Read a little. Learn a lot. • Tightly-written news, views and stuff • Follow us on Twitter • Be a Facebook Fan • Tumble us!

27 Jul 2011 22:53

tags

Culture: Massachusetts politicians cut “It Gets Better” clip

  • If you thought this was the last time you’d get to see United States lawmakers in an “It Gets Better” video, think again! John Kerry, who was absent from the previous effort, has made up for it by posting an IGB clip of his own, where he appears alongside a bunch of other Massachusetts politicians to help comfort LGBT youth. The gang’s all here—and by “gang,” we mean “Massachusetts congressional delegation”—except for Scott Brown, who’s afraid of getting primaried from the right in his re-election campaign busy focusing on jobs and the economy. Regardless, it’s nice to see more lawmakers stepping up to the plate here.  source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

10 May 2011 17:46

tags

U.S.: Mr. Diplomat: Senator John Kerry heads to Pakistan

  • Tense times call for Kerry: The Massachusetts Senator, also head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, will be traveling to Pakistan this week, likely to try to smooth things over after what’s been a very rocky stretch for American/Pakistani relations. Kerry has long been a supporter of the aid the U.S. has been providing Pakistan — as we mentioned yesterday, it totals $18 billion over the last nine years — so one might expect a pacifying tact on this visit. Also, in your alternate political history update, we could be halfway through President Kerry’s second term right now.  source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

13 Apr 2011 11:26

tags

U.S.: Two losers try to save face by introducing online privacy bill

  • “GUYS! Guys. Come on, you know us.” “I’m the guy who lost the presidential election in 2004. Flanking me on my left is the guy who lost in 2008. Despite the fact that we’re both losers, we still have some winning moments, and this is one of them. We’re introducing this online privacy bill to ensure that consumers still have rights on the Internet and that their info isn’t being shared by anyone like those jerks at Rapleaf. I know my boy didn’t even discover Twitter until like a year ago, but we’re totally on top of this thing. Give us some credit, guys!” source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

20 Feb 2011 17:07

tags

Politics: A Senate revival? The secondary F-35 engine that just won’t die

  • yes House GOP leadership, led by Speaker John Boehner (whose state stood to benefit), fought for additional funding for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter’s second engine.
  • no However, it was forced out of the bill thanks to the hard work of Rep. Tom Rooney, who corralled the freshmen Republicans to block the amendment. Whoo!
  • yes Now, Sens. John Kerry and Scott Brown, among others, are working to ensure the funding gets back in the bill. Hey, at least it’s bipartisan, right? source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

08 Dec 2010 21:00

tags

Politics: One well-known dude in Obama’s compromise corner: John Kerry

  • Obama can count on one influential Democrat in his corner. Problem is, it’s John Kerry, who’s as exciting as vat of ketchup. OK, now that we’ve gotten the veiled insult at his wife out of his way, let’s see what he has to say about the compromise: “The truth is, the President got a lot of things here we’ve been fighting for that we haven’t yet been able to win any other way.” It’s one of a number of messages that the White House has been distributing tonight. We have to emphasize, though, that we’re with Andrew Sullivan on this one: It’s frustrating to see Obama compromise, but he’s playing a pretty good game of handball with the GOP in making this compromise. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 May 2010 12:27

tags

Politics: John Kerry tells us the truth: We can’t quit offshore drilling

  • Now we are not going to stop drilling in the Gulf tomorrow, folks. Let’s be realistic. There are 48,000 wells out there. One of them went sour. About 30 percent of our transportation fuel comes from the Gulf. You think Americans are going to suddenly stop driving to work tomorrow? Do you think people are going to stop driving the trucks to deliver the goods to the department stores? Not going to happen.
  • Sen. John Kerry • Pointing out the ugly truth about the oil spill, which is that, put into perspective, we really need to be offshore drilling to keep up with energy demands. Put THAT in your pipe and smoke it, crazy dreaming environmentalists. That dream of yours? It’s in a pipe. A pipe distributing oil. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

24 Feb 2010 22:12

tags

Politics: We imagine John Kerry feverishly working on a climate change bill

  • Senator Reid made it clear to me the other day that he wants a bill and he wants it soon.
  • Sen. John Kerry • Discussing the possibility of a climate change bill just in time for the sting of the the health care bill to wear off. He says he plans to have a bill within the next two weeks, which we imagine he’ll be writing at the very last second, asking Professor Reid if he can get an extension on because he tripped on a ketchup packet and sprained his ankle or something. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

24 Dec 2009 09:50

tags

U.S.: Campaign contributions didn’t affect the vote that much, it seems

  • $9.27 million the amount Republican John McCain has gotten from the health care industry; Orrin Hatch and Mitch McConnell were also well-compensated
  • $8.34 million the amount Democrat John Kerry got; Max Baucus (the bill’s biggest influencer) and Arlen Specter also got slightly bigger paydays than Hatch & McConnell source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

26 Aug 2009 21:26

tags

U.S.: When Mass. last had an open Senate seat, leg warmers were popular

  • 25 years since both Senate seats weren’t filled by somebody source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

09 Aug 2009 11:38

tags

U.S., World: The next diplomacy frontier: Climate change in unstable regions

  • I’ve been making this argument for a number of years, but it has not been a focus because a lot of people had not connected the dots.
  • Democratic Sen. John Kerry, who chairs the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee • Regarding climate change and the effect it could have on the world’s stability. Some regions, such as sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia – areas which already could be considered among the world’s more unstable – could face rising tides, droughts, food crises and other problems as a result of global warming. Recent war games have suggested this, and the U.S. is considering how it will handle these issues down the road. • source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
top tags
older >>