In honor of the extremist preacher’s upcoming 80th birthday, the state of Virginia officially sanctioned Robertson as a great American:

“WHEREAS, Dr. M.G. “Pat” Robertson, an inspirational televangelist and longtime host of the Christian television program, The 700 Club, is recognized in 2010 for his many contributions to the Commonwealth and his fellow citizens; and” [...]

“WHEREAS, in 1989 Dr. Robertson founded the Christian Coalition, a political organization credited with increasing the influence of conservative Christians in American public policy; and ” [...]

“WHEREAS, Dr. Robertson is a compelling and compassionate spiritual leader, who is guided by Philippians 4:13, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”; he is devoted to his family, his viewers who are his extended family, his community, and the Commonwealth;”

Rob Boston of Americans United had some excellent suggestions for additions to the Virginia resolution:

“Whereas Robertson in 1990 said of homosexuality, “It is a sickness, and it needs to be treated” and added, “Many of those people involved with Adolf Hitler were Satanists; many of them were homosexuals. The two things seem to go together”; and” [..]

“Whereas in 1998 Robertson said, “I want to state very clearly, ladies and gentlemen, there’s no such thing in the Constitution as, quote, separation of church and state. That term does not exist in the United States Constitution. It existed in the former Soviet Union’s constitution but not America”; and” [...]

Boston concludes:

“I would have made some other changes as well. For example, instead of lauding Robertson in the resolution, I would have condemned him as an intolerant, bigoted and dangerous extremist and called for all right-thinking Americans to reject his views.”

h/t Right Wing Watch

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Sanford was previously able to escape impeachment after toothless state legislators in January fell short of the required votes after months of threatening to remove the governor.

A judge also finalized Gov. Sanford’s divorce from his wife, Jenny, today ending their 20-year marriage. The couple have four children. Jenny Sanford has moved with her sons to their beachfront home along the South Carolina coast.

Boehner is known for his strict adherence to Republican talking points and not for his intellectual bona fides, to say the least. But his outright and blatant pandering to the financial industry, after the abuses of Wall Street nearly destroyed the entire economy, less than two-years ago, is astounding. Appearing at the American Bankers Association governmental relations summit, Boehner rallied the group of Wall Street fat cats to stand up to the “punks” at Capitol Hill and he pledged to fight Democrats to delay, delay, delay and obstruct reform of their industry:

“If the Senate is able to produce a bill, I think it’s just as likely that we’ll be talking about the same issue a year from now as we are right now,” Boehner said.

“Don’t let those little punk staffers take advantage of you and stand up for yourselves,” Boehner said. “All of us are hearing from our friends and constituents on lack of credit, you can’t get a loan, the more your government takes and taxes, the more regulations you have to comply with the more cost you have there and less amount you are going to have available to loan to customers.”

Chairman of the Financial Services Committee Rep. Barney Frank wrote a letter demanding an apology for Boehner’s remarks, saying “I am appalled that a Leader of the House, who must know what good work is done by our staffs, would take such an inaccurate cheap-shot at these people, for the purpose of ingratiating himself with bankers or any other group.”

And Larry Summers, speaking at the National Press Club, also took direct aim at Boehner’s “punk” remarks, pointing out that the financial industry that spent $500 million on lobbying in 2009, doesn’t need any further help from the likes of Congressman Boehner to screw ordinary Americans:

“I do not think that those who want to address these issues are ‘little punk staffers’ who need to be stood up to,” Summers said. “At a moment when there are four lobbyists per member of the House and Senate working on this issue, we in the Administration do not believe that the prominent issue is allowing bankers to stand up for themselves.”

As noted by Think Progress, Boehner has raked in $3.4 million from the financial services industry, which is $1.2 million more than he’s received from any other group.

The CityStore is a storefront where the police department often sells off things seized in closed cases, surpluses from various departments in the city, and the local PD’s property room.

But when they handed over an old filing cabinet, apparently someone forgot to check inside.

They ended up handing over 123 bags of heroine, cocaine, meth and marijuana.

No one came into contact with the drugs, and the mistake was quickly caught before any of the drugs could get out.

The department is currently doing an internal review to find out what happened.

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Jim Cramer is a former hedge-fund manager and the off-the-wall CNBC host of “Mad Money.” He was blamed by many, especially Comedy Central’s Jon Stewart, for his complicity in Wall Street’s financial meltdown, with his irresponsible financial reporting. Cramer is the co-founder and Chairman of the Board of TheStreet. And he provides commentary for the site for an annual subscription of $399.95.

According to the report in the NY Post, federal regulators first looked into TheStreet’s dealings with Promotions.com last summer, but appeared satisfied with the the company’s internal probe and backed off:

“Last summer, TheStreet.com announced there were “issues” related to how it had been recording revenue at Promotions.com, the marketing company it acquired in 2007. An internal probe ensued and resulted in several quarters of delayed earnings results for the parent company, frustrating investors.”

Cramer then unloaded Promotions.com for $3.1 million and finally released TheStreet’s delayed earnings reports. But “a person close to the company” says the SEC is now conducting another investigation.

TheStreet’s CEO Daryl Otte, told the paper the company is “is cooperating fully with the investigation.”

The unnamed suspect had apparently been working for a massive drug ring, in which doctors provided the prescription pills, which were then sorted and sold on the streets in large amounts.

The ring has also been connected to 5,000 fraudulent prescriptions, and Haim himself was found in possession of a stolen prescription pad with a filled out script.

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Lohan had traveled to New Delhi for a BBC documentary about child and women trafficking.

Originally, she had caused controversy after posting a status report on Twitter that claimed she had saved dozens of children her first day there.

“Over 40 children saved so far … Within one day’s work … This is what life is about … Doing THIS is a life worth living!!!”

But activists who had lead the raid in which 40 children were rescued from a sweat shop where they were working 17 hour days after being sold by parents, said that she had taken no part.

As a matter of fact, she had not arrived until the day after the raid had occurred.

They accuse her of belittling the accomplishment, and of minimizing the problem of child abuse and trafficking.

In addition to this, she caught the attention of the Indian government.

According to officials, she was on a tourist’s visa, but was filming a documentary with the BBC, which means she broke laws and didn’t register under the correct channels for the project and visit.

She is now being threatened by a blacklisting, which will leave her unable to travel again to the country.

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In the last two years alone, two labs run by the same Nevada-based company – Charles River Laboratories – have seen two extreme cases of research monkey cruelty.

In the first case, a heater was left on high in a room with the animals, leaving 30 to literally cook to death, and two others to have to be euthanized.

The second case involved a monkey still in its’ cage to be run through a mechanical washer, which scalded him with boiling water, killing him painfully.

These two instances together led to only $14,000 worth of fines, and one employee was fired, and one disciplined.

There have also been reports of monkeys losing the tips of their tails, or fingers were caught in the wiring cages and not released before being moved.

With so few incentives to change, labs that have no interest in the care of their research animals are getting away with murder, and are unlikely to stop.

“The penalties have given them virtually no motivation whatsoever to cease violating the law,” executive director of Stop Animal Exploitation Now, Michael Budkie, said.

“If they are literally killing animals through negligence, something is wrong with the system.”

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Since George Stephanopoulos left the Sunday talk show to become co-anchor of ABC’s morning news program “Good Morning America,” the show has used a number of guest hosts, to lukewarm response.

Although Amanpour’s expertise is in international affairs and world news, she is certainly intelligent and engaging enough, to make the switch to American political reporting. And an ABC official said the network believes Amanpour can easily handle the change.

According to the Media Coder’s report:

“The network’s interest in Ms. Amanpour — and her favorable response to the approach — has been widely speculated about for weeks. Now the negotiations are close enough to completion that an announcement may be made as early as Thursday, though an ABC News executive cautioned that nothing was final and a number of points in the deal had yet to be resolved.”

It’s sadly ironic that as CNN loses an intelligent voice, like Amanpour from its news team, the cable network hires a decidedly intellectually challenged ideologue, like Erick Erickson. The right-wing blogger of RedState.com is widely known for his radical, violent, race-baiting and sexist remarks.

Some of Erickson’s more notable statements are: asking when voters would “march down” and “beat” lawmakers “to a bloody pulp” and referring to former Supreme Court Justice David Souter as a “goat fu***** child molester.” He also referred to First Lady Michelle Obama, as a “Marxist harpy wife.” And after President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize Erickson said, “I did not realize the Nobel Peace Prize had an affirmative action quota.”

CNN should be ashamed.

CNN’s loss will be ABC’s gain.