O'Keef Watch: Connected white people rule

By GottaLaff

UPDATE:

Via an e-mail news alert:

Federal prosecutors have filed reduced charges against conservative activist James O'Keefe and three others accused of trying to tamper with the phones in Sen. Mary Landrieu's New Orleans office, the Associated Press reports.

For more information, visit washingtonpost.com:

Via MSNBC, he pleaded guilty to get the reduced charges.

ORIGINAL POST, BUMPED UP FROM AN EARLIER DATE:

Connected white people, indeed, "rule", and the injustice is nauseating. How nice for relatives of U.S. attorneys that they get breaks the rest of us don't.

Imagine if these little conservative brats had been "unconnected", "liberal" African Americans who approached a white employee... while duping the public into thinking they were dressed as pimps/hookers at the time.

Now imagine those same African Americans popping into a U.S. Senator's office to snoop around with a hidden camera, checking out the phones. Yeah, that would have gone over well:

Louis Moore, the magistrate judge for the federal district court in New Orleans, agreed Wednesday to motions on behalf of the four to extend the time by which the U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District must seek a felony indictment, press misdemeanor charges or drop the case.

Moore said the extension, which was unopposed by prosecutors, would offer the parties "additional time to conduct informal discussions and discovery and avoid or lessen additional proceedings," suggesting the possibility of a plea deal that would likely spare the four from facing felony charges.

At the time of their arrest Jan. 25, O'Keefe, 25, Joseph Basel, 24, Stan Dai, 24, and Robert Flanagan, 24, were charged with entering federal property under false pretenses for the purposes of committing a felony, a crime that carries a maximum term of 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

Whitewash.

H/t: Cody

Obama by a head

By GottaLaff

The Rational Explainer Syndrome seems to be common among some Democratic leaders: Gore, Kerry, now... Obama? He seems to have more emotion (definitely more charisma) going for him than the other two, but unfortunately, that "professorial" label has stuck.

I'm a firm believer in logic and clear communication, but yes, you do have to pull an audience in. It's something so basic that I teach it in every theater class. Without the emotional pull, the speaker/performer isn't letting us in, isn't engaging us, and that's a no-no, regardless of whether the stage is theatrical or political (often synonymous):

Jon Meacham says President Obama "has grandly failed so far in doing what presidents must do, which is to lead the nation emotionally as well as rationally. It would be great if politics were fact-based, but it is not, and it is surely not nuance-based. What works in a classroom or a think tank does not work on Capitol Hill or in the White House. Obama sometimes seems to be running the Brookings Institution, not the country."

I wouldn't go quite that far, but a little more emoting might help to revive that bond some are looking for.

Nazi looted art found at future site of Bush presidential library

By GottaLaff

(via)

That's some blog title. It's not mine, it belongs to The Hill:

Two valuable works of art looted by the Nazis during World War II have been discovered at Southern Methodist University (SMU), which is the future home of the George W. Bush Presidential Library.

I vill not make any Chimpenfuhrer jokes. I vill not make any Chimpenfuhrer jokes.

Because if I did, I'd be just like those mean ol' Tea Tantrumers and ClusterFoxers linking Obama to Hitler, right?

The former president's office declined to comment on the story.

Of course, this Bush/Hitler connection comes to mind, no matter how hard I try to suppress it.

I have Obama connections!

By GottaLaff

Mr. Laffy just got off the phone with his cousin. She is the sister of three other cousins, and what cousins they are! So far, I know three of the four, and am happy to say, adore them all. However, here's what I didn't know:

Mr. Laffy's first cousin, I now find out, is a Philadelphia lawyer who was co-chair of the Pennsylvania finance committee for Obama, and part of the national finance committee, during the election. Now he's part of the transition team! He's the one I have yet to meet.

Cousin #2, the other brother, is in charge of Caroline Kennedy's finances. So, I guess that means he's the one responsible for giving out her financial disclosure information. The last time I saw him and his family was a couple of years ago when we all had dinner together (and had a cool Elton John sighting only a table away). That was before I got into blogging, so any political talk was brief and across a large, crowded table.

And if all that's not enough, their sister, Ellen Alderman, is the one I've mentioned previously who has co-authored two best-sellers with Caroline. They were Columbia Law School students together. She was recently quoted here in the New York Times.

I will now officially begin a campaign to get them to introduce me to the future president.

VIDEOS: Saxby Chambliss Turns Election Frustration on Cameraman

By GottaLaff

(This is a really short video, about 25 seconds)

Oh that Saxby, always causing a ruckus. He's probably just upset about his name.

Facing a runoff election in a few weeks — and recently hit with a subpoena to testify about his ties to the sugar company whose refinery exploded in February, killing 14 — the Georgia Republican has turned his frustration on the media, giving a light shove to a cameraman yesterday who appears to get to close to the embattled senator.

The Democrats are hoping to make the subpoena (not to mention the shove) an issue in Chambliss’s Dec. 2 runoff against Democratic challenger Jim Martin — which, by the way, can’t come quickly enough.

Here's another, slightly longer video (h/t: Jon Lester) to give you some background:

Can he just lose already? Please?