state’s gas tax — second-lowest in the U.S. — a solution Christie refused to consider. That tunnel project, billed at $9 billion, would’ve been a godsend to New Jersey rail commuters — not to mention the thousands of jobs committed to its construction.
Chris Christie not only killed the tunnel, but lied about doing so to save the state from paying for imaginary cost overruns, even after the U.S Department of Transportation, trying to save the tunnel, said it would cover New Jersey’s share of any such costs. That was late 2010; Christie’s men — including David Wildstein and Bill Baroni, both of whom resigned in the wake of the Great Ft. Lee Clusterfk — were beginning to take over the PA. That process accelerated when David Samson, another Christie crony, became Chairman of the Port Authority Board of Commissioners early in 2011.
Oh, and here’s the New Republic story.
Band of blockers
Jon Stewart’s really been on a roll lately: