GOP Congresswoman: I Opposed Domestic Violence Bill Because It Protected Too Many Groups

By Annie-Rose Strasser and Josh Israel/Think Progress
Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) on Monday openly admitted that she opposed the latest reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) because it included protections for LGBT, Native American, and undocumented victims of domestic violence.

In an appearance on MSNBC, Blackburn pointed out that the latest iteration of the law protects “different groups” and thus dilutes funding for straight, non-Native American women with the proper documentation:

When you start to make this about other things it becomes an “against violence act” and not a targeted focus act… I didn’t like the way it was expanded to include other different groups. What you need is something that is focused specifically to help the shelters and to help out law enforcement, who is trying to work with the crimes that have been committed against women and helping them to stand up.

Watch it:

Domestic violence is domestic violence, period. And there is no way to justify Blackburn’s suggestion that some victims of this violence are more deserving than others. The reauthorized VAWA allows programs targeting LGBT victims of domestic violence to compete on equal footing for grant money with other groups serving underserved populations, and it ensures thatLGBT victims will not be turned away from shelters and other services because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. These victims of violence deserve the same protections as anyone else caught in domestic abuse.

Additionally, the reauthorized VAWA includes provisions to prevent serial rapists and similar abusers from preying on Native American women. If Blackburn considers Native American women a “different group,” then it’s one she should be most concerned about: Three out of every five Native American women has been assaulted by an intimate partner.

WND Columnist Alleges Sandy Hook Shooting Was Staged

 BEN DIMIERO/Media Matters for America

In an outlandish column for WorldNetDaily, Bradlee Dean suggests that the mass shooting last week in Newtown, Connecticut, was staged in order to aid the passage of the UN Arms Trade Treaty and gun control legislation, comparing the administration's purported actions to that of the Nazis setting the Reichstag Fire.

Though WorldNetDaily often publishes conspiratorial stories like Dean's column -- the site was the driving force behind the birther movement -- it's still regularly validated by more mainstream conservatives. Last month, the site announced that they had hired former GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum as a columnist. 

Dean, an "ordained preacher, heavy metal drummer, [and] talk-show host of Sons of Liberty Radio," suggests in his December 21 column that the "timing is impeccable" for both the theater shooting in Aurora and the shooting in Newtown because they happened while the UN was deliberating over the Arms Trade Treaty:

The Sandy Hook shooting occurred just days after Sen. Rand Paul sent out an alert that the U.N. was set to pass the final version of the Small Arms Treaty, supported by Obama the day after election.

Part of the treaty bans the trade, sale and ownership of all semi-automatic weapons ... like the one Adam Lanza used to kill 20 children and 6 adults.

The "Batman shooting" in Aurora, Colo., also happened to coincide with the same time as negotiations of the U.N. Small Arms Treaty.

The timing is impeccable.

Aside from its conspiratorial nature, Dean's column is also plainly inaccurate. Contrary to his suggestion that the U.N. Arms Trade Treaty would ban "the trade, sale, and ownership of all semi-automatic weapons" like the one used by Newtown shooter Adam Lanza, it does nothing of the sort. The Arms Trade Treaty is an effort to regulate the international arms trade and overtly affirms the "sovereign right" of countries to regulate the domestic ownership of firearms "pursuant to its own legal or constitutional system."

As we have previously explained, the Department of State has stated that it will oppose any treaty that contains "restrictions on civilian possession or trade of firearms otherwise permitted by law or protected by the U.S. Constitution."

Dean also provides links to several "reports" alleging inconsistencies in eyewitness accounts of several recent mass shootings in our country. He concludes that "[e]yewitnesses in all of these massacres said there were more shooters than the media maintain, indicating the shootings were coordinated and planned."

Among the sources for these "reports" are Alex Jones' InfoWars website, a forum posting at a separate Alex Jones affiliated site, and a site called "Conscious Life News." Reliable sources, all. (For a sample of the type of conspiracy-mongering Jones' websites have been engaged in this week, a few days ago they published an article proposing that the presence of the phrase "Sandy Hook" on a map in the latest Batman movie is "bizarre evidence" that the shooting "may have been staged.")

According to Dean, Obama's call for "meaningful action" and the push from others for new gun violence prevention legislation in the wake of Sandy Hook is akin to Adolf Hitler "attacking his own Reichstag to start a world war":

When the "fire" is started, these government gun banners are right there to strip away your rights in an attempt to gain control under the guise of "putting out the fire."

Adolf Hitler was responsible for attacking his own Reichstag to start a world war. Hitler was also responsible for sending his brownshirts to incite the people so he could play the role of solving their problems. No one believed Hitler was guilty of these crimes until after the fact.

Then it was too late.

Today, these gun banners are doing the opposite of what our forefathers fought, bled and died to give us.

Dean's column also includes a video suggesting that the Oklahoma City bombing and the Columbine shooting (among others) were similarly staged.

Pat Robertson: Sikh temple massacre because ‘atheists hate God’

By David Edwards/Raw Story

Televangelist Pat Robertson on Monday reviewed the case of a shooting at a Sikh temple in Wisconsin that left at least seven dead and came to the conclusion that places of worship were being attacked because “people who are atheists, they hate God.”

Robertson opened Monday’s 700 Club broadcast with the news that there had been a mass shooting at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin in Oak Creek.

“What is it?” the TV preacher wondered. “Is it satanic? Is it some spiritual thing, people who are atheists, they hate God, they hate the expression of God? And they are angry with the world, angry with themselves, angry with society and they take it out on innocent people who are worshiping God.”

“And whether it’s a Sikh temple or a Baptist church or a Catholic church or a Muslim mosque, whatever it is, I just abhor this kind of violence, and it’s the the kind of thing that we should do something about,” he added. “But what do you do? Well, you talk about the love of God and hope it has some impact.”

U.S. Attorney James A. Santelle on Mondaysaid that the man who murdered six people in Wisconsin before being shot himself was 40-year-old Army veteran Wade Michael Page. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)identified Page as a neo-Nazi who led a racist white-power band.

SPLC’s Heidi Beirich told the Journal Sentinel that there was “no question” that the suspect was part of the white supremacist movement and had attended “hate events” around the country.

Reports also indicated that Page had a number of tattoos, including one that said “9/11″ and a Celtic knot, which is commonly used a symbol of the Christian Holy Trinity. There is no evidence that Page was an atheist.

Watch this video CBN’s The 700 Club via Right Wing Watch, broadcast Aug. 6, 2012.

Allen West suggests 80 House Dems are Communist Party members

By David Edwards/Raw Story

Tea party darling Rep. Allen West (R-FL) on Tuesday warned that as many as 80 Democratic lawmakers are members of the Communist Party.

Speaking to about 100 supporters and 15 protesters in Jensen Beach, the freshman congressman refused to name names after saying that that he had “heard” that 80 Democrats serving in the House of Representatives were secretly Communist Party members, according to the The Palm Beach Post News.

West also took the opportunity to blast President Barack Obama, who had spoken in Boca Raton earlier in the day about fairness in the tax code and policies to ensure millionaires paid as much in taxes as their secretaries.

“I really wish that, standing here before you, was Allen West and President Obama,” West told the crowd. “We could have a simple discussion. But that ain’t ever gonna happen.”

“Why not?” a member of the audience shouted.

“Cuz he was too scared!” West replied.

Last week, failed GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin first floated West’s name at a possible “rogue” pick for 2012. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R), an early supporter of Mitt Romney, agreed that West would be “good” in the VP slot.

West said on Friday that he would accept the Republican vice presidential nomination if it was the “right fit.”

West told CNN’s Kyra Phillips that he had “never been out on a dinner date” with Romney, but he’d be willing to join the ticket.

Yeah, well, right now, you know, the focus is, of course, being a good Congressional representative,” West explained. “But if someone were to make that call to me, which I really doubt is ever going to happen, you would have to make sure that it is something that God would ordain for you, and you’d have to talk to your wife, my wife and my two daughters about. But we have always stepped up to the plate to serve our country. And if it’s the right fit, then I will do so.”

Former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain has also called West an “excellent choice” for the GOP ticket.

Watch this video, uploaded to YouTube April 11, 2012.

Bachmann: Federal Government Could Force A One-Child Policy

By Annie-Rose Strasser/Think Progress

Michele Bachmann argued last night that the Obama administration could institute a one-child policy under the Affordable Care Act. Appearing on Glenn Beck’s online television show Real News From The Blaze, Bachmann launched into a long monologue on why she thinks the health care reform law could negatively impact women and explained that “the federal government will only pay for one baby to be born in the hospital per family.”

When anchor Amy Holmes pressed her on that point, she quickly backed away from singling out the Obama administration, and instead talked of a generic “health care dictator” who may institute such policies:

BACHMANN: Women have a lot to lose under Obamacare If you want to go into specifics, what the government gives, the government can take away. It certainly isn’t beyond the pale to think, in light of Kathleen Sebelius, the Health and Human Services Secretary — she said that it’s important that we have contraceptives because that prevents pregnancy, and pregnancy is more expensive to the federal government. Going with that logic, according to our own Health and Human Services Secretary, it isn’t far-fetched to think that the President of the United States could say ‘we need to save health care expenses — the federal government will only pay for one baby to be born in the hospital per family, or two babies to be born per family.’ That could happen. We think it couldn’t?”

Watch it:

Top ten crazy sh*t Pat Buchanan says

By Katie Halper/Raw Story

Talking to Reverand Al Sharpton this week, Pat Buchanan described Obama as "your boy." But while some became outraged at his comments, they came as no surprise to others more familiar with Buchanan's rich history of bigotry. Below are 10 of his most outrageously bigoted comments on everything from African-Americans to Jews to immigrants to women and beyond.

1. Obama has benefited from being African-American.
First, Buchanan said, "Look, if Barack Obama thinks there‘s no correlation between the fact he‘s an African-American and his career has been so spectacular, he would be as delusional as George W. Bush saying the fact, he‘s president of the United States."

Then he told political analyst, author and blogger Keli Goff, an African American woman, to "shut up." In all fairness he only asked her to shut up "for a second" and added a "please."

2. White People built America

Buchanan gave voice to the voiceless white men, explaining that affirmative action is a way to increase diversity at the expense of downtrodden white males, who he says built this country. "This has been a country built basically by white folks," he said, adding that white people were "90 percent of the entire nation in 1960, when I was growing up." (It was actually 85%.)

3. White people are to the Supreme Court as black people are to Olympic track races

As if the previous clip weren't enough, Buchanan then suggested that white people are just naturally better at being Supreme Court justices, just as "black folks" happen to be the fastest runners: "But if I look at the U.S. track team in the Olympics, and they're all black folks, I don't automatically assume it's discrimination. I will say, "I think maybe those are the fastest guys we got, that maybe they're the fastest guys in the country, maybe they're the fastest in the world."

4. Pedophiles are all gay

When Eleanor Clift asked Buchanan, "Have you renounced and rejected the Catholic priests that have disappointed you over the years?" he responded, "You mean the ones involved in this gay stuff? You're dead right." When John McLaughlin clarified, "Pat, they're not necessarily gay," Pat responded "It's little kids."

But that wasn't his first time conflating gay men and pedophiles. In reference to Mark Foley, the Congressman who sexually harassed several House pages, Pat focused on the real problem -- the fact that this man is a "flamer." Talking to Joe Scarborough, Pat said, "I mean, look, we are now hearing that this flamer, Mr. Foley, was going after kids as early as 19 -- I mean, 20 -- I mean, 1998. I mean, you knew Foley. Did you know he was this kind of flamer who was after pages?"

5. The minorities are "invading"

Buchanan warned MSNBC host Joe Scarborough that "We got an invasion of our country, and you‘re going to lose this country, Joe, if you do not stop this invasion which is altering the character of the country! It‘s turning us basically into what Teddy Roosevelt called a tangle of... of squalling minorities!"

6. Hitler was a genius and the Holocaust is exaggerated

In a column designed to promote his book Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War", Buchanan described Hitler as "an individual of great courage.... Hitler's success was not based on his extraordinary gifts alone. His genius was an intuitive sense of the mushiness, the character flaws, the weakness masquerading as morality that was in the hearts of the statesmen who stood in his path." Buchanan also openly doubts that Jews were gassed to death in Treblinka, writing that, "Diesel engines do not emit enough carbon monoxide to kill anybody."

7. AIDS is God's punishment for being gay

In addition to calling gay people "sodomites," Buchanan once wrote, "The poor homosexuals -- they have declared war upon nature, and now nature is extracting an awful retribution on the gays." On another occasion, he added that "AIDS is nature's retribution for violating the laws of nature."

8. Women are not discriminated against and housework is liberating

On women, Buchanan wrote: "Rail as they will about 'discrimination,' women are simply not endowed by nature with the same measures of single-minded ambition and the will to succeed in the fiercely competitive world of Western capitalism." And in his book Right from the Beginning Pat added that "The real liberators of American women were not the feminist noise-makers, they were the automobile, the supermarket, the shopping center, the dishwasher, the washer-dryer, the freezer."

9. Segregation kept politics from being too polarizing

In Right from the Beginning, Buchanan wrote "There were no politics to polarize us then, to magnify every slight. The 'negroes' of Washington had their public schools, restaurants, bars, movie houses, playgrounds and churches; and we had ours." But, as Nixon's White House adviser, Buchanan told his boss not to visit Coretta Scott King because it would "outrage many, many people who believe Dr. King was a fraud and a demagogue and perhaps worse.... Others consider him the Devil incarnate. Dr. King is one of the most divisive men in contemporary history."

10. Immigrants are killing "us"

On This Week With David Brinkley in 1991, Buchanan said "If we had to take a million immigrants in, say Zulus, next year, or Englishmen, and put them up in Virginia, what group would be easier to assimilate and would cause less problems for the people of Virginia?"

More recently in his book Day of Reckoning: How Hubris, Ideology, and Greed Are Tearing America ApartPat warned "America [Is] Committing Suicide" while "Asian, African, And Latin American Children Come To Inherit The Estate." And this past month, in response to the killings spree in Norway, Pat wrote "As for a climactic conflict between a once-Christian West and an Islamic world that is growing in numbers and advancing inexorably into Europe for the third time in 14 centuries, on this one, Breivik may be right."

From Karl Rove To Caliphates: Glenn Beck's Long, Steep Slide Into Extremism And Isolation

by Simon Maloy

On January 19, 2009, the first episode of Glenn Beck aired on Fox News. Sitting at a desk in a brightly lit studio, Beck read off the day's headlines and transitioned from one discrete segment to the next: the "Hot List," the "One Thing," etc. He discussed the economy with Ben Stein and Obama's inauguration with Karl Rove. The second half of the show was eaten up by interviews with Sarah Palin and the wives of border patrol agents. Beck had big-name sponsors, and his overall tone was hopeful: "I've been thinking, what is the message that I want to bring? And it is -- we're in tough times but we're going to make it, if we count on each other, if we become 'we, the people' again."

In short, it was a standard-issue conservative opinion program with Beck's unique touches.

Fast forward two and a half years, to the June 15, 2011, episode of Glenn Beck. Standing in a darkened studio surrounded by chalkboards, Beck warned that George Soros was involved in the "final collapse" of Greece. He insisted that the Three-Fifths Compromise was designed to "help free slaves." After warning that "violence" might soon be "coming to America," Beck theorized that postal workers would be armed and made part of a nefarious "civilian force" that would rival the military. There were no guests (save for one of Beck's radio co-hosts pretending to be a founding father) and no discrete segments. Just Beck, standing in front of his chalkboards, delivering an extended monologue that was periodically interrupted by ads for survival seeds and shady gold sellers.

The differences are stark -- not just in the tone and content, but in the format of the show. When he started out on Fox, Beck's program dealt in the day's politics and was a prime venue for GOP officials and conservative pundits and academics to get some cable news face time. But as the show progressed, Beck's rhetoric became darker and more extreme, and he became increasingly isolated. He went from discussing electoral politics with Karl Rove to warning of a biblically prophesied Islamic-socialist caliphate threatening to undo Western civilization.

In an early promo for his Fox News program, Beck claimed to disavow those on the "right" who talk about progressives and Democrats "trying to turn us into communist Russia." His high-minded commitment to eschew red-baiting proved short-lived, as Beck accused President Obama of being a socialist who "surrounded himself with Marxists his whole life," and launched a segment called the "Comrade Update," in which he played the tongue-in-cheek part of an insider to the communist scheme to destroy Western civilization.

As 2009 progressed and right-wing anger at Obama steadily increased and mutated, Beck's show became a platform for prominent conservatives to take shots at the president. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) appeared on Beck's program to promote the anti-census movement, of which she was the de facto leader. He teamed up with Andrew Breitbart and James O'Keefe to release the fraudulent ACORN videotapes. Even Rush Limbaugh, who is peerless among right-wing commentators in terms of reach and influence, called into Beck's program to spout his distinctive brand of anti-Obama vitriol. Summer 2009 also saw the beginning of Beck's "In A Nutshell" segments and his habit of spotting "connections" between progressive groups that, he claimed, everyone else the in the media were missing.

Most important, though, was Beck's decision to start attacking Obama over racial issues, which led to the defining moment of his Fox News career: His attack on Obama as a "racist" with a "deep-seated hatred for white people or the white culture." That moment sparked the advertiser boycott of his show, which reportedly cost Fox News millions of dollars in ad sales.

Beck, in the meanwhile, kept updating his shtick and sinking deeper into conspiracy theorism. Hestarted using the now-famous chalkboards and began talking about the "Tree of Revolution." Beck's rhetoric also became increasingly violent; he said the Obama administration was "putting a gun to America's head" and wielded a baseball bat as he warned that "you too could be the next victim of the killing spree." More often than not, the talk of violence and conspiracy mongering were accompanied by attacks on the Tides Foundation, which Beck often placed at the center of his chalkboard diagrams.

After spending most of 2009 warning, sometimes literally, that the end of America was nigh, Beck kicked off 2010 by promoting himself as the person who would "restore honor" to the country. But even as he imagined for himself a grander and grander role among the pantheon of American heroes, his Fox News colleagues were starting to view him as a problem. In a March 2010 Washington Postcolumn, Howard Kurtz reported that "Beck has become a constant topic of conversation among Fox journalists, some of whom say they believe he uses distorted or inflammatory rhetoric that undermines their credibility." Kurtz's article prompted Fox News chairman Roger Ailes to warn employees off intramural sniping: "Glenn Beck, does his show and that's his opinion. It's not the opinion of FOX News and he has a right to say it."

Not long after Ailes defended Beck's right to voice his opinion, the real impact of Beck's rhetoric -- specifically his continued, unfounded smears of the Tides Foundation -- was realized on a California highway as Byron Williams was stopped by the highway patrol and opened fire on the police officers. Williams told police afterwards that he had intended to kill people at the Tides Foundation and the ACLU, and credited Beck with "exposing" information that "blew my mind."

Nevertheless, Beck continued to enjoy significant clout leading into his "Restoring Honor" rally in Washington, DC in late August 2010, which featured Sarah Palin and Republican members of Congress among the featured guests. Beck had spent months promoting the event on Fox News and casting himself as a modern-day Martin Luther King, Jr. He also framed the rally in explicitly religious terms, telling attendees to expect "miracles" and prefacing the actual event with a religious rally at the Kennedy Center.

The overt religiosity of "Restoring Honor" continued to permeate Beck's show as he mixed wild conspiracy with apocalyptic rhetoric, recasting (relatively) mundane political squabbling as epic battles between good and evil and putting himself in the same category as biblical leaders. He also began promoting religious extremists and fringe academics, some of whom were ardent anti-Semites. And Beck himself began trafficking in anti-Semitic rhetoric in his relentless attacks on George Soros, calling him a "puppet master" who controls the media, and falsely accusing the billionaire financier of collaborating with the Nazis.

Neither condemnations from Jewish groups nor the ongoing advertiser boycott did anything to change Beck's behavior -- he instead boasted that he was still on the air despite what he claimed was a campaign against him orchestrated by -- who else? -- George Soros.

Beck's ratings, however, were declining rapidly, and his increasingly eccentric behavior was alienating more and more people at Fox News, including Ailes. The New York Times's Mark Leibovich reported in October 2010 that Ailes was increasingly upset with Beck's use of Fox News' airwaves to promote his own ventures. Leibovich also noted: "When I mentioned Beck's name to several Fox reporters, personalities and staff members, it reliably elicited either a sigh or an eye roll. Several Fox News journalists have complained that Beck's antics are embarrassing Fox, that his inflammatory rhetoric makes it difficult for the network to present itself as a legitimate news outlet." At the time, Beck's ratings were down about 30 percent from 2009.

The beginning of 2011 saw the conservative establishment finally turn on Beck and his increasingly extreme brand of conspiracy theorism. After Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak was deposed, Beckclaimed that the revolution in Egypt and unrest in other North African countries were the first steps towards the establishment of an Islamic caliphate that, with the help of communists and socialists, threatened to engulf the Middle East, North Africa, and even Europe. William Kristol of the Weekly Standard deemed this "hysteria" and likened Beck's fearmongering to that of the John Birch Society. The National Review's Rich Lowry slammed Beck's "wild theorizing," and Wall Street Journal columnist John Fund criticized Beck's "apocalyptic conspiracy terms about America becoming an Islamic state -- that goes too far." Andrew Breitbart, who had collaborated with Beck on the ACORN tapes, also turned on Beck, claiming that Beck had thrown him "under the bus" on the Shirley Sherrod story.

Beck, in response, lashed out at Kristol and others and angrily insisted that not only was he right about the "caliphate," but that his warnings of the coming destabilization were informed by a "gift" of "being able to see slightly over the horizon."

By the time Fox News announced in April that Beck's show was ending, it barely resembled the program as it began in 2009. Beck's first Fox News show was a comparatively tame, even hopeful assessment of America's future. By contrast, on his April 6, 2011, program -- the day he confirmed his planned exit from Fox News -- Beck suggested that there was some sort of connection between the unrest in North Africa, earthquakes in Japan, and a Soros-convened meeting in the U.S. The next day he described Iran's relationships with Russia and Turkey as the fulfillment of a prophecy from Revelation: "This is the alliance of Gog and Magog."

In two and a half years, Beck's Fox News show went from went from Karl Rove and Sarah Palin, to Gog and Magog. And that provides a tidy explanation for how Beck went so rapidly from Fox News ratings phenom to right-wing pariah and outcast.