there goes the female vote

first, of course, it was the hispanics. but you knew the ladies were not long behind, didn't you?

from unreconstituted watergate ghoul and all-around professional creep g. gordon liddy:

let's hope that the key conferences aren't when [sotomayor's] menstruating or something, or just before she's going to menstruate. that would really be bad. lord knows what we would get then.

looks like they've whittled themselves down to the cranky old bald white guy vote now. and they've already lost jesse.

stay classy, gop.

update: gallup and quinnipiac break down the numbers ...

attitudes towards sotomayor nomination
Gallup	D men	D women	R men	R women
excellent/good	65%	70%	19%	33%
only fair/poor	20%	16%	63%	43%
NET	46%	54%	-44%	-11%
Quinnipiac	D men	D women	R men	R women
approve	79%	80%	18%	31%
disapprove	5%	4%	57%	40%
NET	74%	76%	-39%	-9%

looks like the daughters of the revolution aren't quite in the mood for the 24/7 republican hate fest. must be that time of the month.

quote of the day

from eric kleefield @ talkingpointsmemo:

rush limbaugh says that nominating sonia sotomayor to the supreme court is like appointing david duke. so why isn't he supporting her?

[rimshot]

certifigate: newsmakers

first, the setup.

it must have eaten a hole in his gut, waiting all the way until the very end of wednesday's white house presser, before les kinsolving of worldnetdaily could ask his burning question ...

kinsolving:	just one question concerning what the president said in his speech on thursday, and i quote, 'i ran for president promising transparency, and i meant what i said. this is why, whenever possible, we will make information available to the american people so they can make informed judgments and hold us accountable.' end of quote. do you remember that statement?
gibbs:	i can confirm that he said that.
kinsolving:	good. in consideration of this very good promise of transparency, why can't the president respond to the petition to requests of 400,000 american citizens by releasing a certified copy of his long-form birth certificate listing hospital ... [audience laughter] ... 400,000! ...
gibbs:	are you looking for the president's birth certificate?
kinsolving:	yes.
gibbs:	it's on the internet, lester. [audience laughter]
kinsolving:	[also laughing] no, no, no — the long form listing his hospital and physician.
gibbs:	[chuckling] lester, this question in many ways continues to astound me. the state of hawaii provided a copy with the seal of the president's birth. i know there are apparently at least 400,000 people [audience laughter] that continue to doubt the existence of and the certification by the state of hawaii of the president's birth there, but it's on the internet because we put it on the internet for each of those 400,000 to download. i certainly hope by the fourth year of our administration that we'll have dealt with this burgeoning birth controversy.

and now for the handoff:

with the dam of silence on the whole of the media finally broken, fox news wasted no time running with this exclusive bombshell:

and four months into president obama's term, the controversy surrounding his original birth certificate continues to dog his administration. the obama campaign, you will remember, posted a copy of what it said was the document on its website to try to dispel rumors that he is not an american citizen. but an online petition, calling for the release of what it described as "the president's complete birth certificate" with the hospital name, has almost 400,000 signatures. today, the president's press secretary was incredulous that the issue just won't go away ...

anyone else notice that fox political grapevine anchor bret baier forgets to mention who's "dogging" the administration or who's behind the petition drive?

not that it really matters, since online petitions are one of the few things worth less than a subprime mortgage, but as long as you were asking, this one comes from ...

... wait for it ...

... you guessed it ...

fox news wannabee worldnetdaily!

yes, that online right-wing tabloid exclusively devoted to pimping news about its favorite subject — itself and its owner and ceo joe farah — a joke of a journal that's second only to the parody news site the onion in its gift for just making shit up.

being one of the few places that the birthers can still call a home, wnd continues to bravely flog the eligibility nontroversy when no one else will.

last week farah called for donations for his new billboard campaign:

the electoral system has failed to satisfy lingering questions about barack obama's eligibility to serve as president. ... that's how joseph farah, editor and chief executive officer of WND, explains the petition he initiated several months ago that has collected nearly 400,000 names of americans demanding answers as to obama's elidibility as well as the outpouring of financial support for his new campaign to erect billboards around the country asking the simple question: "where's the birth certificate?" ... the first such sign to be posted under the 5-day-old campaign, a digital, electronic one, is up and online on highway 165 in ball, la. – the result of a donation by the owner. ... "as obama transforms this country from self-governing constitutional republic to one governed by a central ruling elite, the simple fact remains that no controlling legal authority has established that he is indeed a 'natural born citizen' as the constitution requires," farah said. "obama's promises of transparency have become a bad joke as he continues to hide simple, innocuous documents like his birth certificate and his student records." the idea behind the billboard campaign is to make sure obama cannot avoid this question any longer. he must be asked to produce it at every turn, farah says.

funny how farah seems to have conveniently forgotten that back in august 2008 his little scandal sheet examined obama's certificate and declared it the real mccoy:

a separate WND investigation into obama's birth certificate utilizing forgery experts also found the document to be authentic.

i guess amnesia must be one of the convenient side effects of fleecing the pockets of birthers.

there goes the hispanic vote

as lord limbaugh hands down his marching orders:

i doubt that sotomayor can be stopped. she should be. she is a horrible pick. she is the antithesis of a judge, by her own admission and in her own words. she has been overturned 80% by the supreme court. she may as well be on the ninth circus court of appeals, given all the time she’s overturned. she has been reprimanded by a truly strong hispanic judge, jose cabranes. she has been rebuked in writing by cabranes for opinions that she wrote that had no bearing on the constitutional issues before her in the case that was being decided. details on that coming up. but here is why, even though she may not be able to be stopped, here is why sonia sotomayor needs to be opposed by the republicans as far as they can take it, because the american people need to know who barack obama really is, and his choice of sonia sotomayor tells everybody, if we will tell the story of her, who he is.

barbed wire and plywood

what john said:

cnn just had james inhofe on talking about how we could not bring the gitmo folks to the states because they are too dangerous, and it reminded me of something that has been bothering me the last few days. there seems to be an effort to pretend that we chose to put these people in gitmo for security reasons. that is simply nonsense on stilts. it was little more than barbed-wire and plywood when we started detaining them there, and we had to build the damned place. we didn’t put the detainees there because it was super secure. we put them there so there would be no controlling legal authority and we could do whatever the hell we wanted with them. i’m really tired of people making things up.

deep thought

we have to keep them in guantanamo 'cause we can't hold them legally.

deep question

so when did "suspected terrorists" become the brotherhood of evil mutants?

how to talk about torture

and no, it has nothing to do with nancy pelosi or hillary clinton ...

hasselback:	what is your mind — i know your mind is, ah, pretty made up about waterboarding, correct? you were waterboarded part of, part of your navy seal training, correct?
ventura:	no, it wasn't part of navy seal training; it was part of what they call SERE school: survival, escape, resistance, evasion. it's, it's a school that they required you to go to prior to the combat zone in vietnam. and yes, we were all waterboarded there, and yes, it is torture.
hasselback:	what do you think about nancy pelosi in terms of what she has been claiming with the cia lying to and misleading congress ... ?
ventura:	i, i, what's worse is this: the fact that it happened. if, if we hadn't waterboarded to begin with, none of this would be a controversy, would it?
hasselback:	if we hadn't waterboarded ...
ventura:	and torture, wait — torture is torture. if you're going to be a country that follows the rule of law, which we are, torture is illegal.
hasselback:	but these were specifically approved techniques with ksm, okay ... ?
ventura:	approved by who ... ?
hasselback:	khalid sheik mohammed, the information we extracted from him before waterboarding was zip. afterward, he released the information ...
unidentifed:	no ...
ventura:	no, we got all of that before waterboarding.
unidentifed:	yes.
hasselback:	this was the case that was used three times ...
ventura:	the question is this: alright, wait a minute — if waterboarding is okay, then —
hasselback:	[to unidentified] do you want me to put you in a triple nelson?
ventura:	wait, wait, if waterboarding's okay, then why don't we let our police do it to suspects so that they can learn what they know?
	[applause]
hasselback:	i understand that question, i understand that question ...
ventura:	if waterboarding's okay, why didn't we waterboard mcveigh and nichols, the oklahoma city bombers, to find out if there were more people involved?
behar:	well, what's your answer to that? why didn't we? why didn't we?
ventura:	well, i don't know, but we only seem to waterboard muslims.
goldberg:	hmm ...
audience:	oohh ...
	[crosstalk]
ventura:	haa-ha, ha-ha! have we waterboarded anyone else? name me someone else we've waterboarded!
behar:	well, one of the things that's coming out now is that they were waterboarding them to get a connection between iraq and al qaeda. and that the reason they waterboarded was to get information out so they could justify the invasion of iraq.
hasselback:	what do you think is gonna happen now —
behar:	so how does that work into your theory of how great it is?
hasselback:	look, i'm not saying it's great. i'm not saying, okay everybody, let's all go next door and get waterboarded. i'm, i'm concerned right now about nancy pelosi, who was supposedly briefed on this thing —
goldberg:	she lied —
ventura:	okay, they want her out now, right? because she lied? well, why didn't they ask for bush, bush and cheney to go out when they lied about why we went into iraq?
	[applause]
hasselback:	senator clinton! senator clinton, hillary clinton was right there with them, as were many democrats ...
ventura:	the point is, nothing is gonna happen cause they're all involved. the dems and repubs are both involved. that's why president obama's backing off from it, and they're not gonna do it now. it's a good thing i'm not the president. i'm an independent. because i would prosecute the people who did it, i would prosecute the people who ordered it, and they would all go to jail.
	[applause]
hasselback:	well, wouldn't they prosecute president obama in the future going backwards when he ordered the killing of the somali pirates? i mean, you have to think about —
ventura:	no, because the somali pirates —
goldberg:	there's a lot of differences ...
ventura:	that's apples and oranges. you're not talking about someone in custody who is supposedly under — okay, how would we feel, look how outraged we were when waterboarding was done to our vets in vietnam. where do you think we learned that? and we created the hanoi hilton right in guantanamo. that's our hanoi hilton. people have died there, people are tortured there — i'm ashamed of my country.
hasselback:	people aren't basing all those, extremists are not basing their behaviors on us, i can guarantee that, they are —
ventura:	because — should we stoop to their level?
hasselback:	look, we have —
ventura:	no. we should be above that.
hasselback:	absolutely —
ventura:	torture is wrong.
	[applause]
hasselback:	torture is wrong, but enhanced interrogation is —
ventura:	"enhanced interrogation" is dick cheney changing a word. dick cheney comes up with a new word to cover his ass.
	[crosstalk]
goldberg:	new question! new question!
ventura:	i've said it before: you give me a waterboard, one hour and dick cheney and i'll have him confessing to the sharon tate murders.
unidentified:	yeah baby!
	[applause]

smith:

our chief fox report correspondent jonathan hunt is live with us. johnathan, republicans seemed to keep the pressure on the speaker throughout the weekend and certainly continuing into today.

hunt:

yes, absolutely, this is the political gift that keeps on giving for the republicans. instead of this debate being about national security, what is and isn’t torture, what the bush administration should and shouldn’t have allowed and whether anybody in that administration should now be prosecuted, they are, they, the republicans are now able to frame this debate as to whether nancy pelosi is fit to continue as speaker. so shep, they are not about to let their foot off the gas in any way, shape, or form right now.

b.y.o.b.*

more great civic proposals from the land of the free:

hamburgers, hot dogs, brats and guns at picnic onalaska, wis. — a picnic open to the public at a park in la crosse county will offer free brats and hamburgers and an invitation to bring your gun. organizer hubert hoffman said sunday's picnic at marvin gardens park in the town of onalaska celebrates a recent opinion from state attorney general j.b. van hollen that citizens who openly carry firearms should not be cited for disorderly conduct. hoffman said the picnic is open to everyone, including children and those who don't want to bring a gun. the gun rights advocate said it's a way to let the public know that openly carrying a firearm isn't dangerous or risky. la crosse county sheriff's capt. mike horstman said hoffman is "legally entitled" to host the open carry picnic.

come one, come all i hope this event has a HUGE turnout i am going to see if we can get our planting done early and try to attend it myself!

good for you guys. rights not exercised are in time, lost. in addition, the gun grabbers need to see that honest armed citizens are no threat to civility or public order. criminals are nowhere found where the risk outweighs any potential gain. in fact, i’ll wager that gathering will be the safest place in the state.

GRRRREAT post, lori. thanks.

---

* (bring your own beretta)

this was the co-pilot

... not the flight attendant.

shaw, 24, had worked for colgan air of manassas, va., which operated the flight for continental, for 13 months, flying 774 hours in her first year. colgan pays its beginning first officers $21 an hour, which means she would have earned $16,254 that year, although she could have earned more if she worked more hours, said roger cox, an ntsb aviation safety expert. in questioning colgan officials, cox suggested that shaw was commuting from her home near seattle because she couldn't afford to live in the new york metropolitan area on her salary. she had a second job in a coffee shop when first hired. — "pilots' low pay, long commutes probed in air crash" (ap)

just another american corporate cost-control success story, folks. the bodies have already been factored in.

what dick said

and, more importantly, what he didn't say ...

---

*mid-atlantic shredding services
  (see also: zelikow memo)

bait taken, i'd say

quote of the day from think progress:

i really think one afternoon, [obama senior advisor] david axelrod leaned back in his office chair and said, "i know, let's see if we can get all the republicans to denounce the concept of empathy."

president barack obama, on supreme court justice souter's prospective replacement:

i view that quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people's hopes and struggles as an essential ingredient for arriving at just decisions and outcomes. i will seek somebody who is dedicated to the rule of law, who honors our constitutional traditions, who respects the integrity of the judicial process and the appropriate limits of the judicial role.

utah senator orrin hatch:

well, it's a matter of great concern. if he's saying that he wants to pick people who will take sides, he has also said a judge has to be a person of empathy? what does that mean? usually that's a code word for an activist judge. but he also said that he's going to select judges on the basis of their personal politics, their personal feelings, their personal preferences. now, you know, those are all code words for an activist judge who is going to, you know, be partisan on the bench.

rnc chairman michael steele:

good morning y’all, we’re back in the house. we’re talking a little bit of constitution and a little bit supreme court. and a whole lot of saving america’s judicial system and saving our rights as citizens and not having empathetic judges decide cases, but rather judges who are actually understanding the rule of law and what the constitution and those laws are all about. and how to apply the facts to the law and the law to the facts. and adjudicate my case. i don’t need some judge sitting up there feeling bad for my opponent because of their life circumstances or their condition. and short changing me and my opportunity to get fair treatment under the law. crazy nonsense empathetic. i’ll give you empathy. empathize right on your behind. craziness.

update: bush attorney general alberto gonzales:

i do worry a little bit, well, i worry, i worry about about justices on the court making decisions based on what they think makes them feel good. i don’t think it’s fair to expect society to anticipate the outcome of a case based upon what makes a justice feel good. in essence what you’re saying, i think, is that i’m going to, i don’t care what the law says, i’m going to come out, i’m going to pursue an outcome that i think is fair and just. i’m going to rewrite the law. and i think that’s dangerous.

defections have consequences

the senate dealt a blow tonight to sen. arlen specter's hold on seniority in several key committees, a week after the pennsylvanian's party switch placed democrats on the precipice of a 60-seat majority. in a unanimous voice vote, the senate approved a resolution that added specter to the democratic side of the dais on the five committees on which he serves, an expected move that gives democrats larger margins on key panels such as judiciary and appropriations. but democrats placed specter in one of the two most junior slots on each of the five committees for the remainder of this congress, which goes through december 2010. democrats have suggested that they will consider revisiting specter's seniority claim at the committee level only after the midterm elections next year.

maybe arlen shouldn't have spent his first week as a democrat voting like a republican.

certifigate: the docket

the score: 48 cases, 0 wins (i know, whatta surprise!), 35 denials or dismissals, 1 judgment against and 6 proposed bills, 3 dead.

SUMMARY Changes since last update (Apr 2)
Events	Current	Previous	Change
Lawsuits Known	48	45	+3
Lawsuits Dismissed/Denied	35	34	+1
Judgments For	0	0	0
Judgments Against	1	0	+1
Bills Known	6	6	0
Bills Signed	0	0	0
Bills Failed	3	2	+1

BIRTHER LAWSUITS Challenges to Obama's qualifications
Case	Court	S/F	Status	Notes	Next Event
Ankeny v Daniels et McCain	IN	S	Dismissed	Article AG Letter Motion DIS Memo Motion OP Article
Berg v Obama et al	PA Eastern	F	Dismissed	Documents
	3rd Circuit Appeals	F	Filed	Brief FEC Brief O DNC
	SCOTUS	F	Denied
Berg v Obama	DC District	F	Filed, Sealed	Docket Listing
Brockhausen v Andrade	TX	S	Dismissed	Complaint Articles
Broe v Reed	WA Supreme	S	Dismissed	Article Order
Church of Jesus Christ Christian Aryan Nations of Missouri et al v Obama et al	MO West	F	Filed, Sealed	Complaint Article
Cohen v Obama	DC District	F	Dismissed	Prisoner Memo
Connerat v Browning	FL	S	Dismissed	Articles
Corbett v Bowen et al	CA	S	Filed	Summary Notes
Craig v US	OK West	S	Judgment for Defendant	Complaint Order
	10th Circuit Appeals	F	Filed
Donofrio v Wells	NJ	S	Dismissed
	NJ Supreme	S	Denied
	SCOTUS	F	Denied	Application
Essek v Obama	KY Eastern	F	Dismissed	Order
Gleeson v McDonald et al	ND	F	Filed	Official
Greenberg v Brunner	OH	S	Dismissed with Court Costs	Outline Article
Hamblin v Obama & McCain	Arizona District	F	Filed	Complaint Docket Listing
Herbert v Obama et al	FL Middle	F	Dismissed	Complaint Report Order
Hollister v Soetoro	DC	F	Dismissed with Reprimand	Article Complaint Amend1 O Motion Order B Motion Op Order SC Order Disch B Response B Rejoin B Pro Hac O Reply Memorandum Order Reprimand
Hunter v Obama	SCOTUS	F	Dismissed	Article and Order
Judy v McCain et RNC	NV District	F	Dismissed
Kerchner et al v Obama et al	NJ	F	Filed	Article Article Amend 1 Amend 2	May 5
Keyes v Bowen	CA Superior	S	Dismissed	Petition Quash QuashPA QuashD Article Prelim Ruling
Keyes v Lingle	HI	S	Dismissed	Dismissal Recon Dism Article
Keyes et al v Obama et al	CA Central	F	Filed	Article Complaint
Lightfoot v Bowen	SCOTUS	F	Denied	Articles
Morrow v Obama	FL District	F	Dismissed	Prisoner Complaint Order
Marquis v Reed	WA	S	Dismissed	Press Release Notes
Martin v Lingle	HI	S	Dismissed	Articles
Neal v Brunner	OH	S	Dismissed	Notes Article
Neely v Obama	MI Eastern	F	Dismissed	Complaint
Roy v Obama	HI	F	Dismissed	Complaint Order
Schneller v Cortes	PA Supreme	S	Denied	Summary
	SCOTUS	F	Filed	Docket Listing	May 18
Stamper v US	OH District	F	Dismissed	Complaint Article, Order and Memo
Strunk 29641-08	NY Supreme	S	Filed	Notes
Strunk 29642-08	NY Supreme	S	Filed	Notes
Strunk 08-cv-4289	NY Eastern	F	Dismissed with Prejudice	Notes
	NY 2nd Circuit Appeals	F	Denied	Notes
Strunk v US Dept of State	DC	F	Filed	FOIA Response Motion Op Motion Dis Def Answer	Jun 1
Sullivan v Marshall	NC	S	Dismissed	Articles
Terry v Handel	GA	S	Dismissed with Prejudice	Order Appeal Article
Thomas et al v Hosemann	MS Southern	F	Dismissed with Prejudice	Article Order
Welch v Mukasey et al	NY	F	Dismissed
Wrotnowski v Bysiewicz	CT	S	Dismissed	Order
	SCOTUS	F	Denied	Article
"s/f" = state/federal. "article" = published non-judicial comment. "official" = plaintiff is suing the president in his official capacity. "prisoner" = plaintiff is in prison suing the president in his official capacity. see also the right side of life eligibility lawsuits page. see also free republic list of cases. compiled from dr. conspiracy's obama conspiracy theories docket project.

BIRTHER BILLS Requiring presidential candidates submit proof of qualification
Bill	Legislature	Sponsor(s)	Status	Notes
HR 1503	Congress	Bill Posey, Rep, R-FL	Refer'd to Hse	Bill Article Article
SB 474	MT	Aubyn Curtiss, Sen, R	Tabled	Bill Article
HB 1329	OK	Mike Ritze, Rep, R	Failed	Amend1 Amend2 Article Article Article
SB 1158	AZ	Russell Pearce, Sen, R Judy Burges, Rep, R Pamela Gorman, Sen, R Ron Gould, Sen, R Chuck Gray, Sen, R Jack Harper, Sen, R Thayer Verschoor, Sen, R Carl Seel, Rep, R	Read	Bill Article
HJR 34	MO	Robert Cooper, Rep, R Bob Nance, Rep, R Brian Nieves, Rep, R Cynthia Davis, Rep, R Dan Brown, Rep, R Don Wells, Rep, R Doug Ervin, Rep, R Doug Funderburk, Rep, R Dwight Scharnhorst, Rep, R Jason Brown, Rep, R Mike Lair, Rep, R Mike McGhee, Rep, R Rick Stream, Rep, R Shane Schoeller, Rep, R Walt Bivins, Rep, R	Withdrawn	Bill Article
HB 835	TX	Sid Miller, Rep, R	Filed	Bill Article