Back to the Summer Doldrums

++How bitter will the next few years be? Maybe it is just the humidity but already the nuts are beginning to surface again.

++The House is developing a menu to present President Obama in order for them to raise the debt limit. President Obama said this time he was not negotiating it. Observers expect it to reach climax by December recess. One of the options is to "privatize social security", which would only increase the debt but never mind. 

++The House says they will have a conference July 10th on their immigration bill. Whether it includes a "path to citizenship" is anyone's guess.

++If you believe CNN, Republicans are demanding something be done about student loans. Last I looked it was Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat, who was spearheading the charge to cut interest rates on them.

++Sam Adams Lager had a 4th of July ad that quotes the Declaration of Independence but omitted the word "God".  A Fox news commentator said that was "letting the terrorists win."

++The Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity are running ads in Georgia warning the state about the dangers of solar energy and that their rates will skyrocket if state power plants use solar.

++The same Americans for Prosperity have cut ads aimed a younger women warning them about Obamacare.

++Republicans are attacking Obamacare again because the employer mandate has been delayed a year. Now they are arguing this is illegal while others are proclaiming this is Doom and Gloom for the health insurance industry like they did when it was passed the first time.

++Rick Perry is using his anti-abortion stunt in Texas as a launchpad for his 2016 run for the Presidency.

++Scott Walker, who also has higher aspirations, quietly signed his ultrasound anti-abortion bill into law. The ACLU and Planned Parenthood are suing.

++In Michigan, New Jersey and Alabama, same sex couples are suing for the right to marry.

++Mississippi is attempting again to pass a strict anti-abortion law after the success of Ohio, Wisconsin and Texas.

++House Republicans sort of admit that there is no there in the IRS "scandal case". What's worse there smoking gun was the director of the IRS visited the Whit House over 150 times to see President Obama. Forbes rained on their parade in an article that no he never went there.

++House Republicans think they have found the person who can expose the Benghazi scandal. The only problem is that the man is a retired Marine and wants nothing to do with them.

++The Russians think it would be best for Edward Snowden to go to Venezuela for asylum. No one seems to be making the point that Booz-Hamilton, his employer is owned by the Caryle Group, which is now owned by foreigners.

++The Obama scandals all seem to have Republicans as major players. The Scandal to me is the NSA and the Fisa Court. So the head of the NSA is a Republican and the head of the FISA Court is none other than John Roberts. As the New York Times piece indicated this morning, Roberts appoints all 11 judges and they have vastly expanded national security law,which is of course totally secret. The NSA has rejected all FOIA requests by American citizens and the DOJ has just urged the FISA court to keep their decisions secret, contrary to some in the Senate.

++A Mexican sheriff was killed over the weekend with a gun from the Fast and Furious program. This should give Darryl Issa something to play with now that his scandals keep shrinking.

++Liz Cheney wants to be Senator from Wyoming. The only problem is that Republican Mike Enzi doesn't want to retire. Allan Simpson says this will get ugly.

++Only a year ago Mohammed Morsi won the first election in Egypt's modern history. A year later the largest demonstrations in modern history led to his removal by the military. The Saudis applauded Morsi's removal as a sign that authoritarianism would return to the Middle East. The Wall Street Journal urged that Egypt should have a leader like Pinochet. Great. Now The Moslem Brotherhood is waging counter-protests. El Baradei was going to be the Prime Minister, now he's not and he cancelled his appearance on the Sunday talk shows. It looks like the military can't run things any better than Morsi.

++John Kerry was on a yacht during the Egyptian crisis or not. A video shows he was, giving the right new fuel for a Benghazi-type scandal.

++Syria's Assad applauded Morsi's overthrow. The Free Syria Army are waging a war against the Islamists as if that struggle was over and now they are gearing up to take power.

++While Republicans are figuring out ways to suppress the vote in 2014, Hispanics are registering at high rates in reaction to Republican opposition to immigration reform.

++A Fayetteville ,North Carolina man had a July 4th float in a parade celebrating White History Month. I didn't know whether the negative reaction was because of his racism or that his float had a confederate flag. 

++Ted Nugent wants to run for President in 2016. I think he would be older than Hillary Clinton.

++Environmentalists warn that the new border security provisions in the immigration law will jeopardize several animal species because they migrate back and forth between the United States and Mexico.

++Oh, by the way, Mariano Rivera made the all-star team in this, his last season.

++The right is circulating a video about a new Civil War where Texas would be the first to secede. The theme is that the confederacy is born again. Strange that your ideal is the confederacy. In Iain Bank's last novel "The Quarry", one of his characters makes the sage comment that libertarianism is the new Marxism for political ideology. I think we are seeing that fused in the United States where after the minorities are suppressed,the whites will have a libertarian paradise. 

++With Mohammed Morsi gone, does that make North Carolina's law against Sharia moot?

++What would be our unemployment rate if we had the 1 million government employees back?