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In an op-ed today, John Kerry takes on the useless embargo we have against Cuba:

For nearly 20 years after the fall of Saigon, the Vietnam War took a less bloody but equally hostile form. The United States and Vietnam had no diplomatic relations. Vietnamese assets were frozen. Trade was embargoed. But in 1995 the United States normalized relations with Vietnam. The Cold War had ended, and we even signed a trade deal with a country where 58,000 Americans had given their lives.

The result? A Vietnam that is less isolated, more market-oriented, and, yes, freer — though it has miles to go.

Yet when it comes to a small impoverished island 90 miles off the coast of Florida, we cling to a policy that has manifestly failed for nearly 50 years.

While our Cuba policy has largely stood still, reality has changed dramatically. Today, the Cuban "threat" is a faint shadow, change is afoot in the Cuban leadership, and — importantly — Cuban-Americans increasingly seek broad, far-reaching interaction across the Florida Straits.

We need a Cuba policy that looks forward, brings our strengths to bear, and builds on what works to help the Cuban people shape their country's future.

Democracy in Cuba rightly remains an American policy goal. But for 47 years, our embargo in the name of democracy has produced no democracy at all. Too often, our rhetoric and policies have actually furnished the Castro regime with an all-purpose excuse to draw attention away from its many shortcomings. We have played to Fidel Castro's strengths, not ours.

Read on

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Anderson Cooper is seeing his ratings plummet:

The respected CNN anchor has seen his numbers slip significantly through the past year. His 10 p.m. show, "Anderson Cooper 360," has declined 62% in total viewers and 70% in adults 25-54 from November 2008, according to Nielsen figures.

Last month, in Cooper's time slot, Fox News' "On the Record" attracted an average viewership of 1.9 million while "360" averaged 672,000; repeats of MSNBC's "Countdown" and HLN's Nancy Grace show averaged 655,000 and 458,000, respectively.

But in the ad-friendly 25-54 demo, those same repeats won out over Cooper with 224,000 (MSNBC) and 214,000 (HLN).

CNN really needs to make some big changes and make them quick. Cooper is at the point that he’s getting beat by reruns. That is really sad in the news industry.

Assholes like this should not be allowed to wear a badge:

The most recent atrocity committed by the self-proclaimed "America's Toughest Sheriff" involves a woman who was detained while 9-months pregnant. Alma Minerva Chacon's case has been receiving media attention due to the brutality with which she was treated. The very same night of her arrest, Chacon went into labor and found herself afraid and alone, being rushed to a local hospital with her hands and legs chained in shackles.

Once she reached the hospital, nurses repeatedly begged the Sheriff's staff to allow them to unchain the mother, but they refused and Chacon was forced to give birth while still shackled to the bed. At one point, the nurse asked for them to release her so that she could be escorted to the bathroom for a urinalysis, but even that request was denied. But the worst came once Chacon gave birth to her baby girl.

Here is the video interview of Chacon:

This is one that I didn’t see coming:

Three prominent conservatives warned in a joint statement against Republican "scaremongering" on Guantanamo Bay detainees, saying the prison in Thomson, Illinois would be fine to handle them.

Former Republican Congressman and Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr, David Keene, chairman of the American Conservative Union and Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, have teamed up to urge the Gitmo detainees be taken to the U.S.

"The scaremongering about these issues should stop," Barr, Keene and Norquist wrote.

Wow – conservatives calling out the GOP for scaremongering. That is amazing, and probably unprecedented.

Now we must ask if people will call the media out for the same. Allow me to elaborate with a little “a picture is worth a thousand words” example, courtesy of Bob Cesca. Here we see the famous picture of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, used whenever the media would talk about him at Gitmo:

Now that we are bringing people like this to the U.S., the media has decided to retire that photo and replace it with this one:

Dede Scozzafava is a Republican candidate for NY-23. Last night she held a dinner and afterwards someone from her campaign called the police on John McCormack from the Weekly Standard. Here’s what he says about it:

I spotted Scozzafava later as she was walking to the parking lot, and asked her: " Assemblywoman, do you believe that the health-care bill should exclude coverage for abortion?" She didn't reply. I asked her twice more. Silence.

After she got into her car, I went to my car and fired up my laptop to report the evening's events.

Minutes later a police car drove into the parking lot with its lights flashing. Officer Grolman informed me that she was called because "there was a little bit of an uncomfortable situation" and then took down my name, date of birth, and address.

"Maybe we do things a little differently here, but you know, persistence in that area, you scared the candidate a little bit," Officer Grolman told me.

This sounds like a misunderstanding is all, but let’s look at how Malkin responds to this:

Radical leftist Dede Scozzafava can’t stand the heat

I just read through Scozzafava’s issues page on her campaign site, and nothing strikes me as her being a “radical leftist”. As matter of fact items like these speak the speak the opposite:

Last week news broke that the Obama administration had struck a deal with big pharma to spend up to $150 million in advertising in support of President Obama’s health care reform. This got a lot of people wondering what deals were struck, and some of the rumors even included prevention of Congress from negotiating for lower drug prices. Sen. Sherrod Brown decided to ask the White House about the deal:

Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) asked two top White House aides, David Axelrod and deputy White House chief of staff Jim Messina, if the administration had cut such a deal with PhRMA.

"He says there's no deal. I take him at his word," Brown told the Huffington Post.

But there is something else to this – something much less sinister.

Every year big pharma gives away millions in free drugs to uninsured people who can’t afford them. Pfizer has their Connection to Care program, while Glaxo-Smith-Kline has Bridges to Access and Bristol Meyer offers their Patient Assistance Program. Each of these programs are extremely beneficial to those who can’t afford their much needed medications.

If we see a truly comprehensive health care bill like President Obama wants, which includes a public option, then these companies stand to benefit from it. Instead of giving away all these drugs, they will now be able to charge the government for them. It means increased profit for big pharma, and not in a bad way.

It’s no wonder why the hard core conservatives love this chick. It seems like every time she opens her mouth nothing comes out but lies. Take this latest example. One of her reasons for resigning was that it was costing the taxpayers too much money to fight the ethics complaints. Well it turns out that is flatly wrong:

But there's new evidence to suggest the argument is just factually wrong. Greg Sargent reported that the governor's own office conceded yesterday that money used to respond to the ethics charges are part of fixed costs that would have gone to the same lawyers, whether the charges were filed or not. The funds wouldn't have to go schools, police, or transportation, as Palin claimed. The $1.9 million "was arrived at by adding up attorney hours spent on fending off complaints -- based on the fixed salaries of lawyers in the governor's office and the Department of Law. The money would have gone to the lawyers no matter what they were doing."

(h/t Cesca)

Palin’s biggest problem is that she can’t keep her mouth shut. People talk about Biden’s mouth. His is nothing compared to hers. And the right thinks this lady is presidential material? Now that is down right laughable.

I remember reading about Judge Alex Kozinski when news broke that he had been caught having pornographic images on his personal website. To me there was nothing wrong with it. The pictures were all of adults, so who really cares? Yeah I know – the religious freaks.

Well a judicial council decided to take up the issue and have released their findings:

A panel of judges assigned to investigate concluded Kozinski's "possession of sexually explicit offensive material combined with his carelessness in failing to safeguard his sphere of privacy was judicially imprudent." His actions, the panel wrote, "can reasonably be seen as having resulted in embarrassment to the institution of the federal judiciary."

He wasn’t disciplined, but their findings really perked my interests, particularly the “carelessness in failing to safeguard his sphere of privacy “ part. So it’s not what he did, it’s the fact that he got caught. I wonder if more judges will tell defendants that in court rooms.