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A California mother says that she was forced to pay spousal support to her ex-husband after he raped her daughter for years.

Carol Abar told KCBS that her former husband, Ed Abar, began raping her then-9-year-old daughter soon after she married him in 1991.

But the daughter, who did not wish to be identified, said she did not tell her mother for 16 years because she was terrified of her stepfather.

"He had threatened me that he would kill my mom; he would kill my stepbrothers; he would kill me," she recalled.

When Carol Abar found out, she filed for divorce. Because she made more money than her husband, a judge ordered her to pay alimony of $1,300 a month.

"The judge told me I had no proof. It was my word against him," she explained. “He had been raping her since she was little. Since I got married to him.”

Just last year, Ed Abar finally pleaded guilty to one of four rape charges and was sentenced to over a year in jail. After Carol Abar had paid about $22,000 in support, a judge temporarily halted the payments.

But now that he's out of prison, Carol Abar's ex-husband is asking the court to force her to resume the payments.

"He’s asking not just to resume the existing support of $1,300 a month, but he’s asking for what amounts to approximately $33,000 in past due support and that too is a miscarriage of justice," attorney Brian Uhl, who is representing Carol Abar, said.

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MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell went after the NRA's Wayne LaPierre after he attempted to exploit the Boston Marathon bombings with his claim that more of the city's residents would have liked to have had a gun while the manhunt for the suspects was going on.

Cops–not NRA’s armed citizenry–stopped terrorists in Boston:

“How many Bostonians wished they had a gun two weeks ago?” National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre asked an audience Saturday at the gun lobbying group’s annual convention in Houston, Texas. LaPierre argued more guns in the hands of Bostonians would have helped in the city-wide manhunt for the marathon bombing suspects and protect residents.

O’Donnell said that comment was “spoken like a man who knows nothing about Boston.” The Last Word host said guns could not have stopped the tragedy that unfolded following the deadly attack.

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This has to be one of the most pitiful things I've seen in a long time, even by Fox's "standards" -- if they had any. Brit Hume jumped the shark on Bret Baier's show this Monday and tried to conflate their drummed-up Benghazi non-scandal to George W. Bush lying about Saddam Hussein and fearmongering to get us to invade a country that was not a threat to the United States.

HUME: Long experience teaches that highly anticipated Congressional hearings often fail to meet expectations. Witnesses don't quite say in public what they told investigators ahead of time. Congressional interrogators prove inept and unfocused. But if Wednesday's Benghazi hearing lives up to its billing and the truth about what happened that night and the administration's efforts to disguise it, might at last begin to come out.

Yet for this case to become the scandal it surely deserves to be, will require another ingredient – relentless news coverage of the kind the media typically avoid when the subject is someone or some cause they favor. That's why the Gosnell abortion horrors were played down for so long. And that's why the now-discredited Benghazi talking points are treated as just an honest mistake.

Each new advance tidbit from Wednesday's witnesses makes it clear that the State Department, CIA and White House deliberately concocted the Benghazi cover story that was false in nearly every particular. Now, think back to the disputed claim by President George W. Bush that Iraq had tried to buy uranium in Africa. It amounted to sixteen words in his 2003 State of the Union Address and it was arguably true.

But it triggered a media firestorm that did much to advance the notion that Mr. Bush had lied to the U.S. into Iraq. Now, suppose that administration had done what this one has on Benghazi.

It's hard to say what's more disgusting and reprehensible: The revisionist history on Bush lying us into invading Iraq, or the fact that he thinks his audience is stupid enough to believe four people being killed in a country that they knew full well was dangerous and in turmoil is in any way akin to the hundreds of thousands of lives that were destroyed and God knows how much money flushed down the toilet due to the actions of the Bush administration.

Every time I think Fox can't sink to a new low, they outdo themselves once again.

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The Daily Show's Jon Stewart took his audience through the good, the bad and the crazy that was the NRA's 2013 National Convention over the weekend. After pointing out that it looked a whole lot like a recycled CPAC convention with the same lineup of guests complaining about the same set of grievances, Stewart noted that they did eventually get around to the fearmongering and guns.

After showing some of Wayne LaPierre's "simple message" about how the only one that can stop a "bad guy with a gun" is a "good guy with a gun," Stewart pointed out that the message wasn't quite so simple at the convention this year, since the lot of them didn't seem to know just who the bad guys or good guys are, or what the definition of democracy and tyranny are for that matter.

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Televangelist Pat Robertson on Monday defended an Ecuadorian preacher's homophobic comments and said that LGBT people could change their "orientation," just like God could change murderers and rapists.

The Huffington Post reported earlier this year that evangelical preacher Nelson Zavala had his political rights revoked after he said that homosexuality was "immoral" while he was campaigning for president.

"For somebody to say that a homosexual can change is somehow a hate crime -- it is a hate crime to say that somebody can change their sexual preference, that that's a hate crime?" Robertson opined on Monday. "That's what's going to happen, ladies and gentlemen. Mark that down and fight for freedom because that man's freedom of speech is being taken away."

"And the idea that anybody who has ministered to thousands of people -- as undoubtedly he has and others have in that church in Ecuador -- know very well that the power of God can change people's orientation. A murderer can change, a rapist can change, a thief can change. That's what the gospel is all about. It's not a hate crime."

(h/t: Right Wing Watch)

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Heritage Foundation President Jim DeMint on Monday said that he opposed a bipartisan plan for comprehensive immigration reform because "unlawful immigrants" could live "another 50 years" and take advantage of government benefits that they earned by paying taxes.

At a press conference on Monday, the Heritage Foundation released a report that claimed the immigration reform bill offered by the "Gang of Eight" senators would cost Americans $6.3 trillion.

"The number over the 50-year lifespan of an amnesty for unlawful immigrants, it's $6.3 trillion to the American taxpayer," DeMint told Fox News host Martha MacCallum prior to the press conference. "And we know over time that this is going to increase more debt, increase taxes. That has a depressing effect on our economy. And we know that unlawful immigrants -- once that they have amnesty -- are going to replace the jobs of many Americans and depress their salaries."

"So there is no way you can look at this and conclude that it's good for the American taxpayer, and that includes immigrants who are here lawfully."

MacCallum noted that most benefits would not be available to immigrants for 13 years under the proposed plan.

"I'll believe that when I see it," the former South Carolina senator quipped. "Even if they follow through, unlawful immigrants are already receiving many benefits. A lot of their children are legal American citizens, whether its public education or Medicaid. But if you just look at a 13-year window when the life expectancy of unlawful immigrants goes another 50 years and once they get on Social Security and Medicare -- I mean, the average cost of an unlawful immigrant is hundreds of thousands of dollars."

DeMint added that he was all for immigration reform as long as "lower-skilled, less-educated" immigrants were excluded from the plan.

"In 1960, the average immigrant had about the same education and skill level of an American citizen. Today, immigrants have -- they're four times less likely to even have a high school diploma. And now with all of our welfare benefits, the arithmetic for immigration is totally different."

(h/t: Twitter/@igorvolsky)

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This parody of an actual product meant to instill tolerance could land the makers in legal hot water. News report by WGN, Chicago.

via Opposing Views

A greeting card picturing a talking Muslim terrorist doll on the front with the message “Hope Your Birthday Is a Blow Out” is causing controversy in Chicago.

The Chicago Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) wrote an official letter to the greeting card maker, NobleWorks Inc., over the card. The doll pictured on the cover wears a traditional headscarf, a Hijab, and messages on her box read “The Talking Doll, Pull string for message, if you dare,” and “She’ll Love You To Death! She’ll Blow Your Brains Out!”

"There are those who will claim Muslims do not have a sense of humor," wrote CAIR-Chicago director Ahmed Rehab. "But one would like to think humor comes with (even a minimal degree of) intelligence."

CAIR-Chicago pointed out card makers may have also infringed on copyright. The dolls are an actual Arabic language product made by Desi Doll Company.

Aamina the Talking Muslim Girl is a bilingual plush doll is described as a “fun way for young children to learn languages” and “learn about Islam and its teachings.” Aamina recites words from the Quran like “As-Salamu-Alaikum” (peace be upon you) and “Insha’llah” (if Allah wills).

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Digby flagged this segment from this Sunday's Fareed Zakaria GPS, and as she noted, Zakaria seems to be singing a very different tune now on whether austerity is popular with the masses in Europe than he was four years ago. And as she noted, being wrong never seems to get anyone kicked out of the club once you've gained entry as one of the Very Serious People by our corporate media.

Fareed Zakaria four years ago in a post called The Center Holds: In Britain even pain is popular":

Three weeks ago the new chancellor, 39-year-old Tory George Osborne, presented a budget that promised to get Britain’s fiscal house in order with sharp cuts in spending, coupled with tax increases. It landed in the midst of a heated debate across the industrialized world about how to best get the economy back on track. Osborne and his boss, Prime Minister David Cameron, have come down firmly on one side of this debate, hoping that a major effort to reduce the deficit will reassure bond markets and investors that Britain is a safe and compelling place to put their money.

Leaving aside the economics of this, what struck me as I spent time in Britain last week was the politics of deficit reduction. Having announced major cuts in popular programs, plus hefty tax increases, the Cameron government might be expected to be losing popularity by the day. But in fact the budget was well received by the public—though attacked ferociously from the left—and the governing coalition has actually inched up a bit in the polls.

There are several possible reasons for this. Cameron has played the public role of prime minister exceedingly well, making a pitch-perfect apology for the British Army’s wrongful use of force in Northern Ireland in 1972, and handling himself on the global stage with grace and ease. It’s also true, of course, that the effect of the cuts and taxes have not yet been felt, and when that happens, the government’s poll ratings might plunge. But clearly the honesty of the budget has resonated with voters.

It’s heartening to see a government do something that it must have thought would be deeply unpopular, and then be rewarded by the public...

I love this description of how he reacted to the commentary from his guests. Potted plant indeed:

Zakaria still rails against "entitlements" (which his earlier guest Stephen Haas described as a "cancer" to no objection from anyone) but he hasn't exactly come clean about the disastrous effects of the austerity measures in Europe that "heartened him" so strongly, has he? No, today he sits there like a potted plant while the bill of indictment rolls right over him.

But then he's a card-carrying Very Serious Person which means never having to say you're sorry.

Ain't that the truth? I don't always get a chance to watch all of his show every week, but I don't recall seeing him doing much to rebut that flawed economic study by Reinhart and Rogoff which the right has used to justify austerity as well. Most of our corporate media has done their best to ignore that, even as many of them, as Zakaria was here, have finally been forced to admit that maybe that whole push for austerity isn't working out so well.

Full transcript below the fold.

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Rep. Jason Chaffetz was more than happy to help continue the Republican witch hunt on Benghazi this Sunday, but as Josh Israel over at Think Progress took note of, when pressed by Chris Wallace about his claims that there are witnesses from the State Department who are being threatened by their bosses, he couldn't name any examples.

Asked about a claim by a witness’s lawyer that whistle-blowers had been blocked from testifying (a claim rejected by the Department of State), Chaffetz said that “more than one” witness has indeed been “suppressed” by the Obama administration. [...]

Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA) quickly debunked his colleague: “There’ve been two attorneys involved here, the only reason they haven’t received information is that they haven’t asked for it yet… there has not been a request for documents from these attorneys to the State Department.”

The only “retaliation,” Lynch noted, was that one of the witnesses wants a reassignment and a promotion and feels he’s being retaliated against because has not yet gotten the promotion.

As they reminded their readers and we have here as well, there are plenty of reasons why anything Victoria Toensing, who is representing some of these potential witnesses, attaches her name to, and who has been peddling conspiracy theories for months now, ought to be looked at with more than just a healthy dose of skepticism.

Full transcript below the fold.

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On this Saturday's Fox News Watch, the fake outrage that's been going on for months on end on the network over the embassy bombings in Libya continued, with the talking heads on the panel of course doing their best to hype Darrell Issa's upcoming hearings this week. When host Jon Scott asked his guests why the other networks weren't giving this story the same type of media of coverage as Fox, hilarity ensued.

The National Review's Rich Lowry claimed there's some conspiracy with the rest of the media to do the administration's bidding and help stonewall the issue and then later call it old news and say “let's move on.” Regular and Fox token “liberal” Ellen Ratner claimed that the other networks were just “jealous” after quoting someone saying anything that comes from Fox “ought to be taken with a grain of salt.”

Scooter Libby stenographer Judith Miller called the administration refusing to answer all of her network's questions “chutzpah” and Fox's Jim Pinkerton criticized the Washington Post for running a story about protests at a nuclear facility and how dare they write that story while ignoring Fox and their fake Benghazi outrage.

Judith Miller wrapped things up by having the “chutzpah” to actually claim it's “lamentable” that this story has become “politicized.” Well, there's one thing I agree with that was said here, but it's been the Republicans and her network that are responsible for it.