Home > Top of the Morning > Top of the morning

Top of the morning

Post on February 13, 2012 by Chris Fitzsimon 11 Comments »

The New York Times editorial this morning explores the pernicious role the right-wing American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is playing in state legislatures around the country.

It’s based on a report from ProgressVA that found many bills in the Virginia General Assembly were lifted almost word for word from proposals from ALEC on issues like voter ID, anti-health care reform, gun rights, and for-profit virtual charter schools.

Sound familiar?

This entry was posted in Top of the Morning. Bookmark the permalink.

Thousands at HKonJ take their message to NC’s legislature (audio postcard)

AP: How is Romney like 007? Both have money offshore

Comments (Closed):11

Frances Jenkins
February 13, 2012 at 7:38 am
What do you propose to do about the problems? We are on a runaway train and tax the rich is not the only solution. You fan the flames of divison rather than solutions. Get off of your hate for the right and begin to search for solutions. A poor quality education creates a greater class of poor and a greater divison between rich and poor. The system is failing the poor and you want to continue to fund the current system. It will not work. Education is the only hope for the poor, but not the current system.
jlp75
February 13, 2012 at 10:41 am
So Frances, you have no problem with a questionable organization circumventing state’s rights by passing identical legislation in every state with a Republican lead legislature? I always thought the purpose of state’s rights was so individual states would be allowed to govern as the residents of the state see fit. In this environment, states with more conservative constituents can have a conservative government while more liberal states can have liberal governments. When a group of monied conservatives decides to push the same conservative legislation in every state they all sort of start looking the same don’t they? State by state the agenda is becoming clear and it is basically gain control by conservatives, gerrymander and disenfranchise voters to keep control by conservatives. It would appear that the goal is a Republican take over of the country followed by decades of Republican control. I don’t know about you, but one party rule sounds a lot like a communist dictatorship to me. Certainly not something true patriots would be interested in. But when you have a country with a large portion of low information wannabe patriots, who engorge themselves with misinformation from Fox News this is what you get.
Frank Burns
February 13, 2012 at 3:30 pm
Yes this sounds very familiar. We see the same thing being done by the left, sponsored and paid for by that former Nazi collaborator, George Soros.
gregflynn
February 13, 2012 at 9:01 pm
George Soros was not a “Nazi collaborator”. You can read the true story of how a 14 year old Jewish boy survived Nazi occupation of Hungary from March 1944 through April 1945 through his father’s efforts with a false identity as the Christian son of a government official who himself had a Jewish wife.
Alex
February 14, 2012 at 7:28 am
George Soros is a predator plain and simple !
gregflynn
February 14, 2012 at 9:01 am
Predator? George Soros, Carl Icahn, Rupert Murdoch, Mitt Romney, Henry Kravis, Donald Trump, Ron Perlman, Michael Milken, Warren Buffet, T Boone Pickens, Ken Lay. Oh, I see where you’re headed. You’re all for capitalism except when you’re against it.
Frank Burns
February 14, 2012 at 3:46 pm
I saw the 60 Minutes interview with Soros. It was clear to me that Soros knew exactly what he was doing and that experience helped form the man we see today. He participated in confiscating jewish property with no feeling of guilt as he said.
gregflynn
February 14, 2012 at 9:59 pm
KROFT: For example that, ‘I’m Jewish and here I am, watching these people go. I could just as easily be there. I should be there.’ None of that?

Mr. SOROS: Well, of course I c — I could be on the other side or I could be the one from whom the thing is being taken away. But there was no sense that I shouldn’t be there, because that was — well, actually, in a funny way, it’s just like in markets — that if I weren’t there — of course, I wasn’t doing it, but somebody else would — would — would be taking it away anyhow. And it was the — whether I was there or not, I was only a spectator, the property was being taken away. So the — I had no role in taking away that property. So I had no sense of guilt.
Frank Burns
February 15, 2012 at 6:14 am
The rest of the story.

George Soros Interview On 60 Minutes http://sweetness-light.com/archive/george-soros-on-helping-the-nazis-during-the-holocaust

When the Nazis occupied Budapest in 1944, George Soros’ father was a successful lawyer. He lived on an island in the Danube and liked to commute to work in a rowboat. But knowing there were problems ahead for the Jews, he decided to split his family up. He bought them forged papers and he bribed a government official to take 14-year-old George Soros in and swear that he was his Christian godson. But survival carried a heavy price tag. While hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews were being shipped off to the death camps, George Soros accompanied his phony godfather on his appointed rounds, confiscating property from the Jews.

(Vintage footage of Jews walking in line; man dragging little boy in line)

KROFT: (Voiceover) These are pictures from 1944 of what happened to George Soros’ friends and neighbors.

(Vintage footage of women and men with bags over their shoulders walking; crowd by a train)

KROFT: (Voiceover) You’re a Hungarian Jew…

Mr. SOROS: (Voiceover) Mm-hmm.

KROFT: (Voiceover) …who escaped the Holocaust…

(Vintage footage of women walking by train)

Mr. SOROS: (Voiceover) Mm-hmm.

(Vintage footage of people getting on train)

KROFT: (Voiceover) …by–by posing as a Christian.

Mr. SOROS: (Voiceover) Right.

(Vintage footage of women helping each other get on train; train door closing with people in boxcar)

KROFT: (Voiceover) And you watched lots of people get shipped off to the death camps.

Mr. SOROS: Right. I was 14 years old. And I would say that that’s when my character was made.

KROFT: In what way?

Mr. SOROS: That one should think ahead. One should understand and–and anticipate events and when–when one is threatened. It was a tremendous threat of evil. I mean, it was a–a very personal experience of evil.

KROFT: My understanding is that you went out with this protector of yours who swore that you were his adopted godson.

Mr. SOROS: Yes. Yes.

KROFT: Went out, in fact, and helped in the confiscation of property from the Jews.

Mr. SOROS: Yes. That’s right. Yes.

KROFT: I mean, that’s–that sounds like an experience that would send lots of people to the psychiatric couch for many, many years. Was it difficult?

Mr. SOROS: Not–not at all. Not at all. Maybe as a child you don’t–you don’t see the connection. But it was–it created no–no problem at all.

KROFT: No feeling of guilt?

Mr. SOROS: No.

KROFT: For example that, ‘I’m Jewish and here I am, watching these people go. I could just as easily be there. I should be there.’ None of that?

Mr. SOROS: Well, of course I c–I could be on the other side or I could be the one from whom the thing is being taken away. But there was no sense that I shouldn’t be there, because that was–well, actually, in a funny way, it’s just like in markets–that if I weren’t there–of course, I wasn’t doing it, but somebody else would–would–would be taking it away anyhow. And it was the–whether I was there or not, I was only a spectator, the property was being taken away. So the–I had no role in taking away that property. So I had no sense of guilt.
gregflynn
February 15, 2012 at 10:13 am
George Soros was not a “Nazi collaborator”.

Soros survived the Holocaust with a subterfuge that made him a witness to some evil things that may have seemed pedestrian at the time. Soros has been honest about this. When Glenn Beck repeated this smear in 2010 the Anti-Defamation League responded:

Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director and a Holocaust survivor, issued the following statement:

Glenn Beck’s description of George Soros’ actions during the Holocaust is completely inappropriate, offensive and over the top. For a political commentator or entertainer to have the audacity to say – inaccurately – that there’s a Jewish boy sending Jews to death camps, as part of a broader assault on Mr. Soros, that’s horrific.

While I, too, may disagree with many of Soros’ views and analysis on the issues, to bring in this kind of innuendo about his past is unacceptable. To hold a young boy responsible for what was going on around him during the Holocaust as part of a larger effort to denigrate the man is repugnant.

The Holocaust was a horrific time, and many people had to make excruciating choices to ensure their survival. George Soros has been forthright about his childhood experiences and his family’s history, and there the matter should rest.
Frank Burns
February 15, 2012 at 3:48 pm
What does Glen Beck have to do with the price of eggs? We can read the interview for ourselves without the aid of Glen Beck’s input and make our own judgements.