Rachel started us off with the news that we are perilously close to actually getting some health care reform.

Or at least to the Senate getting to vote on whether they can debate and then vote on health care reform, with maybe another vote or two thrown in for good measure.

(People from other lands who are following this process and are wondering why the hell we seem to be doing this again after we just did this, only with the other, more entertainingly wacky bunch of reps, I am sorry. This is how we’re set up to do things here. I know the process is slow and insane. But remember what happened when we had a President and Congress who liked to just ram stuff through? P.S. Sorry about that.)

The Conservadems are getting pretty much everything they threatened to hold their breath until they turned Republican over, including some reasonable stuff like making sure we don’t increase the deficit, and then some of the exact kind of dumb-ass stuff I was worrying about yesterday, like restoring funding for abstinence education when we all know full well that it doesn’t work.

If we’re going to fund stupid religion-based health care measures people would like to be true even though they don’t actually work, why don’t we just throw $800 billion into faith healing?

(NOT REALLY, CONGRESSWOMAN BACHMANN. Settle down.)

There’s also some water-down language that makes the public option nearly nonexistent and may ensure that the scraps that are there will have premiums that won’t really be cheaper than private insurance premiums, which was only the entire freaking point of health care reform.

So if you’ll excuse me, I have to go whack my head against the wall until my neighbor complains to my building manager again.

OK, I’m back. Ow.

A surprisingly optimistic Senator Amy Klobuchar (D – Minnesota) checked in to talk about the bill and whether the Conservadems will nard up and vote yes.

Did you hear that, lawmakers? It hurts Rachel’s feelings when you don’t call her back. Don’t make her do Sad Pundit puppy eyes.

Which Hunt

Oh, dear, I seem to have missed a memo from the Office of Good and Evil again. (Probably because the Office of Good and Evil closes at midnight and I’m usually too busy to wait in the garden out back.)

Anyway, Rachel reported that apparently it’s now Good to be a vicious bigot about Muslims again. Being completely uninformed except for your own paranoia and hatred is not only sensible and safety-conscious, it’s downright Christian. Who knew?

I can’t tell if political “leaders” have really allowed themselves to become frightened literally beyond all reason of if they’re just playing on the fears of the ignorant to score political points, but either way they should be ashamed of themselves.

Suhail Khan of the Institute for Global Engagement managed not to call Pat Robertson and Congressman Pete Hoekstra (R – Michigan) idiot racist sphincterheads, which makes him two up on me.

Man-Made Disaster

Rachel took us for a closer look at Wednesday’s district court ruling that the Army Corps of Engineers caused the New Orleans levees to fail and thus caused the flooding of the city.

Michael Grunwald of Time joined Rachel to talk about how Mother Nature will whomp you if you’re an idiot about these things.

Not that we seem to be applying any of those lessons in the rebuilding process.

Ms. Information

Rachel noted that Sarah Palin, always a stickler for accuracy, simply did not have the time to put the exhaustive index that she doubtless would have insisted on into her book.

Fortunately, people on the Interwebs will research and catalogue absolutely anything, and at this writing there were already five handy Going Rogue indices.

Rachel, naturally enough, pointed us to Goingrogueindex.com, but you should not click on that link unless you can deal with VERY LOUD music that will come tumbling into your world whether you want it or not, much like the former Governor herself.

Rachel also gave us an update on the vile merchandise that reminds people to pray for President Obama’s death. Gosh, that’s heelarious.

Online sales outlets have had crises of conscience with varying results. Zazzle.com found the merchandise threatening in intent, so it took it off the site, and Café Press took it down, decided it was intended as a joke, and put it back up.

If you go looking for this charming line of products, be warned that another thing that may not stay down is your breakfast.

Pardon the Interruption

Welcome to a Touch of Geek that the folks at TRMS were, according to the Twitter machine, jazzed about all afternoon. And rightly so.

The National Archives is starting a project of trying to reconstruct Nixon chief of staff H. R. Haldeman’s missing notes in an attempt to figure out what was “accidentally” erased in the famous 18 ½ minute gap in the Watergate tapes.

By way of introduction, you will get to see Rachel do the Rose Mary Woods stretch. Try it today!

Rachel started us off with the news that a district judge in Lousiana ruled that shoddy work by the Army Corps of Engineers led to the flooding of St. Bernard Parish. She had a more thorough rundown later in the broadcast, but first it was time to move on to some hot legislative action.

I Know I’ll Be a Law Someday

Rachel reported that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D – Nevada) introduced Senate health care bill on Wednesday and, goodness gracious, so far it doesn’t look half bad.

I’m still jumpy, though. I’ve been burned before and now a part of me is convinced that there are secret clauses that we’ll have to bark like seals before we can get strep throat cultures or that “94% of Americans are covered” means that each of us has a secret random 6% of the body that’s outta luck.

At any rate, it sounds like some good old-fashioned arm-twisting has been happening and this thing might actually make it to the floor.

The dance floor, that is. Ever since Tom DeLay started shaking everything he’s got that’s disturbing, other lawmakers have been inspired. In lieu of debate, health care reform will be decided by a freestyle dance battle.

Set your DVR. You do not want to miss the Blue Dog tribute to the House of Ninja.

The Karmic Boomerang is Slow But Steady

Rachel noted that the Department of Justice’s Office of Professional Responsibility report is due out within the month.

It reportedly recommends that Jay Bybee and John Yoo, the lawyers who wrote the memos saying that torturing other human beings was totally cool as long as members of the Bush Administration really, truly wanted to, should be disbarred.

I’ve been reading Angler and I’d say that recommending disbarment is generous. Where’s the report that diagnoses them as sociopaths?

Affront Groups

As she so loves to do, Rachel rode the razor-thin line between hilarious and terrifying as she looked at the increasingly bold attempts to influence – or, you know, stop – health care reform.

Sure, you knew about the Fox News connection and the connections to the pharmaceuticals industry, and you had probably noticed that for some reason a disturbing slice of the people against heath care reform are insane, cartoonish racists.

But did you know that Medicare is immoral? I think it’s because so many seniors hook up in the waiting rooms. And you probably didn’t know that electronic medical records are evil, but that’s only because you’ve been hypnotized.

Now bark like a seal.

“I’m Not Scared”

The U.S. is bringing suspected conspirators in the 9/11 hijacking to New York for trial and several right-wing politicians (and whatever the hell Liz Cheney is) have taken the opportunity to scream about what if the terrorists have the power to walk through walls and also super heat vision to melt their shackles and what if they also have several skilled surgeons among them and also what if they all saw Face/Off?

And then several of them started gibbering and drooling about how what the founding fathers really, truly wanted was a judicial system in which you could skip trials for guys you don’t like.

Would anyone like to join me in a séance this weekend? I want to manifest the ghost of Benjamin Franklin just once so he can zip around and slap some of those people. Or make witty, crushing remarks about them that they totally wouldn’t get, but deep down they’d know they’d been burned.

(OK, yes, mostly what materialized Franklin would do is tinker with cool electronic gadgets, drink good beer, and relentlessly hit on chicks. But I’m sure he’d work in at least a few scathing remarks.)

At any rate, Attorney General Eric Holder had a good answer for the fearmongers, which was stop being craven jerks and let our justice system do what it was designed to do.

The next time one of these guys starts sanctimoniously waving the Constitution around, I hope someone is nearby to remind them how quickly they were willing to mulch it when it came to the terror trials.

Army of… How Many?

Holy buckets.

Remember that strategy of sending 40,000 more troops to Afghanistan?

Turns out that’s almost all we have left. And the ones who would be deployed have, for the most part, already done multiple tours of duty.

Spencer Ackerman of The Washington Independent checked in to drop a few sobering numbers on us.

The people who were suggesting the surge in the first place had to know about this, right? What were they thinking we’d do if something else came up, prop up mannequins with helmets on them? Set up a bunch of trip wires that would trigger recordings of dogs barking? Just have the Cheneys hover menacingly over… OK, that one would work.

Katrina Ruling

Rachel finished off by fleshing out the report on the ruling in favor of four plaintiffs from St. Bernard Parish. Michael Grunwald of Time called in with an interesting and sad explanation of the decision.

I suspect we’ll be hearing more about this and it will be maddening, so stock up on happy songs and comfortingly fuzzy blankets.

Rachel got us all fired up with the news that the Senate will start debating its version of the health care reform bill next week and Senator Harry Reid (D – Nevada) hopes to pass it by Christmas.

Wow. Six weeks? That is some Senatorial speed! Don’t throw your backs out!

The House bill, of course, passed over the weekend, with an endorsement by the American Medical Association.

But now there’s a controversy over whether the AMA should withdraw its support.

If you just involuntarily blurted out “Creepy fake grassroots lobbyists!” your cynicism levels are dangerously high, and you should consult with your doctor about rainbow and unicorn therapy before watching the clip.

I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that your cynicism levels are dangerously high.

If “consulting with your doctor” means looking up your symptoms on the Internet because you don’t have health insurance, DO NOT start the therapy regimen. You’re just going to end up so annoyed with the world that you’ll just end up giving the unicorn a noogie.

(Yes, that would hurt. You’re going to be that cynical.)

Newsweek’s agreeably crotchety Michael Isikoff dropped in to guide us through the muck.

Memorial at Fort Hood

President Obama and the First Lady attended services for the Fort Hood victims on Tuesday. In a horrific development, at almost the same time there was a multiple shooting in Portland, Oregon.

Condolences to the loved ones of everyone involved.

For Pete’s Sake

In the what-the-hell-happened aftermath of the Fort Hood shootings, Congressman Pete Hoekstra (R – Michigan) announced that Hasan had been corresponding with a radical Muslim cleric.

Which was an interesting development, since Hoekstra, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, seemed to be a wee bit ahead of the news curve.

And his announcement could have tipped the cleric in question off to the fact that he was being investigated.

Chris Hayes of The Nation checked in to talk about whether we can convince our country’s intelligence services to actually brief Congress if they’re just going to turn around and put everything into their comically misspelled Twitter feeds 20 minutes later.

Bottom line: If you have asked Representative Hoekstra to help plan a surprise party, join your fight club, or hang on to your sex tape, it might be time to rethink.

Bribe and Prejudice

Did you fail that test of your cynicism levels earlier?

Then just skip this next clip. It’s um, about how puppies are nice. But not cute puppies that you’d need to watch or anything. In fact, I forgot: It’s really about slugs. No need to watch at all.

Seriously, even if your cynicism levels aren’t dangerously high, this next story might peg them. It’s about Blackwater bribing Iraqi officials to literally get away with murder.

OK, watch if you must, but I highly recommend watching Bob Ross before and after. We’ve had enough unicorn pantsings around here.

OK, seriously: Why are they still on our country’s payroll? Why are they in Iraq instead of jail?

Get over here, unicorn. No, I just want to talk. Really.

Ms. Information

Rachel gave us the news that the D.C. Sniper was executed Tuesday night. His younger accomplice will be spending the rest of his life in prison.

Rachel noted that his attorneys wanted clemency granted on the grounds of mental illness, but the Commonwealth of Virginia is not big on death row clemency.

Rachel also reported that the Stupak amendment is still wreaking havoc among Democrats in both the House and the Senate.

(And I would like to report that if you call Representative Stupak’s office and explain that you would like to talk to the Congressman about your uterus since he seems to be so very interested in it, his staffers have been trained to suck all the joy out of the situation by not showing even a flicker of reaction. But it was still fun to hear the guy try to be polite while saying “And what would you like to say to him regarding that?”)

Senator Barbara Boxer (D – California), fresh off slam-dunking a climate change bill through committee, thinks there are enough pro-choice Senators to defeat Stupak-Pitts language should anti-choice Senators try to weasel it into their version of the bill.

Rachel noted that Senator Clarie McCaskill (D – Missouri), after taking an initial position that the Stupak amendment wasn’t so bad, has now tweeted her opposition. Though she’s not sure how she’d vote on the overall bill.

What I’m saying is that Congressman Stupak is trying to mess with our reproductive organs and Senator McCaskill is messing with our heads.

Rachel also gave us an update on Brazil’s massive blackout – the population affected was equivalent to Los Angeles and New York going dark at the same time.

Fortunately, Brazil is a seventeen-time winner of the Nation Most Likely To Have Fun During a Blackout title, so I think they’ll be OK.

GOP in Exile

Rachel gave us the sad news that the Tea Party is turning more and more into the Wonderland kind of tea party. They’re almost done with the shouting insane riddles part, which means they are only seconds away from trying to stuff each other into teapots.

An official Tea Party is now registered in Florida, but that has made other Tea Partiers mad because while they want to be a political force that can sway elections, they also want to be so independent that they aren’t an official political party at all. Because that’s just how mavericks roll.

New developments are expected sometime in March.

Rachel Re: Slave Drivers

OK, I’ll admit it: I just gave the unicorn a pink belly and a swirlie.

Cynicism rules and satire is dead. We have a pro-slavery, pro–child labor contingent in this country. Yeah, but it’s good for business, right?

Rachel isn’t having it.

Yes, I’ll apologize to the unicorn later. For now, let Rachel help drive the cynicism away.

There are very few Americans who have never heard of Roe v. Wade: the landmark decision that legalized abortion for women in the United States. Since that moment in history, abortion has become a tenuous privilege, restricted greatly (in part by the various prohibitions against so-called “partial birth abortions”), but not impossible.

But, as many know, accessing health care is as much about dollars in the bank as it is about legalized health care services. It doesn’t matter so much if it’s legal if no one can afford to use the service.

Well, abortions are particularly difficult since they affect young, poor women in disproportionate numbers. For abortion, in particular, lack of insured access will effectively kill the flow of this medical service to the bulk of people who need it most.

All of this is common sense.

Yet 64 Democrats voted to include an effective ban on insured abortions in the health care bill passed through the House. They did this knowing that their amendment would end abortion access for many vulnerable women.

There is nothing to say about this except that it is yet another example of the Democrats erasing campaign promises – this time to protect a woman’s right to choose. As LGBT people we know how this feels. As members of a free society we should be outraged.

Rachel started us off with an overview of the legislative poison pill that is the Stupak-Pitts amendment. Everyone set your clocks back 36 years.

Since they are so interested, ladies, please don’t forget to call Representatives Stupak (D – Michigan, 202-225-4735) and Pitts (R – Pennsylvania 202-225-2411) with daily updates on the state of your uterus.

Ask them for advice on feminine products, have them talk a younger loved one through her first period, or just settle in for a nice long uterine chat. Remember: They make up laws to control yours because they care so much.

Gentlemen, I don’t want to leave you out. Please feel free to call up Stupak and Pitts and speculate about what would be going on with your uterus if you had one.

This is a rare opportunity – Stupak and Pitts understand womanhood so well, they can probably give you some real perspective.

Right To Murder

Rachel reported that Scott Roeder confessed to murdering women’s health care provider Dr. George Tiller. He plans to use a “necessity defense” and try to put abortion itself on trial.

Rachel then ran through a few of the people in the anti-choice movement who have signed on to a “Defensive Action Statement,” which is essentially an attempt to justify killing people they disagree with.

I know there are people who are in anti-choice movement because they believe in the sanctity of life. I am waiting to hear the public statements in which they distance themselves from these vicious, coldblooded murderers.

And waiting.

How Joe Can You Go?

Joe Lieberman is still promising to kill health care reform, but has decided to win back the hearts and minds of a nation by jumping to rash conclusions about the Fort Hood shootings.

That and perfecting his ongoing Droopy Dawg imitation.

Rachel won 3,000 extra bonus points by working in the phrase “grandstanding uninformed preening camera time.”

For crying out loud, Democrats, take away Lieberman’s chairmanship.

Or at least his chair. Every time he tries to sit down, just take it away.

C Street Ban

Did you need a severe case of the heebie-jeebies?

How about a radical religious cult with members in both houses of Congress who believe women should be subservient to men and who wield enough power to push through astonishingly restrictive legislation?

Oh, and they are sooooo comfortable with the LGBT community.

Rachel welcomed author Jeff Sharlet, whose book The Family goes a long way toward explaining why American politics are the way they are, but is not recommended reading if you need a tranquil night’s sleep.

Best part of this segment: Sharlet gently suggesting that Stupak is something of an eejit.

A God-led government?

Does that mean irritating political figures would be afflicted with boils? Because I could maybe get behind that.

One More Thing:

C Street poster boy Senator John Ensign has moved out of C Street so as not to embarrass his roomies.

He then went around back and closed the barn door. Legends say years ago, the barn once held horses.

Rachel had a good time imagining C Street’s Craisglist posting for a new roommate. Are mistress payoffs included as part of the rent, or are they extra?

Ms. Information

Rachel reported that Fort Hood shooting suspect Major Nidal Hasan is conscious, off the hospital ventilator, and able to speak, though there’s no word yet on whether he has spoken about his motives.

There are reports that Hasan may have tried to contact Al Qaeda months ago, but most people are responsibly avoiding jumping to conclusions.

(Word on the street is that Lieberman jumped to his by standing on his chair. I’m just saying.)

Rachel also gave us a look back at the fall of the Berlin wall, including the bureaucratic error that started it all, secret spy tricks in the wall’s construction, and giant celebratory dominoes.

Normally I am a fan of the thorough TRMS reporting, but in this case I must register a harrumph. Not ONE shot of David Hasselhoff’s celebratory concert, Rachel?

Rachel also noted that genius businessman Rupert Murdoch wants to charge for his content. And is so ready to protect it that he wants to block Google from pointing you to it.

Because you’ll appreciate it more if you really have to hunt for it. Like the Illuminati or that secret bar at Disneyland.

Fringe and Purge

Rachel couldn’t resist reveling in simultaneous election nostalgia and anticipation and thus welcomed Ana Marie Cox (hooray!) for a look back at New York’s District 23 race and ahead at the coming Republican purges.

Rachel started us off with a look at the attempts to piece together what happened at Fort Hood and what we know about Major Hasan, the suspected shooter.

Fort Hood Stirs up Prejudices

Rachel noted that reactions to the shootings at Fort Hood have been very much colored by Hasan’s religion. And that’s just in the mainstream press.

FrontPageMag.com went with full-on bigotry, whereas WorldNetDaily hit a level of whack-a-mole conspiracy mongering that would make the Illuminatus Lizard People folks blush.

Rachel welcomed Suhail Khan of the Institute for Global Engagement, who I’m guessing is in for another challenging year.

GOPlan

The Republicans’ sensible bargain-priced health care plan costs $60 billion and eventually leaves even more people uninsured than there are now.

It kind of reminds me of when I was 22 and I bought “bargain” work shoes for my bartending job that fell apart almost immediately and had so little arch support that they left me literally crawling around my apartment after a nine-hour shift.

The difference between me and the Republicans is that I didn’t buy those shoes again, I didn’t try to talk anybody else into thinking my purchase was an awesome choice, and I didn’t spend days on end bloviating about how much I cherished the freedom to be in terrible pain and unable to reach my toaster oven.

Now Newt Gingrich (R – Your television, for ever and ever) and Governor Rick Perry (R – Secessionist Texas) are urging the Texas model of health care. (Warning: DO NOT BUY THOSE SHOES.)

We also got a soupçon of disingenuousness from Representative Michele Bachmann (R – The Land of 10,000 Lakes and Maybe One Lake of Fire) and a visit from Representative Anthony Weiner (D – New York) straight from the House session on the health care bill.

SPOILER: The health care bill passed on Saturday night, but not before the cheerfully insidious Stupak amendment was inserted at the last minute.

It’s being presented by conservatives as a simple amendment to stop federal funding of abortions, which is a lie. That language was already in the health care bill.

The Stupak amendment would stop insurance companies that participate in the public plan from offering abortion services – which means most will opt to drop those services rather than take a huge financial hit. Where’s that part where conservatives don’t want the government to interfere with business again?

The amendment will drastically reduce women’s options where it doesn’t cut them off completely. Which is totally awesome, because apparently restricting access to safe abortions instantly solves all the problems surrounding them.

If this little development infuriating to you, now would be the time to direct a few choice words at your Congressional rep. There is still time to get the language out of the bill.

One More Thing:

Rachel passed on the most fascinating bit of Capitol Hill gossip I’ve heard all year: Michele Bachmann’s chief of staff quit right before her rally for freedom, bloody Nancy Pelosi costumes, and proudly coughing for weeks at a time.

Apparently Ms. Bachmann runs through a lot of staffers, but that’s probably because it’s really hard to figure out how payroll should work when you keep discovering commies in the mix.

Ms. Information

Rachel reported that unemployment hit 10.2% and unemployment benefits finally got extended for up to 20 weeks.

Republicans had filibustered the benefit extension three times because they wanted to add an unrelated anti-ACORN bit. So, sorry if anybody got evicted, but at least a telegenic shouting issue got a little more time!

Rachel also gave us an update on census worker Bill Sparkman’s death that made at least one viewer say “The hell?” out loud.

Kentucky authorities are now suggesting that Sparkman wrote “Fed” on his chest, stripped nearly naked, blindfolded and gagged himself, duct-taped his ID to himself, bound his own feet and hands, and then somehow used the minimal hand movement he had left to commit suicide.

In a related story, Kentucky authorities are now “80% sure” that Julius Caesar and Rasputin also did themselves in.

And because she is a conscientious nerd, Rachel issued a correction on herself.

On Thursday, Rachel made fun of Congressman John Boehner (R – Ohio) for whipping out his not-at-all-a-prop portable copy of the Constitution and then – Oopsie! – quoting the preamble to the Declaration of Independence.

(Sometimes, when you are overwhelmed by sincere Patriotism, your passion will jump documents. Be very careful about quoting historic national texts if your are standing near any of Benjamin Franklin’s less formal discourses.)

Rachel, in her zeal, had said that the Constitution doesn’t even have a preamble, which of course it does.

She made it up to all of us with a little help from Schoolhouse Rock.

GOP in Exile

Rachel looked at the sad, lonely case of Governor Charlie Crist (Florida), who was one of the Republican governors reasonable enough to admit that his state could use a little federal stimulus help.

Now, however, the far right wing of the Republican Party is trying to hunt down and eat any party members who don’t automatically scream “Government BAD!” every time their shock collars go off, and Governor Crist is getting a little nervous.

So nervous that he is now saying he has always hated that darned stimulus package.

So nervous that he has forgotten about the existence of videotape and the Internet. Oh, dear.

Cloudy with a Chance of Baloney

Senator Barbara Boxer (D – California) demonstrated her black belt in political badassery by getting the climate change bill out of committee without a single Republican vote. Apparently she’s the only Democrat who has figured out that the Republicans don’t actually want to help with anything.

(Senator Boxer, can you signal to the others, somehow? Semaphore? Notes in invisible ink? Saying it out loud?)

After reminding us all that Senator Inhofe (R – Oklahoma) wants to bring a Truth Squad to Copenhagen (Pleeeeeeeease let there be tights and capes!), Rachel gave us a bit more of her talk with former Vice President Al Gore.

Gore surprised everyone by doing the interview while sitting in an idling Hummer, cooking up a steak with a portable hair dryer, and insisting on a new plastic knife and fork for every bite.

One More Thing:

Ever wonder what to do when everyone is sitting around after a big Thanksgiving meal? Have you been looking high and low for something that’s fun and appropriate for all ages?

Search no more! Coal coloring books are here!

Rachel once again did separate 9:00 and 11:00 broadcasts as she tried to sort out Thursday’s tragic and baffling events at Fort Hood.

As of the first broadcast, almost all that was known was that the shooting suspect is U.S. Army Major Nidal Malik Hassan, a military psychiatrist, and for much of the first broadcast he was believed dead.

A press conference with Lieutenant General Bob Cone clarified the matter, but raised more questions about the flow of information.

Rachel spoke with Danny Coulson, a former Deputy Assistant Director of the FBI.

Murder in the Military

In trying to figure out how and why something like Fort Hood can happen, Rachel and Salon.com’s Mark Benjamin took a disturbing look at similar incidents in the past and the possible strain that can be involved in helping soldiers deal with the trauma of combat.

Fort Carson murders

Rachel continued with an unsettling piece on the extent to which proper mental health support is just not available to returning soldiers.

Lee Christopher Smith of Rolling Stone joined Rachel to talk about Fort Carson in Colorado, where 14 soldiers have been charged with murder in recent years.

Republican Option

In a story that was fun much earlier in the day, Representative Michele Bachmann led her “emergency house call” for the teabaggers on Thursday, and she continues to think it’s adorable to use violent rhetoric and imply that it’s time to overthrow the government.

Are we sure that Bachmann knows she’s a part of the government? I can’t tell if she’s really that loony or if she can just be induced to say absolutely anything when she thinks she’s on a roll.

Anyway, apparently it’s super-patriotic to encourage people to be belligerent toward their elected representatives and litter in the halls of the Capitol.

If you ever get invited over to Bachmann’s house for tea and crazy, make sure to tear up papers and throw them all over her foyer. She loves that.

I guess it’s a good thing that Bachmann is cute and thin enough for Levin’s political standards or the day could have been awkward, huh?

Rachel started us off with the breaking news that Senator Evan Bayh (D – Indiana) is backing way off of his apparent threat to join a filibuster to stop debate of the health care bill.

Bayh’s office said that he was “clarifying” his position rather than skittering away from it in fear.

It’s good to know that I can now tell people I clarified my position with the black widow spider I found in my apartment a few months ago. Let’s hope that Senator Bayh will not be reduced to dropping a pizza box on the health care bill and then stomping on it.

This leaves Senator Joe Lieberman (I – Connecticut) standing alone in jerk territory.

Why does he seem so happy about it? Does he have trouble interpreting other people’s facial expressions? Or hand gestures? Or angry phone calls and e-mails? Who’s going to explain it to him?

Jane Hamsher of FireDogLake.com dropped in to explain what’s up with a genius beauty pageant metaphor that will have you scrambling for the brain bleach.

Stuck in the Middle with You

Rachel moved on to the House health reform bill, which does have a public option. Sort of.

It’s so watered down that it’s kind of appropriate that only ten Tea Partiers could pull it together to go protest it.

You can go with the “Well, at least it’s there,” optimism, and it’s true, there was a point a couple of months ago when it looked like health care reform would consist of getting insurance executives to agree not to punch us directly in the kidneys while we’re dropping off our wheelbarrows full of premium money.

And yet, said insurance executives will not be trading their suits in for comical barrel costumes any time soon. Thanks, Blue Dogs.

Rachel had some footage of an outright disgusted Representative Dennis Kucinich (D – Ohio), who had some choice words on the subject. I love him.

Congressman Anthony Weiner (D – New York), on the other hand, was way calmer than I expected him to be.

Popping the Question

As you may have guessed, Rachel is geeked for Election Night.

And you should be too, because the Question One referendum in Maine is going to be a nail-biter. If you have loved ones – or, hell, acquaintances – in Maine, make sure they get out there to vote.

Tell them you’ll keep talking about Joe Lieberman in a bikini until you do.

Rachel welcomed Maine Governor John Baldacci (D), who was against gay marriage only a couple of years ago, but has since had a change of heart.

Here’s what I’ve noticed: People who move from opposing gay marriage to favoring it tend to either realize that the issue directly affects someone they care about or, like Baldacci, they come to believe it’s about fairness and equal protection under the law.

People who stick to opposing gay marriage tend to cite Jesus, and when you point out that he didn’t actually say much about that, they become intensely interested in a single verse of Leviticus.

It’s kind of like saying we should change our nation’s drug laws because of the Eleusinian Mysteries. 

Good luck, Maine! And remember that if you don’t live there, you can still jump on a phone bank.

(Or on a phone bank for Washington’s Referendum 71. Go get ‘em, Evergreen State!)

Ms. Information

Rachel took another look at Congressman Steve Buyer’s (R – Indiana) Frontier Foundation, a scholarship fund with such amazingly high standards that it has never actually seen fit to award one.

Buyer, however, has been tirelessly subjecting himself to golfing fundraisers in beautiful locations in the hopes that one day some student will be diligent enough to qualify for the more than $800,000 the foundation has raised.

In other news of the Buyer family’s civic-minded selflessness, Buyer’s son Ryan sits on the board of the Frontier Foundation when he’s not busy at his job at PhRMA, a drug industry trade group.

PhRMA has donated extensively to the Frontier Foundation, and you could have knocked them over with a feather when they realized that Representative Buyer sits on the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health, which regulates the pharmaceutical industry.

Truly, they had no idea. Small world, eh?

Rachel also noted that according to President Obama’s former campaign manager David Plouffe, Evan Bayh was once a strong contender to get the Vice Presidential nod.

That story really gave me pause. Not because Obama was considering such an obstructionist conservadem, but because I couldn’t decide in which position Bayh would be more irritating.

Carbon Copies

Are you ready for some comical, transparent lying to Congress? You’re in luck.

In their zeal to keep the world safe for coal dust, Bonner & Associates stole some letterhead and forged missives to three members of Congress before a critical climate change vote.

Or rather, a “temporary employee” did. Right before he jammed the copier and took two packets of breakroom tea home for personal rather than office use. He just couldn’t be stopped!

Nor could Bonner & Associates bring themselves to tell the Representatives they’d sent the letters to after they discovered what the naughty temp had done.

I guess another temp was running the phones that day.

Rachel started us off with a look at Senator Joe Lieberman (I – Connecticut), who has announced that he would cross party lines (he caucuses with the Democrats and owes his Homeland Security chairmanship to them) to filibuster any health care bill with a public option.

Lieberman’s threat to filibuster stems from a longstanding, deeply principled belief.

No, wait, the other thing.

Turns out Senator Evan Bayh (D – Indiana) is also a humongous weasel. He and his wife seem to have adopted the intriguing tactic of being so hilariously, cartoonishly corrupt that future fictionalized accounts will have to be toned down for believability.

How can steelworkers be getting laid off when by all rights they should be working round the clock to fashion the Bayhs’ nards?

Seriously: How can Joe Lieberman possibly still have a chairmanship? Of whom does he have compromising photos?

At this point, I’m guessing that it must be the Area 51 aliens soul kissing every last one of the Senate Democrats while exiting a limousine with no panties on and conspiring to take out the World Trade Center.

It’s the only explanation that makes sense.

One More Thing:

Fox News, which is totally an unbiased news organization and not a convenient bullhorn for Republican propaganda, hired John Stossel to objectively report the news.

Which he will do just as soon as he is done speaking at those Americans for Prosperity rallies against health care reform.

Big Poppy

As Rachel reported last night, the brother of Afghan President Karzai has been on the CIA payroll for years.

Which would only be counterproductive and awkward if he weren’t widely rumored to also be a drug lord.

And that would only be upsetting and scuzzy if it weren’t for the fact that the Afghan opium trade funds the Taliban.

Which means our intelligence agents may have been inadvertently funding the deaths of our soldiers.

Tim Weiner, the author of Legacy of Ashes, dropped in to talk about the fact that our military, diplomatic, and intelligence efforts in Afghanistan are not coordinated, and we seem to be using different strategies in different regions.

Other than that and the new death toll high, the war is going just swell.

Stimfrastructure

Rachel decided to terrify us all with graphics of collapsing streets and crumbling bridges because it’s been a little while since she gave us heart palpitations and she likes to stay in shape.

But then she had mercy on us and pointed out that spending money on infrastructure might not be such a bad thing.

Ms. Information

President Obama signed the Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act into law on Wednesday. The act expands federal hate crimes law to include gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, and disability. The act also sets aside funding to help local law enforcement agencies pay for the prosecution of hate crimes.

Rachel also reported that eBay refused to host the repellent planned auction of murderer memorabilia to benefit Scott Roeder, who is accused of killing Dr. George Tiller. Good.

LaWrong

Rachel served up a bit of political strangeness with the news that The Clifton Journal erroneously reported that women working for the Hoffmann-La Roche pharmaceuticals company were handing out anti-health reform leaflets portraying Obama as Hitler.

The women were in fact working for Lyndon LaRouche. For those of you who weren’t around or weren’t paying attention during the 80’s, he would be distinctly unfunny if he weren’t so entertainingly bizarre.

Or maybe I’m wrong and Queen Elizabeth really has been a drug dealer all these years.

Rachel Re: Catch F-22

Rachel gave us a fascinating Rachel: Re. The F-22 fighter jet was a classic (and depressing) study in how to pork up a project so thoroughly that it can’t be killed, no matter how big, dumb, expensive, and useless it is.

Amazingly enough, the story has a happy ending.

Well, almost.

Rachel Gets a Gingrich Gavel

You heard me. Enjoy.

Rachel started us off with the news that Senator Joe Lieberman (D – Connecticut) (for now) is being really super-annoying again.

Now that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D – Nevada) has announced that there will be a public health care option in the Senate health care reform bill, Lieberman has stated that he’ll block a vote on any bill that contains one.

Since Lieberman’s reasoning behind that makes no freaking sense, we’ll have to assume that he got jealous of all the attention Olympia Snowe (R – Maine) got last week and now he’s acting out.

Democrats, I know he’s annoying, but could you try putting his drawings up on the fridge in the Senate breakroom?

Jane Hamsher of FireDogLake.com dropped in to discuss possible political consequences for Lieberman.

Frankly, Lieberman had better hope there are political consequences, because otherwise members of the American public will have to default to the only punishment they have left: Constantly giving Joe Lieberman the finger.

Assuming members of the American public have any fingers left.

Moment of Geek

What could move the Moment of Geek this high in the show? Infrastructure! (Yes, you get the Infrastructure Growl in this clip.)

President Obama gave out the largest stimulus award in a single day thus far. The money will go toward updating our nation’s electric grid, which is currently being held together by duct tape and spider webs.

Vice President Biden, in turn, announced that an old GM auto plant will become a new auto plant, only now it will be putting out supercool sexy electric cars.

So it might be time to start talking to your current car about its end-of-life decisions. Broach the subject gently so it doesn’t go all Christine on you.

Fringe and Purge

Rachel noted that many prominent far-right politicians are jumping all over New York’s District 23 race, in which the Democratic candidate is watching wide-eyed and joyous as the Republican candidate is being challenged by Douglas Hoffman, a Conservative candidate.

Rachel astutely pointed out that the helpful Marilyn Musgrave, Rick Santorum, Steve Forbes, and Fred Thompson all got stomped so hard in their last election attempts that they struck oil, and yet somehow they still think that driving the party farther to the right is a neato idea.

How much farther to the right can the party go? Whose vote are they trying to pick up over there? Vlad the Impaler’s?

Anyway, now that the far-right bullies are realizing that they can wield actual power, other Republicans are making the mind-bendingly dumb decision of scrambling to cater to them.

Thus Governor Tim Pawlenty (R – Minnesota) is now in the awkward position of trying to prove that he is less smart and reasonable than he seems to be.

Good luck with that, Governor! Try not to gnash your teeth too loudly during those long, dark nights of the soul!

Ms. Information

Rachel brought us the hot-off-the-presses news that The New York Times is reporting that Afghanistan’s incredibly corrupt President Karzai’s even more corrupt brother gets regular payments from the CIA, and has been doing so for the better part of eight years.

Don’t worry – I’m sure it’s nothing like a full salary. Just a little something to supplement his opium trafficking. And buy some cool decals for the paramilitary group.

On the heels of that inspiring reminder of just what we’re fighting for, Rachel reported that eight more American troops were killed in Afghanistan on Tuesday, bringing the death toll for October alone to 55 – and that’s only counting the American lives lost.

Matthew Hoh, until recently the senior U.S. civilian in Afghanistan working for the State Dept, also had trouble justifying the loss of life, and has resigned in protest of the war.

Deparment of Corrections

Rachel had previously reported that The New York Times waited more than eight years for an interview with President Bush, which was incorrect.

While the Bush White House didn’t grant the Times any interviews during his second term, he didn’t freeze them out for the full ride.

Rachel regretted the error and let her inner nerd out to apologize and pledge even greater commitment to correctness in the future.

“A Trade Show for War Profiteers”

Rachel brought us the joyous news that the International Peace Operations Association just had its annual summit in Washington, D.C.

The participants in the convention for private security companies included Blackwater, ArmorGroup, and DynCorp International.

If you decide to attend the convention next year, think twice before you pick up swag.

In the Dark

Back in May, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D – California) said that Congress had been misled by the intelligence community.

Turns out she was correct.

And I must have been in a coma or abducted by aliens for a couple of days and not noticed it, because I distinctly remember that after Pelosi’s initial announcement, Newt Gingrich went on about 40,000 talk shows to pitch fits about what an awful awful thing she said and how she should resign immediately and wear sackcloth and ashes for the rest of her days.

But it turns out Pelosi was correct – really, terrifyingly correct – and somehow I have missed Newt Gingrich’s national apology tour.

That’s what a responsible adult who is so very worried about accuracy in politics would do, right? Admit that he was wrong and apologize for being such a vicious, shrieking hosebeast?

Maybe he’s just waiting for the blooming season of the perfect floral offering.

I’m focusing on waiting for Newt to nard up and freaking apologize because it is something I can get my brain around. Which is in marked contrast to the news that our intelligence community has been operating with enormous budgets and no real oversight for heaven knows how long.

Well, heaven doesn’t really know concretely for how long. Heaven has been briefed on a need-to-know basis. Except for those things the intelligence community left out.

Live Newt Girls

There is no good reason for me to include this clip, except that it’s fun. And it involves all-around classy guy Newt Gingrich, some exotic dancers, and a heartwarming story about dogs.

Which is a good thing, because it looks like those dancers don’t have much else to keep their hearts warm.