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This Week notes the passings of actor John Forsythe, longtime WH butler Eugene Allen, former journalist and Ford press secretary Jerald terHorst, educator Jaime Escalante, computer pioneer Henry Edwards Roberts, and Ford Motors engineer Donald Frey. In addition, the Pentagon released the names of three service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan:

US Marines LCpl Jacob A Ross, 19, Gillette, WY

US Army PFC James L Miller, 21, Yakima, WA

US Army PFC Raymond N Pacleb, 31, Honolulu, HI

According to iCasualties, the total number of allied servicemembers killed in Iraq is now 4,705; in Afghanistan, 1,712. Per Iraq Body Count, 91 Iraqi civilians were killed during this same period.

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A golden oldie from the incredible C&L archives on Harold Ford from an appearance he had with Hannity & Colmes:

Colmes: Barack Obama had a great point when he said those who voted for the war in Iraq and then had to apologize for that vote should probably be the last people to criticize he---who was right about the war in Iraq all along.

Ford: I don't know who's been right about this war all along...

Colmes: Sure you do...

Ford: That's open for dispute.

Colmes: You don't know who's been right about the war all along?

Ford: One thing is clear. What we're doing now is not working.

BNF's made a nice video mash-up for us that exposes his anti-gay, pro gun, anti civil rights, anti- choice, Bush loving creds. His sudden change of positions to justify his entrance into NY politics is incredible.

I remember Ford's 2006 election very well. I wouldn't raise him any money, but did write a lot on the smear ad that the republican party promoted about him. It was tough watching him proclaim his Blue Dog credentials and then he did a campaign commercial inside a church.

Now he's a carpetbagger trying to run in NY and running away from his old positions as fast as he can.

I imagine NYers are smart enough to see right through his lies.

Scarce did a nice post on Harold Ford called : The many lies of Harold Ford Jr

And now Ford is using the odious NY Post to disseminate more fabrications on his record and the type of Democratic politician he would be.

It's true: I am strongly considering running for the United States Senate.

I do so because our best as a nation has always come when we test our ideas and ourselves, and when we trust competition to refine the steel of our convictions and the truth of our arguments.

Some have already questioned whether I should be running.

Others are falsifying my record in public life.

New Yorkers deserve a free election....read on

Adam Bink has a few thoughts about him.

Harold Ford, Jr. thinks New York Democrats are stupid. Like, you want a Democrat who says he's liberal? Here's one on paper! That they'll just read a checklist of progressive issues in his stupid op-ed, read that he is suddenly in favor of marriage equality after flip-flopping on the Federal Marriage Amendment, voting twice for it, and then not announcing his newfound position in 2007, 2008, 2009 or early this year, and fall in love.

As usual, Media Matters has a great rundown of his bullshit.

Harold Ford Gets It Wrong On Harold Ford

If Harold Ford runs, there will be a big uprising in the blogosphere to defeat this jackass. Being a former New Yorker, I get really pissed off when frauds like Ford think they can waltz into the state and lie about their record. DLC Democrats are a dying breed anyway. The sooner they're altogether extinct, the better.

Bill Moyer talks to Mark Danner and Bruce Fein on last night's Journal:

The President had a press conference on Wednesday night in which he was asked two questions about torture. If you'd been there, Mark, what would you have asked him?

[...] BRUCE FEIN: I would have asked him, since he's agreed that what was done was torture, and that the United States criminal code makes torture a crime. And there's no national security exception, no exception if you get useful information. And because we had impeached, in the House Judiciary Committee, a former President, called Richard Nixon, for failing faithfully to execute the laws. How he can justify not moving forward with an investigation when we have a former President and Vice President openly acknowledging they authorized water boarding, what he has described as torture, is a crime.

Or in the alternative, if he thinks that there are mitigating circumstances, and there's body language suggests that, then he should pardon them like Ford did Richard Nixon. And the reason why the difference between a pardon and non-prosecution is important, is because a pardon requires the recipient to acknowledge guilt. That there was wrongdoing. There was a crime. Just forgetting and sweeping it under the rug suggests this wasn't illegal.

BILL MOYERS: But he is clearly trying to move, as he says, beyond the past. He's closing Guantanamo. He doesn't countenance torture. He says it won't happen on his watch. I mean, shouldn't that settle the issue?

MARK DANNER: This is an issue that, as he has put it, divides the country. But because it divides the country, in my opinion, is one reason we have to confront it. The idea that this is about the past is simply wrong. It's not about the past. It's about our present politics.

Fein is exactly right. As long as we act as if a crime wasn't committed, we undermine the rule of law.

It’s been a while since we last heard from the American Family Association and its endless efforts to boycott companies that bother the group. As long-time readers may recall, every once in a while, Wildmon and the AFA will draw headlines for attacking a group or company for being insufficiently “pro-family,” though most of their complaints come across more as bizarre rants from extremists than anything else.

The targets from recent years include, but are by no means limited to, Wal-Mart (for promoting “Brokeback Mountain” DVDs), Target (for not having Salvation Army bell-ringers during the Christmas season), Ford Motor Company (for purchasing ads in gay-oriented publications), and the movie “Shark Tale” (which the AFA believed was intended to “brainwash children” into accepting gay rights). Last year, the AFA was particularly bold when it tried to block U.S. troops’ access to adult materials.

This week, the AFA decided McDonald’s is the new national scourge.

The “problem,” if you want to call it that, is the company’s vice president of communications, Richard Ellis, who has joined the board of directors for the National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce. In an “action alert” sent to supporters yesterday, the AFA’s Wildmon expressed his outrage.

According to McDonald’s CEO Jim Skinner, McDonald’s will aggressively promote the homosexual agenda. In remarks on McDonald’s Web site concerning the company becoming a member of the National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (NGLCC), Skinner wrote: “Being a socially responsible organization is a fundamental part of who we are. We have an obligation to use our size and resources to make a difference in the world … and we do.”

Regardless, I hope McDonald’s has the good sense to ignore the AFA’s complaints.

...please take a sweet draw on the tailpipe of my minivan...

Love and linkage to Media Bloodhound, who sent me this Youtube, and comments: "Nothing bought the crazy more than these [2006] commercials. These Competitive Enterprise Institute*** ads seem worth revisiting in light of Gore's Nobel yesterday: 'Carbon dioxide. They call it pollution. We call it life.'"

If Al Gore and those so-called "scientists" had just adopted this "run the camera backwards" solution to global warming, they woulda won their Nobel and saved a few more glaciers years ago.

***Who the hell are these people, and why is Exxon Mobil funding them? Just guessing, actually. Google google....oops sorry

it's Ford Motor Company. Let the record stand corrected.

Open thread below. Don't do too much CO2 before you post. "Life" is precious!

(Photo of a tasty looking cafe au lait and oj in Quebec City via Bill on Capitol Hill.)

The Sunday Talking Head thread is up and ready for the reading. It's quite an interesting mix this morning, with everything from Iraq to infrastructure and a lot in between on the topics menu.

Perhaps it is just me, but I think the subject of Harold Ford's loss last year and this op-ed that Kos and SusanG penned for the WaPo yesterday might come up in passing on Meet the Press. Here's hoping that Markos gets an opportunity to ask Mr. Russert why it is that he even bothered booking the politically tone deaf, irrelevent, self-promoting Ford in the first place, and why Russert still masquerades as a news man now that all of us know that Dick Cheney owns him. What, you don't remember that Cathie Martin classic?

-- MTP (putting VP on MTP), plus a pro and con of putting VP on MTP Pros: best format, we control the message

Could make for some fun viewing this morning. Here's hoping, anyway. Plus, there is likely to be quite a bit of discussion on the "buy yourself some voters, promise them a buffet and stick 'em on a bus day" Iowa GOP straw poll. And of course, Bob Geiger has his regular cartoons.  So, what's on your mind, catching your eye in the news or on the blogs this morning?

There were quite a few offensive Supreme Court rulings this year, but one of the more surprising decisions was in Ledbetter v. Goodyear, in which the court ruled 5 to 4 (natch) that workers who face wage discrimination only have 180 days to challenge the initial discrimination in court. (Slate’s Richard Thompson Ford explained the case quite well a couple of months ago.)

Goodyear Tire intentionally shortchanged Lilly Ledbetter, a female employee, for two decades. The court majority (Justices Roberts, Alito, Scalia, Thomas, and Kennedy) said if Ledbetter wanted to challenge the discrimination, she needed to sue within 180 days of her first unfair paycheck — even though she continued to receive unfair paychecks for 20 years.

Today, the House took up legislation — the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act — that would put into law a clarification — wage disparity based on race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, and disability is not a one-time occurrence. Every discriminatory paycheck represents an ongoing violation. Employees would still have 180 days to challenge the discrimination, but from the last check, not the first.

The good news is the House passed the measure. The bad news is Bush plans to veto.

Not for nothing, President Bush and Dick Cheney have to despise alternative energy. They made (and continue to make) fortunes from oil and must see this as a direct threat to their livelihoods. And now that a hybrid almost killed the President, it must make it even worse.

Detroit News:

Credit Ford Motor Co. CEO Alan Mulally with saving the leader of the free world from self-immolation.

Mulally told journalists at the New York auto show that he intervened to prevent President Bush from plugging an electrical cord into the hydrogen tank of Ford's hydrogen-electric plug-in hybrid at the White House last week. Ford wanted to give the Commander-in-Chief an actual demonstration of the innovative vehicle, so the automaker arranged for an electrical outlet to be installed on the South Lawn and ran a charging cord to the hybrid. However, as Mulally followed Bush out to the car, he noticed someone had left the cord lying at the rear of the vehicle, near the fuel tank.

"I just thought, 'Oh my goodness!' So, I started walking faster, and the President walked faster and he got to the cord before I did. I violated all the protocols. I touched the President. I grabbed his arm and I moved him up to the front," Mulally said. "I wanted the president to make sure he plugged into the electricity, not into the hydrogen This is all off the record, right?"

TPMCafe: It is now clear there were elements within America's government and/or military, working in concert with Iraq's current scarecrow power-holders, who wanted as many people as possible in the world to see video of Saddam being hung.

Unclaimed Territory: The president's praise of fair trials and the rule of law

HOLY CRAP: Jesus did not trust the political world to further his mission...New Kansas Special Prosecutor freely admits to years of close association with a prominent operative of an antiabortion terror group, the Army of God...If you have a strong stomach, read this smirking porker's gag-inducing musings on morality

MediaBloodhound: Should we mourn James Brown or Gerald Ford?...the Rude Pundit has some thoughts. I'm convinced Betty is the Ford who has done the most to help others. 

Bob Geiger: The usual crackerjack collection of editorial cartoons

END-OF-YEAR STUFF: From Foley to Frey: The Year in U.S. Scandals...Ten Video Moments from 2006 -...50 things we know now, that we didn't know this time last year...The P.U.-litzer Prizes for 2006...The BRAD BLOG Year in Review 2006...A deadly year for journalists...The most popular Top 10 Lists of 2006...The Top Ten most discussed articles of the year...The ten most outrageous civil liberties violations of 2006...