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Nicole Wallace wants us to think that the party of no has not been using scorched earth policy and trying to undermine the President at every turn-- even though she worked for the likes of George Bush and the John McCain campaign which brought us that totally non-scorched earth wonder Sarah Palin. You know... the one who said that Barack Obama was "palling around with terrorists".

How could anyone ever get the idea that the Republicans wanted to resort to a "scorched earth" policy after watching that campaign in action?

Of course, that would be asking too much of Anderson Cooper to possibly bring that up to Ms. Wallace, wouldn't it?

And she thinks Bill Frist and Jeb Bush are people "who could end up on the landscape in a presidential landscape down the road".

Really? Jeb-- who's last name is mud since his brother messed up his chances of ever running-- and the cat killer Bill Frist? Bring 'em on Nicole. Bring your good buddy Palin on with them while you're at it if that's the GOP's hope for the next presidential election. I welcome any one of them as the GOP's next nominee.

COOPER: Nicolle, have -- critics of the Republicans say, basically, look, they have a scorched-earth policy going on right now, that they are opposing anything that President Obama supports.

Is that fair?

WALLACE: That's not fair. And it's not true.

I mean, Jeb Bush has been very complimentary of Obama's Education Department secretary so far. Today, he said he was encouraged. Bill Frist was on, you know, as a very credible voice, as a doctor, talking about the need for health care reform. John McCain is -- is a statesman's statesman. And he is providing a lot of leadership and I think productive and constructive ideas...

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: But you're kind of clutching at straws. I mean, Jeb Bush and Bill Frist?

(LAUGHTER)

WALLACE: These aren't straws. These are certainly people that...

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Bill Frist is like, you know...

(LAUGHTER)

WALLACE: But these are people who could end up on the landscape in a presidential landscape down the road.

So, I think when you -- you look at Washington, sure, you look at House members. But when you look at the American public at large, you know, not all of what happens in Washington breaks through.

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When the GOP trotted out the hapless Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA) to deliver the response to President Obama, the former cardiologist became just the latest Republican physician deployed to halt health care reform. As it turns out, the repentant Birther was an unfortunate choice to carry the GOP banner of tort reform, given his own history of malpractice suits. Of course, as his colleagues Tom Price, Tom Coburn and Bill Frist all show, when it comes to the politics of health care, Boustany isn't the only Republican doctor offering Americans the wrong diagnosis and bad prescriptions.

Georgia's Tom Price, a one-time orthopedic surgeon and current chairman of the Republican Study Committee, is a case in point. While the GOP tried to block the passage of Medicare in the 1960's and tried to slash its budget by 15% in the 1990's, today's Republicans pretend to be the defenders of the system Newt Gingrich famously said they hoped to see "wither on the vine." But in a July op-ed, Dr. Price reminded America's seniors why it is Republicans and not President Obama they should fear when it comes to Medicare:

Going down the path of more government will only compound the problem. While the stated goal remains noble, as a physician, I can attest that nothing has had a greater negative effect on the delivery of health care than the federal government's intrusion into medicine through Medicare.

Then there's Oklahoma Senator and unexpected Obama confidante Tom Coburn. As a Senate candidate in 2004, Dr. Coburn famously warned that "lesbianism is so rampant in some of the schools in southeast Oklahoma that they'll only let one girl go to the bathroom." Upon his arrival in the Senate, the former obstetrician was elevated to the Judiciary Committee despite having advocated the death penalty for doctors who perform abortions. More recently, Coburn the C Street marriage counselor to John Ensign and Mark Sanford turned Deather:

In an interview with KOTV, Coburn said that he disagreed with Obama's dismissal of fears that reform will "pull the plug on grandma."

Coburn said that he'd offered three amendments seeking an "absolute prohibition" on rationing care based on effectiveness research.

"Why would you not want an absolute prohibition? Because you ultimately plan to ration care," Coburn said. "Their plan is to control costs by limiting options."

Last but certainly not least is former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist.

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Here's a blast from the past from the incredible video archives of C&L that's relevant to today. On Dec, 10th, 2004, The former Republican Majority leader was exposed as being a crook and a liar and when it comes to getting what they want, these supposedly religious folks will lie to get their way. Ex-Senator Bill Frist embodies the typical pro-life movement conservative. The face they try to hide from the world is that they want to control they way people have sex. If they were truly worried about unwanted pregnancies they would embrace contraception. Just ask Tim Ryan about their beliefs. Just listen to Frist's lies about condoms and HIV. It's quite stunning. At the time the conservatives were in charge and the media hid in the little holes, too afraid to report on what they really are.

SENATOR BILL FRIST: That's right. Only surefire. Very hard culturally in lots of approaches. Being faithful. Again, one partner and in certain cultures that is very hard and, then third, condoms. If you take out just condoms and say that is the answer with the 15 percent failure rate with a highly infective virus through sexual relations ...

That's a lie. And then he goes on to lie some more.

...that are funded by the Federal government, the funding has doubled over the last four years but there was a report by the minority staff at the House Government Affairs Committee that showed that 11 of 13 of these programs are giving out false information. I want to show some of the claims they identified in the curricula. One of them was, one of the programs taught that "The actual ability of condoms to prevent the transmission of HIV/AIDS, even if the product is intact, is not definitively known." Another, "The popular claim that condoms help prevent the spread of STDs is not supported by the data." A third suggested that tears and sweat could transmit HIV and AIDS. Now, you're a doctor. Do you believe that tears and sweat can transmit HIV?

SENATOR BILL FRIST

I don't know. I can tell you ...

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS

(Off Camera) You don't know?

SENATOR BILL FRIST

I can tell you things like, like ...

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS

(Off Camera) Well, wait, let me stop you, you don't know that, you believe that tears and sweat might be able to transmit AIDS?

SENATOR BILL FRIST

Yeah, no, I can tell you that HIV is not very transmissible as an element like, compared to smallpox, compared to the flu.

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CNN obtained video of Michael Jackson and his dancers rehearsing in LA at the Staples Center for his London residency on June 23rd, a mere two days before his death. It's mesmerizing and haunting, to say the lest.

I'm about to pull a Bill Frist, and it may be the energy of "They Don't Care About Us", one of his best songs, but as Consequence of Sound noted, this does add a degree of credibility to the idea that there was reason to believe he was in good health shortly before his passing.

Republicans have been known, from time to time, to use the politics of fear to get ahead. That, of course, includes scaring the bejeezus out of their own rank-and-file supporters, in order to get them to open their checkbooks.

But former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) seems to have laid it on pretty thick in his latest email missive on behalf of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, sent this week. The subject line read, “Democrats Win Landslide Victory.”

I have a real fear of waking up to this headline after the elections this fall. Make no mistake about it: If our grassroots teams fail to come together and work as hard as they did in 2000, 2002 and 2004, that headline could very likely be the result!

In key states, news accounts indicate Democrats are outpacing Republicans registering voters. We also know Barack Obama’s campaign is utilizing the Internet to raise record amounts of money to support his campaign and Democrats nationally ... all in the hope that new voters and record resources will produce a Democrat landslide victory this fall.

There’s so much at risk, and conservatives I talk with from all across the country are feeling the rumblings of “what could be.”

Now, I’m obviously not the target audience of Frist’s message, but if I were a DSCC donor, and Chuck Schumer sent me an email about John McCain doing a great job registering voters, raising money, and rallying legions of supporters, all of which points to a Republican “landslide,” I might feel a little discouraged.

The New Yorker’s Hendrick Hertzberg offered some psychoanalytic observations about the email’s author.

Download | play Download | play

It's no secret that Chris Matthews has a mancrush on Senator John McCain, but I think he needs to take a step back and look at reality -- stat. During his Power Rankings on Monday's Hardball, Matthews contends that because John McCain is expected to do well on Super Tuesday and is likely to be considered his party's nominee for President, and has Rudy Giuliani stumping for him, he will LOOK presidential, therefore, he has the best shot to win the White House in '08.

So because McCain LOOKS presidential, tens of millions of Democrats will suddenly go brain dead and vote for a man who is running on a platform that runs counter to what they believe in and put another warmongering, anti-choice Republican who is despised by the base of his own party in the White House for another four years.

I put together a little mashup of the segment because by and large, there was little to be found outside the ordinary -- what is outside the ordinary (and logical thought) is Tweety and Howard Fineman somehow trying to make people believe that McCain already looks like the presumptive Commander In Chief and that both Obama and Clinton will have a hard time competing against him. Fineman actually brings up the Bay of Pigs...

  Scripps (h/t NonnyMouse):

Former Senate Republican leader Bill Frist of Tennessee, is keeping low key about his vindication in two federal probes over the timing of his 2005 sales of all his family's stock in HCA Inc.

When the 19-month-long probes ended with no charges, Frist simply issued a brief written statement to the news media Friday saying he was "pleased" that the findings echoed what "I've said throughout this matter ... (that) I acted properly."

Frist disclosed that he had been notified by both the Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. attorney for the southern district of New York that they concluded their inquiries and are taking no action. Neither office disputed his report.

With what we're now learning about US Attorney directives coming from the executive offices, can anyone truly believe with 100% certainty that there was no partisanship involved?

MarketWatch:

Outgoing Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist took himself out of the running Wednesday for the nation's top political prize, announcing that he won't seek the Republican nomination for president in 2008.

"In the Bible, God tells us for everything there is a season, and for me, for now, this season of being an elected official has come to a close. I do not intend to run for president in 2008," Frist said in a written statement.

[..]Frist said that after 12 years in the Senate, he and his wife, Karyn, were prepared to take a "sabbatical from public life."

"At this point a return to private life will allow me to return to my professional roots as a healer and to refocus my creative energies on innovative solutions to seemingly insurmountable challenges Americans face," Frist said.  Read on...  

There are some very disappointed comedians and scared transplant patients at this news. 

Yesterday on Face the Nation, Bill Frist outlined his fears of a Democratic take over in Senate. Besides the fear that he might have to pay more taxes on his fortune, he also said he was scared of no more "common-sense judges" being confirmed by Senate.

Video - WMV  Video - QT

It has been awhile since we have heard the old "common-sense judges" rhetoric thrown around. Perhaps in part because of this:

"We need common sense judges who understand that our rights are derived from God. Those are the kind of judges I intend to put on the bench."

That is a line used by President Bush himself last year, a line which quickly drew some criticism (and rightfully so).

This is part of the larger agenda by the radical-right to remove the judicial restraint that has protected our country for years. When you consider how much more religion is thrown into the political arena, our last hope is the judicial branch to decipher the differences between religion and law. This is also something that Sandra Day O'Connor addressed this past weekend:

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Like habeas corpus last week, Keith eulogized the death of "stay the course" last night by taking a look back at all the good times we've had together. From Reagan, Bush 41 and Dana Carvey to Bill Frist, Joe Lieberman and Bush 43, Keith takes us on a stroll down memory lane to pay tribute to the passing of one of our (least) favorite mainstay rhetorical strategies.

Video WMP  |  Video MOV 

You knew Holy Joe had to be in there somewhere amongst the sea of Republicans...

You couldn't make this stuff up.

Dkos:

Bill Frist has just put the final stake in the heart of the myth of Republican toughness on national security.

U.S. Senate majority leader calls for efforts to bring Taliban into Afghan government

Huh? No, really. Huh?

QALAT, Afghanistan U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Monday that the Afghan guerrilla war can never be won militarily and called for efforts to bring the Taliban and their supporters into the Afghan government.

The Tennessee Republican said he had learned from briefings that Taliban fighters were too numerous and had too much popular support to be defeated by military means.

"You need to bring them into a more transparent type of government," Frist said during a brief visit to a U.S. and Romanian military base in the southern Taliban stronghold of Qalat. "And if that's accomplished we'll be successful."Talk about the soft bigotry of low expectations.

What about Mel Martinez, who was also on the trip?

Sen. Mel Martinez, a Republican from Florida accompanying Frist, said negotiating with the Taliban was not "out of the question" but that fighters who refused to join the political process would have to be defeated.

"A political solution is how it's all going to be solved," he said.

Sadly, it bears repeating: Taliban = Al Qaeda. They are joined economically, ideologically, and operationally at the hip.

Republicans everywhere are having their heads explode. Read on...

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 Bill Frist is now using the Republican trick of saying that he can't tell you what's in or not regarding torture because the enemy will then train for it. If it has already been reported that we've used waterboarding before then aren't the terrorists already engaged in waterboarding school? He also didn't make much sense  through the rest of the interview. Why does he bother going on with GS?

Video-WMP Video-QT

George hit him with a little history about waterboarding. Frist probably never knew that we prosecuted the Japanese for waterboarding American soldiers and his answer reflects that simple mindedness, 

Mike L: He's the Senate leader and he hasn't read the status report on Iraq? This really is hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. He refuses to give his opinion on whether or not waterboarding is torture because it might help the enemy. Like Jon Stewart says, we don't want them growing gills, right? This Republican Congress is really a disgrace. He even blames the Democrats for obstructing all critical legislation. These people really have no souls.

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Lucie picked this up from Frist's blog:

With all the information available about all the hateful efforts of the terrorists to strike America since the late 1980s -- easily available by one click on the Internet -- let's simmer down on the censorship calls and honor the memory of 9/11 by letting people see ABC's The Path to 9/11 and draw their own conclusions about the Islamofascist war against America.

There goes First again mouthing off about how we view things. I mean he is the only doctor that can diagnose people off of video tapes so maybe he has a point.

The Times UK Online:

Washington hit by curse of the kid bloggers

As the leader of the Republican party in the US Senate and a possible presidential candidate, Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee has a reputation for sober rectitude. The same cannot be said of his son Jonathan, a Vanderbilt University student who recently appeared on the internet wearing six cans of beer strapped to his belt .

Nor has Jonathan's brother Bryan done much to help his father's attempts to strike a reasonable note about US involvement in Iraq. "I was born an American by God's amazing grace," wrote Bryan Frist in an online profile. "Let's bomb some people."  

But it gets better...

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Bill Frist was on Hannity and Colmes last night to give his insight into the mid-term elections.

"We're for tax cuts. They're for tax hikes. We're for staying the course in Iraq and the War on Terror. They're for cutting and running"

So Frist reaffirms the Republicans'  position of "staying the course in Iraq", while flat out lying by saying the Democrats want to "cut and run" from the War on Terror.

Video - WMV  Video - QT

The best part comes at the end of the interview when Hannity gives his little commentary on the Lieberman/Lamont race:

"Republicans don't go try and torture someone who has different points of view like Senator Lieberman".

Of course, we all know who Hannity stands behind in the Connecticut primary.