I was at the Occupy LA raid last night until 2am. I talked to Sam Seder this morning about the night.

Wow, it's like they have something to hide...

Yesterday, at a conference in New Orleans, two ThinkProgress reporters were attacked by security guards for no apparent reason. Reporters Scott Keyes and Lee Fang were at the Marriott Hotel for the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) annual meeting, an event that brings together state lawmakers with corporate lobbyists to draft “model” legislation.

While [Keyes and Fang] stood by the second floor lobby of the conference hotel, security guards surrounded [them], demanding that [they] leave. As we were leaving, [the guards] approached [Keyes and Fang], violently pushed [them] and twisted [their] arms. A guard approached Fang from behind, tackling him and later bending his arm to take his camera. Keyes, faced similar treatment: two security guards roughed him up on the escalator, taking his video camera, and cutting Keyes’ hand as he attempted to leave the premises. As Keyes asked why he was being forced to leave, he was shoved from the back. Asked why they were being so belligerent, the security guards said they were acting on instructions from ALEC.

I tend to stay away from shadow government conspiracy theories, but this truly is a shadow organization--accountable to no one and with no need or desire for transparency--that is writing legislation that affects all of us throughout the country. And now, they're roughing up reporters who get too close? New world order, indeed.

Paul Newman, 1925 - 2008 RIP

["Plastic Jesus" written by Ed Rush and George Cromarty, and sung by Paul Newman in "Cool Hand Luke." h/t Driftglass.]

Ned Lamont pays tribute to Paul Newman

As I was trying to get from one end of Denver's airport to this past Friday after United Airlines screwed up my flight completely, I literally bumped into Michael Steele with coffee in my hand walking to the gate. The news of the Palin VP pick was just announced on TV and I asked him if he was voting for Obama now. He said, "No way." I yelled that McCain just lost the experience argument that he's been trying to use on Obama.

He picked up his walking pace as I continued.

"She's got plenty of experience," he said.

"And it was a move to try and win over some fictitious Hillary voters and appease the religious right, but one problem was that nobody knows who she is."

"Everyone knows her," he said.

"Really? In what way?" I asked. "Do you even know who she is?"

He then ran away...

To follow up on my Rick Warren post---here's a quick story. I actually did meet a member of his church once.

When I was flying to DC in 2006 for the CNN blogger bash, I was sitting next to a guy who kinda looked like Kinky Friedman. As we waited for the flight to take off from LAX---he already was on his second cocktail. After we took off, he asked me what I did for a living and I said I was a liberal political blogger. He smiled and proclaimed that he was a Christian Conservative and then we both started laughing.

After a while he told me about this great church he was a member of and the leader was this really cool guy named Rick Warren. He loved it so much. I told him that I heard of it and I asked him if Rick would frown on his drinking so much and he said "no way.""Grapes, my man, grapes."

I can't remember a time when he didn't have a drink in his hand during the entire five hour flight and by the end he was so drunk that as we were getting ready to land he stood up in the aisle and told all the passengers what a cool bleeding heart liberal I was. "You gotta come to the church with me, " he said as we were leaving. I said, "Sure, just give me your card.

Wow. Just wow.

KOCO 5 (Oklahoma City):

An Oklahoma church canceled a controversial gun giveaway for teenagers at a weekend youth conference.

Windsor Hills Baptist had planned to give away a semiautomatic assault rifle until one of the event's organizers was unable to attend.

The church's youth pastor, Bob Ross, said it's a way of trying to encourage young people to attend the event. The church expected hundreds of teenagers from as far away as Canada.

"We have 21 hours of preaching and teaching throughout the week," Ross said.[..]

"I don't want people thinking ‘My goodness, we're putting a weapon in the hand of somebody that doesn't respect it who are then going to go out and kill,'" said Ross. "That's not at all what we're trying to do."

Ross said the conference isn't all about guns, but rather about teens finding faith.

What Would Jesus Do? Give a semi-automatic weapon to a teenager, naturally. Makes perfect sense to me. (/sarcasm)

The Atlantic's Mark Ambinder has the scoop:

Michigan’s 156 delegates would be split 50-50 between Clinton and Obama.

–Florida’s existing delegates would be seated at the Denver convention—but with half a vote each. That would give Clinton a net gain of about 19 elected delegates.

– The two states’ superdelegates would then be able to vote in Denver, likely netting Clinton a few more delegates.

Given the slew of bad and costly remedies floated so far, this actually doesn't sound like a bad way to quickly save untold millions and seat the two states' delegates. On the one hand we don't want to essentially disenfranchise these voters, but on the other, the rules are the rules. We don't need to start the post-Bush era of America by breaking the rules.

Howard Dean needs to start cracking skulls and make this right.

h/t Batocchio. Some of us are talking about carrying a pocket full of flag pins so when we hear that stupid talking point, we can hand one over with the line, "Gee, I see you don't have one. Here. Now you look just like Larry Craig's mugshot."

Via Wonkette: (h/t BillW)

It’s that time of year again, and the Hill is looking for 2008’s crop of ambitious, savvy whippersnappers to make up its corps of summer interns! They’ll get to organize back room deals and schmooze with the fat cats, but mostly, they’ll learn that running America isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. And if you’re a summer intern for Idaho Sen. Larry Craig, who knows what else you’ll be forced to do?

Our good senior senator from Idaho is an important man in Washington and wields power that reverberates nationwide. Just ask the salmon of Idaho River — they know what’s up. So what are the massive qualifications a young sprite needs to work for such a man? Read on...

I am curious to know what kind of response the Senator gets. I have to hand it to Craig, he stuck it out and has been an entertaining burr in the GOP saddle, but somehow I don't see many Republicans lining up to have their kids work for him. Stranger things have happened...

Mock Paper Scissors: Tengrain Presents...Economic Stimulation!

Jesus' General: From Swiftboating to Pork Shot Hand Ointment.

No More Mister Nice Blog: Fred Thompson is convinced that Mike Huckabee is too liberal to be President. Did you get that?

One Po'd Veteran: Just a few stats from the war....Just a few. Stats. From the war....

The staff of the Mighty Corrente Building is having a fundraiser to cover their server costs. Help out if you can...

Mike is back tomorrow send tips to finnsagain AT aol...