Thursday, July 16
Today, Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor concludes her testimony before the Senate after backtracking from comments on judicial bias. Also, RNC Chairman Michael Steele makes some unwise comments of his own. Liberals and Conservatives stick to party lines as Obama engages Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl in a health care duel. Democrats in the House push for massive tax hikes as Karl Rove launches an attack on Obama’s stimulus plan. Meanwhile, U.S. intelligence searches for Kim Jong-Il’s mysterious heir, and the Chinese economy surges.
Unwise Answers from Wise Latina: Sotomayor Explains Comments
AP: During her second day of questioning, Sotomayor backs off slightly from earlier remarks, saying she intended the “wise Latina” speech to be inspiring. Today marks the final day of questioning.
“’It’s muddled, confusing, backtracking on issue after issue,” complained Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the top Republican on the Judiciary panel. “I frankly am a bit disappointed in the lack of clarity and consistency in her answers’….Once she finishes testifying, Republicans plan to call New Haven, Conn., firefighter Frank Ricci, who passed a promotion exam only to see the city toss out the results because too few minorities qualified for promotion. His ensuing discrimination complaint gives the GOP another chance to portray Sotomayor as a judge who allows her bias to dictate the outcome of a case.”—Read More
Steele to Bring Minorities to GOP with “Fried Chicken”
HuffPo: RNC Chairman Michael Steele makes some unfortunate comments to bloggers at the Young Republicans convention in Indianapolis last week.
“Local Republican blog Hoosier Access was able to get RNC Chairman Michael Steele to sit down with a group of bloggers and they taped the conversation. The old gaffe-o-matic (or as I like to call him, the Republican Joe Biden!) answers a question from a gay person of color in this clip about the GOP’s diversity outreach.”—Read More
Obama Duels with Kyl
Politco: Upset over criticism of the President’s stimulus and health care plans, the White House is targeting Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl, R-AZ, with ads and appeals to Arizona’s governor.
“So after seeing Kyl and House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) again paint the legislation as a failure on Sunday talk shows, White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel directed that the letters from the Cabinet secretaries be sent to Brewer, according to two administration officials. And then the DNC made sure other Republicans saw the message being delivered to Arizona by touting the letters.”–Read More
Dems Hike Taxes to Pre-Reagan Levels
Washington Times: Top earners would hand over 45 percent of their income in the House Democrats’ health care proposal. Business advocates warn this could cripple the economy.
“Polls show most Americans support raising taxes on the rich. However, the last time Democrats pursued that agenda in 1993, when they raised the top federal income tax rate from 31 percent to 39.6 percent, they lost their congressional majorities in both chambers the next year.”—Read More
Mystery Teenager to Take Control of North Korea
WaPo: American intelligence is racing to discover the identity of a North Korean student who briefly enrolled in a Swiss boarding school. The boy is suspected to be Kim Jong-Il’s heir.
“LIEBEFELD, Switzerland — In August 1998, as famine reached a terrible climax in North Korea, the destitute Asian nation enrolled a shy teenager in a Swiss state school. He arrived with a fake name, a collection of genuine, top-of-the-line Nike sneakers and a passion for American basketball. ”–Read More
Rove: Obama is Hiding Stimulus Failure
WSJ: As progressives call for yet another stimulus package, Karl Rove suggests the White House is trying to lower expectations in order to distract Americans from the failings of his original stimulus plan.
“When it came to the stimulus package, the president and his administration promised, in the words of National Economic Director Larry Summers, “You’ll see the effects begin almost immediately.” Now it’s clear that those promised jobs and growth haven’t materialized. So Mr. Obama is attempting to lower expectations retroactively, saying in an op-ed in Sunday’s Washington Post that his stimulus “was, from the start, a two-year program.” That is misleading. Mr. Obama never said if his stimulus were passed things might still get significantly worse in the following year.”—Read More
China Booms as World Plummets into Recession
NYT: The Communist nation’s economy grows by an astounding eight percent, a statistic which some attribute to aggressive lending practices.
“Some analysts, however, have warned that China’s growth also holds serious risks because of an explosion of bank lending that could eventually led to non-performing loans, overly aggressive infrastructure spending that could be wasteful, and policies that do not favor private businesses.”—Read More
Limb-Hating Man Voluntarily Causes Amputation
ABC: Saying he felt his leg just didn’t belong, the man used dry ice to ruin his healthy limb.
“Well at times I tried to – you know sort of fatally injure the leg with tourniquets and the likes of that. Dropping the weight of the car on the knee and things like that and but you know the leg was made of tougher stuff than I imagined. And it wasn’t until I was about thirty that I thought now get rid of it once and for all.”—Read More
Surge in Octogenarian Pickpockets Worries Authorities
UPI: An elderly thief is nabbed by Italian police.
“PESARO– Italian police said an 88-year-old woman with a history of petty theft was caught attempting to steal a woman’s purse at a weekly market in Pesaro.”—Read More
Court Commends Drunk for Passing Out in Car
AP: After being awoken by police and forced to drive drunk, the teenager successfully argues entrapment.
“Once out of the parking lot, Peterson was arrested for drunken driving. He was subsequently found guilty and ordered to spend 60 days in jail. A Wisconsin appeals court on Wednesday commended Peterson for doing the right thing by trying to sleep it off, and said the trial court was wrong not to let him argue that police had entrapped him.”—Read More
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