On the left is Tareq Salahi, who makes up one half of the “White House Party Crashers” tag team, testifying (more like asserting the 5th) to a Congressional panel this morning. On the right is Rafe Hollister from “The Andy Griffith Show”, who was known for his beautiful singing and moonshining abilities.

One of them spent time in the Mayberry jail. Just pointing that out.

White House gate-crashers take 5th Amendment at congressional hearing

Tareq and Michaele Salahi, who got through White House security to attend a state dinner, today invoked their Constitutional rights against self-incrimination and refused to testify before Congress.

The Salahis refused to answer questions from lawmakers on the House Committee on Homeland Security, probing how the couple got past the Secret Service to attend a state dinner on Nov. 24 for the prime minister of India. The couple was able to shake hands and pose for photos with top officials including President Obama.

A federal grand jury is also probing the incident.

Read the rest, including Representative Pascrell’s hilarious line of questioning, at the LA Times.

Every so often, we’ll get a request from a listener to post a specific item that means a great deal to them. This is one of those times.

Whether you have seen the movie “Avatar” or not, you’re likely familiar with the story line, and its similarities to life today. A fellow named “Sparkydunc” from our chatroom, sent the image you see at the left along to me last night, and asked me to pass it along to you. Click on the image to read it full size.

You won’t have to wait in a long line at the movie theatre. You won’t have to spend money on over-priced popcorn. And, you won’t have to wonder what that smell is in the bathroom! All it takes is a phone, and a few minutes of your day to let your Congress critter know that art imitating life isn’t always a good thing.

Thanks for passing this along, Sparky!

YouTube Link

Here’s one for the neocons who, no doubt, will be crying about “activist judges”.

Congratulations, Senator Al Franken!

MINNEAPOLIS (Reuters) – The Minnesota Supreme Court on Tuesday declared Democrat Al Franken the winner of a tight U.S. Senate race over Republican Norm Coleman, which should give Democrats the 60-seat majority they need to overcome procedural obstacles and push through their agenda.

Coleman has said in published reports he is unlikely to appeal the state court’s decision to the federal courts. Under state law, the court’s decision gives Franken the right to occupy the seat, which has been up for grabs since last November’s election.

Minnesota Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty has said he will certify the election winner based on what the state court decides.

Read the rest of this article here.

Congratulations, Senator Franken!

Courtesy BradBlog:

While former radio talk show host and author Al Franken is consistently described in corporate media reports as “comedian Al Franken”, it seems it’s the legal team of former Senator Norm Coleman who are providing the laughs in the first days of the U.S. Senate election contest up in Minnesota.

When even the unapologetic, rightwing, “Franken is stealing the election!” nutcases and conspiracy theorists at Powerline describe Coleman’s legal case as being of “Three Stooges quality”, you know these guys must really be falling apart.

Such seems the case again on yesterday’s Day 2 of the trial, following the disastrous Day 1 when the 3-judge panel tossed out doctored evidence, as submitted by Coleman’s team. Today’s Day 3 doesn’t seem to be going much better for them, either.

Yesterday, two of the six voter/witnesses called by Coleman, to testify how they were disenfranchised when their absentee ballots were rejected, actually admitted that their ballots were properly tossed because they were, in some way, incorrectly — or even fraudulently — cast…

The Uncounted

TPM’s excellent on-the-scene coverage from Eric Kleefeld describes the comedy of errors on the stand yesterday:

One of the voters was Douglas Thompson, who admitted under oath that his girlfriend filled out his absentee ballot application for him, signing his name with her own hand and purporting to be himself. His ballot was rejected because the signature on his ballot envelope (his own) did not match the signature on the application (his girlfriend’s). The Coleman team’s argument appears to be that he is still a legal voter in Minnesota, as the signature on the ballotwas his own, even if admitted dishonesty was involved in getting the ballot.    

Keep in mind: Thompson’s story came up during the direct examination by Coleman lawyer James Langdon. So the Coleman camp fully knew this information and decided to make him into a witness.

Another one of the voters, an older man named Wesley Briest, initially responded that he voted at the polls — not by absentee. Then Coleman attorney James Langdon showed him his absentee ballot envelope, reminding him that he did not go to the polls, too.

So one of the six voters called by Coleman to testify admitted his ballot should have been rejected, since his signature was forged by his girlfriend, while the another couldn’t remember whether he’d voted at the polls or via absentee. Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk, wheeee! Doink!

The latter voter went on to admit, under cross, that “his wife, who served as the witness on his ballot, did not fully complete the witness section of the absentee ballot.” So yup, that would disqualify the ballot, according to the rule of law.

Now we’ve made the case in the past that absentee ballots are rejected too easily, everywhere, particularly in the cases where signatures are thought to be mismatches from the voter’s registration form. We concurred with San Diego election attorney Ken Karan, who wrote via email following the questionable rejection of ballots in a contested election in CA that “It should not be as simple to discard a ballot because the signatures don’t match after a subjective comparison of signatures by people without any recognized expertise in the recognition of handwriting.”

“Furthermore, if the signatures don’t match,” Karan added, “then that should mean that someone is trying to vote someone else’s ballot. Now, that is voter fraud. Every questionable ballot should either be verified with the voter whose registration signature is at issue, or it should be the subject of a criminal prosecution.”

-Article Continued @ Sourced Site.

From Treehugger:

Understandably in the anticipation leading up to yesterday’s inauguration, your political eye was probably not focused on what’s going on in the aftermath of the TVA coal ash spill. But last week Sarah McCoin and Tom Gizzard, residents of Harriman, Tennessee, showed up at Congress asking questions and bearing gifts of coal ash in mason jars. They also delivered hats with “Filthy Coal” written on them to then senator, now Vice President, Joe Biden and senator John McCain, in recognition of their support for clean coal on the campaign trail. Here’s some of what McCoin and Gizzard told members of Congress:

McCoin: Coal Isn’t Clean. It’s Filthy.

We are here to say that real coal comes with a heavy cost and disastrous consequences. In reality, coal isn’t clean, it’s filthy. We want answers on why these toxic ponds of coal ash are allowed to remain dangerous to so many people, and why policy-makers have failed to protect us from the dangers posed by coal to the American people and communities all across the country.

Gizzard: Coal May Look Clean on TV, But It’s Toxic

I have lived in this community since 1956, and I have never seen a disaster like this. I would like the folks at this PR firm to come to my community and witness first-hand the havoc their clients have brought to Harriman. I can tell you this, their coal may look clean in a TV ad but it is filthy and toxic when it is piled up in yards and playgrounds and rivers. This will harm the wildlife we hunt for and has destroyed the crappie holes where my family has fished for generations.

More photos of the TVA coal ash spill disaster:

-Article with Photos, Continued @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy Rawstory:

A federal district court judge has ruled that outgoing Vice President Dick Cheney, who leaves office on Tuesday with an approval rating of just 13 percent, will be the sole determining authority on the public release of his vice presidential records.

“Congress drastically limited the scope of outside inquiries related to the vice president’s handling of his own records during his term in office,” wrote U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in a 63-page opinion, according to a published report.

The ruling cuts out National Archive oversight in the release of Cheney’s records. Judge Kollar-Kotelly, appointed in 1997 by President Clinton, seems to have a history of siding with the Bush administration in legal battles, though she rejected the extraordinary claim that detainees in Bush’s terror war are not entitled to lawyers.

The suit, brought by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), contended that Cheney illegally curtailed provisions of the post-Watergate Presidential Records Act. The act, passed in 1978, mandates public ownership of the records, but allows presidents to discard volumes not of historical significance, if the Archivist of the United States agrees with the assessment. 

The act also requires vice presidential records to be treated the same, but CREW alleged that Cheney is using his own methods of determining what should and shouldn’t be released. The judge ruled that CREW failed to substantiate this allegation.

The assertion that Cheney alone may determine what is historically significant is based on his 2007 claim, over objections from the National Archives, that the vice president is not actually part of the executive branch.

“Your position was that your office ‘does not believe it is included in the definition of ‘agency’ as set forth in the Order’ and ‘does not consider itself an ‘entity within the executive branch’ that comes into the possession of classified information,’” a National Archives official claims Cheney’s chief of staff, David Addington, wrote to him.

“Instead of making disclosures like most of the White House, Cheney’s office since March 2002 has periodically responded to [Office of Government Ethics] inquiries by stating that it is not obligated to file such disclosure forms for travel funded by non-federal sources,” wrote Kate Sheppard and Bob Williams with the Center for Public Integrity. 

-Article Continued @ Sourced Site.

YouTube Link

Full article at Rawstory.

Courtesy The Washington Post:

Millions of tons of toxic coal ash is piling up in power plant ponds in 32 states, a situation the U.S. government has long recognized as a risk to human health and the environment but has done nothing about.

An Associated Press analysis of the most recent Energy Department data found that 156 coal-fired power plants store ash in surface ponds similar to one that ruptured last month in Tennessee. Yesterday, a pond at a northeastern Alabama power plant spilled a different material — water laced with calcium sulfate, a component of a material known as gypsum — and some lawmakers said the incident was more evidence that Congress needs to overhaul coal waste regulations.

“One disaster convinced me that we ought to subject coal ash impoundments to federal design, construction and inspection requirements,” said  Rep. Nick J. Rahall II (D-W.Va.), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee. “But two incidents in less than three weeks at a TVA site illustrate that we must act swiftly if we hope to ensure a basic level safety for our communities and the environment.”

-Article Continued @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy Rawstory:

Eleanor Holmes Norton’s schedule is likely going to become a lot more crowded in the next year. 

With Barack Obama’s election, along with Democratic gains in the Senate, Norton — the District of Columbia’s non-voting delegate to the House of Representatives — is poised to become a full-fledged Representative, giving DC a voting member of Congress for the first time in the nation’s history. 

Senate Democrats have added at least seven members to their caucus this year, with two races yet to be decided. While a filibuster-proof 60-vote majority remains elusive, the gains should be enough to move forward a DC voting-rights bill, among other measures that are supported by moderate Republicans, the Washington Post notes Monday.

Under a measure that passed the House by a wide margin last year, Norton would receive a vote in the House on behalf of the District’s nearly 600,000 residents. The bill also would give Utah an additional House member, bringing the total in the House to 437. 

The bill fell to a Republican-led filibuster in the Senate on a 57-42 vote, but this year’s Democratic pick-ups seem likely to assure its passage if it returns to the floor. All seven Republicans who were replaced by Democrats voted against the measure.

Article Continues @ Sourced Site.