Republican candidate Jody Hice keeps sharing fake quotes by the founding fathers, reminding us of Benjamin Franklin's maxim, "Don't share fake quotes on Facebook, Jody Hice." The NSA has its own Google, ICReach, but it's really sucked since the forced integration with ICReach+. And Dan Sullivan shot a television in his latest campaign ad. The television will now be on display at the Smithsonian's Museum of Things Shot By Politicians -- it's located between Joe Manchin's copy of the cap and trade bill and Alexander Hamilton. This is HUFFPOST HILL for Tuesday, August 26th, 2014:
GROWING NUMBER OF AMERICANS SUPPORT AIRSTRIKES IN IRAQ - Saddam has to pay for 9/11. Emily Swanson: "American support for U.S. airstrikes in Iraq has solidified in recent weeks, a new HuffPost/YouGov poll shows. But the survey shows continued wariness about additional involvement to quell the insurgency there. According to the poll, 66 percent of Americans now favor the decision to conduct airstrikes in Iraq, while only 20 percent oppose it. In a HuffPost/YouGov poll conducted earlier in August, just after President Barack Obama announced that the U.S. would begin conducting airstrikes, 58 percent of respondents said they favored it and 24 percent said they opposed that action. In the latest poll, which was conducted after American journalist James Foley was beheaded by the Islamic State, the insurgent group operating in Iraq and Syria, 75 percent of Democrats, 56 percent of independents and 76 percent of Republicans said they support the decision to conduct airstrikes. But Americans continue to oppose sending ground troops to Iraq, by a 56 percent to 20 percent margin. Sixty-three percent of Democrats, 59 percent of independents and a 41 percent to 31 percent plurality of Republicans said they oppose sending ground troops." [HuffPost]
America's worst congressman is seeking interns for the remaining 12 days of Congress.
CORPORATE MONEY BETTING ON A DEMOCRATIC SENATE - Paul Blumenthal: "In the most heavily contested Senate races over seats now held by Democrats, corporations and business trade associations are largely sticking with the Democrats as they dole out funds from their political action committees. A review of Federal Election Commission records by The Huffington Post found that PACs affiliated with corporations and trade associations have given $9 million combined to the Democratic Senate candidates in Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan and North Carolina in this electoral cycle. Their Republican challengers have received just $2.9 million from that category of PACs. Why isn't the business community unreservedly backing the GOP? Money from corporations and trade associations can be motivated by ideology, but corporate PACs also seek to maintain influence by anticipating which party will control the majority in the next Congress. Late in the midterm campaigns of 2006, these PACs shifted their contributions to House Democratic candidates and party committees as it became clear that the Republicans would lose control of the lower chamber. The same dynamic played out ahead of the 2010 elections, when corporate PACs turned their donationstoward the Republicans early in the election year. Although most polling analyses give the GOP the advantage in the battle for Senate control this year, that same shift of corporate contributions could not be seen in the first six months of 2014." [HuffPost]
DAILY DELANEY DOWNER - Fancy new buildings in New York City have separate doors for poor people. They're called "poor doors." Mireya Navarroa: "A 33-story glass tower rising on Manhattan’s waterfront will offer all the extras that a condo buyer paying up to $25 million would expect — hotel-style concierge services, entertainment rooms, and unobstructed views of the Hudson River and miles beyond. Taking advantage of affordable-housing incentives, the same project will also cater to renters who make no more than about $50,000, and who will not share the same perks. They will also not share the same entrance." [NYT]
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BOEHNER, CAMP BENEFIT FROM TAX INVERSION - Boehner definitely laughs every time the E*TRADE baby appears on the television in his finished basement/mancave. Bloomberg: "While U.S. House Speaker John Boehner and Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp have resisted calls for a crackdown on companies adopting overseas addresses to pay lower taxes, both have made money off one of the deals. They also have investments at risk of losing value because of government action. The two lawmakers reported the sale of stock in Covidien Plc within nine days of Medtronic Inc. saying it was planning a takeover, an announcement that sent Dublin-based Covidien’s shares near a 52-week high. The deal, one of several that have sparked a national debate over U.S. corporate tax policy, would put the combined company’s headquarters in Ireland and reduce its tax rate. Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, and Camp, whose committee controls tax policy, haven’t backed a proposal by President Barack Obama and Democrats for a retroactive law that would penalize the Medtronic-Covidien deal and seven others. According to an analysis of public disclosures, the lawmakers still hold Medtronic shares -- and Camp bought additional stock after the medical-device maker announced the transaction. Those holdings, though only a small part of the two multimillionaires’ stock portfolios, give them an interest in the deal’s completion, along with their ability to influence the outcome." [Bloomberg]
An ostensibly lighthearted video is a window into House Speaker John Boehner's soul. In the clip a toy monkey delights little children gathered around the Ohio Republican, who tells the children that the chattering monkey is actually his life. "That's what I do all day!" says Boehner, whose job is to control an uncontrollable group of people. "My staff gave it to me. Every fifteen, thirty minutes they come in and wind me up and I do my thing." A Boehner spokesman explained in a blog post that they bought Boehner the monkey in 2011 because the speaker once "joked in an interview that some days he felt like a windup toy because his jam-packed scheduled kept him so busy." SPOILER ALERT: At the end of the video, the Boehner monkey falls off a coffee table. Also, monkeys are the chuckleheads of the animal kingdom. [HuffPost]
LIKELY FUTURE CONGRESSMAN LOVES FAKE FOUNDING FATHER QUOTES - Andrew Kaczynski reports that Jody Hice, a pastor and radio host likely to be the next congressman from Georgia's 10th district, shares a lot of fake quotes from Thomas Jefferson and Patrick Henry on Facebook. In other words, Hice is a typical tea party nut. Welcome to Washington, sir. [BuzzFeed]
Politicians can no longer kiss babies...because they might have EBOLA: "Arkansas Sen. Mark Pryor's (D) re-election campaign is out with a new ad that preys on fears over the growing Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The ad begins by showing several news anchors dramatically relaying concerns about the outbreak, which has cost 1,400 lives in five countries. A narrator then criticizes Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), Pryor's challenger, for voting to 'cut billions from our nation's medical disaster and emergency programs.' An image of Cotton is paired with the caption, 'only one against pandemic response.' Cotton was one of 29 House members to vote against a 2013 bill reauthorizing funding for public health and emergency programs. The ad also hits Cotton over his vote against funding pediatric research at Arkansas Children's Hospital. The line of attack is a frequent one, attracting millions of dollars in spending from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee." [HuffPost's Igor Bobic]
Also, as Dan Sullivan's latest ad suggests, shooting things is the new baby kissing.
THE NSA HAS ITS OWN CREEPY GOOGLE - The program has not yet been paired with ICUP. "The National Security Agency is secretly providing data to nearly two dozen U.S. government agencies with a 'Google-like' search engine built to share more than 850 billion records about phone calls, emails, cellphone locations, and internet chats, according to classified documents obtained by The Intercept. The documents provide the first definitive evidence that the NSA has for years made massive amounts of surveillance data directly accessible to domestic law enforcement agencies. Planning documents for ICREACH, as the search engine is called, cite the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Drug Enforcement Administration as key participants. ICREACH contains information on the private communications of foreigners and, it appears, millions of records on American citizens who have not been accused of any wrongdoing. Details about its existence are contained in the archive of materials provided to The Intercept by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. Earlier revelations sourced to the Snowden documents have exposed a multitude of NSA programs for collecting large volumes of communications. The NSA has acknowledged that it shares some of its collected data with domestic agencies like the FBI, but details about the method and scope of its sharing have remained shrouded in secrecy." [The Intercept]
OH GOV: DEMOCRAT GIVES UP - Cleveland.com: "Ed FitzGerald's campaign for governor confirmed Friday what was speculated for days: That the beleaguered Democrat is altering his strategy in an attempt to ensure his troubles don't doom his party's entire statewide ticket. But FitzGerald, the Cuyahoga County executive, also plans to mount a 'competitive, vocal' challenge to Republican Gov. John Kasich, his press secretary said... The shift Hitt notes is expected to benefit down-ballot Democratic candidates in races for attorney general, auditor, secretary of state and treasurer. FitzGerald's campaign is reshuffling after weeks of character questions that dogged the gubernatorial nominee and raised doubts about his viability against Kasich. On Monday, an exodus of staff advisers and outside consultants signaled Democrats' eagerness to salvage something out of the November elections. The Northeast Ohio Media Group and others reported Aug. 1 that while responding to a 4:30 a.m. call about a suspicious vehicle in 2012, police in suburban Westlake found the county executive parked outside an industrial complex with a woman who was not his wife. Reporters subsequently learned that FitzGerald was driving on a learner's permit at the time and had lacked a regular driver's license for a decade." [Cleveland.com]
The Times refuses to endorse Andrew Cuomo: "Why endorse no candidate in a major state primary? Here’s how we see it: Realistically, Governor Cuomo is likely to win the primary, thanks to vastly greater resources and name recognition. And he’ll probably win a second term in November against a conservative Republican opponent. In part, that’s because issues like campaign finance rarely have been a strong motivator for most voters. Nonetheless, those who want to register their disappointment with Mr. Cuomo’s record on changing the culture of Albany may well decide that the best way to do that is to vote for Ms. Teachout. Despite our reservations about her, that impulse could send a powerful message to the governor and the many other entrenched incumbents in Albany that a shake-up is overdue." [NYT]
BECAUSE YOU'VE READ THIS FAR - Here's an otter eating at the table.
WE GET IT, FRANCE, YOU DON'T LIKE US - Someone dust off the freedom fries sign. Vox: "Two polls released this week both ask a question that you would hope wouldn't need asking: how many people support the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS)? Unfortunately, in all four countries surveyed, the answer is greater than zero, and by a lot...In any case, the big, scary, surprising, number here is France: 16 percent of those surveyed say they support ISIS. That's an awful lot. And that number gets even larger as the demographics get younger, as shown in this by-age breakdown published by Russia Today (the poll was commissioned by Russian state media, almost certainly to tar and/or troll Western countries, but that doesn't make the findings any less disturbing)...This is alarming, in part because a growing number of Europeans, often from predominantly Muslim immigrant communities, are not just expressing their support for ISIS in polls: they are traveling to Syria and Iraq to join up. The ISIS fighter who killed American journalist James Foley on video last week spoke with a strong London accent. European governments are rightly worried about the implications of this for their own national security." [Vox]
COMFORT FOOD
- A GoPro harness now let's you film from your dog's perspective.
- Second installment of a dad using special effects to turn his son into an action hero.
- Watch Israel's Iron Dome intercept 15 rockets.
- Guy loses it seeing Google fiber being installed on his street.
- Today's college freshmen were born in 1996. They don't know what Tamagotchi is.
- Last night's Emmys tribute to Robin Williams.
- There is now a 99-pack of beer on the market.
TWITTERAMA
@farenthold: Today I celebrated @NationalDogDay with my pups Simba and LuLu. pic.twitter.com/E9umhENZeE
@BenjySarlin: "Hi, I'm Benjy Sariln. [fires machine gun wildly into air]. So the city parks commission elections are coming up."
@ryanbeckwith: "My name is Tony Montana. I'm running for Senate because I think it's time to clean house." pic.twitter.com/oh0XgkvFd0
@emmaroller: I understand the appeal of linking out to sites using a personalized link shortener, but I also understand the appeal of not being a douche
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