tpm

Franken Isn’t Happy At All With Apple

Following the explosive news yesterday of Apple mobile devices recording their users every move (for background see here and here), Senator Al Franken is upset and demanding answers from Apple CEO Steve Jobs:

Franken expressed special concern for iPhone and iPad users who are minors, writing that an "estimated 13% of the 108 million iPhones and 19 Million iPad devices sold are used by individuals under the age of 18."

Among Franken's specific questions to Jobs are:

Why did Apple choose to initiate tracking this data in its iOS 4 operating system?

Why were Apple consumers never affirmatively informed of the collection and retention of their location data in this manner? Why did Apple not seek affirmative consent before doing so?

Does Apple believe this conduct is permissible under the terms of its privacy policy?

TPM has Franken’s full letter. It’s great to see a member of Congress take this kind of privacy breach serious. Hopefully more will soon, but in the mean time, I suggest everyone stay clear of Apple products.

Society

The GOP Continues To Show Their Deep Seeded Racism

From TPM comes this email Dave Bartholomew, the chair of the Virginia Beach GOP, thought was funny enough to forward to other people:

MY DOG

I went down this morning to sign up my Dog for welfare.

At first the lady said, "Dogs are not eligible to draw welfare".

So I explained to her that my Dog is black, unemployed, lazy, can't speak English and has no frigging clue who his Daddy is.

So she looked in her policy book to see what it takes to qualify...

My Dog gets his first check Friday.

Is this a great country or what?

Bartholomew offered to resign Monday night over the email, but there are some interesting defenses coming out of other Virginia GOP higher-ups:

David Bartholomew is not a racist and agreed to resign because the e-mail had become a distraction to the Nov. 2 election, said Gary Byler, the 2nd Congressional District GOP chairman, after meeting with Bartholomew.

The e-mail was dated March 15 and sent from the address that Bartholomew uses as party chairman. Bartholomew forwarded it without reading the contents when "he was first getting familiar with the Internet," Byler said.

News

What Do Montana Republicans Have Against Firefighters?

Back in 2006, former Senator Conrad Burns (R-MT) made national news when he called firefighters “lazy bums’. Three months after that Burns was unemployed and Jon Tester became the new Senator from Montana.

Now we have another story, very similar in nature. From TPM:

Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT), fresh off his Republican primary win, filed a lawsuit Friday against the City of Billings and the Billings Fire Department for damages sustained in a 2008 fire. Rehberg is the developer of record for the 1,000-acre subdivision that is managed by his wife.

The lawsuit, which seeks an award to be determined at trial, says that the fire department "breached its duty" during the July 2008 fire. The Rehbergs are claiming damages for the loss of trees and ground cover in an area they intended to develop.

Two points need brought up here. First off, what about tort reform? I thought Republicans were against these lawsuits, yet time and time again we see them filing suit after suit. Talk about a massive hypocrisy.

And the second, and more important point. Why do Republicans feel like firefighters are lazy and never do their job? As a former firefighter I’ve heard this song and dance from other Republican politicians before. When you aren’t on a run and resting at the firehouse, they think you are being lazy. I would love to put one of these fat asses in 75 pounds of gear in the middle of the hot summer and send them into a burning building. I guarantee they will collapse instantly.

National Security

Cantor Goes There On McChrystal

Via TPM:

Washington, D.C. - House Republican Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) today issued the following statement about an article in Rolling Stone regarding the top military officer in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal:

"Obviously a General and his top brass don't make statements like these without being frustrated, so I hope that the President's meeting with General McChrystal will include a frank discussion about what is happening on the ground, and whether the resources and the plan are there to defeat terrorists and accomplish our mission in Afghanistan. Without question, the article in Rolling Stone raises a lot of concerns, but our top priority must be to ensure that our forces in Afghanistan have what they need in order to successfully execute their mission and win the war there.

"At the moment, Democrats in Congress are standing in the way of a clean bill to fund our troops and provide the resources needed because they want to lard it up with domestic spending. We need to get our troops these funds, and should do so without any pork or unrelated domestic spending items thrown in."

And now we got the first big Republican trying to blame this all on President Obama and crying “poor Stanley”. I seem to remember a lot of Republicans yelling “treason” when all those retired generals were speaking out against the Iraq war. Funny how a retired general can’t get “frustrated”, yet an active general in charge of one of America’s war can. Double standard anyone?

And Greg Sargent reminds us of this:

Down Right Freaky

TPM has been digging deep into the apparent implosion at The Washington Times and this latest revelation is just creepy:

It's starting to seem like everything we've reported so far about the implosion at Washington's conservative paper, The Washington Times, was only the pre-implosion. The OpEd page editor is now filing complaint with EEOC alleging religious discrimination -- one of the allegations contained in which was being forced to attend a Moon mass wedding. And it seems like this may only be the beginning of the fireworks. More soon.

On one hand it’s heart warming seeing a publication of hate and partisanship falling apart, but on the other hand it’s really disturbing that an American company feels they can do this sort of thing. The Constitution means absolutely nothing to the right – nothing at all.

Did The Left Wing Blogosphere Contribute To The Demise Of Dobbs?

Greg Sargent believes so:

Whatever you think of Media Matters, there’s no denying that the group led a campaign against Dobbs that had to have played some kind of role in his departure. CNN president Jonathan Klein reportedly told Dobbs months ago that he wanted Dobbs to tone down his opinions. It’s hard to imagine that the constant drumbeat of attention paid by Media Matters, Think Progress, HuffPo, TPM and other sites to Dobbs’ more outlandish opinions — and the damage they were doing to CNN’s news brand — didn’t put Klein and CNN on edge.

There has been a vigorous campaign from the blogosphere to get CNN to dump Dobbs. Given the fact that Dobbs up and quit with no warning in the middle of his contract implies that CNN was rather willing to let him go. I wouldn’t doubt if the rapid decline of CNN ratings coupled with outside pressure contributed to CNN agreeing to his departure so easily.

The Way Back Machine

TPM has dug up a CBS report from 1986 when Jeff Sessions, the now ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, was rejected by the Senate for a court appointment over his racial views.

How’s that for the Republicans trying to “reach out”.

Tying The Hands Of The Commander in Chief

While our economy continues to go down the tubes, the Pentagon wants to keep increasing their funds:

Before the presidential election, reports began to circulate that the Pentagon was planning to propose a defense spending increase of roughly $450 billion over five years. That's in addition to the increases in the base budget already laid out in the 2009 Future Years Defense Plan.

The services have been laying the groundwork for the request for several months. Earlier this year, briefing slides showing $60 billion to $80 billion per year in new expenditures started making the rounds inside the Beltway, supported by a public campaign by conservative think tanks and politicians to establish a floor on defense spending at 4 percent of GDP.

As if that’s not bad enough, they are also looking at ways to trap Obama into increasing spending in the military:

The uniformed services are trying to lock in the next administration by creating a political cost for holding the line on defense spending. Conservative groups are hoping to ramp up defense spending as a tool to limit options for a Democratic Congress and president to pass new, and potentially costly, social programs, including health care reform.

They also like the idea of creating an unrealistically high baseline of expectations for defense spending that will allow them to claim President Obama has cut defense spending.

Not Conservative Enough?

TPM gives us this interesting news:

Now this is just sad. Sen. Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican who has long led the conservative forces of his state, has been denied his customary position as a voting delegate to the Republican National Convention -- and it's being done by an even more conservative bunch.

The Iowa Christian Alliance, a successor to the state's Christian Coalition, has effectively taken over the state party's executive committee, and they obviously weren't happy with Grassley. It does seem curious, though, when one considers that he came up in the ranks of conservative activists and was elected to the Senate in 1980 on Ronald Reagan's coattails, and is a reliably conservative vote on issues like abortion and gay rights. What could have gotten them angry?

Now will all the wingers, who accuse the Democrats of being unfair to Lieberman, denounce this action? I wouldn't hold my breath.

The Great Collapse

A reader writes in to TPM and highlights how Rudy was the front runner one year ago amongst Republicans and majority of the Democratic field. Today he is struggling to survive, placing it all on Florida. This is something the media doesn't really seem to be talking about.

More Bad News For Rudy

From TPM:

A new Quinnipiac poll in Florida shows a four-way dead heat on the Republican side, much like the Rasmussen poll also out this morning. Here are the numbers, compared to the last Quinnipiac poll from mid-December:

McCain 22% (+9)
Giuliani 20% (-8)
Huckabee 19% (-2)
Romney 19% (-1)
Thompson 7% (-1)
Paul 5% (+3)

Even though it is a four way tie, it is very bad for Rudy. He is betting the bank on Florida and has lost eight points, most of which appear to have gone to McCain.

For Crying Out Loud

Here's Jesse Jackson Jr., Obama's national campaign co-chair questioning Hillary's moment of tears:

Any wonder why more women are now going back to Hillary?

(h/t TPM)

Oh The Standards That Are Double

Some Republicans are calling for the House to investigate the New York Time's charging MoveOn a lower rate on the "Betray Us" ad. Well it looks like the New York Times isn't the only ones guilty of such an error:

The Star Tribune will be refunding about $12,000 spent on a full-page ad to Al Franken's Senate campaign, a Franken campaign spokesman says.

This week, Sen. Norm Coleman's campaign took out a full-page ad in the newspaper criticizing Franken for not condemning a New York Times ad by MoveOn.org, which had attacked General David Petraeus.

Coleman's campaign says it paid a little over $23,000 on the ad â€” far less than the $37,000 that Franken's campaign says it paid for a full-page ad two months ago.

Glad they are refunding money to Franken, but was this an "accident"? Perhaps the House should investigate this, if they are too take up the MoveOn ad.

(h/t TPM Election Central)

Grand Olde Perverts

Senator Larry Craig (R-ID) arrested for lewd conduct in a men's room in June. On August 8th he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor. TPM has all the details.

Gonzo Highlights

Hear are some highlights from around the blogosphere regarding today's Gonzo hearings.

Arlen Specter is now proposing a special prosecutor to investigate the entire attorney gate scandal, including possible contempt charges from the House.

TPM also picks up on hints being dropped at perjury charges against Gonzales. This is big considering he is our top law enforcement official.

Gonzales may have revealed that the domestic wiretapping had nothing to do with terrorist surveillance:

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) recalled that former Deputy Attorney General James Comey testified to a much different version of events. Comey said he had refused to sign on to an extension of the program â€œamid concerns about its legality and oversight.â€

Today, Gonzales said Comey was referring to â€œother intelligence activities,â€ appearing to confirm that the Bush administration is operating more than one warrantless domestic spying program. In a heated back and forth with Specter, Gonzales stated:

The disagreement that occurred was about other intelligence activities and the reason for the visit to the hospital was about other intelligence activities. It was not about the terrorist surveillance program that the president announced to the American people.