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September 2013

I rise to stand in defense of my former home State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations as the most corrupt state. From John: With apologies for the bad photography, I'm sending along the pic below that I recently snapped in Chicago. Close inspection will reveal that the...

The House of Representatives is voting late tonight on amendments to the Senate Continuing Resolution. Among the amendments being voted on are a one year delay in Obamacare, elimination of the medical device tax, and possibly a "clean" resolution to fund the military. [voting concluded] https://twitter.com/SpeakerBoehner/status/384171886436823040 https://twitter.com/LegInsurrection/status/384174495675584512 House passes repeal of Medical Device Tax 248-174 [caption id="attachment_66310" align="alignnone" width="513"](House Vote Amendment No. 1 Repealing Medical Device Tax) (House Vote Amendment No. 1 Repealing Medical Device Tax)[/caption] House passes Delay of Obamacare until January 1, 2015, 231-192 [caption id="attachment_66312" align="alignnone" width="508"](House Vote Amendment No. 2 Delaying Obamacare for One Year) (House Vote Amendment No. 2 Delaying Obamacare for One Year)[/caption]

Sitemeter is the free traffic meter I've been using since day one of the blog to keep track of visits and page views.  It's public, and linked at the bottom of the page in the footer. The reason I like Sitemeter is it's free.  And it's...

Harry Reid almost never allows up or down votes on Republican agenda legislation coming out of the House.  He has taken the Senate hostage. A good example is the House Continuing Resolution which Reid would not allow to come up for a vote until Obamacare defunding...

It's come to this: the White House Twitter account is attempting to drum up support for Obamacare through the "Adorable Care Act," a meme template featuring cute animals.  While the Obama administration and OFA both deny being behind the associated accounts, the White House takes...

I told you just a couple of days ago that the Gallup headline of a decline in Tea Party popularity was misleading. The misleading headline, ignoring the details of the poll, was picked up far and wide, Congrats @Gallup for inspiring these 5 misleading anti-Tea Party headlines. The Washington Post yesterday, however, revealed that the Tea Party popularity was rising, Obamacare fight reenergizes tea party movement (emphasis added):

WaPo Tea Party Support Rising

The tea party movement rose to prominence in the early years of Obama’s presidency, helping drive a surge of conservative activism that helped flip control of the House to Republicans in 2010. At the time, according to CBS-New York Times polling, nearly a third of Americans considered themselves tea party supporters. The movement’s popularity, though faded, shows signs of growing again: A quarter of Americans in a new CBS-New York Times survey between Sept. 19 and 23 said they support the tea party, up four points from two weeks earlier.
"Oddly" enough, it was really hard to find the poll to which WaPo was referring. The rise in Tea Party popularity in the CBS-New York Times survey didn't get the attention of the misleading Gallup headline.  I could not find any stories about that finding prior to the WaPo article. The rise in Tea Party support didn't get headlines at The Times, or at CBS News which ran this misleading headline about the Gallup poll instead, but nowhere in the article mentioned its own contrary findings:

CBS News Gallup Tea Party 9-26-2013

Eventually I found the poll, here it is. CBS-NYT poll cover The question about Tea Party support shows that Tea Party support rose rapidly this month, is higher than it has been for over a year, and is in the same range it has been in since early 2010, with the exception of the surge in support around the 2010 election:

FIRST, you find out stuff before your friends. Case in point, on Monday afternoon Leslie wrote Hamilton College sponsors “I Love Female Orgasm” workshop based on an obscure Facebook page we stumbled upon while researching the Hamilton segregation scandal.  The post was tweeted and shared on Facebook hundreds of times. [caption id="attachment_66168"...

From Barbara: In Palmetto, FL. The bottom one says I heart capitalism and the one on the windshield says Lord, deliver us from Obamacare. Nice to know I am not alone. ...

From my wife after over 30 years: "I already have the ring. I'm done making sandwiches." Background: Two people meet. Make sandwiches. Fall in love. Make more sandwiches. Plan to get married. 124 sandwiches NY Post
Eric devoured the sandwich as if it were a five-star meal, diving in with large, eager bites. “Babes, this is delicious!” he exclaimed. As he finished that last bite, he made an unexpected declaration of how much he loved me and that sandwich: “Honey, you’re 300 sandwiches away from an engagement ring!” .... Today, I’ve made and blogged about 176 sandwiches. Over the months, my creations have grown more complex — lobster rolls, bánh mìs, pulled pork. No matter what’s on the menu, Eric smiles and says thank you. He’s just happy I cook for him at all. “You women read all these magazines to get advice on how to keep a man, and it’s so easy,” he says. “We’re not complex. Just do something nice for us. Like make a sandwich.”
Read the whole thing.  It's a great love story.  And watch the video at the bottom of this post, it's love to which the sandwiches really are mere observers. But someone had to go and ruin it.  Via Jim Treacher: Twitter - sandwich complaints Really, what do you care?  I thought feminism meant empowering women to make their own choices.  I guess it meant empowering you to make choices for women who don't make the choices you would make. And why is Chris Hayes chiming in on a woman's choice?  Chris Hayes is anti-choice and part of the patriarchy!

Obama held a victory dance over Senate Republicans as part of a press statement today. Before he got around to gloating and calling the Tea Party extremists, Obama started with the big announcement that he had spoken by phone with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani:
I do believe that there is a basis for resolution. Iran’s supreme leader has issued a fatwa against the development of nuclear weapons. President Rouhani has indicated that Iran will never develop nuclear weapons. I’ve made clear that we respect the right of the Iranian people to access peaceful nuclear energy in the context of Iran meeting its obligations.... I also communicated to President Rouhani my deep respect for the Iranian people.
Of course, it was historic. For the Mullahs. https://twitter.com/LegInsurrection/status/383678578971271168 https://twitter.com/RichardGrenell/status/383690230433198081 https://twitter.com/RichardGrenell/status/383687451631292416 Having the U.S. become a participant in preserving Mullah rule against their own people has been the precondition to which Obama always has been willing to agree. That's why he was silent during the 2009 street protests. https://twitter.com/LegInsurrection/status/383685789453787136 https://twitter.com/LegInsurrection/status/383684860067323904

Sometimes what comes around, goes around. The Washington Times is reporting that the Florida Commission on Ethics has launched an investigation of controversial State prosecutor Angela Corey over her firing of IT director Ben Kruidbos in the aftermath of the prosecutorial debacle that was the George...

The Senate has passed the necessary 60 votes to cut off debate on the House Continuing Resolution, opening the way for Harry Reid to strip out the Obamacare defunding provision and get a vote on a Continuing Resolution restoring Obamacare funding. The procedural explanation is here. https://twitter.com/amandacarpenter/status/383634778991652866 https://twitter.com/Citizens_United/status/383634654361690114 [caption id="attachment_66109" align="alignnone" width="502"]Senate Cloture Vote Final Vote (Senate votes 79-19 for Cloture on House Continuing Resolution)[/caption] https://twitter.com/ByronYork/status/383636918355128320 https://twitter.com/ChadPergram/status/383636628641554432 https://twitter.com/BretBaier/status/383639488922017793

Much of the coverage of the Marissa Alexander case (previously touched on Legal Insurrection here and here) laments that Ms. Alexander was sentenced to a statutory mandatory sentence of 20 years in prison for having "merely" fired a "warning shot".   The actual evidence of the...