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Sen. Diane Feinstein told Fox News' Chris Wallace that she supports sending detainees from Guantanamo Bay to California maximum security prisons. "In a maximum security prison, I don't worry about it, provided the prison is set up to accommodate it, and I believe we have facilities that are," said Feinstein.

John Amato:

DiFi knows all about prisons since California has such an incredible prison population that is regulated by asinine rules. Also several idiotic ballot initiatives have made it harder to lower the prison population by easing sentences on drug abusers instead of drug dealers. That being said, Diane at least takes the step of not being a bed-wetter when it comes to taking Gitmo prisoners. We as a country certainly know how to incarcerate people.

Bond acts like a frightened little child when talking about Gitmo prisoners and spreads the falsehood that Gitmo prisoners will suddenly be hanging out with the general population of a prison so they can grow al-Qaeda cells behind prison walls and encourage those nasty criminals into criminal behavior. It's absurd and another lunatic right wing talking point. He knows what Maximum security means and if we built new prisons to hold detainees then it would create jobs for the state of California or any state willing to take them. It would also close the disgusting Gitmo hell hole chapter from the Bush era and end it as a recruiting tool for terrorists, a win-win situation all around.

Transcript via CQ Politics:

FEINSTEIN: Well, as you know, I’m one that believes very strongly Guantanamo should be closed, and I believe it can be done.

I’m also one that’s somewhat familiar with the prison structure in the United States. And I know that there are maximum security prisons from which no one escapes in the United States, which are isolated from neighborhoods.

And no one is going to put these people in anyone’s neighborhood, as some have tried to say.

WALLACE: So you’ll be OK with having some of these detainees in California?

FEINSTEIN: Yes. In a maximum security prison, I don’t worry about it, provided the prison is set up to accommodate it, and I believe we have facilities that are.

WALLACE: Senator Bond, you get the last word.

BOND: I -- this is one of the areas on which Senator Feinstein and I disagree. I think Guantanamo is the best place to hold these hardened criminals. We don’t want to put them in our general prison population where they have and will radicalize other prisoners.

They will draw their friends in Al Qaida to come into the area from the outside. I wouldn’t mind seeing them at Alcatraz, but my California friends have minimum amount of high enthusiasm for that.

But if they’re sick, they’re transferred to the federal Springfield, Missouri medical facility in my state, and my constituents and I think that would be a very bad idea.

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President Barack Obama explained to the Congressional Black Caucus that some people were confused about why health care reform opponents were comparing him to Hitler. Ann Coulter told Fox News' Geraldo Rivera that she suspects posters showing Obama with a Hitler mustache were created by "liberal agitators."

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President Bill Clinton told NBC's David Gregory that the vast, right-wing conspiracy that once targeted him is now focusing on President Barack Obama. "You bet. Sure it is. It's not as strong as it was because America has changed demographically but it's a virulent as it was," he said.

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George Carlin from Back in Town, 1996. Very funny and definitely not safe for work.

h/t Mikeovhell

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Fox News' Chris Wallace hailed conservative filmmaker James O'Keefe as the "Power Player of the Week" Sunday. When asked about allegations that he broke Maryland wiretap laws by recording ACORN employees with out their knowledge, O'Keefe confessed that he didn't know.

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Syndicate columnist Charles Krauthammer appeared on Fox News Sunday with sharp criticism of President Barack Obama speech to the UN General Assembly. "I think he indulged himself in his speech at the General Assembly, which started out as sort of adolescent utopianism and went downhill. He started out saying things like no nation can dominate another. He said no group of nations ought to be above others," said Krauthammer.

"What do our allies think when they hear that and when they hear -- as we saw in the clip -- Obama denigrating his own country and presenting himself as the man who will redeem America from its wickedness and he said those of you who doubt that the character of America should look at what we -- meaning I -- have done in the last eight months, including joining the human rights council act at the U.N. which is a body which we should take no pride in being on. I thought it was a sorry performance. It did not advance our interest in the least," concluded Krauthammer.

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Here's another portion of Michael Moore's interview with Wolf Blitzer from Sept. 24, 2009. Michael is exactly right about one thing here. You're not seeing the passion on the left in support of the President because he started from a compromised position instead of starting with single payer and compromising from there if need be. He is also correct that if, not when, the President ever came out for single payer, you would see massive amounts of people coming out and supporting him. You're not going to see that passion on the left for a watered down giveaway to the insurance industry.

BLITZER: That's what President Obama said back in 2003. But now he's backed away from that as president of the United States and he seems to be backing away even from the so-called public option, which would allow the government -- a government-run health insurance company to compete with the private insurance companies. Is this what you wanted?

MOORE: Well, here's the -- here's the problem with President Obama on the health insurance proposal. He's a nice guy. You know, I mean, really, I believe he came into the White House with an olive branch to the people on the other side of the aisle. He believed in bipartisanship. I mean you've got to give the guy credit. He really -- he did not come in wanting to fight. He came in saying, you know, we're all Americans here and we need to fix this and we need to put aside this partisan stuff.

The other side didn't want to put it aside. The other side wanted to fight him tooth and nail. And -- and as part of his nice guy thing, he -- he backs a half measure, a public option.

BLITZER: But that might not even...

MOORE: And we (INAUDIBLE)...

BLITZER: That might not even make the final bill that he signs.

MOORE: And that may not. Well, of course not, because any time you don't fight for the thing you want, any time that you start off compromising, you're never going to get what you want. He started off with a compromise position -- let the private insurance companies still sit at the table, have a public option. He should have started with what he truly believes in, what he believed in, what he said in 2003, a single payer, national health care system, like all other Western countries have. We should have the same thing.

I know he believes in that, but he was trying to reach out and say, you know what, I'm not just going to come in here and ram this, so I'm willing to work with you and listen to your concerns. They don't want to listen to him.

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From The Late Show with David Letterman Sept. 25, 2009.

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Rachel Maddow with the second half of her report on the political witch hunt of ACORN and the problems that the De-Fund ACORN Act is going to bring for private war contractors if it actually passes.

As Rachel notes the De-Fund ACORN Act has a bill of attainder problem. The Constitution prohibits the legislature from enacting bills of attainder, which means the De-Fund ACORN Act must also include "any company that's ever been indicted for breaking campaign finance laws, or that's ever filed fraudulent paperwork with any federal agency". That means a good deal of our military contractors are going to be swept up under the law as well and it cannot only be enforced against ACORN.

Rachel reads off a list of all of the military contractors that would have their funding cut off and goes into the list of other crimes like murder, prostitution and contract fraud that they have committed as well which pale in comparison to what ACORN has been accused of.

Jeremy Scahill is asked whether the war contractors are worried about this law touching them. His answer. "Hell no." It's all about politics and too many in Congress are bought and sold by our military industries. And as he notes, ACORN got pennies when compared the massive sums of money these private contractors received.

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Rachel Maddow breaks down who is behind the smears against ACORN and why, and how dishonest the reporting has been by the right wing media on the topic.

MADDOW: It may seem like the only thing happening in Congress these days is the never-ending fight over and of health reform. But if you happen to be watching the House floor at 3:00 this afternoon, this is what you would have seen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. STEVE KING ®, IOWA: Who has consistently called for the clean-

up of the corrupt ACORN, the criminal enterprise ACORN and all of their affiliates? It‘s been people on the Republican side of the aisle that have done that. This is the star of ACORN. He is—he is the lead chief organizer. He is the—he is the person who told the people at ACORN, “I will invite you into the—and we will be setting the agenda for America,” even before he is inaugurated as president of the United States. This is the man who worked for ACORN.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MADDOW: This is the star of ACORN!

That was paranoid Republican Congressman Steve King of Iowa, today, railing against the community organizing group ACORN, and falsely accusing President Obama of being ACORN‘s lead chief organizer. This sort of animus toward ACORN is something that‘s been percolating on the right for a really long time, but it‘s broken open recently as even Democrats in Congress have decided to go along with efforts to defund and demonize ACORN, and some Republican governors have even enthusiastically defunded ACORN as well, despite the fact that those governors didn‘t fund them in the first place.

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