Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Political Digest for August 22, 2012

The Old Jarhead Blog: Bringing you news and information the MSM is too busy covering American Idol, celebrity affairs and sensational missing person cases to cover. Please forward to friends who need to be informed.

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, or that I was able to verify the information present, which is the responsibility of the author. In some cases I post things sent to me by readers I might not have posted on my own, to get ideas circulating.

Advice for my Granddaughter: For When I'm Gone
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True, That...

Robbing Hood

Worth Reading: "Issues" or America? By Thomas Sowell 
Excerpt: There are some very serious issues at stake in this year's election -- so many that some people may not be able to see the forest for the trees. Individual issues are the trees, but the forest is the future of America as we have known it. The America that has flourished for more than two centuries is being quietly but steadily dismantled by the Obama administration, during the process of dealing with particular issues. (Sowell, as always, goes to the heart of things. He describes the awful process that's been ongoing for quite a while, and makes clear what it really means in the long run. This makes the outcome of the next election more critical than anything else in the last century. --Del)

Worth Reading: Paul Ryan, Who Is He???
Excerpt: What are we to think of this selection? He's not a graduate of Columbia University. He's not a graduate of Harvard. He wasn't selected as the President of the Harvard Law Review. He didn't get a special free quota scholarship ride to any prestigious university and, instead, had to work his way through Miami University of Ohio. For God's sake the man drove the Oscar Mayer Wiener Truck one summer and waited tables another! (OK, I will up front admit I had not done any checking into who Paul Ryan is, about all I knew was that he's Conservative, and so squeaky clean that when he was nominated even the major Democrats had to say nice things about him personally, could only register that despite his being a nice guy, they were firmly opposed to his way of examining the budget and his idea on what the future budget should be. Now I find out stuff that gets my attention. Like he has a degree in Economics! So not only is he not a lawyer (like so many politicians now) but he actually studied a technical field, and one that is bound to be useful to anyone in Congress. This alone makes him close to unique in Congress. But enough from me, go ahead and read for yourself. Personally, I'm liking the guy more and more as a damn good choice for the ticket. --Del)

Must Read: Are We Doomed?  Seeking a politician with the guts to say, “Stop!” By Victor Davis Hanson
Excerpt: Sometimes societies find themselves in pernicious cycles in which the perceived medicine seems worse than the known disease. The Roman satirist Juvenal lamented the ill effects of free food and free entertainment for the masses (“bread and circuses”) in part because he knew there was no remedy for the pathology in sight — and thus only a slow decline toward fiscal insolvency or riots were on the horizon. Any Roman emperor bold enough to rein in the Praetorian Guard, charge the mob for grain, and curb gladiatorial shows would earn a usurper marching on Rome from the provinces. So most did not.

Social Security Administration on Ammo Buy: 589 Bullets Per Agent Is Normal
Excerpt: Tracy Lynge, deputy assistant inspector general with the Social Security Administration’s Office of Inspector General, said the order for 174,000 rounds of hollow point bullets is normal for the agency to use in training its 295 special agents and arming them as law enforcement personnel deployed in 66 offices around the country. (Call me an innocent; it never once crossed my mind the SSA had its own armed agents. The power of government is force. Always. Ron P. Step away from the bingo card, Granny... ~Bob)

The PC Insanity Surrounding the Nidal Hasan Trial. By Arnold Ahlert
Excerpt: One could be forgiven for thinking that political correctness is only one step away from complete insanity. Last Friday, a military appeals court halted the murder case against Maj. Nidal Hasan indefinitely. Why? Because Hasan refuses to shave a beard he grew beginning in June to express his allegiance to Islamo-fascism. According to CNN, U.S. Army Col. Gregory Gross, the military judge presiding over the case, "had previously held that Hassan's beard disrupts the court proceedings and held him in contempt of court five times, the Army said in a news release." The case is on hold in order to "sort out issues" surrounding the judge's threat to have Hasan forcibly shaved.

Swedish rape-jihad: "police reported an average of five rapes a day in Stockholm"

Egypt: Muslim cleric issues fatwa permitting the murder of demonstrators against Muslim Brotherhood president Morsi
Excerpt: If some of you are killed by them, you will go to Paradise, and if you kill them, no "blood money" will be warranted, because their killing is permissible.

Excerpt: A new e-book on the Obama administration says presidential adviser David Axelrod is so popular with reporters that one privately admits to avoiding writing tough stories that would upset him. Author Glenn Thrush doesn’t name the reporter in his “Obama’s Last Stand” e-book, but wrote that “Axe” is “so well liked a reporter told me he softened his stories to avoid ‘hurting his feelings.'"

Subsidy-Powered Vehicles. By Kenneth P. Green
Excerpt: As Robert Bryce points out in Power Hungry, “All-electric cars are The Next Big Thing. And they always will be.” Bryce goes on to chronicle the 100+ year search for the all-electric car that can compete on a level playing field with internal-combustion engines, and finds a long history of failure.

Todd Akin rape comments prompt GOP to pull campaign funding, calls to exit race
Excerpt: Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and the entire GOP national political apparatus launched a swift and relentless crusade against one of their own Monday, seeking to drive Rep. Todd Akin out of the U.S. Senate race in Missouri after his controversial comments on rape and pregnancy threatened the party with widespread political harm. (Akin will likely turn out to be yet another Tea Party gift to Harry Reid. This disaster could have long term effects on all of us, if the Democrats again control the Senate. And as long as the Tea Party base believes that a liberal-controlled Senate is better than voting for an electable candidate with the taint of RINO, Harry Reid wins. Would have happened in Wisconsin except that there were two Tea Party types against Thompson. Nominating the most conservative candidate makes sense in some states, not in others. ~Bob.)

Tweet from @guypbenson
I see noted candy-ass RINOs such as Allen West, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, and Mark Levin have all denounced Akin.

Excerpt: MSNBC had a banner day yesterday. A Republican went skinny dipping in Israel. Disgrace! Never mind that their Hollywood darling, George Clooney hosts skinny dipping parties at his palatial estate on Lake Como in Italy on a regular basis; they think that's dear....but dear god, deliver us from seeing a naked Republican! The other Republican disaster was far more serious and far more harmful to Republicans. The Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate from Missouri gave an interview to a local Missouri television statement and spewed some idiotic nonsense that abortion for rape was unacceptable and that, somehow a woman's body would shut down, thus denying birth from a rapist. 

Will the President Clarify His “Flexibility” Remarks on Missile Defense?
Excerpt: While the President pursues his “reset” policy—which is nothing but a list of concessions and lack of leadership on human rights issues—with Russia, this ill-fated policy seems to be encouraging Russia’s aggressive behavior. Recently, a Russian submarine operated in the Gulf of Mexico for weeks—undetected. Russia also sent its bombers into restricted U.S. airspace in June and July. Russian Chief of General Staff Nikolai Makarov stated, “A decision to use destructive force pre-emptively will be taken if the situation worsens.”

Obama Threatens Force Against Syria
Excerpt: President Obama warned Syria on Monday that it would face American military intervention if there were signs that its arsenal of unconventional weapons was being moved or prepared for use. It was Mr. Obama’s first direct threat of force against Syria, as he has resisted being drawn into the bloody 18-month rebellion. (Translation: "Killing your enemies with bullets or bombs is fine, but if you kill them with gas, I'll bomb you to help the al Qaeda linked Islamist opposition who wants to kill us any way they can; with bullets, bombs, gas, germs or nukes." ~Bob.)

Excerpt: Medicare is an emotionally charged program because it provides health insurance coverage for the elderly. But Medicaid covers America's poor and disabled—and no one wants to see them harmed, either. However, like Medicare, Medicaid is also in desperate need of reform if it is to continue serving the people it was designed to serve. Nearly one-third of America's doctors are already opting out of treating Medicaid patients—because their costs often outweigh what the program pays for care.

Excerpt: The leaders of this event – Jibril Hough and Imam Siraj Wahhaj as advertised are no moderates. …If that is who the DNC is consorting with then all Americans, Democrats should be concerned. There are many patriotic Muslims who are part of both parties, and when radical ideologues like this do a demonstration of “solidarity” in the name of our faith and choose an imam like Siraj Wahhaj who I saw with my own eyes in 1995 seditiously say it his duty and our duty as Muslims to replace the US Constitution with the Quran- then we need to speak up!

Excerpt: Somehow, it seems that the folks at the International Longshoremen’s Association misunderstood Candidate Barack Obama’s 2008 statement: “If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.” Since the target of the Longshoremen’s union protests is the U.S. Marines, according to this union press release, ‘misunderstood’ might actually be an understatement:

Egypt Reportedly Moves Anti-Aircraft and Anti-Tank Missiles into Sinai in Violation of Israel Peace Treaty. By Sharona Schwartz
Excerpt: Israel Radio – Voice of Israel – is reporting that Egypt has moved anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles into the Sinai Peninsula, which if true would be a violation of the 1979 Camp David peace accords it signed with Israel which limits the forces Egypt is allowed to position in the Sinai. Just last week, Israeli officials said they were concerned by the movement of tanks and armored vehicles into the Sinai – ostensibly to aid Egyptian forces in their battle with the growing jihadi terrorist threat growing in the area bordering Israel. But the addition of more sophisticated weaponry and the fact that terrorists in the Sinai are not armed with aircraft or tanks is raising alarm bells in Israel.

Reagan Vs. Obama - Social Economics 101
Fun Cartoon.

Excerpt: Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood told The Daily Caller that he is “very proud” of the Economic Recovery Act of 2009 that put 65,000 people to work with $48 billion in federal funds for the Department of Transportation, amounting to $738,461 per job. The Recovery Act of 2009, which in total cost taxpayers $825 billion, has been criticized because it did not prevent the unemployment rate from rising above 8 percent, contrary to what the Obama administration predicted. “Yeah, we spent $48 billion and we put 65,000 people to work in 15,000 projects in two years with no problems,” LaHood told The Daily Caller in a video interview in AlexandriaVa., on Friday.

Tweet from @IowaHawk
I'll believe a poll of Chicago voters when they sample the graveyards

Al Qaeda Still in Afghanistan. By Thomas Joscelyn
http://www.defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/al-qaeda-still-in-afghanistan/
The presidential candidates should listen to Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta when he reminds us that there is still a war being fought in Afghanistan. And we should remember what Panetta’s predecessor, Robert Gates, had to say about Afghanistan in 2010, too. After a speech at Duke University in September 2010, Gates explained to students that eastern Afghanistan “is increasingly an unholy syndicate of terrorist groups working together: al Qaeda, the Haqqani network, the Pakistani Taliban, the Afghan Taliban and groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba.”

Obama’s Future ‘Flexibility.’ What did the President promise the Kremlin and why isn't that a topic in the campaign debate? By Clifford D. May
http://www.defenddemocracy.org/media-hit/obamas-future-flexibility1/
Excerpt: National security and foreign policy have received short shrift in the 2012 presidential-election campaign. Mitt Romney made a quick swing through Britain, Israel, and Poland to suggest he would repair strained relations with America’s closest allies. President Obama has repeatedly reminded voters that he gave the order to kill Osama bin Laden. That’s about it. For the most part, each campaign has sung a single note: Romney has tried to convince voters he can fix the broken economy. Obama has tried to convince voters that Romney is a heartless, plutocratic tax cheat and, possibly, a murderer to boot.

Worth Reading: Joe Biden's Gaffes Call For A Thorough Neurological Examination
Excerpt: Biden should submit to a thorough neurological and psychiatric examination, with special attention to whether he is experiencing “transient ischemic attacks” – marked by impaired blood flow to the brain – small strokes, seizures, or suffers from a brain tumor. After all, we often demand to know whether a candidate has recovered from open-heart surgery, cancer or a stroke, and many states require elderly drivers to be re-licensed. Aren’t the vice-president’s highest-level security clearance and his influence on public policy as important as the ability to drive a car? ... Henry I. Miller, a physician, is the Robert Wesson Fellow in Scientific Philosophy and Public Policy at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution.

The South China Sea's Gathering Storm. By Sen. James Webb
Excerpt: Nowhere is this growing tension clearer than in the increasingly hostile disputes in the South China Sea. ... For all practical purposes China has unilaterally decided to annex an area that extends eastward from the East Asian mainland as far as the Philippines, and nearly as far south as the Strait of Malacca. China's new "prefecture" is nearly twice as large as the combined land masses of Vietnam, South Korea, Japan and the Philippines. Its "legislators" will directly report to the central government.

The Sino-Japanese Naval War of 2012. By James R. Holmes
Excerpt: Lord Wellington depicted the allied triumph at Waterloo as "the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life." Wellington's verdict would describe the likely outcome should Chinese and Japanese forces meet in battle over the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands, or elsewhere off the Northeast Asian seaboard. Such a fight appeared farfetched before 2010, when Japan's Coast Guard apprehended Chinese fishermen who rammed one of its vessels off the disputed islands, but it appears more likely now. 

Top U.S. general’s plane damaged in Afghanistan attack
Excerpt: A plane belonging to the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff was apparently attacked by insurgents in Afghanistan on Tuesday. Militants fired rockets at the Bagram Airfield outside Kabul, and shrapnel hit U.S. Army Gen. Martin Dempsey’s C-17 military plane, according to NATO officials. Dempsey was not in the plane at the time of the attack.

Israel, America Bashed at Iranian-Inspired DC Rally
Excerpt: Claims of Jewish control of the media and American politics and alleged war-mongering by Israel and America dominated speeches Friday at an Iranian-inspired rally in Washington, D.C. "If you love America, you love lying, you love rape, you love murder, you love killing," said Abdul Alim Musa, imam of Washington D.C.'s Masjid Al-Islam and head of a separatist movement called As-Sabiqun. "And then, the Zionist, diabolical, sinister Israeli. Nobody in history, they cry about some Holocaust, we had five or ten people get killed."

Researchers say declining circumcision rates will raise health-care costs by billions. By Eryn Brown
Excerpt: A team of economists and epidemiologists estimates that every circumcision not performed leads to significant increases in lifetime medical expenses to treat sexually transmitted diseases and related cancers. Declining rates of circumcision among infants will translate into billions of dollars' worth of unnecessary medical costs in the United States as the boys grow up and become sexually active men, researchers at Johns Hopkins University said. (What a few billion dollars and a lot of suffering if liberals get to feel politically correct? Results don't matter, only intentions. ~Bob.)

Obamanomics: Almost 500,000 Federal Employees Earn Over $100,000
Excerpt: Here’s the bottom line, according to Shadowbosses: government service is now more lucrative than the private sector. Federal government workers reportedly averaged more than twice the salary and benefits of an average private sector worker. Even more unbelievably, there are fully 459,016 federal workers who make over $100,000 in salary – one in five federal workers.

How Obama—And The Media—Lost Egypt, Part 2
Yet as we saw in the first part of this three-part series, Morsi and his Egyptian Brotherhood have crossed virtually every “red line” that they weren’t supposed to have crossed--and nothing has happened. In other words, as they seek to transform Egypt, they are getting away with it. Not only has the Obama administration been mostly quiet, but so have Congressional Republicans. And so there is little reason to think that Morsi won’t get away with this Tehran trip, too, as Uncle Sam continues to dole out money to his government.

Apocalypse Not: Here’s Why You Shouldn’t Worry About End Times. By Matt Ridley
Excerpt: This is the question posed by the website 2012apocalypse.net. … the site’s authors are impressively open-minded about the cause of the catastrophe that is coming at 11:11 pm on December 21 this year. but they have no doubt it will happen. after all, not only does the Mayan Long Count calendar end that day, but “the sun will be aligned with the center of the Milky Way for the first time in about 26,000 years.” Case closed: Sell your possessions and live for today.

Obama pees on our leg and tells us it’s raining [Reader Post]. By Dr John 
Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable. Obama: “Nobody Accused Mr. Romney Of Being A Felon
(Nan G’s comments illuminating. Says 3 press corps members briefed with questions; all front row handpicked and O read from his notes; he was rehearsed…. All a set up to “look spontaneous.” --Barb)

Excerpt: In a June 25, 2003 interview with the Chicago Defender, an urban newspaper serving the city’s African-American community, President Barack Obama praised the U.S. Supreme Court for preserving the practice of affirmative action in U.S. university admissions. Nine years later, Obama’s Department of Justice filed an amicus curiae brief with the Supreme Court on Aug. 13, arguing in favor of racial preferences in the admissions department of the University of Texas.

Justice Department upholds Va. voter ID law, governor says
Excerpt: The Justice Department has signed off on Virginia’s new voter ID law, Gov. Robert F. McDonnell (R) said Monday night, in a decision that clears the way for the bitterly contested measure to take effect in time for Election Day. Justice officials found that the law, which closes a provision that had allowed Virginians to vote without identification but also expands the types of ID accepted at the polls, does not violate the Voting Rights Act, McDonnell said in a statement.

Excerpt: At the Gatestone Institute, a group of journalists with diverse backgrounds and outlooks reviews world events with a view to American security, with special emphasis on the Middle East. ….American analysts mistook the protestors of Tahrir Square for revolutionaries. The Muslim Brotherhood now reveals itself to be a revolutionary organization on the Leninist or Nazi model. Wishful thinking blinded American analysts to the Muslim Brotherhood’s intent and methods….. (The comments are enlightening as well. --Barb)

The Border Conspiracy, Part Two: Video Confessions of a Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Deputy
Excerpt: Downgrading the nature of the crimes that the sheriff’s office reports to the federal government makes the Texas county appear safer than it really is. The statistics also help the Obama administration argue that the border is now safer than it was just a few years ago, despite the drug war raging across the Rio Grande in Mexico. What we have learned so far is just the tip of the iceberg.

Excerpt: The missing Solyndra tubes have finally turned up — in a modern art exhibit at U.C. Berkeley: One of the great mysteries of the 2011 Solyndra bankruptcy was: What happened to all that money? After the United States government “loaned” Solyndra $535 million, the money quickly vanished; the bankruptcy court later found that the company had essentially no cash on hand. They had spent it all on equipment and inventory.

Obama’s Nuclear Strike on American Workers. By Daniel Greenfield
Excerpt: In Obama’s hometown of Chicago, over ten thousand illegal aliens lined up for a chance to become full participants in the social welfare and voter fraud machine of urban politics. With as many as 2 million illegal aliens potentially eligible to enter the legal workforce, these lawless lines are only the beginning. The act of filing an application, no matter how fraudulent, prevents deportation which turns Obama’s one-man DREAM Act into a free pass for any illegal immigrant willing to game the system.

Worth Reading: Sabotaging Black Education. By Walter Williams
Excerpt: If I were a Klansman, wanting to sabotage black education, I couldn’t find better allies than education establishment liberals and officials in the Obama administration, especially Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, who in March 2010 announced that his department was “going to reinvigorate civil rights enforcement.” ... Mac Donald adds, “Nationally, the picture is no better. The homicide rate among males between the ages of 14 and 17 is nearly ten times higher for blacks than for whites and Hispanics combined. 

47% Say Media Bias Bigger Problem Than Campaign Contributions, 42% Disagree
Excerpt: Most voters continue to believe it is not possible to run for the presidency without help from lobbyists and special interest groups. A narrow plurality, however, continues to believe that media bias is a bigger problem than big campaign contributions. (The legacy media continues to lose market share, and wonders why. I think most consumers want news straight, not spun with an agenda. I don’t like Fox much better than MSNBC. I think this is why a newsmagazine like The Week is thriving, while Newsweek is dying. Journals of Opinion, like National Review, The Weekly Standard or the New Republic I think are different, as consumers know they are signing up for opinion from one side. Even there, I wonder how a Journal with an equal balance of liberal, conservative and centrist pundits would do. ~Bob)

Hamas official: "Oh Allah, destroy the Jews and their supporters. Oh Allah, destroy the Americans and their supporters. Oh Allah...kill them all, without leaving a single one."
Excerpt: Imagine the world outcry if this were a Christian politician. But no one will take any notice of this. (What? Did we miss a Jizra payment to Hamas of US Tax dollars? ~Bob.)

'Honor' murderer boasts of triple killing
Excerpt: From behind the steel bars of his jail cell, Muhammad Ismail described with uncanny ease how he shot and killed his wife, his mother-in-law, and sister-in-law. (Muslims commit 91 percent of honor killings worldwide. A manual of Islamic law certified as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy by Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, says that "retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right." However, "not subject to retaliation" is "a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring's offspring." ('Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2). In other words, someone who kills his child incurs no legal penalty under Islamic law. --Robert Spencer, Jihad Watch. Didn’t get the memo. ~Bob.)

Murder of Copts Begins After Genocide Call
Excerpt: Hours after leaflets from Egypt’s jihadi organizations were distributed promising to “reward” any Muslim who kills any Christian Copt in Egypt, specifically naming several regions including Asyut, a report recently appeared concerning the random killing of a Christian store-owner. (The fruit of the “Arab Spring,” much praised by the Obama Administration, the leftist media and progressives in general. Their intentions were good, so they feel good—the deaths of real people don’t signify. ~Bob.)

Black Bishop Calls For All Christians To Leave Democratic Party. By Dave Jolly
Excerpt: Like Barack Obama, Jackson is a graduate of Harvard Law School. Unlike Obama, Jackson served in the U.S. Marine Corps and knows what it really means to serve your country. Following law school, he was a practicing attorney for 15 years in Boston.
Bricks, pipes, anarchists graffiti found on downtown Tampa roof
Excerpt: Chiropractor Joseph Papilla runs a clinic in a 6,000-square-foot building on the corner of Florida Avenue and Tyler Street downtown. From the roof, there is a clear view of the avenue, including the front entrance of the newly remodeled Floridan Palace Hotel. And it's within brick-throwing distance, Papilla said. (And so it begins….—Laura. Violence at the 1968 Democrat convention helped Nixon. But leftist nihilists getting out of hand in Tampa might cut the other way. ~Bob.)

1 comment:

  1. I rather enjoy the thought of Clooney et al skinny dipping in Lake Cumo. My understanding is that it is frightfully polluted and dangerous to swim in.....

    Doesn't calling for a neurological exam of Joe Biden presuppose that there is something there to examine?

    ReplyDelete