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I'll bet the sweet ladies of the Spring Mountain Republican Women's club in Nevada weren't really prepared for this.

Speaking before several GOP women's groups who invited him to Las Vegas, Donald Trump launched into a profanity-laced tirade against President Obama and his administration's policies.

Among the bons mots, as you can hear in the amateur video above [originals here]:

-- Trump would deal with OPEC in order to lower oil prices just by being tough: "We have nobody in Washington that sits back and said, you're not going to raise that f—-ing price,"

-- Here's how he'd tell China he intends to slap a tariff on their exports: "Listen you mother——ers we're going to tax you 25 percent!"

He sprinkled obscenities throughout, including one not in the video, describing Iraq: "We build a school, we build a road, they blow up the school, we build another school, we build another road they blow them up, we build again, in the meantime we can't get a f---king school in Brooklyn."

Oh, and apparently he believes that the idea that Iraq could become a democracy is a joke. Which makes you wonder about his audience of former George W. Bush devotees -- especially when they applaud this loudly.

Now, I understand that, you know, when in Rome, blah blah blah. But you gotta wonder if Franklin Graham or the rest of the Religious Right still think Trump is a good horse to be backing, you know what I mean? Not to mention the Spring Mountain Republican Women's Club.

Conservatives like Malkin will go to the ends of the earth to blame brown people for all the problems in the world.

It's no coincidence that most of the areas hardest hit by the foreclosure wave - Loudoun County, Va., California's Inland Empire, Stockton and San Joaquin Valley, and Las Vegas and Phoenix, for starters - also happen to be some of the nation's largest illegal-alien sanctuaries. Half of the mortgages to Hispanics are subprime (the accursed species of loan to borrowers with the shadiest credit histories). A quarter of all those subprime loans are in default and foreclosure.

Regional reports across the country have decried the subprime meltdown's impact on illegal-immigrant "victims." A July report showed that in seven of the ten metro areas with the highest foreclosure rates, Hispanics represented at least one third of the population; in two of those areas - Merced and Salinas-Monterey, Calif. - Hispanics comprised half the population. The amnesty-promoting National Council of La Raza and its Development Fund have received millions in federal funds to "counsel" their constituents on obtaining mortgages with little to no money down; the group almost succeeded in attaching a $10-million earmark for itself in one of the housing bills past this spring...read on

The National Review should be ashamed to print this garbage, but we all know their history on racial issues. This is why Latino voters need to turn out in huge numbers this November.

I'd say more, but Digby spells it out for Michelle.

I guess Malkin has never heard of something called "No Doc" loans which mean No Income, No Asset, No employment Verification. It's got nothing to do with immigration.

And, like most racists, she forgets herself from time to time and forgets to distinguish between illegal immigrants and Mexican Americans. It makes no difference to her, of course, but they are usually a bit more scrupulous in their obfuscation.

The idea that the trillion dollar credit crunch was caused by illegal immigrants is so ludicrous that I can't stop laughing.....This meme is absurd, but it's the only way the conservatives can explain things within their world view. And there's nothing new here. The historical American resistance to government action is historically tied to a reluctance give money to people of color...

Tim Rutten via Los Angeles Times

"What goes around comes around" sometimes is an accurate description of human affairs, but for anyone with a decent sense of their own fallibility, it's seldom a comforting one.

That's one reason it's as hard to gloat over Bill O'Reilly's problems as it was over the fall not so long ago of that other merchant of virtue, William J. Bennett. For all their commandeering of the public stage, for all their incessant scolding over the purported absence of virtue from our communal life, there is something joyless, lonely — andd rather sad —about their private conduct.

Once they wwere, the pair of them, as big a brace of bullies as ever bestrode the electronic pulpit. Nowadays, when Bennett shows up at all, it's as a kind of booker's afterthought on some third-tier chat show. But not so many years ago he was the right wing's hulking point man in the culture wars. It was virtually impossible to flip the channels without encountering Bennett — the one-time philosophy professor turned Republican activist — wearily stringing together snippets of Plato, Aquinas and Burke to make the case that the country was going to hell in a handbasket and it was all the Democrats' fault.

Like O'Reilly he was a great defender of traditional values — the sturdy, good old-fashioned virtues — and ad an unforgiving judge of anyone who offended against them. Both Bennett and O'Reilly, for example, had a field day beating up on Bill Clinton.

"Virtue is a word we need to recover," Bennett rumbled at one interviewer. And, to that end, he made himself a wealthy man as author of "The Book of Virtues" — a compendium of thoughts on traditional stories annd maxims that sold more than 2 million copies — and "The Childreen's Book of Virtues," which even spawned a PBS kids' show.

Some in the GOP spoke of him as a potential presidential candidate, and he collected $50,000 a pop for speaking engagements in which he gravely reminded his audiences that we "need to set definite boundaries on our appetites."

All that, you will recall, came to a halt when Newsweek and the Washington Monthly reported that Bennett was a compulsive gambler who had lost $8 million over the previous decade at casinos in Las Vegas and Atlantic City. There was not then, nor is there now, any evidence that the former federal drug czar's avocation had led him to neglect his family or stiff his creditors, but it's a little hard to peddle moderation when you're dropping $500,000 a weekend at the Bellagio.

O'Reilly, meanwhile, was hit recently with a suit alleging that he sexually harassed a 33-year-old producer of his show just as he embarked on a publicity tour to promote his latest book, "The O'Reilly Factor for Kids," modestly described on its dust jacket as "a code of ethics by which to live." The book contains advice on dealing with friends, bullies (they're losers), money, smoking, alcohol (he doesn't drink), drugs, TV and sex — among other things. There's even a prim admonition to girls against dressing in a fashion that suggests they are "sexually available" and a helpful hint to young men that crisp white shirts are irresistibly sexy.

There are your traditional values for you. More

On Friday, Nevada MoveOn members got this action alert:

Last night, Sen. Harry Reid gave George W. Bush a blank check for endless war in Iraq--supporting the same bill that just days earlier Reid called "weak tea."

Reid needs to know we're disappointed--we expect stronger leadership from him, not weakness.
Can you send Harry Reid a bag of "weak tea" and a letter telling him your opinion of last night's vote?

And MoveOn members came through...and better yet, it did not escape the notice of the media:

WaPo: Activists declared they would remain focused on Republicans but would hold Democrats accountable. Television advertisements, financed by an antiwar coalition, will target Sens. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), both up for reelection next year. And MoveOn organizers said Democrats also are likely to see skirmishes in their districts. MoveOn asked its members Friday to send Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.) protest letters in the form of tea bags, reminders that he had called the Iraq bill "weak tea" before he voted for it.

"This is not partisan anymore. This is not about staying away from Democrats to make them look good or attacking all Republicans to make them look bad," said Susan Shaer, co-chairman of the Win Without War coalition. "We don't care who you are or whether we usually like you. This vote was wrong."

Similar coverage at CNN, LA Times Wire, Politico, and the Las Vegas Sun. These are the kind of progressive actions we need to escalate to make sure we pierce the bubble surrounding the "inside-the-Beltway" crowd. I've put a few emails out to the offices of some representatives and I promise you that they are stung by the backlash. Let's make sure they remember that.

Media Matters:

Time reported that Democrats "got an unwelcome distraction this week when Senate minority leader Harry Reid ... found himself embroiled in a real estate scandal," but the magazine has ignored reports from June that House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert made almost $2 million on the sale of land in Illinois after reportedly taking an active role in the inclusion in a transportation spending bill of an earmark for a highway project near the property. Read on...

UPDATE: Chicago Trib: Reid's Raw (Land) Deal

The tempest that's been created over Sen. Harry Reid's Las Vegas real-estate transaction puts me in mind of the famous poet's famous line "There is no there, there."

Las Vegas Sun:

"The 60-second spot says in Spanish that Reid "blocked our leaders from working together" and blames Democrats for legislation that passed the Republican-controlled House that would make illegal immigrants subject to felony charges. "Reid's Democrat allies voted to treat millions of hardworking immigrants as felons," the ad says, "while President Bush and Republican leaders work for legislation that will protect our borders and honor our immigrants."

It was Sensenbrenner's House bill that would make it a federal crime to live in the United States illegally, and would turn illegal immigrants into felons- so it's just another dishonest ad by Mehlman and Co.

Alabama Senator Hank Erwin: Katrina was God's wrath.

As I mentioned earlier, the wingnuts heads are all exploding with racism and the bible over Katrina. Erwin's statements are a bit more scary because he holds office. When you see Hank you figure Falwell or Robertson, but not a State Senator.

Download | play -WMP low res Bittorrent-WMP Hi res

Download | play -QT Bittorrent-QT

Here's the transcript. Here's an article.

As you know, I'm not against religion or God or spiritual beliefs. I am against idiots like Erwin. The frightening thing is that people like Hank are being elected more and more in our country and our media will not call them out when they sprout nonsense like this. He's all smiling and so taken with his opinions. Why hasn't Las Vegas been hit with something you pompous fool?

Erwin: Well, I think, if you look at what‘s going on, this whole region has always known that, with the church, that New Orleans and the Gulf Coast are known for sin. And if you go to a church and you read your Bible, you are always told avoid sin and that there‘s judgment for sin. And I just think that, in my analysis—and I can‘t speak for everybody, but I believe that, if you look at the factors, that you had a city that was known for sin—the signature of New Orleans is the French Quarter, Bourbon Street. It is known for sin. read the whole transcript"

Scarborough makes a good point in his close when he says:

"All I will say is this. When you look at Matthew 25, and the disciples ask Jesus, how do we get to heaven? That‘s what they were interested in. We want to sit on the right hand of the father. How do we do it? Jesus said, you take care of the poor. You give the thirsty water. When they come to your door and they need food, you give it to them. When they need clothes, give them the clothes off your back and visit them in jail. Basically, help the dispossessed. " That‘s why I just find it hard to square up my vision of God and what Jesus Christ said in the New Testament with what the senator is saying tonight."

Operation Yellow Elephant has made it into the pages of the very French "Las Vegas Sun"

Despite an Internet effort to drum up opposition, several hundred of the nation's most ambitious young Republicans convened Thursday with little controversy. Activists of a loosely organized campaign called "Operation Yellow Elephant" had threatened to protest the Young Republican National Convention at Mandalay Bay this week.

They argue that Young Republicans who support the war in Iraq should enlist in the military, especially given recent lags in recruiting. Their motto: Sign up or shut up.

A delegate from Florida, 27-year-old David Fletcher, said he participates in the Young Republicans because he thinks it's important for young people to get involved in politics. But while Fletcher said he fully supports the war in Iraq, he said he has not enlisted and doesn't have plans to enlist.

When asked why, he said, "I'd rather not answer that question."

Pentagon Creating Student Database

The Defense Department began working yesterday with a private marketing firm to create a database of high school students ages 16 to 18 and all college students to help the military identify potential recruits in a time of dwindling enlistment in some branches. The program is provoking a furor among privacy advocates. The new database will include personal information including birth dates, Social Security numbers, e-mail addresses, grade-point averages, ethnicity and what subjects the students are studying....read on

School systems that fail to provide that information risk losing federal funds, although individual parents or students can withhold information that would be transferred to the military by their districts.

This sounds like Dobson's plan to cut funding against the judges they don't like.

The Pentagon's statements added that anyone can "opt out" of the system by providing detailed personal information that will be kept in a separate "suppression file."

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As long as they get the information, you can opt out? What the hell does that mean? This is like reading some dime store sci-fi novel, but this whole psycho administration's approach to most problems it faces reads the same way. Robert Heinlein, Issac Asimov, take your pick. Find a certain applicant that has the right type of records, the right type of temperament, the right type of ethnicity and manipulate them into enlisting. I can't wait to hear from the winguts on this one. Captain Ed will think up something laughable that Drudge can link to.

After 9/11, the patriotism of this country was off the charts. I knew actors that gave up their careers to enlist. Let me repeat. I knew actors that gave up their careers to enlist. This White House effectively killed off that feeling of wanting to protect our country. For the most part the whole world mourned the tragedy of that day. Now? You have to hand it to George Bush. He's good at something. So good in fact that he has to spy on the new ownership society that he blubbers on about so he can try to fill recruitment quotas.

Notice it doesn't say anything about which high schools they are targeting. Do you think Beverly Hills High will be a prime location? Sounds like they are getting closer to the draft. At least C&L and Jesus General are way ahead of the administration in our pursuit of new recruits. Our allies are on the ground in Las Vegas getting ready to step up Operation Yellow Elephant to the next phase.

Well Operation Yellow Elephant is producing results way past our expectaions. Steve Gilliard has more. AmericaBlog found that Grover Norquist attacked three GOP Senators over at the College Chickenhawks conference: Speaking to the same group a few hours later, party strategist Grover Norquist lambasted three Republicans who broke party ranks over the issue of judicial filibusters. He referred to them as "the two girls from Maine and the nut-job from Arizona" - Sens. Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe and John McCain.

Way to go Grover, he must have read our Special Ops manual.

I have some more Special Ops planned after my encounter with the YRNC that helped to kick off the whole project. DU Top Ten Conservative Idiots of the Week was kind enough to list the project at #9. Check it out for a highlight. I've almost got a radio talk show host commited to go down to Las Vegas and set up shop for the July 6-10 convention. Stay tuned...