Summary: In the inaugural edition of CNN American Morning’s “Wingnuts of the Week” segment, John Avlon named U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann a charter member of the Wingnut Hall of Fame.
Summary: Can U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) be defeated in the 2010 U.S. House of Representatives election in Minnesota’s 6th Congressional District? Yes, but not by a Democrat in the general election. Rep. Bachmann is most vulnerable in the primary election against a more moderate Republican challenger. The trump card for Bachmann opponents is Minnesota’s open primary system. With no party registration in Minnesota, self-identified Democrats and Independents are able to vote in the Republican primary against Bachmann, joining forces with disaffected Republican voters. The fact that Bachmann did not receive a majority of the votes in either the primary (47.2%) or the general election (46.4%) in 2008 underscores her vulnerability.
Summary: PolitiFact’s Truth-O-Meter gave U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann a liar “Pants on Fire” rating for her false statement, “I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out then under another Democrat president, Jimmy Carter. And I’m not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it’s an interesting coincidence.” In fact, the February 1976 scare happened on the watch of Gerald Ford, a Republican — not that President Ford was blameworthy in the least; in fact, he called for a nationwide vaccination program, in which 40 million Americans were vaccinated in just 10 days.
Summary: U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann responds to the launch of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s (DCCC) “Bachmann Watch” site with a fundraising appeal. … Her Republican challenger, Aubrey Immelman, responds to Bachmann’s fundraising letter with an appeal of his own for campaign contributions to help defeat Bachmann in the September 14, 2010 primary election.
Summary: The sheer weight and volume of U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s assault on reason may have reached critical mass, crossing the tipping point beyond which Minnesota media could no longer tune out Bachmann’s insanity or avert their gaze from “The Emperor’s New Clothes” in embarrassed silence.
Summary: The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee created a Web site devoted to U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann’s controversial statements, intended as a virtual “truth squad” to expose Bachmann’s “fantastic claims and lies … that can quickly be disproven.”
Summary: Minnesota Public Radio political analysts Todd Rapp and Tom Horner weigh in on whether U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann is a liability to the Republican Party. Includes analysis of Bachmann’s assertion that AmeriCorps amounts to a “reeducation camp” for young people.
Summary: PolitiFact debunks Rep. Michele Bachmann’s claim, in an April 7, 2009 editorial in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, that President Barack Obama’s cap and trade proposal would cost every household in America more than $3,000 in energy costs a year.
Summary: U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) is warning that a new bill expanding the AmeriCorps community service agency could lead to the “brainwashing” of America’s youth. Said Bachmann: “I believe that there is a very strong chance that we will see that young people will be put into mandatory service. And the real concern is that there are provisions for what I would call re-education camps for young people, where young people have to go and get trained in a philosophy that the government puts forward and then they have to go and work in some of these politically correct forums.”
Summary: U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann announces forums in St. Cloud and Woodbury to debunk global climate change and President Obama’s proposed carbon “cap and tax” plans, featuring Chris Horner of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. … North Korea situation report.