Roland Martin Doesn’t Call Out DNC Chair for Linking GOP-Backed Voting Requirements With Jim Crow Laws
June 8, 2011 No Comment
CNN analyst Roland Martin simply allowed DNC Chairwoman Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz to say what she wanted about Republicans on his Sunday show Washington Watch, on TVOne. Schultz linked Florida GOP-backed voting proposals with Jim Crow laws and poll taxes, and said one has a better chance of being struck by lightning than see an instance of voter fraud. Martin not once challenged Schultz over her rhetoric. Schultz was referring to Republican-backed measures in certain states that require a photo I.D. to vote and trim the number of early-voting days, in order to prevent voter fraud. Schultz hit such policies as discriminatory. [Video below the break.] “[N]ow you have the Republicans, who want to literally drag us all the way back to Jim Crow laws and literally – and very transparently – block access to the polls to voters who are more likely to vote for Democratic candidates than Republican candidates,” Schultz insisted. After she spoke, Martin briskly moved on to the next question. The story was picked up by Politico and other online sources, and Schultz retracted her Jim Crow analogy a day later. Later in the interview, Schultz ridiculously added that “you're more likely to get hit by lightning than you are to see an instance of voter fraud in this country.” And again, Martin did not question her assumptions. At the end of the segment, Schultz was asked about Rep. Anthony Weiner's Twitter fiasco – one day before Weiner called his press conference and revealed that he had lied to the media for a week about the scandal. Schultz called Weiner's situation “a personal matter” and added “that's where it should be left.” A transcript of the segment, which aired on June 5, is as follows: ROLAND MARTIN: An ongoing effort underway in Republican-controlled state houses across the country, could be another. Republicans are backing measures that will require photo identification and other type of things, including cutting the number of days for early voting. Republicans say it will cut down on voter fraud. Critics contend it's a step backwards, and it would discriminate against the poor, elderly, students, people with disabilities, and minorities. Joining me to explain why Democrats are against this move is the chair of the Democratic National Committee, Florida Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz. We're glad you're here on Washington Watch. Rep. DEBBIE WASSERMAN-SCHULTZ (D-Fla.), DNC Chairwoman: Thank you Roland. Great to be here with you. MARTIN: Your home state – Gov. Rick Scott is leading one of these efforts, and for the life of me, I don't understand whenever I see Republicans or even Democrats contesting votes and things along those lines. We talk about this is the fundamental right to be Americans, but to put roadblocks up to – to – for voting makes no sense to me. SCHULTZ: Well, I mean if you go back to the year 2000, when we had an obvious disaster and – and saw that our voting process needed refinement, and we did that in the America Votes Act and made sure that we could iron out those kinks, now you have the Republicans, who want to literally drag us all the way back to Jim Crow laws and literally – and very transparently – block access to the polls to voters who are more likely to vote for Democratic candidates than Republican candidates. And it's nothing short of that blatant. MARTIN: Now, Georgia has a voter I.D. law that was passed, and the Obama Justice Department – they actually approved that particular law, saying it will not impact minority voters. But other states are looking to – to put into place voter I.D. laws. Your – the DNC’s position on those voter I.D. laws. SCHULTZ: Well, photo I.D. laws, we think, is – are very similar to a poll tax. I mean you look – just look at African-American voters as a snapshot. About 25 percent of African-American voters don't have a valid photo I.D. I mean – and – and the reason it's similar to a poll tax is because you've got the expense. You've got the effort. There's difficulties for s- — for many people in getting a photo I.D. So, you're literally just throwing a barrier in the way of someone who's trying to exercise their right to vote. And the reason that it's not necessary is because we already have very legitimate voter verification processes, signature checks that are already in place; and there is so little voter fraud, which is the professed reason the Republicans are advancing these – these laws. There's so little voter fraud, and I mean you're more likely to get hit by lightning than you are to see an instance of voter fraud in this country, but Republicans are imposing laws all over the country, acting like it's not – voter fraud is rampant, and it's ridiculous. (…) SCHULTZ: Rick Scott, the Republican governor of Florida, as part of his election reform law that he just pushed through the legislature, literally said to third party groups who register voters, “We're going to fine you a thousand dollars per voter if you don't turn the voter registration form in within 48 hours of registering that voter.”
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Click here to view this media Every time you think these guys can’t possibly stoop just a little bit lower with the tactics they’re willing to resort to, they manage to sink to a new low. From the Detroit Free Press — Conservative group: Fake eviction notices were ‘meant to startle people’ : The state director of the conservative group Americans for Prosperity offered no apologies today for papering homes in Detroit’s Delray district Monday with fake eviction notices. Bearing the words “Eviction Notice” in large type, the bogus notices told homeowners their properties could be taken by the Michigan Department of Transportation to make way for the New International Trade Crossing bridge project. The NITC is the subject of debate in Lansing, and Americans for Prosperity is lobbying heavily against it. “It was meant to startle people,” Scott Hagerstrom, the group’s state director, said today. “We really wanted people to take notice. This is the time that their opinions need to be heard. We wanted people to read it.” Read on… And from Think Progress — Americans For Prosperity Places Fake Eviction Notices On Detroit Homeowners’ Doors To Scare Up Support : The Michigan chapter of the Koch-backed conservative activist group Americans For Prosperity (AFP) has been campaigning against a new bridge project called the New International Trade Crossing (NITC) that the state is considering. While there may be some merit to some of the arguments against the NITC project, the tactics AFP has just been found to be using in campaigning against it are revolting . Yesterday, numerous residents in the Delray area of Detroit came back to their homes to find eviction notices. The problem was that these notices were not authorized by any sort of local government authorities. Rather, they were mocked up by AFP to look like actual eviction notices. The “notices” sensationally claimed to homeowners that their property may be seized if the NITC is constructed. Some residents, particularly elderly ones, were physically shaken by the tactic AFP’s tactics are bad enough by themselves, but they are even worse when you consider where the fake eviction notices were delivered. Michigan has the country’s highest foreclosure rate, and Detroit in particular is perhaps the epicenter of the foreclosure crisis.
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A London Wildlife Trust report shows the capital is greying, with green spaces increasingly paved over or built on If the garden of England is Kent, then its front drive may well be London, according to a survey that shows the capital’s householders and landlords are paving over front gardens, erecting sheds and decks, and cutting down trees. The biggest survey ever conducted of private space in the capital, taken by the London Wildlife Trust, shows it is getting greyer – threatening its reputation of being one of the world’s greenest cities because of its extensive public parks and gardens. The city is losing the equivalent of two-and-a-half Hyde Parks of greenery a year from its private, domestic gardens – about 3,000 ha (7,410 acres), says the report. It goes on to say that this is undermining wildlife and adding to the “heat island” effect, which sees temperatures in cities much higher than in the countryside and contributes to drainage problems as water floods more quickly into drains. The report compared city-wide aerial surveys taken in 1998 and 2006, and found that domestic gardens make up nearly 24% of the city’s total area, or 37,900 ha. Of this, about 22,000 ha, or 14% of the city, is covered with lawns and tree canopy. The report estimates that there are around 2.5 million trees in private gardens. But as a result of changing fashions in garden design and management, the area of plant-covered land dropped 12% during that period, while the area of hard surfacing increased by 26%. The survey also found that Londoners were fast discarding their lawnmowers to build sheds. The area of lawn decreased by 16% and that of new garden buildings increased by nearly 55%. Although the report was not detailed enough to identify which boroughs were destroying their gardens, suspicion fell equally on both rich and poor boroughs. Anecdotal evidence suggests that London’s greener outer suburbs, where gardens are around 10 times larger on average than those in inner city boroughs, are increasingly paving over their green space as a fashion statement. However, landlords in inner city boroughs may be turning to concrete in order to avoid paying for garden upkeep. “The speed and scale of the loss is alarming,” said Matthew Frith, deputy chief executive of London Wildlife Trusts. “Collectively these losses detrimentally affect London’s wildlife and impact on our ability to cope with climate change. It’s never been more important that Londoners understand the value of the capital’s gardens.” The reasons suggested for the decline of the garden green space include insurance companies insisting that trees are removed to avoid claims for subsidence, the infilling of large gardens to provide building land space, consumer pressure to make gardens look more like living rooms and the rise of the shed as a home working space. “There has been a great gap in our knowledge about London’s private gardens. People are taking more interest in wildlife gardens but everyone can do something to make London greener,” said report author Chloe Smith. According to Smith, nearly two thirds of all London’s front gardens are now covered with hard surfaces, whereas back gardens have around 33% lawn and 22% hard cover. “An area of vegetated garden equivalent to 21 times the size of Hyde park was lost between 1998 and 2006,” she said. Surprisingly, the survey shows that the 2.5m garden trees in London cover nearly 6,700ha, or 4% of all greater London. This makes London technically one England’s largest privately owned forests, bigger than Sherwood, and around one third the size of all the woodland owned by the National Trust. If all the public gardens and parks of the capital are included, London would almost certainly be one of the greenest mega-cities in the world. A study of 386 European cities in 2009 found green space coverage averaging 18.6%. Other British cities including Leeds and Edinburgh are thought to be comparable to London with around 25% garden cover, said Smith. Endangered habitats Wildlife Conservation Gardens London John Vidal guardian.co.uk
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Daughter reattempts to make France’s richest woman, 88, a ward of court after she invests in company run by TV mogul Only months after they kissed and made up, France’s richest woman, the L’Oréal heiress Liliane Bettencourt, and her daughter appear to have fallen out again. Françoise Bettencourt Meyers, the heiress’s only child, is reported again to be seeking to have her mother made a ward of court after Bettencourt, 88, invested €170m (£151m) in a company belonging to one of her lawyer’s clients. The two buried the hatchet in December after a three-year estrangement over Bettencourt’s decision to give a society photographer more than €1bn worth of art masterpieces, cash and life-insurance policies. But the second act of what French newspapers call the Bettencourt affair erupted on Tuesday, after Bettencourt Meyers, 57, alerted the authorities, claiming at least one member of her mother’s entourage appeared to be taking advantage of her deteriorating mental state. Her accusations were directed at Pascal Wilhelm, Bettencourt’s lawyer and the man appointed in January to manage her “interests”. The latest spat in France’s long running family feud saw a judge, police officers and five doctors turn up at Bettencourt’s home on Tuesday to check on her health. Their arrival at the house in the chic Paris suburb of Neuilly at 8am – at least two hours before the heiress reportedly makes her morning appearance – was prompted after Bettencourt failed to keep two medical appointments. Le Monde revealed that in March a judge had decided that it was “impossible” for Bettencourt to act in her own interests. It quoted a legal document stating her “cognitive faculties” had changed for the worse and that she suffered from profound deafness. Bettencourt Meyers decided to act again when she discovered her mother had written a cheque for €170m as an investment in a company run by television mogul Stéphane Courbit, who brought the Big Brother reality show to France, and is also a client of Wilhelm. Bettencourt legally named Wilhelm to manage her fortune in January as part of the agreement with her daughter reached last December. However, Wilhelm also remained her lawyer, which Bettencourt Meyers argues is a conflict of interest. The Bettencourt affair, as it became known, began in 2007 after Bettencourt Meyers accused the photographer François-Marie Banier, 63, of taking advantage of her mother’s frailty and sued him for “abuse of weakness”. Secret tape recordings suggested Bettencourt had made Banier her “sole heir”. In 2010, the affair turned from private squabble to political scandal amid allegations – vehemently denied – that Bettencourt had made illegal donations to President Nicolas Sarkozy’s election campaign . It was also revealed that the wife of Eric Woerth, then budget minister, was working for a company managing the heiress’s fortune while Bettencourt had hidden millions from the taxman in Swiss bank accounts. Bettencourt Meyers later dropped the case after her mother agreed to change her will and not see Banier and the photographer renounce the insurance policies. This week, she told lawyers she feared a “new security cordon” was being thrown up around her mother “to the detriment of her family”. France Nicolas Sarkozy Kim Willsher guardian.co.uk
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• Proposal to increase production rejected by 6 of 12 members • Analysts foresee Opec’s power base weakening Oil prices have jumped by more than $1 a barrel after a meeting of Opec collapsed in acrimony without a deal to aid the struggling world economy by pumping more crude. Saudi oil minister Ali al-Naimi called the gathering “one of the worst meetings we have ever had,” after the Saudis’ proposal to increase production quotas by about 1.5m barrels a day was blocked by six of the group’s 12 members, including Iraq and Venezuela. Several countries argued that they are using their tax revenues to cushion their populations against the rocketing cost of other commodities such as food and cannot afford for oil prices to fall. Opec is not due to meet again for another three months, and some analysts said the angry divergence of views could mark the beginning of the end for the cartel. “A new world order beckons, doubtless preceded by disorder,” said Marc Ostwald, strategist at Monument Securities. He predicted that non-Opec members such as Russia and Kazakhstan could be the main beneficiaries if the cartel’s power wanes. Production quotas have now remained unchanged since 2009. The International Energy Agency, the global energy watchdog, expressed its “disappointment” at Opec’s decision and urged producers to increase output anyway. “Ongoing supply disruptions, as well as the fragile state of the global economy, call for a prompt increase in supply on a competitive basis that will allow refiners to boost throughputs and meet rising seasonal demand,” it said, adding: “Otherwise, a further tightening in the market and potential increases in prices risk undermining economic recovery, which is in the interests neither of producers or consumers.” However, Julian Jessop, chief international economist at Capital Economics, said the weakening outlook for the global economy should bring oil prices down later this year: “We continue to expect the price of Brent crude to drop back below $90 per barrel by the end of the year, as global demand continues to disappoint, the Middle East risk premium fades, and the dollar rebounds.” Oil Commodities Heather Stewart guardian.co.uk
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About to take on evil wizard Voldemort for the very last time, Emma Watson stands ready, finally, to take on her next challenge. “I was in denial,” she told the Sunday Times Style Magazine about her brief retreat into the anonymity of college life. “I wanted to pretend I wasn’t as famous as I was. I was trying to seek out normality, but I kind of have to accept who I am, the position I’m in and what happened.” The position she’s in is beloved megastar of the most successful movie franchise in the world. And while her run in “Harry Potter,” is ending with next month’s eighth and final volume, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2,” she has plenty more on her plate. Watson is the new face of Lancome, and is set to star in the big screen adaptation of the angst-teen novel “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” As for that foray into college — she took a break this spring — she swears she’s not done with her education and will be returning to school in the fall. And while she won’t be going back to Brown, she swear it has nothing to do with alleged bullying. “It made me so sad when all this stuff came out that I left Brown because I was being bullied. It made no sense at all. Brown has been the opposite. I’ve never even been asked for an autograph on campus. I threw a party for nearly 100 students and not a single person put a photo on Facebook,” she told the paper. “Anyway, even if I was being given a hard time, I wasn’t going to wuss out of university because someone said ‘Wingardium leviosa’ to me in a corridor, or ‘Ten points for Gryffindor.’ I’ve been dealing with the media since I was nine. If I can’t stand up to a few people giving me a hard time, it’s a bit pathetic, really. I’ve had so much worse.” Watson does admit, however, that dating has been a bit of a problem for her as of late. “I say to my friends, ‘Why hasn’t X called me? Why doesn’t anyone ever pursue me?’ They’re like, ‘Probably because they’re intimidated.’ It must be the fame wall,” she said. “It must be the circus that goes around me. Me, as a person, I find it hard to believe I would be intimidating.” In fact, when she does hear from guys, it’s not always a positive experience. “Sometimes, maybe because they feel intimidated, they feel they have to knock me down. They know perfectly well who I am, but they’ll ask me, ‘How are the Narnia films going?’” she laments. “I’m single at the minute.” For much more, click over to the Times Sunday Style Magazine or the blog WatsonUncensored.
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MP calls for expanded investigation as list grows of those allegedly hacked by Jonathan Rees for News International Pressure is building on the Metropolitan police to expand their phone-hacking inquiry to include a notorious private investigator who was accused in the House of Commons on Wednesday of targeting politicians, members of the royal family and high-level terrorist informers on behalf of Rupert Murdoch’s News International. Guardian inquiries reveal that the former prime minister Tony Blair is among the suspected victims of Jonathan Rees , who was involved in the theft of confidential data, the hacking of computers and, it is alleged, burglary. According to close associates of Rees, he also targeted: • Jack Straw when he was home secretary, Peter Mandelson when he was trade secretary and Blair’s media adviser Alastair Campbell; • Prince Edward and the Countess of Wessex, and the Duke and Duchess of Kent, all of whom are said to have had their bank accounts penetrated, and Kate Middleton when she was Prince William’s girlfriend; • The former commissioner of the Metropolitan police, Sir John Stevens, and the current assistant commissioner, John Yates , who later supervised the failed phone-hacking inquiry for 19 months; • The governor and deputy governor of the Bank of England, whose mortgage account details were obtained and sold. Rees, who worked for the Mirror Group as well as the New of the World, is also accused of using a specialist computer hacker in July 2006 to steal information about MI6 agents who had infiltrated the Provisional IRA. According to a BBC Panorama programme in March, Rees was commissioned by Alex Marunchak , then the News of the World’s executive editor, to hack the information from the computer of Ian Hurst, a former British intelligence officer in Northern Ireland who had stayed in contact with several highly vulnerable agents. Marunchak has denied the allegations. The Guardian has previously identified other suspected targets of Rees, including Eric Clapton, Mick Jagger, George Michael, Linford Christie, Gary Lineker, Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan, and the family of the Yorkshire Ripper, Peter Sutcliffe. None of these cases has been officially confirmed or even investigated. With many of them, it is not yet clear precisely what form of surveillance Rees and his agency, Southern Investigations, were using. Answers may lie in the “boxloads” of paperwork the Metropolitan police are believed to have seized from Rees. But the Labour MP Tom Watson told the prime minister on Wednesday the head of the Operation Weeting inquiry into the News of the World’s investigator, Glenn Mulcaire , had told him that it may be beyond its terms of reference to investigate this evidence. “Prime minister, powerful forces are attempting a cover-up,” Watson said. “Please tell me what you intend to do, to make sure this doesn’t happen.” While Glenn Mulcaire worked for the News of the World as a full-time employee from 2001, Rees worked freelance for the Mirror Group and the News of the World from the mid 1990s. His agency was earning up to £150,000 a year from the News of the World alone. In 1999, he was arrested and sentenced to seven years for conspiring to plant cocaine on a woman so that her husband would get custody of their children. After his release in May 2004, the News of the World continued to hire him under the editorship of Andy Coulson, who went on to become David Cameron’s media adviser. Rees’s targets during this period included Prince William’s then girlfriend, Kate Middleton. Scotland Yard is believed to have collected hundreds of thousands of documents during a series of investigations into Rees over his links with corrupt officers, and over the 1987 murder of his former business partner, Daniel Morgan . Charges of murder against Rees were dismissed earlier this year. Daniel Morgan’s brother, Alastair, who has been gathering information for a book, told the Guardian he was aware from his own investigations and from material revealed in court hearings that the Metropolitan police was holding “boxloads” of evidence on Rees’s activities. Guardian inquiries suggest that this paperwork could include explosive new evidence of illegal news-gathering by the News of the World and other papers. According to journalists and investigators who worked with him, Rees exploited his position as a freemason to make links with masonic police officers who illegally sold him information on targets chosen by the News of the World, the Sunday Mirror and the Daily Mirror. One close contact, Det Sgt Sid Fillery, left the Metropolitan police to become Rees’s business partner and added more officers to their network. Fillery was subsequently convicted of possession of indecent images of children . Some police contacts are said to have been blackmailed into providing confidential information. One of Rees’s former associates claims that Rees had compromising photographs of serving officers, including one who was caught in a drunken coma with a couple of prostitutes and with a toilet seat around his neck. Rees claimed to be in touch with corrupt Customs officers, a corrupt VAT inspector and two corrupt bank employees. An investigator who worked for Rees claims he was commissioning burglaries of public figures to steal material for newspapers. Southern Investigations has previously been implicated in handling paperwork which was stolen by a professional burglar from the safe of Paddy Ashdown’s lawyer, when Ashdown was leader of the Liberal Democrats. The paperwork, which was eventually obtained by the News of the World, recorded Ashdown discussing his fears that newspapers might expose an affair with his secretary. The Guardian has confirmed that Rees also used two specialist “blaggers” who would telephone the Inland Revenue, the DVLA, banks and phone companies and trick them into handing over private data to be sold to Fleet Street. One of the blaggers who regularly worked for him, John Gunning, was responsible for obtaining details of bank accounts belonging to Prince Edward and the Countess of Wessex, which were then sold to the Sunday Mirror. Gunning was later convicted of illegally obtaining confidential data from British Telecom. Rees also obtained details of accounts at Coutts bank belonging to the Duke and Duchess of Kent. The bank accounts of Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, are also thought to have been compromised. The Guardian has been told that Rees spoke openly about obtaining confidential data belonging to senior politicians and recorded their names in his paperwork. One source close to Rees claims that apart from Tony Blair, Straw, Mandelson and Campbell, he also targeted Gaynor Regan, who became the second wife of the foreign secretary, Robin Cook, the former shadow home secretary, Gerald Kaufman; and the former Tory minister David Mellor. It is not yet known precisley what Rees was doing with these political targets, although in the case of Peter Mandelson, it appears that Rees obtained confidential details of two bank accounts which he held at Coutts, and his building society account at Britannia. Rees is also said to have targeted his brother, Miles Mandelson. Separately, for the News of the World, Glenn Mulcaire was hacking the voicemail of the deputy prime minister, John Prescott, Straw’s successor as home secretary, David Blunkett, the media secretary, Tessa Jowell, and the Europe minister, Chris Bryant. Scotland Yard has repeatedly refused to reveal how many politicians were victims of phone hacking, although Simon Hughes, Boris Johnson and George Galloway have all been named. The succesful hacking of a computer belonging to the former British intelligence officer Ian Hurst was achieved in July 2006 by sending Hurst an email containing a Trojan program which copied Hurst’s emails and relayed them to the hacker. This included messages he had exchanged with at least two agents who informed on the Provisional IRA – Freddie Scappaticci , codenamed Stakeknife; and a second informant known as Kevin Fulton. Both men were regarded as high-risk targets for assassination. Hurst was one of the very few people who knew their whereabouts. The hacker cannot be named for legal reasons. There would be further security concern if Rees’s paperwork confirmed strong claims by those close to him that he claimed to have targeted the then Metropolitan police commissioner, Sir John Stevens, who would have had regular access to highly sensitive intelligence. Sir John’s successor, Sir Ian Blair, is believed to have been targeted by Glenn Mulcaire, although it has not been confirmed that Mulcaire succeeded in listening to his voicemail. Assistant commissioner John Yates was targeted by Rees when Yates was running inquiries into police corruption in the late 1990s. It appears that Yates did not realise that he himself had been a target when he was responsible for the policing of the phone-hacking affair between July 2009 and January 2011. Targeting the Bank of England, Rees is believed to have earned thousands of pounds by penetrating the past or present mortgage accounts of the then governor, Eddie George, his deputy, Mervyn King, who is now governor, and half-a-dozen other members of the monetary policy committee. According to police information provided to the Guardian in September 2002, an internal Scotland Yard report recorded that Rees and his network were engaged in long-term penetration of police intelligence and that “their thirst for knowledge is driven by profit to be accrued from the media”. Operation Weeting has been investigating phone hacking by the News of the World since January. The paper’s assistant editor, Ian Edmondson , chief reporter, Neville Thurlbeck, and former news editor James Weatherup have been arrested and released on police bail. News International Rupert Murdoch News of the World Phone hacking Tony Blair Peter Mandelson Jack Straw Alastair Campbell Kate Middleton Eric Clapton Prince William Mick Jagger Tom Watson Police Glenn Mulcaire Daily Mirror Trinity Mirror Andy Coulson Paddy Ashdown John Prescott David Blunkett John Yates Nick Davies guardian.co.uk
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Prime minister gives full backing to justice secretary Kenneth Clarke, saying he has ‘plenty more fuel left in his tank’ David Cameron has denied that his government has made a “complete mess” of health and justice reforms amid claims of two major policy U-turns on the same day. The prime minister also gave his full backing to the justice secretary, Kenneth Clarke, saying he has “plenty more fuel left in his tank”. The defence came after the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, seized on reports that Cameron has ditched controversial plans to introduce a 50% prison sentencing discount for an early guilty plea after holding talks with Clarke on Tuesday. Miliband told Cameron at prime minister’s questions: “He knows, and the whole country knows, he’s in a total mess on his sentencing policy, just like on all his other crime policy.” The Labour leader also accused Cameron of being in a “complete mess” over his health plans after the announcement on Tuesday that the prime minister was abandoning key elements of health secretary Andrew Lansley’s, original blueprint for health reforms. He pledged changes to deadlines, competition, funding and waiting times, causing consternation among many Conservative MPs. Cameron had changed course because he had been “found out” over his plans to turn the NHS into a “free market free-for-all” , Miliband said. Cameron dismissed Miliband’s attacks, accusing him of “empty opposition”, “weak leadership” and “jumping on a series of bandwagons”. Miliband turned first to sentencing policy, asking Cameron to confirm reports that he had “torn up” a key plank of the justice secretary’s policy on sentencing. The prime minister did not answer directly, but said: “What we want is tough sentences for serious offenders. “We produced a consultation paper that had widespread support for many of the proposals that it made and, in the coming weeks, we will be publishing our legislation.” He said it was the Labour government that introduced a one-third discount on sentences, and lent his support to Clarke when asked by the Tory MP Philip Hollobone why magistrates were forced to retire at 70 when the justice secretary, who appoints them, is 71 later this year. Cameron said: “It is important that you get turnover in the magistrates so that new people come in. To be fair to the lord chancellor, he has only been in his job for a year – he’s doing a superb job, and I can tell you there is plenty more fuel in his tank.” On the NHS, the prime minister said the review of the plans was conducted because the government “wanted to get these right”. He added that there had been “widespread support” for the review from the shadow health secretary, John Healey. “What he [Miliband] calls a shambles, his shadow health secretary calls good government,” Cameron said. “He’s not really in command of the ship.” Miliband said Cameron had made a series of promises before the election, such as no more top-down reorganisations of the NHS, because he was “completely shameless and he will say anything”. He said the prime minister “didn’t think the policy through”, such as the decision, last June, to stop enforcing the 18-week target, claiming that the amount of patients waiting longer than 18 weeks had gone up by 69%. The prime minister said Miliband’s performance at the dispatch box suggested he “wasn’t thinking about politics on his honeymoon”. Cameron said median waiting times had gone down and claimed Miliband had misled the house about the issue two weeks ago, prompting an intervention from the Commons Speaker, John Bercow, who urged him to withdraw the remark in line with protocol. Cameron said: “What I meant, of course … he gave an interesting use of facts in terms of waiting times, which are down in the NHS.” Miliband responded: “The whole house will notice he didn’t withdraw that, and obviously he is rattled about the health service. “After a year, he’s proved the oldest truth in politics – you can’t trust the Tories on the NHS.” David Cameron Ed Miliband PMQs House of Commons Labour Kenneth Clarke Conservatives Liberal-Conservative coalition Prisons and probation Health policy Health Public services policy UK criminal justice Hélène Mulholland guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Sarah Palin Shows Her Mean Girl Persona In "Apology" For Stealing Romney’s Spotlight
June 8, 2011 No Comment
Click here to view this media Some people never leave high school. That’s what came to my mind while watching Sarah Palin make a forced and oh-so-sincere apology to Mitt Romney for stepping all over his announcement that he was running for the Republican nomination. But the look on her face makes it clear that she doesn’t think it’s her fault that the media would rather see her mangle American History 101 than watch the actual announced candidate. Palin’s all about the attention, doncha know? And all’s fair in love and war…and Republican politics. David Frum spoke to Lawrence O’Donnell about Sarah’s spoiler role in the Republican primary season. Click here to view this media Ultimately, I think it will be the non-Fox media that will have to come to grips with the notion that Palin is just not a serious player, no matter how hard Fox tries to legitimize her. Fox News cannot be the agenda-setter for all other media.
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We hear from doctors, nurses, community workers and those living with HIV and Aids about attitudes towards the virus in their countries Liz Ford Lisa Villani
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