{"id":19,"date":"2009-09-13T03:04:00","date_gmt":"2009-09-13T11:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=19"},"modified":"2009-09-13T03:04:00","modified_gmt":"2009-09-13T11:04:00","slug":"in-the-news-%e2%80%93-913","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2009\/09\/13\/in-the-news-%e2%80%93-913\/","title":{"rendered":"In the News \u2013 9\/13"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Saturday was a slow news day for politics.<\/p>\n<p>On a personal note, I\u2019ll be scarce today.&#160; It\u2019s a Holy day in the First Church of the Ellipsoid Orb, and I shall raptly attend three services: the morning NFL game, the afternoon NFL game and the evening NFL game.<\/p>\n<p>The only thing I have to say about yesterday\u2019s tea party protest is that they lied about their attendance.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><font color=\"#000000\">Conservative activists, who organized a march on the U.S. Capitol today in protest of the Obama administration&#8217;s health care agenda and government spending, erroneously attributed reports on the size of the crowds to ABC News.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#000000\">At no time did ABC News, or its affiliates, report a number anywhere near as large. ABCNews.com reported an approximate figure of <strong>60,000 to 70,000<\/strong> protesters, attributed to the Washington, D.C., fire department. In its reports, ABC News Radio described the crowd as &quot;tens of thousands.&quot;\u2026 [<em>emphasis added<\/em>]<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Inserted from &lt;<a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/Politics\/protest-crowd-size-estimate-falsely-attributed-abc-news\/story?id=8558055\" target=\"_blank\">ABC<\/a>&gt;<\/p>\n<p>They had claimed 1.5 to 2 million.<\/p>\n<p>Elsewhere, Bonner and Associates, the lobbyists infamous for sending bogus letters to members of Congress thinks TPM treated them unfairly.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><font color=\"#400040\"><a href=\"http:\/\/s217.photobucket.com\/albums\/cc83\/TomCat1948or2\/Blog%202009\/IntheNews913_3255\/bonner.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" title=\"bonner\" style=\"border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; border-left-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin: 0px 5px 0px 0px; border-right-width: 0px\" height=\"144\" alt=\"bonner\" src=\"http:\/\/s217.photobucket.com\/albums\/cc83\/TomCat1948or2\/Blog%202009\/IntheNews913_3255\/bonner_thumb.jpg\" width=\"204\" align=\"left\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a> In the annals of damage control strategies, this one from Bonner &amp; Associates may go down as one of the least effective ever: <strong>We may have forged 13 letters to lawmakers about climate change, on behalf of our coal industry client. But definitely not 14! <\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#400040\">Yesterday we reported that congressional investigators had found a fourteenth forged letter to a lawmaker criticizing the recent climate change bill, purporting to come from a Virginia American Legion post, but actually sent by Bonner, the Washington-based astroturf lobbying firm, on behalf of a coal-industry client.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#400040\">But soon after we posted that story, a Bonner spokesman contacted us. Bonner, he said via email, &quot;is being unjustly blamed&quot; for the latest letter, which went to Rep. Tom Perriello (D-VA). To support that claim, the spokesman attached a FedEx receipt, which indeed appears to show that on June 11th a package was sent from Bonner&#8217;s office to Charles Santrock, an official with the American Legion post. The package was signed for by &quot;Anne Lester&quot; at the Legion post, then returned to Bonner a few days later. Bonner also sent us a copy of the letter, which had been signed with the name &quot;Charles Santrock.&quot;\u2026 [<em>emphasis added<\/em>]<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Inserted from &lt;<a href=\"http:\/\/tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com\/2009\/09\/bonner_were_being_unjustly_blamed_--_we_didnt_forg.php\" target=\"_blank\">TPM Muckraker<\/a>&gt;<\/p>\n<p>How horrid that TPM would do such a thing!! \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n<p>Also, Tina Fey won an Emmy!<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p><font color=\"#000000\"><a href=\"http:\/\/s217.photobucket.com\/albums\/cc83\/TomCat1948or2\/Blog%202009\/IntheNews913_3255\/tina_fey.jpg\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" title=\"tina_fey\" style=\"border-top-width: 0px; display: inline; border-left-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin: 0px 0px 0px 5px; border-right-width: 0px\" height=\"108\" alt=\"tina_fey\" src=\"http:\/\/s217.photobucket.com\/albums\/cc83\/TomCat1948or2\/Blog%202009\/IntheNews913_3255\/tina_fey_thumb.jpg\" width=\"79\" align=\"right\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a> Is Tina Fey an Emmy winner? You betcha. Fey received an Emmy Award on Saturday for her impersonation of Republican vice presidential contender Sarah Palin on &quot;Saturday Night Live.&quot;<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#000000\">Accepting her trophy for best guest actress in a comedy, Fey thanked &quot;SNL&quot; producer Lorne Michaels and her parents, &quot;who are lifelong Republicans, for their patience.&quot;<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#000000\">She was honored at the Creative Arts Primetime Emmys, which recognize technical and other achievements for the 2008-09 season and preceded next weekend&#8217;s main ceremony&#8230;<\/font><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Inserted from &lt;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.huffingtonpost.com\/2009\/09\/12\/tina-fey-wins-emmy-for-sa_n_284757.html\" target=\"_blank\">Huffington Post<\/a>&gt;<\/p>\n<p>I thoroughly enjoyed her imitations of Snake Oil Sarah!&#160; Here\u2019s a clip you may remember.<\/p>\n<p> <object width=\"425\" height=\"344\"><param name=\"movie\" value=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/UfgzbXCAz64&amp;hl=en&amp;fs=1&amp;\"><\/param><param name=\"allowFullScreen\" value=\"true\"><\/param><param name=\"allowscriptaccess\" value=\"always\"><\/param><embed src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/v\/UfgzbXCAz64&amp;hl=en&amp;fs=1&amp;\" type=\"application\/x-shockwave-flash\" allowscriptaccess=\"always\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" width=\"425\" height=\"344\"><\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Saturday was a slow news day for politics. On a personal note, I\u2019ll be scarce today.&#160; It\u2019s a Holy day in the First Church of the Ellipsoid Orb, and I shall raptly attend three services: the morning NFL game, the afternoon NFL game and the evening NFL game. The only thing I have to say <a href='https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2009\/09\/13\/in-the-news-%e2%80%93-913\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal","category-politics","category-3-id","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}