April 1, 2015

David Letterman: 'This Is Not The Indiana I Remember As A Kid' (VIDEO)

-snip-

"This is not the Indiana I remember as a kid," Letterman said during a serious moment on CBS's "Late Show with David Letterman."

"I lived there for 27 years, and folks were folks, and that’s all there was to it," he said. "We all breathed the same air, we were all carbon-based life forms. We didn’t care."

"This guy throws a monkey wrench into the works," Letterman continued. "Something's gone haywire."

"It may be legal, but it ain’t right," he said.

Letterman then launched into a Top Ten list of "Guys Indiana Governor Mike Pence Looks Like."

###

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/david-letterman-mike-pence-indiana

April 1, 2015

After Christie’s privatization, NJ lottery missing targets

Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON (AP) — When Chris Christie privatized New Jersey’s lottery two years ago, he said its new overseers would “modernize and maximize” the games.

Instead, a lottery once ranked among the nation’s top performers is now lagging for the second straight year, trailing its state income targets by $64 million seven months into the current fiscal year. Meanwhile, the company running it has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to hire lobbyists and a public relations firm with close ties to the governor.

New Jersey lawmakers anticipated receiving nearly $1.04 billion in income from the lottery this year, a number reduced to just $955 million in a revised budget released this month. Having collected an estimated $510 million seven months into this fiscal year, the lottery is not on track to meet even its lowered expectations.

The shortfalls could mean budget cuts to programs directly funded by the lottery system — such as after-school care, programs for veterans and education for the deaf — should the lottery’s fortunes not improve.

-snip-

Read more: http://www.salon.com/2015/04/01/after_christies_privatization_nj_lottery_missing_targets_2/

April 1, 2015

Dick Cheney: Obama Admin Is The 'Most Damaging... Since World War II'

Source: TPM

Former Vice President Dick Cheney told a crowd of Republicans on Tuesday night that the Obama administration has been the worst in 70 years, according the Wall Street Journal.

The administration has been “the most damaging, certainly, since World War II,” Cheney said at an event hosted by the conservative Young America’s Foundation in New Jersey.

Cheney lambasted Obama's foreign policy decisions during the 30-minute speech, saying that he expected the Iranian nuclear negotiations to fail and arguing that America's traditional allies in the region have lost “all lost faith and confidence” in the U.S.

“We have a terrible situation now. We need leadership to turn it around,” Cheney said.

###

Read more: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/dick-cheney-obama-most-damaging

April 1, 2015

Hannity And D'Souza: Why Are Gays Mad At Indiana But Silent On Sharia Law?

Fox News host Sean Hannity on Tuesday brought on conservative activist and convicted felon Dinesh D'Souza to dismiss the controversy over Indiana's religious freedom law that may permit discrimination against gay people.

Hannity argued that the backlash to the bill was simply "selective political moral outrage" on the left.

"Gays and lesbians, they might disagree with me on gay marriage, or they might disagree with somebody — a religious person as it relates to their Christian views, but why are they so silent on the bigger issues of the day, which would be taking on radical Islamists?" Hannity asked, noting that gay people and women are mistreated under Sharia Law. "Virtual silence from these groups that are so outraged and indignant over a law that Bill Clinton supported in ’93 and Barack Obama supported." D'Souza then explained that opposition to the Indiana law "is a selective attack on Christianity."

"Not only do you not see the left talking about gays and lesbians abroad, but even at home, you’ll rarely find homosexuals trying to force a Muslim baker to bake a cake for a gay wedding," D'Souza said.

Hannity then asked why there hasn't been "outrage as a group speaking out against Sharia law and women not being able to vote or drive in Saudi Arabia or not being able to leave their own homes without a male relative."

-snip-

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/hannity-dsouza-indiana-sharia

April 1, 2015

A Bigger Deal Than You Think - By Josh Marshall

As the Indiana debacle unfolds there is an unmistakeable and merited glee from supporters of LGBT rights as they watch the law's sponsors buffeted by waves of bad publicity and threatened boycotts. As I noted on Monday, Indiana is anything but the first state to pass anti-gay legislation. It's just that the state's Governor and Republican legislators seem to have stumbled onto one of those tipping point moments when the balance of public sentiment and action doesn't just shift but shifts dramatically, with the initial shift building on itself. I doubt very much that most of the companies and organizations that have announced boycotts or opposition in recent days thought they would be doing so before Salesforce's Marc Benioff made his announcement just five days ago. But for all this, I think the sheer scale of the debacle is still not quite visible. It's hidden in plain sight. But we're not quite seeing it.

It's not just that the laws defenders are denying it targets gays and lesbians. It's not just that they're claiming (mainly falsely it turns out) that other states and the federal government have similar laws. It's this: virtually everyone from the governor on down is claiming not only that the law wasn't intended to allow discrimination and that it does not have this effect but that they oppose discrimination in any form.

No one of any prominence has been willing to say that gays and lesbians don't deserve "special rights" (as the social conservative right likes to phrase it) or that godly business owners shouldn't be forced to participate in same sex weddings that violate their religious principles. (If you've missed this, catch up on the bakery rights movement.) If you listen to Gov Pence you half expect he's about to push through a full LGBT anti-discrimination bill just to make clear he loves him some gays and doesn't accept discrimination in any form.

Now, no, I don't expect that's the "fix" he was referring to today will amount to that. Indeed, social conservatives have always tried to find ways to argue that they don't support discrimination per se - just "special rights" etc. But these kinds of slippery, obfuscating arguments have major consequences. And these are far more total and unqualified than we almost ever see in these cases.

more
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/a-bigger-deal-than-you-think

April 1, 2015

Supreme Court’s Big Gay Pandora’s Box - By Michael Tomasky

The idea that we should make gay marriage the law of the land and yet refuse to force businesses to follow that law is unjust and absurd.

Everybody’s up in arms about Mike Pence, Mike Pence, Mike Pence. My arms are up too. In fact I have anti-Pence cred going way back, to his chairmanship while in the House of the Republican Study Group, which played a key role in dragging the whole House GOP caucus hard to starboard. Indeed he was a protean figure in the lower chamber, a man ahead of his time, in whose breast dwelt deeply reactionary tendencies driven both by fiscal malevolence and alleged Biblical prophecy. There weren’t nearly as many of those in his day, so he was worth noticing, and to longtime Pence students, this law he’s signed is as unsurprising as a thing can be.

But I suggest to you, friends and comrades, that we also concern ourselves with the Supreme Court here. The High Court started all this, with the Hobby Lobby decision, and it’s the court that is steering us into some potentially dark and dangerous waters here.

Consider this. As we all know, the court is set to release its decision on same-sex marriage, probably at the end of its term in June. Virtually everyone thinks that a five-justice majority is going to uphold a federal right for same-sexers to marry. That would consist, of course, of the court’s four liberals plus Anthony Kennedy.

Okay, that’s great, if it happens. But remember: This is the same court that just said that it is okay, on the basis of religious conscience, for businesses to discriminate against gay people and refuse to photograph or cater or be-flower their wedding ceremonies. (The court actually ruled that privately held corporations could discriminate, but I guess since corporations are people, the various red-state legislatures have extended the principle to smaller enterprises.) So if the court rules for same-sex marriage this June, it will have said, in the space of exactly one year: Same-sex marriage is the law of the land, but refusing to honor same-sex marriage is the law of the land, too!

more
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/04/01/supreme-court-s-big-gay-pandora-s-box.html

April 1, 2015

Indiana Pizzeria: No Pies for Gay Weddings

Source: TDB/ABC News

A Walkertown, Indiana, pizza shop is the state’s first business to declare it will discriminate against gays after the Religious Freedom Restoration Act was signed into law last week. “If a gay couple came in and wanted us to provide pizzas for their wedding, we would have to say no,” Memories Pizza owner Crystal O’Connor told a local news station. “We are a Christian establishment.” However, gay couples—like those of other faiths—are welcome to patronize the establishment on non-matrimonial occasions. “I don’t think it’s discrimination,” O’Connor says. “It’s supposed to help people that have a religious belief.” Gov. Mike Pence said yesterday that he didn’t believe the law allowed discrimination but asked for new legislation to “fix” the RFRA by the end of the week.

Read it at ABC News

Read more: http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2015/04/01/indiana-pizzeria-no-pie-for-gay-couples.html

---

-----------------------

Indiana Pizzeria Vows To Never Deliver A Pizza To A Gay Wedding

-snip-

O'Connor told WBND that she doesn't believe the law allows for discrimination or specifically targets gays.

But her father suggested that the family shouldn't be punished for refusing to cater same-sex weddings if they were asked to do so.

"That's a lifestyle that you choose," Kevin O'Connor told WBND. "I choose to be heterosexual. They choose to be homosexual. Why should I be beat over the head because they choose that lifestyle?"

The family later clarified for the news station that they would not deny service to a same-sex or non-Christian couple who came to eat at the restaurant.

Watch below via WBND:

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/memories-pizza-indiana-anti-gay-law