WTF....

I had to settle for Reese's Puffs cereal and Horizon chocolate milk.

#yuppiesobstories

Mr. President, When Should I Expect Your Call?

Dear President Obama,

?One of the things I want them to do as they get older is engage in issues they care about, even ones I may not agree with them on,? you said.  ?I want them to be able to speak their mind in a civil and thoughtful way. And I don?t want them attacked or called horrible names because they?re being good citizens.?

And I totally agree your kids should be able to speak their minds and engage the culture.  I look forward to seeing what good things Malia and Sasha end up doing with their lives.

But here?s why I?m a little surprised my phone hasn?t rung.  Your $1,000,000 donor Bill Maher has said reprehensible things about my family.  He?s made fun of my brother because of his Down?s Syndrome. He?s said I was ?f?-d so hard a baby fell out.?  (In a classy move, he did this while his producers put up the cover of my book, which tells about the forgiveness and redemption I?ve found in God after my past ? very public ? mistakes.)

If Maher talked about Malia and Sasha that way, you?d return his dirty money and the Secret Service would probably have to restrain you.  After all, I?ve always felt you understood my plight more than most because your mom was a teenager.  That?s why you stood up for me when you were campaigning against Sen. McCain and my mom ? you said vicious attacks on me should be off limits.

Yet I wonder if the Presidency has changed you.  Now that you?re in office, it seems you?re only willing to defend certain women.  You?re only willing to take a moral stand when you know your liberal supporters will stand behind you.

But?

What if you did something radical and wildly unpopular with your base and took a stand against the denigration of all women? even if they?re just single moms? Even if they?re Republicans?

A grand jury will investigate the death of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old shot to death in a gated community in Florida on Feb. 26, state attorney Norm Wolfinger announced Tuesday.

"I share in the desire of the family and the community to accurately collect and evaluate all the facts surrounding the tragic death of Trayvon Martin," Wolfinger said in a news release. "The public is entitled to no less than a thorough, deliberate, and just review of the facts. We intend to honor that commitment."

The Seminole County Grand Jury will be called to session on Tuesday, April 10, Wolfinger said.

Meanwhile, on Monday, the Justice Department and the FBI opened an investigation into the death of the black teenager, who was shot by a neighborhood watch captain who was not arrested.

More than 435,000 people, many alerted by tweets from celebrities such as movie director Spike Lee and musician Wyclef Jean, signed a petition on Change.org, a social action website, calling for the arrest of the shooter, George Zimmerman.

The Justice Department investigation will review whether Zimmerman, 28, violated any federal civil rights statutes when he shot Martin, who was not carrying any weapons when he was killed.

The shooting occurred February 26 when Zimmerman spotted Martin walking home from buying candy and iced tea at a convenience store.

Zimmerman, patrolling the neighborhood in his car, called the 911 emergency number and reported what he called "a real suspicious guy."

"This guy looks like he's up to no good, or he's on drugs or something. It's raining and he's just walking around, looking about," Zimmerman told dispatchers, adding, "These @!$%#s. They always get away."

The dispatcher, hearing heavy breathing on the phone, asked Zimmerman: "Are you following him?"

"Yeah," Zimmerman said.

"Okay, we don't need you to do that," the dispatcher responded.

But several neighbors subsequently called 911 to report a scuffle between Zimmerman and Martin. While some of the callers were still on the phone, cries for help followed by a gunshot could be heard in the background.

"I recognized that (voice) as my baby screaming for help before his life was taken," Martin's mother, Sybrina Fulton, told Reuters. (Zimmerman) was reacting to the color of his skin,?? Fulton, said Monday on NBC's Today show. ?He committed no crime. My son wasn?t doing anything but walking on the sidewalk, and I just don?t understand why this situation got out of control.??

'Stand your ground'
Police declined to arrest Zimmerman, citing Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law, enacted in 2005 and now in effect in at least 16 other states.

Dubbed "Shoot first (ask questions later)" by opponents, the Florida law allows a potential crime victim who is "in fear of great bodily injury" to use deadly force in public places.

 http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/03/20/10775671-trayvon-martin-case-to-go-to-grand-jury-fla-state-attorney-announces

I have to wonder exactly how this is going to go. 

I'm assuming standard business attire is fine - skirt suit; blouse; fun shoes, bag, and jewelry - but I thought I'd double check.

tia  

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2012/03/21/448804/eric-fehrnstrom-etch-a-sketch/?mobile=nc

Top Romney Adviser Says Romney Can Change His Positions After The Primaries: ?It?s Almost Like An Etch A Sketch?

By Alex Seitz-Wald on Mar 21, 2012 at 9:25 am

Mitt Romney can?t be held accountable for his extreme right-wing views, at least according to his campaign?s senior adviser, who said the candidate should be given a ?reset button? on any positions he?s taken during the primary campaign if he wins the nominations and faces off against President Obama in the fall.

Appearing on CNN this morning, Romney Communications Director Eric Fehrnstrom was asked if he?s concerned that Romney may alienate general election voters with some of the hard-right positions he?s taken during the primary to appeal to conservatives. Fehrnstrom brushed this concern off:

HOST: Is there a concern that Santorum and Gingrich might force the governor to tack so far to the right it would hurt him with moderate voters in the general election.

FEHRNSTROM: Well, I think you hit a reset button for the fall campaign. Everything changes. It?s almost like an Etch A Sketch. You can kind of shake it up and restart all of over again.

Watch it:

Polls show Romney has lost support among independent voters as the primary campaign has forced him further to the right.

It?s unclear if Fehrnstrom expects people to just forget some of the fairly radical stances Romney has taken on everything from immigration, to contraception, to climate change, or if he expects the candidate to change his positions on those issues in the coming months ? something Romney is certainly known for doing. As Fox commentator Brit Hume said of Romney last year, ?You are only allowed a certain number of flips before people doubt your character.?

According to Mitt "Bain" Romney, the reason small businesses aren't starting is b/c of regulations, not b/c of the corporate environment.  At one point, he actually said "corp... people" when on that point.

I guess in the midst of crazy Santorum/Gingrich, I forgot I hadn't heard Mitt talk since a debate a long time ago.   Either it's new talking points or I missed them before.

Police in the French city of Toulouse have surrounded a man suspected to be behind Monday's killing of four people outside a Jewish school and that of three soldiers a few days earlier.

Claude Gueant, the French interior minister, said the 24-year-old suspect had in negotiations with the police agreed to give himself up in the afternoon.

"He said...he will turn himself in this afternoon," Gueant told BFM television, adding that the police were determined to take him alive so that he could stand trial.

A police source identified the suspect as Mohammed Merah, a Frenchman of Algerian origin, the AFP news agency reported.

Gunshots were heard after the police raided the five-storey building at 03:00am (0200 GMT) on Wednesday.Three policemen were reportedly injured in the shootout after the suspect shot through the door.

The suspect later exchanged one of his weapons for a cellphone. The police, however, said he still had several weapons.

The mother of the suspect had arrived at the scene to negotiate a surrender.

Brother arrested

Speaking to journalists, Gueant said the suspect was a French man and and "he belongs to al-Qaeda."

He said the suspect wanted to "take revenge for Palestinian children" killed in the Middle East, and was angry at the French military for its operations abroad.

Michael Stephens, a researcher with the Royal United Services Institute in Qatar, however, told Al Jazeera the interior minister needed to step back until there was more evidence.

"There is very little evidence of organisational structure behind the attack. It is more likely he was acting alone and radicalised by al-Qaeda ideas," he said.

Gueant further added that the man's brother was arrested and he was known to authorities for having spent time in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Al Jazeera's Jacky Rowland, reporting from Toulouse, said the operation was ongoing.

The raid came as three children and a rabbi gunned down outside the Ozar Hatorah school in Toulouse were buried in Israel.

The bodies had earlier arrived in Israel after being flown by Israeli El Al airlines.

Alain Juppe, the French foreign minister, along with 50 relatives and friends of the victims accompanied the bodies as they were flown home.

Jonathan Sandler, a 30-year-old Frenchman, his two sons Arieh, 5, and Gabriel, 4 as well as seven-year-old Myriam Monsonego were buried at the Givat Shaul cemetery in Jerusalem.

President Nicolas Sarkozy paid silent homage to the victims on Tuesday at a school in Paris close to the city's Holocaust memorial, and afterwards admitted that authorities had as yet no clue as to the identity of the killer.

"Anti-Semitism is obvious. The Jewish school attack was an anti-Semitic crime," Sarkozy told reporters at the Paris school after meeting children.

Attack on soldiers

French investigators fear the same gunman also killed three soldiers in two recent separate attacks.

The soldiers were French citizens of North African origin, while another who was critically wounded in the attack was black and from the French West Indies.

French police on Monday launched a huge manhunt after the shooting, and the region was put on its highest level of security alert.

Police said that the same weapon and the same stolen scooter appeared to have been used in all three attacks.

All three attacks were carried out by the rider using a .45-calibre weapon, who witnesses described as calmly shooting his victims.

The gunman may also have recorded the attack with an extreme sports video camera strapped to his chest, the French interior minister said.

"A witness saw a small video camera around the killer's neck," Gueant told Europe 1 radio on Tuesday.

"It's a video camera worn in a harness on the chest and indeed he was seen, a witness said so, with this device," Gueant said. "I don't know if he filmed everything."

All seven people slain in three attacks were shot in the head at point blank range, the prosecutor leading the investigation said on Tuesday.

Separatly, a package bomb exploded at the Indonesian embassy in Paris on Wednesday, causing minor damage but no injuries, police said.

"We received information at 5 am Paris time that there was a bomb," Teuku Faizasyah, spokesman for Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, said. "We're still looking for clarity whether we are really a target or not."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9QI4v9Jehs 

Were they wearing orange shirts on Friday to protest management? Or to get psyched for happy hour?

Either way, orange-shirted workers no longer have jobs at the Deerfield Beach law firm of Elizabeth R. Wellborn P.A.

A spokeswoman said the law firm had "no comment at this time."

Four workers tell the story this way: For the past few months, some employees have worn orange shirts on pay-day Fridays so they'd look like a group when they went out for happy hour.

This Friday, 14 workers wearing orange shirts were called into a conference room, where an executive said he understood there was a protest involving orange, the employees were wearing orange, and they all were fired.

 The executive said anyone wearing orange for an innocent reason should speak up. One employee immediately denied involvement with a protest and explained the happy-hour color.

The executives conferred outside the room, returned and upheld the decision: all fired, said Lou Erik Ambert, 31, of Coconut Creek, a litigation para-legal who said he was terminated.

"There is no office policy against wearing orange shirts. We had no warning. We got no severance, no package, no nothing," said Ambert. "I feel so violated."

Meloney McLeod, 39, of North Lauderdale, said her choice of shirt puts her in a tough spot: "I'm a single mom with four kids, and I'm out of a job just because I wore orange today."

Janice Doble, 50, of Sunrise,said she wore orange Friday because she was looking forward to happy hour with colleagues after a busy work week.

 "Orange happens to be my favorite color. My patio is orange," said Doble. "My lipstick was orange today." She said she supervised 12 people who scanned, copied and mailed documents for the firm.

Now she's worried for relatives employed at the law firm. "I have four kids who work there," said Doble. "I don't want them to retaliate and fire my kids."

Yadel Fong, 21, of Miami, wonders where he'll find work after losing his job in the mail room. He was not aware of anyone in the group involved in a protest.

"To my mind, protesting is where you put your foot down, and you're not working. There was none of that today," said Fong, who said he was working and looking forward to happy hour.

Florida is an "at-will" state for employment. That means unless there's a contract, an employer can fire a worker "for a good reason, for a bad reason or even for the wrong reason, as long as it's not an unlawful reason," said Eric K. Gabrielle, a labor and employment lawyer at Stearns Weaver in Fort Lauderdale.

"No violation of the law jumps out" in this case, Gabrielle said.

The "Transformers: Dark of the Moon" director told a crowd recently at the Nickelodeon Upfront New York event that instead of the series fans have loved about a mutant strain of turtles from earth who are obsessed with pizza and turn into two-footed creatures thanks to some transmutant goo, Bay's reptiles will simply be an alien race.

As first called out on the blog StuffWeLike, Bay explained his vision for the 2013 remake: "When you see this movie, kids are going to believe, one day, that these turtles actually do exist when we are done with this movie." Wha? And then, "The turtles are from an alien race, and they are going to be tough, edgy, funny, and completely loveable."

For those a little fuzzy on these "loveable" creatures: First, it was a cartoon. Then it became a live-action film franchise in the 1990s. The original story revolves around four mutant two-footed turtles who are trained by a rat on the art of being ninjas, and are named after Renaissance artists. The four fight crime from their home base in the sewers of New York City.

The comic book, then television show, and finally film franchise were popular in the late '80s and early '90s. It is, in short, the perfect vehicle to be mucked up by Bay. At least that's how fans reacted on Twitter and blogs.

Illuminati tweeted, "Michael Bay is re-making Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If Michael Bay destroys this classic, he will surely be sacrificed for his mistakes."

A fan of the "TMNT" bemoaned, "'TMNT' fans, prepare to have Michael Bay destroy your childhood the same way he's already done with mine. Three words: They are aliens." The A.V. Club opined, "Bay's willingness to reshape Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles bows to no canonical authority?not even that inherent in its title."

The blog /Film agreed, arguing, "If you're going to make a movie about mutant turtles, that's what they should be, right?" Bay will produce the movie. Jonathan Liebesman ("Wrath of the Titans") will direct.

In response to the outcry from fans, Bay posted this statement on his official website:

Fans need to take a breath, and chill. They have not read the script. Our team is working closely with one of the original creators of Ninja Turtles to help expand and give a more complex back story. Relax, we are including everything that made you become fans in the first place. We are just building a richer world.

Fans can be on the lookout for the new, probably explosion-filled, action-packed alien version of "TMNT" that is scheduled to open December 25, 2013.

I am just burnt out, but I don't want to become a mindless drone in voting.

Anyone else just over it already? 

Last Friday, I wrote about the racist, anti-Obama "Don't Re-Nig in 2012" bumper sticker that has been making the rounds across social media circles. While people were questioning the authenticity of the photograph showing the bumper sticker on someone's car, we were able to track down a website selling the sticker along with several other controversial items.

Writing for Forbes, Roger Friedman interviews the site's owner, Paula Smith. Ms. Smith, who hails from Hinesville, Georgia, insists that neither she nor the sticker are racist. Who knows what Smith really believes, but her logic is a stretch, to put it gently.

"I do find it amazing and entertaining that one of our stickers has become a racist thing," Ms. Smith told Forbes.

She even tried arguing that the dictionary does not define the "N-Word" as racist. Wisely, Friedman posted the actual definition from dictionary.com, which says the word, "is now probably the most offensive word in English. Its degree of offensiveness has increased markedly in recent years, although it has been used in a derogatory manner since at least the Revolutionary War. Definitions 1a, 1b, and 2 represent meanings that are deeply disparaging and are used when the speaker deliberately wishes to cause great offense."

Her protestations aside, Ms. Smith appears to have removed the bumper sticker from her site. Under the  "Anti-Obama" section of the site (advertised as her No. 3 bestseller), you'll now only find a sticker reading, "I was Anti-Obama Before It Was Cool."

In what may be a reference to the controversy her other bumper sticker has caused, the description below reads, "Show the world how you feel! (but be careful, you may hurt someone's feelings)."

Ms. Smith then goes on to argue that President Obama is "not even black," but rather, "a mixture of race." When Friedman asks Smith if she thinks the N-Word is offensive or derogatory, she says no, but then claims that she herself does not even use the word.

"I have kids here around me that are black kids. I call them my own kids. I've helped black families?to guide them in the right direction," Smith told Forbes. "We like to laugh and have a good time. That's our way of life."

Not surprised about Mittens. I still can't stand him.

Mitt Romney declares victory in Illinois

She reported the following:

1) She voted for Romney because after what Santorum said in PR she couldn't support him. She was really upset by his comments about the Spanish language.

2) She doesn't understand how anyone living in DC could support Obama after he "closed all of the best schools for black children after coming to office" (this I learned after some question was actually the DC Voucher program, she just didn't understand what it was.)

3) Obama is the "abortion president" and as of last week the federal government is funding abortions and she doesn't understand how I haven't heard of it as it is "in all of the papers."

4) My friend whose husband is regularly cheating on her, who spends no time with his children and who is emotionally and possibly physically abusive should get marriage counseling because children need 2 parent families. No matter that she had no ability to consent to the marriage in the first place, she's married now and the vows must be upheld. 

5) It's not practical for women not to work because in this economy a lot of families need the income. But it would be better for kids if no mothers worked. 

I did not bring up politics. In fact I demurred when she said "how can you support Obama" by saying "I have to be registered Dem because that's how we elect our local government." But I couldn't hold back when she said Obama closed all of the schools that were helping the black kids of DC. And she did concede that it is ludicrous for Congress to force the people of DC to live with policies they do not support and that their elected officials have not enacted. She even said "I don't like that people in DC aren't allowed to vote." Winning the voting rights battle one Republican at a time

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBiI9KcJ9UY&sns=fb

http://youtu.be/Qhm7-LEBznk 

Kirk Cameron of ?Growing Pains? Says He?s Not Homophobic, Explains Christian Beliefs

The former star of Growing Pains put his foot in his mouth when he went on Piers Morgan Tonight and said homosexuality was ?unnatural.? For his first interview after that debacle, he tells Ramin Setoodeh why Morgan was ?insensitive? and ?heartless? and how he really feels about gay people. 

Kirk Cameron doesn?t speak in sound bites. He?s in New York on Monday afternoon to promote his new documentary, Monumental: In Search of America?s National Treasure, except his flight was delayed and he missed almost all of his interviews. He?s sitting in a plush leather sofa in a Times Square hotel, looking tired as he sips a Starbucks coffee (his hoodie, which says ?Do Justice,? makes him look much younger than his age, which is 41).

I was surprised on a couple of levels, yes. [Pauses.] I was surprised that people acted surprised by what I said. They didn?t hear everything I said: the interview was 10 minutes longer than what you saw, because it was edited down. 

?If my kid came to me and said I?m gay, I?d say, ?Son, I love you.??

This is part of the conversation between the operator and Zimmerman:

Operator: "Which entrance is that he's heading toward?"

Zimmerman: "The back entrance."

"F****** c***s," (Zimmerman possibly said under his breath)

http://www.wftv.com/news/news/state-attorney-case-will-be-given-grand-jury-shoot/nLX9c/

listen to it here for yourself: http://www.wftv.com/videos/news/zimmerman-possible-racial-slur-explicit/vGbyc/ (possibly nsfw)

There's More to Fixing Food Deserts than Building Grocery Stores 

There has been a lot of talk about what's wrong with food deserts. First lady Michelle Obama, for one, says far too many people can't access the fruits and vegetables they need to be healthy. Last year, she helped persuade several major retailers, foundations and small businesses to bring more healthful food to neighborhoods where supermarkets are scarce.

But researchers are finding that it's more complicated than "if you build it, they will come." A study finds that shoppers don't just care about cost and proximity to fresh produce ? they also need choice and quality if they're going to buy it.

"Simply providing fruits and vegetables may not be enough if [they] don't meet the expectations of those people who are supposed to buy them," Jonathan Blitstein, a research psychologist at Research Triangle Institute and lead author of the paper, tells The Salt.

In other words, low-income shoppers dislike wilted lettuce just as much as anyone else. Not shocking.

The study, which recently appeared in the journal Public Health Nutrition, used data from 495 people in six low-income Chicago neighborhoods. Participants were asked whether the place they shopped for fruits and vegetables was convenient, whether that place provided a good selection and whether they thought the fruits and vegetables were high quality.

The researchers found that the answers were closely related to what people ate. "People who had higher ratings for the places they usually shop for fruits and vegetables had greater intake [of produce]," says Blitstein. "[That finding] held across all different types of people, different age groups, ethnicity groups, men and women and regardless of people had greater economic need."

The study is "part of a growing body of evidence that the environment is important in terms of promoting good eating," says Shannon Zenk, a health systems scientist at the University of Illinois at Chicago, who also studies how environment affects health in Chicago neighborhoods.

Zenk says that what can also turn people off from shopping for healthful food is a "lack of safety or cleanliness, poor customer service or treatment of customers, including racial profiling" at food stores.

Both Zenk and Blitstein say that except for their budgets, there is no difference between what low-income consumers and higher-earning consumers are looking for.

Still, Zenk says that there's no one-size-fits-all solution to increasing fruit and vegetable intake. That's why community members need to be at the table when public health experts try to get more healthful food into them.

http://www.wftv.com/news/news/local/sanford-police-release-new-calls-george-zimmerman/nLXs9/

SEMINOLE COUNTY, Fla. ?

The outcry over the shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin has prompted a federal investigation. And calls made by George Zimmerman to Sanford police in the months before he shot and killed Martin were released.

ABC News talked to a 16-year-old girl who was on the phone with Trayvon Martin when he was confronted by George Zimmerman. She said he told her he saw someone watching him and tried to get away.

?He said this man was watching him? so he put his hoodie on. 'What are you following me for?' The man says 'what you doing around here'? then the man like, like pushed Trayvon cause his headset like fell," the girl told ABC News.

The girl said after that the phone went dead and when she called back, Trayvon never answered.

The girl's parents didn't want her identified and would only allow an attorney for Martin's family to ask questions.

Sanford's mayor, Jeff Triplett and Congresswoman Corrine Brown are headed to Washington, DC Tuesday morning to meet with Attorney General Eric Holder about the case.

People have been showing up all across central Florida to protest the shooting in Sanford.

Now, their cries for justice seem to be picking up traction.

The U.S. Justice Department announced Monday night that it will review the investigation into the events that resulted in the teenager's death. The U.S. attorney's office and the FBI are also opening investigations into the killing.

It's been three weeks since Martin was killed by Zimmerman and the outrage across the country is still raw.

Zimmerman told police he shot Martin in self-defense after calling 911 to report that the boy was acting suspiciously. Martin was walking home from a nearby store and only had a bag of Skittles and an iced tea.

Sanford police released six of the 46 calls Zimmerman routinely made to police during the months leading up to the night he shot and killed Martin.

Zimmerman placed approximately 10 percent of all the calls from his neighborhood to the Sanford Police last year.

Four of the six calls Zimmerman made to police start exactly the same way: He calls to report suspicious black men in his gated community.

Zimmerman told one of the emergency operators that his neighborhood had been 'plagued" by a rash of break-ins.

In a call reporting the break-ins, Zimmerman told the operator he thought he'd found the suspects: "Two African American males."

In the calls, Zimmerman even reported things that are normal in neighborhoods, like an open garage door and kids playing in the street.

WFTV also found out the 28-year-old has a history of not just reporting people to the police, but also following them, like he did with Martin.

Eight years ago, Zimmerman followed some people who stole from a supermarket. Another time Zimmerman followed a driver who he accused of spitting on him from car to car after he had already reported the driver to the police.

Authorities said those are the only calls available because recordings are deleted after seven months.

On Monday, more than 75 students, mostly from Florida A&M University, rallied outside the Seminole County courthouse demanding that the state attorney's office file charges against Zimmerman.

"Why is Seminole County the only county in the U.S. where a pack of Skittles is equivalent to a 9-millimeter?" asked protester Jason Reed.

Students met with Pat Whitaker from the State's Attorney's office who told them they're considering manslaughter charges, but that it could take weeks before a decision is made.

The White House is also talking about the case. The president's press secretary was asked about the investigation during a press briefing on Monday.

"Our thoughts and prayers go out to Trayvon Martin's family. But obviously we're not going to wade into a local law enforcement matter," said Press Secretary Jay Carney.

He said the White House was aware of what happened, but would let local and national investigators handle the case.

WFTV?s legal analyst Bill Sheaffer said if Zimmerman is never charged criminally, he could be a target for a civil case.

Sheaffer said Martin's family could also go after the homeowner's association since Zimmerman claims he was acting as a neighborhood watchman.

But he believes that would be tough to win.

"Unless we learn that the HOA either sanctioned the carrying of the gun or had some other input that led to the shooting the likelihood of recovery I believe is remote,? said Sheaffer.

http://thinkprogress.org/health/2012/02/07/420595/staples-co-founder-complains-that-allowing-women-to-breastfeed-at-work-will-cost-jobs/?mobile=nc

Staples co-founder Tom Stemberg is speaking out against a serious threat to economic recovery and job creation: breastfeeding moms.

Stemberg, a longtime supporter of Republican policies and candidates like Mitt Romney, complained recently that President Obama?s health care reform law hurts businesses by requiring them to provide what he dubbed ?lactation chambers? for new moms who need to breastfeed at work:

Tom Stemberg, co-founder of mega-office supply chain Staples is questioning an Obamacare provision that discourages job creation by dictating employers funnel their capital into lactation chambers.

?Do you want [farming retailer] Tractor Supply to open stores or would you rather they take their capital and do what Obamacare and its 2,700 pages dictates ? which is to open a lactation chamber at every single store that they have?? he asked.

?I?m big on breastfeeding; my wife breastfed,? Stenberg added. ?I?m all for that. I don?t think every retail store in America should have to go to lactation chambers, which is what Obamacare foresees.

Stemberg was presumably referring to provisions in the Affordable Care Act that require employers to give lactating mothers ?reasonable break time? to nurse their child, as well as ?a place, other than a bathroom, that is shielded from view and free from intrusion from coworkers and the public?? The place they provide for new moms does not have to be a dedicated room as long as it?s private and can be called into use when female employees need it.

Stemberg, who has contributed tens of thousands of dollars to Romney?s campaign and SuperPAC, added that repealing the health care law should be at the top of the next president?s ?to-do? list.

As of early January, the Labor Department had already cited 23 companies, including Starbucks and McDonald?s stores, for violating the new protections for breastfeeding employees.

I'm still unclear on how putting the olds on private insurance will work since the olds use the most healthcare.

NPR: Rep. Ryan Says New GOP Budget Plan 'Offers Real Solutions Again' 

With a video, an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal and press events today, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., is offering what he and other Republicans say is a budget plan with "real solutions" to the exploding federal deficits and debt.

And he says that like the plan House Republicans introduced last year, which did not survive critics' challenges:

"Our budget delivers real spending discipline. It does this not through indiscriminate cuts that endanger our military, but by ending the epidemic of crony politics and government overreach that has weakened confidence in the nation's institutions and its economy."

NPR's Tamara Keith reports on Morning Edition that among the differences from last year's GOP blueprint, the new proposal would allow senior citizens in the future who are covered by Medicare to "choose between government coverage and private insurance." Last year, Ryan and his colleagues proposed turning Medicare into a voucher program.

The National Journal adds that "in an attempt to rein in government spending and slash corporate tax rates, Ryan's budget aims to lower the corporate tax rate to 25 percent, from its current level of 35 percent. It also consolidates the six current tax brackets to just two: 10 percent and 25 percent, among other cuts and changes to the tax system. ... [It] aims to cut $5.3 trillion over the next 10 years ? a drastic move that will see fervent pushback from his Democratic colleagues."

Along with the video and op-ed, the Budget Committee is posting materials about the Ryan plan on its website.

The Washington Post's The Fix blog reports that the plan is already coming under criticism from some other Republicans, who say it will be a political problem for the party.

And critics from the Left are weighing in too. Roger Hickey of the Campaign for America's Future calls it a "suicide pact ... that ignores the clear views of the majority of Americans."

CNN Money: House GOP Budget Chief Aims at Tax Code

In a year when political stalemate is expected to block any real progress on fiscal reforms, House Republicans will take a swing at tax reform in their fiscal year 2013 budget proposal due out on Tuesday morning.

House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, the lead writer on the budget, and his caucus will call for a reduction in individual tax rates and brackets. Instead of today's six brackets, with rates from 10% to 35%, they are calling for just two -- 10% and 25%. It's not clear how much income would fall under each bracket.

The Republican proposal would also eliminate the Alternative Minimum Tax altogether.

Although originally intended to ensure that the very wealthy pay taxes, the AMT was never structured to keep pace with inflation.

So on paper the AMT is scheduled to bring in trillions of dollars in revenue over the coming years because it would capture more and more taxpayers who are not wealthy. But every year Congress passes costly "patches" to protect the middle class from having to pay the AMT, and adds the cost of those patches to the deficit.

It was not immediately clear whether the House GOP plans to replace that forecasted revenue, but it seems unlikely since it is proposing to keep revenues as a share of the economy on par with the 40-year average of 18.1% of the economy's GDP.

Since the financial crisis in 2008, revenues as a share of GDP have hit 60-year lows, coming in at around 15%. And going forward, independent budget experts have said the country may need to bring in more revenue than the historical average to meet entitlement benefit promises and adequately fund programs without slashing too deeply in any one area of the budget.

On the corporate tax side, the House GOP would lower the top tax rate to 25% from 35% and switch the United States to territorial system of taxation, meaning that U.S. multinational companies would only owe tax on foreign-made profits to the government of the country in which the profits were made.

Currently, a U.S. company owes U.S. taxes on foreign profits once the money is brought home, and they can subtract from their Washington tax bill taxes they have already paid to the country where the profits were made. Some estimate that U.S. companies may be parking as much as $1 trillion abroad.

The House GOP proposal on corporate taxes differs from President Obama's. He would lower the corporate tax rate to 28% and impose a minimum tax on foreign-made profits the year they were made to discourage companies from parking money abroad.

And as they have at every turn, House Republicans will reject outright most of Obama's tax proposals for individuals, particularly those on the wealthy, including his proposed Buffett Rule to ensure millionaires pay at least 30% of their income in federal tax. (bridey sez: I need to read more about this proposed Buffett Rule.  Does it really want millionaires paying an effective tax rate of 30%, which is what this sentence implies, or does it want to make sure they pay a marginal rate of 30%?  Huge difference!)

The emphasis on tax reform in advance of the formal release of the House Republican budget may indicate the GOP's desire to turn the conversation away from their anticipated and polarizing proposals to reform Medicare and to cap discretionary spending at levels lower than the top cap agreed to by both parties last summer.

Democrats have expressed opposition to both prospects.

House Republicans are expected to propose a spending level that is about $20 billion less than that specified by the Budget Control Act, the deal that ended the bitter fight over the debt ceiling in August. If that's the case, that could set off a battle with the Democratic-controlled Senate on federal spending just weeks before the November election.

Meanwhile, the most conservative factions in the House have been pushing for the GOP to propose spending levels lower than those likely to be proposed on Tuesday.

"When I'm elected, I'll make sure gays and corrupt labor unions can't sabotage our hard-working neighborhoods."

There's also a wine review, NFL jargon, etc.