Old Jarhead's Political SitRep for February 25, 2013

Robert A. Hall

Your one-stop-shop for political news and opinion. Please forward to friends who need to be informed. This SitRep (Military for “Situation Report”) is created by many readers who send me items for inclusion, which I would have likely missed or skipped. And I can only spend at most three hours a night pulling stuff, plus the healthcare or economic stuff that crosses my desk at work. As always, I—and you—owe them thanks and appreciation. I post articles because I think they are of interest and will stimulate thought and discussion. 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 presented, which is the responsibility of the author. I try not to post things that are false, or too far a stretch, regardless of the view point, but I don’t always succeed. As always on the Net, or in the legacy media, you must read critically and with skepticism.

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

All royalties go to a charity to help wounded veterans. E-Book available at Smash Words: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/59105 Please forward and post where possible. For a free PDF of Collapse, write to me at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com.

Worth Reading: Obamacare Blows Up In Dem's Face!

http://justcommonsense-lostinamerica.blogspot.com/2013/02/obamacare-blows-up-in-dems-face.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FMoXTa+%28Lost+in+America%29

Excerpt: Okay folks, I know you think the C-Span Channel that broadcasts all those Congressional hearings is boring, but, really, you should have been around to watch the Senate Finance Committee's hearing Wednesday on the Affordable Health Care Insurance Oversight. Folks, you haven't seen so many faces of misery since you watched Les Miserables for three and a half hours...and they were all Democrats. And one of them, Senator Max Baucus, was the primary sponsor of Obamacare in the Senate! Now, try to follow me here because this gets pretty complicated.

Sequestration More Than A Fleeting Concern For U.S. Navy. By Michael Fabey

http://www.aviationweek.com/Blogs.aspx?plckBlogId=Blog:27ec4a53-dcc8-42d0-bd3a-01329aef79a7&plckPostId=Blog:27ec4a53-dcc8-42d0-bd3a-01329aef79a7Post:0fe36128-ad41-4a51-b36b-530c1bd5f5b6

Excerpt: You would have to cast a net far, wide and deep to find anyone of U.S. Navy rank who doubts sequestration will happen. Instead of dealing with “what-if” scenarios, the brass is talking more about “this will happen when … “ And the first big thing that will happen is that the Navy will find itself in quite a quandary. (The news is..... bad news. No matter how they finally work it out, missing funds mean missing resources in the end. We'll have fewer ships in service, or fewer of the new design ships, or still ships in service with antiquated systems in them, or some other combination that means less naval resources for the nation. --Del)

Building Bridges, Not Walls

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl85AL1l0H0&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Israel is accused of Nazi-like oppression of Palestinian Arabs and of practicing apartheid through occupation. Does this look like a concentration camp? --Larry Greenburg.

Oregon Drafts Invasive Gun Control Law

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/02/23/Oregon-Drafts-Most-Invasive-Gun-Law

Excerpt: Oregon is the latest state to draft legislation that puts major restrictions on the 2nd Amendment. House Bill 3200’s summary states the “crime of unlawful possession or transfer of assault weapon or large capacity magazine” is punishable “by maximum penalty of 10 years’ imprisonment, $250,000 fine, or both.” The entire first part of the bill tries to define an assault weapon. (If you think it can be registered to keep it, you have to allow “inspectors” in your home…..4th Amendment…per article. --Barb.)

Report: Obama’s Secret North Korea Talks Failed; Hagel Approach Ineffective

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2013/02/24/Report-Obama-s-Secret-North-Korea-Talks-Failed-Hagel-Approach-Ineffective

Excerpt: The Obama administration conducted two secret diplomatic missions to North Korea in 2012, according to reports in the South Korean press that were confirmed by the Los Angeles Times. The talks failed to dissuade the regime of Kim Jong Un to abandon that country’s aggressive nuclear weapons program. President Barack Obama suggested such talks in 2007, as did Secretary of Defense nominee Chuck Hagel that same year.

Glenn Reynolds: The $1.5 Billion Hollywood Tax Story They Won't Tell At The Oscars. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324880504578298080119811240.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop

Excerpt: About $1.5 billion in tax credits and exemptions, grants, waived fees and other financial inducements went to the film industry in 2010, according to data analyzed by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Politicians like to offer this largess because they get photo-ops with celebrities, but the economic payoff is minuscule. George Mason University's Adam Thierer has called this "a growing cronyism fiasco" and noted that the number of states involved skyrocketed to 45 in 2009 from five in 2002.

The Guns of Chicago (And the safe sidewalks of New York). By Heather MacDonald

http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/guns-chicago_703137.html?page=2

Excerpt: [The most common gun violence] occurs overwhelmingly in certain locations of cities—over the past 30 years in Boston, for example, 75 percent of the city’s shootings occurred in 4.5 percent of its area, whereas 88.5 percent of the city’s street segments experienced not a single shooting. Urban shootings are retaliatory or the product of the most trivial of slights. They are committed with handguns, not assault rifles. 

Video: The Battery That Might Change Everything.

http://hotair.com/archives/2013/02/23/video-the-battery-that-might-change-everything/

Excerpt: Unlike heavy metal batteries, the carbon compound is biodegradable and cheap to manufacture. And a battery made of layers of this material could charge your cell phone for a full day’s use in – wait for it – two seconds. A ramped up version could charge an electric car in a minute or two.

Obama’s Sequestration Scam. By Wayne Allyn Root

http://townhall.com/columnists/wayneallynroot/2013/02/23/obamas-sequestration-scam-n1518273/page/full/

Excerpt: The economy is in freefall. Gas prices are skyrocketing. Walmart calls their sales “a total disaster.” But don’t panic. Our fearless leader Obama is just back from a “Swing State”…you know, the kind of place where you work on your golf swing.

Gaining Momentum: Now 44 Gun Companies Have Stopped Selling To Anti-Second Amendment States

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/23/gaining-momentum-now-42-gun-companies-have-stopped-selling-to-law-enforcement-in-anti-2nd-amendment-states/

Excerpt: The list of companies that have stopped selling firearms and ammunition to law enforcement agencies in states that are restricting the Second Amendment has more than doubled since Wednesday and is more than five times larger than just one week ago. There are 44 companies on our list, with more being added as we receive notification. 

VIDEO: Juan Williams: Liberal media will ‘shut you down, stab you, kill you, fire you’ if you disagree.

http://dailycaller.com/2013/02/23/juan-williams-liberal-media-will-shut-you-down-stab-you-kill-you-fire-you-if-disagree-video/#ixzz2Loj4lgZB

Excerpt: “I always thought it was the Archie Bunkers of the world, the right wingers of world, who were more resistant and more closed-minded about hearing the other side,” he said. “In fact, what I have learned is, in a very painful way — and I can open this shirt and show you the scars and the knife wounds — is that it is big media institutions who are identifiably more liberal to left-leaning who will shut you down, stab you and kill you, fire you, if they perceive that you are not telling the story in the way that they want it told.”

President Barack "I Didn't Do It" Obama. By Derek Hunter 

http://townhall.com/columnists/derekhunter/2013/02/24/president-barack-i-didnt-do-it-obama-n1518991?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl

Excerpt: It’s one thing for a politician to “massage” the truth ... it happens all the time. But it’s quite another for one to so brazenly repeat an easily disprovable lie. But, as in the case of President Obama and sequestration, when the fear of being caught in a lie is removed because those charged with being “watchdogs” are active participants, brazenly lying carries no more risk than saying “hello.”

The Right Way to Combat Gun Violence. By Steve Chapman 

http://townhall.com/columnists/stevechapman/2013/02/24/the-right-way-to-combat-gun-violence-n1518283?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl

Excerpt: But most of these ideas are irrelevant or impossible. Even if the Second Amendment didn't prevent it, Americans would never stand for a near-total ban on ownership of semiautomatic weapons, a la Australia, or of handguns, as in Britain. You might as well expect Nebraska to build 300 miles of oceanfront beaches.

New NYPD tactics slash murder rate

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/new_nypd_tactics_slash_murder_rate_IL640p1mv8gCwgRry71HSK

Excerpt: The city’s murder rate, which hit an all-time low last year, continues to plummet thanks to creative new police strategies that target youth gangs and spouse beaters. The innovative tactics helped send the city’s homicide numbers tumbling to a record-low 414 murders in 2012 and they’re down another 33 percent so far this year, police said. One novel approach involves charging teen gang members with conspiracy, using taunts and threats they post on social-media sites to build mafia-style cases against them. (Can't do it in Chicago. Targeting gang members is racist. ~Bob.)

Imprisoned American says Iranian captors 'waiting for me to deny Christ'
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2013/02/22/imprisoned-american-says-iranian-captors-waiting-for-me-to-deny-christ/#ixzz2LrVKH2AO

Excerpt: American pastor Saeed Abedini, jailed in a notoriously brutal Iranian prison for his Christian faith, is facing physical and psychological torture at the hands of captors demanding he renounce his beliefs, according to supporters.

Strasbourg: Muslim Smashes Up Church, Leaves Koran and Muslim Prayer Carpet Inside and Writes "Allahu Akbar" on Smashed Statues

http://islamversuseurope.blogspot.com/2013/02/strasbourg-muslim-smashes-up-church.html

Excerpt: A 24-year-old Moroccan has been arrested in Strasbourg, suspected of having damaged statues in a church and of having placed a prayer carpet and a Koran stolen from a mosque.

GUNS (Virtual State of the Union 2013) 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_T-F_zfoDqI
Excerpt: In this segment of his Virtual State of the Union, the Virtual President talks about why politicians want to talk about gun control rather than crime control, and delivers the factual evidence and historical truths that make the case for the Second Amendment self-evident. (Don't miss this one. It covers it all and needs to be shared all across America. If we had a honest to God president, this is what he would have said at the State of the Union. --MM)

Where big GOP bucks could matter. By Glenn Harlan Reynolds

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/where_big_gop_bucks_could_matter_sud7apkPHDcFSVDDZkFDEL

Excerpt: One of the groups with whom Romney did worst was female “low-information voters.” Those are women who don’t really follow politics, and vote based on a vague sense of who’s mean and who’s nice, who’s cool and who’s uncool. Since, by definition, they don’t pay much attention to political news, they get this sense from what they do read. 

Why Is This Month-Old Clip Of An Ex-Secret Service Agent Suddenly Going Viral?

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/22/why-is-this-month-old-clip-of-an-ex-secret-service-agent-suddenly-going-viral/

Excerpt: Dan Bongino lost his race for the U.S. Senate last Fall and the former Secret Service agent was finally closing up shop on his campaign offices when his phone started ringing like crazy. Television and radio shows were calling to ask Dan if he was free… free to talk about this brief speech he gave on January 19th at a Guns Across America rally in Annapolis Maryland.

20 Of The Most Embarrassing Moments In The History Of The Democrat Party. By John Hawkins

http://townhall.com/columnists/johnhawkins/2013/02/23/20-of-the-most-embarrassing-moments-in-the-history-of-the-democrat-party-n1518613/page/full/

For example, one will virtually never hear that the Palmer Raids, Prohibition, or American eugenics were thoroughly progressive phenomena. These are sins America itself must atone for. Meanwhile, real or alleged “conservative” misdeeds — say McCarthyism — are always the exclusive fault of conservatives and a sign of the policies they would repeat if given power. 

It’s So Easy to Blaspheme Islam. I Just Did.
http://politicaloutcast.com/2013/02/its-so-easy-to-blaspheme-islam-i-just-did/

Excerpt: The ambassador from Pakistan to the United States, Shehrbano “Sherry” Rehman, is being accused of blasphemy by some guy in Pakistan. Blasphemy is a capital crime in Pakistan, and pretty much anybody can accuse pretty much anybody of doing it for pretty much anything. Some poor soul was tried for blasphemy because he threw away a business card belonging to a man named “Muhammad.”

Armed Robber Quickly Retreat When He is Met With an AR-15

http://girlsjustwannahaveguns.com/2013/02/armed-robber-quickly-retreat-when-he-is-met-with-an-ar-15/

The Feds Want Your Retirement Accounts
http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/02/the_feds_want_your_retirement_accounts.html
Excerpt: Quietly, behind the scenes, the groundwork is being laid for federal government confiscation of tax-deferred retirement accounts such as IRAs. Slowly, the cat is being let out of the bag.