free headslaps

[ProblemAgain]

GOP Lawmaker Says Climate Change Is 'The Greatest Deception In The History Of Mankind'

The Huffington Post  | By Shadee Ashtari

Posted: 06/30/2014 7:17 pm EDT Updated: 4 hours ago

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Louisiana state Rep. Lenar Whitney (R) is accusing liberals, such as former Vice President Al Gore, of advancing "the greatest deception in the history of mankind" -- man-made climate change -- in a scheme to empower the executive branch and increase taxes.

“A specter is haunting America,” Whitney, who is running for Congress in Louisiana’s 6th Congressional District, warned in a campaign video released Wednesday. “It is perhaps the greatest deception in the history of mankind.”

Mocking Gore’s 2006 Academy Award–winning climate change documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth,” Whitney claimed that the planet "has done nothing but get colder each year since the film’s release.”

“Quite inconveniently for Al Gore, and for the rest of the politicians who continue to advance this delusion, any 10-year-old can invalidate their thesis with one of the simplest scientific devices known to man: a thermometer,” Whitney said, citing record sea ice in the Antarctic sector.

Numerous GOP lawmakers and climate change contrarians have pointed to below-zero temperatures and seasonal snowfall as evidence against the legitimacy of human-induced climate change, despite numerous scientific reports debunking their claims.

Although many parts of the U.S. witnessed record-low temperatures this past winter, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are still rising, winters have become increasingly warmer over the past century and Arctic sea ice is still melting.

Whitney’s own state is one of the most vulnerable regions in the country to climate change, with rising coastal sea levels estimated to submerge the Louisiana coastline by 2100.

[ProblemAgain]

notice how this actually works?

Tax Center

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10 states with the worst taxes for average Americans

By Thomas C. Frohlich 6 hours ago

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While a certain degree of income inequality might be expected, the difference between rich and poor Americans has grown dramatically in recent years. As of 2013, the wealthiest 20% of Americans had more income in aggregate than the bottom 80% combined.

State and local tax systems play a significant role in redistributing income among people. The nationwide average effective tax rate for the poorest 20% of Americans was 10.9%, roughly double the 5.4% rate for the top 1%.

Related: The Poorest County in Each State

When looking at taxes paid as a share of the income earned, all states have a regressive tax system, which means poorer residents are taxed more than the wealthiest ones. The difference in effective tax rates between income groups, however, varies widely between states. According to “Who Pays? A Distributional Analysis of the Tax Systems in All 50 States,” a report released by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP), Washington has by far the most regressive tax system nationwide. Based on the index score, a ratio calculated from a range of factors to measure income inequality before and after taxes, these are the states with the most unfair tax systems for the average American.

In fact, the poorest 20% of individuals paid at least 12% of their total incomes in state and local taxes in seven of the 10 states with the most regressive tax systems. In contrast, the wealthiest 1% of residents paid no more than 3% in state and local taxes as a share of income in six of the 10 states. In an interview with 24/7 Wall St., Meg Wiehe, state tax policy director at ITEP, said that in most states, and these 10 especially, “tax distribution looks very much like a staircase going down, where as your income goes up, your effective tax rate goes down.”

Related: States With the Best (and Worst) Schools

State residents earning average incomes also often bore a higher tax burden compared to the richest residents. The middle 60% of earners in all of the 10 states paid at least three times what the wealthiest 1% paid, as a share of income, in state and local taxes -- all of these ratios were also among the highest nationwide. Middle earners in Washington and Florida, the two most regressive taxation states, paid as a share of their income more than 400% what the richest 1% of residents paid as a share of their income.

Often, it's the presence or absence of a particular kind of tax that determines the extent to which state tax systems are regressive. For example, taxing goods and services consumed daily such as food is especially regressive because food makes up a much larger share of poorer Americans' income. A graduated income tax is far more progressive, on the other hand. Five of the 10 states with unfair tax systems taxed food at the state and local level. Also, all but one of the 10 states had relatively low or flat income tax rates, and four had no personal income tax.

Related: America’s Most Hated Companies

According to Wiehe, these states “rely heavily on taxes that are paid disproportionately by low- and middle-income households, and have very little reliance on taxes that the top 1% or top 5% would be responsible for paying.” In other words, states have to make up for that revenue in one way or another. Nationwide, personal and corporate income taxes accounted for an average of nearly 18% of state revenue. Yet in five of the 10 states, the contribution to revenue from income taxes was less than 5%. And while sales and excise taxes accounted for less than one quarter of state revenue on average across the nation, they accounted for more than 30% of revenue in six of the 10 states with the most regressive tax policies.

While it is difficult to know the exact degree that these tax policies impact income inequality, the states with the most regressive tax systems also had relatively uneven income distribution even before taxes were applied. In six of the 10 states, the 2013 Gini coefficient -- which has values between zero and one, where one means all income belongs to a single person and zero means uniform income distribution -- was higher than in the majority of states.

[Get the Latest Market Data and News with the Yahoo Finance App]

To identify the 10 states with the worst tax systems for average Americans, 24/7 Wall St. reviewed ITEP’s Tax Inequality Index scores for the 50 states. The index incorporated effective tax rates for the poorest 20%, middle 60%, top 1%, as well as ratios comparing these rates, among other measures. Effective tax rates were based on total state and local taxes as a share of family income for non-elderly taxpayers in all 50 states. ITEP’s model used 2012 income figures, and considered tax laws from 2014 and 2015. Contributions to state revenue by tax type were also provided by ITEP. We reviewed the Gini coefficient from 2013 -- which is based on pre-tax income -- as well as additional economic data from the Census Bureau’s 2013 American Community Survey.

These are the states with the worst taxes for the average American.

10. Indiana
> ITEP index score: -6.6%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 12.0% (8th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 5.2% (23rd highest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.46 (17th lowest)

A negative score on the ITEP index means state residents' incomes were less equal after taxes than they were before taxes. With a score of -6.6%, Indiana’s tax system was the 10th most regressive among all states. While what makes a tax code fair is a contentious issue, middle class families are often among the hardest-hit by regressive tax policies. Indiana households who earned between $34,000 and $56,000 paid 10.8% of their combined income in state and local taxes, the fourth highest tax burden among that income group nationwide. Indiana’s taxation policies may have had an effect on income inequality in the state. Indiana’s Gini coefficient in 2013 had grown at nearly the fastest pace from 2009.

9. Kansas
> ITEP index score: -6.9%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 11.1% (13th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 3.6% (11th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.46 (20th lowest)

While Kansas has a graduated income tax structure -- widely regarded as a progressive feature in a tax code -- the state has no corporate income tax. This means that the vast majority of businesses in the state are exempt from paying state taxes. Since business owners tend to have relatively high incomes, wealthier Kansas residents have likely benefited from this arrangement. As a share of income, the poorest families in Kansas paid 310% what the wealthiest 1% of families paid in state and local taxes, the ninth highest such ratio nationwide. As in many states, incomes among the wealthiest Kansas residents grew between 2009 and 2013, while incomes among poorer residents shrank. The tax code in Kansas will likely remain relatively unfair to poorer residents. The state's aggressive income tax cuts of 2012 and 2013 resulted in a budget shortfall. To address the shortfall, Governor Sam Brownback proposed earlier this year to raise several excise taxes.

8. Arizona
> ITEP index score: -7.1%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 12.5% (5th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 4.6% (19th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.47 (20th highest)

Families in Arizona earning $22,000 or less in 2012 paid 12.5% of their incomes in state and local taxes, the fifth highest rate for that income group in the country. The wealthiest 1% of Arizona households were subject to an effective tax rate of only 4.6%, which was also smaller than the average tax rate for the wealthiest people across the nation of 5.4%. As in most states ITEP found to have unfair tax systems, sales and excise taxes were considered particularly regressive. The poorest Arizona residents paid more than 8% of their incomes in general sales and excise taxes, while the wealthiest 1% paid just 1% of their incomes in such taxes. States identified as having regressive tax codes did not necessarily have dramatic income inequality. Arizona, however, had a higher Gini coefficient than that of most states, and 18.6% of residents lived in poverty in 2013, among the highest poverty rates nationwide.

Related: Cities Where Crime Is Soaring

7. Tennessee
> ITEP index score: -7.3%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 10.9% (14th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 3.0% (10th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.48 (12th highest)

Like in several other states reviewed, Tennessee does not have an individual state income tax on earnings, although residents are required to pay a 6% tax on dividends and interest payments. While the lack of an income tax lowers tax burdens on all residents, it does not do so equally. As a share of income, Tennessee’s poorest 20% of households paid 366% what the state’s wealthiest 1% paid in state and local taxes, the seventh largest such discrepancy nationwide. The income group earning close to average incomes was also disproportionately taxed. The middle 60% of earners in the state paid 280% what the wealthiest 1% paid as a share of income, also the seventh highest such percentage in the country. Incomes among Tennessee’s wealthiest households grew by nearly 3% between 2009 and 2013, versus the comparable national growth rate of 0.4%. Among the nation’s less wealthy earners, including those in Tennessee, incomes shrank.

6. Pennsylvania
> ITEP index score: -7.3%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 12.0% (8th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 4.2% (14th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.47 (18th highest)

General sales and excise taxes on everyday goods such as gas are considered regressive because while everyone consumes very similar quantities, not everyone has similar incomes. Pennsylvania, which has a long-term plan to raise taxes to repair its transportation infrastructure, levies a tax of 41.8 cents per gallon of gasoline, the fifth highest rate in the nation. Residents with the lowest 20% of incomes paid 5.8% of their incomes on sales and excise taxes like these, versus the comparable rate of 0.6% for the state’s wealthiest residents. Similarly, while property taxes tend to be levied more proportionately across the nation, Pennsylvania’s poorest households paid nearly 4% of their income on their homes, while the wealthiest 1% paid just 1.6%. This was a relatively large gap compared to other states. Since the bulk of school funding comes from property taxes, such disparity has prompted some to argue that Pennsylvania children receive an “education by zip code.”

5. Illinois
> ITEP index score: -8.1%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 13.2% (3rd highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 4.6% (19th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.48 (8th highest)

The poorest 20% of Illinois households paid 13.2% of their incomes in state and local taxes, and the middle 60% of earners paid 10.9% of their incomes, both nearly the highest effective tax rates respectively. Meanwhile, the state’s wealthiest residents paid 4.6% of their incomes in state and local taxes, one of the lower effective tax rates. Looking just at income tax, the wealthiest 1% paid a slightly higher effective income tax rate than the poorest 20% of state households. However, Illinois uses a flat income tax rate, which is widely considered to be a regressive feature. The state’s wealthiest residents had especially high incomes. A typical Illinois household in the top quintile earned more than $200,000 in 2013, the ninth highest compared to the wealthiest households in other states.

4. South Dakota
> ITEP index score: -8.4%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 11.3% (12th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 1.8% (3rd lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.44 (7th lowest)

With an effective tax rate of 1.8%, South Dakota’s wealthiest residents paid less in state and local taxes as a share of their income than their peers in nearly every other state. The poorest 20% of families, on the other hand, paid among the higher effective tax rates. The difference is due in large part to the complete lack of an income or corporate tax in the state. While even states with regressive tax systems often exclude groceries from the sales tax, this is not the case in South Dakota. In fact, the state relies on consumption taxes as an important revenue source. Sales and excise taxes accounted for 35.6% of the state’s tax revenue, higher than the contribution in all but four other states. Unlike many other state tax systems identified as regressive, income inequality in South Dakota -- measured before taxes -- was not nearly as prevalent compared to most states in 2013.

Related: States Where the Middle Class Is Dying

3. Texas
> ITEP index score: -8.5%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 12.5% (5th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 2.9% (8th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.48 (9th highest)

Texas is one of a handful of states levying no income tax. While the state collects a gross receipts tax -- which is a tax on business transactions -- it does not collect a tax on any corporate profits. As is common in states with abundant natural resources, the oil and gas industry in Texas stimulates the economy and helps the state raise revenues from other sources. Yet, this may not be enough, as the state relies heavily on sales and excise taxes. These consumption taxes accounted for nearly 32% of the state's revenue, the ninth highest nationwide in fiscal 2012. The state also does not provide low-income residents with any tax credits, which help offset sales, excise and property taxes in other states. Partly as a result, the poorest 20% of Texas families paid an effective state and local tax rate of 12.5%, higher than in all but a handful of states, while the wealthiest 1% of families paid less than 3%, one of the lowest rates.

2. Florida
> ITEP index score: -9.5%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 12.9% (4th highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 1.9% (4th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.48 (5th highest)

As in other states ITEP identified as having state and local tax systems that exacerbate income inequality, the lack of a personal income tax in Florida disproportionately benefits the wealthiest residents of the state. The lack of income tax also means the state relies more heavily on sales taxes for its revenues. In fiscal 2012, sales and excise taxes accounted for 30.8% of the state’s revenue, the 10th highest such share, and well above the average national rate of 23.7%. The wealthiest 1% of Florida families paid an effective tax rate of less than 2%, nearly the lowest rate in that income group.

1. Washington
> ITEP index score: -12.6%
> Effective tax rate lowest 20%: 16.8% (the highest)
> Effective tax rate top 1%: 2.4% (5th lowest)
> 2013 Gini coefficient (pre-tax): 0.46 (19th lowest)

Washington’s score of -12.6% was the worst in the nation. The poorest 20% of families paid nearly 17% of their income in state and local taxes, the highest such rate nationwide. With the wealthiest 1% of state households paying just 2.4% -- nearly the lowest such rate -- Washington’s tax system helped widen the income gap more than any other state. Washington’s poorest residents paid nearly seven times what the wealthiest 1% paid as a share of income, one of the highest such ratios nationwide. While Washington’s tax code is considered by many to be among the nation’s most unfair, residents are better-off financially than in many other states. A typical household earned $58,405 in 2013, one of the higher household median incomes. And while 15.8% of Americans lived in poverty that year, 14.1% did in Washington.

[ProblemAgain]

nothing helps the democratic process like idjits with guns in the legislative chambers

Armed gun-rights advocates rally at Washington state capitol

By DERRICK NUNNALLY February 7, 2015 4:50 PM

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A woman stands with a pistol strapped to her hip as parents, also armed, of a toddler sit behind during a rally by gun-rights advocates Saturday, Feb. 7, 2015, in Olympia, Wash. Approximately 50 demonstrators, including a half-dozen small children, protested rules that prohibit openly carrying guns into the House and Senate viewing galleries. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson)

OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) — A gun-rights rally drew about 50 people, mostly armed, to the steps of the Capitol on Saturday morning for a demonstration they hoped would end with their arrest. To raise money for bail, some protesters hawked caps with "Fight Tyranny — Shoot Back" printed on them and sold out.

The plan was to walk into the Capitol after a few speeches and carry guns into the Legislature's viewing gallery, in defiance of rule changes made in January that banned the open carry of firearms there. However, the Washington State Patrol kept the gallery doors locked after the building opened to the public at 11 a.m. The crowd, including two state legislators, walked through the marble hallways, with some lining up to knock on the doors to the House gallery and Gov. Jay Inslee's office.

No one was arrested, and the State Patrol reported no disturbances. The protesters went instead to the closed gate of the governor's mansion and prayed.

"What's the world coming to when there are people who want to break the law and they won't let you do it?" said Dave Grenier, 58, of Tumwater, as his fellow pro-gun demonstrators began to file out of the Capitol.

Their complaints against state government stem from the 2014 passage of Initiative 594 by voters statewide. It imposed new background-check requirements on several types of gun transfers, including purchases and loans, and opponents say the new law infringes on firearm rights guaranteed in the state and federal constitutions.

After protest rallies at the Capitol in December and January, leaders of the House and Senate prohibited the open carrying of firearms into the Legislature's viewing galleries. In the January rally, one protester among the dozen or so who carried guns into the House gallery was rebuked by the State Patrol for how he was holding his gun, and the ban was instituted days later.

Saturday morning's rally began before the Capitol opened to the public at 11 a.m. A few visitors waiting for guided tours of the legislative building mingled with the gun-rights advocates who clustered in the portico facing Washington's Temple of Justice to get out of the rain.

State Reps. Elizabeth Scott and Matt Shea addressed the crowd. Shea, R-Spokane Valley, gave a fiery speech that included a list of more than 20 grievances against the government, including militarization of police, high taxes, surveillance programs, Sharia law and restrictions on guns. Scott, R-Monroe, opened her coat to show the crowd her pistol.

"I carry at least one gun every day," Scott said, "because a cop is too heavy and a guard is too heavy."

For Eric Devenny, 19, an apprentice mechanic from Bremerton, the rally was his first trip to the Capitol. He wore an AKS-74, a variation of a Russian assault rifle, in a sling on his back as he walked with the group into the legislative building and out to the governor's mansion gate and said he'll return for another protest.

"It's not gonna stop, and we won't let up," Devenny said.

[LoveLife&Laughter]

I'm sure this idiot will try to claim he was just "Standing his ground"   

Parking dispute may have led to triple shooting.

[ProblemAgain]

Jindal to leave Louisiana's next governor with budget mess

By MELINDA DESLATTE February 11, 2015 11:51 AM

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FILE - In this Feb. 9, 2015, file photo, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal talks about his plan for national education reform at a policy breakfast on Capitol Hill in Washington. His budget maneuvers have created shortfalls and hefty debts for the state's next governor. Now, the Republican is running out of short-term patches and is struggling to plug a $1.6 billion budget hole just as he tries to build support for a possible 2016 presidential run. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — Year after year, Louisiana didn't have enough money to cover its expenses, yet Gov. Bobby Jindal refused to roll back income tax cuts or ever-increasing corporate tax breaks. Instead, he raided reserve funds and sold off state property.

Jindal suggested job growth from his economic development wins would replenish those assets once the recession ended. It hasn't — and money from the lucrative oil industry has taken a nose dive with crude prices. Now, the Republican is running out of short-term patches and is struggling to plug a $1.6 billion budget hole just as he tries to build support for a possible 2016 presidential run.

Funding for higher education and health care services will almost certainly be subject to cuts deeper than what they already have endured in recent years, and Jindal's successor will have to repay a string of debts and IOUs.

"They've used all the smoke that was in the can and all the mirrors that they could buy and now they're out of tricks. Their solution is to gut higher education like a fish," said Republican state Treasurer John Kennedy.

As for Jindal, he said in a recent interview that the shortfall isn't his fault, and he dodged any talk of his temporary fixes.

"The shortfall next year is almost entirely due to the declining revenues, and the vast majority of that is due to falling oil prices," he said.

The numbers, however, don't back up the governor's explanation.

More than $1 billion of the shortfall on the horizon for the fiscal year that begins July 1 can be tied to Jindal's refusal to match the state's spending to its yearly revenue over his two terms in office — as he also steadfastly refused to consider tax increases.

When Jindal took office in 2008, he positioned himself as a fiscal conservative who decried budget shell games akin to "using your credit card to pay your mortgage." It didn't take long to ditch that rhetoric and shift the focus to saving critical services with any money available.

Jindal scraped together what he could from all sorts of funds: railroad crossing safety, artificial reef construction, housing programs and the blind. He pieced together money from one-time legal settlements and property sales, using it to pay for continuing programs. Lawmakers went along, and Louisiana has careened from one budget crisis to the next as the dollars either don't pan out or the sources of financing dry up and need replacing.

"Our budget has been full of sleights of hand — it's almost a Ponzi scheme of moving moneys around, one-time money around, to serve recurring needs," Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne, one of the Republicans vying to be Louisiana's next governor, said at a recent forum.

In early February, national credit rating agency Moody's Investors Service described Louisiana's budget as having a "structural deficit," raising worries from Kennedy the state could be threatened with a rating downgrade that could make borrowing more difficult.

Jindal said those patchwork fixes aren't really "one-time dollars" because the state has similar types of money available to pull together annually. "They have been here year after year," he said.

The governor has successfully trimmed some spending by cutting more than 30,000 full-time state employees. He's reduced the state's vehicle fleet, privatized much of the Medicaid program, turned over the state's charity hospitals to outside managers and looked for ways to make state government more efficient.

That hasn't closed all the gaps, however, and Jindal's short-term solutions leave a string of debts for Louisiana's next governor to pay off.

The state owes $190 million to federal officials for improper Medicaid spending in hospital privatization deals, an order being appealed, and a $270 million repayment to the state "rainy day" fund in 2017 as part of a legal settlement. Economic development deals will cost the next governor at least $340 million over his first four years.

Far fewer savings accounts will be left to pay those liabilities because Jindal drained or reduced trust funds.

As complaints grew louder in recent years, the Jindal administration defended attacks from Democrats and conservative Republicans who decried budgets reliant on accounting gimmicks, claiming its budgeting protected needed programs without raising taxes.

When he talks of his record in national appearances, Jindal doesn't mention the budget troubles. He describes cutting Louisiana's budget from $34 billion in 2008 to $25 billion — but doesn't explain much of that drop comes from spending down one-time federal recovery dollars after hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

The state's general fund, by comparison, has only dipped from $8.7 billion to $8.4 billion during Jindal's seven years in office.

Previous governors have used piecemeal financing to fill budget gaps over the years. Jindal's two immediate predecessors, Republican Mike Foster and Democrat Kathleen Blanco, each used up to $600 million in such "one-time" funding to stop cuts in particular years.

But Jindal's use of such financing reached new highs, a situation the chair of the Louisiana Democratic Party, state Sen. Karen Carter Peterson of New Orleans, called "a ticking time bomb."

New money hasn't rolled in, despite promises that tax revenue would increase from multibillion-dollar manufacturing and petrochemical projects announced by the Jindal administration in the last few years.

The escalating price tag for tax breaks has only made things worse.

In his first year in office, Jindal signed off on the largest individual income tax cut in Louisiana history, stripping hundreds of millions from the state treasury at the same time the national recession hit.

Meanwhile, the cost for the state's various tax credits, rebates and exemptions has ballooned by more than $600 million in the last five years alone, according to the Department of Revenue.

The Legislature's chief economist, Greg Albrecht, has described Louisiana's tax break programs as spending with no annual oversight from state lawmakers before the money goes out the door.

But Jindal considers any attempt to scale back a tax break equal to a tax hike and has successfully fought legislative efforts to rein in the state's giveaways.

As they ran into Jindal's resistance to tax break changes, lawmakers who voted for budgets packed with the governor's patchwork funding say removing the dollars would force harmful cuts to colleges, public safety and health care. For the upcoming session that begins in April, lawmakers are scrambling to find loopholes to generate new money but allow Jindal to call the plans "revenue neutral."

"Everybody says, 'Oh, you're using one-time money.' I tell people that say that, 'Well, tell me what you want to cut,'" said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Jack Donahue, a Republican. "'Is it higher education? Or is it health care? What university do you want to close?' The truth is, from a political standpoint, that's not possible."

[ProblemAgain]

GOP lawmaker calls women “a lesser cut of meat”

South Carolina's Thomas Corbin: Sexist pig or sexist pig?

Luke Brinker

Topics: Sexism, Republicans, South Carolina, Gender, Thomas Corbin, domestic violence, Politics News

South Carolina State Sen. Thomas Corbin (Credit: Thomas Hanson/Vimeo)

A Republican state senator in South Carolina called women “a lesser cut of meat” and suggested that they belonged barefoot and pregnant, the libertarian-leaning blog FITS News reports.

Chauvinist in any context, Corbin’s remarks occurred during a legislative dinner this week to discuss domestic violence legislation. Sources present at the meeting told FITS that Corbin directed his comments at fellow GOP state senator Katrina Shealy, the sole woman in the 46-member chamber.

“I see it only took me two years to get you wearing shoes,” Corbin told Shealy, who won election in 2012. Corbin, the site explains, is said to have previously cracked that women should be “at home baking cookies” or “barefoot and pregnant,” not serving in the state legislature.

“He makes comments like that all the time to everybody – including Senator Shealy,” said one legislative aide who spoke to FITS.

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Indignant at Corbin’s rank sexism, Shealy asked him where he “got off” making such remarks.

“Well, you know God created man first,” a smirking Corbin replied.  “Then he took the rib out of man to make woman.  And you know, a rib is a lesser cut of meat.”

Corbin appears to have a penchant for offensive or downright bizarre statements. During a 2013 speech on the Common Core education standards, he reportedly embarked on a tangent about “gay man juice.”

Luke Brinker is Salon's deputy politics editor. Follow him on Twitter at @LukeBrinker.

[ProblemAgain]

Judge tells Chris Christie: Put more money in pension funds

By MICHAEL CATALINI and GEOFF MULVIHILL 7 hours ago

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TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Republican Gov. Chris Christie and the state's Democrat-controlled Legislature must find $1.57 billion to put into pension funds for retired public workers, a judge ruled Monday in a decision that comes as a major legal blow to the governor as he prepares to run for president.

Unions for public workers sued Christie after he announced last year he would not make the full pension payments he had agreed to in a 2011 overhaul that was one of his main accomplishments.

Superior Court Judge Mary Jacobson's ruling could force big changes in the state budget late in the fiscal year.

"In short, the court cannot allow the State to 'simply walk away from its financial obligations,' especially when those obligations were the State's own creation," she wrote in the ruling, released a day before Christie is scheduled to make his budget proposal for the fiscal year starting July 1.

The judge didn't issue a deadline for a solution, but she was clear the state's obligation was to pay $1.57 billion more into pension funds.

The state government will appeal, the governor's office said in a combative statement.

"Once again, liberal judicial activism rears its head with the court trying to replace its own judgment for the judgment of the people who were elected to make these decisions. This budget was passed by the Legislature and signed by the governor with a pension payment," Christie spokesman Michael Drewniak said in a statement. "The governor will continue to work on a practical solution to New Jersey's pension and health benefits problems while he appeals this decision to a higher court where we are confident the judgment of New Jersey's elected officials will be vindicated."

Representatives of government employees, meanwhile, declared victory.

"It's a win for all of the participants in the fund and the retirees," said Kenneth Nowak, a lawyer who argued the case on behalf of the New Jersey Education Association, the state's largest teachers' union.

Christie, who's laying the groundwork for a presidential run but hasn't announced a candidacy, said reducing payments last year and this year was the only reasonable way for the state to balance its budgets after tax revenue fell short of expectations last year.

The legal dispute centered on whether the state was contractually bound by the governor's 2011 promise to make up for missed or reduced pension payments over a seven-year period.

The 2011 pension deal was one of Christie's major accomplishments as governor and served as evidence he could work with Democrats to deal with one of New Jersey's persistent financial issues. But it has become a thorn in his side.

Last year, even before the scramble to balance the budget, Christie decried the cost to taxpayers as too high. When revenue came in under projections, he funded most of the gap by cutting contributions. He said he's still making good on the state's current obligation while suspending efforts to catch up from past underpayments.

He reduced the contribution from a planned $1.7 billion to $700 million last year. He wants to contribute $681 million rather than the planned $2.25 billion this year.

The Legislature adopted a version of the budget that would have made the full pension payment, but Christie used a line item veto to implement his approach. Democratic lawmakers on Monday said in light of that the judge's ruling was no surprise.

"If the governor had signed the budget we presented to him last June, we would not be confronted with this massive fiscal crisis," state Senate President Steve Sweeney said.

At a court hearing over the cuts in January, the state attorney general's office, representing the Christie administration, was in the unusual position of arguing that a law signed by Christie to make the deal more ironclad violated the state's constitution. It argued that a law should not require spending of future legislatures.

Unions say the law is constitutional and it's only fair: Public workers had their contributions increased and saw their retirement ages raised, while retirees had their cost-of-living increases suspended.

___

Mulvihill reported from Haddonfield.

[ProblemAgain]

ahhh so the 44 previous votes don't count?

Jindal: GOP leaders in Congress fear repealing health law

By THOMAS BEAUMONT 19 hours ago

PALM BEACH, Florida (AP) — Louisiana Gov.Bobby Jindal on Saturday called congressional Republican leaders "fearful" of acting to fully repeal President Barack Obama's health care law.

Jindal, a second-term Republican governor weighing a 2016 presidential candidacy, said the GOP had failed to act on their signature issue in the 2014 midterm elections. Republicans overtook Democrats in the Senate and broadened their majority in the House.

"It's leadership and other members who, I think, are fearful of being criticized for putting anything out there that could be attacked. If not, why wouldn't we have had a vote by now?" he told reporters at the anti-tax Club for Growth's winter meeting. "I would hope, though, that we're honest enough to say, we campaigned on getting rid of Obamacare."

Jindal is one of six Republican presidential prospects speaking to the roughly 200 fiscal conservatives attending the meeting that ends Saturday. The others were former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

The Club for Growth is influential in Republican campaigns. It conducts thorough reviews of candidates' records on spending, taxes and budgets, and it makes recommendations to its members. Its political action committee has also emerged as a factor in recent campaigns, spending money on behalf of and against Republican candidates.

The group has never backed a candidate for president, but it has not ruled out an endorsement in the 2016 race.

[ProblemAgain]

Tuesday, Mar 10, 2015 12:56 PM CST

Ted Cruz: Freedom won’t survive unless we deny gay people theirs

The Republicans' anti-gay rock star explains why states must be allowed to ban marriage equality VIDEO

Luke Brinker Follow

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Topics: Video, Ted Cruz, LGBT, Marriage equality, Gay Rights, anti-gay, Social conservatives, Republicans, GOP 2016, Right Wing Watch, Politics News

Ted Cruz (Credit: AP/Jim Cole)

Continuing his long-running crusade against marriage equality, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) told an Iowa radio host Monday that liberty is imperiled unless Congress passes his amendment allowing states to deny gay couples the right to marry.

“If the citizens of the state of Iowa or the citizens of the state of Texas want to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman … the states have the constitutional authority to do so and the federal government and unelected judges cannot set aside the democratically elected legislature’s reasonable decisions to enact and protect traditional marriage,” Cruz told radio host Jan Mickelson.

The likely 2016 presidential candidate added, “If the courts were following the Constitution, we shouldn’t need a new amendment, but they are, as you put it quite rightly, making it up right now and it’s a real danger to our liberty.”

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One might ask about the liberty of gay couples who wish to form marital bonds, but it appears that his views on the matter were molded by his crackpot father, who is rather fond of the notion that ex-gay “therapy” can bring gay people back to the “Christian, biblical standpoint.”

[ProblemAgain]

oh yeah...this is one of the clowns who are soooo concerned with following the Constitution

Lindsey Graham: As president I would deploy the military against Congress

Updated by Amanda Taub on March 12, 2015, 9:43 a.m. ET @amandataub

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Senator Lindsey Graham speaks at a conference on March 10, 2015. (JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)

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Republican senator and presidential maybe-hopeful Lindsey Graham stopped by the "politics and pies" forum in Concord, New Hampshire, today, where he announced that if he is elected president in 2016, his first act will be to deploy the military in Washington to force Congress to reverse cuts to the defense and intelligence budgets.

Yes, you heard that right. Here are Graham's exact words:

And here's the first thing I would do if I were president of the United States. I wouldn't let Congress leave town until we fix this. I would literally use the military to keep them in if I had to. We're not leaving town until we restore these defense cuts. We are not leaving town until we restore the intel cuts.

Graham would use the military to force members of Congress to not just vote on the bill — but to pass it. Graham didn't say "until I get an up-or-down vote on restoring defense cuts." He said "until we restore these defense cuts."

In other words, Graham is proposing that his first act as president would be to use the military to force the legislative branch to pass his agenda.

[LoveLife&Laughter]

Climate change is a hoax? The only thing I am positive of is, that the Republicans belief that they can govern or lead, is a hoax.

[ProblemAgain]

so now the republicans are too far left and liberal too....

Glenn Beck: 'I'm out of the Republican Party — I am not a Republican'

By Dylan Stableford 1 hour ago Yahoo News

Radio and television personality Glenn Beck speaks to a gathering at FreePAC Kentucky, Saturday, April 5, 2014, at the Kentucky International Convention Center in Louisville, Ky. (Timothy D. Easley/AP)

Glenn Beck says he is no longer a member of the Republican Party.

“I’ve made my decision — I’m out," Beck said on his radio show Wednesday, according to Mediaite.com. "I’m out of the Republican Party. I am not a Republican; I will not give a dime to the Republican Party. I’m out.”

The former Fox News host and founder of the Blaze supported the GOP during the last election cycle but has become disillusioned with the party in recent years over what he believes was its failure to stand up to the Obama administration — specifically, the Affordable Care Act and immigration reform.

“Four years ago I was with them," Beck said. "Four years ago I said, ‘Work from the inside, let’s change it, let’s get new guys in there.’"

But those efforts have proved futile, he said.

“They’re torpedoing the Constitution, and they’re doing it knowingly,” Beck said. “They’re taking on people like Mike Lee and Ted Cruz and they are torpedoing them. Knowingly. And these guys are standing for the Constitution.”

He added: "It's too late."

The GOP isn't the only group Beck is fed up with. Last week, Beck threatened to quit the National Rifle Association if it doesn't cut ties with Grover Norquist after one of his guests, Frank Gaffney, accused Norquist of being connected with the Muslim Brotherhood.

"If this man is elected, or re-elected, and confirmed on the board of the NRA, I may drop my membership in the NRA," Beck told listeners and viewers of his show. "I am that concerned that he is a very bad influence and a very bad man that, if this is who the NRA decides to put on their board of directors, I don't think I can be associated with them."

[ProblemAgain]

Could Wisconsin's Scott Walker now abolish the weekend?

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Michael Hiltzik

Los Angeles Timesmichael.hiltzik​@latimes.com

@hiltzikmCould Wisconsin's Walker now abolish the weekend? (Update: State's lousy job statistics another bad mark for Walker.) http://t.co/cmh2JtnUQQ

He runs, Wisconsin's economy fades: Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker at a recent political luncheon. (Gerry Melendez / Associated Press)

Is the weekend next on Gov. Scott Walker's hit list?

Wisconsin proposal would let workers 'volunteer' to go without days off

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, a leading aspirant for the Republican nomination for president, made his state the 25th "right-to-work" state in the nation on March 9 when he signed a measure passed by the Republican-controlled legislature.

He may soon get another crack at a worker-unfriendly law: Legislators have introduced a bill to abolish employees' legal right to at least one day off per week.

Walker's tenure falls somewhere between lackluster and a failure. - Christopher Flavelle, Bloomberg

State law currently allows factory or retail employees to work seven days or more in a row for a limited period, but they and their employer have to jointly petition the Department of Workforce Development for a waiver. These petitions apparently number a couple of hundred a year. The new proposal would allow workers to "voluntarily choose" to work without a day of rest. The state agency wouldn't have a say.

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It can't be a secret what "voluntarily" really means in this context. As Marquette University law professor Paul Secunda told the Nation, the measure "completely ignores the power dynamic in the workplace, where workers often have a proverbial gun to the head." Workers will know that if the boss demands it, they'll be volunteering or else. 

How Tea Party tax cuts are turning Kansas into a smoking ruin

The new measure tracks one last year that was introduced too late in the legislative session to reach a vote. As the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported at the time, it came directly from the wish list of Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the state's biggest business lobbying group. According to the newspaper, the measure's sponsors at first "said they had heard from businesses with employees who want to work the additional time." Under questioning, one sponsor, Republican state Rep. Mark Born, acknowledged that he had met only with representatives of the business lobbying group.

Walker hasn't said he would sign the bill, but he hasn't spoken out against it either; nor did he when it was introduced last year. The elimination of a guaranteed weekend would fit nicely with the rest of Walker's anti-worker platform, which includes his having ended collective bargaining rights for most public sector employees and signing the deceitfully named "right to work" law, which prohibits requirements that private-sector workers join unions or pay a representation fee as a condition of employment. Right-to-work laws in general are associated with poorer workplace conditions and lower pay than in union-friendlier states.

Walker would have a case to make to GOP voters if these policies yielded higher job growth. They haven't. Bloomberg economic analyst Christopher Flavelle wrote recently that as measured by improvement in "the living standards of the people he represents... Walker's tenure falls somewhere between lackluster and a failure."

Caption Wisconsin vs. the nation

Urban Milwaukee

Private sector job growth falls well behind neighboring Minnesota and the U.S. average.

Caption Payroll trends

Menzie Chinn, Econbrowser

Wisconsin payroll trends fall behind California, Minnesota and the U.S.

Caption Job growth falls short of Walker's promises

Menzie Chinn, Econbrowser

Walker promised 250,000 new jobs in his first term. By December 2014, he had fallen more than 100,000 short.

Caption Wisconsin companies

Bloomberg

Publicly traded companies haven't benefited much from Walker's pro-business policies, according to this graph of share price changes.

Since Walker took office, Wisconsin's economic performance has ranked a dismal 35th in Bloomberg's economic index of states. Private sector job growth lags behind such neighboring states as Minnesota and Michigan -- not to mention California, where labor and fiscal policies are at the opposite pole from Walker's. Bloomberg's index of share values for Wisconsin-based public companies shows they lag well behind Iowa, Minnesota and the median state. (See accompanying graphics package for details.)

This week brought another dose of bad news for Walker: his state fell to 38th in the nation in job growth for the year ended Sept. 30, 2014, at 1.16%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. (For comparison, California ranked seventh, at 3.1%.)

Wisconsin's budget situation is dire, with state tax revenue increasing at a fraction of the rate of the median state--4% vs. 20%--in 2011-14. In February, the state announced it would delay a scheduled $108-million principal payment on its debt. Under Walker, Wisconsinites seem to be facing a double-whammy--lousy performance at the state level, and a continuing assault on their household income.