...will he ever win?

Newt Gingrich has dropped his Virginia quest, Michele Bachmann already found the perfect candidate, a House member was tricked by the Onion and Mitt Romney is changing targets.

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February 06, 2012 10:08 PM

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As Tommy Christopher over at Mediaite correctly pointed out, emergency contraception or what is known as the "morning after pill" is not an "abortion pill" and it's not covered by the Preventive Services Mandate that has all the right wingers worked up because the Catholic Church and other religious institutions are going to have to offer contraceptive benefits to their members and employees.

That didn't stop George Will from conflating the two on This Week with host George Stephanopoulos failing to correct him after he lied.

Here's more from Christopher -- This Week Host Lets George Will Lie About Contraceptive Mandate And ‘Abortion-Inducing Drugs’.

Transcript below the fold.

WILL: This is not about women's health. This is about providing 300,000 abortions a year. They -- Planned Parenthood cleverly cast this to say we are in the mammogram business. They're not in the mammogram business. They're in the referral of mammograms.

This showed two extraordinary things, George. First, the American left cares about ending wars and they care about poverty and they care about the environment. What they really care about, when they're not perfunctory, is when you touch abortion, and historians will marvel that American liberalism in the first part of the 21st century is defined as defense of abortion. Furthermore...

(CROSSTALK)

WILL: Second -- wait just a -- just a moment. Second, all these people describing themselves as pro-choice said it is illegitimate to choose not to be involved in abortion. And a much more important decision politically that was taken this week was the Obama administration saying that Catholic institutions have no choice -- and this was applauded by pro-choice people -- have no choice but to provide contraception, abortion-inducing drugs, and sterilization.

February 06, 2012 10:00 PM

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Somehow, that bumbling socialist usurper in the White House who has constantly apologized for America -- has the approval of half of the country.

Obama’s overall approval rating stands at 50 percent, the highest in a Post-ABC News poll since a brief run above 50 percent immediately after Osama bin Laden was killed in early May.

But what about all those Real Americans in Real America?

Overall, 55 percent of those who are closely following the campaign say they disapprove of what the GOP candidates have been saying.

But surely, a man who made his $250M outsourcing creating jobs will mop the floor with the Kenyan Marxist, right?

In a general-election test, Obama leads Romney 52 to 43 percent among all Americans; more narrowly, 51 to 45 percent, among registered voters. Among all adults, it’s Obama’s first time topping 50 percent in a head-to-head matchup with Romney since July; it’s his first time ever above that point among registered voters.

For those keeping score at home, the Black Jimmy Carter is currently outperforming the Great Leader who was supposed to usher in a permanent Republican majority. Yes, we've got a long way to go on unemployment -- but as the ad says, "pessimism never created a job."

How's that taste, GOP?

February 06, 2012 09:01 PM

Democrats have been saying for a long time that the House could be in play in 2012, and now some Republicans are starting to join them.

“For Democrats to take 25 seats, they will need a wave,” former congressman Tom Davis wrote in an op-ed in The Hill recently. “Continued polarization and obstruction could create such a wave.”

February 06, 2012 08:27 PM

While Chrysler’s Super Bowl ad has become a political football, an actual campaign ad aired during the game is also causing controversy.

Michigan Senate candidate Pete Hoekstra (R) aired his first campaign ad of the cycle Sunday night, and Asian-American groups are crying foul.

February 06, 2012 08:26 PM

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This one seems really dumb as the National Football League seems to be saying Chrysler infringed on its copyright of "Halftime." Another odd thing about this is that there are plenty of other versions still to be found at YouTube, but the official one at the YouTube Chrysler channel was taken down.

(EDIT: It's working now, probably after someone with some clout rectified the situation.)

Marketwatch has some details and reaction to the ad.

The Clint Eastwood ad during the Super Bowl — catch it here because it’s been blocked by YouTube after the NFL alleged a copyright infringement — could be viewed as a simple celebration of the recovery of bankrupt Chrysler. But the political overtones were easy to see as well: “Halftime in America” could be interpreted as a rallying call for a second term for President Barack Obama, who pushed ahead with a bailout of Chrysler and General Motors (read more on GM’s financial results on WSJ.com) despite objections from Republicans, including his likely presidential opponent, Mitt Romney.

“Saving the America Auto Industry: Something Eminem and Clint Eastwood can agree on,” tweeted Dan Pfeiffer, the White House spokesman. Added David Axelrod, Obama’s chief strategist: “Powerful spot.” Filmmaker Michael Moore was a bit more direct (and apologies for the Twitterese): “Your sermon seemed 2 b a call 2 give O his ‘second half.’”

The former Republican mayor of Carmel, Calif. wasn’t universally loved. “WTH? Did I just see Clint Eastwood fronting an auto bailout ad???” said Michelle Malkin, the conservative blogger. “I think Clint Eastwood’s credentials as a conservative have been overrated for some time,” added David Limbaugh, the brother of Rush and himself a conservative author.

The right-winger's unsurprisingly negative reaction is made all the more ironic considering what pains Chrysler took to make the ad as "inoffensive" as possible, even going so far as to edit out pro-union signs. Via The Nation:

At the fifty-second point in the ad, images from last year’s mass pro-union protests in Madison, Wisconsin, were featured.

But something was missing: union signs.

The images from Madison were taken from a historic video by Matt Wisniewski, a Madison photographer whose chronicling of the protests drew international attention and praise. Wisniewski’s work went viral, and was even featured in a video by rocker Tom Morello.

Chrysler used Wisniewski's award-winning video with permission. But the union presence—and some Wisconsin history—was lost in translation.

February 06, 2012 08:00 PM

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Susan G. Komen for the Cure Vice President Karen Handel drove the foundation's decision to defund Planned Parenthood for purely political reasons, according to emails reviewed by The Huffington Post.

"The emails show that Karen Handel was behind the entire decision to defund Planned Parenthood," The Huffington Post's Laura Bassett told CNN's Soledad O'Brien Monday. "She was behind the strategy to develop the new criteria for who can be funded and she's been behind the PR effort to clean up what's happened since the decision was announced."

"What I understand is that Karen Handel, since she was hired back in April, has been kind of pumping up and magnifying the attacks against Komen and the anti-Planned Parenthood protests and whatnot, and trying to get the board and trying to get Komen leadership on her side as part of this decision to defund Planned Parenthood."

In a posting on her blog last year, Handel made no secret of her opposition to Planned Parenthood.

"First, let me be clear, since I am pro-life, I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood," she wrote.

In a video posted to YouTube last week, Komen’s Founder and CEO Nancy G. Brinker denied that politics played any role in the decision.

"It was a boldface lie," Bassett explained. "Karen Handel had a political agenda against Planned Parenthood. And I know that Komen founder Nancy Brinker went on Andrea Mitchell Thursday and said that Karen Handel had nothing to do with this; this was not political. That's simply not true. And if you're a cancer charity, you have no business lying to the public about what's going on behind closed doors."

While Komen reversed its decision on Friday and made Planned Parenthood eligible for future grants, many will not be satisfied until Handel is ousted from the organization.

CREDO action, a super PAC run by one San Francisco phone company, has already gathered over 24,000 signatures demanding that Komen fire Handel.

February 06, 2012 07:00 PM

NY Mayor Mike Bloomberg appeared on Meet The Press yesterday to push for gun control, pointing out, "You’d think that if a congresswoman got shot in the head, that would have changed Congress’ views."

If anything, the picture in Congress is even bleaker than Bloomberg suggests. In 2006, the NRA successfully lobbied Congress to make the head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) a Senate-confirmed position. Since then, the Senate has been unable to confirm anyone to serve as the chief enforcer of firearms laws due to the combination of gun lobbying and the nearly-unbreakable filibuster. President Obama’s nominee was blocked because he opposes allowing civilians to purchase a weapon capable of punching a baseball-sized hole in 2.5 inches of bulletproof glass.

Not content simply to erect barriers to enforcing federal firearms laws, much of Congress also wants to strip states of their power to enforce reasonable gun regulations. The House recently passed the “National Right To Carry Reciprocity Act,” which forces nearly every state to honor concealed carry licenses issued by the states with the laxest licensing rules. Half of North Carolina concealed carry permit holders with felony convictions have been allowed to keep their permits, and Florida issued 1,700 concealed carry permits to people with “criminal histories, arrest warrants, domestic violence injunctions and misdemeanor convictions for gun-related crimes.” Under this NRA-sponsored bill, all of these permit holders [would] be allowed to carry concealed firearms in 49 of the 50 states.

Nor are federal lawmakers the only ones looking for new and more creative ways to arm the nation. Several states are pushing efforts to force colleges to allow concealed firearms on campus — because clearly what America needs are rooms full of fraternity members packing heat right after they each consumed a case of Milwaukee’s Best. Not to be outdone, Colorado lawmakers are pushing a bill to allow firearms in elementary schools.

As conservative Justice Antonin Scalia explained in D.C. v. Heller, respecting the Second Amendment does not mean filling every building with firearms, or eliminating concealed carry rules, or placing guns in the hands of convicted felons or the mentally ill. Sadly, far too many lawmakers have let the NRA convince them that the myth of the Second Amendment far exceeds the reality.

This "Mayors Against Illegal Guns" ad ran during last night's Super Bowl:

February 06, 2012 06:00 PM

A Chrysler ad aired during the Super Bowl Sunday night has inspired ire among some Republicans and admiration among some Democrats — with both sides seeing a political message that boosts President Obama.

February 06, 2012 05:52 PM

Depending on the results of Tuesday’s contests, there may be pressure on either Newt Gingrich or Rick Santorum to drop out of the GOP presidential race.

At which point the other one would have a good shot at beating Mitt Romney head-to-head, right?

February 06, 2012 05:03 PM