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World Net Daily columnist and former Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum on Sunday insisted that Americans were entitled to armor-piercing bullets because they are "a right in our country."

The Pennsylvania Republican told an ABC News panel that conservatives "should stick to our guns" and oppose President Barack Obama's efforts to curb gun violence in the wake of the slaughter of 20 children in Newtown, Connecticut.

"Having a gun and gun ownership is part of how people can feel safer," Santorum explained. "And in my opinion, when you look at the disingenuousness of the [Obama] administration when they met with the NRA, and [Vice President] Joe Biden did. And the NRA brought up the fact that prosecutions for gun crimes and prosecutions for people who lie on their registration forms or gun forms are down under this administration. The vice president responded, 'We don't have time to devote to see whether people fill out a form right!'"

Current TV host Jennifer Granholm pointed out that there had been fewer enforcements because the National Rifle Association (NRA) had pushed Republicans to oppose any effort to confirm a head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).

"This is not about taking peoples guns away, this is about a narrow set of proposals that will enable us to help enforce the existing gun laws," Granholm explained. "The ban on assault weapons and a ban on high capacity magazines and even a ban on armor-piercing bullets are overwhelmingly supported by the citizenry. Fifty percent of men, 59 percent of women support an assault weapons ban. Same number for a ban on high capacity magazines."

"What about the president's argument that if it can stop even one of these horrific shootings, it's worth a try?" host George Stephanopolous asked Santorum.

"Well, how many people are you going to deny guns who are going to protect themselves?" the former Pennsylvania senator replied.

"Senator, what about the magazines?" ABC correspondent Cokie Roberts wondered. "Why have a magazine that can riddle a 6 year old into shreds?"

"Here's what I would say about that: 50 years ago, you could go on a catalog and buy a gun," Santorum opined. "There were no restrictions on gun ownership, there were no restrictions on magazines, there were no restrictions on anything and we had a lot less violence in society than we do today. The idea of pointing to the gun instead of pointing to society -- and not one thing the president did dealt with Hollywood and gun violence and video games and all the glorification of violence."

"Armor-piercing bullets, why do you need that?" Granholm interrupted.

"Why do you need to protect Hollywood?" Santorum shot back.

"You're deflecting," Granholm observed. "Deer don't wear armor. Why do you need an armor-piercing bullet?"

"But criminals could," Santorum quipped.

"And police officers certainly do," Granholm noted.

"Having the ability to defend yourself is something that is a right in our country," Santorum asserted.

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This clip of a curvaceous and big-haired 19 year old Jennifer Granholm went viral this week on YouTube.

via The Detroit Free Press:

The buzz surrounding former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm about her enthusiastic speech to the Democratic National Convention may shift this week as a long-lost copy of her 1978 appearance on “The Dating Game” surfaced on YouTube.

“Let’s give a hand for the cute and curvaceous Jennifer Granholm,” the show’s host, Jim Lange says as a 19-year-old Granholm, complete with big, blonde, Farrah Fawcett-like hair comes on stage to meet her three bachelors.

Marty Nislick, 67, of Bayside, N.Y., told the Free Press he came across the footage on the Facebook page of a friend who was one of the losing contestants on the show with Granholm.

“I’m a Democrat of the liberal persuasion and I have always admired Jennifer Granholm,” he said. “And she was 19 years old, so I think she could be excused for being on a stupid show.”

Granholm took the sudden Internet attention in good humor. Her former spokeswoman Liz Boyd sent her a link to the clip. After watching it, Granholm said: “I’m still laughing so hard my stomach still hurts.”

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From this Thursday evening's Democratic National Convention, this is what you call a barn-burner folks. Former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm brought down the house with her passionate speech thanking President Obama for saving the auto industry when no one else was willing to come in and rescue them, including Bain Capital, and took it to Mitt Romney for famously saying to "let Detroit go bankrupt."

Full text of former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm's speech at Democratic National Convention:

Good evening, I'm Jennifer Granholm, from the great state of Michigan, where the trees are just the right height! Let me tell you a story about the dark days in my home state. Towards the end of my time as governor, Ford closed one of its biggest factories, a factory in Wixom, Michigan. The Wixom plant had employed thousands of middle-class men and women in neighborhoods near—yet worlds away from—the place Mitt Romney was raised.

When Ford's decision hit, I went down to the local union hall. It was almost empty; a few workers milled about in shock and grief. I talked to a 45-year-old guy who told me, "This is the only place I've ever worked.

I've been loyal. I've done everything they've ever asked. And just like that, it's gone." He looked around the hall and said, "So, governor, is it over for us? Is the American auto industry dead?" Honestly, at that moment, I just didn't know. And that was just the beginning. When the financial crisis hit, things got a lot worse – and fast.

The entire auto industry, and the lives of over one million hard-working Americans, teetered on the edge of collapse; and with it, the whole manufacturing sector. We looked everywhere for help. Almost nobody had the guts to help us – not the banks, not the private investors and not Bain capital. Then, in 2009, the cavalry arrived: our new president, Barack Obama!

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From this Tuesday evening's coverage on Current TV of the Republican National Convention, The War Room host and former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm reacts to Ohio Gov. John Kasich taking credit for his state's improving economy.

As Granholm and others pointed out, if Kasich were willing to be honest, he'd be thanking President Obama for saving the auto industry and his state's economy, rather than praising and supporting the guy for president, who famously said to let Detroit go bankrupt. If it were up to Willard, Kasich wouldn't have anything to be bragging about right now.

Par for the course for a convention whose entire theme is based on a lie and distortion and taking President Obama's "you didn't build that" remarks out of context.

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The religious lifestyle show hosted by televangelist Pat Robertson on Monday suggested that Christians in Florida had convinced God to move soon-to-be Hurricane Isaac away from Tampa, Florida to protect Republicans.

During a segment about how Isaac forced the first day of Republican National Convention to be cancelled, Christian Broadcasting Network's Paul Strand noted that Current TV host Jennifer Granholm sent out a "snarky tweet" saying that "God has ways to shut that whole thing down."

"For anybody who's a liberal who's part of a party that would like to whitewash God out of America, it's amazing that she's acknowledging that God has any part in the storm," conservative radio host Bill Bunkley told CBN.

"But gratitude's been a predominant attitude in Tampa's Christian circles as it looks like the city will escape much of Isaac's wrath," Strand reported, pointing out that the group "Pray Tampa Bay" was leading an effort to "cover the party conventions in prayer."

"We have had lots and lots of people praying around the clock that it would move," Rev. Jesten Peters explained. "And if you watch from the very beginning where they were saying it was coming up and now where they're saying it's going, then it's really moved a lot for us, and we appreciate God doing that and moving it for us."

Tropical Storm Isaac is project to strengthen into a hurricane within a day, sparing Tampa, but making landfall south of New Orleans almost exactly seven years after Hurricane Katrina devastated the city.

At the time, Robertson suggested that then-Supreme Court nominee John Roberts' unwillingness to overturn abortion rights caused the storm.

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As an update to our previous post yesterday. Via the Oakland Press:

Two U.S. Secret Service agents on Thursday interviewed Councilman Paul Smith, one day after the Sterling Heights City Council voted 6-1 to ask the freshman councilman to resign over derogatory statements he made at a Tea Party rally in 2009 against President Barack Obama and other political figures. Smith said he won’t resign.

Smith said his interview with federal officers at City Hall on Thursday morning went well and it was more of a friendly dialogue than a grilling.

“Some joker called the Secret Service and made a complaint about me,” Smith said. “They told me that their policy is they respond to every complaint and that’s exactly what they did. They asked me a lot of questions dating back to when I was a kid. I answered them honestly and I guess they believe I’m not a threat or some kook.”
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He carried a large sign with a picture of former House speaker Nancy Pelosi with bullet holes in her face and a hammer and sickle, symbols of the Communist Party. The verbiage on the sign said, “Extreme left bitch,” “We won’t die soon enough,” and “She hates America, God, You and Capitalism.”

Former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm was depicted in a hangman’s noose. Smith called the three (Obama, Pelosi and Granholm) communists, and said they are worse than any enemy America ever fought against.

Nope, not a kook at all.

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We've been accustomed to these type of signs at Tea Party rallies. What's unusual in this instance is that this person went on later to get himself elected and become a public official. The non-binding resolution means Smith still holds the position and is not up for re-election this year. The video above is a snippet from a longer video at YouTube, found here.

via The Detroit News

Sterling Heights— The City Council called for Councilman Paul Smith to resign over a video that shows him holding inflammatory signs depicting violence against President Barack Obama and others during a tea party rally in 2009.

The council on Wednesday passed a resolution, 6 to 1, with Smith the "no" vote, urging Smith to resign. He is in his first term on the council.

Mayor Pro Tem Michael Taylor said he began drafting the resolution after he saw the video. He described the images in the video, which runs 3minutes and 15 seconds, as "incredibly disturbing."

"It's beyond unreasonable for anyone to do, and it's obvious we're dealing with someone who is completely irrational," he said.

In the video posted on YouTube, Smith, a tea party member, displayed signs showing illustrations of the impaled head of the president, then-Gov. Jennifer Granholm with a noose around her neck and U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with bullet holes in her face. The signs also included slurs against undocumented immigrants and gay people.
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Reached Wednesday, Smith said he sees nothing offensive about the images, which he said were "good old First Amendment speech."

"Yeah, it's harsh, but it's a harsh world, it's a harsh game," Smith said. "As long as you don't use a real weapon, it's fair game."

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I have to agree with former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm here and that's if Republican governors across the country think they can run on taking away medical coverage for the people who live in their states, good luck with that.

We've already seen the threats out of the likes of Bobby Jindal with more joining him this week. Even if these governors don't have one iota of care for the poor and those who don't have much of a voice in our society, they're going to be hearing from hospitals and others in the medical community and not just constituents who are fed up with their nonsense.

Here's more from Current's site on Granholm's commentary: Granholm: Health care issue is real and personal, not abstract and political :

The health care debate isn’t about political theory or semantics, it’s about people’s lives. Jennifer Granholm says voters will see through the rhetoric and defy Republicans who push for taking away people’s coverage, who fight against the freedom people should have to live without fear of sickness and crippling debt. Granholm says, “Republican leaders, you want your campaign slogans to be: “Vote for me and I’ll take your child’s health insurance away… Good luck with that.”

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Filling in for Jennifer Granholm of Current TV's The War Room, John Fugelsang spoke to spoke to Brian Sims who is a policy attorney and civil rights advocate running for the Pennsylvania state House of Representatives 182nd District and was featured as part of the network's LGBT Pride Month.

As Sims and Fugelsang noted, Mitt Romney's position on gay marriage has changed over the last decade or so, with Mittens doing his best to outdo John Kerry and any criticisms of him flip flopping. Romney was for it before he was against it, before he was for it again and then against it again. That's not just a flip flop. It's just pandering and hoping voters have selective amnesia, along with hoping that we don't have those thing called recording devices these days, so people can go back and see when you talked out of both sides of your mouth.

Regardless of what Romney's stances were in the past, he's moved so far to the right during this presidential campaign, I think it's safe to say that if we're unfortunate enough to see him elected, he's going to govern from the far right because that's where the Congressional Republicans and those advising him now are going to push him, and sadly it's going to be on a lot more issues than just gay marriage where it means more misery for the American public and the working class.

Here's more from Current on Sims' interview: Brian Sims: Gay marriage ‘common sense’ for most Americans, but not for Romney

Pennsylvania candidate and civil rights advocate Brian Sims talks about Romney’s stance on marriage equality and how Romney’s waffling is a reflection of the polls. “My guess is that behind closed doors, Mitt Romney would tell you that he’s had gay friends, gay family, gay co-workers, and we all know that he has. And my guess is that he probably treated them with the utmost respect. But the fact that he, in order to receive the nomination from the Republican party, feels that he needs to stray so far from what is very common sense for most Americans speaks more to the party than it does to Mitt Romney.” Sims also tells his personal story, of coming out as gay while a championship college football player.

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After Cory Booker went out and undermined some of the recent attack ads by the Obama campaign during his appearance on Meet the Press this weekend, and President Obama's defense of those attacks, telling reporters that the issue is not a distraction but instead critical to evaluating Mitt Romney's qualifications to be president, Paul Krugman agreed during his appearance on Current TV's The War Room with Jennifer Granholm.

Krugman: Romney ‘really does not understand the economy at all’ :

Nobel Prize-winning economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman joins Jennifer Granholm in The War Room to discuss candidate Mitt Romney. Krugman says, in spite of his protestations, Romney’s business career is fair game. “Yes, he made a lot of money. He made a lot of money in ways that were often not good for workers.” Krugman points out that what made Romney an effective businessman may be the opposite of what’s needed from the leader of a country: “What a President needs to do is not what you need to do if you’re trying to make a bunch of money for private equity for investors.”

Krugman also pointed out the need for more stimulus spending right now to get the economy out of this depression we've been in:

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