Political Digest for November 3, 2010

I post articles because I think they are of interest. Doing so doesn’t mean that I necessarily agree (or disagree) with every—or any—opinion in the posted article.

I’ll be back!
I will post this at on Election Day, so you have something to read while waiting for the polls to close. I have a business conference call tonight, followed by Joel Pollak’s Victory Party. I leave tomorrow for a business trip that will have me working 14-hours days. Not sure there will be any digests, but might grab a few hours tomorrow and Thursday to post some things. Back Monday. I’ll leave a few items from other folks to post. Back Monday. While I’m gone, you can catch up on the stories you haven’t read in past Digests.+

From a Marine Buddy in Massachusetts
Just came back from holding signs at poll in Shrewsbury. Not sure what it portends but turnout is VERY high, more than 450 votes as 11:15AM. As comparison, I was number 176 at 4PM on Primary Day. Town clerk in Attleboro reported 900 votes as of 8AM this morning (polls opened at 7AM). I'm thinking a big turnout favors the insurgents (us), but, of course, have no evidence until the votes are tallied, and then it's too late. Holding good thoughts, though. Going back after I warm up--it's cold out there. --Ron P.

From a Marine buddy I was with in Vietnam
I'm going to watch the election results on MSNBC tonight instead of Fox. That's where the fun's going to be. Chris Matthews may have to be shot with a tranquilizer gun. Keith Olbermann may have to be shot with a tranquilizer gun. Chris Matthews will probably have to be strapped in a straight jacket.

Stopping Voter Fraud
http://blog.heritage.org/2010/11/02/morning-bell-stopping-voter-fraud/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=Morning%2BBellExcerpt: Voter fraud happens. Just ask Olivia Alair, press secretary for the U.S. Department of Transportation. Alair was regional communications director for the 2008 election in Ohio under White House press secretary Robert Gibbs. In 2008, Alair and two other Obama campaign staffers registered to vote in Ohio. The problem was that Alair did not live in Ohio and had no permanent plans to do so. By Ohio law, this made her ineligible to register. Only after this was made public did Alair and her cohorts send letters asking that their registrations be canceled. If the press had never made this public, would Alair have gone ahead and committed a felony by voting? Only she knows. But her cavalier attitude toward our nation’s voting laws permeates the entire Obama administration. In 2004, an immigrant illegally registered to vote in Putnam County, Tenn., and then voted illegally. This is a felony three times over! 18 U.S.C. § 1015(f) makes it illegal to claim you are a U.S. citizen in order to register to vote for any election; 18 U.S.C. § 611 prohibits a noncitizen from voting in an election where there is a federal candidate on the ballot; and 18 U.S.C. § 911 makes false claims of citizenship in general a felony. Instead of prosecution, the Obama administration sent the immigrant a letter asking him when he “discovered” that he was “not a United States Citizen.” Protecting the ballot box was not their priority (you can read more about The Threat of Non-Citizen Voting, here). And the Tennessee case was not an isolated incident. Thanks to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, we now know that not protecting the ballot box from voter fraud is the official policy of the Obama Justice Department. Former American Civil Liberties Union attorney and current Justice Department employee Christopher Coates testified before the committee that: 1) Deputy Assistant Attorney General Julie Fernandes ordered DOJ attorneys only to enforce “traditional types of [voter intimidation] cases that would provide political equality for racial and minority language voters;” and 2) Fernandes informed DOJ attorneys that it was the policy of the Obama administration not to enforce anti-voter fraud laws since Obama “was not interested in that type of issue, but instead interested in issues that pertained to voter access.” Fernandes has never responded to these allegations.

Illinois Hardball Politics: "Democrats Are Prepared to Steal This Election
http://townhall.com/columnists/GuyBenson/2010/11/02/illinois_hardball_politics_democrats_are_prepared_to_steal_this_election
Excerpt: The battle over President Obama’s old senate seat in Illinois is excruciatingly close. Republican Mark Kirk leads Democrat Alexi Giannoulias by a very small margin in most polls and is narrowly favored to win. But a number of Illinois GOP operatives I spoke with today expressed concerns about an eleventh-hour development in the race: A $1 million cash infusion from the DNC into the state late on Saturday, coinciding with the President’s Hyde Park Rally. Politico’s Ben Smith reports: With Illinois shaping up as perhaps the tightest Senate race in the country — and one where the Democratic candidate and his advisers have friends in the White House — the DNC just sent nearly $1 million to the state, topping a list of cash transfers totaling more than 2.6 million. “Your readers need to understand that this amounts to $1 million of walking around money for Alexi Giannoulias,” one insider warned. “This is money that very well could be used to literally buy the election at the street level.” My source said he’s been reliably informed by his Democratic counterparts that the White House weeks ago decreed that holding the Illinois Senate seat was a top priority, approving a no-holds-barred approach to boosting Giannoulias. “They essentially said, ‘do whatever it takes,’ and Illinois Democrats know what that means,” he explained. “They are prepared to steal this election, which should come as no surprise. Just ask Norm Coleman.” A second GOP operative echoed these concerns, pointing out that it’s too late in the game to spend seven figures on advertising. “First of all, at this stage, there is nowhere near $1 million-worth of available advertising inventory to buy,” he said. “Secondly, even if there were, they couldn’t possibly turn TV, radio, or mailers around in time. It’s too late.” This Republican source said state Democratic Chairman and Illinois Speaker of the House, Mike Madigan, is “identifying key districts and precincts, and sending cash. It won’t just be [Giannoulias] who will benefit from this slush fund -- although that’s definitely the race that the White House is most personally invested in,” he said.

What to watch tonight
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1110/44530.html
Excerpt: All the outstanding questions of the 2010 campaign boil down to this: How big is the wave? Republicans appear to be on the cusp of a historic victory, potentially extending into every level of state and federal government. Beyond the race-by-race polling — across 435 House districts, 37 Senate races and 37 gubernatorial races — all the large-scale The POLITICO/George Washington University Battleground Poll showed in late October that 64 percent of likely voters believe the country is on the wrong track, as opposed to just 29 percent who say it’s headed in the right direction. Gallup found independent voters leaning toward the GOP by a 28-percentage-point margin, 59 percent to 31 percent. Whether Republicans can fully exploit that environment — or whether Democrats have adequately braced themselves for impact — is another story. Here are the most important results we’ll be watching on election night for clues about where the 2010 campaign is headed — and what it all means:

The Washington Examiner Election Day Liberal Media Spin Drinking Game!
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/The-Washington-Examiner--106442923.html
Excerpt: Election night commentary is mostly about pundits and anchors stating that the election results confirm some belief that said pundit or anchor already held (see the Dougherty Doctrine for an example). Given that most non-FOX television types are liberal, and that Republicans -- especially conservative Republicans -- will likely have a very good night, this will be a difficult feat tomorrow. As a result, we expect the liberal talking heads to resort to a few predictable -- but silly -- talking points. What better foundation for a drinking game? Below are the liberal platitudes to explain away the election, followed by a brief explanation of why they're so silly. Any time you hear one of these platitudes, take a drink. (But if you're watching MSNBC, we recommend cutting the portions in half -- and still telling your boss you won't be in before lunch on Wednesday).

What they're saying: Predictions for Election 2010
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columns/What-theyre-saying-Predictions-for-Election-2010-106501064.html
Bob’s prediction of GOP gains: House 52, Senate 8, Governors 7. But I hope it’s better. See what the pros think in this article.

Democrats bracing for major losses
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/01/AR2010110106417.html?wpisrc=nl_headline
Excerpt: The campaign of 2010 ended as it began: loudly. But the nationwide barrage of last-ditch attack ads and the sniping among the country's political leaders appeared to have little effect on the dynamics of the year. Republicans enter Election Day confident that they will recapture control of the House, while Democrats are preparing themselves for what appears likely to be a significantly smaller majority in the Senate. "We feel quite good in the Senate, although we're not taking any race for granted," Democratic National Committee chairman Tim Kaine told CNN Tuesday morning. "In the House, it's going to be tough for us .... We're not throwing in the towel. We're encouraging everybody to get out there and vote." President Obama stayed at the White House Monday, having campaigned over the weekend in hopes of influencing an election that could throw a roadblock in front of his agenda. Obama granted a round of radio interviews, including one with Ryan Seacrest of "American Idol," and will do more interviews Tuesday, hoping to spur Democrats in battleground states to go to the polls to offset highly energized Republican voters.

Dems hail high turnout while GOP exudes confidence on House
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/127009-dems-hail-high-turn-out-while-gop-exudes-confidence-on-house
Both parties whistling past the graveyard. We used to say that rain or snow was Republican weather, because Republicans are more patriotic, thus more likely to vote in bad weather. ~Bob. Excerpt: Democrats on Tuesday insisted high Election Day turnout was helping their party, while Republicans expressed confidence they would win back a House majority. “The reports that we're getting back are encouraging,” said Democratic National Committee (DNC) spokesman Hari Sevugan. He said Democrats are seeing strong turnout in the suburbs of Philadelphia, central Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio. More than a dozen House seats in the two states are in play, as are races for the Senate and governor.

Record number of early ballots cast
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/02/AR2010110201758.html?wpisrc=nl_pmheadline
An indication that voters are fired up—but which ones? ~Bob. Excerpt: A record number of voters have cast early ballots for a midterm election. The total number of early votes has topped 16 million, according to one preliminary analysis, and is on track to be slightly shy of the historic number of early ballots cast in the 2008 presidential election. "It's going to easily beat any midterm we've had," said Michael McDonald, a George Mason University government professor who has tracked early voting for several election cycles and estimates that 29 percent of midterm votes have been cast in the days and weeks before Election Day. All 50 states have sent out absentee ballots, and in 29 states, in-person early voting is also underway. Most of them have made it easier for people to vote early, allowing "no excuse" mail-in ballots and automatically sending ballots to voters who voted by mail in the past. That has paid dividends, with early voting growing more popular over the years. From 2004 to 2008, the percentage of votes cast before Election Day increased from 20 percent to 30 percent, according to the Census Bureau's Current Population Survey.

Companies may have to make amends after midterm elections
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/01/AR2010110106753.html?wpisrc=nl_headline
Excerpt: Republicans have a message for the businesses that worked closely with the Obama administration over the past two years on key controversial issues: We won't forget. Take the case of Wal-Mart, the behemoth big-box retailer that liberals have long loved to hate. Several years ago, it began to break ranks with industry groups by speaking out in favor of an increase to the minimum wage and health-care reform. And, for the first time in its history, it gave more money to Democrats than the GOP for Tuesday's elections. The corporation's moves caught the eye of Republican Rep. Dave Camp of Michigan. During a phone call with company lobbyists last year during the fight over the health-care bill, Camp bluntly reminded Wal-Mart of its unpalatable position on the issue, according to sources familiar with the conversation. Now, Wal-Mart's political team finds itself in an awkward position. Camp is poised to become the next chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee.

Good column: Guess Who? By Thomas Sowell
http://patriotpost.us/opinion/thomas-sowell/2010/11/02/guess-who/
Guess who said the following: "We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work." Was it Sarah Palin? Rush Limbaugh? Karl Rove? Not even close. It was Henry Morgenthau, Secretary of the Treasury under Franklin D. Roosevelt and one of FDR's closest advisers. He added, "after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started. . . And an enormous debt to boot!" This is just one of the remarkable and eye-opening facts in a must-read book titled "New Deal or Raw Deal?" by Professor Burton W. Folsom, Jr., of Hillsdale College. Ordinarily, what happened in the 1930s might be something to be left for historians to be concerned about. But the very same kinds of policies that were tried-- and failed-- during the 1930s are being carried out in Washington today, with the advocates of such policies often invoking FDR's New Deal as a model. Franklin D. Roosevelt blamed the country's woes on the problems he inherited from his predecessor, much as Barack Obama does today. But unemployment was 20 percent in the spring of 1939, six long years after Herbert Hoover had left the White House. Whole generations have been "educated" to believe that the Roosevelt administration is what got this country out of the Great Depression. History text books by famous scholars like Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., of Harvard and Henry Steele Commager of Columbia have enshrined FDR as a historic savior of this country, and lesser lights in the media and elsewhere have perpetuated the legend….. There are few historic events whose legends are more grossly different from the reality than the New Deal administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. And there are few men whose image has been more radically different from the man himself. Some of the most devastating things that were said about FDR were not said by his political enemies but by people who worked closely with him for years-- Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau being just one. Morgenthau saw not only the utter failure of Roosevelt's policies, but also the failure of Roosevelt himself, who didn't even know enough economics to realize how little he knew. Far from pulling the country out of the Great Depression by following Keynesian policies, FDR created policies that prolonged the depression until it was more than twice as long as any other depression in American history. Moreover, Roosevelt's ad hoc improvisations followed nothing as coherent as Keynesian economics. To the extent that FDR followed the ideas of any economist, it was an obscure economist at the University of Wisconsin, who was disdained by other economists and who was regarded with contempt by John Maynard Keynes.

Top 10 Democratic excuses for losing the mid-terms
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tobyharnden/100061754/its-the-fill-in-blank-stupid-top-10-democratic-excuses-for-losing-the-mid-terms/
Excerpt: It’s Wednesday morning, you’re a Democrat and you’re waking up after a terrible night. You’re hung over and you can’t quite remember what happened. You’re pretty sure you lost the House of Representatives and – who knows? – perhaps even the Senate as well. You have a vague recollection of Harry Reid being sent back to Searchlight, Nevada. It might have been a hallucination but didn’t you lose another Kennedy seat in New England too? You reach for your remote control to check out what the pundits are saying but can’t find it. Perhaps someone threw it at the television set when Illinois went red (or was it Wisconsin?). Never mind, you don’t need to listen to the excuses because they’re all been aired beforehand. Here’s an idiot’s guide as to why the Democrats lost (with apologies to James Carville):

Explaining Why The Democrats Will Be Obliterated Today In 7 Quotes
http://townhall.com/columnists/JohnHawkins/2010/11/02/explaining_why_the_democrats_will_be_obliterated_today_in_7_quotes
Excerpt: If you ask the Left, they'll give you every excuse in the book for why they're going to get their brains beaten out today. The economy is bad, Obama cooperates too much with the Republicans, the American people are irrational, it's Bush's fault -- it goes on and on. What you will very seldom hear are liberals admitting that they richly deserve to be decimated today because of their poor performance, terrible policies, and astonishing arrogance. Most conservatives are willing to admit that the American public rejected the GOP in 2006 and 2008 because the Republican Party did a lousy job. If and when liberals are willing to admit that they deserve the beating that they're going to get, then you'll know that they're starting to act a little more like adults and a little less like, well....liberals. In order to help our liberal pals get a grip on reality, here are 7 quotations that help explain why the Democrats are going to get annihilated at the ballot box today.

I hate to TEA on your parade
http://tartanmarine.blogspot.com/2010/11/i-hate-to-tea-on-your-parade.html
Guest post. More guidance for the winners.

Internet helped Muslim convert from Northern Virginia embrace extremism at warp speed
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/01/AR2010110106394.html?wpisrc=nl_headline
Excerpt: For months, the radical young Muslim convert had been waging war online, championing violent jihad from his computer in Northern Virginia. Zachary Adam Chesser often wrote scathingly about people who voiced support for the mujaheddin but who made no move to join them. The fact that he remained safely in the United States clearly troubled him as 2009 gave way to 2010. In March, Chesser begged the fighters already abroad to "not forget those of us who have lagged behind." "Your fingers glide over cold steel whilst mine merely grace the empty plastic of my keyboard," the 20-year-old white suburbanite posted to his Web site, themujihadblog. "If I die in this land then what will I say to Allah? 'O Allah I was just going to wait until the mujahideen reached America. I swear I would have joined them, but they took too long.' " Chesser, who pleaded guilty in federal court Oct. 20 to supporting Somali terrorists and threatening the creators of "South Park" for mocking the prophet Muhammad, hadn't been a Muslim long. He converted to Islam in 2008, soon after graduating from Oakton High School in Fairfax County. His emergence online as a Muslim extremist followed at warp speed. By the time federal agents arrested him in July for trying to travel to Somalia and join the Islamist insurgent group al-Shabab, he'd gone from breakdancing high school kid to bearded radical in little more than two years. For Chesser, it was the latest - and perhaps most unlikely - in a series of identities he'd experimented with, then discarded. Other attempts to define himself had proved harmless. "If he'd lived in L.A.," observed one person close to him, "he would have been a Scientologist."

Net neutrality: Job-killing zombie
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/44239.html
To be fair, it creates jobs for government regulators, who pay union dues, which go to Democrats. So there is a logic to this. ~Bob. Excerpt: Many now predict that “net neutrality” — a Washington power grab that seeks to dictate how private telecoms prioritize use of limited bandwidth — is walking the Green Mile. As Congress scurried to finish its legislative business before returning to the campaign trail, the compromise net neutrality legislation, crafted by House Energy and Commerce Committee chairman Henry Waxman D-Calif.), died in committee. But its death gives the Federal Communications Commission another chance to regulate the bandwidth decisions of private companies. This could spell death to the thousands of jobs created each year by the billions of dollars private telecoms spend on infrastructure. Imposing net neutrality could reduce broadband expansion and cost the U.S. economy upwards of 300,000 jobs, according to a new Phoenix Center study. Just a 10 percent decline in IT infrastructure investment, Brett Swanson of Entropy Economics found, could eliminate 502,000 jobs and $62 billion in gross domestic product growth. This is a price that the U.S. economy cannot afford. Policymakers and consumers need to ask why politicians and regulators should be allowed to regulate traffic volume on networks, rather than the companies that own the infrastructure and paid billions to build it in the first place? A sensible answer to that question would have killed this regulatory power grab long ago. Instead, companies that have spent more than $576 billion on Internet technology expansion in the last five years are now forced to lobby the FCC to control their own infrastructure. There is no need for Washington to meddle in an industry that creates hundreds of thousands of new jobs and robust consumer choice. The Internet has been a remarkable achievement of human ingenuity and cooperation. Billions of individuals conduct business and share information over a network with no president, no chief executive officer, no board members and currently, no regulators.

How to Cut $343 Billion from the Federal Budget
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/10/How-to-Cut-343-Billion-from-the-Federal-Budget
Every federal dollar spent goes to somebody. And that somebody will fight tooth and nail to keep it going to them, which budget cutters lack the passion of short-term self interest. So the government and the spending and the deficit grow—until the collapse. ~Bob. Excerpt: Federal spending is on an unsustainable path that risks disaster for America. Runaway spending has increased annual federal budget deficits to unprecedented levels, adding $2.7 trillion to the national debt in the past two years alone. Each year’s huge federal deficit increases the mountain of national debt borrowed from future generations of Americans. Congress needs to cut federal spending sharply and quickly. This paper sets forth $343 billion in available spending cuts.

Tax Breaks for the Wealthy Do Boost Economy
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=19994&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=DPD
Excerpt: A political fight has erupted over the fate of the top income tax bracket rate and the tax rate on dividends and capital gains, say Alex Brill, a research fellow, and Chad Hill, a Jacobs Associate, at the American Enterprise Institute. One particularly troubling idea that has emerged is summed up by a recent statement by President Obama, who argued, "These [high-income taxpayers] are folks who are less likely to spend the money, which is why economists don't think tax breaks for the wealthy would do much to boost the economy." However, saving is not the practice of the wealthy stashing money under plump mattresses. Rather, when we save, we defer consumption to the future, allowing our savings to be invested in productive ways that lead to long-term economic growth. In short, my savings account is your investment fund. Our collective savings are the funds available for investing in stocks, bonds and other securities that allow businesses access to the capital they need to grow. Firms use these funds to start or expand businesses and to buy machinery and other physical capital. The logic espoused by this spending-cult mentality denies the role of saving, or, at the very least, relegates it to the backseat. Because much of the savings that can drive investment and economic growth over time comes from the relatively small fraction of individuals in the top income tax bracket, permitting a tax increase on high-income earners would be a significant disincentive for savings. Alan Viard of the American Enterprise Institute recently cited Internal Revenue Service data for 2007 revealing that households with incomes above $200,000 received 47 percent of the taxable interest income, 60 percent of the dividends and a staggering 84 percent of the net capital gains reported on tax returns. Consumer spending has its place, but it is not the answer to every economic question. By disparaging investment and in particular the taxpayers who account for most of that investment, Congress is biting the hand that feeds long-run economic growth, say Brill and Hill.

A Plague of 'A' Students - Why it's so irksome being be governed by the Obami
http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/plague-%E2%80%98a%E2%80%99-students
Excerpt: Barack Obama is more irritating than the other nuisances on the left. Nancy Pelosi needs a session on the ducking stool, of course. But everyone with an ugly divorce has had a Nancy. She’s vexatious and expensive to get rid of, but it’s not like we give a damn about her. Harry Reid is going house-to-house selling nothing anybody wants. Slam the door on him and the neighbor’s Rottweiler will do the rest. And Barney Frank is self-punishing. Imagine being trapped inside Barney Frank. The secret to the Obama annoyance is snotty lecturing. His tone of voice sends us back to the worst place in college. We sit once more packed into the vast, dreary confines of a freshman survey course—“Rocks for Jocks,” “Nuts and Sluts,” “Darkness at Noon.” At the lectern is a twerp of a grad student—the prototypical A student—insecure, overbearing, full of himself and contempt for his students. All we want is an easy three credits to fulfill a curriculum requirement in science, social science, or fine arts. We’ve got a mimeographed copy of last year’s final with multiple choice answers already written on our wrists. The grad student could skip his classes, the way we intend to, but there the s.o.b. is, taking attendance. (How else to explain this year’s census?) America has made the mistake of letting the A student run things. It was A students who briefly took over the business world during the period of derivatives, credit swaps, and collateralized debt obligations. We’re still reeling from the effects. This is why good businessmen have always adhered to the maxim: “A students work for B students.” Or, as a businessman friend of mine put it, “B students work for C students—A students teach.”

Celebrities Need to Understand Their Own Country
http://townhall.com/columnists/RichTucker/2010/10/25/celebrities_need_to_understand_their_own_country
Excerpt: Perhaps the easiest way to generate positive publicity for your cause is to draft a megastar as its spokesman. For example, when Bono accompanied then-Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill on a tour of Africa some years ago, reporters were happy to go along and write glowing dispatches from exotic locales. Have these places shown much progress since? Who knows? Bono went back on tour with U2, O’Neill retired to write books criticizing President Bush and, in Africa, life went on as usual. But maybe all the continent needs is bigger stars. Instead of Bono, how about George Clooney? He recently returned from a trip to Sudan, and popped by the White House to brief President Obama on the situation there. Now, it’s wonderful that Americans such as Clooney want to help others. But this raises a question: How well do these Hollywood stars understand their own country? Now well. Consider Clooney’s most recent film, aptly named “The American.” What, exactly, is an American? Well, in this case, Clooney’s an international hit man. Ah. A killer. Just like the typical American boy next door. In The Atlantic, reviewer Christopher Orr writes that, “Clooney is less Everyman than every man’s idealized self: stoic yet not unfeeling, bruised but unfaltering.” And he kills people for a living. It’s not the first time Clooney’s portrayed an American overseas. In Syriana (he was also executive producer), Clooney starred as hard working CIA operative Bob Barnes. He’s sent to the Middle East to assassinate a regional prince who seems to favor forcing American troops to leave his country. In a way, it’s nice to think of our CIA as an omnipotent organization, coolly gathering and breaking down information about America’s enemies. In Syriana, as in the Bourne series, “The Company” is everywhere and all-powerful. Sadly, the reality is much different. “The CIA’s ability to produce human source intelligence is dismal. It has become a bureaucratic creature loyal only to itself, with almost unlimited funds and no accountability,” writes former CIA agent Ishmael Jones in his book "The Human Factor." American intelligence services missed the clues leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks.

A Special Note to Our Democrat Readers in Washington from Red State
http://www.redstate.com/erick/2010/11/02/a-special-note-to-our-democrat-readers-in-washington/
Excerpt: Just wanted to write a special note to our readers who are Democrats in Washington, D.C. We know we get a number of you on here and I am sure you have felt more than a little left out in the past few weeks. I want a post just for you today so you can stop feeling left out, particularly on this day. So, just for you here is a great guide on how to write a resume from the Rockport Institute. Trinity College also has one. There’s even an online resume builder you might like to take advantage of. Remember, you’ll need references on a resume. I suggest you not put Nancy Pelosi down as a reference after today. Who knows, after what happens today the White House might be hiring. You guys have a great day. I know I will. Oh, and here is the online job application site for Wal-Mart. They helped you guys out with the Obamacare push. Maybe now they’ll hire you. (And to help, here’s a link to my article, “Resume Rewrites” ~Bob)
http://tartanmarine.blogspot.com/2009/03/resume-rewrites.html

Sharia: A Muslim's life is worth twice that of a Jew or Christian, and fifteen times more than that of a Hindu or Buddhist
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/11/sharia-a-muslims-life-is-worth-twice-that-of-a-jew-or-christian-and-fifteen-times-more-than-that-of.html
Excerpt: With all the talk of Sharia in the news lately -- the measure to outlaw it in Oklahoma, the ongoing attempts by Islamic apologists to whitewash it -- it is useful to recall some of its more notable aspects. One of these is qisas, or retaliation, which allows for blood money to be paid by the perpetrator to the relatives of the deceased in cases of accidental death or even murder. In such cases, the compensation is higher if the victim was a Muslim than if he was a non-Muslim. Only the Hanafi school of Islamic jurisprudence allows for the possibility of capital punishment in the case of a Muslim who has murdered an unbeliever. The Maliki and Hanbali schools set a Muslim's life as worth twice that of a non-Muslim -- hence this Saudi Hanbali ruling below. The Shafi'i school sets a Muslim's life as worth two-thirds that of a Jew or Christian. Polytheists, as here, are valued less. The Shafi'i Sharia manual 'Umdat al-Salik dictates: "The indemnity for the death or injury of a woman is one-half the indemnity paid for a man. The indemnity paid for a Jew or Christian is one-third the indemnity paid for a Muslim. The indemnity paid for a Zoroastrian is one-fifteenth that of a Muslim." (o4.9) From the website of the Consulate General of India, Jeddah, who is recording these matters because they come up in connection with his people who are working in Saudi Arabia.

Yemen bomb suspect, Al Qaeda expert Ibrahim Hassan Tali al-Asiri, blew up his own brother
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2010/10/31/2010-10-31_suspect_not_beyond_a_bomb_in_the_bum.html
Didn’t get the memo. ~Bob. Excerpt: The Al Qaeda bombmaker thought to be behind the Yemen cargo bombs is so ruthless that he once slipped explosives inside his own brother's body to kill a Saudi prince. His brother managed to get face to face with the prince before a text message triggered the device, but he killed only himself. The August 2009 plot was the latest failed attempt by a Saudi bombmaker so skilled, daring and prolific that success is probably just a matter of time. Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, 28, known by his alias Abu Saleh, also is suspected of sewing explosives into the crotch of the briefs that Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, 23, wore onto a Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines jet on Christmas Day 2009. "Based on the forensics analysis, it's [the same] individual who has been responsible for putting these devices together," said White House counterterrorism czar John Brennan. Like the cargo bombs and the anti-prince device, the underwear bomb sailed past security, and 290 people would have died had Abdulmutallab not bungled the detonation.

This Is America, Stupid!
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/11/this_is_america_stupid.html
Excerpt: A nation holds its collective breath. America's pivotal election is today. We will either put the brakes on the Democrat-socialists' drive to transform us into a failing European-style social democracy or we continue to hurtle toward the cliff of no return. Voters have waited through long, suffering months to make their voices heard at last. Democrats have made an unprecedented mockery of representative government, ignoring the will of the people with arrogant disdain. Elitist hypocrites who campaigned on "love" for the poor party hearty on the hard-earned money of America's producers, jet to debauchery-ridden Europe to scorn our good name, and come back home only to spend our children into serfdom. The words "public servant" have almost become synonymous with "tax cheat." American companies are threatened with open thuggery by a power-mad administration of academics who wouldn't know how to actually produce a single cent if their very lives depended upon it. The Democrats and their president line up in bowing and scraping infamy before the Islamists, throwing America under the bus of cowardly appeasement. A Democrat president still sends America's finest young people to war and ties their hands with hideous rules of engagement and withdrawal timetables, which inevitably make our bravest into cannon fodder. Democrat foreign policy has emboldened every evil actor on the world stage and made whole regions into powder kegs set to blow at the slightest provocation. Peace with genuine justice is an alien concept to the cowards in charge. These so-called peacemakers have been revealed as nothing but doormat-enablers. And all around the land, media elites fumble the ball. These dimwitted media scalawags have twiddled their thumbs while 1776 redux has mounted a vociferous challenge to the ruling class of both parties (a class that the media themselves have for decades joined and empowered). The economy stands at the precipice of full-blown depression, the inevitable outcome of discredited Keynesian theory and a president who has bitten the small-business hand that feeds us enough to leave it bleeding and traumatized. Since our media elites are nothing more than materialist fat-cats themselves, they can see nothing in the Tea Parties but economic angst. What a bunch of ninnies these people are. All of them. From the ivory-towered elitists in charge of the government to those in charge of the airwaves. They forgot something. This is America, stupid! And it's not just the economy. It's the disrespect for the wishes of the electorate, who pay for everything.

Global Warming Elitism, Tomorrow’s Election, and The Future
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/11/global-warming-elitism-tomorrows-election-and-the-future/
Dr. Spencer has been working and commenting on climate science for decades. I wish this had been written and posted a month ago when it might have made a difference to the election's outcome. Ron P. Excerpt: This really is the Golden Age in satellite data collection of the global climate system. While a few A-Train satellites are still to be launched, other older satellite assets in the A-Train are now operating well past their planned lifetimes. There are no plans to replace many of these one-of-a-kind instruments, so much of what we will learn in the coming years will have to come from the analysis of previously collected data. Unfortunately — at least in my opinion — the existence of this superb national resource depended upon convincing congress almost 2 decades ago that manmade global warming was a clear and present danger to the world. Since I believe the majority of what we now view as “climate change” is just part of a natural cycle in the climate system, I argued from the outset that NASA should be also selling “Mission to Planet Earth” as a way to better prepare ourselves for natural climate change — something that history tells us has indeed occurred, and we can be assured will occur again. But behind the scenes there was a strong push for policy changes that even most of the scientists involved supported — ultimately culminating in the governmental control over how much and the kinds of energy sources humanity would be allowed to use in the future. Cap and Trade, as well as potential regulation of carbon dioxide emissions by the EPA, are the fruits of the labor of politicians, governmental representatives, bureaucrats, the United Nations, and activist scientists who have used global warming as an excuse to accomplish policy goals that would have never been accomplished on their own merits. Of course, most who speak out on this issue continue to point to the supposed “scientific consensus” on global warming as the justification, but those of us who knew the players also knew of these other motives. I am often asked, “So, are you saying there is a conspiracy here?” No, because the ultimate goals were not a secret. Just a bunch of elitists carrying out plans that the politicians supported — with continuing promises of congressional funding for research that those politicians knew would support Job #1 of government — to stay needed by the people. Many of the scientists involved are just along for a ride on the gravy train. Even I ride that train. The elitism clearly shows through in the behavior of those who speak out publicly on the need for humanity to change its Earth-destroying ways: Al Gore, James Cameron, Harrison Ford, Julia Roberts, RFK, Jr. These people apparently believe they are God’s gift to humanity. How else can we explain that they do not see the hypocrisy the rest of the nation sees in their behavior? (...) Yet, many Americans believe that government can more equitably distribute the wealth generated by a country. This is a laudable goal on the face of it. Unfortunately, history has taught us that trying to impose equality of outcomes only serves to make people equally miserable. I like to think that I know something about basic economics. It was the subject of the 6th chapter in my first book –Climate Confusion — which received a nice blurb on the jacket from noted economist Walter Williams. One of the reasons I am willing to stick my neck out and inform people of the uncertain nature of government-approved global warming science is because the basic economics behind any governmental (or environmental extremist) attempts to restrict personal choice in energy use will end up killing people. In fact, it already has. The biggest threat to humanity is poverty. Wealthier is healthier. When governments make energy more expensive, or environmental organizations pressure foreign countries to not build hydroelectric dams, poor people die. Those already living on the edge are pushed over the edge. Energy is required for everything we do, and artificially raising the price of energy cannot help but destroy wealth generation.

A Great American Woman, Mom to Our Troops
http://www.kyleanneshiver.com/2010/11/01/a-great-american-woman-mom-to-our-troops/
Excerpt: The name, “Operation Gratitude,” kept popping up again and again in my mail from our troops. They mentioned the stuff in the packages, and especially the handwritten cards and letters from Americans of all ages, in all situations and even from school children, all thanking them for their service. The packages arrived stamped with their own names, ranks and personal military addresses and often came to every member of their squads on the same day. The thing they couldn’t figure out — and wanted me to find out for them — was who was behind this terrific morale-booster. “Who is Operation Gratitude”? they asked again and again. “Who started this thing?” “Who pays for all this great stuff?” “Why are they doing it?” The questions about Operation Gratitude came so often that I myself became intrigued — very intrigued. So, I began to track down the source of all this appreciation. I anticipated finding some big-moneyed backer with an army of paid staff. Or some veterans group or troop-family group, who spearheaded this thing. What I never — in a million years — expected to find was an American homemaker, who was simply so passionate about our war effort and all of the brave young men and women fighting in foreign lands on our behalf, that she dropped her whole life just to figure out a way to say, "Thank you!"

Do You Hear the People Sing
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgQgzKVX9jc&feature=fvw
The music of a people who will not be slaves again!

The greatest threat to America
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=XNUc8nuo7HI
Worth watching and forwarding.

The President, Thrown Under the Bus
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/251849/president-thrown-under-bus-kathryn-jean-lopez
Excerpt: by Chris Matthews, calling Obama an ‘elitist’:

Channel 2 Uncovers Proof Terrorists Crossed Mexican Border
http://www.wsbtv.com/news/25596196/detail.html
Excerpt: The U.S. Border Patrol has captured thousands of people they say are classified as OTM which stands for "other than Mexican." Documents show many of them are from terrorists nations like Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Sudan, Somalia, Pakistan and Yemen. Federal authorities call those groups SIAs, which stands for "special interest aliens". Federal officials have offered few details about the number of actual terrorists caught along the border. Retired immigration agent Michael Cuttler says the actual threat is being covered up. "Incredibly the government is attempting to keep the citizens like a bunch of mushrooms. Keep us in the dark and feed us a bunch of manure." Government officials have denied that terrorists have crossed our open border. Still, Channel 2 Action News has proof they have. Channel 2 Anchor Justin Farmer found documents filed in federal court in San Antonio, Texas, in May. They show an indictment against Ahmed Muhammad Dhakane for allegedly smuggling hundreds of people from Brazil to Mexico, then into the U.S. The federal indictment states it includes some Somalis from the terrorist group Al Shabob. Terrorism experts say the group is responsible for terrorist attacks and suicide bombings worldwide. "To this day we do not know where those 300 Somalis are," said Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas. "We do know they are in the United States."

No more double standards
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/11/01/no-more-double-standards/#more-27252
Whoa! This is a no-holds-barred, take-no-prisoners essay on the relationship between government beancounters, publicly funded science, and the rest of us. Many, many good points. Ron P. Excerpt: Who could oppose following the rules, making quality products and being honest? But shouldn’t these values apply where far more is at stake than a few companies, pills, baseball records or bad role models? Shouldn’t we demand that these rules apply to people and actions that have unprecedented impact on lives, livelihoods, liberties and communities throughout the country? Can we afford to continue having double standards that let government officials violate basic standards of honesty and accountability that they apply “vigorously” to citizens and companies? Why should legislators, regulators and investigators be exempt from rules they devise and impose on everyone else? Shouldn’t we teach our kids that government officials mustn’t lie to us, either? (...) The Environmental Protection Agency’s new mercury, ozone and soot rules alone would eliminate up to 76,000 megawatts of generating capacity by 2015, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation calculates. That’s 7% of total US electric generating capacity – enough to power 38,000,000 homes under normal conditions. It’s 1.2 times the all-time peak electricity demand record for the entire state of Texas. Credit Suisse estimates that compliance with these new standards will cost the power generation industry (ie, electricity consumers) $150 billion by 2020, to retrofit coal plants or replace them with natural gas-fired units. NERA Economic Consulting calculates that meeting EPA’s proposed new 60 ppb ozone standard alone would impose an annual cost of $1-trillion per year and cumulative losses of 7.3 million jobs; create hundreds of new air quality non-attainment areas; require millions more car inspections and repairs; and block numerous highway, residential and commercial construction projects. The costs are monstrous – the benefits negligible, illusory or fabricated. The ozone rules would send power plant emissions almost to natural background levels in many areas. That’s just for starters. (...) Now we face another monumental federal power grab, this time of the hydrocarbon energy that powers 85% of the American economy. The looming seizure of our money, jobs and liberties is based on shoddily manufactured “evidence,” fraudulent data and science, good-old-boy peer reviews, and false or misleading reports and testimony that would earn any citizen or company exec major fines and jail time. When Republicans take control of the House of Representatives, their first order of business should be investigating the “manmade climate disaster” industry.

Judge Questions Justice Department’s Lawsuit Against AZ Immigration Law
http://weaselzippers.us/2010/11/01/judge-questions-justice-departments-lawsuit-against-az-immigration-law/
Excerpt: A federal appellate judge expressed deep skepticism Monday about the Justice Department’s lawsuit over Arizona’s new immigration law, leaving uncertain the Obama administration’s chances of stopping the law from taking effect. Judge John T. Noonan Jr. grilled administration lawyers at a hearing before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. He took aim at the core of the Justice Department’s argument: that the Arizona statute is “preempted” by federal law and is especially troublesome because it requires mandatory immigration status checks in certain circumstances. “I’ve read your brief, I’ve read the District Court opinion, I’ve heard your interchange with my two colleagues, and I don’t understand your argument,” Noonan told deputy solicitor general Edwin S. Kneedler. “We are dependent as a court on counsel being responsive. . . . You keep saying the problem is that a state officer is told to do something. That’s not a matter of preemption. . . . I would think the proper thing to do is to concede that this is a point where you don’t have an argument.”

Four US Citizens Murdered in Mexico in Separate Attacks
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1325847/Four-U-S-citizens-murdered-Mexico-separate-attacks.html
Excerpt: Four U.S. citizens were shot to death in separate attacks in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, Mexican authorities said Monday. Chihuahua state prosecutors' spokesman Arturo Sandoval said Edgar Lopez, 35, of El Paso, Texas, was killed Sunday along with two Mexican men when gunmen opened fire on a group standing outside a house. On Saturday, a 26-year-old U.S. woman and an American boy were slain shortly after crossing an international bridge from El Paso. Giovanna Herrera and Luis Araiza, 15, were shot to death along with a Mexican man traveling with them just after 11 a.m., Sandoval said. Sandoval said authorities also identified a 24-year-old woman killed Friday inside a tortilla shop as Lorena Izaguirre, a U.S. citizen and El Paso resident. A Mexican man was also found dead in the store.

Suspicious package sparks massive security operation at Angela Merkel's office
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1325944/Angela-Merkel-office-targeted-bomb-Greece.html#ixzz149MWNOzW
Excerpt: massive security operation was underway in the office of the German chancellor in Berlin today after a suspicious package was delivered to Angela Merkel’s workplace. Police said they could not rule out the possibility it was explosives. The building was evacuated as teams of specialists moved in to deal with the latest in a spate of terror-attacks seemingly linked to the Greek debt crisis. The sender of the mail was listed on the courier inventory as the Greek economics ministry, according to Germany’s Bild newspaper. The alert came after parcel bombs exploded at the Russian and Swiss embassies in the Greek capital Athens on Tuesday. Three other devices, believed to have been sent by left-wing extremists, were intercepted. The immediate theory behind the German terror alert is Berlin‘s hard-line on Greece putting its catastrophic finances in order. Mrs Merkel underwrote billions worth of credit to save Greece from collapsing into chaos due to the financial crisis - but the price was savage austerity measures that has split Greek society.

Stephen Timms knife attack: CCTV shows moment Muslim woman stabs MP
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/8105085/Stephen-Timms-knife-attack-CCTV-shows-moment-Muslim-woman-stabs-MP.html
Guess she didn’t get the “Islam is a Religion of Peace” memo. ~Bob. Excerpt: Armed with a three-inch kitchen knife, the 21-year-old student smiled before plunging the knife twice into the MP. Grainy images filmed in the local community centre and released on Tuesday show Choudhry walking up to Mr Timms’ desk. They emerged at the end of a two-day trial in which she was convicted of attempted murder and two counts of possessing an offensive weapon. Choudhry refused to go to the Old Bailey because she did not accept the authority of the court and will be sentenced via videolink on Wednesday. The CCTV footage of the attack showed her wearing floor length black Islamic robes, her head covered by a scarf and her face can be clearly seen. With a bag slung casually over her shoulder, the bespectacled Choudhry strolled up to the desk after her name was called out. Instead of sitting in front of the MP, she moved round to the side of the desk as if to shake hands, but was in fact holding a knife in her left hand. As he offered his hand, she decided to strike. In one image, the blade can be clearly seen as she moved towards Mr Timms.

Voters to Democrats: It's Obamacare, stupid
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/Voters-to-Democrats_-It_s-Obamacare_-stupid-1409131-106472953.html
Excerpt: "We can run on this," David Axelrod, President Obama's chief political strategist, said nine months ago as Congress debated Obamacare. On Tuesday, the president's party appears poised to lose control of the House and to be reduced to dependence on Vice President Joe Biden's tiebreaking vote to retain vestigial power in the Senate. Axelrod's advice surely ranks among the worst campaign miscalculations in American political history. And it is indeed difficult to account for an error of such magnitude without thinking that Obama and Axelrod ignored what they surely could see with their own eyes. The evidence was certainly there for everybody to see early on. A clear majority of Americans expressed doubts about Obamacare in 2009 as soon as they became aware of its central feature: putting government bureaucrats between patients and their doctors. Their doubts solidified into determined opposition during 2009's long hot summer of tempestuous Town Hall meetings. The opposition grew stronger still as the months ticked by despite repeated "new" efforts by Obama and his allies in Congress and the liberal mainstream media to "sell" Obamacare.

Michelle stumps for Harry, but it's all about Barack
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/Michelle-stumps-for-Harry_-but-it_s-all-about-Barack--1410690-106485318.html
Excerpt: Everybody knows Harry Reid is in trouble. The Senate Majority Leader is in grave danger of losing his bid for re-election for a variety of reasons, among them that he is a terrible campaigner who is not particularly liked in his home state. But the biggest cause of Reid's woes is his decision to spend the last two years working not on behalf of his constituents -- hit hard by the highest unemployment rate in the country -- but rather to enact Barack Obama's agenda, which is largely unpopular in Nevada. So on election eve, Reid welcomed one of the biggest guns in the Democratic world, First Lady Michelle Obama, to give his campaign a much-needed, last-minute shot in the arm. And Mrs. Obama delivered a rousing political speech in an appearance here at Canyon Springs High School. The only problem was, it was on behalf of Barack Obama, and not the man on the ballot Tuesday.

Crazed Democrats in Virginia attack opponents, throw signs
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/crazed-democrats-in-virginia-attack-opponents-throw-signs-106474998.html
Excerpt: If you thought negative campaign ads were a problem in this election, perhaps you haven’t spent enough time in Virginia’s 5th district. This video depicts two men unleashing a string of racial epithets at members of Americans for Prosperity, who took the video. While flailing arms and shouting, the two also start yanking signs off of private property and throwing them aside, while saying, “This is public space. I pay taxpayer dollars while y’all to spread racism and bigotry.” See for yourself:

The Brown Wall
http://www.americanthinker.com/2010/11/the_brown_wall.html
Excerpt: California once was the finest example of the American dream. Siberian immigrants pursuing game and furs were the first to arrive. Later, settlers came from Spain to farm and graze the land. In 1849, prospectors flooded into northern California in search of gold. A century ago, drillers came for the oil and filmmakers came for the abundant sunshine and natural outdoor movie sets. California defense contractors helped America win World War II by building ships and airplanes better and faster than ever before. High-tech companies flourished. And, as Thomas Wolfe described in The Right Stuff, many of America's early accomplishments in the space age happened in California. There are few things that governments can do better than private enterprises. One of them is infrastructure development -- built by private contractors and funded by taxpayers. For the first six decades of the 20th century, Republicans controlled the California legislature and developed the infrastructure needed to accommodate the state's spectacular growth. The state was renowned for its excellent roads, water supplies, schools, and universities. The growth accelerated during the 1960s, as a Democrat legislature saw infrastructure funding as a means to greater power -- just as the Republicans probably had in prior decades. The Anti-American Dream: But the accomplishments stopped in the 1970s with the election of Governor Jerry Brown. Mr. Brown expropriated the budget money that had been allocated for infrastructure -- much of it raised by motor fuel taxes -- and diverted it to his own leftist causes. Aqueducts and freeways were canceled, including some that already were under construction. Brown also blocked private construction of power plants. His anti-American Dream was this: If you don't build it; they won't come. But they came anyway, and now Californians waste millions of gallons of fuel in traffic jams. Forbes named California the nation's worst state for drivers. During the time since Mr. Brown canceled most of the state's freeway construction, Californians travel more than twice as many miles, but the lane mileage has increased by less than ten percent. Despite insane spending, education quality worsens. Water rates continue to rise, yet irresponsible eco-fascists demand that taxpayers spend billions of dollars to demolish existing reservoirs. This year, chief executives voted California the worst state in the nation for doing business.