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It used to be that politics in the workplace was a very taboo subject. I have worked for companies in the past that would go as far as reprimand any employee or management that would engage in such conversation, simply because it is so easy to create animosity amongst workers. But that was then and this is now. Now we have people like Mitt Romney, who think politics in the workplace is a very good idea.

Back in June of this year, Romney held a conference call with the conservative National Federation of Independent Business. In that call, Romney had this to say about the upcoming election:

I hope you make it very clear to your employees what you believe is in the best interest of your enterprise and therefore their job and their future in the upcoming elections. And whether you agree with me or you agree with President Obama, or whatever your political view, I hope — I hope you pass those along to your employees. Nothing illegal about you talking to your employees about what you believe is best for the business, because I think that will figure into their election decision, their voting decision and of course doing that with your family and your kids as well.

I will give Romney credit here; he played it very safe. If Romney told these people that they should tell their employees to "vote for Romney", then we would be looking at something illegal. Instead he did some wordsmithing to stay away from any legal problems.

But even if this does fall into the realm of being legal, it is still morally questionable. Having an employer say something like that to an employee carries a certain weight of threat to it. They don't have to say "vote for Romney or lose your job", but simply saying "A Romney win is in your best interest," is the nicer way of putting it.

The latest in the crazy capers of Mitt and Paul has Paul Ryan pretending that he cares:

The head of a northeast Ohio charity says that the Romney campaign last week “ramrodded their way” into the group’s Youngstown soup kitchen so that GOP vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan could get his picture taken washing dishes in the dining hall.

Brian J. Antal, president of the Mahoning County St. Vincent De Paul Society, said that he was not contacted by the Romney campaign ahead of the Saturday morning visit by Ryan, who stopped by the soup kitchen after a town hall at Youngstown State University.

What about government coming into our homes and businesses? Paul Ryan just forced his way into one. Not only that, but what Ryan washed was already clean!

But it gets worse. There is fear that Ryan's shenanigans could cause the kitchen some donations:

He noted that the soup kitchen relies on funding from private individuals who might reconsider their support if it appears that the charity is favoring one political candidate over another.

“I can’t afford to lose funding from these private individuals,” he said. “If this was the Democrats, I’d have the same exact problem.”

I'm sure many would think this sounds petty; not supporting a charity because it looks like they support a certain candidate. They would be right. It would be as petty as churches that shun members for supporting a certain candidate or mega-millionaire business owners threatening their employees over support for a candidate (*cough* KOCH!).

During an open and televised hearing of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, House Republicans decided to out a CIA base Benghazi. The hearing, which was in fact nothing more than another witch hunt conducted by Darrell Issa, the following occurred:

Through their outbursts, cryptic language and boneheaded questioning of State Department officials, the committee members left little doubt that one of the two compounds at which the Americans were killed, described by the administration as a “consulate” and a nearby “annex,” was a CIA base. They did this, helpfully, in a televised public hearing.

Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) was the first to unmask the spooks. “Point of order! Point of order!” he called out as a State Department security official, seated in front of an aerial photo of the U.S. facilities in Benghazi, described the chaotic night of the attack. “We’re getting into classified issues that deal with sources and methods that would be totally inappropriate in an open forum such as this.”

Now this may seem rather cryptic, but Dana Milbank goes into further detail, using his knowledge of Washington, to describe what was actually being talked about:

May still be a facility? The plot thickened — and Chaffetz gave more hints. “I believe that the markings on that map were terribly inappropriate,” he said, adding that “the activities there could cost lives.”

This Fall, the Supreme Court will be taking up a case that can really affect all of us. The case will determine if you actually have the right to sell a used product that was made or contains parts from overseas:

At issue in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons is the first-sale doctrine in copyright law, which allows you to buy and then sell things like electronics, books, artwork and furniture, as well as CDs and DVDs, without getting permission from the copyright holder of those products.

Under the doctrine, which the Supreme Court has recognized since 1908, you can resell your stuff without worry because the copyright holder only had control over the first sale.

Put simply, though Apple Inc. AAPL -0.62% has the copyright on the iPhone and Mark Owen has it on the book “No Easy Day,” you can still sell your copies to whomever you please whenever you want without retribution.

That’s being challenged now for products that are made abroad, and if the Supreme Court upholds an appellate court ruling, it would mean that the copyright holders of anything you own that has been made in China, Japan or Europe, for example, would have to give you permission to sell it.

So if a product contains any foreign made parts, then you can be caught up by this. Want to sell your used Chevy or Ford? Well there are a lot of parts in those "America" made vehicles that come from overseas, so selling your used car, or even trading it in, can now make you a criminal.

Having a yard sale and want to get that old TV out of the basement? Better not sell it without permission from the manufacturer.

And what will this do to services like EBay or Craig's List? Copyright trolls would have a field day going after people selling products on the popular auction sites.

These guys really get around:

Lindsay Lohan told police she was assaulted in her Manhattan hotel room early Sunday morning by a man she met at a night club, police sources said.

According to law enforcement officials, Lohan told police she got into an argument with a 25-year-old man she brought to her room after meeting him 1 Oak in Chelsea.

The argument was allegedly over photos the man took of Lohan on his cell phone while they were in her 15th floor room at the W Hotel near Union Square with some of Lohan's friends

[SNIP]

LaBella was initially charged Sunday afternoon with assault and harassment, but after further investigation police dropped the assault charge. LaBella has since filed a harassment complaint against Lohan.

According to his YouTube page, LaBella ran for president of his business fraternity at the University of San Diego and was a child actor. In police paperwork, LaBella listed his employer as Illinois Congressman John Shimkus.

“While no one from Congressman Shimkus’ office has been contacted by Mr. LaBella following his arrest, he has been an employee in the Congressman’s Washington office," a spokesman for Rep. Shimkus said in a statement Sunday. "Obviously, the Congressman does not condone his actions. As this is a legal matter for Mr. LaBella, the Congressman nor his office will make further comment.”

It pretty much goes with the entire platform for the GOP when it comes to women...

There is a certain points in which government regulation is bad, and this is one of those:

The U.S. has fallen behind much of the Western world when it comes to phone, cable and Internet service. Americans actually pay much more for inferior service compared to their global counterparts.

In his new book, The Fine Print: How Big Companies Use 'Plain English' to Rob You Blind, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter David Cay Johnston highlights these astounding facts:

• Americans pay four times as much as the French for an Internet triple-play package—phone, cable TV and Internet—at an average of $160 per month versus $38 per month.
• The French get global free calling and worldwide live television. Their Internet is also 10 times faster at downloading information and 20 times faster uploading it.
• America has gone from #1 in Internet speed (when we invented it) to 29th in the world and falling.
• Bulgaria is among the countries with faster Internet service.
• Americans pay 38 times as much as the Japanese for Internet data.

Since the mid-1970's when Ma Bell was cited as holding a monopoly over phone service, Americans have been told more competition would lower their phone bill. But the promise of lower prices has actually led to higher prices, says Johnston.

Johnston goes on to lay out the very reasons why we are so bad off:

The telecos got the rules changed while we weren't watching," says Johnston in the accompanying interview. Basically, the phone and cable companies lobbied Washington to change laws and regulations to favor their business over their customers.

And remember the so-called "Information Superhighway"?

Have you been to the emergency room lately? Waits are long. Why? Because they have become the doctor's office for the uninsured. Well Mitt Romney thinks that is actually a good idea:

Downplaying the need for the government to ensure that every person has health insurance, Mitt Romney on Sunday suggested that emergency room care suffices as a substitute for the uninsured.

"Well, we do provide care for people who don't have insurance," he said in an interview with Scott Pelley of CBS's "60 Minutes" that aired Sunday night. "If someone has a heart attack, they don't sit in their apartment and die. We pick them up in an ambulance, and take them to the hospital, and give them care. And different states have different ways of providing for that care."

The problem with this approach is the lack of preventive care. People can't go for regular check-ups, so things like blood pressure and cholesterol get out of control. When they finally reach the boiling point, people go to the ER with a full blown heart attack, and now what would have been a cheap visit turns into a very expensive one.

Now this brings us to the second problem - costs. One of the biggest contributors to rising healthcare costs is the uninsured. Hospitals are businesses. Businesses exist to make money. When uninsured people come into the ER and can't pay, the hospital is left with costs. Remember, they still have to pay doctors, technicians, laboratories, specialists, etc. Do the hospitals just eat these costs? No, they absorb them into their overall operational costs, which means higher bills for the insured. Sure you might not really see this, but the insurance companies do and now they need to recoup those costs by increasing your premiums.