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11 Jan 2012 20:26

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Politics: Mississippi judge blocks 21 of Haley Barbour’s pardons

  • Checked by the judiciary: Thanks to a request by Mississippi’s Democratic Attorney General, Jim Hood, 21 of the 208 pardons issued by outgoing Governor Haley Barbour yesterday have been blocked. Hood objected on the grounds that the convicts in question failed to give sufficient notice they were seeking the pardons, which he claims amounts to a violation of the state’s constitution on Barbour’s part. Barbour defended his decision today, in a statement emphasizing the relatively low rate of currently serving prisoners released, as well as medical considerations. (Photo by Gage Skidmore) source
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

11 Jan 2012 15:18

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U.S.: Mississippi ex-Governor Haley Barbour goes on pardon spree on last day in office

  • 208 pardons by Haley Barbour on his last day in office source
  • » The power of the pen: In a move that shocked the Mississippi political system and jumbled up the traditional left-right orthodoxies on law and order, outgoing Governor Haley Barbour used his last day in office to pardon 208 inmates, among them 14 convicted murderers, as well as the older brother of former NFL quarterback Brett Favre. This deluge has both led Democratic lawmakers to push for future restrictions on the gubernatorial right to pardon. To be sure, it’s wrong to decry a particular pardon without knowing all the facts. But waiting until the last day of an eight-year tenure, with no more accountability in sight? That’s always going to cause controversy, and rightly so. Edit: Fixed an error. Sorry about that all :/
Posted by Chris Tognotti • 0 Comments • Permalink

28 Apr 2011 10:29

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U.S.: Death toll from tornadoes, storms in South absolutely insane

  • 213+ people killed by storms throughout the South
  • 131+ were killed by severe storms in Alabama alone
  • 32+ were killed by severe storms in nearby Mississippi
  • 12+ people were killed by storms in Georgia
  • 30+ people were killed by the storms in Tennessee
  • 8+ people were killed as far north as Virginia source
  • » An unprecedented toll: In Alabama in particular, where Tuscaloosa took incredibly strong damage from the storm and many died in Birmingham, officials were still trying to wrap their heads around the disaster. “I would be pretty sure about saying we’ve never had 128 people die in one day,” said Yasamie August, the Alabama Emergency Management Agency’s information manager. (The number’s jumped since she spoke.) “It’s going to be difficult to get an accurate count of damage or injuries at this point. Many people can’t get to a hospital.”
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

25 Apr 2011 22:56

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U.S.: Republicans in Mississippi ambivalent about outcome of Civil War

  • 38% of Mississippi GOPers wish the South had won source
  • » There’s more: If you include the 41% that’s undecided, you get a whopping 79% of Mississippi Republicans who aren’t quite ready to throw their support behind Abraham Lincoln circa 1861. Also, 9% of African Americans in the state aren’t sure whether they like the NAACP more than the KKK; surely, this is the result of a typo, or some sort of methodological error, or perhaps a psychoactive pollutant in the drinking water. Oh well; at least 54% of the state agrees that interracial marriage shouldn’t be illegal. That’s right, a whole 54%!
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

21 Mar 2011 21:44

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Politics: Haley Barbour would like to introduce you to … Haley Barbour

  • They have yet to learn what a Haley Barbour is, and that will be a challenge.
  • Haley Barbour • Speaking about himself in the third-person in a profile piece about him for the New York Times. He’s a likely 2012 presidential candidate, but his profile is a tad low — more Herman Cain, less Sarah Palin. If anyone needs an idea of who this Haley Barbour character is, we have a pretty good collection of posts about this guy. In his defense, he did some great work as Mississippi governor in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. But on the other hand, he has said a bunch of other stuff that voters may not like. And he has a career as a lobbyist under his belt, which doesn’t exactly mesh well with the current anti-lobbyist vibe right now. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

17 Feb 2011 22:36

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Politics: Haley Barbour refuses to condemn tribute to KKK leader

  • No candidate can successfully run for president if he doesn’t understand you should rebuke efforts to honor the man most identified with the KKK.
  • The Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin • On Mississippi governor and likely presidential candidate Haley Barbour’s latest racially-tinged blunder. After praising the racist, pro-segregationist Council of Conservative Citizens last year as “an organization of town leaders,” and insisting that that the civil rights battles of the 60s weren’t “that bad,” he’s now refusing to condemn an effort in Mississippi to make commemorative license plates honoring a leader of the KKK, Nathan Bedford Forrest. For a while, members of the GOP establishment have been urging Barbour not to run for President. We think they’re onto something. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 01:04

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Politics: Judges spar over constitutionality of health care reform

  • tuesday A federal judge in Florida found the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate provision unconstitutional and struck down the whole law, saying the provision invalidated everything. Republicans rejoiced.
  • thursday A federal judge in Mississippi, tackling a similar lawsuit, contended that there wasn’t sufficient standing for him to take the case, and threw it out. Democrats rejoiced. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

30 Dec 2010 18:09

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U.S.: Haley Barbour: Want early release? That will cost you one kidney

  • $11 the amount two Mississippi sisters stole in an armed robbery at a nightclub 16 years ago
  • two the number of life sentences they got for the crime (really); they had no prior records
  • one number of kidneys one sister has to donate as a condition of her sentence getting suspended source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

21 Dec 2010 22:06

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Politics: Haley Barbour backtracks on controversial segregation statements

  • Nobody should construe that to mean I think the town leadership were saints, either. Their vehicle, called the ‘Citizens’ Council,’ is totally indefensible, as is segregation.
  • Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour • Making the inevitable backtrack after his controversial statements that suggested he didn’t think racism in the South wasn’t that big a deal. And not a moment too soon. This guy wants to possibly run for president in 2012. After that interview, have fun with that, buddy. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

21 Dec 2010 10:59

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Politics: Haley Barbour’s not feeling the love over civil rights comments

  • There’s nothing in his past that shows that. If you pick out a sentence or a paragraph out of a fairly long article and harp on it, you can manipulate it.
  • Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour’s press secretary, Dan Turner • Criticizing the coverage of comments Barbour made to The Weekly Standard about living during the Civil Rights era. Liberal organization Media Matters, which obviously would want to make political hay out of something like this, promoted the comments, in which Barbour praised the White Citizens’ Councils (a late-’60s group that opposed integration of different races) as “an organization of town leaders” that were a positive force in the community. As for the civil rights struggle in his hometown, Yazoo City, Mississippi, he simply said: “I just don’t remember it as being that bad.” Barbour, who’s been suggested as a presidential candidate more than once, has been one of the party’s most successful figures in recent years, so if something like this stuck, it could hurt his chances. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
 
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