Scott P

A lifelong Delawarean who has left-of-center views -- and he's not afraid to use them.

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An Open Letter to the Tea Party

Filed in National by on April 15, 2010 83 Comments

Dear Tea Party Members and Sympathizers, Happy (or do I wish you an Angry?) Tax Day to you. Since you seem to have appropriated today as your holiday, I thought it would be a good opportunity to try to reach out to you. Despite what some may think, I consider myself to be a fairly intelligent and […]

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Now the Tea Partiers Want Their Own Army

Filed in National by on April 13, 2010 14 Comments

I’m sorry, but no good can come of this. From the great conservative state of Oklahoma, site of the largest domestic terrorist attack in US history, we get this story about a Tea Party umbrella group that is looking to form an official, state-approved militia. The scariest part is that this is not just some crazy […]

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Stupak to Announce Retirement Today

Filed in National by on April 9, 2010 6 Comments

Insider sources are saying this morning that Democratic Congressman Bart Stupak of Michigan will announce today that he will not not seek re-election this fall. He is expected to have a news conference later this morning to officially announce his intentions. Had Stupak run for re-election, he would have faced challenges from just about every […]

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Get Your GOP Talking Points Now and Beat the Rush

Filed in National by on April 8, 2010 7 Comments

Via Dave Neiwert at Crooks and Liars, we get a sneak preview of what at least one influential conservative wants to be a main Republican talking point this fall. While blabbering incoherently talking to Sean Hannity Tuesday night on Hannity’s FOX News show, Newt Gingrich regurgitated the factually untrue and already debunked right-wing myth about […]

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Pssst…Wanna Buy a Judge?

Filed in National by on April 5, 2010 4 Comments

Ever since the Supreme Court issued its January ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission (FEC), lifting the ban on corporate spending on elections, most of the attention has been directed towards how this would effect things like presidential and congressional races. And while there now will certainly be the opportunity for big corporations […]

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Affordable Care Act Survives Its First Challenge

Filed in National by on March 31, 2010 6 Comments

In case you missed it yesterday, the ACA survived the first of what will undoubtedly be many attempts to nip at the edges of its authority.  The issue at hand this time was the provision that insurers would be prohibited from denying to coverage to children with pre-existing conditions. The goal and spirit of the law […]

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So This Is What They Meant by Bipartisan

Filed in National by on March 29, 2010 9 Comments

We all know that Republicans have been going on about how much they want to work in a bipartisan way with Democrats, but we always figured they were doing it with their fingers crossed behind their backs. It turns out, though, that we were wrong — Republicans really do want bipartisanship. Yesterday, on FOX News […]

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The Nexus of Wingnut

Filed in National by on March 26, 2010 28 Comments

Get ready everyone for Kookapocalypse Now! Well, OK, not now. Actually, April 7. That’s when former Governor, former VP candidate, and current Queen of the Tea Baggers Sarah Palin will host a fundraiserfor Minnesota Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann. Yup. That’s right. Palin and Bachmann will be together in the same room. Physicists at CERN are concerned that […]

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The GOP Is Now Officially Guilty of Petulance

Filed in National by on March 25, 2010 24 Comments

I think it was noted here somewhere the other day that on Tuesday, Senate Republicans used a little-known rule to prevent hearings from proceeding past 2:00 PM. In fact, our own beloved Sen. Carper was forced to halt a Senate Homeland Security Subcommittee hearing on transparency due to Republicans’ refusal to give unanimous consent to […]

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Postal Service Looking for Five Day Week

Filed in National by on March 24, 2010 9 Comments

This idea has been kicked around for several years now, but the US Postal Service is now taking the first formal steps toward five-day delivery: The postal governing board agreed to ask the independent Postal Regulatory Commission for an opinion on dropping Saturday delivery. That request goes to the commission next week. Under the proposal, […]

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One Simple Reason Why the Health Care Law’s Mandate IS Constitutional

Filed in National by on March 24, 2010 25 Comments

First of all, let me say how much better I like writing “Health Care Law” than “Health Care Bill”. But on to the topic, there is a simple but under-reported fact in the whole “The individual mandate is unconstitutional” debate, that, while not new, only came to my attention last night. Last night on Countdown, […]

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HCR 2010 = WMD 2002

Filed in National by on March 23, 2010 6 Comments

Anyone who’s been around this site lately should recognize the title of this post. It’s the little signature that commenter anonone has been putting at the end of his comments. Well, I’ve been thinking about this a bit (no, I don’t have anything better to do — thanks for asking) and I’ve decided that he […]

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Deem and Pass Is Out

Filed in National by on March 20, 2010 3 Comments

After spending a week getting themselves all riled up about “Demon Pass”, it seems the procedural maneuver has been ruled out: House leaders have decided to take a separate vote on the Senate health-care bill, rejecting an earlier, much-criticized strategy that would have permitted them to “deem” the unpopular measure passed without an explicit vote. […]

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