Seriously, I wrote about Rick Scott's swiftboating, lying ways way back in May. Back then I told you about how even if Florida voters overlooked his swiftboaty tactics, they should not and could not overlook his lying, criminal conduct with regard to Columbia/HCA.

Yet, they did. It boggles the mind. Of course, Scott did what he always does, and lied through his teeth about how that whole debacle came to pass and his own involvement in it. Forget that he used some legal maneuvers and plea agreements to end the mess. He was, in his mind anyway, above it all.

Rick Scott has always used this one excuse: "If I had known about the fraud, I would have stopped it." Baloney, and the St. Petersburg Times agrees.

But he was cautioned year after year that the financial incentives Columbia/HCA offered doctors could run afoul of a federal antikickback law that seeks to limit conflicts of interest in Medicare and Medicaid.

They were contained in the company's annual public reports to stockholders that Scott, now the Republican candidate for Florida governor, signed as Columbia/HCA's president and chief executive officer.

Scott's response?

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Crazy Sheriff Joe Arpaio -- who is currently under investigation by the Justice Department for his wanton racial profiling as the chief law-enforcement officer in Maricopa County, Arizona -- was on Neil Cavuto's Fox News program yesterday to talk about the swine flu outbreak and how it's being caused by illegal immigrants. (For some reason, Cavuto didn't bother to mention the DOJ investigation.)

Cavuto: Should we close the border. There are many folks who say, Enough is enough, let's close the border.

Arpaio: Well, I'll tell you one thing right now, we should be stopping and inspecting and searching every vehicle coming across that border. Washington is not talking about all the illegal immigrants coming into our country, they're talking about checking at the airports and at the ports. Why are they not talking about all the illegals that circumvent that area coming into the United States?

[snip]

Arpaio: I'm going to say it again: My deputies arrested 900 human smugglers. Guess what? Ninety percent have come through the Mexico bordering states into our country. It takes seven days to come from Mexico City to our county -- seven days' incubation period. We have 28,000 people we checked into jails. We have TB, we have chicken pox, and a majority have come from south of the border. So we have a problem with this illegal immigration.

Cavuto: So if you're right, and this disease takes awhile to incubate and show itself, you could have many, many more cases than are being reported now.

Arpaio: Yeah, but once again, I'm saying, I'm not just blaming illegal immigration. I'm concerned Washington is not talkin' about it! Why don't they talk about all those that evade the checkpoint? Someone should be checking them out!

Cavuto: And you don't think we're doing enough of that.

Arpaio: Nobody's talkin' about it! Nobody's bringing up the illegal immigration and all those hundreds of thousands who sneak into our country that could be diseased.

Yeah, nobody's talking about it -- except every right-wing nutcase on the planet!

Media Matters has much more, plus a video:

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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...

Paul Krugman on the media:

"Why do the McCain people think they can get away with this stuff?" This stuff being deception. "Well, they're probably counting on the common practice in the news media of being 'balanced' at all costs. If a politician says that black is white, the news report doesn't say that he's wrong, it reports that 'some Democrats say' that he's wrong. Or a grotesque line from one side is paired with a trivial misstatement from the other, conveying the impression that both sides are equally dirty."

They're probably also counting on the prevalence of horse-race reporting, so that instead of the story being "McCain campaign lies," it becomes "Obama on defensive in face of attacks."

Need I say more?

Want proof that last week's nonsense on Hurricane Gustav was all political posturing?

Why is McCain not in Texas playing President this time around?

Reports indicate 2.9 million without power. Wholesale gas at $4.65 a gallon on refinery damage fears. Thousands flooded out.

Our best wishes and good thoughts to those affected by the storm...including those in Cuba. There should be no restrictions in offering help to a storm-ravaged area.

Barack Obama canceled his SNL appearance in response to the hurricane, and indicated he would not travel to the area in order to avoid interferring with relief efforts, just as he did with Gustav.

just sayin'...

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We've talked about China on this blog so you know where we stand on the issues there. But I love sports and I did actually watch some of the Olympics over the weekend. I haven't checked them out in many years, but I was interested in seeing Phelps swim this time around. Apparently---America was glued to their sets for this one.

NBC Universal's Olympics coverage is drawing huge audiences, helped by the extravagant opening ceremony and swimming star Michael Phelps, and setting the stage for what could be record TV ratings for the Games. NBC Universal said the first two days of the Beijing Olympics drew an average audience of 29.1 million, making it the most highly rated broadcast of the Summer Games held outside the United States since 1976.

In total, 114 million viewers tuned in for at least part of its broadcast in the first two days, about 20 million more than the 2004 games in Athens, NBC said, citing figures from Nielsen Media Research.

I was shocked it received these ratings. Watching Bush sit next to Putin while the invasion of Georgia was happening was pretty pathetic, even for him.

Thx Driftglass for the image.

CNN:

Water with trace amounts of radioactivity may have been leaking for months from a U.S. Navy nuclear-powered submarine as it traveled around the Pacific to ports in Guam, Japan and Hawaii, Navy officials told CNN Friday.

The leak was found on the USS Houston, a Los Angeles class fast attack submarine, after it came to Hawaii for routine maintenance last month, Navy officials said.

Navy officials believe the amount of radiation leaked was virtually undetectable. But the Navy alerted the Japanese government because the submarine had been docked in Japan.

I'm sure it's no big deal. Pay no attention to that three-eyed fish, that's what they're supposed to look like.

When asked how many lobbyists work at the McCain campaign, Rick Davis told Katie Couric: "we don't make it a litmus test for employment at the McCain campaign." But in May, after a series of reports about McCain's campaign being run by lobbyists, Davis wrote a memo outlining a new campaign policy that said: "No person working for the Campaign may be a registered lobbyist or foreign agent, or receive compensation for any such activity." (h/t Sam)

Confused yet?

TPM has more....

Never Make Your Move Too Soon from the album of the same name (h/t miss kitty)

More Ernestine Anderson here, here and here.

EURweb:

Jazz vocalist Ernestine Anderson, who once worked with Quincy Jones and Ray Charles, is facing foreclosure on her home in Seattle after falling behind more than $30,000 in payments and penalties, public records show.

Family and friends of the singer are pleading for $45,000 in donations to save her Central District home, reports the Associated Press.

James Kelly, president of the Urban League of Seattle, said counselors will try to find out how Anderson got a loan that now asks for a monthly payment of $5,000. Gayton said Anderson's monthly income is $1,000 from Social Security, and at her age of 79, her performances are limited

Ms. Anderson has only until June 30 to come up with a payment or lose her home. An account has been set up at Bank of America. Donations can be made at any branch to The Ernestine Anderson Fund.

Today is World Refugee Day. Yesterday the House passed an Iraq Supplemental with no deadlines for withdrawal and with funding for the occupation into next year.

Every day in Iraq, the Iraqi Red Crescent workers put their lives on the line to bring food, water, and medical care to their fellow Iraqis. Scores of these humanitarian workers have been kidnapped, murdered and harassed by death squads. Reports of raids on Red Crescent offices by our forces are frequent. Yet they keep on working – doing all they can to bring relief to internally displaced Iraqis and to their neighbors across Iraq. IRC is the only organization still bringing such aid to every region of Iraq and across all sectarian lines.

A number of us thought today was a very good day to flood the IRC with donations – and even if you can only donate a little, they will put every bit to work. This is one small way we can show our opposition to the occupation and our concern for the devastation our country is causing the Iraqi people.

To send a donation, click here and select “Iraq Humanitarian Response” in the “I want my contribution to go here” box. 100% of your donation will go directly to assisting Iraq Red Crescent’s work. Here's what your donation will buy:

Every 15 days, Iraqi Red Crescent networks deliver food rations that include flour, rice, sugar, vegetable oil, tomato paste, salt, jam, spaghetti, lentils, tea, sardines, and cheese. The $33.50 USD cost per family ration covers the expense of the food, distribution, transport and security. (These rations are delivered to 200,000 families.)

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