New York Magazine writer Rebecca Traister says that the media and the politicians do not yet understand the historical significance of the women's marches.

Courtesy of Crooks and Liars:  

New York Magazine writer Rebecca Traister, in a discussion with Chris Hayes and organizer Linda Sarsour, asked why the women's marches got so little media coverage. 

"What do you want me to tell the crazy women talking about justice? They ignored us again but they will not ignore us at the ballot box," Sarsour said. 

"This is right. This is symptomatic, the marches and the activism is not taken seriously. Why?" Traister asked. 

"They are women's marches. We know last year single biggest one-day demonstration in this country's history, we heard how afterwards, it was okay but just a march, it's performance, fun, people get together and wear their cute hats, whatever. No one seems to have connected, still, a year later when there is a spontaneous demonstration almost the same size in some places like Chicago, bigger, without a centralized organization drawing everybody. 

"I didn't know about the marches," she said. "I write about women and politics. I didn't know there would be women's marches until January and they were massive. They don't just have cute marches with the hats with the fact it's women clogging congressional phone lines and doing town halls, who have been organizing on the grassroots activist level around state and local office races around the country who have been winning in New Jersey, in Virginia and who are running in unprecedented numbers for the House, for the Senate and primarying Democrats from the left. 

"And apparently, the media's failure to take this seriously as a political movement and not as some social weekend thing that women do once a year, has led Senate Democrats to think it's not a serious political movement," she said.

I have been saying for awhile that women are changing things, and that the #MeToo movement and these female driven rallies are going to be significant.

But I have to admit that even I may not have recognized just how important of this will be to the future of this nation.

Women have clearly found their voice, and they are no longer asking men for permission to join the conversation. They are already having a conversation to which men better pay attention.

Petty Donald Trump makes Romney niece change name in order to get work.

Courtesy of WaPo:

Before Ronna Romney McDaniel took over as Republican National Committee chairwoman earlier this year, President Trump had a request: Would she be willing to stop using her middle name publicly? 

Trump followed up by saying in a lighthearted way that McDaniel, the niece of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, could do what she wanted, according to two people familiar with the comments. But the change was soon plain for all to see. Though she had used her maiden name for years in Michigan, where her grandfather George W. Romney had been governor, McDaniel dropped “Romney” from most official party communications and has rarely used it since. 

The moment offers a window on Trump’s complicated and often tense relationship with the 2012 Republican presidential nominee, who has remained a frequent critic of the president and is considering a Senate campaign next year in Utah. The pair’s history stretches from Romney’s pained courtship of Trump’s endorsement in 2012 to Trump’s searing criticism of Romney in 2016, when he called his predecessor a “stone cold loser” who blew an easy chance to beat then-President Barack Obama. 

Those tensions were on display again this week, when White House aides scripted a trip to Utah with a single political goal in mind: to convince Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) to run for reelection and thwart Romney from mounting his own bid for the seat, according to a senior White House official involved in the preparations.

This guy simply never drops a grudge.

That's why he is still obsessed with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Hell I think his entire campaign was inspired by his desire to get back at then President Obama over those jokes he made during that 2011 White House Correspondents' Dinner.

And as for this suggesting to Romney McDaniel to change her name being "lighthearted," it was not lighthearted, it was a thinly veiled threat.

It was just like the "lighthearted" thinly veiled threat that he issued to James Comey about dropping the Flynn investigation.

Comey's refusal to comply cost him his job, should we actually believe that McDaniel would have this job if she did not knuckle under?

By the way have you noticed how Trump likes to surround himself with the female relatives of his vanquished foes?

I'm almost surprised that he has not offered Chelsea Clinton a job.

Oh that's right, she is far too intelligent to allow him to marginalize her and make her act like a brainless sycophant.

Conservative media has now launched an all out attack on Robert Mueller in order to undermine his investigation.

(Sorry for the abrupt ending, it was the only version I could find.)

Courtesy of CNN: 

What's President Trump hearing when he watches Fox News? 

He's hearing that special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation is "illegitimate and corrupt." That it's led by a "band of merry Trump-haters" who are trying to reverse the results of the election. And that it must be stopped. 

He's also hearing that the FBI is becoming "America's secret police," akin to the KGB in Russia, full of "sickness" and "corruption." 

These are all actual quotes from some of the president's favorite pro-Trump talk shows. 

The overarching message from "Fox & Friends" and "Hannity" is unmistakable: Mr. President, you're the victim of a "deep state" plot to take you down. Don't let it happen. 

Sean Hannity, the highest-rated host on Fox, has renewed his calls for Mueller to resign. And Fox's other pro-Trump shows reinforce this message on a daily basis. 

In recent weeks, there's been a big increase in reporting about Mueller's probe and how it could affect Trump's inner circle. At the same time, there's also been a sharp escalation in the anti-Mueller rhetoric coming from right wing media sources.

We have seen some of these attacks before, but now it appears that things are ramping up to a rather hysterical level.

In looking for more information about this I Googled "conservative attacks on Robert Mueller" and what I found makes these attacks from Fox News look like child's play.

Other conservative outlets are not even trying to appear reasonable, and some of what they are charging is so unhinged that it almost seems to be a parody of itself.

I think that it is beyond obvious that the Right Wing media is conditioning their listeners, Trump's base, to accept that the firing of Robert Mueller as not only reasonable, but necessary.

That is why Robert Mueller must be protected at all cost.

So is Bernie Sanders finally ready to end his campaign and endorse Hillary Clinton, well according to him, yes.

Courtesy of New York Magazine:

On Wednesday evening, multiple outlets reported that the Clinton and Sanders campaigns were finalizing the terms of the Vermont senator’s endorsement, and discussing the possibility of holding a joint rally next week in New Hampshire. Later that night, Sanders confirmed those reports. 

“I think at the end of the day, there is going to be a coming together,” Sanders told MSNBC’s Chris Hayes. “And we’re going to go forward together and not only defeat Trump, but defeat him badly.” 

“So, you’re not denying the report that there are talks about a possible endorsement?” Hayes asked. 

“That’s correct,” Sanders replied. 

Sanders's confirmation of a “possible endorsement” came on the same day that he was booed by a few of his colleagues on Capitol Hill. According to Politico, after a House Democrat asked Sanders why he had yet to endorse the presumptive nominee, the Vermont senator replied, “The goal isn't to win elections. The goal is to transform America.” A few of his fellow lawmakers loudly disagreed.

So a couple of questions occur to me.

Since very recently Sanders was claiming that he remained unsatisfied with the Democratic party platform because it did not contain language condemning TPP nor guaranteeing the $15 minimum wage hike, are we to believe that he has now become satisfied simply with the fact that Clinton has agreed to a plan to make college more affordable?

Or was it perhaps the Democratic boos the other morning which signified to him that the jig was up?

And if indeed he is about to endorse Clinton and end his campaign, then why in the hell is that soon to be non-existent campaign seeking a permit to hold a rally on the evening before the DNC convention?

And what does all of this mean for his never say die Bernie-Bros?

Personally I get the impression that Sanders made this decision quite recently, and that it was not made because he, or his supporters, actually got everything they were asking for. 

Former Trump employee says "He has to be stopped."

Barbara Res on her former boss, Donald Trump: "He has to be stopped" #inners https://t.co/gLOKoF3NzK

— All In w/Chris Hayes (@allinwithchris) May 19, 2016

Courtesy of Addicting Info:  

Res, who oversaw the construction of Trump Tower and now supports Hillary Clinton, explained to Hayes that Trump “will put our country back thirty years” and “will be bad for our country.” 

She added, “I don’t think he has the experience to be president, or the political knowledge to be president.” Res also said Trump’s policies are “very backward, very anti-woman, very anti-woman” and very “anti-progress.”

Gee no kidding.

And it could not happen too soon as Trump is already taking up the conservative conspiracy theories to go after Hillary Clinton, and even more pointedly Bill Clinton.

Courtesy of the Washington Post:

Donald Trump went there last night on Fox News, accusing Bill Clinton of “rape.” In an exchange between Trump and Sean Hannity, the Fox host railed against recent media coverage of Trump’s treatment of women, asking whether women who have accused Bill Clinton of sexual misconduct would also be interviewed. And then this transpired: 

“In one case, it’s about exposure. In another case, it’s about groping and fondling and touching against a woman’s will,” Hannity said. 

“And rape,” Trump responded. 

Whenever Trump says this kind of thing — for instance, when he says he will be attacking Hillary Clinton for enabling Bill Clinton’s womanizing — a great burst of hand-wringing and gnashing of teeth pours forth from Democrats who fear that Trump’s “unconventional” and “unpredictable” attacks could prove difficult to fend off.

(Of course Trump might want to cool his jets on this line of attack, as he is not the only one that can play this game.)

If all of that were not enough there is a commentary on the Post that also, quite seriously, discusses the possibility of Donald Trump's presidency making fascism fashionable in America: 

This is how fascism comes to America, not with jackboots and salutes (although there have been salutes, and a whiff of violence) but with a television huckster, a phony billionaire, a textbook egomaniac “tapping into” popular resentments and insecurities, and with an entire national political party — out of ambition or blind party loyalty, or simply out of fear — falling into line behind him.

Worried yet? Yeah, me too.

How Susan Sarandon single-handedly turned me against Bernie Sanders supporters.

Courtesy of the Daily Beast:  

As they continued to discuss the issue, Hayes pressed Sarandon to see the election as potentially a choice between Clinton and Trump, arguing that Sanders himself would “probably” urge his supporters to vote for her. 

“I think Bernie would probably encourage people, because he doesn’t have any ego in this thing,” Sarandon told him. “But I think a lot of people are, ‘Sorry, I just can’t bring myself to [vote for Clinton].’” 

“How about you personally?” Hayes asked. 

“I don’t know. I’m going to see what happens,” Sarandon said. 

That bit of honesty prompted Hayes to stop in his tracks. “Really?” he asked incredulously. 

“Really,” Sarandon said, adding that “some people feel that Donald Trump will bring the revolution immediately if he gets in, things will really explode.” Asked if she thinks that’s “dangerous,” she replied, “It’s dangerous to think that we can continue the way we are with the militarized police force, with privatized prisons, with the death penalty, with the low minimum wage, threats to women’s rights and think you can’t do something huge to turn that around.”

So to Susan Sarandon, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are two sides of the same "revolution?"

WTF?

You know I sometimes joke on here about yelling at my TV set, but during this interview I literally was yelling at my TV set.

It's not that Sarandon did not make good points about Clinton's ties to Monsanto and fracking, she did. However these are small parts of a much bigger picture, a picture that Sarandon and many other supporters of Bernie Sanders seem unable to fully appreciate.

Such as the importance of making sure we have somebody who will continue to support the Affordable Care Act, will select reasonable Supreme Court nominees who will fight for women's right to choose and help overturn the Citizen's United decision, and has the capability to bring in more Democrats to the House and Senate so that we can start to make some real progress in this country concerning improved infrastructure and moving from fossil fuels to renewable energy.

After I watched it I went downstairs to talk to my daughter about it, and she responded by telling me that a large number of Sanders supporters were of the same opinion as Sarandon. (This after she assured me she was not one of them of course.)

I think I kind of lost it after that, and started ranting about how Sanders was not supporting down ticket Democrats, so his ideas were pie in the sky fantasies that would elicit very little support from Democrats who worried about retaining their seats once Bernie's big socialist agenda crashed and burned on liftoff.

I also said that anybody who has lived through the sixties and seventies knows full well that revolutions in the United States do not bring huge changes, but good ideas can take root, and change can occur, if people remain realistic and keep pushing their agenda even in the face of entrenched opposition.

I also ranted that people like this were the crux of the problem because they sit out midterm elections, and fail to support local elections, and then every four years awaken from their political hibernation to bitch about the process and throw their support behind the spoiler candidate who has little if any chance of winning.

By the end I had decided that I was simply done with Bernie Sanders.

I KNOW that some of you are Bernie supporters, and I want to be sympathetic to your point of view, but at this point I am finding it almost impossible to feign neutrality in the face of the bullshit that I am seeing.

Even the Republicans are in on this scam. 

The only ones who don't seem to recognize what is happening here are the Sanders supporters themselves, and unless they wake up they will soon find themselves living in a country where revolution really WILL seem like the only viable alternative.

Here is the piece that Chris Hayes did on SarahPAC yesterday. It's short but powerful.

If you write a check to Sarah PAC, you're writing a check for Sarah Palin's travel, consultants, lifestyle #inners https://t.co/auzRnInKVn

— All In w/Chris Hayes (@allinwithchris) January 27, 2016

I have to say that so far this has been a great year for those of us who have worked tirelessly to expose this horrible woman.

First the kerfuffle with Dakota Meyer over child custody, then the arrest of Track Palin and the increased scrutiny of his military service, and now renewed interest in the SarahPAC slush fund.

And the best is still yet to come.

Former St. Louis police officer: Darren Wilson processed his own evidence after shooting Michael Brown. #Fergusonisnotover.

Courtesy of 3 Chics Politico: 

Redditt Hudson a former police officer with St Louis County police says Darren Wilson processed his own evidence. Reddit also says he was in the room when Ferguson police chief Tom Jackson told them, Darren Wilson had no knowledge of Michael Brown being involved in a store robbery before the encounter with Wilson.

Hudson also wrote a rather incredible piece for  the Washington Post about how being a cop taught him about racism within law enforcement.

I think Chris Hayes is one of the last television hosts still digging into Ferguson, for which I admire him greatly.

It seems since the Eric Garner situation hit the front pages, with incriminating video and everything, that the shooting of Michael Brown has been permanently pushed to the side.

And that is too bad, because in my opinion there is still much to learn about the Ferguson case, and it will never be uncovered now that most news outlets have moved on to the next hot story.

However Michael Brown remains dead, Darren Wilson remains free, and justice remains unserved. 

MSNBC's Chris Hayes "Did Alaska Congressman Don Young kill a guy?"

Click pompous ass to play video

Let me first say that I think I may have squealed out loud when I heard Chris Hayes say those words in the headline. However I think I deserve a pass on that as I have been waiting all week for this story to make it to cable news.

As you watch the segment you can see that neither Hayes, nor Young's opponent Forrest Dunbar, take any of this very seriously, but MSNBC also includes a kind of "best of Don Young" portion as well which as we Alaskans know all too well is anything but good for the Congressman.

Now I am hoping that this inspires other news outlets to really go after Young on this issue.

Because don't forget folks we really only have three choices here.

1. Either Don Young is a senile old coot who just says crazy shit.
2. Don Young is a habitual liar who says crazy shit.
3. Or Don Young is a murderer, who does crazy shit. 

And NONE of those are good for Don Young.

However getting him to admit any one of them IS good for Alaska. 

Chuck Todd clumsily blames the fact that he gave ammunition to the Mitch McConnell campaign on opponent Alison Lundergan Grimes.

Courtesy of Egberto Willies:  

Chuck Todd does not get it. Once he becomes the news in this manner he has failed as a journalist. A few days ago Alison Lundergan Grimes was interviewed by the Louisville Courier-Journal editorial board. They asked her whether she voted for president Obama in 2008 and 2012. She justifiably refused to answer. 

The talking heads and pundits claimed she was not prepared for the question. The lack of sophistication of the traditional media is astounding. It was evident that she was prepared for the question and she intended not to answer it. It was evident that her team likely thought the downside was worse if she answered. 

How does Chuck Todd respond to this journalistic mistake? He blames the candidate. “I think that is one of those situations where she invited this on herself,” Chuck Todd said. “It feels like she had a lot of consultants whispering in her ear, ‘Whatever you do don’t give Mitch McConnell a line for a TV ad.'” Alison Lundergan Grimes did her part. Chuck Todd failed as a journalist. He became the news. He gave Mitch McConnell a line for a TV ad.

Exactly! Grimes understood that she was standing in a minefield and she stepped cautiously.

Todd on the other hand gave McConnell the gaffe that she was too intelligent to provide.

And then, as if that wasn't enough, he essentially blames Grimes for stepping around the traps that he carelessly stumbled right into. Pathetic!

Chris Hayes discovers the inspiration for SarahPAC and other GOP fundraising scams.

Click image to play video

From Breitbart Unmasked:

 MSNBC’s Chris Hayes had Nicholas Confessore of the New York Times on his show last night to discuss the circle of scam that is conservative politics. BaseConnect, formerly called BMW Direct, pretends to be a mail order fundraising business for long-shot Republican candidates and veterans, but keeps almost all of the money it raises from senior citizens. 

Conservative scams are almost risk free. Not only is this behavior completely legal, the marks generally want to be scammed. 

There can be NO doubt that this is how SarahPAC works. Only in Palin's case she is not an unknowing stooge but an active participant.

IN her case the only victims are the morons ignorant enough to believe in her, or to believe that she cares about anything other than getting her hands on more of their money.

By the way Hayes also discussed Palin's newest get rich scheme.

Florida Congressman mistakes two brown skinned Americans for representatives of India, and then the fun begins.

Courtesy of the Miami Herald:  

The latest inductee to the Sunshine State's face-palming club: U.S. Rep. Curt Clawson, the Bonita Springs Republican who replaced Trey Radel, the cocaine congressman busted for buying blow in Washington last year. 

The scene: The House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday. 

The players: Clawson and two congressional witnesses named Nisha Biswal and Arun Kumar. 

“I am familiar with your country; I love your country,” Clawson told them, speaking about India, which he thought was their land. “And I understand the complications of so many languages, and so many cultures, and so many histories, all rolled up in one.…” 

Yes. All those languages. Like the English language. Spoken primarily in the United States. English is also a written language and, in plain English, the witness list said Biswal and Kumar, respectively, hold senior positions at the State Department and Commerce Department. 

That is, Biswal and Kumar work for the U.S. government. They don't work for India. They are Americans. 

But Clawson apparently didn't read the witness list's plain English. Nor did the freshman probably know that it's rare for foreign-government officials to testify before Congress, according to Foreign Policy's blog, The Cable. The Cable reports that Clawson had been busy talking about his knowledge of India and his favorite Bollywood movies. 

You know, most of his friends are Indians. Oh, and he's also concerned about U.S.-India trade relations. 

Do yourself a favor and read the entire article from the Herald, they brutalize this dumb son-of-a-bitch.  As well they should.

I saw this last night on both the Chris Hayes show and Rachel Maddow, and I knew I had to share it today.

And you see this is the problem with these fucking Teabaggers. They are ideological pure enough to get elected by the rabid Right Wing, but so incredibly stupid that they make the state they are from and the entire country look like it is being led by preschoolers.

I have watched this video about five time at it literally gets better each time.

Chris Hayes does his best to have a reasonable conversation about the ACA with a Koch brother funded crazy person. Does not go well.

Click exasperated expression to play video.

I watched this last night with my jaw hanging open.

It was like watching somebody try to chase down a greased pig and explain Obamacare to it.

Here let Raw Story give you the highlights:  

MSNBC host Chris Hayes clashed with a state official for the Koch Brothers-funded group Americans for Prosperity (AFP) on Wednesday after she claimed that extending the deadline to sign up for the Affordable Care Act by two weeks would have a negative impact on her childrens’ health care. 

“It continues to not allow people to go back and change this law,” AFP Pennsylvania State Director Jennifer Stefano told Hayes. “This law has made seven million people lose their insurance.” 

As Reuters reported earlier in the day, the deadline to sign up for Obamacare, as the law is commonly known, was extended until April 15 for people who have already begun the subscription process through the healthcare.gov website. As of March 17, more than 5 million people had signed up for coverage. 

“People without health care right now, who don’t have health care for their children, don’t want this law, Chris,” Stefano said. 

She did not mention that, in several instances, people who were refused coverage by their providers because their plans did not meet the minimum requirements set by the new law have in fact been eligible for coverage at a lower cost after factoring in government subsidies. 

“As a mother, I take real offense that women are being forced to have no choices to cover their children,” Stefano continued. 

“What are you talking about?” an incredulous Hayes responded, before arguing that much of the “heavy lifting” under the law would be accomplished by expansion of state Medicare programs, which have been frequently been opposed by conservatives. 

“Throw out the mandate, throw out the exchange,” Hayes then told her. “Bumping up Medicaid eligibility from 100 percent of poverty line to 133 percent of poverty line so that some working poor people can get some health insurance — what is the objection to that? Why does every conservative Republican governor oppose that? Explain that to me.” 

“Number one, not true,” Stefano answered. “Plenty of Republican governors, including Tom Corbett in Pennsylvania, including [Ohio Gov. John Kasich], there are Republican governors that have expanded Medicaid. Please, please, please, spare me that this is a Republican-Democrat thing.”

Well of course it IS a "Republican-Democrat thing" because though there have been some Republican governors who have seen the  writing on the wall and expanded Medicaid, ALL of those who have not are in the Republican party.

At one point a little later in the conversation (Which was actually more like an air raid siren going off and one poor slob trying to find the off button.), Stefano actually claimed that raising the poverty level would mean that people making $94,000 a year would be considered to be living in poverty. And she repeated that multiple times.

Then when Hayes tried to reason with her, she took a comment he made COMPLETELY out of context and then raged that he was insulting her as a mother, and in fact was insulting all mothers.

Apparently this woman is from the Sarah Palin school of debate in which you misunderstand the conversation and then throw your children out in front of you like information deflecting sandbags while using white noise to pummel your opponent into submission.

I will hand it to Chris Hayes for at least trying to have a rational conversation with an irrational Koch supported Teabagger, but perhaps now he understand why others may not be quite as willing to do so.

Chris Hayes reports on the armed response in Texas to the gathering of four women to talk about gun control.

Men piling out of cars with rifles and automatic weapons, in response to four women meeting to talk about gun control.

A woman so frightened that she refuses to reveal her identity on television.

THIS is the group of people who believe that they deserve to be allowed to walk around armed in this country?

And I have a question, why would these morons need to get out the "self defense tools" if they were not needed for self defense? (And by the way that is the DUMBEST name for weapons that I have ever heard.)

In my opinion bullies, especially bullies who only feel tough when they have a gun, don't get to have her way.  They get their asses kicked.

And if there are any REAL men in Texas they should be hunting these assholes down and showing them that not everybody is afraid of their store bought penis extenders.

In my opinion this conversation on "Now with Alex Wagner" this morning was the MOST interesting discussion about why, and when, we trust our government with our privacy and why, and when, we don't.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Courtesy of MSNBC:  

In his book, “The Twilight of the Elites: America after Meritocracy,” Hayes divides American thought leaders into two camps, arguing that figures like The New York Times’ Paul Krugman and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange are classic insurrectionists, distrustful of institutional hierarchies, while Krugman’s colleague at The Times, David Brooks, serves as the model institutionalist. 

That prompted Alex to ask Hayes whether 29-year-old Edward Snowden was an insurrectionist bent on tearing down the system or an institutionalist looking to fix it. 

“I think the most dangerous thing for authority are people who were once institutionalists who later became radicalized, and I think a lot of whistle-blowers are that,” Hayes said. 

“The entire national security state constructed post -9/11 has been shrouded behind secrecy, and because it’s shrouded behind secrecy, people’s opinions about how it functions and whether it’s justifiable tend to fall along these polarized lines of how much you, by default, trust authority.” 

“People don’t really have a lot of information to operate on,” Hayes said. “And so what they do is they take cues from people they trust.” It was easier for Democrats to be more skeptical of the national security state when they were not running it.”

I found this conversation incredibly riveting this morning, and in fact was unable to complete my morning routine until it was over,  because it seemed to answer a question I have had since this Snowden thing first burst into our public consciousness.

As all of you know I got very upset at early reports and predicted this would damage the President, in part because I believed that it should.

That assertion was met by irritation from a number of you for my perceived  attacks against the President, and defensiveness over the fact that this was different because now the "good guys" are doing it.

However the question that we have to ask ourselves is should we be relaxed about this situation now because we perceive the people in charge of this as being on our side, and if we are relaxed about this now do we have the right to be indignant about it when the Republicans are once again in charge? After all THAT is how those on the Right are responding now, even though they were the most aggressive defenders of the program when Bush first started it.

For the record I am still pretty uncomfortable with this. Sadly it looks like I will just have to live with it, as the genie is out of the bottle and clearly has NO intention of ever returning,

Lawrence O'Donnell takes yet another victory lap. This time in response to the fact that Congress has finally realized that the REAL IRS scandal is that it has been breaking the law for fifty years.

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As everybody who watches the Last Word well knows Lawrence has been the lone voice reporting that the IRS should not be giving 501 tax exempt status to ANY of these political groups. And now Darrell Issa's Oversight Committee has FINALLY recognized a truth that might just mean that ALL of these Tea Party groups, and even Democratic ones, will soon lose any tax exempt status.

There is a murmur on the internet that I had been poo-pooing, but now I think it deserves some consideration. And that is a kind of conspiracy theory, if you will, that suggests that perhaps many of these recent leaks, the IRS 501 leak, the drone strike leak, the leak about the collecting of AP reporter phone records, the Verizon data collecting leak, might in fact be coming from inside the Obama White House as a way of getting these very touchy subjects out into the media so that they can be discussed and the administration can then be "pressured" into doing something about them.

But nah, that's just silly.

I mean NOBODY could be that far ahead of the curve. Could they?

Well at least one MSNBC host was pretty damn far ahead of the curve. THAT MUCH we do know!

Chris Hayes of MSNBC does the best job of explaining why the REAL IRS scandal starts with Citizens United.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I watched carefully to see who would do the best job of explaining this IRS brouhaha and Chris Hayes did the best job, and really made it understandable as to WHY the IRS should be commended for doing their job appropriate, and also WHY this is such an unfortunate story for the White House.

The REAL problem as I see it is not that this is actually an honest to goodness scandal, the real problem is that it will undoubtedly breathe new life into the Tea Party which has been on life support recently and now has a spanking new lease on life.

The fact is that EVERYTHING is seen through a political lens these days, and through that lens what should be a non-story has become the absolute symbol of every conspiracy theory the Teabaggers have ever had about the Obama administration and the government's attitude toward them.

For that reason this is going to have serious consequences for the next two elections, and that sucks for all of us. Which is essentially what sent Jon Stewart over the edge last night.

Chris Hayes interviews MHP about the Right Wing freakout over her MSNBC promo.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I think my favorite part of this is hearing Melissa Harris-Perry giggle in the background as Hayes set up the spot and describes how irrationally upset the Fox News became over her innocuous statements.

And some of the faces on those Fox New contributors while they are ranting about this makes me wonder if a number of those people should not be institutionalized.

Seriously!

Authors of "It's Even Worse Than It Looks" discuss the obstructionism that is now the central theme in the Republican party.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

This extremely interesting, and somewhat frightening, discussion focuses on how far right the GOP has gone and how dedicated they are to beating President Obama at all cost, even if that cost is the complete shutdown of the government and irreparable damage to our democracy.

Here is part two of this fascinating conversation in which MUCH of the blame for our out of control partisanship is laid at the feet of Newt Gingrich. And then here is part three where we learn that this is NOT the fault of both parties, regardless of how hard the Republicans try to push forward that lie.

The take away from this is that there IS no longer any way to negotiate with today's GOP and the only way to make progress is to vote them out of office and replace them with Democrats who appear, thus far, still able to put progress ahead of ideology.

If you are interested you can purchase the book "It's Even Worse Than It Looks: How the American Constitutional System Collided With the New Politics of Extremism" by clicking here.

In case you missed it, here is the Chris Hayes story about lobbyists planning to target OWS protesters and the Democratic politicians who support them.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Courtesy of MSNBC:

CLGC’s memo proposes that the ABA pay CLGC $850,000 to conduct “opposition research” on Occupy Wall Street in order to construct “negative narratives” about the protests and allied politicians. The memo also asserts that Democratic victories in 2012 would be detrimental for Wall Street and targets specific races in which it says Wall Street would benefit by electing Republicans instead. 

According to the memo, if Democrats embrace OWS, “This would mean more than just short-term political discomfort for Wall Street. … It has the potential to have very long-lasting political, policy and financial impacts on the companies in the center of the bullseye.” 

The memo also suggests that Democratic victories in 2012 should not be the ABA’s biggest concern. “… (T)he bigger concern,” the memo says, “should be that Republicans will no longer defend Wall Street companies.” 

Two of the memo’s authors, partners Sam Geduldig and Jay Cranford, previously worked for House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio. Geduldig joined CLGC before Boehner became speaker; Cranford joined CLGC this year after serving as the speaker’s assistant for policy. A third partner, Steve Clark, is reportedly “tight” with Boehner, according to a story by Roll Call that CLGC features on its website. 

For all of those who said that this protest was not focused, and that it would have no effect, I think these lobbyists disagree with you. You don't spend just under a million dollars to discredit a movement, unless they are scaring the bejeezus out of you.