As it completes one year on the chart overall, Adele’s album 21 will hold at the top of the Billboard 200 album chart for a 21st week. This ties it for the eighth longest stay atop the album chart in its more than 50 year history. With the wind of Grammy Awards wins at her back, Adele notches up a mark of 730,000 copies sold. That is her best week yet, and its the best sales week for any album since Lil Wayne debuted with Tha Carter IV selling 964,000 copies last September. Adele will next set her sights on Prince’s Purple Rain and the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack which each spent 24 weeks at the top of the album chart. The pop phenomenon that is Adele shows no signs of slowing down.

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Special thanks to About.com for the scoop!

Billboard has officially certified that Katy Perry’s new hit single “Part Of Me” will be sitting at #1 when the Hot 100 chart is released tomorrow morning. That makes it the 20th song to accomplish the feat of debuting at the top in the over 50 year history of the chart. It is the first song since Lady Gaga splashed in at the top with “Born This Way” a year ago. The overall Billboard Hot 100 is a bit chaotic at the top this week. Adele capitalizes on her Grammy wins and brings “Rolling In the Deep” and “Someone Like You” back into the top 10. Nicki Minaj and Chris Brown…

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Special thanks to About.com for the scoop!

Something tells me this may be an X Factor contestant with a true chance at stardom. Columbia Records, the label home of Adele and Glee, has signed 14 year old phenomenon Rachel Crow to a recording contract. In addition, she has also been signed by the Nickelodeon cable network which is building a pilot for a potential new series around her. Rachel Crow will also appear in a recurring role in the network’s comedy Fred: The Show. She says of the recording contract, “To think that I am signed to the same label as my idols is a dream come true. I can’t wait to get in the studio and start making music.” Rachel Crow first performed in public at the age of six for her school’s talent show.

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Special thanks to About.com for the scoop!

Mitt Romney yesterday, taking the Keynesian position that in a sluggish economy, spending cuts reduce economic growth:

“If you just cut, if all you’re thinking about doing is cutting spending, as you cut spending you’ll slow down the economy,” he said.

Romney’s point seems to have been that if you don’t cut taxes while slashing spending, the net effect will be a reduction in demand. That’s not an entirely crazy thing to say, though cutting taxes is a far less efficient way to stimulate growth than cutting increasing spending, and if you target your tax cuts to upper income folks who will merely pocket the savings, tax cuts won’t do a thing. But regardless of the merits of what Romney said, it’s a striking change from his message throughout the campaign, which has been that cutting spending by itself is an economic growth strategy.

For example:

We must cut federal spending to free up resources for productive investment.

And:

Runaway federal spending crowds out private investment. [...] We must cut government spending.

Therefore:

Under my administration, we will level with the American people about what it will take to truly cut spending.

Because:

We’re going to have to cut spending.

To be clear:

As president, I pledge to reduce spending.

And the cuts will be severe:

Upon taking office, I will immediately cut discretionary spending.

So up until yesterday, Romney’s argument was that cutting spending would, in and of itself, generate economic growth because it would free up resources for private investment. Now he says cutting spending would reduce economic growth because it would reduce demand. Those are two very different economic theories, and I’ll bet you he doesn’t even know why he decided to switch sides. But I’ll guarantee you that by tonight, he’ll have switched back.

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!

For those of you who think Democrats wouldn’t love to drag out the GOP nomination contest longer and perhaps even hit the mother lode-a Santorum nomination-take a gander at this:

Allies of President Obama are wading into the Michigan GOP primary, attacking former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney on one of his weakest points in the state.

A new Priorities USA ad hits Romney for opposing the auto industry bailout, a position the candidate has struggled to explain as he campaigns in the home of the U.S. auto industry.

Obama’s Super PAC is now engaging in Michigan, attempting to weaken Romney for the benefit of the GOP’s own SNL Church Lady. And as much as the Super PACs might pretend that they operate independently of their candidates, they don’t. Priorities wouldn’t be hitting Romney in Michigan without the tacit approval of Team Obama.

The polls are close. It won’t take much to tip the scales one way or another. And yes, Democrats benefit most from a Santorum victory. That’s why we continue to urge Democrats in upcoming open primary and caucus states (Michigan, Tennessee, North Dakota, and Vermont) to cast their very legal and quite ethical votes for Rick Santorum. If Republicans didn’t want Democrats voting in these primaries and caucuses, they would close them to outsiders (like they do in most states).

Of course, I realize that this makes some of you squeamish, and if you live in one of those states and don’t want to participate, you don’t have to! (We also stopped fundraising for it, focusing instead in message mobilizing.) But there’s too much at stake to worry about idealistic notions of what democracy should be. Luckily for all of us, Team Obama isn’t restraining itself based on such idealism. They’re playing to win, and this latest action is essentially strategic vindication for Operation Hilarity.

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Let’s talk about these comments about religion coming up right now, this 2008 speech from Rick Santorum saying that “Satan has his sights set on America and is making progress.” Now Santorum is not backing down, but he also says it’s not relevant. Is he right?

CHRIS CHRISTIE: Well, listen, I think anything you say as a presidential candidate is relevant. I mean, it’s by definition relevant. You’re asking people to be President of the United States. So, I don’t think he’s right about that. I think it is relevant what he says. I think people want to make an evaluation, a complete evaluation, of anybody who asks to sit in the Oval Office, so I think it’s relevant in that respect. Now, do I think it’s the things that we should be as a party talking about and emphasizing at the moment? No.

Sorry, bub. It’s too late for that. The train has left the station-the ship has sailed. Even Mitt Romney, who has Chris Christie’s seal of approval, can’t stop talking about religion (though he does have the discipline to avoid talking about the Planet Kolob). As Joan points out, just yesterday, Romney opened the door to a theocratic agenda by attacking President Obama for having a “secular agenda,” as if secular has suddenly become a dirty word. Romney went so far as to claim the President had “fought against religion” in America and posed a threat to religious freedom.

So the pork rind, as it were, has been eaten. But there’s still a party for people who don’t want to debate the policy implications of Satan’s attack on America … and it’s called the Democratic Party.

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!

In an attempt to outdo Rick Santorum in appealing to the American Taliban, Mitt Romney appears to be promising a theocratic agenda in his would-be presidency.

“You expect the president of the United States to be sensitive to that freedom and protect it and, unfortunately, perhaps because of the people the president hangs around with, and their agenda, their secular agenda, they have fought against religion,” Romney said, responding to a question about religious freedoms, in particular the Obama administration’s recent controversial attempt to require all institutions, including hospitals and colleges with religious affiliations, to offer free birth control and other contraceptives.

Which leads to the obvious question: Doesn’t the Constitution pretty much demand that the only agenda a president have be a secular one? What agenda would Romney have as president? A theocratic one?

He’s opened the door to that question, essentially giving the anti-JFK speech on religion. Here’s what Kennedy had to say specifically on the matter of faith and governance:

{…] [L]et me stress again that these are my views. For contrary to common newspaper usage, I am not the Catholic candidate for president. I am the Democratic Party’s candidate for president, who happens also to be a Catholic. I do not speak for my church on public matters, and the church does not speak for me.

[. . .] Whatever issue may come before me as president on birth control, divorce, censorship, gambling or any other subject-I will make my decision in accordance with these views, in accordance with what my conscience tells me to be the national interest, and without regard to outside religious pressures or dictates. And no power or threat of punishment could cause me to decide otherwise.

Would Romney, like Kennedy, disavow the outside religious pressure or dictates he might receive from his own bishops? Since he’s now expressed a disdain for a “secular” presidential agenda, it’s a question that has to be asked.

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!

Someone remind Mitt Romney that he’s still running for president under the “Republican” line. Yesterday, he embraced progressive language opposing further austerity.

“If you just cut, if all you’re thinking about doing is cutting spending, as you cut spending you’ll slow down the economy,” he said.

He’s right! Of course, that statement is a dramatic departure from his previous position on austerity, as Jed has helpfully noted at that link above. It’s such a dramatic departure, in fact, that he now finds himself directly at odds with his party’s primary electorate-an odd place to be given his current electoral woes.

But that’s not all! Today, the malfunctioning Romneybot embraced Occupy Wall Street language while discussing taxes:

And in order to limit any impact on the deficit, because I do not want to add to the deficit, and also to make sure we continue to have progressivity in our code, I’m going to limit the deductions and exemptions particularly for high income folks. And by the way, I want to make sure that you understand, for middle income families, the deductibility of home mortgage interest and charitable contributions, those things will continue, but for high income folks, we are going to cut back on that so we make sure the top 1% keeps paying, paying the current share they’re paying or more.

Sounds good! Definitely make the 1 percenters pay more. Glad to have him aboard the pursuit of a more progressive tax code (his words, not mine). But again, has he forgotten that he’s running for the Republican nomination? And if he was going to start pivoting to the center earlier than expected, couldn’t he have at least waited until after tonight’s debate, most likely the last of this primary season?

This is what happens when you have no core principles, no real ideological foundation, no moral underpinnings. You end up flapping around, saying random shit, and ensuring that just about everyone hates you.

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!

The Obama administration is proposing to cut the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 28 percent (25 percent for manufacturing), close scores of loopholes that currently reduce the effective tax rate, put a minimum tax on foreign profits and simplify tax filing for small businesses. You can be certain of two things: Republicans and many corporate mouthpieces will say the cut doesn’t go deep enough; and, when the nitty-gritty is dealt with in the congressional committees that will review it, expect a major drive to lower the rates and keep at least some of the loopholes. Because when it comes to tax rates on corporate profits (and high-income individuals), the right believes they can never be low enough.

The proposal also keeps credits for research, development and production of electricity from renewable sources. The goal is to spur investment in wind, solar and geothermal power. One of those credits, the production tax credit, expires in December.

It being an election year, the chances that any proposal will wind up on the president’s desk before 2013 is small. John Hudson at Atlantic Wire says it’s “sensible” but bound to fail. But the issue is also bound to be part of the debates once the Republicans settle on a presidential nominee. The White House proposal-the culmination of two years’ work-will certainly serve to undercut any GOP attempt to say the administration is doing nothing to deal with what people across the political spectrum agree is an antiquated corporate tax system riddled with often inefficient breaks, most of which are taken by the largest companies.

As has been widely reported for years, the effective (read: actual) corporate tax rate is far lower than the 35 percent headline rate that gets all the bad press. Last year, Citizens for Tax Justice reported on the 280 most profitable Fortune 500 companies. Findings? Thanks to tax breaks and subsidies, the average effective tax rate over the three-year 2008-2010 period was 18.5 percent and the companies enjoyed subsidies of $222.7 billion. During at least one of the three years, 78 highly profitable companies paid zero taxes and 30 actually had a negative tax rate.

But that’s not the worst of it. In 2011, according to the Congressional Budget Office, the effective corporate tax rate fell to 12.1 percent, the lowest level in 40 years. This comes at time when corporate profits are at a 60-year high.

(Continue reading below the fold)

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!

At the now infamous no-girlz-allowed birth control policy hearing Rep. Darrell Issa held last week, the Democrats had one witness they wanted to speak in the first panel. Unbelievably (to the GOP), it was a woman. Sandra Fluke, a third-year student at Georgetown Law and past president of the school’s Students for Reproductive Justice group, was slated to speak about how the policy would actually affect women.

The horror.

So Democrats have decided to hold their own hearing, an unofficial one because they are in the minority in the house, with Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi spearheading the effort. But here’s how much Republicans want the discussion of women’s health to be limited entirely to male theologians: they aren’t allowing the hearing to be broadcast.

Pelosi aides say the House recording studio has denied a request to broadcast the event, “apparently” at the behest of the Republican-controlled Committee on House Administration.

Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill pointed to a July 2008 decision in which the committee lifted restrictions on use of the studio.

“If Chairman [Dan] Lungren has reversed this policy, he has done so in secret and not consulted with CHA Democrats,” Hammill said in an email. “This leaves us only to think that the House Republican leadership is acting out yet again to silence women on the topic of women’s health.”

A spokeswoman for Lungren’s committee says that the policy has not been changed, but had no explanation for why-for this specific hearing-a policy of always covering hearings is not being followed. Pelosi’s office says that this is the first time they’ve had the recording studio refuse to cover a hearing or to say they had another commitment.

The GOP wants, desperately, this fight to be about religious freedom instead of what it’s really about: controlling women. The problem for them is that the more they shut women out, the more obvious their anti-woman agenda is and the less success they’ll have in changing the narrative.

So let’s help Pelosi and the Democrats keep this issue alive. Sign this petition to tell the Republicans to let women talk about women’s heallth.

Special thanks to Daily Kos for the scoop!