Confederate Flag Sets off Debate in GOP 2016 Class

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney called for the immediate removal of the Confederate battle flag from outside the South Carolina Statehouse, scrambling the 2016 Republican presidential contenders into staking a position on a contentious cultural issue.
Some still steered clear from the sensitive debate, even after the shooting deaths of nine people in a historic African-American church in Charleston further exposed the raw emotions about the flying the flag.

Many see the Confederate flag as "a symbol of racial hatred," the GOP's 2012 presidential nominee tweeted on Saturday. "Remove it now to honor #Charleston victims."

Romney joins President Barack Obama and civil rights leaders in calling for the flag to come down as the nation grapples with Wednesday's murders. The man charged with the crimes, Dylann Storm Roof, held the Confederate flag in a photograph on a website and displayed the flags of defeated white-supremacist governments in Africa on his Facebook page.

So far, most of the Republican Party's leading 2016 presidential contenders have been silent on flying the Stars and Bars.

South Carolina was the last state to fly the Confederate battle flag from its Capitol dome. A compromise in 2000 moved the flag to a 30-foot flagpole elsewhere on Statehouse grounds, where it has been flying at full staff.

The debate holds political risks for Republicans eager to win over South Carolina conservatives who support the display of the battle flag on public grounds. The state will host the nation's third presidential primary contest in February, a critical step in the 2016 race.

Via: Newsmax

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O'Malley: 'I'm Pissed'

Democratic presidential candidate responds to the Charleston shooting with an email saying, "I'm pissed."

"I'm pissed that after an unthinkable tragedy like the one in South Carolina yesterday, instead of jumping to act, we sit back and wait for the appropriate moment to say what we're all thinking: that this is not the America we want to be living in," O'Malley writes.

I'm pissed that we’re actually asking ourselves the horrific question of, what will it take? How many senseless acts of violence in our streets or tragedies in our communities will it take to get our nation to stop caving to special interests like the NRA when people are dying?

I'm pissed that after working hard in the state of Maryland to pass real gun control—laws that banned high-magazine weapons, increased licensing standards, and required fingerprinting for handgun purchasers—Congress continues to drop the ball.

It's time we called this what it is: a national crisis.

I proudly hold an F rating from the NRA, and when I worked to pass gun control in Maryland, the NRA threatened me with legal action, but I never backed down.

So now, I'm doubling down, and I need your help. What we did in Maryland should be the first step of what we do as a nation. The NRA is already blaming the victims of yesterday's shooting for their own deaths, saying they too should have been armed. Let's put an end to this madness and finally stand up to them. Here are some steps we should be taking:

1. A national assault weapons ban.

2. Stricter background checks.

3. Efforts to reduce straw-buying, like fingerprint requirements.

Via: The Weekly Standard

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None of Opportunist Obama's Own Gun Control Proposals Have Anything to Do with the Shootings in Charleston

It didn’t take too long until we heard the oh-so-predictable calls for more gun control. Speaking this morning during an emotional press conference, the Mayor of Charleston, Joseph P. Riley, expressed his disappointment that the massacre at Sandy Hook had not yielded a “major national effort” to restrict the right to keep and bear arms. Later, he signaled his intention to “push on” toward that goal.

 He was quickly joined by the President of the United States, who used his remarks as an opportunity to propose that Something Needed to Be Done: 

Giving voice to intense heartache, anger and sadness, President Barack Obama said Thursday the South Carolina church shooting that left nine people dead shows the need for a national reckoning on gun violence. 

Obama, who knew the pastor killed in the Charleston attack, said he has been called upon too often to mourn the deaths of innocents killed by those “who had no trouble getting their hands on a gun.” 

“Now is the time for mourning and for healing,” the president said. “But let’s be clear. At some point, we as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries. It doesn’t happen in other places with this kind of frequency. And it is in our power to do something about it.

” The million dollar question, though, is, “Do what?” It is all very well to criticize the National Rifle Association and the Republican party for opposing further gun control, and yet it remains an inconvenient truth that not one of the reforms that the Democratic party proposed the last time it ventured into this debate would have changed the outcome here.

Via: National Review

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[VIDEO] GOP Gov. Nikki Haley Chokes Up, “The Heart And Soul Of South Carolina Was Broken”…

While Obama’s first reactions was to politicize the tragedy and push for gun control.

Via: Weasel Zippers

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Former Obama Administration Official Blames South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley For Shooting At Black Church

A former Obama administration official wasted no time in politicizing a shooting at a black Charleston, S.C. church that left nine people dead.

What do you think?

Brandon Friedman, the former deputy assistant secretary of public affairs at the Department of Housing and Urban Development, posted a tweet shortly after the Wednesday night shooting linking it to South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s defense of flying the Confederate flag outside of the South Carolina statehouse.

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In the tweet, Friedman linked to a 2014 article from the liberal website Talking Points Memo which reported Haley’s position on the issue.

What Haley’s defense of allowing the flag to continue flying has to do with Wednesday night’s shooting is unclear. Friedman did not return a request for comment.

What do you think?

Police say a white male in his early 20s entered the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal church in Charleston and opened fire on parishioners holding Bible study. The gunman is still on the loose, and his motivation is unknown. Charleston police chief Greg Mullen did state at a press conference that he believes that the shooting could be a hate crime.

What do you think?

This is not the first time that Friedman, a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, has made controversial statements on social media. Last June he posted a string of tweets asserting that Bowe Bergdahl, the soldier who deserted his Army unit in Afghanistan in 2009, may have done so because the rest of his platoon were “psychopaths.”

What do you think?

“What if his platoon was long on psychopaths and short on leadership?” Friedman asked. What if he grew disillusioned with what he saw, didn’t trust his leadership, and walked off? Legal? No. Worthy of sympathy? Maybe.” (RELATED: Obama Administration Official Brandon Friedman: Hey, Maybe Bergdahl’s Platoon Was A Bunch Of Psychopaths)

Via: Daily Caller

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[VIDEO] Manhunt on for gunman who killed 9 at South Carolina church prayer meeting

A frantic manhunt was on in South Carolina, hours after a "horrible scoundrel" opened fire in a historic African-American church in downtown Charleston, killing nine, including a state senator who is a prominent pastor, during a regular prayer meeting.

Police immediately branded the shooting spree, which began just after 9 p.m. Wednesday, a hate crime, and released surveillance images of a white man fleeing the scene at 180-year-old Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church after the horrific incident, which left six women and three men dead.

"This is an unspeakable and unfathomable act by somebody filled with hate and a deranged mind," Charleston Mayor Joseph Riley said in a Thursday morning press conference. He vowed that authorities were "committed to finding this horrible scoundrel."

"This is an unspeakable and unfathomable act by somebody filled with hate and a deranged mind."

- Charleston, S.C., Mayor Joseph Riley

A five-year-old girl reportedly survived the attack by following her grandmother's instructions to play dead, and a woman was allowed to leave to tell what had happened. It was not immediately known what message she was supposed to convey.

Charleston Police Chief Greg Mullen said the gunman, described as clean-shaven and approximately 21 years old with sandy blonde hair and a slender build, was still at large. Police said the man was last seen wearing a gray sweatshirt with blue jeans and Timberland boots. 

Via: Fox News

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Gowdy: 'I Want to See Every Single Solitary Document'; Death of 4 Americans 'Transcends Politics'

Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), who has been chosen to chair the select committee on Benghazi, went “On The Record tonight.

When asked what he would say to Democrats like Rep. Adam Schiff who oppose the committee, Gowdy said, “At least let the process have a chance to work before you declare it null and void.”

Gowdy said the committee will lay out all the facts and evidence, and then a jury will come to a decision. He said he hopes for a reasonable, fair-minded jury.

The South Carolina congressman told Greta Van Susteren that witnesses have come forward and shared that there was a systematic effort to keep certain documents under wraps. He also said there is a lot of over-classification of documents to protect people’s careers.

“I’m not interested in summaries, I’m not interested in synopses, I’m interested in access to the document and the witness, and I’ll decide whether or not I think the appropriate questions were asked in the past,” he said.

“There are certain things in our culture that have to transcend politics. And I don’t mean to sound naive, but the murder of four fellow Americans and an attack on a facility that is emblematic of our country should transcend politics, and I know our fellow citizens can handle the truth, but only if they get access to it,” he said.

Via: Fox News

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After Senate Dems go nuclear, GOP fights back with conventional weapons

Democrats may have changed the rules on filibusters, but far from ending the intense battle over President Obama’s nominations, the move has pushed Republicans to fight harder — and to pioneer other tactics.

The latest move was made late Friday, just as the Senate was preparing to adjourn for a two-week recess. Republicans refused to allow a courtesy request to keep the full slate of Obama nominees pending. As a result, the nomination process must restart early next year.

It was a capstone of a year in which a deal on filibusters frayed and finally collapsed, leaving the Senate atmosphere more poisoned than it has been in generations.

Restarting the nomination process is a small procedural hurdle, but it’s the latest sign that Republicans intend for Democrats to feel the pain from using the “nuclear option” in November to change the filibuster rules.

“The normal way the Senate has operated for a couple hundred years has been destroyed this year, and to ask that normalcy come about now is just beyond the pale,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, said as he delivered the parliamentary blow that forced dozens of nominations to be killed for lack of action.

Enlarge Photo

Alejandro Mayorkas was confirmed as deputy secretary of the Homeland Security Department ... more >

Republicans did confirm a number of military nominations but blocked all pending judicial, ambassadorial and civilian Cabinet posts.

Such action is by no means unprecedented. Indeed, Senate rules state that if the chamber adjourns for the end of a session, any of the president’s nominations that haven’t reached at least the floor will be sent back to the White House.

Via: Washington Times

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ObamaCare May Devastate the Real Estate and Travel Industries

Americans are among the most mobile people on earth, but ObamaCare may soon start freezing them in place. Millions are losing their health insurance policies and being forced onto the ObamaCare exchanges, where most plans only provide local medical coverage. As Americans realize they must pay for all non-emergency medical care when they leave their home county, their decisions may have a profound impact on the real-estate market, particularly the second home sector, and on the travel business.

I recently interviewed a woman I'll call Sue, whose story may become increasingly common. Sue, a 60-year-old retiree, and her husband bought a second home in South Carolina to escape the Connecticut winters. "I had a Blue Cross Blue Shield policy in Connecticut, and I used it with no problem in South Carolina. I found an internist and ophthalmologist and dermatologist down here, and kept the rest of my doctors up north."

"The price was reasonable. It cost me $450 a month, with a $2,500 deductible. It was slightly more for out of network; there was no co-pay, and I got my prescriptions filled in both states with no problem."

"Then I got the letter telling me that my policy would no longer exist, because it didn't comply with the new health care law. They wanted to transfer us into a new plan that doubled my premium to $900 a month. The deductible went up to $3,500, and it covered zero out of network."

Via: American Thinker

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Jim Clyburn says Democrats are 'in bed' with insurance companies over Obamacare

Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., conceded that Democrats got "in bed" with insurance companies while crafting Obamacare, as he argued that the companies should do more to promote the law.

"We need to push this out into the insurance companies," Clyburn said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "If we are going to be in bed with them, let's bring them into this process. A lot of these insurance companies could be signing people up, they could be informing their policy holders — this letter that they're sending out, don't just cancel the policies, let them know what their alternatives are."

Clyburn's comment concurred with NBC's Chuck Todd's analysis, who explained why "the White House is disappointed" with the insurance companies' failure to promote Obamacare.

"They're in bed with the insurance companies," Todd said. "They're disappointed that the health insurance companies aren't more publicly enthusiastic since this law was essentially designed to give them more business."

Clyburn seems not to realize that insurance companies are directing policyholders to new Obamacare plans, but some of those policies cost more to provide less. For instance, the city workers in Bel Aire, Kan., lost their coverage only to have inferior alternatives offered to them.

"I simply wanted you to know the pain this is causing me and my staff in losing the terrific health coverage we had through Blue Cross Blue Shield in exchange for worse coverage at a higher price," city manager Ty Lasher wrote in a letter to Rep. Mike Pompeo, R-Kan., last week.

"BCBS offers other plans that we can choose from based on the government’s standards," Lasher wrote. "All offer higher deductibles and the two closest to our old plan each cost more than what we were paying. In addition, because we are under 50 employees, we no longer get a ‘group’ rate so everyone is being judged as a single."

Via: Washington Examiner

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Lies Transcend all Colours

The evil sin of lying does not come in any particular colour.  White men lie; black men lie and politicians of both colours do it all the time.

Over in the UK, US talk show queen Oprah Winfrey is using South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson’s shout “You lie!” when President Barack Obama was pushing the benefits of his now epic fail Affordable Health Care Act, aka ObamaCare, as proof positive that dislike for the president comes down to “the colour of his skin”.

Winfrey, talking to BBC Arts Editor Will Gompertz about her starring role in The Butler, which recounts the life of an African American man who grows up on a cotton plantation,  raised Wilson’s calling out Obama a liar as evidence that Americans don’t like Obama based on the colour of his skin.

“Asked if some of the challenges and criticisms faced by President Barack Obama were down to the colour of his skin, she said: “There’s no question.” (BBC, Nov. 13, 2013)

“She recalled an incident in 2009 when Mr Obama was giving a speech to Congress, and Republican congressman Joe Wilson called out “you lie”.

“Remember that?” she said. “I think there’s a level of disrespect for the office that occurs.

“And that occurs in some cases, and maybe even many cases, because he’s African American. There’s no question about that. And it’s the kind of thing no one ever says, but everybody’s thinking it.

Via: Canada Free Press

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Exclusive: Marilyn Tavenner Did Not Speak Truth Under Oath, Says Victim of Security Breach

A top Obama administration official came under fire Tuesday after her congressional testimony conflicted with the account of a man at the center of the HealthCare.gov security breach.

Marilyn Tavenner, administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, promised a Senate committee that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services had reached out to Tom Dougall, the South Carolina man whose private information was exposed on Healthcare.gov.

That’s not true, said Dougall, who spoke to Heritage following Tavenner’s testimony.

Dougall has called HHS repeatedly since Friday. That’s when he learned his name, address and insurance eligibility had been released to a total stranger in North Carolina. Dougall used the problem-plagued HealthCare.gov in early October, but opted against signing up for insurance.

At a hearing before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee this morning, Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) told Tavenner about Dougall’s experience and asked her why no one from HHS has contacted Dougall:

Mr. Dougall has called [HHS] on several occasions but no one will call him back. Not a single person has taken the time, after having his information exposed, to even call Mr. Dougall back.

But Tavenner protested, promising HHS had already called him:

First of all, Senator Scott, we have reached out to Mr. Dougall several times, and we will find him, and we will follow up on his question.

When Scott offered to give Tavenner all of Dougall’s contact information, she said she didn’t need it and confirmed again that HHS had already reached out. Tavenner even told Scott “we have disagreement there” on whether Dougall had been reached.

Via: The Foundry

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Maddow: Tea party apparently no longer embarrassed to flaunt its racist, neo-Confederate roots

Wednesday night on “The Rachel Maddow Show,” host Rachel Maddow discussed the increasing explicitness with which tea party Republicans are embracing the Confederacy-era South as their cultural touchstone.

Maddow began the segment by discussing the conservative women’s group the National Federation of Republican Women (NFRW) and their 2010 conference in Charleston, SC, in which attendees were promised “A Southern Experience” by the South Carolina branch of the organization.

“And boy did they mean that!” said Maddow. “They meant a very specific kind of ‘Southern Experience.’”

She then showed photos of the event, which featured white attendees dressed in Confederate regalia and African-American people dressed as slaves. The individual dressed as a Confederate officer in the image is South Carolina’s now-Lieutenant Governor Glenn McConnell, who in 2010 was still just a state senator.

In South Carolina, it is apparently good for your political career to be seen doing Civil War reenactments, complete with slaves.

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R), shortly after being sworn in, elected to celebrate Confederate History Month. Unlike past governors, however, he did not mention or make any note of the issue of slavery.

“After a while, after a national kerfuffle,” said Maddow, “McConnell did finally get embarrassed and went back to the commemoration statement and added a reference to slavery.”

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul (R), she said, hung on in the face of his own neo-Confederate scandal until he was forced to ask one of his advisers to resign. Senate aide Jack Hunter left the Paul office after it came to light that he was a right-wing radio shock jock called “The Southern Avenger.” In his radio persona, Hunter railed against immigrants and people of color and insisted that the South should have won the Civil War.

“Right now we are at a moment in Republican politics of deep turmoil,” Maddow said. “And in one specific part of the Republican Party, the turmoil’s not what it is for the rest of the country.”

Via: The Raw Story

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