I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
I just received this email from Saul Anuzis of the Michigan Republican Party:
Lipstick on a pig?! That’s how Barack Obama just this week described Governor Sarah Palin, our vice presidential nominee! What an outrage! I need you to click here now to make a secure online donation to the Michigan Republican Party so we can fight back against Obama and the Democrats’ false and sexist attacks on Governor Palin.
This is a rather baldfaced lie. Only the most fevered and delusional among us could possibly interpret what Obama said as calling Sarah Palin a pig. Here is the actual text of what Obama said, in context:
“John McCain says he’s about change, too — except for economic policy, health care policy, tax policy, education policy, foreign policy and Karl Rove-style politics. That’s just calling the same thing something different.”
With a laugh, he added: “You can put lipstick on a pig; it’s still a pig. You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called change; it’s still going to stink after eight years.”
The quote doesn’t have anything to do with Palin, he’s talking about McCain and using a familiar analogy to argue that McCain is trying to dress up the same old policies under a new name. How familiar is that analogy? Familiar enough that McCain has often used it himself. Just last year he said the same thing about Hillary Clinton’s health plan:
When asked about Mrs. Clinton’s speech, he said her proposal was “eerily” similar to the plan she came up with in 1993, when she headed a health care reorganization effort during her husband’s administration. “I think they put some lipstick on a pig,” he said, “but it’s still a pig.”
Was he calling Hillary Clinton a pig? Of course not. The Republicans are simply lying about this one. This is not a matter of interpretation, this is a stone cold lie and they know it. And they’re using that lie to get people to send them money. Obama is right, they are utterly shameless.
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