Insanity abounds at the Values Voter Summit

At "The League of Ordinary Gentlemen," Tod Kelly reports on what he heard at the Values Voter Summit. This is pretty amazing stuff. It would be difficult to make up things this bizarre. Here's an example:

The greatest challenge to our security and our Constitution we face in the 21st century is gay soldiers being able to marry. (Steven King, US Rep-Iowa)
Kelly's bonus observation was quite interesting to me:
Friday morning before Paul Ryan came out, they showed a video presentation honoring the Heritage Foundation. The video ended with stills of famous conservatives that had worked with the foundation, and each got a different level of applause by the audience, based on how popular the pictured conservative was. Not surprisingly, the picture of Paul Ryan got the loudest. The next biggest cheers went to a picture of Limbaugh, followed by one of Hannity, and right behind him was George W. Bush. One of the pictures that got the least, shockingly, was the picture of Reagan, who got what might be called a polite, golf-clap smattering. This may have been the most surprising moment of the conference for me.
I do think we have gotten to the point where Ronald Reagan is far to liberal for the leaders of today's Republican Party.

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Homosexuality in the 1950’s

This is a shocking film to watch. Yes, I understand the concern that kids should beware of strangers. But check out the characterization of "homosexuals." According to this film, they are all sick pedophiles and murderers. This video serves as a time capsule, or at least it should, except that many people still harbor these attitudes.

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Your bi-partisan politicians at work: floodgates to open to Wall Street misinformation

The hucksters are about to fill the airwaves with misinformation. From the New York Times:

Soon retirees and other investors will be barraged with advertisements for private stock offerings — via mail, cold calling, television, radio, billboards, the Internet and so on.Such advertising, which used to be banned under federal securities law, will make it easier for hedge funds, venture capitalists, start-ups and other nonpublic companies to find investors. It will also make it easier for hucksters and rip-off artists to lure people into unsuitable investments and outright frauds because private offerings are not subject to disclosure requirements and other investor protections that apply to publicly held companies. Bipartisan majorities in Congress and President Obama are to thank for this development. Bowing to the financial industry, they joined forces last April to pass a law that requires the Securities and Exchange Commission to lift the ban on mass advertising of private offerings.

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