Joe Biden appeared on "The View" and successfully refrained from telling Joy Behar how much he enjoys her vocals on "Wind Beneath My Wings." Michele Bachmann made false statements about an alleged Hezbollah-Cuba alliance, though we hear Campaign Manager Ahmed Chalabi was very pleased. And Fox News reports so you can decide, which is why Sean Hannity decided not to believe Fox News' report about Chris Christie's political future. This is HUFFPOST HILL for Tuesday, September 27th, 2011:
PERRY COOKED ON BOTH SIDES - That's the resounding message that comes through in a HuffPost-Patch poll of influential Republicans in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina run by Mark Blumenthal. This past week, he asked 160 key Republicans in early states about how their opinions of Romney and Perry have changed over the last two or three weeks. Staffers on Perry campaign and affiliated Super PACs will want to scroll right through the rest of this graf. A majority (57 percent) say their impression of Perry has grown less favorable, while just 16 percent say it has become more favorable. The results are nearly reversed for Romney. By 47 to 16 percent these influential Republicans say their impression of Romney has become more favorable. When pressed to choose, the Power Outsiders give Romney a huge advantage over Perry on both electability and presidential stature. He leads by better than two-to-one (63 to 24 percent) on the ability to defeat Obama in the general election, and by a slightly smaller margin (56 to 30 percent) as the candidate who would make the best president. This presents a dramatically different picture for Perry than one we'd found in weeks past, when Perry and Romney were more or less running even in both categories. Should we be surprised that an Alan Simpson for President campaign is brewing? [HuffPost]
Andy Rooney is retiring from "60 Minutes." America will have to find someone else to tell it about things at the supermarket that have too much packaging.
Here's what's up with the CR, courtesy of Jen Bendery: "On Thursday, the House will pass a short-term resolution to keep the government funded through next Tuesday. Lawmakers are out of town until Monday, so the measure just gives the House more time to get back and vote on the spending bill. The House will pass the resolution by unanimous consent, which means only one lawmaker needs to be present in the House to clear the measure...The bill doesn't include spending cuts that House GOP conservatives wanted, so there's a chance that some may revolt on the bill. House Republican leaders are waiting until Monday, when lawmakers are back, to gauge possible opposition to the measure. 'I think it's too early to tell,' a senior House Republican aide said of a possible revolt among conservatives. 'We'll have to see the mood of the Conference when they get back Monday night.'"
A bunch of Google lobbyists showed up at Heritage today to assure the folks there that the guy who wanted his taxes raised totally wasn't speaking for Google.
CANTOR PRESSES FEMA ON FUNDS FOR HIS DISTRICT - Republicans have been all in a huff over the last couple of weeks because some people wanted to give the government's disaster response agency more money. Displaced Americans, they argued, could hide under the invisible hand of the market (it's really big. It might have Marfan's, or something. And besides, it's a hand. It can help them clear away the wreckage of their former lives). Despite his party's hostility to FEMA, Eric Cantor contacted the agency last Friday about funds for his Virginia district, which sustained damage in the August 23rd earthquake, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Cantor also reportedly contacted Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano about the matter. Young Gun! [HuffPost's Amanda Terkel]
Women are exercising their innate autonomy. Don't worry, Cliff Stearns is on the case.
RICK SCOTT WILL GLADLY PEE IN A CUP - Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) is standing by his state's new policy of drug testing welfare recipients even after the American Civil Liberties Union challenged the scheme in a lawsuit and just 2.5 percent of beneficiaries flunked the first round of tests in July, triggering additional calls for the policy's repeal. The governor highlighted the issue during a speech at a recent Conservative Political Action conference in Orlando, and added that he would like to see testing for public employees as well, a policy he previously enacted but later rescinded. In an email to HuffPost, Scott spokesman Lane Wright said that not only had the governor's stance not changed, but that he would be willing to subject himself to drug screening. "Scott has said he is always willing to submit himself to a drug test," Wright wrote. [HuffPost]
DAILY DELANEY DOWNER - The average jobless worker older than 55 has been out of work for longer than a year, and older unemployed people are more than twice as likely than younger jobless to become 99ers. That's why Jack Gross is bummed businesses have been using his name to throw out discrimination complaints brought by older workers since 2009, when the U.S. Supreme Court tossed Gross's claim and set a tougher precedent. "It personally concerns me I was somehow involved in denying a lot of other people their chance at justice because my case is being cited so often," Gross, 63, told DDD. "It feels bad." Story this week on the HuffPost.
"I've never seen a job listing saying that the unemployed need not apply." -- The Atlantic's Daniel Indiviglio, 9/27/2011
Don't be bashful: Send tips/stories/photos/events/fundraisers/job movement/juicy miscellanea to huffposthill@huffingtonpost.com. Follow us on Twitter - @HuffPostHill
SUSPICIOUS PERRY STAFFER EMAIL ASKS FOR 'UNDER THE TABLE' INPUT ON HPV VACCINE - The day before Rick Perry issued his order mandating Texas middle school girls be immunized against a life-threatening disease, a staffer sent around an email asking for off-record input on the matter from outside sources. "If you've been working offline on some changes or under the table with someone else on this one, get your comments to me ASAP," Executive Clerk Gregory Davidson wrote to senior Perry staffers on February 1st, 2007. While the email might be a pro forma request for last-minute thoughts on the implementation of a major policy, given the accusations of cronyism that have been swirling around the vaccine mandate, it carries more weight. Perry's former chief of staff, Mike Toomey, was working as a lobbyist for Merck, the manufacturer of the vaccine, at the time. [HuffPost's Jason Cherkis]
The Perry campaign released fundraising numbers today and they're quite strong, despite Perry's Quayle-esque debate performances. Perry raised over $20 million in only three days from his first fundraisers in Texas and Oklahoma and the campaign says online fundraising has outpaced their original expectations. Can you imagine the thunderous applause/fundraising boost the guy would've gotten if the moderator of the Fox debate asked him about Troy Davis? [HuffPost]
Ben Smith scoured the Wikileaks cables for mentions of the Republican presidential candidates. *Somehow*, Smith overlooked Nicolas Sarkozy's effusive praise for Herman Cain and Godfather Pizza's "Hot Stuff" pie.
Michele Bachmann is worried that Hezbollah is setting up shop in Cuba to file missiles at America. "There's reports that have come out that Cuba has been working with another terrorist organization called Hezbollah," Bachmann said at a rally in Iowa this week. "And Hezbollah is potentially looking at wanting to be part of missile sites in Iran and, of course, when you're 90 miles offshore from Florida, you don’t want to entertain the prospect of hosting bases or sites where Hezbollah could have training camps or perhaps have missile sites or weapons sites in Cuba. This would be foolish." The claim originated in a report featured in Corriere della Sera, an Italian newspaper, that claimed that Hezbollah was establishing itself in Cuba to target Israelis in Latin America. However there was no mention of arms smuggling or missiles. [A HREF="http://huff.to/pstx5v" TARGET="_HPLINK">The Hill]
CHRIS CHRISTIE WON'T RUN FOR PRESIDENT (BUT WILL HE???) - Fox News today reported that New Jersey governor Chris Christie won't run for president, putting to bed reports that he had been reconsidering his earlier refusal to enter the race. Christie had previously said that he would have to commit suicide to convince members of the media that he wouldn't run in 2012. WELL YOU'RE STILL BREATHING, the media replied. Earlier in the day, the Star-Ledger published a quote from Chris Christie's brother, who seemed equally bewildered. "I'm sure that he's not going to run," Todd Christie said. "If he's lying to me, I'll be as stunned as I've ever been in my life." Let us put this to bed, please. [HuffPost]
Sean Hannity doesn't trust Fox News - @seanhannity: Will Gov.Christie run or won't he? That is the question.
Sarah Palin is "days away" from making a decision on whether to run for presi--zzzzzzzzzzzzzz....
Joe Biden appeared on "The View" today. Two points: One, he didn't confuse Barbara Walters with Andrea Mitchell. That is good. Two, he spoke out against the GOP debate audience members who booed the openly gay soldier in Iraq who asked the candidates about "don't ask, don't tell." "I did have a visceral response to it," Biden said. "I'm not sure if it's because my son spent a year in Iraq. And I know my sons and all the kids with them -- 'kids,' they're grown men -- I don't think they give a damn whether the guy firing a rifle to protect them is gay or straight. I don't think they care about that. Look this kid risked his life. This kid is there for them. And I, quite frankly, I thought it was reprehensible." [HuffPost's Sam Stein]
@Chris_Moody: A new app lets you change your eyes to look like Michele Bachmann's Newsweek cover bit.ly/nnaP1h (via @hollybdc)
GOP MEMBER APPEARS AT RIBBON-CUTTING FOR PROJECT HE OPPOSED - We've mentioned before that Republican lawmakers have a tumultuous, love/hate and generally repulsive relationship with the stimulus. Well it turns out that Republicans' abusive and manipulatively hot/cold relationship toward the economic recovery bill continues. Take, for example, this move from the Ike Turner playbook: Republican Rep. Robert Dold this week appeared at the ribbon cutting for a renovated historic train station in his Illinois district. The renovations had been paid for by the American Recovery Act, which Dold had previously condemned. I myself think that what's going on right now is our out-of-control spending is just that -- out of control," he said in 2010. "We need to make sure we're not raising taxes. We need to focus on how to get people back to work. In the 10th [of] this $862 billion stimulus package, we spent $169 million in the 10th District, ... and we've created 158 jobs. That is a dismal failure. We need to be pro-growth and pro-jobs strategies out there." Ike Turner would be proud. [HuffPost]
CENSUS BUREAU: 131,729 GAY COUPLES ARE MARRIED - Guess Western Civilization is 131,729 steps closer to crumbling.
BECAUSE YOU'VE READ THIS FAR - Cinema's greatest F-bombs.
COMFORT FOOD
- Here's Sammy Davis Jr. singing Michael Jackson's "Bad." [http://huff.to/r7zZV6]
- "Pig Parker" documents cars that have been brought to a stop in the most egregious manner possible. [http://huff.to/rqxfGu]
- The world's oldest car -- which really does look like a retrofitted carriage -- is up for sale. It was built in 1884. Just try low riding in THAT thing. [http://huff.to/q9WhzK]
- The top ten misused English words. Read this and ponder the literal enormity of your ignorance. [http://huff.to/o1O8uc]
- "Oops: the owners of an ice cream shop in Ocala, Florida recently discovered that many people in the town had mistaken their ice cream cone mascot for a KKK member." [http://huff.to/opiC4q]
- Time-lapse video of the largest pumpkin in Connecticut history growing. Kind of looks like an art school horror film,. [http://huff.to/ohr7Cw]
- Here's a machine knitting a Cosby sweater ... with Bill Cosby's face on it. [http://huff.to/osnrS1]
- We don't post too many pictures in Comfort Food, mostly because we want to give you more bang for your buck. However, this might be the most intense dog ever, so we just had to share it. [http://huff.to/rauHue]
TWITTERAMA
@BenjySarlin: The Heisenberg Principle of the GOP -- conservative saviors are only saviors until you look at them
@pourmecoffee: Elf familiar with the situation indicates Santa not likely to bring new contender for GOP field.
@MikeBloomberg: Happy 13th Birthday @Google, and best wishes on your Bar Mitzvah.
ON TAP
TONIGHT
5:00 pm: The RickPerry.org Host Committee hosts a kickoff party to support everyone's favorite immunization zealot/granter of immunity to ILLEGALS. [The Willard Hotel, 1401 Pennsylvania Avenue NW]
6:30 pm - 8:30 pm: CNN celebrates self-centered young D.C. media professionals with a cocktail reception honoring "The New Guard." [Johnny's Half Shell, 440 N. Capitol Street NW]
TOMORROW
12:00 pm - 1:30 pm: Elijah Cummings zips down to D.C. for an hour-and-a-half luncheon. That's the nice thing about recess. You can actually take the time to enjoy the bacon-wrapped figs at your fundraiser. [National Democratic Club Townhouse, 40 Ivy Street SE]
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