Mark Kirk sinks to new depths

Add comment December 2nd, 2009

 

 This erstwhile moderate Republican is acting more and more like a wingnut, which makes no political sense. It isn’t like he’s going to have to woo the far right to win the GOP nomination for an Illinois seat in the  U.S. Senate.

 Still, he resorts to nonsense like THIS.

Mark Kirk deservedly blasted for alarmist stance on Thomson prison proposal

11 comments November 17th, 2009

U.S. Rep. Mark Kirk, a candidate for the Republican nomination to succeed Roland Burris in the U.S. Senate, is getting A LOT OF HEAT for his craven fearmongering in the controversy over the proposed transfer of Gitmo detainees to an underutilized state prison in northwestern Illinois.

The real reason why GOPers oppose transfer of Gitmo detainees to Illinois

29 comments November 16th, 2009

 

 (NOTE: This post has been updated yet again to reflect new developments, one of which includes a Rockford angle.)

 As everyone knows by now, the Obama administration is considering the federal purchase of a vacant state prison (above) in rural northwestern Illinois to house about 100 suspected terrorists who have been held for years at a facility in Cuba that eventually will be shuttered for various geopolitical reasons.

 The folks who live in Thomson, Ill., the site of the prison in question, generally seem to be in favor of the idea. So does Gov. Pat Quinn, who relishes the prospects of as many as 2,000 new jobs and the inflow of hundreds of millions of federal dollars.

 But I’ve yet to hear of any prominent Republicans boosting the proposal. On the contrary, U.S. Rep. Don Manzullo, whose district includes Thomson, is against it. And his fellow Republican Congressman Mark Kirk is circulating a letter of opposition among other GOP politicians.

 The objections raised by Manzullo and Kirk, however, are nonsense.

 Will the detainees attract hordes of terrorist sympathizers to tiny Thomson? That hasn’t happened in other U.S. locales where Islamic terrorists are imprisoned, including downstate Marion, Ill.

 Might not the detainees escape? Nobody’s ever escaped from a federal supermax prison.

 Won’t this plan make Illinois in general, and perhaps Chicago in particular, a likelier target for future terrorist attacks? No more likely, it would seem, than any of the other U.S. states or locales where Islamic terrorists currently are imprisoned.

 Well, if these Nervous Nellie Republicans can’t come up with any logical arguments against the Thomson proposal, why do they refuse to go along with it? What’s the real reason for their opposition?

 The answer is simple: They’re against it because it’s Barack Obama’s idea. To side with Obama on anything, especially if it relates to terrorism, is to invite the wrath of the wingnut base of the Republican Party.

 UPDATE: Steve Benen is even HARDER than I on Manzullo and Kirk.

UPDATE II: Hold on! I stand corrected! There are, in fact, some prominent rightwingers who support the Thomson prison proposal.

 In THIS NEWS STORY, three of them take a swipe at the poppycock peddled by the likes of Manzullo and Kirk.

 ”The scaremongering about these issues should stop,” the trio declare in a joint statement, noting that there is “absolutely no reason to fear that prisoners will escape or be released into their communities.” 

 UPDATE III: The letter from Mark Kirk to which I referred in the main body of this post suggests that federal trials of any detainees held in the Thomson prison might be held in Rockford.

 The text of the letter is HERE.

Here’s more on Mark Kirk’s flirtation with Sarah Palin

1 comment November 5th, 2009

 

 Yesterday, we had THIS.

 Today, we have THIS.

 A few excerpts:

 When Kirk decided to run for the Senate, it made some sense — Illinois is one of the more reliably “blue” states in the country, but Kirk has generally preferred to keep the far-right, Sarah Palin wing of the Republican Party at arm’s length…

 Why in the world would Kirk sully his reputation like this [by seeking an endorsement from Palin]? Because he’s facing a little-known, underfunded anti-tax activist/political neophyte in a Republican primary, and a right-wing third-party candidate is a possibility in the general election.

Mark Kirk begging for an endorsement from Sarah Palin?

6 comments November 4th, 2009

 Mark Kirk, the erstwhile moderate Republican congressman from the Chicago suburbs, reportedly is pleading for an endorsement from Sarah Palin in his bid to succeed Roland Burris as the junior U.S. senator from Illinois.

 At least, that what it says HERE.