Wednesday, March 4, 2015

Some interesting political news today

Update

My talk to "Pints and Politics" Tuesday night went very well, though I had to stop a couple of times for breathing issues. Those who know me well will be stunned to know that I was supposed to speak for 30 minutes, but went 45.

Wednesday morning, the VA called just as I was getting ready for Rehab. They wanted to move my right eye cataract surgery from April 8 to this Friday, March 6. Guess they had a cancellation and saw I lived in Madison. I said yes, so Wednesday after rehab I did the Pre-op, which pretty much killed the day--thus a shorter post now. My health in general has been stable; not much change in February from January. ~Bob

General News and Comment

Worth Seeing: Grandpa takes kids to the movies

US ambassador to South Korea injured in razor attack
Excerpt: The U.S. ambassador to South Korea was injured by a man wielding a razor Thursday morning in Seoul, and his assailant was immediately detained.
Mark W. Lippert was rushed to a nearby hospital with cuts to his face and wrist, the South Korean news agency Yonhap reported, and appeared to be splattered with blood but was on his feet, TV images show. He was on his way to attend a morning lecture in central Seoul when the attack took place shortly before 8 a.m. YTN TV reported that the man, only identified by his surname, Kim, screamed "South and North Korea should be reunified" during the attack.

Hillary Clinton's Off-the-Books Mail Server Was in Her House, Registered to a Non-Existent Man.
Excerpt: Stage 2 of the Hillary email scandal has been achieved, as yesterday’s “confused old lady who didn’t understand how email works” defense utterly collapsed with the Press' discovery that Clinton’s mail server was located in her house (her estate in Chappaqua, to be exact — the one she had to settle for because she was “dead broke” after Bill left office) and was registered under the name of a man who does not appear to exist.

Latest Scott Walker Scandal: His Spokeswomen Are WAY TOO HOT. By Eric Owens
Excerpt: The crusade to find some scandal — any scandal — to sink 2016 Republican presidential frontrunner Scott Walker officially jumped the shark on Monday when a deeply concerned American suggested that the Wisconsin governor’s spokeswomen are problematically attractive. Isthmus, an alternative weekly newspaper out of Madison, raised the allegation in Tell All, a regular advice column.

Scott Walker Pledges to Sign Controversial Pro-life Bill. By Cortney O'Brien 
Excerpt: As the Wisconsin legislature moves forward in the coming session, further protections for mother and child are likely to come to my desk in the form of a bill to prohibit abortions after 20 weeks. I will sign that bill when it gets to my desk and support similar legislation on the federal level.

Excerpt: Wisconsin governor Scott Walker has nearly all of the right ingredients to win the GOP nomination. He is popular among both anti-establishment activists and the big donors of the establishment. He has working-class appeal (desperately needed for the GOP), and he’s battle-tested in his home state — a state many believe the Republicans could finally pick off in a presidential election. The question is whether his timing is off. In countless discussions I had at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference — as well as among people I’ve talked to who attended the Club for Growth meeting in Florida last weekend — the concern for friends, and the hope for foes, is that Walker is peaking too soon.

No One Cares!’: Major Garrett Unloads On WH ‘Deference’ To Hillary Over Emails. By Al Weaver
Excerpt: After taking multiple questions on the topic during Tuesday’s briefing, White House press secretary Josh Earnest was taken to the woodshed by CBS’s Major Garrett, who wondered if the Obama administration paid too much “deference” to Clinton due to the pair’s contentious relationship. “Let’s just step back for a second on this email thing,” Garrett started. “Hillary Clinton did not arrive in this administration like any other cabinet secretary. As you have often said from this podium over the past two days, she brought with her a team. She brought with her a formidable political backing and the strenuous campaign against this president who was elected.”

Awash in cash, Bush asks donors not to give more than $1 million – for now
Excerpt: An unusual request has gone out to wealthy donors writing large checks to support former Florida governor Jeb Bush: Please don’t give more than $1 million right away. The requested limit, confirmed by multiple people familiar with the amount, may mark the first time that a presidential hopeful has sought to hold off supporters from contributing too much money. (I understand the problem. I ask that people contributing to the bob hall retirement Fund not give more than $1M as well. please keep that in mind when writing out your checks...~Bob)

Too Funny: Obama Supporters Endorse Karl Marx for President in 2016

Venezuela Bars Bush And Cheney As 'Terrorists'
Excerpt: The travel bans target those who “violated human rights and bombed villages as in Iraq, Syria and Vietnam.” - Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. (I'm sure they are bothered. If they want to visit a socialist paradise, Washington has better restaurants and hotels and the airfare is cheaper. Obama will likely increase their foreign aid. ~Bob)

Lawyer: Department of Justice Shut Down Search For Lois Lerner’s Emails
The Department of Justice blocked an attempt to force the Internal Revenue Service to search for Lois Lerner’s missing emails at off-site storage facilities, according to a lawyer pushing to obtain the emails. The IRS never looked for Lerner’s backup email tapes at the West Virginia storage facility where they were being housed. Treasury deputy inspector general Timothy Camus told Congress that the IRS never asked IT professionals at the New Martinsville, W.V. storage site for the backup tapes. Camus only found the backup tape for Lerner’s missing 2011 emails about two weeks ago.

Nobel Peace Prize Committee OUSTS Chairman Who Crowned Obama With $1.4 Million Award
The Nobel Peace Prize committee demoted chairman Thorbjoern Jagland on Tuesday. The Oslo, Norway-based committee gave no reason for downgrading the former Norwegian prime minister and respected diplomat from his perch.... The Nobel Peace Prize is the one of the five Nobel Prizes created by the Swedish business mogul Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite.

Random Thoughts. By Thomas Sowell
Excerpt: When President Obama keeps talking about "violent extremists" in the abstract, you might wonder whether Presbyterians are running amok. The mainstream media seem desperate to try to find something to undermine Republican governor Scott Walker's rise in the polls. The worst they have come up with is that he didn't finish college. Neither did Bill Gates or Michael Dell. The Wright brothers didn't finish high school. Neither did Abraham Lincoln or George Washington.

Gun News

Deputies identify man shot by homeowner during home invasion. http://www.wafb.com/story/28249586/deputies-homeowner-shoots-intruder-in-deadly-home-invasion
Excerpt: According to officials at the scene, detectives believe a man and a woman tried to break into the home around 10 a.m. when the man was shot by the homeowner. The man shot by the homeowner has been identified by the coroner as 31-year-old Jermoid Wheeler. The coroner was called to the scene and Wheeler was pronounced dead.

Race Card News

Justice Department won't prosecute Ferguson police officer
Excerpt: The Justice Department announces it will not prosecute former Ferguson, Missouri, police officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black 18-year-old, that led to weeks of protests. (Be different if they thought they had a 1% chance of winning. ~Bob)

Obamacare/Government Healthcare News

Excerpt: In March 2010, Congress passed, and President Obama signed, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA). The ACA was never implemented as written. The ACA authorizes subsidies to health insurers operating in state-established exchanges, but not the federal exchange. Some 37 states opted not to establish their own exchanges. Nevertheless, the Administration has been paying subsidies to insurers in those 37 states. On March 4, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in King vs. Burwell. At stake is the Administration’s payment of subsidies to health insurers operating in states which use the federal exchange. The Supreme Court is expected to announce its decision by July. A decision to uphold the ACA, as written, will surely cause millions of people to stop paying premiums that will double, triple, or more after the Supreme Court strikes down the illegal subsidies.

Undocumented Democrat News

GAO: Chance Of "Path To Citizenship" Was A "Primary Cause" Of 2014 Migration Surge. By Conn Carroll 
Excerpt: "Some Hondurans believed that comprehensive immigration reform in the United States would lead to a path to citizenship for anyone living in the United States at the time of reform," the report found. These beliefs were "a primary cause of UAC [unaccompanied alien children] migration," the report continued.

Democrats Plan To Win Elections With Illegal Alien Votes. By Phyllis Schlafly
Excerpt: The Obama Democrats have an audacious scheme for winning future elections. They just plan to import 5 million non-citizens and credential them as voters who will, in gratitude, vote Democratic. The way this devious formula works is stunningly simple. Just get the new Republican Congress (under Speaker John Boehner and Sen. Mitch McConnell) to pass a full-funding bill for Homeland Security without any exception for the funding of Obama's illegal executive amnesty, which will allow Obama to give work permits, Social Security numbers and driver's licenses to 5 million illegal aliens. (F. Y. I. If this was ever allowed to become a reality, every legal American should be very, very scared. If it does happen - and I'm not being a doom and gloomer or an uneducated paranoiac - the country will be a thing of the past within five years; it'll become the largest, and failed, socialist country ever in this world; and we'll see major social and crime problems that will outdo even the worst turmoil that we're seeing now in Greece. As such, I would suggest that every reasonably patriotic American should become much more attuned to everything that's happening in America and the world today; make your families, friends, neighbors, business associates, all of your local, State's, and national elected officials, and any other American that you can think of because, if this would actually occur, I do believe that the America that we grew up in will begin going down a long and dark road that will lead to untold disasters in the freedom and liberty that we have fought for, worked for, and cherished for over 200 years will begin to rapidly erode. People, the fact that this may actually happen - unless we wake up and start to act now - is chilling to and for all of us. We have to be aware of those positive signs that this is a very real possibility and then start acting now to ensure that it doesn't happen. Regards, Paul Rendine)

"You're Greener than Gore" News

Excerpt: The following is from a scientific journal that questions the validity of human activity's impact on climate change. What is really scary (and should scare everyone, regardless of your opinion on climate change) is how our monstrous big government is now persecuting those who refuse to fall in line with the government's thinking. This is scary and you should be concerned. This is why I can't stand government interference into literally every facet of our lives...and why I'll never trust them. Footnote: I read that many, many scientific organizations promote the concept of human caused climate change because literally hundreds of billions of dollars are being funneled to them. Money talks, folks! It also corrupts! There are as many scientists who don't believe as those that do. As you can see the "non-believers" are being persecuted and threatened! A little over four hundred years after the Salem witch trials, witch-hunts are still used as a tactic of social persecution and a vehicle to censure those who do not conform to a special interest agenda. From Salem to McCarthy to today's attacks on so called "climate skeptics," witch-hunts tear the fabric of a free society.

Religion of Peace News

Excerpt: Massive columns of Shiite militias, including some groups that are listed by the US as Foreign Terrorist Organizations, have been leading the fight in Tikrit. Qods Force commander Qassem Soleimani has been spotted at the front lines.

Obama has already lost on Iran. By Jennifer Rubin 
Excerpt: The White House is not bothering to defend the concessions it has made to Iran because they are indefensible. Instead President Obama sets out to convince the media that the only alternative to his bad deal is war (more sanctions, a credible threat of military action and a new president with superior credibility are all yet to be deployed), smear the Israeli prime minister and whip up left-wing Democrats. But if his aim is to wave his agreement in hand, leave a “legacy” and put Iran effectively on a glide path to join the world’s nuclear powers — but not for 10 years — he has already failed.

The World Bows to Iranian Regional Hegemony. By David P. Goldman
Excerpt: The problem with Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu's address to Congress March 3 was not the risk of offending Washington, but rather Washington's receding relevance. President Barack Obama is not the only leader who wants to acknowledge what is already a fact in the ground, namely that "Iran has become the preeminent strategic player in West Asia to the increasing disadvantage of the US and its regional allies," as a former Indian ambassador to Oman wrote this week. For differing reasons, the powers of the world have elected to legitimize Iran's dominant position, hoping to delay but not deter its eventual acquisition of nuclear weapons.

Netanyahu Responds to Obama’s Criticism of His Speech to Congress
Excerpt: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday he offered a “practical alternative” to the deal being negotiated over Iran’s nuclear program, after President Barack Obama criticized his address to Congress as containing “nothing new." Obama said Netanyahu didn’t offer any “viable alternative” and that “as far as I can tell, there was nothing new” in the Tuesday speech.

 ‘I Hope a Rocket Will Fly Up Your …’: Israeli Ambassador Reads Hate Letters on Camera. By Sharona Schwartz
Excerpt: “It’s the truth that the Jews are resting on the Holocaust, and they are just too lazy to work.” “Child murderer! I hope that a rocket will fly up your ass.” “I am very happy that Adolf Hitler massively decimated you %&$f**ing Jews here in Germany.” That’s just a sample of the 20 or so hate letters the Israeli Embassy in Berlin receives every day.

Democrat Leader Calls Israeli Leader “Arrogant” and says He Doesn’t “Speak for Her”
http://eaglerising.com/15768/democrat-leader-calls-israeli-leader-arrogant-says-doesnt-speak/
Excerpt: Hearing Democrat Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) call anyone “arrogant” is funny, because the irony in the statement is just so thick. Here is a woman who has, for years, been name-calling and demonizing her Republican counterparts while also belittling our beliefs and philosophies. And she has the audacity to call the leader of one of our closest allies “arrogant.” For years, these same Democrats have dictated to Israel, telling the only Western democracy in the Middle East what they can and can’t do with their own nation to protect themselves… and now one of these foolish Democrats is calling their representative “arrogant’? If the situation weren’t so disgustingly maddening, it could be the basis for a Hollywood farce. (Well, she knows "arrogant." ~Bob. It struck me that Pelosi commenting on intelligence is rather like a blind person being engaged as an art critic. --Steve)

Nancy Pelosi on Bibi. By Jim Geraghty, Morning Jolt
Meanwhile, here’s Nancy Pelosi’s official statement responding to the speech: I was near tears throughout the Prime Minister’s speech -- saddened by the insult to the intelligence of the United States as part of the P5 +1 nations, and saddened by the condescension toward our knowledge of the threat posed by Iran and our broader commitment to preventing nuclear proliferation. (Above is) a meeting with a foreign leader where Nancy Pelosi wasn’t near tears and didn’t feel insulted. Gee, why would anyone ever think Nancy Pelosi wasn’t sufficiently knowledgeable about a threat?

Boost for Bibi? Widening rift with Obama could propel Netanyahu in upcoming election
Excerpt: The OneVoice Movement, launched in 2002 by snack bar mogul Daniel Lubetzky and boasting the star power of such celebrities as Brad Pitt, Danny DeVito, Rhea Perlman and Sir Paul McCartney among its honorary advisors, is headed by Marc Ginsberg, who advised President Carter on Middle East Policy and served as President Clinton’s ambassador to Morocco. Ginsberg is a former Fox News contributor. His communications staff said he would not speak to FoxNews.com directly about OneVoice’s links with V15, but he has described the Obama administration’s approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – an approach to which Netanyahu has been cool – as a “window of opportunity.” The group focuses on Israel’s 1967 borders as a starting point for negotiating a final settlement, which parallels Obama’s thinking, but runs counter to Netanyahu’s.

Important: U.S.-Backed Syrian Rebel Group Collapses, U.S.-Supplied Weapons End Up in Al-Qaeda Hands. Unexpectedly.
http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2015/03/03/us-backed-syrian-rebel-group-collapses-us-supplied-weapons-end-up-in-al-qaeda-hands-unexpectedly/#ixzz3TQliAJfc
Excerpt: Reports this week revealed that a U.S.-backed Syrian rebel group, Harakat al-Hazm, had officially dissolved itself under pressure from Jabhat al-Nusra, Al-Qaeda’s official affiliate in Syria, and many of the fighters have joined up with the jihadist Islamic Front. With the group’s dissolution, the U.S.-provided TOW anti-tank missiles have reportedly fallen into the hands of al-Nusra. Hazm was the first U.S.-backed group to receive TOW missiles, the Washington Post reported last April – and at the time the Washington D.C. foreign policy establishment hailed Hazm as “rebels worth supporting.” But now with the demise of Hazm it seems the fantasy of backing “vetted moderate” groups in Syria is effectively at an end. )FSA backed by John McCain with his outed pro-Islamist advisor. --Barb)

Imam Who Said Ayaan Hirsi Ali Deserved Death Penalty Was Hired By DOJ To Teach Muslim Classes To Federal Prisoners
An Egyptian-born imam who in 2007 said that Somali-born activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali should receive the death penalty for her criticism of Islam is now a Department of Justice contractor hired to teach classes to Muslims who are in federal prison. According to federal spending records, Fouad ElBayly, the imam at Islamic Center of Johnstown in Pennsylvaniawas contracted by the DOJ’s Bureau of Prisons beginning last year to teach the classes to Muslim inmates at Cumberland Federal Correctional Institution in CumberlandMd. The records show that ElBayly has two contracts worth $12,900 to teach the classes and to provide the inmates “leadership and guidance.” (Underreported radicalization of potentially violent criminals by US GOV, funded by US taxpayers. And then push to get them let out of jail free for crimes/punishment based on racial prejudice or insignificant drug charges. Community organization, folks. --Barb)

Good Man Gone: Syria death reported of ex-British marine fighting alongside Kurds
Excerpt: A former Royal Marine has become the first Briton to be killed while fighting alongside Kurdish forces against Islamic State in Syria, a Kurdish militia has told the BBC. The Kurdish Popular Protection Units (YPG) named him as Konstandinos Erik Scurfield, from Barnsley.

Jihadi John family's 20 years on benefits: How it's cost taxpayers up to £400k to house fanatic and his relatives in upmarket areas
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2978334/Jihadi-John-family-s-20-years-benefits-s-cost-taxpayers-400k-house-fanatic-relatives-upmarket-areas.html
Excerpt: Jihadi John and his asylum-seeking family have milked the British benefits system for 20 years, the Mail can reveal today. Housing the Islamic State executioner and his relatives in affluent parts of London has cost taxpayers up to £400,000. One landlord said Mohammed Emwazi’s family were ‘parasites’ and ‘tenants from hell’. Incredibly, they are still believed to be pocketing £40,000 a year in handouts despite there being no sign of them in Britain.

*****
Robert A. Hall is a Marine Vietnam Veteran who served five terms in the Massachusetts State Senate. He is the author of The Coming Collapse of the American Republic. http://www.amazon.com/Coming-Collapse-American-Republic-prevent/dp/1461122538/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1304815980&sr=1-5 For a free PDF of Collapse, e-mail him at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com. Hall’s eleven books are listed here:

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